Gadgetory

welcome to the 3:39 I'm Roger Chang I'm Ben Fox ribbon well samsung's foldable smartphone is real the cup we showed off the device I'll be in a very very short cameo with less lights little light darken the lights I was the cameo at the end of its developer conference keynote what do you think this now this exists it's real we saw it then what were your first impressions I think the whole idea is very exciting to create an entirely different concept for a phone / tablet and that is you know in an innovation that's been going on for for many years we've been expecting this for a long time that being said people should kind of have measured expectations for the first go-around ultimately the it's going to be expensive I'm sure mhm and the apps probably aren't really gonna be there and it's probably kind of clunky it's interesting right they've got they tad the multi active app multi active window I don't know what it's all basically the ability to handle three apps at once Google's on stage to talk about how Android will be supporting foldable phones so I mean there seems to be a lot of forces behind it that that that's gonna make this you know more than just a gaming device yeah but let's let's admit the fact that it could end up becoming a new gimmick device and good good for Samsung and I think LG is also another one of these guys that's working on these types of concepts they're always well up yeah they're not gonna stop at foldable phones they said that they're gonna be working on rollable and stretchable displays as well these are really futuristic ideas but whether customers are gonna go for this right the price is gonna be right and also whether the content is actually gonna be like why would I need a rollable phone yeah those are all important questions that asking that first generation even second generation of the foldable phone it's gonna be pretty rough and remember the first galaxy no it was not that well-received was a little clunky the first curved display the galaxy round was a complete flop it did lead to sort of the infinity display that we have now so you know these are definitely stepping stones to something greater we just don't know one that's actually gonna happen yeah I I would angry and so let's let's be cautiously optimistic that this might be a big transition away from the rectangular phones yeah we all know today so next up CNN has its review of the Facebook portal that is the smart speaker slash video chat device bottom line it's our our own Megan Walton says it's an expensive device has a slightly awkward design but really overall casting shadow over all that are these lingering privacy concerns do you trust Facebook enough to have a portal in your home no no I personally don't and I've talked to enough consumers that don't trust Amazon or Google yep to have live mics and potentially live cameras in their home so that's a big ask from Facebook and I think is it our own Ian sure wrote a story about saying like hey guess what the timing on this was really awful yeah and he's right absolutely how many Facebook is coming off probably the worst year ever right between came Gianluca between the breaches then then they go hey guess what we've got a cool product for you now we've got hardware it's got a camera on everything in your home so so facebook messenger enthusiasts may buy this it may actually find a market so calling it completely dead on arrival I would hesitate to say that there there might still be a market for this thing but I think that it's an enormous uphill battle for them agreed lastly let's talk about the best smartphone you you can't buy in the US this is the huawei mate 20 pro it's got a long list of features in display a fingerprint reader it's got three rear cameras one of which has a 40 megapixel sensor it's got you know water-resistant it's got the knotch it basically hits every list every check on that list of flagship phones but you can buy in the US do you have a like a dollar value on like what it would cost if it was in the US it's somewhere I mean it's like the same kind of like thousand dollar plus okay flagship it's absolutely like priced I get two thousand dollars or anything notes it's right now just to be exact Amazon Lister teen hundred dollars okay so it's yeah that's it's definitely a high-end device it it throws in everything is there any chance it could make it to the US at this point no I mean you can buy it unlocked it's not gonna be optimized for any carrier no carrier and no US retailer right now is willing to sell Huawei device mmm that is too bad they go for more of those stories cuz I seen it I'm Roger Chang I'm Ben Fox everybody ace will sing you know sometimes I'm convinced that you guys like a hurry in to the end just to see if you can catch me sleeping whoa what how we were friends we're casually talking about this topic in the lake if you wanna hear more about these topics if that's the point where I look at the timer go well we're way let's wrap this up now so and again like you said three years and you still haven't gotten used to that no I never gotten worse give this yeah give us give us another few so we and we did run out of time but I do want to provide people with a