Gadgetory

all right we are live t-mobile bundles Netflix for families Samsung OLED czar at fault for iPhone pricing LG explains the issue with the V 30s camera aperture and will Google by HTC color us curious those stories plus we'll be chatting with the folks behind Frank a crowdfunding project on IndieGoGo which aims to bring you a cheaper phone so make sure you're charged and ready for Episode two six nine of the pocket now weekly recorded November 7th at noon pacific this weekly podcast is where we dissect and discuss those gadgets that make our lives mobile smartphones tablets and wearables it's all the stuff you wished existed when you were a kid and you wished all this stuff existed because you were a kid that's the best I could come up with for a joke this week I'm Juan Carlos magno senior editor pocketnow.com joined as always by plucky podcast producer mr. Jules Wong out on the east coast how's it going buddy boy good afternoon and yeah you just use your imagination you're a kid you can do anything you want please well and use your imagination for a better joke than I can right in the moment apologies for going a little late on the live broadcast I'm sorting out a few technical gremlins try and get this live feed brought to you in as clean a way as possible not like any other week you know exactly the the the weekly what's going wrong with hangouts today exercise that we play with whenever we try and to look at what going on with hangouts today that's the new title of the show oh yeah but Before we jump into tech tomfoolery we do want to take a minute to thank this week's sponsor hello fresh now hello fresh is a farm to box and couch to kitchen meal delivery service which aims to make cooking more fun so you can focus on the whole experience not just that finished plate you're going to share with your family and friends on the Facebook each week hellofresh delivers delicious new recipes with step by step cooking instructions broken down into six easy-to-follow photos again I've cooked off of hellofresh and I really do like the way that they layout each recipe each meal designed to take around 30 minutes to prepare even for the kitchen novices or experienced cooks who might be short on time sourcing the freshest ting radians measured to the exact quantities needed this helps reduce food waste and again I have to throw that shout out because their packaging is excellent instead of a big clumsy foil bag full of food all of the ingredients for each meal are packed in their own individual containers and that really helps streamline the amount of prep per meal less than $10 per serving you can select between the classic plan vegetarian options and a family box to feed more people hello fresh employees to full-time dietitians to ensure each meal is nutritionally balanced and delicious and they're offering light summer fare they've just introduced breakfast options get you started right for the most important meal of the day some excellent meal prep that you can take part in delicious ingredients you'll love to eat simple recipes you'll love to cook hello fresh has a special offer for p-n weekly listeners get $30 off your first week of deliveries when you use the promo code pocket now 30 again $30 off your first week when you sign up at hellofresh comm with the promo code pocket now 30 and we thank them for supporting the pocket now weekly array for them and hooray for us for being spotted by such a delicious company nice thing is I mean with a lot of these meal prep services I mean hellofresh what I really love is you can jump in jump out we use it to sort of supplement so as we go through the month you know it's not like we're relying on hellofresh for every meal obviously but you know we're feeling like we want to try something a little more experimental we want to throw something in there sort of midweek and we'll make sure to make sure that health we'll make sure to make sure that they'll drop something off just make sure that you're all right with your grab but anyway is the redundancy department no indeed well we want to make sure that your hashtags on Twitter our hashtags that we can appreciate and one of those hashtags is the p-n weekly hash tag it's where we can receive your thoughts as the show goes along live at 3 p.m. Eastern or whenever you listen to it even if you're after No if you're late to the party well you can still drop your thoughts in and we'll be able to read them also podcast at pocketnow.com is where you can email us and ask us questions there as well so podcast at pocketnow.com hashtag pn weekly hashtag pn weekly yeah i'm just gonna repeat that it's gonna be great it's all the media we already have some great comments and and some great questions coming in on that PN weekly hashtag which we'll be getting to later in the show as they do pertain to some of the news topics pulled from pocketnow.com some of the top stories of the week of August 14 2017 this is all the news that is fit to podcast if you have a family account on t-mobile you may be eligible to procure free Netflix Netflix there we go from September 12 you have got to have at least two lines with t-mobile one but unlimited data thing and the best you'll get is a to screen plan so take that into account but if you already have Netflix yeah $9.99 bill credits towards that so if you can take advantage may be co-opted it's getting into that back-to-school season University you might want to co-op with your roommates to get something on that friend the iPhone 8 may cost more than $1,000 and part of that goes to the OLED screen from the leader of all such things Samsung KGI securities estimates that the cost of each display will range between 125 and 135 dollars per unit and that is versus a $50 LCD and that's expected to go on to the 7s or 7s plus or whatever they're called when they launched on September 12 prices will stay up through 2019 as competitors start producing OLED screens for the big time and that includes LG LTE is something that ZTE is rumored to be bringing are not misread first phone - LT 88 ent there are way too many letters story man yeah backside multi which is you know I think it's the T sound that has something to do with it has two screens as told by Evan blasts and the body folds out and basically we're talking about something like the key of Sahara echo supposedly we are dealing with the less of that Center bezel and more just but we