Gadgetory

uh-huh they do besides making sure that I make sure recording a history of failing it's live I just I love the little banter once it hits one once a live appears over there I just I just love taking that on anyway fail the weekly is supported by the Oregon State University eCampus do you want to take the fast track to your career in computing you can earn your computer science degree 100% online from Oregon State and tap into unlimited career opportunities in any field learn more at eCampus Oregon State dot edu slash now alright hello everybody and welcome to the weekly brought to you by pocket now and xda-developers on this day the 15th of March 2019 all right so we are moving into a generally new format for the podcast so we do have a one big topic to talk to you about though in this topic this is basically what I want the show to look like I want to have one main topic where there are a bunch of stories I sort of add to that particular topic but before we get to that let's have a warm welcome to all of our guests we had and among last week aboard network himself thundery but now we have the old crew back let's start off with Brandon minimun over there how's it going Brandon hey it's been a while there has been a bit yeah it's good to see everyone's faces again and then hailing from ok so you had it you went on an epic rant about Williamsburg Ville where are you right now I'm alright a warm welcome back to Jaime Rivera of course thank you thank you and then in the booths today is our producer extraordinaire Jules Wong well it's been the first time in a long time that I've gotten on camera and at this very comfortable angle for me because you're hunched over my nose cam and those nook 14 yeah yeah so I just don't that beat be conscious and stare at the camera like this every time I want to talk meanwhile on my end I can do something like this let me say yeah oh no it doesn't really count but yeah never mind I have a lamp in front of me that like that like rolls in a rainbow so it would look kind of funny in front on my face in any case there were questioned by the way I'm Joshua Vergara what's going on everybody oh you're cursed by request of our fellow hosts I had I was about to go into a funny little story about a tweet that I had made so let's do that so the other day this is just a great example of tribalism on the Internet so even on a very simplistic level I tweeted out I think it was yesterday that I shouldn't be reading YouTube comments first thing in the morning like I do one of those I do that dumb things though where I wake up and the first thing I do is go like this and I start looking at stuff ready at YouTube comments tweets all that stuff not the healthiest thing and and I learned that the hard way yesterday so like that what I said was that level of negativity is something that I shouldn't be having before I even have coffee so there's already like back and forth the there's always sides when it comes to YouTube comments and all that stuff and I was like I'll take to Twitter people are responding saying oh yeah I don't worry about just don't read those things until you're actually like ready to read them blah blah blah it's all quit once we came back and said but aren't you a tea guy and I was like in a nutshell right they're just the internet tribalism just just the tribalism right there even in a simplistic little tweet like that and I responded with I do I am I like coffee too like I'm allowed to write like you can you can you can do whatever you want everybody it never has to be just one side anyway I just wanted about your brand now that you've been damned to JB Tech tea here you're stuck on it and no one will ever let you go someone did once say that should be GV tech coffee and I'm like it doesn't all the time as well what's wrong with you anyway I do want to do a quick check-in with everybody now that we have one main topic for today we're gonna get into it there are a few different stories about this whole idea behind the I want to call the ultimate demise the ultimate demise of a phone of a service of a company because over the last couple of weeks we've actually had a lot of examples of it which is kind of odd and these are all things that people were excited for but then probably all too soon they go by the wayside so before we get into that topic I want to check in with Brandon Brandon how have things been over the last how many weeks has it been since you've been on like a thousand I but when we were setting up and having some back and forth before we hit the live button I noticed something I may pick up the phone you're using just show it to the camera quick which one yeah that no the white one yeah okay no to stop the white one or this one okay Joshua hold up the phone you're using right in front of you whatever yeah we've got we are very unoriginal here yeah look at that oh gee Kouts the S one this should be a signal to all of our viewers right now that the s10 content is nearing it's not end but we're getting employment yeah it's hitting that peak because we were high Mae's pocket now review is going to come out my review on JB is going to come out and then of course we have some comparisons the way that we signal that that is about to happen is there's another phone and play now I'm actually using the me 9 after the s10 is done so I'm actually bringing this thing with me to China tomorrow so I'll be I'll be beyond the Great Firewall so everyone pray for me Lee uh Jaime how we weren't able to have you on last week we had a spirited discussion with with enna bong about foldables for a while there sorry about that I'm currently posting on Instagram that were alive for people to join Oh God so what did I miss in that conversation about foldables because I was the naysayer that actually ended up becoming a believer well we had another we did have another remember what the other topic of discussion was but I remember that the last like 20 minutes turned into all about foldables and I was missing 10 Elisabet during the chicken doing the chicken was the last time we were talking about the wallpapers and and all that which by the way I know this because I listened to the podcast you have to listen to at least four times before but yeah the though as far as foldables went I was saying that I'm not fully convinced yet because the use case scenarios that I know of foldable or even a larger screen could provide we just don't have the software for that yet it's just not optimized for it yet so current applications on a foldable like the mate X or the Galaxy fold just aren't where they should be yet so I'm not going to spend the $1,500 to get one until the actual experiences match the technology match the hardware but then you talk to any bar and he's like spend the $1500 these companies can have a little cash and then you know what it depends like the problem is not all companies are reliable in that department particularly Apple for example they're like okay we're gonna charge $17,000 for a watch and then because people didn't buy it they're like oh okay $17,000 was a bit too crazy yeah so that's what I kind of feel like if the technology is there if they want to take it to the next level they need to dock drop the price and so I feel that consumers I mean you don't need one so it's like you know why why spend on it I would be like you know what companies you figure out you are in gee if you're spending two three billion dollars in R&D how about using part of that to drop the price you know yeah exactly and then amongst whole thing was like but just think about think about the video editing in the gaming and I'm like yeah you're absolutely