little bit more context about why US carriers wouldn't yeah yeah well obviously the security concerns there have been long-standing security concerns with Huawei you know the fear is that you know why waste God's software or something in its devices that allow it to spy there's been associations between Huawei and the Chinese government the founder of Huawei is an ex Chinese military so you know none of these links are are have ever been publicly established you know the the US government's never gone on record just to really specify what the real risks are it's always been rumors but it's you know it's definitely has effect I think 18 teen Verizon we're all set to sell Huawei phones at the beginning this year but you know something happened calls are probably made and they turned around they just are they are talking about more they probably thought it wasn't worth it Best Buy was selling these devices laptops phones they stopped selling them at the beginning of the year and so really the huawei has been shut out here in the US and it's been happening more or less quietly it's not like a tariff or like a ban no like a public ban there is no public ban it's just serve you no calls roommates things were happening in the background also in of always just shut out you shame if something were to happen to that business of yours Best Buy to benefit was called medium buy it's a free show it's our Friday show we're gonna be lame as opposed to what you're right I mean thanks Bryan was always gonna be lame like I'm here just laying truth bombs okay on to questions yeah questions first off a shout out to Miguel who's joining it for his first live show welcome what do you think about a scrolling phone that starts out wait for it as a pen yes I like it yes let's go wild with these ideas why not what happened well yeah actually I could work I could see it and then you flip it around and be like here we go I've got my pen phone is it work as like a real pen that would be really fun well yeah it'd have to work you know it would just look like a pen stylus we're getting into some serious James Bond inspector but yeah that's what I like talking about foldable phones is that yes you kind of your imagination gets away with you and you start thinking about it's the same concept as like flying cars or delivery drones right you know you start to think about how technology could really change in in really very different ways in the not-too-distant future yeah and that's but it is understandable to see a lot of people already describing this phone is like a potential gimmick or a flop for sure for sure and I think I mean it could very well be a gimmick but that's generation one I respect generation two or three you know once they start polishing the product up once other companies start building foldable phones if like Apple got into it all sewn there be sort of an arrow legitimacy to it so it's yeah it's still early days it probably will be gimmicky but it's a it's a first step we need to have that first step yeah and I think Samsung has obviously presented itself as being very committed to this idea that they don't intend like they've put like years of R&D into this already so my expectation would be that even if the first generation didn't sell well they're probably not gonna give up on it that quickly no no I think well ultimately I think once you start seeing some of this technology get integrate it into its flagship phones that's when it starts to take off right that's sort of what we saw with the the galaxy round which was this curved display that like curved inwards like this it was kind of terrible but it was gave yeah it was sort of the first example of like of rounded corners which got moved into the galaxy note and then into the Galaxy S naught or the Galaxy S line then became a mainstream thing right it's like the one of the flagship features of its of its marquee phones are these like infinity displays they're curved a little bit and so it took a while it took several years but like that's become a mainstream thing and you sort of see that with foldable phones like the idea that this starts out with gimmicky gimmicky device and maybe a flop it might be super expensive no one really buys it but it translates down to or get trickles down to more of its mainstream devices right and they'll be smart to name it something else yeah not one of their flagship starting off hello what do we got Brian more questions with all the hype about the foldable phone does this mean that the flip phone is going to make a comeback flip or sliders I want them back and that's from our friend Timothy I don't know the slider was that that would kind of feed the purpose of having a mobile phone but the sidekick what we saw what we saw essentially was I know you remember the Nokia communicator it was like a it looked like a candy bar foam but you can fold down half and then there was like a larger display and keys it's kind of a mini laptop this is I felt like this is like a reincarnation of that but like what touchscreen because it has this front and it doesn't have any like there's no there's no seam or anything there's no seam in the middle which is which that's the innovation that's the big