shall see 6.8 inches I believe is the figure there we may see it in the middle of next month for $650 LG masked the aperture reading of its main camera for the V 30 to prevent nosy fans and the competition from peeking it announced the F 1.6 aperture for the 16 megapixel sensor on August 9th after the aperture did end up leaking on August 1st pre-release units continue the list aperture as a 1.7 through the start of this month though sometimes you just get it clean things up a little faster and save that for next time there finally Google is reporting reportedly closing in on an investment or an acquisition on HTC's smartphone operation the word comes on top of a 13-month excuse me 13-year low in monthly revenues HCC made the pixel for last year it will do so again for just the main model model this year and Google owned Motorola between 2012 and 2014 but has been exerting more control over its ideals of Android phones as of late so it makes sense the cards just happened to be aligned for this little deal to go through the question is Oh Google be able to take advantage in you know it will other OEMs do the same thing as they have during the Motorola years and start of shirk away and maybe I think that's definitely one of the big questions but what do you think Jules do you think Google is apt to operate HTC as a secondary brand or do you think that this will they will transition over into a being more because we didn't we had this problem with Motorola where the Nexus was not really intended to be a consumer facing phone so Motorola operated as a separate division the Nexus was sort of Google's in-house brand for developers and that way they didn't step on the toes of any of their other manufacturers I feel with Google positioning the pixel as a consumer facing phone they're less afraid of turning off their other partners and that they could be looking at an in-house division which could scrap the HTC brand as we know it and even with such a high repute I mean you know they've done is excellent we've never been able to fault them for building a nice phone I mean it just just doesn't have the sales cloud to support it and I mean maybe you know that might be to google's credit to actually do whatever it wants to it and maybe the comfort that you might not care that much I mean we're still talking about even though it's ideal Google's really made the point they want you know it's been pushing designs and it basically scrapped Nexus in the middle of its development cycle just to start the pixel to you know have this new narrative going on here so ways your grand we already have a comment on this from Andrew Wallace at fat produce hashtag p-n weekly with the talk of Google buying HTC I wonder if we will even see a sequel to the U 11 especially with sales or lack of and I don't want to poopoo what HTC has been able to accomplish over the last two years from the HTC 10 to the U 11 but there's a part of me that kind of hopes that if Google really does front the cash for this that they opted not to operate HTC a second I would love to see HTC's designs for lower-cost phones rolled into Android one and I would and and then we can have a Google that is just hard focused on delivering their vision for what a flagship Android phone could be as opposed to splitting their resources in their talent between two different divisions yeah I mean we're also talk to speaking of divisions we're talking about 5vr which is also a pretty you know good standing in the VR community right now and there's some talk that Google is doing a little combination with motion tracking to do an hour VR device with HTC now of course Google daydream HTC vive is also making is supposedly making a headset for that Android platform but I have a feeling that's now you know what's funny is it because like I don't want to put all my tech eggs in one basket you know there's some of those rumors from last month where people were talking about HTC potentially spinning off the vibe into its own company I would actually prefer that I mean I would love to see what Google and HTC could do together for daydream that's very compelling that's very interesting but it's also like I don't want to lose too much competition in such a new consumer space and so I would really like to see HTC phones just go just go to Google just just vaya con Google and then we have this separate thing where maybe a steam like entity picks up five because they've already been a partner and that's where we see them able to do battle against you know oculus and Microsoft and all the other new players and hopefully that's a shot in the arm where Google starts taking VR and AR even more seriously as consumer facing not just these like fun add-ons like we've got this daydream headset you can kind of use your phone but really getting after that standalone VR or AR experience so that people could really experience what Google plans for that and then we again we have more competition hopefully building up a healthier VR environment for consumers I mean I've always found valve as a software visionary and you know its main period but it was not hey there was John Freeman I can't even think of the name because I don't game as much as anyone else does here on YouTube but yeah you know it's not new steam machines are not led by the hardware is not theirs and you know I'm wondering if you know in case software visionaries Johnny I agree but it's because we've seen steam trying to get after some kind of hardware portfolio you know it's the same thing like steam hasn't been able to Pete in exactly the same way that Nvidia or Razer have had like living room solutions controllers different types of tablets branded PCs and they tried that whole steam box right you know they had specs for manufacturers to build steam compatible hardware a way to try and compete against consoles didn't really flesh out I think they were just a little too early for this living room game streaming experience that now Microsoft and stone and Sony are really trying to get after but this could be their entry instead of just competing against consoles instead of just trying to replicate the console experience with a PC game why not lead the way on what the future of consumer VR could be you know they're already at the forefront oculus and vive are way ahead of the curve in terms of just the raw tech but really polishing the edges really making this friendly and