right but we're not there yet we're not even there yet with these screens just think about it think about it how good do you think the gaming is gonna be on a product that's designed to fold I don't think the thermal envelope on that thing is gonna be good that's a good point why didn't I think about that things are gonna get hot who's gonna need it's gonna need to vapor chambers it's gonna be a hot product do you think you guys have gotten so fancy time about thermal envelopes and vapor chambers you guys NASA scientists now using thermo omlette envelopes from Microsoft because they still got that hotmail going right Jules thank you well more on that later by the Brandon he was saying like your thoughts on foldables because I don't think we actually spoke to you at length about foldables after MWC after all that stuff happened yeah I've seen the sure and I know what's going to happen this fold I'm very excited for the foldable thing because I think like I've said before there are times where like you want a small form-factor and there are times when you want to show grandma your pictures so to have that all to have that all in one is amazing but here's the problem there's a lot of devices that can do two things there like a tablet and a laptop like the iPad pro in some cases if you have the accessory or the the that thing I sent you the pixel book Jaime which can fold around to be a tablet or you can use it as a laptop the problem with all of these products is that they're not good laptops and they're not good tablets because they're both and I think what's going to happen with a foldable device is that it's not going to be a good phone it's too cumbersome it's too thick and it's not gonna be a good tablet because maybe it's gonna be also too thick but there's going to be a seam in the middle or some other flaw that makes makes you think hmmm instead of showing grandma my pictures on this foldable tablet I'm just gonna get my real tablet and instead of using this foldable as my phone in my pocket I'm just gonna go use my regular phone so I'm just I'm just thinking that like these foldable things are gonna be awesome we're all gonna buy them we're gonna review them but at the end of the day they're they're not going to excel properly in either area they're trying to be I haven't thought about that that's a good point so you think this is the neck the new 3d you remember the time when 3d came on phones it just collapsed horribly mmm we have a little bit of that coming up in a second I mean to be fair I mean hardware a lot more aren't even volved with this so they're gonna try and make this as work out as much more as much as they can especially considering how much money is that state for them so if anything it's going to be a long and slow death if there is one mmm yeah all right yeah I I do kind of do kind of agree with you Brendan I think they're gonna be a lot of those users who are still so ingrained in the way that they use their tech right now that they're going to keep reverting back so the main X is actually going to be a wonderful little centerpiece on a table for a little while as you still go back to your 20 Pro or to your Samsung Galaxy if you have the fold you go back to your original phone because that's what you know that's what you understand and that's what I mean software needs to catch up with the hardware before I will buy the hardware that's what I want first you know and of course I'm in a privileged position because potentially I'll be getting a review unit of it so of course I'm going to end up using it at some point but what I actually spend money on it no not until the software catches up with the hardware speaking of catching up with them the time is up for a lot of companies that we're gonna talk about okay you brought up 3d Jaime I want to hear you talk about the ultimate demise of the hydrogen one the red hydrogen one that's what we're gonna start off with did you ever hold that product no I didn't okay there was an LA event that I was invited to I didn't get to go because they said they weren't going to allow and you want to take pictures and videos of it as it turns out I should have because they did let us and that would have been the only concept I could ever make of the phone because now phone doesn't exist well it does exist but they're there the reevaluating well it's it's not the reevaluating they're literally killing off the project and starting a new one that's what they're doing so yeah it's so it's like we it's taken us two years to realize that we wasted your money and we wasted your time and we can actually do this better but we need more time and so two years two years pretty much snapdragon 835 dude snapdragon 835 this was the summer of 2017 and it took a year if you've read Adam lambs review of it from head to tail from pre-order to usage to I mean I think he's actually returned at this point so it's just been a rough rough ride for all the people involved unless unless you are one of the people user net forums which has always been a refuge for those for the believers for the faithful for the fans because they have been really ginning up the support and saying what the hell do these reviewers now Jim is at Jim Jannard has done these things time and time again and he's going to prove them wrong that's basically what we've been hearing but you know I mean when we go back to Jim Jannard statement on this shift he uses very gilded language you know talks about you know these things of like the Molly you may have seen so it started off with the the taking down of the module depictions that they had planned for the original red hydrogen one ran runs off of pogo pins they took those drawings down people were concerned for a little bit and then about like maybe 12 hours later he released a statement saying say not much of anything at first glance because it's very it's crazy it's like something about well we're going to move on to we're going to have our red team lead the project now and for those who want to buy into the project or something like it doesn't make anything explicitly clear so it left many people to infer that okay modules are not going to appear as they have been promised at this point and that we're probably going to have to pay for a new file but okay so there are a couple of different companies we're going to talk about in this in this segment about they clearly have success in a whole different market and they want to get into mobile but then it turns out is it a matter of just over ambition is it a matter I was expecting going back to the what I had started saying I was expecting this to happen the problem is for the people that didn't hold or use that red hydrogen one it's very different for people to be like but why it looks like a razor phone I mean it's what's that's another conversation but it's not until you use the product that it's you remember the time of the fire phone which is also dead it's really right it's literally it's literally this one-trick pony that nobody's asking for the price right in the case of the fire phone in the case of the red hydrogen one it was a great idea we have a phone and we're gonna use this power to create this modular camera from it it's but the the problem was why take so long to the phone why use a processor the problem with the 8:35 is it didn't have the spectra processor that the 8:45 or 855 have and so there's so much better technology in the next two generations of processor why stick to 835 I you know they if it took them so long to launch it they might as well had just use the 8:45 from the start and then the problem is again this is like telling people yeah