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172: iPhone X

 

00:00:00   I just want to let everyone know that I remain unsatisfied.

00:00:02   Well, I mean, I think everyone always knows that.

00:00:05   Yeah, that's a given.

00:00:06   I know, but like, more than usual.

00:00:07   [

00:00:09   It may be too late by the time you're hearing these words to order ATP shirts.

00:00:13   So if you are even vaguely thinking about, "Hmm, I might want one of these delightful,

00:00:19   wonderful shirts," now is the time to order.

00:00:22   Or actually, it may not even be the time to order.

00:00:24   You may have already missed the boat.

00:00:26   So, if you are interested in either of our two shirts, go to ATP.fm/shirt, and hopefully

00:00:34   for you, it's sometime Friday, I think our time.

00:00:39   It expires sometime in the Friday to Saturday transition.

00:00:42   I forget exactly when.

00:00:43   >> MATT O'DOWD - Midnight Eastern, I believe.

00:00:44   >> CHAD CURTIS - Okay, there you go.

00:00:46   If you're listening to this right now, and it is not yet Saturday, and you want a shirt,

00:00:50   stop everything, pause the show, go get you a shirt.

00:00:53   And to the many, many, many people who have already bought a shirt or sweatshirt or what

00:00:57   have you, thank you.

00:00:58   We really appreciate it.

00:00:59   Cool.

00:01:00   Thanks everybody.

00:01:01   We'll see you next week.

00:01:02   Oh, goodness.

00:01:03   All right.

00:01:04   So, I had tweeted earlier today that we would have a show without follow-up.

00:01:10   I didn't say we'd have a show without follow-up, but at that point earlier today we did not

00:01:13   yet have follow-up.

00:01:15   And here it is, just a few scant hours later, and we have follow-up about new MacBook Pros.

00:01:20   We had follow-up, it just wasn't written into the thing yet.

00:01:22   - So you had follow up.

00:01:24   - Follow up, it just expands,

00:01:25   it's like hard drive space and wedding planning.

00:01:27   It expands into whatever space is available for it

00:01:30   to expand into.

00:01:32   - Yeah, and crap in your attic, right?

00:01:33   - Well, John's attic at least.

00:01:35   - I cleaned up.

00:01:36   - I did some attic cleaning actually the other weekend.

00:01:38   I must have got rid of, I don't know, 40 boxes of stuff.

00:01:43   And some boxes of not stuff.

00:01:45   That's a lot.

00:01:46   - I'm surprised your house hasn't fallen down.

00:01:48   - What do you have more of, boxes of stuff in the attic

00:01:50   or brasswood tabs open right now?

00:01:52   Box of stuff in the attic, no contest.

00:01:55   I'm slightly surprised to be honest with you.

00:01:58   So if you were able to get rid of 40, how many do you think are still there?

00:02:03   This is the low hanging fruit.

00:02:04   I'm going for like, you know, modems.

00:02:08   Okay?

00:02:09   So get rid of those.

00:02:11   Are we talking like surfboard or US robotics?

00:02:14   No.

00:02:15   No.

00:02:16   Oh boy.

00:02:17   28.8 modems.

00:02:18   56k modems.

00:02:19   14.4 modems.

00:02:20   At least are they K56 Flex or were they X2?

00:02:25   They were the...which one were they?

00:02:28   I think they were the Flex one.

00:02:29   I remember those competing standards.

00:02:31   I think I didn't look too closely at the box.

00:02:33   We were an X2 family.

00:02:36   We were all about the X2 because that's what our ISP said we should be.

00:02:40   I think X2 was the superior one until they merged the two into the V90, whatever that

00:02:44   was.

00:02:45   Yeah.

00:02:46   Yeah, maybe that's what I had when they finally settled that thing.

00:02:49   But yeah, lots of boxes of stuff.

00:02:51   A lot of these boxes didn't have anything in them anymore.

00:02:53   Some of them did and the things in them weren't worth much.

00:02:56   Yeah, a lot of empty boxes.

00:02:59   Or somewhat empty boxes.

00:03:00   Some of them just had cables in them, boxes for old hard drives, old hard drive enclosures.

00:03:04   The easy things to get rid of, but it was a lot.

00:03:06   All these boxes were flattened, you know.

00:03:08   And you want to make sure that when you sell your 28.8 K56 Flex modem, no that doesn't

00:03:14   make sense, you want to make sure that you have the original box so that you get the

00:03:18   maximum price for it.

00:03:19   Well, that's the way things are stored in my attic, is in their boxes.

00:03:23   I don't get rid of the boxes until I get rid of the thing for the most part.

00:03:27   But think about how much more old computer garbage you could store in your attic if you

00:03:30   weren't also storing the boxes.

00:03:32   I don't know if that's true because they, with all the loose cables and everything,

00:03:37   I just think they, you can pack them in better like a Tetris puzzle if they're all kind

00:03:40   of rectilinear.

00:03:41   Oh, goodness.

00:03:42   Anyway, I got rid of a lot of stuff and then getting rid of so much stuff and seeing that

00:03:47   bags and bags full of styrofoam that you know you can't really compress and then

00:03:52   these stacks and stacks of flattened cardboard boxes and then looking back at

00:03:55   the attic and realizing it looks like stuff has been removed but not that much

00:03:59   stuff. Boy I got a long way to go. I can't believe your house hasn't imploded under

00:04:05   the weight that you're putting into the attic. Yeah I've thought about how much

00:04:09   that stuff must weigh up there. Some of it's pretty heavy. Hey wait can we solve

00:04:12   multiple problems here? Can you take some of the flattened cardboard boxes of old

00:04:17   computer equipment that you've taken out of your attic and make interior door trim with

00:04:21   it for your front door?

00:04:22   No, already recycled. Too late for that.

00:04:26   Oh, sad times.

00:04:27   You have to wait until you get more modems.

00:04:28   Yeah.

00:04:29   Actually, you know, the US Robotics external modems were about the right shape to be like

00:04:33   molding if you line them all up, you know?

00:04:36   Yeah, that's a fair point.

00:04:37   It doesn't have that many.

00:04:38   The sportsters.

00:04:39   Yeah, I remember, you know, at the time I didn't think of it that way, but there was

00:04:42   something oddly satisfying about hearing that god-awful handshaking sound. Like, today is

00:04:48   so much better in every measurable way, but like that light amount of stress that you

00:04:54   had. Is this going to work? Am I going to get the full, you know, 56k? Oh, God, it fell

00:04:59   down on the 56k negotiation, so we're back to stupid analog.

00:05:02   That's the first thing I did in my AT whatever init string was turn off that sound. Come

00:05:07   on, people. You don't need to hear that. It frustrates me that I can't remember what that

00:05:12   What was the code for turning off the sound?

00:05:14   It's not ATS, was it?

00:05:15   - What was that whole protocol called?

00:05:17   - Was that the haze command set or was that something else?

00:05:19   - Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:05:21   - Yeah, no, I actually had to leave my speaker on constantly

00:05:24   because we only had one phone line

00:05:27   and everybody would always call at night to talk to my mom

00:05:30   and so I was only allowed to tie up the phone line

00:05:34   if I left call waiting on

00:05:36   and would leave the modem speaker on constantly

00:05:39   with a special config string to set it to the higher level

00:05:42   unlike Jon, to set it to like number two or whatever that keeps it on the entire time.

00:05:46   So I was just always hearing static when I was online. And when I would hear call waiting

00:05:49   beeps, I have to go flip off the power to the modem so it would hang up immediately

00:05:52   and then pick up the phone and then just go do something else for a while while my mom

00:05:55   talks on the phone. It was fun.

00:05:58   Yep, good times.

00:06:00   >> Cod world. In any case, we should talk about what we were intending to talk about,

00:06:04   which is the new MacBook Pros. Apparently, there is going to be something funky with

00:06:10   the F in key row, but it may actually be only one screen and not individual screens on the

00:06:16   individual buttons like we were perhaps led to believe. I don't know what to make of this.

00:06:21   I mean, I don't feel like my thoughts have really changed since last week. It could be

00:06:24   good. This doesn't strike me as it's fixing a problem I have in my life. But you never

00:06:27   know with Apple. Sometimes they come up with things you don't know you need.

00:06:30   So assuming these parts leaks are legit, it definitely looks like one big long screen

00:06:36   and not a bunch of optimus keyboard style individual keys with screens on them which

00:06:40   i'm very disappointed about because i have my hopes up from last week that that's what it was

00:06:44   going to be but boy looking at these parts leaks you see a little place where probably like a touch

00:06:48   id sensor or the connector for things going to be in a part where a ribbon cable exits and a big

00:06:52   long channel looks like it's going to be for a big long screen the only thing i can think of now i'm

00:06:58   trying to convince myself that this is not as bad as i think by saying well they could show

00:07:01   notifications on it or something could scroll across there i don't know and the other thing

00:07:08   i was getting my hopes up about was like if when i was thinking about the keycaps maybe they could

00:07:12   be e-ink so they wouldn't take any power because keycaps are kind of monochrome too and that would

00:07:15   be like classy but it really looks like it's gonna be a big long skinny screen again if these things

00:07:21   are to be believed but this close to announcement date it's reasonable for parts to leak these look

00:07:29   semi-legitimate. I'm kind of sad.

00:07:32   - Yeah, now the tipster is saying in the chat

00:07:34   that that's just the mount the thing sits in.

00:07:36   We'll see, that's not, I mean, to my eye,

00:07:38   that is not at all what it looked like,

00:07:40   but it's so hard to say with these terrible pictures

00:07:44   that clearly were taken, what's the word I'm looking for?

00:07:47   Surreptitiously, something like that.

00:07:48   Taken illicitly, if you will.

00:07:50   And so it's hard to tell.

00:07:52   - Well, the other thing with these pictures is,

00:07:55   if you look, I mean, tipster's also kind of arguing

00:07:57   whether this might be the 13 inch MacBook,

00:08:00   which last week we talked about this rumor.

00:08:03   In the middle of the big long sentence of the rumor report

00:08:06   was also a 13 inch MacBook One

00:08:09   that we didn't talk about at all.

00:08:11   (laughing)

00:08:12   So I think it's worth mentioning.

00:08:14   And then there's some speculation in the chat

00:08:16   that I think is possibly warranted here

00:08:19   that these leaked photos may have been

00:08:22   that 13 inch MacBook, not 13 inch MacBook Pro.

00:08:26   And there's a few things that support that.

00:08:28   First of all, the people in chat are trying to figure out

00:08:30   like is this implausibly thin for the kind of cooling system

00:08:33   that an i5 would need?

00:08:35   But what I spotted earlier when I saw these photos,

00:08:38   it only has the four USB-C ports.

00:08:41   There's no other ports.

00:08:43   And so that would mean dropping some ports

00:08:45   that are on the current 13 inch.

00:08:47   Also, it would mean dropping the MagSafe port.

00:08:50   And while it is possible to charge things

00:08:52   through USB PD into a USB-C port,

00:08:54   like what the MacBook One does.

00:08:57   There's a limit to how much current

00:08:58   that can actually deliver, and I think once you get

00:09:01   into the 15-inch MacBook Pro with its external GPU,

00:09:05   I think you're probably pushing that limit.

00:09:07   It's probably, I'm guessing the 15-inch

00:09:10   probably still has MagSafe, and then if the 15-inch

00:09:13   still has it, the 13-inch would probably have it too,

00:09:15   'cause they're built very similarly

00:09:17   and share a lot of similar features and ports

00:09:19   and capabilities and everything.

00:09:20   So I'm guessing that the speculation that this part

00:09:25   is actually the 13-inch MacBook One is probably correct,

00:09:29   'cause that presumably would be able to be charged

00:09:32   through USB-C just like the 12-inch MacBook One,

00:09:36   or at least it would be more likely to.

00:09:38   And we can speculate also about what the heck

00:09:40   a 13-inch MacBook One might include,

00:09:43   and why that would be necessary

00:09:46   when there's also a new, thinner, lighter

00:09:48   13-inch MacBook Pro.

00:09:50   But, overall looking at these photos,

00:09:52   I'd say it is fairly likely that we're looking

00:09:56   at the 13X MacBook One enclosure,

00:09:57   not 13X MacBook Pro enclosure.

00:09:59   However, that said, I agree with John and Casey.

00:10:02   I agree that if these are legitimate parts,

00:10:06   which they look like they probably are,

00:10:08   and this would be a reasonable time for them to be leaking,

00:10:11   I'm guessing that this is real

00:10:14   and that you're right about the keyboard row,

00:10:17   that the F and key row sure does look like

00:10:19   like it's gonna be just one big screen.

00:10:21   And if you think about one other detail too,

00:10:24   these rumors all said that these were supposed to have

00:10:26   Touch ID, at least the MacBook Pro,

00:10:28   we don't know about the MacBook One.

00:10:30   These were supposed to have Touch ID.

00:10:32   Where do you put the sensor?

00:10:34   There is really nowhere on the keyboard to put it.

00:10:37   You might be able to put it in the trackpad,

00:10:39   but is that even possible without messing up

00:10:44   the trackpad sensor, I don't even know.

00:10:45   - I thought there was a patent for that.

00:10:48   - Well, there's a-- - Could be--

00:10:48   - Yeah, there's a lot of stuff that gets patented

00:10:50   that never actually is practical to show up in a product.

00:10:52   - Totally.

00:10:53   - So it might be possible, but for now,

00:10:56   we don't know if it's there.

00:10:57   I'm guessing the most sensible place to put it

00:11:00   is probably on, if that's gonna be one big flat screen,

00:11:04   probably just on the right side of that or something.

00:11:07   An area of that that is actually a touch ID sensor

00:11:10   and not a screen, but it just looks,

00:11:12   maybe it just looks straight black across the whole thing,

00:11:14   it looks unified, but it's actually like,

00:11:16   this part's a screen, this part's a sensor, you know.

00:11:19   If you think about where else you'd put the Touch ID sensor,

00:11:21   there's not really a lot of other good places

00:11:23   that are plausible.

00:11:25   So I'm guessing it's there.