accessible for all comers especially it's slightly more premium price points that could be steams way of really becoming a hardware broker which is benefited by their software licensing and their software distribution platform all the time we have you know hardware and software entities being separate and we've seen you know some of the combine and you know just like you know Google Emoto and I mean perhaps even Sega to a certain extent with many good because because what you know their Hardware never really I mean a computer up until you know satiny I would say CD Saturn and then like a hardware competed really well until I realized what a monstrosity my Genesis had become with the Sega CD in the 32x okay that's right that's right apt out that's where I had the big note button and I became I mean I had a Sega in a Nintendo but that's where I just kept going with Nintendo's after that they couldn't keep up the counter and so that all they had left was softly at that point you know was just Fred franchises and I pinions you know like you know he it's like once you put all the wheels together and then you start losing them again it's you know it doesn't end well you know ends up with you know a merger or acquisition or just the disbursements in the case of Motorola as we've talked about before right so we'd have a couple more comments just on this story again this is I mean this was literally breaking news for us we were putting together the show while I was trying to figure out camera problems and writing the script for this narrative from from at legendary scoop but the u11 was so good this year and I agree it was a great phone but a big problem with HTC and it's a it's a problem we've listed with a number of other companies trying to really crack North America is how do you resonate with consumers and right now I think Google would have more momentum in reaching out directly doing their own advertising their own ad buys where HTC has been a little reluctant to jump into that space from Ed maudlin maybe we'd see a g11 and again that's potential but I think if Google were to buy out HTC they wouldn't want to play with branding exercises they would be buying this division for their expertise not to co-brand and I think that was why Huawei and Nexus fell apart was Huawei didn't want to build a phone that their label wasn't gonna be on and so I think Google isn't looking to share the limelight anymore with with a manufacturer especially I mean they've you can hear that in the rumors about the whole sense of pressure-sensitive frame with the edge that's becoming active edge like you know just it's taking these features and it's making it their own you know what I don't know I don't know how successful it will be in terms of the integration process and then you know just making you know obviously they have they don't have much to lose so I mean they really don't and and for me it's can you just focus on making a killer phone I mean if we lose the you 11 to get an amazing pixel I think we'll all be sad for a bit because I mean I came up with HTC is an OEM and ODM making under like the Audiovox label and the Sanyo label and all these weird sort of cell phone labels way back in the day with Windows mobile and I will be sad to see those letters go HTC but if this is the Phoenix of rebirth for both Google and HTC getting us back to what we loved about necks I and what we like about the pixel but hopefully will be refined for a future phone and it we know that that HT division lives on under Google's umbrella I think we'll be okay but to that same point Edie maudlin on Twitter I tweeted just don't bring back ultrapixels and so I think maybe tell you yeah right III don't I don't think the problem was the ultra pixel I think the problem was the number of ultrapixels and where we had that for ultra pixel camera like on the what was on the on the m77 yeah yeah and now they made too but you know I mean see they called the HTC 10 you know what they had ultrapixels into like they did call it an ultra pixel camera and no there wasn't a half-bad solution for selfie camera so I mean I mean I again I mean if we're talking about TC 10 to you 11 I really wish that HTC 10 selfie camera had made the man a man you know just reminiscing about Frick you know little steel sheaves of or aluminum sheet it was just a sham for engines and right like I had the red HTC well I still have it somewhere in the back over there it's like man those were the times so I just want to couple minutes to this story just cuz I think it was such an interesting way that information was disseminated online and how people were pitchforks at the recce excuse me I'm still working off this dry cough for the LGV 30 this this story about the aperture on the V 30 was at xda-developers or was it ours who went to press with the the announcement that LG had misrepresented the I was sourced to back to a Russian outlet named Ted not or something like that and basically they went through the posts going you know talking about oh hey here are some early camera samples and they went through the exit data so I mean just you know you know it wasn't kind of international thing going on there and you know if there is a so it reported back in F 1.69 on those exif data pieces and those were the camera samples that were released after the August 31 embargo right and you know we had our units you know week before then and they were still reporting at 4.7 they announced the F 1.9 excuse me at four point six aperture on August 9th they have plenty of time to revise their software even on these pre-release units so that no confusion whatsoever could you know take place and that's you know transparency and consistency RFI two big pigs and you know if you don't have that I mean LG from what I've heard from you guys you and Hyman leave done a great job of getting the narrative on each little aspect of the V 30 from camera and you know input optics and the audio too so yeah you know I find it you know odd lapse if you will yeah it's it's a tricky situation because again when we're looking at how LG has been putting out information on this phone and the weird sort of there was a strange split I mean if we want the behind the scenes here there was a strange split in the embargo where day one announcements were were focused more on aesthetics and just a general overview on the phone and then they had a secondary embargo on specific