this is this awesome car that you can buy but the wheels aren't ready so you can buy the car and leave it in your garage for now because it's not really a good car it's just it's a math car and then you can attach the wheels whenever we make them and then out of the blue they're like we're not gonna make the wheels anymore we're gonna make a whole new car and we'll let you know later I've you know I thought the moment that I held that the product was so heavy I'm like crap this is DOA all the way all the while they missed the fundamentals kind of like the Amazon fire phone like you said Jaime they spent so much time working on this gimmick so it sound cool and look cool but it just took too much time and too much cost when they could have just made a fundamentally good phone that has some cool stuff to come in the future yeah and there's a thing like I I find that I find that the general theme of a lot of the stuff we're talking about now that the fundamentals like actually actually dealing with what users want to deal with on a daily basis those are not that level of attention to detail is not being paid attention to and it's always about this like huge gimmick like even LG you could argue that a lot of stuff that they do are huge gimmicks but the core experience is still reliable it's still dope LG really yeah like losing you yeah I'm telling you right now using those phones on the daily even if you were to not use half of the stuff that they put on there you would still have a good time the white Engel still looks pretty good the camera is still quite good like it's still a good phone it's still good by the standards this day is all I'm gonna say is I missed the LG G 6 for me that was the coolest most reliable most well-thought-out LG ever launched and then everything else was this like blend of experimentation um that didn't necessarily look good or work good that's though those are my feelings on I would even I would even go before that and say gee for like the actual curve itself g4 was a great phone but then yeah yeah yeah going back to going back to the case of Reb red I feel so bad you know michael fisher showed it to me and i'm like oh my god because i was at the moment that I saw that he had it I'm like wait a second these guys didn't read didn't send us a unit like what that and then he gives it to me and then I started playing with it and I'm like oh and so there's actually a photo of me doing that that Brandon took at the oneplus event for the oneplus 60 and you could just see my expression there where I'm like what oh I'm like I'm so-and-so Michaels like you want me to reach out that I'm like no no just leave it like that I don't have the time I am we have so many units to review right now and you know what I'm I wouldn't use this thing I just I would not that thing literally felt like a brick with a screen mmm and I think I think this is the this this might be the most hype well not the most high-profile but this is the one that I it actually makes me feel a certain way because I I think we've all been there Brendon have you ever been in a situation where someone kind of promises you something and then like like Jaime said we're good we're making of this car the wheels don't work but then before we even give you the wheels we're gonna make an entirely new car that you even like like that's exactly what they're saying here is that once they transition to a whole new system all the people who bought the original red hydrogen-1 are going to be quote unquote taking care of them just like that just doesn't like wow why would you put your faith in that kind of nebulous statement that never works that never works I you know I I don't know yeah thoughts on that last one these it's a lot it really comes down to expectation I think like read such a good company that people thought well you know they make the you know world-class camera equipment and then they they make their phone launch so dramatic and people's expectations are like this is the company that should be should should have been making a phone they know imaging this is going to be the ultimate and we get a phone that has a gimmicky lacks the fundamentals and doesn't deliver on its core promise and you know here are the expectations and here's what they actually delivered and it's just so disappointing ya know what's the most disappointing for me as a communication student is the fact that there has just been poor messaging all the way through like we're in lanes review we saw that there was a communication from the team but through this weird French email that may have had something to do the company but I was like all factor doesn't like info dash dot whatever the heck I hope it to simple's and Adam had asked me wait are you serious and then yeah but put your info down on this Google form and Wow and like I'm looking at the updates that Jim Jannard the founder of red here has posted since his original announcement you know he admits that from the outset that well I understand that my original post was a bit cryptic and and then talks about in the absence of clear messaging the crowd goes crazy trying to fill in the blanks well hmm what solution did I had in crowds fault just freaking give us a clear message it's not the crowds fault no it's not when you use marketing terms like obsolescence obsolete but what does that really mean yeah exactly I was just we had that phrase and right above it like is the whole idea that he said as I have said before everything can and will change like what do you suppose that mean what does that even mean this is fire festival language like the first actual PR firm you know they emailed out just like saying hey we're taking over there so so much passion from Jules I you froze microphone is already freezing he broke but that's okay so we started off with red and that and that one is an example of and it's hard to talk about right in that way because I mean obviously there are so many people who love a lot of the products I mean obviously to make great cameras do all their Josas but I think what we can do then is like shift from this like weird messaging from red to a little bit more of an official type of of shift and that would be over to Razer I don't know God actually you know what I was in such a hurry to get to my office so that we could do the cast I forgot to bring my razor phone - I wanted to pour some out for it like does anybody else feel as sad as I do that the razor phone which basically started the gaming phone category is now potentially going to be no more according to the story which again this is not from this past week but this is an example over the last couple of weeks last few weeks I'm a you broke the story on the daily that essentially the Singapore based firm has laid off most of its phone division and cancelled the third edition of the razor phone series I was sad when I heard that on the daily and I'm still sad about it now like I actually had a lot of high hopes for the razor phone itself how does everybody else feel somebody's calling and I cameo at it so somebody else starts yeah I'll take a stab uh I'm not surprised at this at all because you take a phone that doesn't have a huge marketing spend and it's it's do a you take a phone with a different design that isn't sexy or dramatic that people can lust over and it's do a you make a phone that's low volume it's very niche for targeted at gamers or vloggers or small phone enthusiasts and it's do a it's just it's just not I mean it's not surprising that these very niche phones are just not going to work which is why I like Samsung phones that present beautifully in the store that have that are