00:11:26   And then if you're gonna have one area of that be flat

00:11:30   to be a Touch ID sensor and not be a key,

00:11:32   it would look weird if there were a whole bunch of keys

00:11:35   next to it and then the keys end

00:11:37   like one key width short of the right side

00:11:39   and there's a flat area there.

00:11:41   So it's probably just gonna be all screen

00:11:43   across the whole thing.

00:11:44   I'm not sure what to make of this, but I am excited and I think it's worth recognizing that this

00:11:49   hopefully will be something new and different about the MacBook line or the MacBook Pro line and

00:11:55   We haven't really seen that much different in a long time. I mean there's certainly been incremental improvements

00:12:00   And I love my work MacBook Pro and God do I love my 5k iMac

00:12:05   But this is something new and exciting and different and I kind of like that

00:12:09   We're trying something new and it's not just the what was it the titanium

00:12:13   PowerBook or whatever that kind of started this whole unibody look. It's not a continuation of that just another you know

00:12:19   photocopier perhaps slightly shrunken version of that it's something that's a little bit different and that's exciting so

00:12:25   Why do you think this is the 13 inch MacBook one if it's not wedge-shaped isn't that kind of the?

00:12:31   Signifier of that of the sort of ultra partable MacBook one line is that it would be wedge-shaped. I don't know I mean

00:12:38   what would a 13-inch MacBook One be for?

00:12:41   If you think about--

00:12:42   - A bigger screen.

00:12:43   - Okay, a bigger screen, but then what could differentiate it,

00:12:47   what could justify it existing compared to just

00:12:49   the 13-inch MacBook Pro, which the new version

00:12:52   will probably be almost as thin and light

00:12:54   as the current 13-inch MacBook Air?

00:12:56   So why does that product need to exist?

00:13:00   And I have a hard time answering that question, honestly.

00:13:03   - It would have a wimpier CPU,

00:13:04   maybe it could still be fanless,

00:13:06   They could put the fastest of the fanless CPUs in there, give it more battery because

00:13:10   it's bigger and have a bigger screen.

00:13:12   I don't know.

00:13:13   I mean, I'm trying to think of when I picture a MacBook One, since there's only been one

00:13:17   model line in that, you know, one physical shape for that model line, I think of kind

00:13:22   of like the Airs where there was the 11-inch Air and the 13-inch Air and they were both

00:13:26   Air-shaped and the 13-inch had a bigger screen and more battery life, but otherwise not much

00:13:31   differentiation.

00:13:32   I mean, what if it's for price?

00:13:34   You know, what if this is how they eventually

00:13:37   replace the MacBook Air is by just making these

00:13:40   like cheaper, more limited computers at the low end

00:13:43   and then the MacBook Pro is the profitable one?

00:13:47   - Yeah, we'll see.

00:13:48   In the little picture they show,

00:13:49   you can see the little connector in the upper right

00:13:52   which I imagined, like there has to be a connector

00:13:54   for the screen, right?

00:13:55   - Yeah. - And I suppose you can't

00:13:56   have the same connector for both the screen

00:13:57   and the Touch ID but there's also a little opening

00:13:59   on the left side that like a ribbon cable could go through.

00:14:01   So if the ribbon cable connects to the screen,

00:14:04   that could be all the screen needs for the connector,

00:14:06   which would leave that thing on the right for touch ID.

00:14:10   - Honestly, the left side just looks like

00:14:11   a physical mounting point to me, but I don't know.

00:14:14   I mean, who knows?

00:14:16   We will probably, hopefully know soon enough from Apple,

00:14:19   but yeah, I think if it's the MacBook Pro,

00:14:23   if it's the 13-inch MacBook Pro, then okay.

00:14:27   Then I think it makes more sense that way, honestly,

00:14:30   even though we'd lose some of the ports and things

00:14:32   that are on the current one and some people would get mad,

00:14:34   well, that's what Apple's best at,

00:14:36   is angering people who like the old laptops.

00:14:37   So, you know, that's in the name of thinness.

00:14:40   - You get four USB-C ports,

00:14:42   that's a pretty big number for Apple,

00:14:45   and I think you can do a lot with four USB-C ports.

00:14:48   Like, just one of those ports,

00:14:50   you can do a lot with a bunch of adapters,

00:14:51   but having four of them means

00:14:52   you're probably not gonna run out of ports.

00:14:54   You may be annoyed that you still have to carry

00:14:56   a bunch of adapters around,

00:14:57   but I think four of them is enough for a 13 inch,

00:15:01   because you can do pretty much anything

00:15:03   from any one of those points.

00:15:03   You can have a monitor, a USB thumb drive,

00:15:07   an ethernet cable, and an external hard drive.

00:15:10   And I feel like that is plenty of things hanging off of,

00:15:13   and you can connect so much more

00:15:15   through just one of those if you have

00:15:16   like a Thunderbolt breakout box or whatever.

00:15:18   - Yeah, exactly.

00:15:19   And then, honestly, that's one of the biggest reasons

00:15:20   I'm looking forward to the USB-C Thunderbolt 3 transition,

00:15:23   because we finally will have like more,

00:15:27   assuming that these are real and assuming that the laptops,

00:15:29   at least some of them, are getting four ports total.

00:15:32   I would love to have four USB ports on a laptop.

00:15:34   I'm always running, I'm always using both of mine.

00:15:37   Usually at least one of them is charging something

00:15:39   or something else.

00:15:40   I'm always using those when I travel.

00:15:42   So that'd be, I'm looking forward to this feature.

00:15:43   But I do wonder, it's such a weird wild card.

00:15:48   It's like, assuming this is the 13 inch MacBook One

00:15:51   and not 13 inch MacBook Pro,

00:15:52   why do they justify having four ports

00:15:55   on the 13 inch version of this computer

00:15:57   where the 12 inch version has one.

00:15:59   You know, it's just weird.

00:16:00   It's like, this is a weird leak of what appears to be

00:16:04   a very, like, a product that raises a lot of questions.

00:16:07   And it might end up being awesome, whatever it is,

00:16:09   but this certainly, yeah,

00:16:12   this certainly raises a lot of questions.

00:16:14   - It still has the headphone port too,

00:16:16   unlike the rumored iPhone.

00:16:18   - Oh, it does?

00:16:19   Oh yeah, there it is, you're right, yeah.

00:16:20   Yeah, so I don't know, the weird thing to me

00:16:22   is the dropping of the MagSafe in this kind of enclosure.

00:16:24   Like if it's big enough and high powered enough

00:16:27   to have four USB ports and no MagSave,

00:16:30   then it's charging through this,

00:16:32   and if that can do it, then could the 15 inch also do it?

00:16:36   I don't know, I don't know.

00:16:37   It's a whole bunch of questions here.

00:16:39   But I don't know, this is looking like

00:16:41   it's gonna be a pretty great update.

00:16:44   As to why this one's not tapered,

00:16:47   I commend whatever decision led to this not being tapered.

00:16:51   Because-- - Yeah, no,

00:16:52   I've always been all for it too.

00:16:53   But I'm just saying, if I have to think of what defines

00:16:56   the MacBook One line, it's like, not only is it so

00:16:58   insanely thin, but it wasn't thin enough that they had

00:17:01   to make one edge thin enough to slice cheese.

00:17:04   - Well also, again, going back to what I said last episode

00:17:07   about defending deep keyboards, because keyboards weigh

00:17:11   almost nothing in laptops, generally when you're defining

00:17:15   the thickness of the laptop, you're limited really by

00:17:18   how much weight you're willing to devote to battery,

00:17:22   basically because batteries are generally

00:17:24   like one of the heaviest things inside

00:17:25   of monocomputing devices, if not the heaviest thing

00:17:28   depending on the device.

00:17:29   And so, and the way you make computers thinner and lighter

00:17:33   is not by just like cutting the case in half

00:17:35   and saying all right, now just kind of shove everything

00:17:37   in tighter, I mean that's part of it,

00:17:38   but the way you make them thinner and lighter

00:17:41   is you first make them lighter by removing battery

00:17:44   and you remove battery by removing the need

00:17:46   for as much battery as you had before.

00:17:48   Which usually comes in power advancements

00:17:50   in how much power the screen and processor both draw.

00:17:53   Usually the processor is the bigger one, but anyway.

00:17:56   So the idea is you develop technology,

00:17:58   you develop savings, you figure out a way

00:18:00   to make the processor and everything else use less power,

00:18:04   then you need less battery mass in there

00:18:06   to achieve the same battery life you had before

00:18:08   to achieve what people consider acceptable.

00:18:10   So then you can shrink the battery

00:18:12   and then you can kinda shrink the case around it.

00:18:14   Like now you have FreeSpace and now it's like,

00:18:16   all right, how thin can we make this case

00:18:19   that only has to hold X amount of battery

00:18:21   plus the other parts.

00:18:23   I think the reason the MacBook One is as thin as it is,

00:18:26   and the reason it's wedge-shaped,

00:18:28   is because they were probably first targeting a weight goal,

00:18:31   because that makes more sense.

00:18:32   You know, it's like, okay, well now,

00:18:34   Intel's making this new five watt CPU,

00:18:36   so we can make a fanless and everything.

00:18:38   So if we make a computer that's small enough,

00:18:40   with a small enough screen that uses this CPU,

00:18:42   it'll only need this little tiny amount of battery inside.

00:18:46   So then, how do we make the thinnest case possible

00:18:48   to contain these parts.

00:18:50   And they had to still have some,

00:18:52   even though it's very little,

00:18:53   some room for a keyboard in there.

00:18:56   But they didn't need the wrist rest area

00:18:58   that was filled with battery,

00:19:00   they didn't need that to be any thicker.

00:19:02   'Cause any thicker, and they would've just been empty space,

00:19:05   or more battery, which would've driven the weight up,

00:19:07   which they didn't want.

00:19:08   So you make the front of it as thin as it can be,

00:19:10   while still holding that battery,

00:19:11   and you make the back of it as thick as it needs to be

00:19:13   to fit the keyboard and the other parts,

00:19:15   and that's how you get a wedge shape.

00:19:16   So they weren't necessarily targeting the wedge.

00:19:21   They did the wedge because they just didn't need

00:19:22   any more space in the front half of the laptop.

00:19:25   So if this part is real, and if this is actually

00:19:27   a member of the MacBook One line

00:19:29   and not the MacBook Pro line,

00:19:31   it certainly raises the question of

00:19:32   what the heck is all that extra space for?

00:19:34   And as far as I can guess,

00:19:37   didn't the MacBook One's CPU architecture

00:19:41   that with the crazy Intel 5 watt thing,

00:19:43   didn't that have like a very low limit

00:19:45   on how many ports it could even drive with its chipset.

00:19:48   So maybe this isn't using those CPUs at all.

00:19:50   Maybe this is using some other Intel low wattage chip

00:19:54   that's higher end than the Core M.

00:19:57   And then that's how it's driving all these ports,

00:19:59   but then it needs all this additional battery to function

00:20:02   and to have an acceptable battery life.

00:20:04   Which of course then raises the question of,

00:20:06   well what the heck is the difference between that

00:20:07   and the MacBook Pro?

00:20:09   - All that empty space in the front

00:20:10   is for speaker cavities, right?

00:20:12   Like on the iPad Pro?

00:20:13   Four speakers.

00:20:14   Tell you what, that'd be awesome.

00:20:16   That'd be amazing, but no, I doubt it.

00:20:18   - We have so much space left over in this case,

00:20:20   we don't even know what to do with it.

00:20:22   Speaker cavities, speaker cavities for everybody.

00:20:25   All right, anything else about these laptops?

00:20:27   - I'm looking forward to hearing what these actually are

00:20:30   and seeing them, 'cause as you said, Casey,

00:20:33   major changes to the Mac designs don't happen very often,

00:20:38   and especially to the main workhorse computers.

00:20:42   It's one thing to introduce a brand new,

00:20:43   tiny little MacBook One at an event,

00:20:46   but everyone's still using MacBook Pros.

00:20:47   It's a whole other thing to totally redesign

00:20:49   the MacBook Pro or the iMac or the Mac Pro.

00:20:52   These are major events in the product line,

00:20:55   and it's exciting, and it's exciting for those of us

00:20:58   who have and love our Macs.

00:21:01   It's kind of reassuring, it's nice to know

00:21:04   that the company that seems like it cares

00:21:06   a whole lot more about iOS devices,

00:21:08   that they haven't forgotten about the Mac in the process,

00:21:10   that the Mac is still being actively developed

00:21:13   being evolved and having attention put on it, really.

00:21:17   - Yeah, and the thing is, to kind of build on what you

00:21:19   and I had both said earlier, is that they clearly,

00:21:22   Apple clearly takes messing with the MacBook Pro

00:21:26   and even the non-Pro line very seriously.

00:21:29   Like, they don't tend to make really crummy decisions.

00:21:33   Like, yeah, we all complained and moaned a little bit

00:21:35   about the MacBook One, but at least you could understand

00:21:38   what they were going for there.

00:21:39   And for them to be messing with a design

00:21:41   that really does work.

00:21:42   I mean, I have loved every MacBook Pro I've ever owned,

00:21:45   and I love the one that work gave me.

00:21:47   And I'm very anxious to see this new one,

00:21:51   because if they're gonna change something

00:21:53   that is so important and that works so well,

00:21:56   because the design that they have today, I really do love,

00:21:59   then it's gonna have to be something good.

00:22:01   This isn't the playground like the iPhone or the iPad

00:22:04   where things change fairly frequently.

00:22:06   This is kind of the slow and steady wins the race

00:22:09   sort of product for them.

00:22:12   And so because of that, I'm really, really anxious.

00:22:14   I'm really, really excited to see it.

00:22:16   And also dreading it,

00:22:16   because then I'm gonna wanna buy a laptop,

00:22:18   and I really don't need a laptop right now.

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00:24:24   (upbeat music)

00:24:27   - All right, so sticking with hardware for a moment,

00:24:30   let's talk about this rumored external 5K display.

00:24:33   This is all coming back again.

00:24:35   I don't remember when it was we talked about this, but it was quite a while ago.

00:24:38   It's all coming up tipster.

00:24:40   It's all coming up tipster.