features and so that's why you saw this sort of two day explosion of videos for the V 30 was because there were some things that LG really wanted to save post announcement in Berlin and and I think this is why the V 30 became the hottest talking point of Aoife this year there weren't a lot of phones to compete against it I was really taken by the sony xperia x z1 compact even though that's a miserable name to say every time you want to talk about the little phone but that that's why we saw this this breakdown and so when we talk about transparent see the fact that it took LG this long to reply to this issue is definitely problematic as part of their narrative but I think it's interesting they kind of engaged in some sort of not industrial espionage but like media espionage in trying to obfuscate specific aspects of the phone until they were ready to talk about it and I wonder you know do you think that that's a sound strategy they didn't want someone to spoil their reveal until they were ready to make it but in doing so they created a small problem for the narrative that they were trying to create yeah I mean LG it you know it they make it sound like a boutique phone but they're trying to hit a massive audience you know following on from 97 yeah it's obviously 30 is their pivot you know so the v10 and the V 20 were enthusiast devices there is all these things are coming up together you know it's like oh this is this is this year's flagship model from LG so it's like these storylines don't really the you know you have to really make a crescendo out of it and I don't think but I don't think it's fair for you to you know go the whole you know go all out on the pre-press treatment but then when you go into the post process it's like alright that's that's it and there is no confusion whatsoever and like the first time around like I caught a whiff of Android Central and true excuse me Android Central's Andrew Montmartre onok who received just the simple confirmation from LG yes this is the F one point six is the app sure that's it and we never really got an explanation okay why is the f1 points at it do you guys know and it took in like a few days afterwards until you know a multi press you know statement was sent out from LG explain the corporate espionage and nosy fans - well and from ed maudlin on Twitter LG trolling people who don't know what prototype because I mean all of the coverages have been put out on the v30 so far and this is why we've been a little coverage light for this phone even though I think it's pretty clear that we've been enjoying our time with these units I mean it came in a plain brown cardboard box there's no badging or I know there's no piano label there's no carrier label this is prototype hardware and so we didn't want to start going into exacting charts and graphs for our audio and camera reviews we've been a little a little light on coverage for things like screen quality just because we don't want to misrepresent what this phone is capable of before we have a proper consumer release and so that's just our last little disclosure on V 30 for you guys but it looks like we've got someone joining the live chat let me get my window back up here because I always fly blind but I heard someone in the background and fahadh from Frank how's it going thank you of course thank you for joining the PocketNow weekly we've got a lot to talk about with your phone in your crowdfunding campaign and Jules if you wouldn't mind getting us kicked off while I pull up my show notes yeah indeed so Frank this whole crowdfunding project was actually started up by a person that we hope to be what technical difficulties that never happens Oh ever never happened no yeah not yeah so that that's gonna happen but his name is Moe Omer and he's right there Mohammad welcome onto the show thank you all right we've got to house now and I've got my notes up here and so really quickly if you guys could help us just explain for the audience what is Frank and how did you come up with such a killer ad campaign to discuss Frank with potential enthusiasts so pretty much what Frank is is a essentially a movement or a push towards sort of a sort of different idea when it comes to phones in the mobile market and pretty much what we're trying to do is create this sort of well take this idea that the big guys aren't your only option so you're samsung's your apples they're not sure only options and we want to provide an option to consumers looking for a lower and a lower price but also don't want to pay a lot of money and don't want to get a bad phone we just want to be able to find something that's good for the everyday person we're not trying to beat Samsung's Galaxy Note 8 or anything like that we're just trying to find an option for people who aren't looking for the best of the best but they're looking for something that will work for them there but I want to get into the specific context of what you've uh started because you're only 17 and this this all came about last year when have you realized oh I'm paying a thousand Canadian dollars this so we have to unicorn it's here this isn't you know Canadian company and a teenage you know see our CTO technically he but he found it company CEO is that God and we you've been noticed by many VCS fit metric apples let's send them tell tell me the process was like and after you realized I'm not gonna be paying a thousand dollars for an iPhone honestly I think it's it's something that most techniques go through at least once when you realize you just dropped another thousand dollars or another seven hundred dollars if you're in the US for the new galaxy s7 and he realized one year later you crack the screen and you put a warranty on it and you're like I have to go buy a new phone and your only other options at that point are going to a two-year or three-year contract which everyone hates and at that point for me it was just like we have to do something about that because I'm a I'm a consumer I I watch this show every week so I'm really in the tech space and I feel like there aren't enough options for people we just want something that's good enough and even though I'm a techie most most phones I've used that in 2017 have been more than good enough for me to use but they all cost a lot of money or they're just not available for us and I think that's something that needed to change and at that point I decided as a designer