on trend big screens color options so many cameras you can't even count them anymore those are the phones that sell millions and create tremendous profits for these sustainable companies with these small players such as red and such as Razer making these niche devices they don't stand a chance and it's it's unfortunate because we like to see differentiation in our industry and it gets exciting when we see something finally different pop up cameras all kinds of different display technologies and functionality but these products aren't going to go on to sell enough units to become viable and sustainable Dover engine fields so when razor announced their first like earnings report after the well they went public like a year ago or something like that but you have to keep in mind that these are diversified companies that are just dabbling into the smartphone field razor doesn't make its money off of phones it makes its money off of mouses of these mice keyboards and chairs and all those other peripherals that gamers want and I think phones were just a natural extension of that he kind of dipped into it they had a trend budget that had they had to spend for research development manufacturing I think manufacturing partnerships were already formed with their other businesses going on so that saved in some money but you know they said 18,000 units or well I did that was derived from the actual figure the money figure that they reported and I think it was something like 18,000 units which is I mean for a company first time serving a small niche I don't think that's necessarily bad I think and they said you know they were showing promising signs of growth but yeah and we but since then we haven't had word which is probably a bad sign of any performance metrics for the reason for them to but even then you know I think this has more to do with razor as a company razor as you know trying to get a profit track going here again they went public last year they had an IPO they now have shareholders so this is a it's a little sad to see something like this go by the wayside when this is a company that could afford to continue the project I feel I'll tell you I'll tell you this much for me in the case of the razor phone it's um I had a really well I have a really good relationship with the when you know one of the founders in CEO and and who was the CEO of next bit who was absorbed by raiser for this project um and you know we we had a lot we had lots of conversations but in one of them it's like like I did believe in the next bit project let's do a phone that's more cloud centric I feel that the phone missed a few things but the whole concept was a good idea um the problem is when you don't know when you don't have enough budget to nurture the project enough I'll give you an example one plus there one plus one two three they were me it wasn't until the one plus five that things were like okay this is now a phone that I'm willing to recommend and if companies are not willing the problem when you have a market like the smartphone market is it's very cutthroat profits are very low it's like if you asked me if if if you had ten million dollars when you build an airline I'd be like no that's the stupidest thing because you're operating ratio is too high and so it's the same with smartphones and you don't do a Xiaomi where you own the store or if you don't have more assets than just the hardware it's very difficult for you to win unless you're willing to throw money at it and so here you have a product that I think it's a good idea having a gaming phone but like I said in my review the problem is not the idea it's the games you know smartphone games aren't really great and then and then I'm like oh shoot I remember what you know we we're in LA we're at the event and they're like we've got a controller and I'm like yes okay fine this is what I needed to become a mobile gamer I needed a controller and then I get the controller and I connect it and it works like trash with my father and so it's like wait a second I mean you're the guys that get the mice right and the chairs right and the keyboards right but you're you know what you're being held by a problem and the problem is not razor the problem is called Android the problem is Android gaming it doesn't matter if you have a one plus sixty or a razor phone to the game the experience is the same and it shouldn't be that way yeah it should not be that way there should be games that cater better to the concept of having a more powerful phone or a phone that's better designed for something or the peripherals that will bring the experience to the next level the problem is when you have companies like Nintendo cave in and give you a Super Mario run because they realize that if they give you the same experience as if you were gaming in a console the game wouldn't play well you just people just wouldn't enjoy the process because you're using a screen and not buttons and so I I was really hoping that razor in a soos would force Google you know be like okay you know what we need better games we need you know we need for the developer community to have better tools and we've seen it with you know in the case of Apple with metal and with everything but the problem is again it's the form factor why is this why is the Nintendo switch such a hit it's not just the indie games but it's the overall experience of using the switch and it's what I asked who did I ask this to by the way Josh I don't remember but I'm like what is the difference between a switch hardware-wise and an android phone nothing nothing from a from a power standpoint they're literally almost the same thing the problem is the operating systems and it's a platform issue - it's a platform issue it is totally a platform issue I'm testing Android Q out right now and but the trend is like with Google is has been that they've been walking down more api's they've been putting more of them onto a blackness so that if you're targeting a certain level of Android you know certain Android version you can't use these api's anymore you have to use these api's and I feel like there's going to be there's not enough what they can do these gaming publishers that you know can they do this and that and not into it upon background process limits that they have to conform to it's a lot of I think unseen debate that we have to like consider when it comes to these sorts of things because Google has been cracking down for the sake of privacy for the sake of power savings and that does not cut with the jib of these you know more advanced gaming features so well I think I probably and you mentioned next bit earlier we actually had a comment let me pull it up real quick I think it was one of our one of our regulars in the chat where is it Steve Deroche it's the official death of next bit sad yeah that is sad because I remember just how cool next bit and just as just in terms of a device was was cool and then razor found a way to sort of the elongate that that life cycle I personally think like to go back to your whole idea Brandon about the phone being DOA I don't think it was DOA I think it was ahead of its time to be honest like the razor phone wasn't have AC yeah I think the razor phone basically introduced all of these other companies or maybe put them on notice that game was going to be the next big frontier all of the enhancements in phones like this galaxy s 10 plus which by the way is the only one of the three that has vapor cooling those enhancements those advancements I should say are due in part to razor making it clear gaming is a thing on a phone and you're right I made that like I was saying earlier about