00:24:42   And so just earlier today as we record this, there's been increased rumors about the potential

00:24:49   of a new Cinema Display or Thunderbolt display, given that stock seems to be running out everywhere.

00:24:55   So any new thoughts on this?

00:24:57   Do we think this is real?

00:24:58   Or is Jon finally getting his external Retina display so he can get his stupid trash can

00:25:02   Mac Pro?

00:25:03   What are we thinking?

00:25:04   The story, the angle on the story I've seen,

00:25:06   I think we did discuss all this in past episodes.

00:25:09   Maybe we did it off air,

00:25:10   maybe it all happened in the chat room.

00:25:12   It all kind of blends together,

00:25:13   but the angle on the story is,

00:25:15   hey, new 5K display is fine,

00:25:16   but then everyone's like,

00:25:17   oh, how are they going to plug this into Macintosh computers

00:25:21   and make an image appear on the screen?

00:25:22   And everyone is going through all the DisplayPort specs

00:25:24   and seeing that they don't give enough bandwidth

00:25:27   and trying to figure it out

00:25:28   and going in around and around,

00:25:29   and eventually the GPU and the display idea comes out.

00:25:33   So just as a review, in case we actually didn't discuss this

00:25:36   and it was all in the chat room,

00:25:38   the idea is that you can't power it with DisplayPort

00:25:41   because there's not enough bandwidth

00:25:42   unless you connect two wires,

00:25:43   which is kind of what happens internally on the iMac

00:25:46   or can happen externally on a current Mac.

00:25:49   But everyone believes that Apple won't do that

00:25:51   because it's gross.

00:25:52   You don't want to have two wires

00:25:53   connected to your actual display.

00:25:56   And Intel is not going to have the,

00:25:58   what is it, DisplayPort 1.4 or whatever,

00:26:00   whatever standard it is that has the bandwidth

00:26:02   power a 5k 1.3 I believe maybe it's 1.3 or 8.4 but either way it's not going to be in the skylake

00:26:08   things it's not going to be in the next one even I think it's like it's a long ways out so even

00:26:12   though DisplayPort will eventually support it doesn't look like any of the current Macs are

00:26:15   going to and so the only thing left is something weird and people think proprietary but really it's

00:26:22   not proprietary it's just plain old thunderbolts because remember the Thunderbolt spec has

00:26:25   bandwidth allocated for data transfer and also DisplayPort and the idea is they will ignore a

00:26:31   a display port. It will connect to it as if it's just a Thunderbolt 3 device and you'll

00:26:36   be running PCI Express over a wire and the thing on the other end of the wire will be

00:26:40   this monitor that has some sort of PCI Express terminator so that from the perspective of

00:26:45   the Mac that you have connected to it, it looks like the monitor itself is a video card.

00:26:50   And then it starts to get hazy and like, well, is the GPU entirely in the monitor? Maybe

00:26:54   for laptops that don't even have a GPU that can drive it anyway, the GPU in the monitor

00:26:58   will handle it, but what about something like the Mac Pro where surely the Mac Pro itself

00:27:02   will have a better GPU than the monitor?

00:27:03   Well, if they updated it might.

00:27:05   Yeah, it will use its internal GPU, but then just use PCI Express to communicate that the

00:27:11   image information over to the monitor and then the monitor will act as a PCI Express

00:27:15   device, even though all the GPU stuff is happening on the Mac Pro.

00:27:18   Anyway, bottom line is not DisplayPort.

00:27:21   That's the answer that we all think of how they're going to drive this 5K monitor from

00:27:26   a bunch of Macs.

00:27:27   They can use Thunderbolt and use it as the same

00:27:30   as all those Thunderbolts PCI Express breakout boxes,

00:27:33   only this will be a breakout monitor box.

00:27:36   - Yeah, I mean, this is another one of those things

00:27:38   where there's a lot of people making a lot

00:27:40   of blanket statements of, well, this isn't possible

00:27:43   because of X, and the reality is this stuff

00:27:46   is all very complicated.

00:27:48   Most of us who are making these statements

00:27:49   don't have a full understanding of all the stuff

00:27:51   that's involved and what actually is possible

00:27:53   and what actually isn't possible and what's needed

00:27:54   and what's kind of just a thing we heard.

00:27:56   The reality is the more I learn about this,

00:27:59   the more I learn that it's way more complicated

00:28:02   than I thought.

00:28:03   There are actually ways to do it with current hardware

00:28:07   or with near future hardware.

00:28:09   And so it's really just a question of like, you know,

00:28:13   has everything gotten together in time

00:28:14   and what will support it and when will it come out

00:28:17   and what will it plug into?

00:28:18   And it seems like the answer to almost all those things

00:28:21   is kind of like, well, that's up to Apple.

00:28:23   So I think it's too early to say really.

00:28:26   they've had a long time to work this out and Apple does have experience for

00:28:29   example having dual GPU laptops and dealing with the GPU switching that's

00:28:32   another question people have like how can you have a GPU in the monitor what

00:28:36   if you yank the cable out of the monitor first of all yanking the cable out of

00:28:38   monitors historically has always been a little bit weird not just when you're

00:28:43   doing them over Thunderbolts right but Apple has some experience dealing with

00:28:48   multiple GPUs running multiple displays and laptops granted not all of that

00:28:52   experience is great but presumably Apple's the company can they can do it

00:28:55   because they know all the hardware involved, they control the monitor side, they control

00:28:59   the Mac side, and surely they'll be limited to support for certain collection of Macs

00:29:04   that can do this and it will probably require a new OS update and all this other stuff.

00:29:08   And we've just waited so long.

00:29:10   How long has the Thunderbolt display been out for?

00:29:12   I think I saw the date filed by, it's been like four years?

00:29:15   Five years?

00:29:16   I don't know.

00:29:17   It's been a long time.

00:29:18   Yeah, and it's especially because it's barely different from the LED SIMO display

00:29:22   that came right before it.

00:29:23   Right.

00:29:24   just updated it with a Thunderbolt but having more ports than going over a Thunderbolt.

00:29:27   Yeah. July 20, 2011. There you go. Yeah, it's a long time. So, it is entirely technically

00:29:36   possible now for Apple to launch both a new Mac Pro, Apple please, and/or an external

00:29:43   5K display that a bunch of the laptops that they will also introduce can drive. Now, is

00:29:47   it possible that existing laptops can drive it too? Probably, maybe, especially if it's

00:29:51   GPU in the monitor that's sufficient to drive the monitor itself.

00:29:56   And this will be a weird solution, but it's better than waiting for the DisplayPort spec

00:30:02   that supports us and waiting many more years for Intel chipsets to support them.

00:30:07   This is far preferable, so I really want Apple to do this.

00:30:10   We've all waited long enough for an external 5K display.

00:30:13   It's time.

00:30:14   And a Mac Pro update.

00:30:15   Well, I'm willing to believe that is not in the cards for WWC.

00:30:19   I'm trying to keep my expectations tamped down but surely announcement of new laptops and

00:30:23   Surely an announcement of a 5k display. Come on. Although I keep seeing more people

00:30:28   Oh, yeah, q4 definitely later in the year

00:30:30   So they could even they could even skip this and announce it not a W

00:30:34   I don't understand why they would but they could if they wanted to give all the glory the WWC stage - I

00:30:40   Don't know what could possibly trump this iPhone stuff

00:30:44   Swift stuff

00:30:47   renaming Mac OS and iOS, I don't know.

00:30:50   Like, who knows what they have planned,

00:30:52   but this year for sure, right guys?

00:30:54   - Mm.

00:30:55   (laughing)

00:30:58   - I sure hope not.

00:30:59   I mean, I'm really excited for you, I hope it works out.

00:31:02   I don't know if I can handle--

00:31:03   - It doesn't, you know, even if they release the new Mac Pro,

00:31:06   you know John's not gonna buy it.

00:31:07   - That's true.

00:31:08   - Oh, you don't know that, you don't know that at all.

00:31:10   Saving my pennies.

00:31:11   - You're gonna, first you're gonna say,

00:31:14   well, I wanna wait and see,

00:31:16   make sure that it doesn't have any big problems.

00:31:17   I'm gonna wait for other people to buy it first.

00:31:19   - Well, of course I'm gonna do that.

00:31:20   Of course I'm gonna do that no matter what about everything.

00:31:22   - Right, and so then, so six months in,

00:31:23   we're gonna remember to ask you about it.

00:31:24   - 'Cause I don't have to wait six months to find out.

00:31:26   - And we're gonna say, "Hey, John, remember when you said

00:31:28   "you were waiting for the first people to buy the Mac Pro?

00:31:30   "So now it's been a while, there's no problem,

00:31:32   "so when are you gonna buy it?"

00:31:33   And then you're gonna be like, "Well, I wish I had

00:31:35   "better GPUs or the gaming performance isn't that good here

00:31:38   "and it's so expensive and so I think my Mac Pro

00:31:41   "is still gonna work for a little bit longer.

00:31:43   or I can get a few more years out of it until the next one.

00:31:45   And then two years into the cycle,

00:31:47   I'd be like, well, now it's pretty old,

00:31:48   I might as well wait till the next one comes out.

00:31:50   (laughing)

00:31:51   - This Mac's gonna break someday, right?

00:31:54   Can't last forever.

00:31:55   - I don't know, those old Mac Pros are pretty solid.

00:31:57   - It is tempting to try to go for 10 years though,

00:31:59   isn't it?

00:32:00   - No, no it's not. - Oh my god.

00:32:02   Oh my lord.

00:32:03   - Would you go 10 years for milk in your fridge?

00:32:05   No, it doesn't matter what the number is.

00:32:07   - It's not milk, it's hardware.

00:32:09   - This is not the kind of area

00:32:11   where you should achieve incredible longevity

00:32:13   of your main computer just for the heck of it.

00:32:18   - This'll be great when I upgrade my PS4

00:32:20   to a faster version while my Mac sits there,

00:32:22   continues not to be upgraded.

00:32:24   - Yeah, how many gaming systems have you bought

00:32:26   in the time you've had that Mac Pro?

00:32:28   - All of them?

00:32:31   No, not all of them.

00:32:32   N64 came out before this, right?

00:32:34   - Oh my god.

00:32:35   - I think the 360, well, you never have a 360, right?

00:32:37   - No.

00:32:38   - I think 360 came out before it,

00:32:39   but did the PS3, no the PS3 was before,

00:32:42   that was like '06 or something like that, right?

00:32:45   - Yeah, console generation's for like seven years

00:32:48   for the PS3 generation, so I haven't bought that many.

00:32:50   - Oh, God.

00:32:52   All right, what else is going on?

00:32:54   Let's see here.

00:32:55   We didn't talk about Apple potentially opening up Siri

00:32:59   and developing an Echo Rival.

00:33:01   - We mentioned the article, but then we got off

00:33:03   on another tangent about Apple and services and stuff.

00:33:06   - We would never do that.

00:33:07   - Us?

00:33:08   that was the headline of the story was, you know, an echo arrival and the Siri opening

00:33:14   up. I guess we didn't talk too much about the API aspect of it, but we mostly just talked

00:33:18   about Apple and services.

00:33:19   Yeah, so apparently Apple may be opening up Siri, there may be an echo arrival, and that's

00:33:25   about all we know, which is to say basically nothing.

00:33:28   Was this the article that said, or maybe I heard this somewhere else, that the idea of

00:33:31   opening up Siri is that it wouldn't be as open as the skills are on the echo, it would

00:33:34   still be more kind of, at least initially for like select

00:33:38   partners to have Siri integration.

00:33:40   I don't quite understand what the holdup is on having an

00:33:43   official API for Siri.

00:33:44   Apple loves APIs.

00:33:45   WWDC is all about APIs.

00:33:48   Like they're all just look at these great new APIs,

00:33:50   integrate this into your app, integrate that into your app,

00:33:52   your app should have one of these.

00:33:53   And yet Siri it's like, no, nothing for you this year.

00:33:57   Like it's been so long.

00:33:58   It seems like they could have come up with the safest

00:34:03   possible Siri integration.

00:34:04   Maybe it would be useless, maybe you don't use it,

00:34:06   but like get the ball rolling on the idea

00:34:08   that Siri is not just like this feature of your phone,

00:34:12   but rather is an API that your apps can integrate with

00:34:14   to make, you know, your apps can make Siri more useful

00:34:16   in the same way that share sheets made

00:34:17   like every app on the system more useful.

00:34:19   Just implement the new share sheet API

00:34:21   and suddenly everybody's apps can all work together

00:34:24   to make everybody's phones more useful.

00:34:25   Siri should be exactly the same, but isn't.

00:34:28   - I really hope that this report is true,

00:34:30   that there is Siri API being unveiled soon,

00:34:34   because as a developer, I would love it.

00:34:36   And there are so many things that,

00:34:38   like I would love for myself to have access to it,

00:34:40   I would love for other developers to have access to it,

00:34:42   I would love to, as a user, for other developers

00:34:44   to have access to it so I can do

00:34:45   so much better stuff with Siri.

00:34:47   I really hope this is real.

00:34:50   I recognize it's a very hard problem to solve

00:34:53   in a way that Apple would be happy with.

00:34:55   And it is not that surprising to me

00:34:58   that they don't have an API,

00:35:00   that they haven't had an API yet up to this point

00:35:02   because it is a very hard problem to solve

00:35:05   in a way Apple would find tolerable.

00:35:07   But it's time, it's really time.

00:35:11   As we see other voice assistant platforms

00:35:14   having APIs and adding APIs and coming soon with APIs,

00:35:19   this is an area where I just really hope

00:35:21   Apple keeps up, I guess.

00:35:24   And as we talked about last week,

00:35:26   I really, really hope that they bring competitive

00:35:29   this area because it's exciting.

00:35:30   It could be really cool.

00:35:32   It's very useful a lot of times.

00:35:34   And I hope I can participate in that as an Apple user

00:35:37   and as an Apple developer.

00:35:39   - You know, thinking of the APIs

00:35:41   and thinking of what the Amazon Echo skills system is,

00:35:44   it's not like Apple hasn't done APIs like that before.

00:35:47   I'm thinking of the Passbook API

00:35:49   before they changed it to Wallet.

00:35:50   I don't remember what that was like.