as a entrepreneur there had to be some way we could come up with almost almost a phone that you would not find in North America and you see this big shift in the Asian African markets where you can buy a really good phone for $20 the Shiomi is the Mays use and all these guys but we have nothing like that in here in the US and Canada and I think that that needed to change so I worked I worked on it from a would by myself for a while and then I found Fahad who's a lot been a lot better than me when it comes to business and entrepreneurship and marketing and I learned a lot from him so we work together to be able to find this company and find a good medium for what we want to create yes for that context on there because you know we've been talking about this as it pertains to the United States market quite a bit would you say that the Canadian market is is fairly similar in how consumers are sort of programmed into a 2 or 3 year cycle we've been we've been trying to stress that that conversation you know there are options for unlocked devices it's just it's a lot harder for those phones to gain any kind of visibility with consumers here because of how we've been programmed to buy phones we totally agree with you and that that's exactly how consumers mindsets have been programmed and it has a lot to do with the amazing marketing of Samsung and Apple and and so on so forth they they eat up the Airways and so actually in development as we said no matter what we develop we need to have an amazing kick-ass very unique marketing strategy to allow us to you know open up those Airways to to you know be edgy enough and cringe-worthy enough at times that people are looking and saying this is interesting just to get a little bit of buzz you know eat the slide right in there that's that's what we're trying to do and how we're tackling on our marketing and how we want to shift people's thinking and you hit it you know rather than head these are husband's consumers have been trained to be okay with two three-year contracts in the US and Canada to $5,000 phones but the Frank movement which we keep referring to is so much more than this one device that we're putting out there right now the kind of fund it's the idea that we should be as consumers helping other consumers shift their thinking in how they're holding these big guys accountable to what they're selling them and to what is being provided to them and so we like to think of it as so much more than just a phone this is where we're starting at you know we have a product and we need to crowd fund it but we want to be so much more as a company in our mission and the values that we want to hold and in the consumer behavior that we want to engage indeed indeed so I guess there are a few points because you know when you come into the arena of the tech enthusiast then you're gonna have more critical Minds pointing at you and we've had media coverage that has been read brash about this campaign so I want to try and dissect mmm now you you you basically I I saw your interview with tech Opia the other day and you went to do this a little bit but if you want to delve into more about how you and I came up with the design that are the spec set that you want the achieve and then the procurement process because I think realistically if you're you know it would take it would take hundreds of thousands or even millions of dollars to bootstrap an own designed a bar and an own you know manufacturing a contract with a group and you know just even the labor to find that all so these audiences for for the tech enthusiasts there's this like bloodhound like nose for any kind of controversy or misrepresentation of what a company might be trying to deliver and I feel that that's become woven into part of this narrative but I was really hoping that we could get your take on what is it you guys are actually trying to represent and actually trying to deliver yeah no we appreciate your sentiment and you know what we're we're a little taken back by this this this you know phenomenon that you're kinda you know speaking to this this you know the the almost attack at some point you know that we were trauma that we were gonna surprise that with with our launch of I think I'll start off here kind of explaining how we went about the design MO had actually approached me you know a few years back now and he said hey pod we work together I was running an entrepreneurship Center out of Carleton University has a lot of different students who are starting their startups and business well that no came to me and said I got this great idea I want to design a phone and my response was that's crazy you design a phone scratching Wow that's millions of dollars and as you put it but labor to keep this said you know is this something you really want to know he said well you know look at my sketches let's look at it and we sat down and we you know designed what we thought would be this is perfect balance of the phone price and honest pricing you know and how can we balance this this to enter the middle market of phones we're having a high spec phone with you know at low cost and fair fair pricing and so we actually spent quite a bit of time designing what we would do if we could designer and then took that and actually went to several different manufacturers through the Alibaba platform to allow us to you know procure is there any manufacturer out there that you know can help us build this with these existing specs that we're looking for and these existing things and many of the manufacturers came back to us saying oh we don't we know you're doing a custom mold for this would be too difficult but we have this kind of matches what you have or we can we can kind of fleet this and build this this way and so we actually went back and forth with several different prototypes but four different prototypes with different manufacturers negotiating back and forth till we landed on what we thought best mold and the best specs that compared to what we wanted if we could design it from the bottom up okay that's a fair assessment and you know you you're pretty honest in saying that okay we've always had a a real target you know per unit production target of $150 now there's also this other you know kind of spar in terms of the pricing because you know you promoted the $180 price point which is the earliest bird tier and that's gone now and then you're suddenly starting to