foldables the software has to match the hardware and right now the software is Android so it's not the best thing but there are good but one thing I would love razor to do is to go by way of Sega where they don't actually create the apparatus by which everyone does gaming on Android maybe they create all of the supports products they actually put in a lot of their R&D into making the best controller they make the best peripherals to make the best accessories to make Android gaming that much better for example let's say that let's say this what was the name of that one product that was supposed to be like an Android gaming console oh the shield Nvidia oh no shield but there's another one there was like the crowd everyone hated yeah yeah oh yeah oh yeah yeah that actually you know how much you know how great razor could be at creating their own whoo yeah where this particular little console like device a lot like the shield but the problem with the shield was that they still focus on having other Android features all the way like take away all of the strip Android to its base level so that it is only a gaming console and then you put in the work it's actually make those experiences work for your peripherals for your controllers and for your accessories but that's what I think raisin could totally do that we've seen it but the problem is we've seen it dude like we've seen it with a shoot the SP the ZT the s pro - we've seen it in projectors we saw experimentation with televisions we've seen people trying to use it in smartwatches heck we even saw Vinci trying to use Android and a pair of headphones the problem is you know and Brandon you're you're probably the most qualified person to confirm this but if I if I if I understand correctly apps and games on Android erster are still emulated correct what do you mean so to my understanding anything that runs on Android is not really native it's all emulated I see I don't know if that's the case anymore it might have been the case or in earlier versions of Android but I don't think that's true anymore I think a lot of the Android runtime I whatever the quote but that's the thing it's like hey I do understand now why Google is trying to come up with fusia which is actually another conversation but why we're looking for alternatives for Android because there are a lot of limits patience um and I feel that Android is the best platform and I feel that it's the best ecosystem to get something like this done it's just where how do we make the jump towards it we've seen companies use Android completely forked and come up with some really cool things we've seen it from Amazon um no but yeah I feel I feel that you're right Josh it's just the question is who is willing to invest more than two generations of a product and giving it a try because there there is no there is no case I don't think there has been a case of a company that's launched the product and has succeeded in generation 2 I don't think there has been what operating system does the Nintendo switch run on their own it's proprietor fully proprietor so there's a product there's a product that was built from the ground up with every piece of software every piece of hardware conceived for one purpose from the very bottom to the very top it's been very successful because of that end to end its just gaming and exactly exactly whereas whereas when you try to convert a phone into a gaming product still an Android phone that can play games with some fancy tricks exactly but then you know if I tell my son to try to play fortnight on his Galaxy S whatever he's gonna be like no I need a controller I need a mouse I need a keyboard I need a screen it's different if you want to be really good at these hardcore games you need more peripherals than just a screen it doesn't work that way yeah I totally get the whole gaming on Android thing but have you ever decided to put Chrome OS on an Intel chipset that's very much powerful and more than what you would ever need oh my god you want to talk about the pixel slate and I could tell you more about that we are running into out here so I'm just like okay fair enough making sure all right so oh this is actually the wrong story that I have pulled up on the topic of gaming just one last thing I wanted to put in like a I do think that there should be standardization of at least certain layers of the gaming of the gaming experience on Android and at the very least that should be input in controllers so like if there could be a standardization then Razer could go by way of steak and actually create the products that support the gaming experience so but then again they're getting the software has to catch up with the hardware and that's exactly why the Razer phone I think I will say this I think Razer is pulling out of the game too quickly I feel that there is a future I feel that they should have just pursued it harder and that they shouldn't have does he have the money they have the money - exactly that's exactly they shouldn't have just assumed that oh because we're not having the same success and that's the problem when you have public companies you know the you know the problem of public companies is they have to look good in front of investors and so you know sometimes they have to make decisions like these just to continue looking good and firm in front of investors there were makers capitalism's I I didn't I didn't hear that okay I'll give you an example of the complete opposite Huawei Huawei is a private company they don't have to look good in front of anybody and so they are willing to nurture ideas for the long term and that depends on oh you know what actually that was the topic that that in a bong I were talking about last week was hallway anyway sorry they do have to look good in from the Chinese government there and verify or confirm that jewels but you can't verify or confirm that jewels it'll make the Facebook knows if you disappear in the next ten minutes we know why you're using it 14 but the point being is that's that's the advantage when you have private companies like that's how GoPro got started that's how many so once you involve the stock market your time to nurture products is gone you have to always look good and that's it and that's a problem yeah I can see that happening all right so before we get too far into that our next one has to do with products not necessarily one okay we are talking about products but in terms of Google speaking of a company that has so much money to invest no is nothing in the Google yeah I'd like to say the speaking of a company that has so much money to be able to invest into like certain core markets tablets and in this case the pixel slate I actually never got to review one I heard mixed vu it there you go I heard very mixed feelings about it so what would you use problem with this thing okay so the okay so in the case of the iPad pro when it launched a twelve point nine inch the biggest question that everybody asked is why like why is this product so big and it and it's not until I met a cartoon artist that I realized that he he loves his iPad pro twelve point nine mainly because of the size of the canvas and because that Apple pencil is such a great tool for you to draw and so he loves it according to him that's the reason why you need a large canvas and so there's a there's a niche for that product to exist the pixel slate you know dude this is a very expensive Chromebook like every pixel product and so it's it's like when cool when Google launched the Chromebook pixel and price that had $1000 uh and and and and they just continued that trend and it wasn't until they launched the pixel book