thing right that there's no hinge it is one seamless screen I don't I don't know about flip folks I guess you can call it a flip phone cuz it does flip out a little fold out right it's dessert those are long gone this is we're moving into yeah yeah like the actual like clamshell flip phones I think that's we're done with that but as far as that fold goes Ryan's wondering if we're ever gonna actually see a line like what the durability rating on this is going to be before that thing starts to crease oh that's a yeah that's fantastic question I think that's I mean we're gonna see once this thing hits the market next year you know they were very cagey about letting people see I think after the event you know we Jessica dole course should our tip can they're on the ground I think they both asked about seeing it and they were completely denied so and they address this on stage they said that they created this type of screen with the expectation that it would be opened enclosed thousands and thousands of times so they're obviously very aware that if you're gonna plunk down serious money on this kind of thing and this is part of the design concept then you you want to make sure that it works and it works for years yeah so I'm gonna go ahead and bring up this comment from Dasher because I agree with it wholeheartedly he says to me the presentation on the phone was sketchy with all the dark Oh totally yeah the two screens showing up what what the hell was it like okay we are all in the ecosystem we understand what a prototype is what are you hiding they dress this also on stage they said that they intentionally avoided showing off certain design features I think they put it they put it in an encasement as well so it looks clunkier it looked clunky on stage than it actually was they said they read he said they intentionally hid certain design elements now that was either they put it in an encasement or they dim the lights but they definitely didn't the lights yeah huh yeah that's for competitive reasons they know that there are other like manufacturers out there working on this guys a small Chinese startup just launched a foldable phone like two days earlier so I mean we do have a hands-on on that device as well so yeah it's true the competitive threat is real there are definitely other companies working at Lenovo showed off foldable stuff Huawei says it's working on something so yeah I mean it's been the competitive reason I think it's also they haven't finished the design right there's still months away from the final product and I don't think they want to tip their hand that that much months before they're actually launched this thing like I'll give him crap for like turning on the lights and like making it dim but like I kind of understand why they would do something like that you know they're trying to show off the core feature of the phone without actually showing the phone off right I will allow the and this probably goes to dashers question is is that it is possible they were trying to hide the fact that this is a really clunky first gen product that's entirely possible and if and when that we we do see a fuller version of this we'll find out and you know they'll they'll have to explain why it looks so ugly because just because yeah yeah did you by the way what did you think about front screen it felt like kind of small yeah it was kind of weird but then again I was operating under the assumption that they they were intentionally hiding certain parts of it so is it possible that it's a little sleeker when they actually come out with it I'm not sure I mean beyond just sleekness like I felt like the screen was small I guess that's just sort of the the consequence of having it being like foldable like having like one half of the screen but yeah so uh devil's advocate Storm King wants to get us to speculate on pricing oh I'm gonna go for I mean for a cool mm yeah that's what I was gonna say yeah yeah this is also this is like super like bleeding edge tech yeah I wouldn't be surprised if it went above that but uh two grand is a lot it is a lot yeah and no five Jesus tablet yes yeah but it's a tablet and a phone so if you really calculate the two together it's it's a steal yeah like the it's going to take year to develop the app store for foldables oh yeah the that market like just the content needs to catch out and that's why you saw it being shown off at the developer conference right they wanted to get this in front of the developer audience so they can start thinking about apps to take advantage of this you know their companies are tried like I like to bring up the ZTE axon em that's that with two screens that folds out it's got that really ugly hinge in the middle that that kind of breaks it from being a seamless bigger phone you know they've had they've tried to foster the development community obviously with with mixed results but they've showed some interesting apps to me that take advantage of that dual screen setup and so like I can see like there are some fairly easy or obvious apps that could take advantage of this right market already exists yeah you could see like certain games at least that we're much better on the tablet that would work for this I mean