00:35:52   It was pretty easy for airlines or whatever

00:35:54   to integrate with Passbook.

00:35:55   It was just like, it was very webby.

00:35:57   It was very sort of make a rest-ish endpoint

00:36:00   that sends and receives JSON in this format

00:36:03   and sends some simple markup.

00:36:04   And in the app, it looked like these little cards.

00:36:08   And I think it's probably the same API for the wallet thing.

00:36:10   I don't think they've changed it that much.

00:36:11   That is exactly the API that you could use for skills

00:36:15   in terms of integrating Siri, not with iOS apps,

00:36:18   just with other backend services and stuff like that,

00:36:20   to be able to ask Siri questions

00:36:23   and have skills installed to let Siri ask something

00:36:25   other than Wolfram Alpha to get questions about,

00:36:28   I don't know, sports, like ask ESPN

00:36:29   for more detailed sports information or whatever.

00:36:32   Like that type of system, that is an API.

00:36:34   It's not like Apple has never made those APIs before.

00:36:36   They've done it, it's rare, but it's possible.

00:36:40   And it's successful.

00:36:43   Like Passbook and all that stuff

00:36:44   had pretty wide adoption pretty quickly,

00:36:46   but it's like, we don't really care that much.

00:36:48   We don't know how much people are gonna use it,

00:36:49   but it's so easy to do.

00:36:50   Throw one web developer at it for a few weeks.

00:36:53   Every airline did it and it was fine.

00:36:55   and it continues to sort of lurch along, right?

00:36:58   They could do that with Siri easily.

00:36:59   Maybe they just don't think that's sufficient.

00:37:00   Maybe they have bigger plans with this,

00:37:02   the new, you know, whatever rumored, much better Siri.

00:37:06   The other thing I was thinking of is that

00:37:08   if they're doing the whole Mac OS renaming

00:37:10   with the lowercase Mac capital OS,

00:37:12   it's a good time to perhaps think about,

00:37:16   and if Siri's gonna appear on the new version

00:37:18   of the Mac operating system,

00:37:20   good time to think about rebranding/combining Spotlight

00:37:23   in Siri, which have been sort of merging

00:37:25   and dancing around each other for years.

00:37:26   I don't know who wins, probably Siri instead of Spotlight,

00:37:29   but how can you have two different things

00:37:31   that are all very similar?

00:37:32   They really should be integrated UI wise,

00:37:34   branding and conceptually.

00:37:37   It's kind of confusing to have them like that.

00:37:38   So this would be a good time to unify those brands too.

00:37:42   And if you did that,

00:37:43   Spotlight does have an extension mechanism

00:37:45   where you can write plugins

00:37:46   and let your files be indexed on your Mac or whatever.

00:37:49   That's another good time to add a Siri API

00:37:54   because once they're combined into one thing,

00:37:55   you can add an API for, I don't know.

00:37:57   Like again, Apple, that's what WDC is all about.

00:38:01   It's all about sessions where they have new APIs

00:38:03   that you can use to make your apps cooler.

00:38:05   And that usually Apple wants you to incorporate.

00:38:07   They're practically begging you to think of a reason,

00:38:09   think of a way that you can incorporate this new API

00:38:13   in all the sessions.

00:38:14   Like you may not think you need this API in your app,

00:38:16   but let me show you some examples.

00:38:17   You can add, you know, a rotating 3D cube in the corner.

00:38:20   So you should use SceneKit.

00:38:21   Like, they're very gung ho about,

00:38:24   we have great new APIs and you should incorporate them

00:38:25   because by incorporating the new APIs,

00:38:27   you add value to Apple's platform

00:38:28   and show its unique value proposition

00:38:30   because Apple believes these APIs are, you know,

00:38:32   something that the other platforms don't have,

00:38:35   things to compete with or that their APIs

00:38:36   are more complicated or whatever.

00:38:37   So yeah, I guess this is the time of year

00:38:40   where everything seems possible at WWC.

00:38:43   All our dreams will come true

00:38:44   and everything we thought of will be announced

00:38:47   at the keynote and we'll have 15 sessions,

00:38:48   but obviously they can't all fit in.

00:38:50   So we'll see what gets dropped on the floor.

00:38:52   - So quick aside, are you in favor of

00:38:54   or against OS X becoming Mac OS?

00:38:58   - Aesthetically, I'm pretty against,

00:38:59   but in terms of it's time for a rebrand, I'm for.

00:39:04   Like I don't like the lowercase M-A-C-O-S,

00:39:06   but I think it's just like the drop the cats.

00:39:10   If you wanna rename it after so many versions

00:39:12   to do a different thing, get rid of the X and the X thing.

00:39:15   And like, I don't know, yeah, sure rename it,

00:39:17   but I really don't like the lowercase thing,

00:39:19   I'll live with it.

00:39:20   - I think it'd be good.

00:39:21   I think it's time.

00:39:22   I'm ready.

00:39:23   - Yeah, me too.

00:39:24   I'm in favor.

00:39:25   You know, the capitalization of the Mac aside, you know, I don't really have a strong opinion

00:39:28   on that.

00:39:29   You know, I would, I think it'd be cool if it was capital 'cause it's, it'd kind of be,

00:39:32   you know, an old school reference and kind of just fits better.

00:39:36   - It's not an old school reference if there's no space.

00:39:39   - But yeah.

00:39:40   - Psy is a different name.

00:39:44   - We have a new sponsor this week.

00:39:45   We are sponsored by Eero, E-E-R-O, Eero.

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00:39:59   So here's how this works.

00:40:00   Now, almost everybody I know who's ever had Wi-Fi

00:40:03   in the house, which is almost everybody,

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00:40:09   What you really need is multiple access points,

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00:40:30   that all talk to each other

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00:40:36   roughly one per thousand square feet.

00:40:38   So most homes in the US,

00:40:40   you'd have either two or three of them.

00:40:41   You designate one of them as your router

00:40:44   and you plug that one in with a wire

00:40:45   to your modem or your internet connection or whatever,

00:40:48   you plug it into ethernet.

00:40:49   The other two, you just plug those in somewhere else

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00:41:16   What do you think?

00:41:17   - I'm really impressed.

00:41:18   I wasn't sure if I would just throw them on

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00:41:23   but I think they have replaced my very old Airport Extreme.

00:41:26   - All right, sounds good.

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00:41:43   So iPhone 7, another tuck or maybe tick?

00:41:46   I didn't see this.

00:41:47   Tuck?

00:41:48   Tell me about this.

00:41:49   Tuck, yeah.

00:41:50   Christina Warren's article at Mashable, talking about the iPhone 7, we talked a lot about

00:41:54   it already, you know, dropping the headphone port and we've seen the spy shots where it

00:41:57   looks a lot like the iPhone 6, but the antenna lines are a little bit moved around and the

00:42:01   big one's gonna have two cameras and so on and so forth.

00:42:05   This story was sort of meta-story about, okay, assuming all that's pretty much the case,

00:42:08   "Hey, the iPhone 7 doesn't really look that different than the iPhone 6."

00:42:13   And for a long time now, the iPhone has been on the thing where they make a new case design,

00:42:19   then they put faster innards in it, then they make a new case design, then put faster innards in it,

00:42:23   and they're calling this the TikTok strategy. Unfortunately, now that Intel has left the TikTok

00:42:27   strategy and I have a solid grasp exactly on what is the Tik and what is the Tok,

00:42:30   really, they said, "Oh, the iPhone 7 will be as if it was TikTokTok when really it should be

00:42:38   talk tick tick it's confusing i know anyway the iphone 7 would really be another tick because

00:42:43   tick is the shrink and the shrink is the boring one where it's the same thing but they just put

00:42:46   it at a smaller size so and the talk is the exciting one the new architecture or whatever

00:42:51   anyway so the iphone 6 new form factor look different than its predecessor phone entirely

00:42:56   the iphone 6s looks like the 6 faster innards and the iphone 7 also kind of looks like the 6s with

00:43:03   with faster innards.

00:43:05   And the angle on the story is that this is a new three year

00:43:08   cycle for phones, that they're not going to do

00:43:10   the every other year thing.

00:43:11   They're slowing down a little bit, possibly permanently

00:43:14   or possibly just because the iPhone 8 will be like

00:43:18   the 10 year anniversary of the iPhone.

00:43:20   And the rumors about that one are like it's edge to edge

00:43:22   glass and it's super thin and it's glass all over.

00:43:25   And it looks like it's really radical and amazing.

00:43:27   And wouldn't it be great to have a 10 year anniversary

00:43:29   of the iPhone with just this amazing new design

00:43:31   that's something that no one ever thought of.

00:43:33   So maybe the iPhone 7 year, this year,

00:43:36   is gonna be a kind of boring year for a change

00:43:39   where yeah, it's gonna be faster and cool

00:43:41   and have different antenna lines

00:43:42   and maybe some different colors

00:43:44   and all the great stuff that we love

00:43:46   and the big one will have two cameras

00:43:47   and do all cool things.

00:43:49   But next year is the big one

00:43:50   where the phone is gonna look totally different

00:43:52   and it's gonna blow your mind

00:43:53   'cause the Touch ID sensor will be integrated

00:43:54   into the screen and it won't have any frame around the glass

00:43:57   and who knows what the heck else it'll have.

00:44:00   And I'm not quite sure how I feel about that

00:44:02   'cause I have a six and I skipped the 6S

00:44:05   and I was thinking of getting a seven,

00:44:06   but if the seven looks the same

00:44:07   and if I know the eight is gonna be

00:44:08   the crazy 10 year anniversary one,

00:44:10   this is gonna be like my Mac Pro all over again.

00:44:12   Am I gonna keep this iPhone 6?

00:44:13   - Oh God.

00:44:13   - The first and only iPhone I've ever owned,

00:44:15   how long am I gonna keep using this?

00:44:16   'Cause you know what, my iPhone 6 is fine.

00:44:19   Like it's still good, I still like it.

00:44:22   The battery life is still decent.

00:44:23   - You're accustomed to using crappy iPod Touch hardware,

00:44:26   John, trust me, we need to teach you

00:44:30   as a first time iPhone owner,

00:44:31   We need to teach you how to be an iPhone owner.

00:44:33   - I need to get one every two years.

00:44:34   I need to get one every year

00:44:35   if I wanna be like you crazy people.

00:44:36   - You're a tech podcaster.

00:44:38   Just get one every year.

00:44:39   It's part of your job.

00:44:39   - Yeah, I agree.

00:44:41   - My wife has a 6S Plus.

00:44:43   I see that it's faster and everything.

00:44:45   It's also giant, but I don't know.

00:44:48   I don't think I need a new phone every,

00:44:49   I'll think about it.

00:44:50   - You do.

00:44:51   At least every two.

00:44:53   - At least every two.

00:44:54   But then if I get the 7,

00:44:56   then when the 10-year anniversary one comes out

00:44:58   and it's awesome, I'll be even more resistant to getting it.

00:45:01   I don't know, I really have to think about this.

00:45:02   I really have to see what the seven is like.

00:45:03   - When you get the 6SS, or whatever went through that

00:45:07   this year-- - I don't think they're

00:45:08   gonna go with SS, just off the top of my head.

00:45:11   - Yeah, let's hope not.

00:45:12   So when you get the one that comes out this year,

00:45:16   and then next year, just one year later,

00:45:18   an amazing new one comes out, get that one too.

00:45:21   - I don't know. - You're a tech podcaster,

00:45:23   this is what we do.

00:45:24   - Yeah, that's the thing, like I always wanted to go

00:45:27   on the annual cycle and could never justify it to myself,

00:45:29   And then it occurred to me, we do make a little bit of money off of this show.

00:45:34   It is sponsored for a reason.

00:45:36   And you know what?

00:45:37   $1,000 or $1,500 or however much a damn iPhone is these days.

00:45:40   Where are you getting your iPhone?

00:45:42   What the hell?

00:45:43   No, they're like, is there like $800 now?

00:45:45   I don't even know.

00:45:46   He's factoring in the cost of the data plan.

00:45:47   Yeah, totally.

00:45:48   That's what it was.

00:45:49   Oh yeah, okay.

00:45:50   Yeah, but anyway.

00:45:51   No, but the point is, you know, even a well-equipped iPhone, you know, it's, what is it, like $800

00:45:57   with that?

00:45:58   It's $900.

00:45:59   So once a year, I think I can afford that,

00:46:03   and I do consider it to be part of the job

00:46:05   of doing this podcast.

00:46:06   And I don't think that's true of everyone.

00:46:08   Like Erin, I've offered to get her a new phone

00:46:11   on off years for her, and she's,

00:46:12   "Meh, I don't think I really need it."

00:46:14   And that's fine, I don't think that's a bad thing.

00:46:15   Before the podcast, I wanted it, but I never did it.

00:46:19   But John, you make a few dollars from the show, it's time.

00:46:23   - Isn't this why we do the podcast?

00:46:25   - My wife has this year's phone,

00:46:27   she has a 5k iMac, she's all swanky and the fancy new hardware. I'm the one with the,

00:46:33   on the other hand, I have been buying more games recently, so that's how I spoil myself.

00:46:38   - I mean, it is the polite thing to do as the tech podcaster to make sure that the other

00:46:43   members of your family are adequately set up with good technology. So you're doing that

00:46:48   part right, but you do have to think of yourself as well here. You don't buy an iPhone and

00:46:53   sit on it for three years because the next one might be good.

00:46:55   - Well anyway, my particular use aside,

00:46:58   what do you guys think of having an off year

00:47:02   where they just kind of cruise with another S revision

00:47:06   while we wait for what we hope will be an amazing new one?

00:47:08   Do you think that's a good idea, a bad idea?

00:47:10   Can they lower the price if they do that?

00:47:12   Can they get their margins up?

00:47:13   Like why is this something that Apple would do?

00:47:15   - I mean, let's think about it.

00:47:16   First of all, as a huge disclaimer here,

00:47:19   what we're really talking about is an external case design.

00:47:24   Like every new generation of iPhone has been

00:47:26   a substantial upgrade from the one before it so far.

00:47:29   You know, the ones that have the S on the end

00:47:32   look about the same or exactly the same,

00:47:35   but they still have really significant upgrades.