that it was like oh my god this thing is expensive but it's so light it's so good it's so well done and it plays so well shoot it's actually a really good computer the only problem is it's a Chromebook but then they come up with a pixel slate and it was a very bad tablet in a very bad laptop and then once she added the price of the keyboard plus the the pen plus the fact that they launched this version that was $600 with an Intel Celeron and I love so I love that marques didn't get a unit he well I don't know if he got a unit but he actually bought the entry-level Celeron version and his review is like you don't use the it's not usable like you can't run anything on it it's literally janky and just about everything and so think about it $600 for an unusable tablet on one end or 750 for an iPad pro what are you gonna pay for yeah and it's way more fleshed out the iPad so it's it's just a more mature product and so I think that Google reached the great point with the pixel book I was really looking forward to a pixel but - and and they launched this late and I'm like okay fine if it's got the quality of the pixel book but it's his tablet sure but then I was too large and the experience was just too cumbersome like dude from the design of it a lot of things were wrong well just it just didn't make sense the product just did not make sense you couldn't attach the pen anywhere the keyboard case the 20 dollar keyboard case is probably like I have never in my history of reviewing products I have never in front of the camera said don't buy this it was the first time that I'm like do not do not buy this it's I've never seen you so passionately just like a product it's just problem is the problem is when you're liking more than the red this is even more than the red so listen and I feel so bad because I because when I saw the product that the event I liked it when I received it it's like because I received the higher tier core i5 my product is not really that bad it's just the moment that I would reach that I reach Hawaii and I'm like okay this is what I'm gonna start using this product and so I go to the event I snap on the keyboard and I place it on my lap and Michael Fisher sitting beside me and the thing just kept falling off because of the design of the keyboard and Michael and Michael is looking at me looking at me and he's like yeah dude that's the problem of a short people it's it's hilarious that he actually included that in his review but it's just it's regardless I mean it's such a it's such a good idea very badly implemented so okay in the dichotomy between tablets and laptops it clearly tablets or the big culprit here right because like Chromebooks actually so pretty well though like when you look at those Chromebooks they actually someone's sure yeah because they are fit for their design they are priced well they just get you by and like that you can easily distribute them throughout schools literally like the Chromebook is by buying a power drill it'll say it'll always help you it's a tool it's pretty much a tool and it's priced as a tool it's not priced aggressively or anything it's $200 $300 I don't mind buying that for my kids I'm fine with that it's just and so here's the problem and this is the reason why my review is just I'm like I really want to love this product because I feel that this is the future of tablets what is my biggest complaint with iPads it's the lack of a good browser it's the fact that for absolutely every hard core thing that I want to do I need to launch an app and apps are not necessarily the best experiences in certain cases sometimes I just want a good web browser to connect to my bank and I can't and so if I'm using an iPad I can't connect to my bank for a lot of things even if there's an app and so wow I'm like this is a great idea a tablet with a full Chrome browser I'm done I want this and then I use it and I'm like oh god no there's a lot of miss fitting going around in Google because I think harder there Hardware week vp r a Costello coming from Motorola and has been there for the past three years doesn't great things in terms of making up the pixel team in terms of building everything up for them and I feel like the tablet and the laptop division has really been just sandbox like they've been making castles and but they don't really much else purpose for them other than for like a bully to stomp on them that's a good way to put a joules definitely because these products don't get me wrong the pixel like if you asked me if anybody wants to buy a high-end Chromebook I'd be like the pixel book man it's a great product it's hilarious how much better the pixel book performs than the pixel slate I just I don't get it yeah well it's those very teams the employees responsible for R&D and manufacturing of those products has been cut by dozens over the last couple of weeks they've just been asked to move to a separate they go somewhere that also means that the portfolio is gonna be pared down that's the thing though like like future products are going to be affected by this it's the fact that this whole team so we don't know if we're going to see like pixel book 2 or pixel slate 2 which you know it's it's it's it's another one of those things where like you were saying with razor high made like you have to actually invest in these kinds of things you know and fuchsia OSU did mention for a second few OS was supposed to be potentially the next step in that and actually creating an operating system that actually that actually had heat that not here's that actually matches the hardware yeah a decent cohesive and I feel like they've been doing and many tests on many different sorts of hardware not even from their own tablets and whatnot they've been loading feature us to other bio C's in other devices so I mean it's gonna be interesting see week 1 between we truly need like I have all credit goes to like Chrome OS and all that for performing the way that it has I mean like we said Chromebooks do tend to sell pretty well especially when they're cheap enough but like we definitely need an experience now where it's like a laptop or a tablet that converts into a laptop that basically has this same level of functionality that Android has that we enjoy in our phones but it's just blown up to top experience like III remember remix OS I remember there was supposed to be like even Android apps are supposed to work in Chrome OS I don't know if all of them are supposed to at this point but I mean I know that they were moving in that direction that has to be a thing now I honestly if these tablets and and laptops are going to be successful I think that just has to be the next step personally I Brandon you've been quiet you don't you didn't like it either no I'm just listening yeah there's definitely some future whereby there's a there's a convergence between a desktop like Chrome OS environment with Android apps alongside of it and I think you know the Android Q Developer Preview is out and Jules you're using it I don't know if you had a chance to mess around with the desktop mode built into it unfortunately that no it's super interesting to see Samsung go hard into this desktop mode thing with Dex and while we go super hardcore into this desktop mode with whatever what their thing is called like huawei home Dex backwards yeah and then and then Google's baking it directly into the operating system we're clearly a lot of these really big companies see a future where by the phone can create a desktop like environment while also having the phone experience alongside it so I think it's it's you know we haven't really figured it out yet but the pieces are there