I can see like running fortnight in the top half having like either control pad or like or a place to like message or your teammates at the bottom you know like really I can see a lot of like legit multitasking you could do on a mobile device yeah but then no I'm thinking just put in a physical keyboard that's really bad idea I mean there are accessories that do that if maybe maybe you would have it fold out without any hinge or anything and then you would sidekick the bottom there would be like a sidekick keyboard that would flip it folds out as well yeah underneath I believe Larry you're about half a step away from Soundwave from Transformers yes oh and then yeah one of the accessories comes out and folds out into a robot or a bird yeah eyes away there absolutely and a boom box we need the boom box what's there's a tape recorder it was a boom box that so yeah Soundwave was a boom box last blaster blaster leads the boom box Soundwave was the tape recorder what is the difference it's a tape recorder it records your they both play tapes 1987 all right fine whatever okay I'm glad you actually brought that up with the the sidekick keyboard because sir enjoy is wondering if blackberry can get back in the game now that we're on this whole like clunky squid phone train again oh sorry you know what's interesting is that when they when they announced the was it proved they the the BlackBerry proved actually used a curved display they actually like borrowed Samsung's technology to create a curved display on it mmm-hmm I don't know why I brought that up but no I I can't imagine blackberry which the phones are made by a Chinese company called TCL which I mean they've done work on like foldable displays and all that stuff I've talked I talked to them about it beginning here they have they had no plans at all to you know introduce foldable phones in the near future they're pretty behind the curve at this point so what are they they're focused you see how it makes TVs though so they do have like they are they do have technology with that that could manipulate glass but I don't think it's a priority for them yeah yeah I'm still waiting for stretchable I guess nobody's asking questions about that because it's so out into the future yeah like I don't even know how that would work you've stretched but that would you like would you push it back into a smaller size in like how would it maintain its elasticity over time no idea my favorite eye my favorite concept is is that it's your everything device where it's your phone during the day you come home stretch it out to a 65 inch TV and slap it on the wall I'm like what a cool idea but that would be amazing well I might not live long except I'm late I like to multitask so I like to have my phone as I watch my TV so that'd be a little that's true yeah during commercials yeah so I could text my wife like yeah Shawn Vega is really running with some creative ideas here in the chat he's wondering if Microsoft and Samsung could get in the bed together and then you could get the Samsung Microsoft Plus keyboard plus S Pen foldable amalgamation monster win I don't know how exactly that might pan out but I just I'm enjoying watching his thought process yeah well it would just be like a sphere that you would push a button on the top and turn into like a fully operational desktop that's possible sure I mean Samsung already has the sfn so it'd be interesting to see if they include an S Pen in this down the line because I think once you fold it out as the giant screen like that stylus actually would be great if you're absolutely true or you sketched or even just taking notes like that would be great although I don't notice when you fold out the phone I mean because of the design it's kind of clunky to hold it's hard to say yeah you haven't really held on to this yeah it looks like the big innovation is that they got rid of the hinge but yeah based on a hinge it that's what it look like on stage it was like this it's so when you open it hopefully it locks in place in a certain way that it's that's part of what I was wondering is is it doesn't have a locking position are there different hinge points that it can lock to different degrees well we ordered this thing just like a floppy napkin dollar floppy now I would assume yeah I would think that from a design perspective if you can't lock it in place as a tablet how are you supposed to like watch a movie on an airplane or something right now you lock it well then you in terms of a movie watching experience I mean this the display was kind of squarish so I don't know what you know given the widescreen format of video like how much larger that video experience is gonna be on the on that square screen yeah it's about what was it a 7.3 inch screen so obviously bigger than most phones yeah but yeah square but square so that's not exactly the format you you want for video mmm it's worked pretty well for this podcast yes hello I'm calling you a bunch of squares alright that's enough time speculating on this weird product that they unveiled in the deepest darkest shadows over well we'll have plenty more on that and yes in months to come but great questions so far let's switch gears real quick and talk about