00:47:37   All of them have.

00:47:38   So what we're talking about here,

00:47:41   if they actually do what this rumor might say,

00:47:44   they're really just saying like, you know,

00:47:45   we're not gonna change the case this time.

00:47:47   You know, normally we would have changed the case this time,

00:47:50   but you know, now we're going to give it another year

00:47:53   and change the case next year.

00:47:55   That matters a lot less, really,

00:47:56   than everything else all told.

00:47:58   I mean, granted, sometimes the case changes come

00:48:00   with things like screen size changes,

00:48:02   which is nice and important,

00:48:04   but ultimately I think it's not that big of a deal.

00:48:08   As long as they have a good set of iPhone guts,

00:48:13   as long as it's a good phone and it's a decent upgrade

00:48:16   from the 6S in important ways,

00:48:19   like if the rumors are true

00:48:20   that the camera's getting a lot better,

00:48:22   especially on the plus size one,

00:48:23   then that's a big deal, you know?

00:48:25   So it all depends on what else they upgrade.

00:48:27   If it's a compelling upgrade for the privileged of us

00:48:31   who upgrade every year, that all talk about

00:48:33   how good it is or how good it isn't, it'll be fine.

00:48:35   If it's a compelling upgrade for all the people

00:48:37   who still have two and three year old phones

00:48:39   to want to upgrade now instead of waiting

00:48:41   for the crazy rumor to all glass one next year or whatever,

00:48:43   that's good for them too.

00:48:45   I do think though, given the state of iPhone sales

00:48:48   and being, you know, the growth is slowing

00:48:51   and they're under all this scrutiny now,

00:48:53   I do think the timing of this is not good.

00:48:55   Obviously this was probably decided

00:48:58   before these quarterly results came in,

00:49:00   but certainly the timing of an appearance

00:49:04   of them slowing down or not trying as hard,

00:49:07   whether or not they actually are slowing down,

00:49:10   and no matter how hard they are trying,

00:49:12   it will appear as though they're slacking off

00:49:16   if they do this again.

00:49:16   So I'm totally up for it.

00:49:19   I don't really care for the six design that much,

00:49:21   but it's fine, it's good enough.

00:49:23   I care more about the way the phone works and the internals.

00:49:25   So I'll be okay, most of us will be okay.

00:49:28   People who buy the phones without doing a whole lot

00:49:30   of research will be okay.

00:49:32   But I think in the public eye, and for a lot of the press,

00:49:36   I think it will not be well received,

00:49:39   because people will think Apple is kind of phoning it in,

00:49:41   no pun intended.

00:49:43   - Well, there are potential upsides.

00:49:45   I can think of a couple upsides.

00:49:46   One, potentially, the battery life could be better,

00:49:49   because if they're not making it thinner,

00:49:50   like that's the rumor,

00:49:51   that not only will it look the same,

00:49:52   but that it'll essentially like the cases

00:49:53   will still fit and everything,

00:49:55   or at the very least it won't be any thinner.

00:49:57   They always go down in power

00:49:59   and find ways to eke out a little bit more power

00:50:01   from the components.

00:50:02   If they keep the same amount of battery,

00:50:04   battery life should be better there, right?

00:50:06   It will also presumably be cheaper for them to make

00:50:09   because they won't have to have new tooling and everything

00:50:11   and build those costs into the line of phones.

00:50:14   So they could either lower the price for consumers,

00:50:16   which would make them sell more,

00:50:18   or they could have higher margins on the ones they do sell.

00:50:20   So potentially, even though it could be boring aesthetically

00:50:23   and there could be stories written about how,

00:50:25   like you said, they're not really trying or whatever,

00:50:27   when it comes time to report results,

00:50:28   depending on which one of those levers they tried to pull,

00:50:30   they could have increased customer sat

00:50:32   because battery life is better,

00:50:34   they could have higher ASP

00:50:35   because it's cheaper for them to make them,

00:50:36   or they could have more sales

00:50:37   because they could actually sell it for a lower price,

00:50:40   or at least like adjust the prices,

00:50:41   like the top end one will still be the same price

00:50:43   'cause that would be a bad signal to send,

00:50:44   but they could mess with the prices.

00:50:46   And by the way, luckily it seems like I'm just believing what I want to believe.

00:50:50   But anyway, there were stories about the low end model still being 16 gigs and then there

00:50:53   were follow-up stories that said, "No, no, no, no, don't worry.

00:50:55   The bottom end will be 32."

00:50:56   If they make the bottom end 32, that will also increase customers that probably won't

00:51:00   increase their cost of goods any because people probably won't even sell them the stupid 16

00:51:04   gig chips anymore because it's insane.

00:51:07   So financially speaking, like in terms of what results they report and how many of these

00:51:11   these things they sell and everything,

00:51:14   another S revision could actually be really good for Apple

00:51:17   and really good for consumers,

00:51:18   especially if they actually do S stuff to it.

00:51:21   So the 6S, they tried to make less slippery,

00:51:23   like the outside is a little bit less slippery, right?

00:51:25   And they, you know, obviously upgrade all the components

00:51:28   and if there were any sort of manufacturing problems

00:51:30   with it, like it was a little bit bendy in the 6,

00:51:32   so they made the 6S stiffer.

00:51:33   If they keep doing that stuff,

00:51:35   like if this is yet another S where it's like,

00:51:38   it's, you know, it's even less slippery

00:51:40   and it's even stiffer

00:51:40   and we've made it lighter and it gets better battery life.

00:51:44   And of course the components are all, you know,

00:51:46   revised and faster and all this other good stuff.

00:51:49   This could really be like, they've never had three shots

00:51:52   at the same phone essentially before.

00:51:53   This could really be sort of a, you know,

00:51:57   a third attempt at building a iPhone 6 shaped phone

00:52:02   where they've learned so much from the past two years

00:52:04   of doing that, this will really be a great phone to buy.

00:52:07   But when you look at it from the outside,

00:52:08   it'll be boring.

00:52:09   and whatever the 10 year anniversary phone is,

00:52:12   however radical that is,

00:52:14   that in theory could have a bunch of weird problems,

00:52:17   but it will sell like hotcakes

00:52:18   'cause it'll be sexy and new and everything.

00:52:19   So I like breaking up cycles like this.

00:52:22   Any type of cycle you kind of get into,

00:52:24   it starts to feel like you're into a rut for a while.

00:52:27   I think there are a lot of potential upsides to this,

00:52:29   but if you're going for like glam and trying to wow people,

00:52:32   I'm thinking of like showing this on a stage.

00:52:34   Traditionally, showing the new iPhone has been,

00:52:38   especially when it's like an even year, whatever odd year,

00:52:41   like when we're expecting the big redesign

00:52:44   has been like, woo and ah.

00:52:46   I can't imagine that much oohing and ahhing

00:52:47   over the iPhone 7 except for maybe the dual camera thing

00:52:50   on the Plus stuff.

00:52:51   I guess we'll just have to save the oohing and ahhing

00:52:54   for the 10 year anniversary

00:52:55   and whatever that's gonna look like.

00:52:57   Ooh.

00:52:57   - Yeah, I agree.

00:53:00   I agree mostly with Marco

00:53:02   that I think that the fallout from the media will be ugly.

00:53:07   - Ugly.

00:53:08   - Well, and not just the media, the public.

00:53:10   You know, like Apple gets a lot of crap

00:53:11   from regular people, from the customers.

00:53:13   - That's true.

00:53:14   - Whenever they don't change the outside design.

00:53:16   It is not just like a couple articles

00:53:18   from like tech media trolls.

00:53:20   It's actually like people care about this.

00:53:23   - No, that's a good point.

00:53:24   And a lot of people say, "Oh, I'm holding on.

00:53:26   "I don't want to bother with an S.

00:53:27   "I want the new case."

00:53:29   And they say, "I'm holding on for the seven,"

00:53:30   or what have you.

00:53:32   I do think, I don't know if I'd go so far as to say

00:53:35   a good idea, but I'm not frustrated by it. And like I was saying a few minutes ago, I like that

00:53:42   my MacBook Pros over the last few years have been basically the same. They've gotten a little bit

00:53:47   thinner and a little bit lighter, but the battery life has kept about the same. They've gotten

00:53:51   faster, they've gotten better, they've gotten retina screens. It's a formula that works,

00:53:56   and I don't have a problem with just iterating on a formula that works. I think that there are

00:54:01   perhaps better choices of case design than the six, but I don't dislike it. And if the

00:54:07   formula works, I don't have a problem with them sticking with it, but the fallout from

00:54:11   the press and, to Marco's point a second ago, from regular people is just going to be intolerable.

00:54:17   And there will be a part of me that will be like, "Oh, that's sad that we're not getting

00:54:19   a new one this year." But in the grand scheme of things, I wouldn't be upset about it. So

00:54:24   I don't know, we'll see. It would be a very fascinating... It would be fascinating to

00:54:29   to see the reaction if they do have a 6SS.

00:54:33   - They're not gonna call it that though.

00:54:35   - No, certainly not, but whatever.

00:54:37   - And they can't call it 6S Plus, they already used

00:54:38   that name.

00:54:40   - Would they call it the 7 even if it looks the same?

00:54:41   I would guess so.

00:54:43   - To me, I think if they call it a 7,

00:54:45   that would make the negative reception even worse.

00:54:49   Like, you know, the negative superficial reaction

00:54:51   because people would be like, remember with like

00:54:53   the iPhone 5?

00:54:54   - It was the 4S, the 4S was the one that made everyone

00:54:56   lose their crap because it was like, whoa,

00:54:58   it's supposed to be the five and it's only a four

00:55:00   with a letter.

00:55:01   - Yeah, like I'm gonna wait for a five

00:55:03   and it was like this massively upgraded phone

00:55:05   with all this new stuff with Siri,

00:55:08   with way faster chip and everything.

00:55:10   - The 4S was a great phone too.

00:55:11   - It was an amazing, it was a great upgrade.

00:55:14   And yeah, and then everyone freaks out

00:55:18   'cause they didn't call it five.

00:55:19   - Well that's why I think they have to name it

00:55:20   the seven though.

00:55:21   They have to give it, like you can't,

00:55:22   if you do it the other way, it just reinforces the story.

00:55:25   You have to give it the seven 'cause they'll be like,

00:55:26   well it doesn't look that interesting

00:55:28   but the number is one bigger, so I guess it's new.

00:55:30   - I see the argument for that,

00:55:33   but I feel like that would make people even more mad

00:55:37   that they call this the seven,

00:55:39   it's the same as the last one.

00:55:40   I feel like that would make that worse.

00:55:43   - I think you gotta put the number,

00:55:46   because even if the story will then be

00:55:49   this doesn't justify the number seven,

00:55:51   not having the number seven is worse.

00:55:53   - Yeah, that's where I'm coming from.

00:55:54   - Because then you're buying into the story.

00:55:57   Anyway, they could just drop the letters

00:55:59   and say this is the new iPhone, or the numbers, rather.

00:56:02   - Here's how you solve this problem.

00:56:04   You ready?

00:56:04   One simple problem.

00:56:05   You call it the seven, and you change all three, four?

00:56:10   You change all four colors.

00:56:12   - Yeah.

00:56:13   - You can even call them the same names

00:56:15   and just make all of them lighter or darker.

00:56:17   Just make them all look different, visibly different.

00:56:19   - Blue Dalmatian and flower power, it's time.

00:56:22   - Yeah.

00:56:22   - Steven Hackett has finally had his day.

00:56:26   Honestly, I would love cool colored iPhones personally,

00:56:28   but even if you keep the same colors that you offer now,

00:56:32   like the names, just change them all.

00:56:34   Make the phone look visibly different,

00:56:37   even if it's the exact same stupid case,

00:56:39   the exact same design, make everything that matters,

00:56:44   make it all like the same physically,

00:56:45   but make it just look different

00:56:47   and people will be happy with that.

00:56:48   - Just so you can still call it space gray though,

00:56:50   because everything is called space gray,

00:56:52   even though all the grays are entirely different.

00:56:54   - How many space grays have there been?

00:56:56   about 14. Oh goodness. Now I don't know, we'll see what happens, but it'll be an interesting

00:57:01   fall if that's the case. And I don't know, there's a large part of me that thinks maybe

00:57:08   just slowing down isn't a bad thing. I mean, the three of us especially keep talking about

00:57:13   how Apple stretched so thin and how they've got so much going on. Now granted, that's

00:57:19   usually about software, but still, it may be nice for Apple to have a rebuilding year.

00:57:24   that may not be such a terrible thing.

00:57:26   - And Wall Street just imploded.

00:57:27   I mean, nobody should suggest that the way for Apple

00:57:32   to slow down is to release the iPhone less often.

00:57:35   (laughing)

00:57:37   Oh my God, all right, Casey, you should not direct Apple.

00:57:40   Sorry, I mean, in all fairness, neither should I,

00:57:43   but still, that's the one option they should not do.

00:57:47   - Well, I mean, sure, for the purpose of Wall Street,

00:57:49   which granted is kind of the purpose

00:57:51   for that entire company existing,

00:57:52   is to please Wall Street in many ways, but I don't know.

00:57:55   It would just be cool to see them breathe for a second

00:57:59   and take a breath and make the iPhone 8

00:58:03   even more amazing than we ever could have imagined.

00:58:05   - They should call it the iPhone 10.

00:58:07   They're gonna skip eight and nine and call it the iPhone 10

00:58:09   because it'll be the 10-year anniversary.

00:58:11   They could use Roman numerals if they want.

00:58:12   They'll take the Roman numeral away

00:58:13   from the Mac operating system and give it to the iPhone.

00:58:15   - There you go.

00:58:17   - Conservation of Xs.

00:58:18   - Oh, God.

00:58:19   - And you have everybody saying iPhone X instead of iPhone 10.

00:58:22   No, they should actually call it iPhone X.

00:58:24   Like it's not a Roman numeral, it's the capital letter X.

00:58:27   Confused yet?

00:58:28   Wait till we hear your name more stuff.

00:58:30   - iPhone times.

00:58:32   - Yeah, you don't remember the very brief OS X days.

00:58:35   Do you remember that?