where you have like a task bar along the bottom and potentially a full desktop browser which for most people is really all you need to get the work done that you need yes my feeling sorry sorry my feeling is exactly that light enough so that you could make it into the operating system but yeah it only does it only goes so far so yeah yeah and and and like it defaults back to a phone first form factor but if you if you're in the hotel room or if you have a mouse and keyboard but you forgot your laptop at the office or whatever you you dock it or you plug it in or you you do wireless broadcasting to your display and you get a pseudo desktop like experience running all from your phone and we've been talking about this for a very long time with continuum and so many other concepts the funny part is might tell my TV and my monitor have had an HDMI to USBC cable connected to them since the huawei mate when made 20 people came out which was like now you can do it wirelessly but ever since the may 10 Pro asked me how many times I've used them just wants to try it out and then you're like what the heck oh I don't think I even tried it out man it's it's it's just the problem is so I really like that project Linda from Razer were you attach the the phone into the the laptop at reddit and it becomes the trackpad I think but how are they gonna make that without the razor phone and so we could we go back to the concept of the asou spat phone I we we love that concept and we praised it for so long and these projects died these projects just died because they bring it's like listen it's like my perspective on VR I love what it can do I just hate the process to get it done I hate the setup process and I think that the most consumers feel the same way if it's not something that you can do quickly immediately know most people are gonna try it out initially and then they're not gonna care yeah I mean if you're gonna be like okay I need my specific USB C to HDMI output adapter and then I need to find my dongle for my keyboard and I need the mouse thing too so you have like you just spent 15 20 minutes setting up this environment when your laptop is like right there on the table and you could just open your laptop and you know there you exactly which is exactly my point all of these all of these ways of connecting a phone to like yeah that's exactly right like okay Dex is a thing I need a monitor yeah like so that's all I'm saying is like stop trying to make this the the centerpiece of the entire experience and just create an operating system that actually works on a tablet works on the laptop that actually has like we say continuum like that's that's that that should be the goal here but again it's the lack of investment in the actual fundamentals of it and then there's the problem with the implementation of apps it's like for example one note on like I tried with the with the Samsung Galaxy Tab s for I tried with a pixel book with the pixel slate you know you the use of Android apps on Chromebooks a lot of these Android apps are like hit or miss dude like for example you can't select text correctly on OneNote you can't do certain things and it's like like that's the problem it's just Google controls so little of the process that it just becomes up for grabs and just so much opportunity for failure if there are too many hands involved in a process it's gonna collapse wellhere's that's it comes a segue Google head right no Google had all of the control in the world on a low what happened there I don't think we're going to allow God did any of you use a low I mean I used it once because Adam dad forced me to try it out um I did the head that video it was again something that was ahead of its time I have to say I'm sorry I lose a head of mallow okay so allô allô this is another one of those things weird like there's there's that just there's that fragment is a fragmentation that's the term right there's like there's there the ecosystem is so fragmented yeah hang out you have a low and now there's is there like hangouts meet hangouts work like there's so many different versions of the same like function and that's life right so like I had a couple conversations on Twitter the other day after I said like oh now alo doesn't work and I felt I actually felt kind of sad about it too because I did use alum for quite a while was a way that I actually communicated with a lot of my co-workers back in the day but the the thing is that allo actually had a lot of the features that we wish more messaging services had like the voice messaging that now even Brandon you and I use it now on messenger because I'm a got all of us addicted to using it on what's that oh it's too cool to press that microphone and record your voice like a walkie-talkie that is cool that is cool Jaime like yeah he introduced me to that when he came to visit he was communicating with Diego and he speaks you know as fast as I can't understand in Spanish and he's just like boom boom boom back and forth and I'm like wow that's brilliant and then Josh started doing that with me it's just it's brilliant like if you're in New York and you're carrying a lot of gear in one hand you can't be walking down the street typing dude it's just it doesn't it's it's the worst and so I love voice messaging like in Latin America that's the thing and I why it's like it's funny whenever Jules tries to talk to me on a hangouts or whenever people try to talk to you at hangouts I'm like if it doesn't have voice I'm not using it because I don't have time I just I don't have time to stop put my freaking backpack down and respond to your damn message I just I don't know if you're if you're in a tradeshow I don't oh that's true so that's the thing that was that was like that was the use case scenario that made it very clear to me this is a useful feature and my point here is that when a lo came out it was one of the few that had voice messaging like voice messaging was a whatsapp thing yeah it was a whatsapp thing it was a WeChat thing yeah and then messenger finally put it in not too long after we started seeing in more places instagram has it now you can even use it in Instagram DMS like yes that's how much it's become a feature and then there's another feature now though that I thought was really funny uh first of all being able to talk to Google assistant I mean that was one thing that was kind of funny but my favorite one that I think maybe one day we'll see it in whatsapp and I would love for this to happen but it's a little bit silly but that's the reason why I loved it when you type something and then you press and hold on the send button and drag up and down to make it bigger or smaller that made for hilarious conversations like like when I would talk to let's say David Amell because he and I are in he and I talk all the time on messenger but on a low way and David when I would say something like when we were at CES one time together I was like hey I think I'm actually gonna drink tonight it would be small text of Josh please know that kind of stuff is fine and it's funny and it adds to the conversation which is why honestly I'm a little I'm a little sad that a lo my god I'm not let it go say something about can I just say something about the reason why products die okay God okay when you have established players and this has is completely irrelevant but it's just this like I have been used to so by the way my eg PU is about to arrive it's eight stops away so so I was away okay so how do I know this I can actually see where my packages on the map because lately Amazon is not using they're not using UPS they're not using UPS USPS or FedEx now they're using