creep up to 210 and I think there was like another like a to 39 or something and then ultimately if you were to go on you know reap the full retail that would be 280 and we looking at in terms of the competition many different options so what was them that process about what was that what we're trying to find that in that process so I think the beauty of crowdfunding campaigns is that the entire and we're gonna hear today priority of it is a market test and the entirety of a crowdfunding campaign is a test to market test your consumers and try and see what works and what doesn't right and you know we work with you know we did a lot of different market surveys before we ever really start pricing and we figured the 180 early bird works really well it's actually still available so there's still a little bit 200 units left at the 180 so if anyone's watching this wants to check it out please do check out our IndieGoGo basically yeah afterwards it creeps up to 210 and then we have a 230 price point the 279 price point was a retail price point if we were going to go into stores now I don't think we're gonna go into stores I think it's gonna be purely an e-commerce play in the long run and we'll never actually have to go to 279 because we agree with you it's too much and that's actually why a lot of phones and exist cost that much because as soon as you go into retail you're having a layer of margin that the holder needs needs to actually make right so you go over manufacturer to retail to consumer and every time you're adding a bit of margins on this so if we can go directly manufacturer to consumer we cut the middleman as we've been saying and we're able to keep our pricing fairly low and so the pricing right now we're testing it you know can we do 180 can we do 200 what can we work with you know people are looking at some of the Alibaba stuff and saying oh well you can get the phone in at 1:21 you gotta buy 3,000 right you know so holding inventory you know marketing and getting it out there there's the cost of running a start-up that I think you know some of the the audience that we see out there on reddit and so on so forth might not be aware of and the reality is when we look at some of LG's phone through Google's phones the cost of build is probably you know just a bit higher but it's the cost of everything else that adds on that makes them $800 because they've got to take them from manufacturer to wholesale to carrier to them consumer and so everyone wants their cut a long way and so our hope is to you know be able to take that away just look directly to consumers and again that a lot of that polls to our marketing and can we capture enough of an audience with our marketing to be able to produce a high quality phone and ensure that it's it's its quality and that's the big part here too is that we've spent over six to eight months now doing Quality Assurance on this one unit you know only my stuff from China we're not really sure right that's that's the big question is it gonna be good is it gonna work is it work with an about screen production yield rates for the one another IndieGoGo project which is a Eva V and they've had a nightmare for time trying to deal with that I want to go back to mo for a second here because and this is sort of a personal gate question relating to you know the whole you know that kind of a discussion with the price too and you because like you talked to like-minded people or you know people yet your friends and family and even strangers out there and you've you know kind of made this assessment hey this is not right let's do something about it how deep you know where are you going with these conversations what did you find it just a personal litmus test out there well I found that a lot of people didn't even realize how much that how much they've been affected by this sort of issue and obviously I'm very very involved in the tech space and tech community online so I've asked people online on on forums and people I know that are very very into this this industry versus what people average everyday people are talking about and what I found is that people as a whole just don't like what they're getting but they find that there's just no other options for them available and even though there are they're just there like for example there are public phone the blue phones which actually own one myself but no one knows about them and that's the problem you need to the reason why our marketing tactics are the way they are is part of the reason is that it captures it captures an audience and whether it's for good or for bad you take notice because companies don't a lot of companies don't do that you don't see Samsung advertising like that or Apple and as a whole people need to meet the gap sure people's attentions for them to be able to realize hey this is something that is available and that's something that people just haven't realized what we have a tweet to that to that topic to from from Peter hatin using the P n weekly hashtag he wonders if cringe-worthy buzz is really the right sort of buzz that will attract and he says remembering what happens to the early one-plus campaigns question I think that marketing agencies and creative people ask on a daily basis I say it's a million dollar question right is this kind of cringe-worthy funny approach you know when you take comedy approach some people find funny and some people find it crazy with it where you get this you know extremes and when you get extremes conversations happen right you know we've got an article on the verge because of some of the extremes that are happening people are starting to talk about it if we kind of went out with lengha hey check it out this is a cool who would actually be talking about it right we want to get the conversation going and so you know that I'd say that's always a good question but I would say you know if we look at 1 1 pluses early days where they are now it clearly worked for them in some cases that's not exactly something you would hate to emulate that kind of know so I I definitely had to ask this because you know I come from a background in marketing and advertising well actually more casting but we will save that for another podcast did you guys work with a marketing team or PR team to craft this because the first thing I thought of when I saw the Frank spot on IndieGoGo was like this was starting to feel really reminiscent of