00:58:36   - What?

00:58:37   No.

00:58:38   - The capital O, capital S, space capital X.

00:58:41   That there was for like 15 minutes,

00:58:43   that was gonna be what they called,

00:58:46   I forget if it was like the shared operating system

00:58:49   between the Mac and the phone.

00:58:50   when they dropped iPhone OS and they were like iPhone runs OS 10. Do you remember that

00:58:55   part of the presentation? Yeah, during the initial iPhone, yeah. Yeah, they didn't say

00:58:59   the iPhone ran Mac OS 10. iPhone runs OS 10. Right, and in the literature, briefly, and

00:59:08   in Apple's press releases, there was a thing called capital L, capital S, space capital

00:59:12   X. It was not referring to the Mac operating system. Later they would rename the Mac operating

00:59:17   system to that, drop the Mac, and that didn't last very long. I think it was maybe a miscommunication

00:59:21   or they changed their mind about the branding, but it was an exciting day or two there.

00:59:27   It would be an amazing troll of John Gruber if they switched to Roman numeral numbering

00:59:30   for the iPhones.

00:59:32   That would be...

00:59:33   No, people can't handle a Roman numeral. Although, when you do get up into the high numbers,

00:59:39   you do have to do something, because the iPhone 17, I don't know, it just doesn't have the

00:59:43   same ring to it. But they're fine for a while.

00:59:46   to start using yours, iPhone 95.

00:59:48   - No, no, Microsoft has tainted that whole naming scheme.

00:59:51   - Forever.

00:59:52   - Yeah, really, it's not like,

00:59:54   it was a good idea when they had it,

00:59:56   it served them well,

00:59:57   but now everyone who uses it is associated with like,

01:00:00   Windows operating system and Office and all those stuff,

01:00:02   even Office dropped it for 365.

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01:01:47   (upbeat music)

01:01:50   - Apple almost bought Time Warner.

01:01:54   - I wouldn't say that.

01:01:56   - Or maybe, possibly.

01:01:58   - According to this rumor story,

01:02:00   I like the fact that it involves ADQ

01:02:02   'cause now I have, well, not really a new image of him,

01:02:05   but reinforcements of old image from that cover story

01:02:08   when he was at the basketball game.

01:02:10   Oh, God, did you see that?

01:02:12   I made a video of him yelling his excitement

01:02:15   to his favorite player's face.

01:02:16   Anyway, according to this rumor from the Financial Times,

01:02:21   Eddy Cue was all, "We should buy Time Warner.

01:02:23   What do you guys think?"

01:02:24   And it didn't really go anywhere,

01:02:26   and Apple didn't buy Time Warner,

01:02:28   but the fact that it was floated as an idea

01:02:30   and was vaguely resulted in meetings according to this,

01:02:34   and that it was a thing that might be considered

01:02:37   kind of blends into the, we talked about it a couple weeks ago when we were talking about

01:02:42   Jason Sonnell's story about Apple should do something like Netflix and sponsor its own

01:02:45   content.

01:02:48   That type of stuff, Apple getting into the creative content business as, not as a middleman,

01:02:56   not as a distributor, not as a store, but as a creator of original content or at least

01:02:59   a funder of original content, I think that idea still has legs and I just think Apple

01:03:05   Apple hasn't quite figured out what to do about it, which is good that they're, you

01:03:09   know, considering all ideas and not quite sure, like it's bad to jump in with that.

01:03:14   Time Warner itself has such a weird history as a not a great, like there's not a good

01:03:20   precedent there for the AOL Time Warner merger, which was kind of a disaster.

01:03:23   I don't know if Apple wants to get in on that.

01:03:26   I don't know if they're the right company to buy.

01:03:27   They have HBO now and everything, right?

01:03:29   So you can kind of see where there's some value there.

01:03:33   But on the other hand, Netflix has sort of gone on its own.

01:03:36   Apple could buy Netflix.

01:03:38   So many things you can do when you have so much money piled up.

01:03:41   And maybe that's part of it.

01:03:42   Maybe it's like money burning a hole in their pocket.

01:03:43   They're trying to give it back to shareholders.

01:03:45   They're trying to buy back their own stock.

01:03:47   They're doing all sorts of things to try to make this pile of money not quite increase

01:03:52   at the same rate.

01:03:53   I think they've kind of leveled it off a little bit, the rate of increase.

01:03:55   But it's just so much money.

01:03:57   And if they're not going to buy Google, which they probably shouldn't really, and they're

01:04:01   not going to buy Nintendo.

01:04:02   Apparently they're not gonna buy TiVo.

01:04:04   Apparently we're never gonna talk about that.

01:04:06   Buying some company that owns the rights to a bunch of television shows

01:04:10   and has an existing system made to create original content,

01:04:15   it's not the worst idea in the world.

01:04:17   So even though this didn't go anywhere, assuming this rumoured story is true,

01:04:22   I like the idea that this is what Apple's considering doing with its money

01:04:26   instead of, say, I don't know, I'm actually more enthused about this

01:04:30   than the idea of them making a car, for instance.

01:04:32   - On the other hand, this was too bad

01:04:35   for even AOL to hold onto.

01:04:37   (laughing)

01:04:38   - Was it too bad for AOL, or was AOL too bad for Time Warner?

01:04:41   That was just--

01:04:42   - Yeah, good point, it could be either way, I guess.

01:04:44   I forgot.

01:04:44   But no, I mean, in the world of,

01:04:48   in the areas in which Apple competes now,

01:04:50   things that include online media services,

01:04:54   and possibly TV-related things,

01:04:57   you know, the Apple TV, you know, with people like Amazon playing hardball, which we can

01:05:02   get to, but there's not much to discuss. Having good original content is important.

01:05:08   It is strategically important. It is important for sales of your stuff and your devices.

01:05:11   It is important for potential subscription services that Apple might want to launch with

01:05:16   things like TV service or, you know, like a Netflix kind of service. So, it totally

01:05:21   makes sense why this is a plausible story and why it might make sense for Apple to do

01:05:26   something like this.

01:05:27   So, you know, this is the kind of thing, I mean, you know,

01:05:30   Apple is such a big company now.

01:05:33   If you look at what other companies this size do,

01:05:35   there's a lot of like big acquisitions and stuff

01:05:37   for strategic reasons, like that's totally normal.

01:05:39   And I know Apple doesn't work just like other big companies,

01:05:41   but, you know, there's gonna be some similarities there.

01:05:43   And we're in a big business world

01:05:46   with all this media stuff.

01:05:47   We, you know, we're in times where

01:05:50   lots of money's being thrown around

01:05:52   for very important things,

01:05:53   and a lot of power shifting going on,

01:05:56   a lot of high stakes going on,

01:05:57   stuff like this is gonna happen.

01:05:58   And it makes sense, and most of it is going to

01:06:02   be really boring for us to talk about,

01:06:05   or to think too much about, but, you know,

01:06:07   this is the world we live in now.

01:06:09   We're in the big leagues now,

01:06:10   we're in big company dealings.

01:06:12   Apple is no longer the scrappy underdog.

01:06:15   - I worry a little bit about the size of acquisitions.

01:06:18   I like it better when Apple is buying smaller companies,

01:06:21   especially when it comes for something

01:06:22   that can really change the character of a company

01:06:24   much as getting into the content business. I like the idea of Apple getting into the

01:06:29   content business as just one aspect of its ongoing strategy of selling digital television

01:06:35   movies, you know, all that kind of stuff. If you make a big acquisition with a company

01:06:41   that's not as big as Apple but is actually really big, how do you incorporate that, those

01:06:45   assets, all that intellectual property, all those employees, all those existing deals,

01:06:50   How do you incorporate that into Apple without it significantly changing the character of

01:06:55   the company?

01:06:56   So that's why I would say I would prefer smaller, more strategic purchases.

01:07:01   So for example, if Apple could just buy HBO and the things HBO owns, right?

01:07:06   Instead of all of Time Warner or even just buy Netflix, like, because I think the sizes

01:07:11   of their business and their entanglement are not credit spares.

01:07:14   "Hey, you should have bought TiVo, too late for that."

01:07:17   type of acquisitions I feel like don't threaten, don't threaten the character of Apple, won't

01:07:21   distract Apple from the important things it's already doing in businesses where it has a

01:07:25   lot of competition, but will give it table stakes to be part of the competition for,

01:07:31   you know, TV set-top puck boxes and having a value proposition. Why should you buy our

01:07:35   puck thing? Well, we have original content and that's why you should do this. And all

01:07:39   of this, as we've said many times in the past, get into the whole conflict of interest where,

01:07:45   You sell a Puck Box that lets me use the Netflix app, but you're also competing with Netflix

01:07:50   because you have your own subscription video service and you have your own original content?

01:07:54   How does that work?

01:07:56   I think that's unavoidable at this point.

01:07:58   It's the same way that Apple sells apps in the App Store, but also sells your apps in

01:08:01   the App Store.

01:08:02   And sometimes Apple's apps are free or cheaper than yours can be, to the point where Apple

01:08:08   is funding the development of its iWork suite with all the rest of the money it makes.

01:08:12   If you're going to try to compete with them,

01:08:14   you're not gonna be able,

01:08:15   you're not doing it on a level playing field,

01:08:17   but somehow everyone lives with the idea

01:08:19   that Apple sells software through its own app store

01:08:22   and also lives with the idea

01:08:23   that Apple doesn't always have to follow its own rules

01:08:25   and all these other things.

01:08:26   And we get along and it's not like everyone leaves in a huff.

01:08:28   It's harder to do that in music and movies and TV

01:08:30   because there are fewer players

01:08:31   and they're bigger and they're crankier.

01:08:34   But I think Apple can navigate that.

01:08:36   Again, especially since everybody's doing it these days.

01:08:38   Like it's just gonna be expected at some point.

01:08:42   And it also makes sense in light of Apple's apparent

01:08:46   inability to cut a reasonable deal for subscription video

01:08:49   service, which we know they wanted to do for a long time,

01:08:52   that they wanted to launch that with the Apple TV

01:08:53   and just couldn't and didn't.

01:08:56   This is another angle.

01:08:57   Well, if we can't figure out how we can license your content

01:08:59   and compete with cable or whatever,

01:09:00   we'll go the bootstrap Netflix route and say,

01:09:03   we'll still sell all the people's stuff,

01:09:06   but we're going to fund our own original content.

01:09:08   And really in the grand scheme of things,

01:09:09   funding your own original content,

01:09:11   couple hundred million dollars here and there

01:09:13   for a couple of TV shows and a movie or two,

01:09:14   that's peanuts for Apple.

01:09:16   They probably spend that much money,

01:09:18   like I don't wanna speculate about what the budgets are

01:09:21   at Apple because I would probably be way off base,

01:09:23   but in the grand scheme of things for a company

01:09:25   with hundreds of billions of dollars in the bank,

01:09:28   it's nothing and the potential upside is huge.

01:09:31   So yeah, I'm all for something happening here.

01:09:36   here. I am disappointed that this is just a rumor and that it was considered and nothing

01:09:40   happened. I'm disappointed there still is no TV subscription service, but I'm heartened

01:09:44   to hear that ideas like this are floating around, even if they do come from Medicue.

01:09:48   Well, because content is king here, you know? In so many ways, look at what people will

01:09:53   tolerate in terms of bad devices, bad apps, bad services, incredible expense, in order

01:10:02   to get specific content they're looking for. You know, the entire world of TV, cable, video,

01:10:10   movies, this is like everything is just dictated by like must-have content. And people are

01:10:15   willing to do crazy stuff like have cable TV, which if you think about it, is incredibly

01:10:21   hostile and terrible in so many different ways, but people are willing to do it for

01:10:26   specific content they get there. People are willing to, you know, even within the realm

01:10:30   of like iOS and Apple TV and stuff, people are willing to use horrible apps from other

01:10:35   companies in order to get must-have content. People are willing to pay big money. Look

01:10:39   how many people pay for HBO. I just subscribed to it. Whichever version of HBO doesn't require

01:10:43   the cable subscription, whether it's now or go, I forgot one of those. We subscribe to

01:10:48   that now. The app is horrible and we're paying $15 a month. I haven't paid a monthly fee

01:10:53   for television shows in almost 10 years. And now we're paying for this and using their

01:10:59   crappy app because there's stuff on there we really want to watch. People are willing

01:11:05   to make decisions like that. People are willing to use inferior apps to pay decent prices

01:11:12   to change entire platforms or to not use entire platforms like Apple TV or whatever because

01:11:17   of certain content that they get in other places. So it's very, very important for Apple

01:11:23   to play in that world.

01:11:26   If it's content that's keeping people away from Apple stuff

01:11:30   or that is making it less of a good proposition for people

01:11:34   or it's making it a worse experience for people

01:11:36   to go use other things,

01:11:38   Apple has to get into the content business.

01:11:41   So it makes total sense.

01:11:43   - So you hear that Eddie?

01:11:44   Go ahead and buy whatever companies you want.

01:11:46   You have our blessing.

01:11:47   - We say it's okay.

01:11:48   - Well you know just run it past me first

01:11:50   to give a thumbs up, thumbs down, obviously.

01:11:52   - Obviously.

01:11:53   But beyond that, yeah.

01:11:54   - All right, go ahead Eddie, have fun.

01:11:57   And if anything breaks, you know where to drive it.

01:11:59   Thanks a lot to our three sponsors this week,

01:12:01   Fracture, Casper, and Eero, and we will see you next week.

01:12:04   (upbeat music)

01:12:07   ♪ Now the show is over ♪

01:12:09   ♪ They didn't even mean to begin ♪

01:12:12   ♪ 'Cause it was accidental ♪

01:12:14   ♪ Accidental ♪

01:12:15   ♪ Oh, it was accidental ♪

01:12:16   ♪ Accidental ♪

01:12:18   ♪ John didn't do any research ♪

01:12:20   ♪ Marco and Casey wouldn't let him ♪

01:12:23   'Cause it was accidental (it was accidental)

01:12:25   It was accidental (accidental)

01:12:28   And you can find the show notes at ATP.fm

01:12:33   And if you're into Twitter, you can follow them

01:12:38   @caseyliss

01:12:42   So that's Casey Liss, M-A-R-C-O-A-R-M

01:12:47   Anti-Marco Armin S-I-R-A-C

01:12:52   USA, Syracuse It's accidental

01:12:56   Accidental They didn't mean to

01:13:00   Accidental Accidental

01:13:02   Tech podcast so long

01:13:07   Something big happened this past week.