their own delivery service and so what was my biggest problem I never know when FedEx is gonna stop by I know UPS is here at 10 a.m. sharp but USPS and FedEx know but now with their with by them using their own delivery service I know exactly where the product is on a map how cool is this and then they take they take a picture of the product and show you where they placed it if they actually deliver it to the right address which usually they don't but when they do to the right address you could be like oh they put at the front door oh they put it the garage because you get a notification that says here's what it looks like so it's so let me ask you this how much I used to work in UPS how much business are they losing right now how much think about it how much is it for Amazon to launch their own airline their own delivery service into the delivery in a place as complex as New York and to give me a far better service than every other of the carriers where that's their business that's what they're good at they're good at these information things it's not Amazon's business to show me where my packages and yet they do it better than the companies that are dedicated to doing it and you walk into Whole Foods and it's got all this practicality because you're a prime temir see this this is the reason why other companies die because they want something good and they're not willing to invest more in R&D or they're not willing to nurture their product and think of more cool things or as you have a company as Amazon that's acid recive as I want it to be lame I'm not gonna lie I used to like you remember in Vegas I was like yeah let's lose you let's use an Amazon locker because I don't know when they're good when they're gonna drop the product but whose idea was it Amazon and now would this have you read the book the innovators dilemma I recommended you to buy the book yeah it's ignoring scribing the innovators dilemma exactly they do something awesome in the beginning and they stopped like innovating and then other companies come in build something from the ground up that's so much better and just eat their lunch I want I want to hear from the Concord innovators of a low from the beginning when because I remember that Google i/o when this was announced and everyone was like a low-end duo interesting like you know cool like we're gonna have a unified messaging service and then they double down on hangouts google hangouts freaking what Google Voice that that integration I mean Google you know prom with Google is Google itself they have it's like Project find all these things a lot of things in Google started project they are allowed a certain amount of time for these projects to develop during projects yep and and then once the project is successful they'll continue with it if not then they'll kill it the promise when you have four messaging platforms that confuse users yeah and I think I think in the beginning it was an IDE see what Google needs to stop doing when it comes to why am i holding stop doing is proving concepts after they prove the concept they have to continue the concept like that's what they gotta do because I was so that's what Allah was in the beginning whenever commenters just said I used Alaa when it was the only place that assistant lived on that's exactly what it was it was a way of proving that Google assistant was a thing that it was going to be successful now Google assistant is great alo though left by the wayside I guess it's it's really a it's really a sad thing and I think it's kind of a weird way for us to have like this entire show we're talking about what I call the ultimate demise but even then we know why it's because of lack of investment so that's really what it is so on that oddly somber note we're gonna go ahead and call it on this one thank you so much for listening to the weekly we certainly want to be making this show if it weren't for you and we would certainly appreciate knowing a little more about you so that we can Matt look what's going on here this is this is a different read I'm sorry and on that note that weird read I just did that is it for the weekly our theme music is bloomed by Minerva courtesy of a royalty-free license with Argo Fox you can learn more in the episodes description our crew is on twitter brandon is found at brandon mini man Jaime is of course Jaime underscored ivenna and I am J VTech t you know me I'm JV I love you some Tekken I love to drink tea I left jewels at the end here because I actually want to give jewels the conch for a couple of minutes because he has an announcement to make to have them yeah so as of March 20th I will no longer be with pocket now so I would like to thank you Josh for working with me with the podcast for past several weeks in terms of gave this show up and tight as the ship that would like to like I don't know be Jack Sparrow's ship is what I would like to call it I can Oh black pearl as it were hi man your mentorship in terms of video has been very key in our for me to keep the videos coming when you needed them so thank you too for me you know having the opportunity to help out with what you did thank you for that Brandon thank you for keeping me on when you took over pocket now again just last summer it really appreciate you finding some value in me and just the allow me to do my work and you know seeing some visions putting some visions down to make the stuff happenin to you the listener the viewer the reader for all these years five years the great stuff happening for me kept me well fed kept me well clothed and you know either law fine along the way I hope you did with my as well I do have a job lined up for me you'll be hearing about that soon but until then this podcast has been my baby I've been on it for on the job for something like 240 episodes which is longer than any host has been on it but you know I take pride in what I've been able to play around with in terms of getting guests in terms of tweaking the format here and there and hopefully what I have been able to deliver to all of our listeners and viewers is something worthwhile to think about so well I guess a lot of you're getting a lot of great responses of the live chat right now you will be missed Jules and yes thank you so much Jules on Twitter at point Jules at point Jules yeah I was about to say Jules won't be far so for anybody in the chat right now wondering where Jules is going to be he won't be far you'll be able to see him very soon but yeah as far as that is concerned the podcast production is going to fall under my wing at that point once Jules exits so he and I are actually going to talk a lot about me taking the reins and that in that regard so hopefully I live up to the amount of work that you've done for over 240 episodes and Jules so thank you for that all right cool well I think from you yeah thanks John and hopefully it's all of you listeners I hope I don't let you down in that regard Baga now is at pocket now on twitter facebook Instagram and YouTube in English and espanol where you can find more news on the pocket not daily and pocket now an audio every weekday catch up on what the weekly is talking about at pocketnow.com slash podcasts also make sure you make your voices heard by emailing us that's podcast at pocketnow.com we'd certainly appreciate your feedback through reviews and ratings on Google Apple Spotify overcast or really wherever you happen to be streaming us because without you we wouldn't have been able to make this show for your eyes and ears for now seven years straight many of which were under the tutelage of the good Jules King and for listening and we will see you next week bye