something like Dollar Shave Club we work closely with a creative agency called creative vision who actually worked on the Dollar Shave Club campaign we very much said you know when we went in that's the approach we want which was you don't need six razors to shave you know just like you don't need that 16 gigabytes of RAM in your phone or you know you know a Snapdragon processor that makes Google searches a millisecond faster right we want to give you something solid at a solid price so we're happy that you just said that you know that means that we're on message and we've done we've done a good job and we were very very close to the creative agency creative vision they're actually a good friend of mine that personal connection so we were very lucky to have that support indeed indeed I do want to go back into the whole crowdfunding ass by now lots of arguments as to whether you know going into VC or going into crowdfunding would be the right path but I was curious about the actual crowd front of funding platform that you chose you know for the run-up to and you know you've been turning the kicks started you know the traditional platform but then you go and you know a couple days out from the launch you decide to go with the IndieGoGo which you know it has the option for project leaders to run with the money that they have if they do not meet their goals and you know that has led to some sort of some controversies in the past you mentioned though in that tech obeah interview that they offered a pretty good promotional package for you so like what was the what was weighing that out like between Kickstarter and IndieGoGo IndieGoGo yeah thanks for that question I guess first and foremost we did we did use a fixed model so in our campaign is just like a starter campaign you have to raise the full amount or everyone gets refunded so while IndieGoGo does offer the flexible option we did not choose that because we're not able to you know meet our demands we want to be able to be very honest and frank with our supporters right if we hit our goal we're able to make it don't and that's it but into the specification is about why IndieGoGo and and you know the point that you brought up I got a call from one there you know lead strategist almost a week out from our campaign because we had been obviously promoting in our pre-launch and gaining the support there and without a call from them and they said hey we'd love for you to use the Google platform kickstart and I you know I remember saying I'm a week out you're gonna have to convince me I think there's no way why would I do that you know like it's gonna keep you know I may be shooting myself in the foot they said no no no make it worth your while I said okay well let's talk and they guarantee does a couple of newsletter promotions guaranteed ones would have eight million subscribers on those newsletters they guarantee does feature on the front page on the front of the IndieGoGo page when we want the guarantees from social media and then in addition the guaranteed a consultant weekly calls with their one of their strategic consultants to help us develop our our campaign page to help us go through the different phases of launch mid-end and they to work their PR team to work with us and ensuring that we get some good PR and the kind of looking at all that looking at you know the possible return on the newsletters that they're offering and a possible return on the consultation call that we said this is more than King star ever offered us and and so we went to the team we sat down we researched a lot between the two platforms and you know we didn't see that big of an advantage to going to Kickstarter because of what was being offered now to us with IndieGoGo and honestly it was a tough decision we sat there and every are we gonna kick ourselves in the foot for doing this and honestly sometimes you still question that because now everyone's questioning us but you know we've been really happy with IndieGoGo support they've been on calls with them to make sure that everything is going well how we developed our perks there's a lot strategy that goes into optimizing crowdfunding campaigns that personally as someone who's done a lot of business and never had to really think about it so having an expert go through our page with us and say you know you should have video you should have pictures here you should you know adjust your perk so that that's this way that'll create you know better conversion rates that has been huge and so you know we're very thankful for IndieGoGo and we're also working last part they offered was to be able to work with their arrow certification so arrows as a program that they run with a partner with that helps individuals who are manufacturing to work and do all the assurance with them and so we're in the process of getting certified to get our arrow checkmark and it'll be a badge on our campaign page but we think that would be a big part in ensuring that you know when we are successful with our IndieGoGo campaign that we can actually deliver and deliver on time because we know how important that is and we know how many people have been burned our funding campaigns now this because this might be a bit deep in the weeds a little bit wonky or maybe something that you can't really speak to but I was just curious as to whether or not indiegogo any of the reps that you had spoken to there had experienced anything like the backlash that you guys had for changing that over if this was something that they were prepared for in the discussion that they were having with you that's a great question in all honesty I don't know I asked I said hey I've been you know never giving this we've been promoting this am i get is this gonna be a problem and they said no we don't think it should be a problem this is kind of what it was at first but we have been in communication with them and I and I have expressed kind of our concern now that the backlash is happened I said hey guys this is some feedback there's clearly there are individuals out there at the tech community who do not trust IndieGoGo as a brand and so I you know I said it conservatively like I hope you can forward this on to your leadership team that's something that that's important for you guys to work on your on your brand and your trust with your consumers because there clearly is a segment of people that I am now missing out on because