01:13:11   Something happened this past week.

01:13:13   [laughter]

01:13:15   Season or series, 23 of Top Gear started and aired and began, etc.

01:13:21   The new Top Gear without our dear friends, Clarkson, Hammond, and May.

01:13:26   All three of us have watched it.

01:13:28   I didn't watch the whole thing. I told you I only watched the beginning.

01:13:30   I didn't have time to watch the rest of it.

01:13:32   Shut up.

01:13:33   No, you weren't. Well, what am I supposed to watch? I go to work, I come home, I make dinner, put the kids to bed, I do this.

01:13:37   [laughter]

01:13:38   You're the worst.

01:13:39   Well, I'm telling you, spoiler city now.

01:13:41   You said in the middle of the day when I'm at work, you said, "We should all watch Top Gear for tonight."

01:13:46   The middle of the day?

01:13:48   What time did you think I was supposed to watch this?

01:13:50   After you got home from work. Let's see what time the middle of the day was.

01:13:54   6.57 in the morning. 6.57 in the morning. I'd like to discuss the new Top Gear on the post show.

01:14:00   So Marco, if you haven't watched, please do so today. Marco, did you do your homework?

01:14:04   I did. He's unemployed.

01:14:06   Well, there's that, but we're also not allowed to give you homework because that's what the theme song says.

01:14:10   Yeah, anyway, I would have watched the rest of it if I had time, but I didn't know so how far did you get?

01:14:15   I thought I got through the first segment. I felt like that was enough. I'm gonna watch the rest of it to be fair

01:14:20   That's most of all you need so spoiler horn

01:14:23   will be a

01:14:26   Sounding horning whatever the word is I'm looking for we have the rights to use a spoiler horn

01:14:30   I don't even know you can use the spoiler dong. That's all in the family

01:14:33   Okay, so the spoiler spoiler dong has just gone off

01:14:39   I think that the new Top Gear, as I'll call it, shows a lot of promise.

01:14:45   I really, really honestly do.

01:14:47   Really?

01:14:47   And if you remember, you should—and this is a collective you, not you, Marco, not you, John, just anyone you—

01:14:55   if you really want to see a rough car show, go watch seasons one and two of the Top Gear that had Clarkson, Hammond, and May,

01:15:03   because they were borderline unwatchable. They were so bad.

01:15:08   Or the American Top Gear.

01:15:09   The American Top Gear, particularly in the beginning, was unwatchable.

01:15:13   I actually don't think it's bad, but...

01:15:16   Pretty bad.

01:15:17   I mean, to each their own.

01:15:19   As we've already established, I am not the arbiter of what's good and bad.

01:15:22   But, um...

01:15:23   But yeah, I mean, like, the first season of the Top Gear that we know

01:15:26   didn't even have James May.

01:15:27   It had Jason Dawes, I believe, who did, like, a used car segment

01:15:31   on every show or something like that.

01:15:32   I haven't seen it in many, many years.

01:15:34   But it was bad.

01:15:36   The studio audience had like 50 people in it or something like that because it seemed like nobody could be bothered with going to the set to be part of the filming.

01:15:43   It was rough.

01:15:44   This show, season 23, episode 1, similarly rough.

01:15:49   Chris Evans, I was expecting to love him because I'd heard just tons of chatter about how much of a car guy he is, a gearhead if you're American, a petrolhead if you're not.

01:16:00   I was excited to see him. He seemed like he really loved the brand, the brand.

01:16:04   Seemed like he really loved the opportunity. I hated Chris Evans so much.

01:16:09   Oh my god. Did you like him, Marco? I'm trying to think of what I liked about

01:16:15   this. About the show or about Chris Evans? Because I was just, I was just

01:16:20   concentrating on Chris Evans at the moment. Uh, no. The answer is no. What

01:16:24   you're looking for is no. Yeah, see, I love Clarkson. Like, he, Clarkson is

01:16:29   bombastic and loud and obnoxious and ridiculous but Chris Evans was just like

01:16:34   loud for the sake of loud I did not get it and I did not care for it now John

01:16:38   what did you think of Chris Evans I have never seen him before to my knowledge

01:16:43   before watching this show he struck me as an overexcited poor man Simon Pegg

01:16:47   and he didn't give me what I was looking for I'm looking for different things and

01:16:52   then you are certainly from from Top Gear again first show there's always

01:16:57   gonna be first show jitters first segment of first show i i give a lot of leeway i didn't get the

01:17:02   impression i i'm sure this is the case but it wasn't communicated to me uh his enthusiasm for

01:17:10   cars in general like enthusiasm was communicated but it seemed like non-genuine enthusiasm not

01:17:17   particularly focused on cars um and i guess like it's kind of rough comparing the old top gear

01:17:24   where all of the hosts were, had mellowed into their roles and could relax and just kind of be

01:17:30   themselves and had sort of established their personality. The old ones had sort of the,

01:17:34   the Gene Hackman school of acting as an interview. I saw Gene Hackman once where

01:17:39   someone was asking him about his acting technique and he says, if you're acting for a long enough

01:17:44   time and you're in enough movies and you're in enough things, you develop a certain poise based

01:17:49   on your years of experience and you pretty much know how things are going to go down.

01:17:53   and people interpret that poise as good acting. And so the hosts of the show, they've been doing

01:17:59   it long enough, they kind of know what their shticks are, and they do them in a relaxed manner,

01:18:04   and you become comfortable with it. And is it the case that the previous hosts were actually

01:18:10   wittier and more insightful about cars than these new ones? Maybe. But definitely they were more

01:18:16   relaxed and more assured in their sort of roles and personalities when it comes to their positions

01:18:22   on these cars or whatever and in general as you all know I don't like the silly stunt things they

01:18:26   do with cars I like the part where they pretend to review cars like as seriously as the show

01:18:31   possibly can that's what I like out of the show then I tolerate the parts where they play with

01:18:35   a giant soccer ball with a bunch of small cars I tolerate those barely so the first segment being a

01:18:42   combination of let's review the Viper ACR and let's also do some silly thing with Top Gun I didn't

01:18:47   like that combination, I didn't like any of the segments, and Chris Evans just seemed

01:18:51   overexcited about nothing. The only part that came away from that first segment liking

01:18:54   was the fact that the jet fire pilot got sick in the car.

01:18:58   Yeah, and Sabine is excellent. Like, she was relatively reserved, I thought, on this episode,

01:19:06   and I was disappointed that she got like three minutes of air time, but I'm super, super

01:19:11   excited to see more of her, because I've enjoyed any time she appeared on old Top Gear, if

01:19:15   well. I thought the segment was fairly cheesy, I agree, but I was happy that they started with

01:19:23   something American, which was surprising. You would figure they would just triple down on all

01:19:28   things British. And then Matt LeBlanc came out, and Matt LeBlanc had also been rumored to be a

01:19:35   huge gearhead petrolhead, and I wasn't sure what to make of him, and I actually really liked him.

01:19:43   And I can't figure out if it's because I'm American and I'm just predisposed to like other Americans on the show

01:19:48   But I really liked him

01:19:50   I thought he did a great job and and he was far away my favorite host of the basically three that they showed Sabine

01:19:57   Chris and Matt and I got it. I hate Chris Evans

01:20:00   Oh the other thing I noticed I actually jumped ahead the lap times that they used for the supercars

01:20:05   He actually rewrote all of Clarkson's little stickies or whatever and in Chris Evans's hand

01:20:12   which I thought was kind of funny. And I also thought the jabs at Clark's at

01:20:17   Hammond and May, like, they did make me giggle, but I don't, I don't know, I just

01:20:21   didn't think it was really necessary. Like, I forget what he said, but something

01:20:24   like, "Oh, we don't talk about catering on this show anymore. Ha ha ha!"

01:20:27   Yeah, I find most of that pretty cringe-worthy.

01:20:29   I feel like you do have to acknowledge it. Like, if you say nothing, it will seem

01:20:34   weird, but you have to do it. It's a tough line to walk, because you want to do it in a

01:20:37   way that is funny, but also respectful, but also acknowledges that I know, that

01:20:41   know that I know that this is weird and they didn't pull that off. I completely agree. Well said.

01:20:46   So yeah, so Matt LeBlanc I really liked. This segment with the two of them, the Reliant Robin,

01:20:51   like it was ostensibly US versus Britain, but they're in two British cars. Like it just served

01:20:56   no point to me and that I didn't care for at all. But everything took a terrible, terrible, terrible

01:21:02   turn when it was time for the guests. This was the most ridiculous, cringe-worthy, terrible interview

01:21:09   I've seen on top here. So the premise was they were having like a competition between Gordon Ramsay and

01:21:15   Jesse something rather the dude who played Zuckerberg on the social network and

01:21:20   They were like I said, thank you

01:21:23   They were talking about like oh who had the best first car and who had like the best

01:21:30   Current car and it I just thought it was terrible

01:21:35   That sounds like a good--I haven't seen the segment, but that sounds like a good premise for an interview.

01:21:40   Like, wouldn't it be fun to have celebrities on and have them compete over those type of car-related things?

01:21:44   But I guess they didn't do it well.

01:21:47   No. I think if the roles were reversed, I would have said the same thing, but having seen it, I thought it was terrible.

01:21:54   What did you think, Marco?

01:21:56   Hmm. Where do I begin?

01:21:58   [laughs]

01:22:00   - I mean, so to be fair, I started watching this

01:22:04   at 8 p.m. or 7.45.

01:22:06   - So you had to fast forward a little bit.

01:22:09   - So I knew I was gonna have to fast forward

01:22:11   through parts, and this was fine,

01:22:13   because for old Top Gear, I would always fast forward

01:22:16   through the British celebrity interview

01:22:19   and the star of the reasonably priced car segments,

01:22:21   because they were just too slow for me,

01:22:23   I would always fast forward through those,

01:22:24   and usually I didn't know the people, so it was fine.

01:22:27   So I gave the show the same courtesy,

01:22:29   because I started watching a little bit of it

01:22:31   to give it a chance and it was so bad.

01:22:33   It just dragged on so poorly.

01:22:36   In general, one of my main complaints

01:22:38   about what I saw so far, and granted only episode one,

01:22:42   but one of my main complaints is that it seems like

01:22:46   both the writing and the editing

01:22:48   have gotten substantially worse.

01:22:51   And that was made very clear in every part of the show,

01:22:54   but especially in the interview,

01:22:56   where it's like, it was clear that a lot of these things

01:22:59   are scripted that they're saying,

01:23:01   they're trying to make it seem like it's not scripted.

01:23:05   It kind of flowed in many ways similarly to

01:23:09   the Tim Cook Bono skit before the finger touch,

01:23:14   where it's like, it's so painfully obvious

01:23:16   that it's scripted, and they're trying so hard

01:23:19   to make it seem like it's not,

01:23:20   and doing a really poor job of it.

01:23:23   That's how a lot of this felt to me.

01:23:25   The interview, the bits, the challenge in quotes,

01:23:29   whatever challenges were going on in reality,

01:23:32   it all just seemed like it was really forced.

01:23:36   It seemed like everybody was reading badly written cue cards

01:23:40   and having trouble seeing them.

01:23:42   I mean, it was, it was so rough in so many ways.

01:23:47   And the fundamental problem I have with this

01:23:52   is that they walked right into the shoes

01:23:57   of a show where the show had really moved beyond

01:24:01   its initial premise of basically like a boring

01:24:04   BBC show about cars.

01:24:06   It had moved beyond that into these three

01:24:09   particular people who had great chemistry,

01:24:12   great personalities, who had years to develop

01:24:15   into this chemistry and into these personalities

01:24:18   and into this show.

01:24:20   And the show that was really about them

01:24:23   and about their chemistry together,

01:24:26   the things they did together, them being funny together,

01:24:29   being, you know, making fun of each other

01:24:30   and doing things together, it was really all about them.

01:24:33   It wasn't really about the cars.

01:24:34   Sorry, John.

01:24:35   And so it has taken that, removed them,

01:24:39   and then they tried to just keep it going in the same way

01:24:44   with a completely different cast

01:24:46   and some minor variation on the formula,

01:24:48   not much variation.

01:24:50   And I just don't see that working,

01:24:52   because what you have now is all these people

01:24:56   who clearly have no previous experience with each other,

01:25:00   or at least not enough to matter,

01:25:03   trying to take a role of a show that depended so heavily

01:25:08   on chemistry and on long-established personalities,

01:25:11   I just don't see how that's going to work, and it doesn't.

01:25:16   Hopefully the show will develop over time

01:25:18   into something people care about.

01:25:21   But the way it is now, I don't see that happening

01:25:24   because I think what took it from that old,

01:25:28   boring British car show and turned it into

01:25:31   the worldwide phenomenon that it was,

01:25:34   was that it went beyond just talking about the cars

01:25:37   and doing skits with cars.

01:25:39   And it went into something that was way more mass appeal

01:25:43   and could appeal to people who only like cars a little bit

01:25:45   or barely even cared about cars at all,

01:25:48   but were just entertained by the show.

01:25:50   The new show doesn't do that.

01:25:51   The new show is, it kind of reminds me,

01:25:56   or it has shown me how little I care about cars.

01:26:00   Because I had no interest in almost anything they did.

01:26:06   I realized what I was actually watching for all this time

01:26:09   was the cast, and not this cast.

01:26:13   Maybe over time, as they're trying too hard

01:26:17   to be old Top Gear, there have been other things

01:26:21   in the past that have started off this poorly

01:26:23   and have gotten better.

01:26:25   I think the most direct, clear example of this

01:26:28   is the US version of The Office,

01:26:30   where the first couple of episodes were direct clones

01:26:34   of the British Office show with a whole different cast

01:26:37   and trying to be that, and they were terrible.

01:26:40   They were just so bad.