Facebook because they are the Giants corrupt that any parent would be proud to disown so if facebook leaves out the camera option or starts offering the camera as an add-on and say like a Gen 2 would this be a better product is it strictly down to the fact that Facebook is under fire for a lot of security concerns and privacy concerns that their their timing is so bad could they salvage this in another form well this is really marketed as a messaging or video chat device so if you take the camera out don't you sort of take out the core element of what this is exactly what I was gonna say yeah I do III appreciate where this question is coming from in that it does rely k-- it improves privacy yeah but it also basically kills off the whole point of the device to begin with Facebook isn't really a big content player so having the screen there I guess you would watch like what do they have Facebook TV or C's book watch Facebook why nobody watches maybe you would use it for that but anybody that wants to buy this thing is buying it because it can do video chat which most smart displays do video chat the only one that doesn't at this point is the Google home hub and we'll see how well that sells we're still although we've we've gotta find it I've also heard comments from people that because a Google home hub doesn't have a camera it's really more you know the a picture frame or a smart home hub people are actually attracted to that because of the fact that it doesn't have camera right I am they feel comfortable like putting in their bedroom right yes yeah I wrote least sorry about more comfortable it's it's very interesting to me that Amazon created a product that's a similar size with a camera that they very explicitly mark it as a nightstand like for us put it in your bed and and they're not and they don't put a shutter on it or anything they're like look you either trust us or you don't and if you trust us you trust us enough that you're gonna put a camera right by you in your bedroom yeah Google took a completely different approach to that but their executives did tell us that they're not like philosophically like they're not like 100% we're never gonna do a camera they might bring a camera in another generation so we'll we'll see how well it sells right all right we got time for just one more let's take it from our old friend Sir Andrew a facebook messenger messenger light to be specific had the best video quality on and a video calling quality on Android last time I checked a few months ago how is the software implementation in the video chat in facebook portal it's a good question you have to watch in watching Meghan's video yeah I'm gonna get it back running again it looked pretty damn sharp I'll give it that much I'm still not interested in it specifically as a user because I'm not ok I do not care about video calling but yeah the picture quality looked clean granted they're calling probably each other over the same Wi-Fi there in the old smart home so as far as like a long distance might go I can't really vouch for it but it look the picture looks good that's all I can really say I'm also wondering if this is kind of a new some more go system play for for Facebook and they have plans on building I mean like didn't they create a whole like skunkworks or a hardware lab like this is gonna be the first of many new pieces of hardware that they might come out with so it's kind of funny that this would be the first one right but I'm interested to see where they build off from this is it building 8 is that the skunkworks I think so maybe if it sounds about right but yes there there is uh there is a unit within Facebook that does these kinds of experimental projects so yeah maybe we'll see more hardware although know if this thing you know elicits the kind of backlash or has a list of the back kind of backlash I don't know if they're gonna be hitting the gas or more products down the Lion time John alright those are some really fantastic questions everybody but we are out of time it's been a really solid week and we want to thank you again for joining us and while I'm at it tomorrow is national pie day apparently as it's the 314th day of the year celebrate that how you will also tomorrow would have been Carl Sagan's birthday very nice let's let's all raise a toast to the late great mr. sagen I just want to say that as a fan myself so I mean I know Freddie died what is it I think the book is called dragons of Eden yes it was it won a Pulitzer and it's a fantastic book definitely pick it up from mr. sagen so and I believe there is a Cosmo season two forthcoming with uh Neil deGrasse Tyson so the legacy lives on yeah and by the way pi day is March 14th so I don't know what you know it's it's an alternate pi day because it's the 314 I know my year I celebrate pi day choice why not it's it's a cool number I'll eat pie I have some apple pie at home I'll eat it there we go alright it's been a great week but we'll see you all next week 359 is available on iTunes tune in feedburner stitcher google play music google podcasts the amazon echo of course Tina calm I won't be around next week but everyone else we'll see you all next week take care folks have a great weekend you