01:26:42   And eventually, maybe like one or two seasons in,

01:26:45   the show kind of grew into its own and became its own thing

01:26:48   because it stopped trying to be the old show.

01:26:50   And it became its own thing and it ended up becoming,

01:26:53   I think, one of the best shows that's ever been on TV.

01:26:56   And so, this, I hope this does that.

01:27:00   I don't have incredibly high hopes that it will

01:27:03   based on what I've seen so far, but I hope it does

01:27:05   because it just, so much of it just didn't work for me

01:27:11   at all, I mean, it just seemed so forced,

01:27:15   so badly acted, badly edited, badly written,

01:27:19   badly conceived, and it's like you have this massive budget

01:27:23   and not enough talent to use it right.

01:27:25   - Well, this is only episode one, though,

01:27:27   I mean, and like Casey said, if you're gonna think

01:27:29   of an example of a show that started off bad

01:27:30   in episode one, according to Casey, Top Gear did.

01:27:32   Like, I give them, I'm gonna give them some time

01:27:36   to settle in, although I wish I hadn't read the stories

01:27:39   skim the stories about like who's feuding with who on the show because it seemed to

01:27:44   me that from the first shot that Matt LeBlanc does not like the fake Simon Pegg guy.

01:27:50   I don't know if those are the two people who were supposed to be feuding.

01:27:54   They were, I believe.

01:27:55   But that's not a good start.

01:27:58   If your show is going to be based on the chemistry and camaraderie, what are we going to say

01:28:02   say about the badly behaved, slightly eccentric, and all around strange old hosts of Top Gear,

01:28:10   they seem to all pretty much get along with each other as evidence from the fact that

01:28:13   they had some amount of solidarity to sort of stick to their jerky face punching non-steak

01:28:19   eater guy when he got kicked off the show.

01:28:21   So I think they all get along with each other, at least in their working relationship, and

01:28:28   that came through on the show, that they mostly enjoyed being together and doing the show

01:28:34   together. And I think you need that. If a show is going to be based on chemistry, you

01:28:37   need that. And even though the show is not about the cars in terms of like gearhead type

01:28:40   things where they're going to tell you about tech specs and get all into the nitty-gritty

01:28:45   of the testing and stuff, I think everyone on that show had an enthusiasm for cars that

01:28:50   came through in the cars that they reviewed. Like each person would review a particular

01:28:54   car and they would do the voiceovers and I'm assuming they had a lot of influence on how

01:28:58   how the segment was put together and structured.

01:29:00   And that came through in the reviews.

01:29:01   And it's not like I read car magazines

01:29:03   for the more in-depth reviews and stuff.

01:29:04   It's not like that's what I'm looking for.

01:29:06   I was looking for basically the same reason

01:29:07   you read like a columnist or whatever,

01:29:09   like three individual people whose personalities

01:29:11   I'd come to know talking about cars

01:29:13   that they have interesting things to say about,

01:29:15   that they're interested in,

01:29:16   whether they like them or not,

01:29:17   or they're into them or they're not into them.

01:29:18   They always had an interesting angle on the cars.

01:29:20   And I felt like the segments were put together well,

01:29:23   edited well, and it sort of like,

01:29:25   it was like a coherent vision of it.

01:29:27   James May review is very different from a Jeremy Clarkson review and and all the different cars were the reviews are different from each other and

01:29:33   And that's what I enjoyed out of the show and I haven't even gotten to well

01:29:37   I don't have I gotten to the car view segment was that ACR thing it

01:29:39   But you know I finished the episode is there anything more in there for me not really

01:29:43   Well anyway episode one I give them lots of leeway in the meantime

01:29:47   I will try out the whatever whatever the hell it's called the Amazon thing those guys are doing a lot unfortunately

01:29:53   Grand Tour. If they're not reviewing cars at all, maybe I'll be not too excited about that either. Yeah, I think that Marco really

01:30:01   took the words right out of my mouth that when they the rare occasions when they didn't try to just follow the exact formula I

01:30:08   Thought it actually went reasonably well

01:30:10   The star in a reasonably priced car is now star in a rallycross car. I think they called it

01:30:15   so it was like a rally mini and

01:30:18   part of the track for the purpose of the stars is an off-road segment which at first I was like really and then

01:30:25   Actually, I was like I watched a little more thought you know what this is pretty good. They're trying something different

01:30:30   They're they're trying something new. I'm okay with this. I thought the

01:30:33   US versus UK segments with Matt and and Chris

01:30:38   After the star in a reasonably reasonably priced car

01:30:42   So once they got into the the Willys Jeep and the and the Range Rover Land Rover Land Cruiser. I always get it wrong

01:30:49   I'm sorry. It's all a mash mash up in my head doesn't matter. It's only a British thing, right? Whatever

01:30:54   It's only a British car. They never matter. Yeah, never at all

01:30:57   God, we're gonna get so much email about this because I know they were like the most popular off-road car in the world

01:31:03   We know etc. Blah blah blah. The point is all the people who own British cars don't listen to this

01:31:06   They're they're busy fixing their cars. Oh

01:31:09   Shots fired in any case that segment. I actually enjoyed I thought that was that was really good

01:31:15   I thought Matt segment on the air on the off-road aerial aerial Adam

01:31:17   I thought that was really good the things that bothered me the most about those two segments were exactly what Marco said earlier that

01:31:24   Even though if you really look closely at old top gear you could tell it was scripted and maybe for some people you didn't even

01:31:30   Have to look close, but for me. I was so caught up in the entertainment of it

01:31:34   I didn't really think about it, and then you look closely and you realize oh wow this is totally scripted

01:31:38   It was so obvious here how scripted it was and where it was

01:31:43   Completely clear that it was that it they were trying to follow the script

01:31:48   It just made it rough

01:31:49   But all that said I do think the hosts with the exception of Chris Evans have a lot of promise

01:31:55   I'm hoping Chris Evans gets his act together and lives up to the expectation I had because he is so well regarded as a radio host

01:32:03   and that's the other thing the other reason I hated the interview because

01:32:07   He was interviewing people on the radio for decades and yet it was such a rough interview

01:32:11   But anyway, I do think it shows a lot of promise. I thought the cinematography was still really really really good

01:32:16   Maybe I'm easily amused, but I thought that was still

01:32:20   Completely up to snuff and I really feel like if we give them time this will end up

01:32:27   Okay, the other thing I should point out is that they did another show called extra gear

01:32:32   Which is kind of like a behind-the-scenes thing. That's only about half an hour. Yeah, this was curious

01:32:36   I didn't see this yet, but I've been so I'd I'd really prefer not to have spoilers if you don't mind

01:32:42   But I have heard it was very very good and Chris Harris who was one of the hosts of that

01:32:48   at least this episode of

01:32:50   extra gear I

01:32:52   Really like because he had a YouTube series for a long time or a couple of YouTube series

01:32:56   That were excellent. And so I'm really looking forward to seeing Chris Harris on top gear

01:33:04   Without spoiling it was extra gear good. I take it you had the time to watch it Marco

01:33:08   So I had to do a lot of skipping through because I was trying to fit it in before this show

01:33:13   so I did I had you a lot of skipping but I

01:33:15   Will say that I had a way higher Tiff and I both had had similarly low opinions of of the main show

01:33:23   And we both had similarly promising opinions of extra gear where extra gear is a different cast almost entirely

01:33:31   It's it's Sabine Schmidt the it's it's what's the guy's name Matt Chris Harris?

01:33:37   Oh, yeah, that show was I think

01:33:41   Substantially more promising it was kind of like an after-dark behind-the-scenes kind of thing

01:33:46   But they they also did like some original bits here or some original things here and there

01:33:50   It's it's clearly like a way lower budget thing

01:33:54   And you this is clearly like the B team in like celebrity rankings

01:34:00   I guess like that whatever politics led to them choosing these weird people for the main show, but to me

01:34:06   That has a way better chance of developing into something good than the main show does because those hosts are not only I thought

01:34:14   substantially better and their enthusiasm for cars is more obvious and clear and and is is

01:34:20   Better integrated into the show, but they're doing like less goofy crap because it there there

01:34:28   the role of that show is not to have like a fighter jet

01:34:33   fly around, it's like all the goofy crap the main show did,

01:34:37   Extra Gear didn't.

01:34:39   And it was people, it was what you want the main show

01:34:43   to be in many ways, which is three people who are very

01:34:47   passionate about cars, who know a lot about it,

01:34:49   and can talk well about them in a seemingly

01:34:53   less scripted way or unscripted way

01:34:56   compared to the main show.

01:34:58   So honestly, I think that Extra Gear is the better show,

01:35:01   and when you see Extra Gear, it kind of makes you wonder

01:35:05   why they didn't just make these people

01:35:07   the hosts of the main show.

01:35:09   - Hmm, that's too bad.

01:35:10   Well, I mean, I'm excited to watch it even more so now,

01:35:12   but that's too bad that that's the way

01:35:14   the hosting shook out, you know, kind of played out.

01:35:17   So did you like Matt LeBlanc or not really?

01:35:20   - Honestly, no, I really didn't like him or Chris Evans.

01:35:24   Yeah, I didn't like either of them.

01:35:25   I mean, I saw, obviously I saw Matt LeBlanc in Friends,

01:35:28   I haven't really followed his work since then,

01:35:30   but I didn't really, I had a fairly neutral opinion

01:35:33   going in, I never saw the other guy.

01:35:35   But I thought both of them were pretty painful, honestly.

01:35:39   It was hard to watch, it was very hard to watch,

01:35:42   because I thought they were both doing such a mediocre job

01:35:47   reading, doing things and reading things

01:35:50   that were written in mediocrity.

01:35:54   And it just, it was not, my position on this show is now,

01:35:59   I'm just gonna let you keep watching it

01:36:04   and you tell me when it gets good.

01:36:06   Because I have zero interest in seeing any more episodes

01:36:09   of this show until everyone else has decided

01:36:12   that this has become good.

01:36:14   - Yeah, we'll see how it goes.

01:36:15   I'm curious to see.

01:36:17   I am hopeful, I'm excited that we have two shows to watch.

01:36:23   There was Fifth Gear back in the day. That actually just got cancelled.

01:36:27   Which I used to watch when I could, and it was a much more serious motoring show,

01:36:34   so it might have been much more up John's alley.

01:36:37   But it was never quite the same as Top Gear. It was always kind of an also-ran.

01:36:43   I'm hopeful that the Grand Tour, the new Top Gear, if you will, with the original three hosts,

01:36:50   I'm hopeful that's really good, and I'm hopeful that Amazon treats it right.

01:36:54   And I'm also hopeful that they get their act together on the actual new Top Gear that we

01:37:00   spent all this time discussing, because I really do think there's promise there, but

01:37:05   man, it was rough, this first one.

01:37:09   We'll see.

01:37:10   - I think there's a reason why we've seen all these different spin-offs and clones and

01:37:16   and everything of this show,

01:37:18   and none of them have taken off.

01:37:20   There's a reason for that.

01:37:22   And what we have now is basically

01:37:24   just another top-year clone or spinoff.

01:37:27   I don't think it's going to go very far.

01:37:29   I think it will probably be canceled

01:37:31   within maybe three to five years at most.

01:37:34   And I think whatever Clarkson and May and Hammond do

01:37:39   is going to be what we are mostly paying attention to.

01:37:43   But we will see.

01:37:45   Yeah, but I'm hopeful. I mean, I agree with nearly everything you said, but I am hopeful.

01:37:49   And Jon, you should watch the rest of the episode now that we've spoiled it, just so you can see and decide whether we are trying to shine a turd or if it's actually really just a diamond in the rough.

01:38:02   I will. And the extra gear thing, is that on after it? Like, when is that supposed to be--or is it web-only or something?

01:38:09   I believe it was on after I think you can get it on BBC America or if you have a friend that might have acquired

01:38:14   It you might be able to get it off of his

01:38:16   Plex or Synology perhaps possibly maybe yeah, it's right next to the main show on Casey's Plex server John

01:38:23   That's that's how I might have seen it. Are they are they airing them and I get BBC America

01:38:28   Are they airing them in real time on BBC America? Not real time. I think it was

01:38:33   Monday that they aired on BBC America because the show airs on Sunday evenings on the actual

01:38:39   Oh, but it's not delayed by like a week or anything. It's like a day off.

01:38:43   That's correct. Or at least that's the way it was this week. And I don't know how much

01:38:48   time was allotted to it on BBC America. The chat room is saying that it will be consistently

01:38:55   on Monday nights on BBC America. But I'm not sure if they're going to do the thing that

01:39:01   they used to do where they cut it down and add commercial. So the runtime is actually

01:39:05   an hour on the BBC.

01:39:07   Honestly, that would be doing it a favor.

01:39:09   - Well, potentially.

01:39:10   But yeah, so they used to cut out scenes

01:39:14   and also change the music,

01:39:15   which that was another thing I meant to bring up.

01:39:17   The music, I didn't notice any of the music on that episode,

01:39:22   which is peculiar because usually the music on Top Gear

01:39:25   is excellent.

01:39:27   And a friend of mine, the guy who got me into Top Gear,

01:39:31   actually said to me that he doesn't think

01:39:33   they actually licensed any actual songs.

01:39:36   like popular songs to use on the episode, they just found like the the the oral equivalent of

01:39:43   Stock photography in order to fill out the episode and I haven't watched back since he said that I might be wrong

01:39:49   He might be wrong. But um

01:39:51   But yeah, I'm curious to see whether or not that's true

01:39:54   And anyway, I bring that up because in the BBC America version they didn't have the rights to all these songs for anywhere

01:39:59   But the UK so they would change all the music and it would be crappier

01:40:01   They would cut it down from an hour to 42 minutes because commercials and it was just terrible additions

01:40:06   And I don't know if that's going to be the case again for the new top gear.

01:40:11   It may or may not be.

01:40:12   Anyway, I'm hopeful.

01:40:13   We'll see.

01:40:14   That makes one of us.

01:40:16   No matter what, you can satisfy your cravings for car-related things by buying an ATP shirt.

01:40:21   Quickly.

01:40:22   Very quickly.

01:40:23   Right now.

01:40:24   [laughter]

01:40:24   (loud thud)