because of the brand that we've attached herself to but in terms of support and in terms of everything else you know when they've been there and they I think you know I'm really happy with how our campaign is doing right now and how it looks and all that and that has a lot to do with the consultations in Gales so we also have another one on here oh go ahead Jules go please go ahead because we have a question here from from Twitter that I hope you guys can expand on just a little too because there's so many moving parts when it comes to a phone launch this is from Andrew Wallace how do you propose to make a move into the United States smartphone market with so much competition from bigger players and the the the sort of inception of this brand is coming from a very Canadian perspective there's obviously a lot of Venn diagram overlap between Canadian consumers and United States consumers but then moving beyond that to what what kind of conversations have you guys faced in terms of smartphones across the world market there are obviously a lot of differences moving from region to region maybe a number of areas like I keep thinking about some of my relatives in Latin America who might not be quite so in touch with a Dollar Shave Club kind of conversation for something that's become such a mission-critical communications device so we would definitely love to expand later on to Latin America Asia markets that sort of thing but if you're looking at we did a lot of market research and when you're looking at the amount of competition in Asia compared to the US for example it's it's night and day honestly and you see this sort of allegiance to some of the bigger brands in the US and that's something that a lot of people a lot of people are okay with but even though there are there is a lot of there are a lot of phones available in the US the tech geek market like us like people like us will know about it the vast majority of people won't and that's reason why this phone is targeted towards the everyday person the person kind of just grown to Facebook and they see a frank ad there and be like oh what's that and honestly we just want to be able to provide something that is good for everyone and honestly having a phone with four gigabytes of RAM it's the core gigabytes of storage at $180 $200 it's gonna entice a lot of people just because it's really isn't available for the vast majority of people and people who it is available for it just don't know about it and so even though there are options available we would love to provide another option just because compared to the other other markets like in Asia we just don't have enough competition rather than too much there really isn't fiat indeed I want to get to the support infrastructure that you might want to build because once you start if you do end up funding your goal then you have to consider you you start after and then it becomes a game of software it becomes a game of hardware too because you'll you know they break their price or something you'll actually have to you know I think you guys offer a $50 kind of extended warranty but I mean how is that gonna go I mean is that a concern you guys have faced especially because part of the infrastructure you're paying so much for with some of these other devices is the ability to kind of just traipse your way into a carrier store and plop down something and hope to receive some kind of timely service based on on that relationship we have our extended warranty which is you know $50 no questions asked place your device and you know it's most effective for us to replace their device outright and then see what we can do with the customer service model doing that you know taking the time to try and fix some of these small things with these devices that are already low cost it's probably the opportunity cost and physical costs that go into it are bigger than just replacing the device but in terms of software which is a big one here there is a software server infrastructure with our manufacturers right now that will allow us to provide software updates and so we're working closely with their team to ensure that we can you know provide one Android 7.0 right out of the box which is which is what we promised which is what we get rid of to deliver but then timely updates for that as security patches we also have a lead engineer on our team I worked for seven years at blackberries of Quality Assurance engineer and has been actually you know a big leader in helping us with that and in addition what's been actually really supportive and awesome to hear is that a lot of people that reached out to us in the last week in two weeks some VP past bp's from blackberry and software that have said we love what we're do what you're doing let me know if I can help you let me know please or two to do software at least whatever it is we can I'd love to be a part of your team and so I think if we hit our goal or our team's gonna expand and you know we have the room for that we have people who are passionate here in Canada that wanna you know revive and you read and so in partnership with our manufacturers the infrastructure is there and then our team is growing we're really able to already set to be able to continue to do updates and security updates and you know the for the first home and in how much we're producing and all that we're barely breaking even and there isn't much profits to be made but that's the goal of the first time around is to build a brand instead to gain that customer trust to build that retention and build product but as we grow we'll be able to develop more devices which will increase our margins it's a it's a low margin high volume business especially budget devices especially when you're entering what's considered the long tail of the market you know we're not tak taking on the big guys directly you know you know we joke about it we're taking on those those smaller pieces at the end the consumers the moms and the dads who don't want thousand-dollar hyphens with the mom to death that want to buy their phone for their child 13 years old but so that is where we're going with so we were great with the infrastructure and we know we can deliver the software in terms of the actual software itself now you guys are dealing with the manufacturer for that but you bring up um oh you brought up the heck you owned a blue smartphone and that itself has been very controversial eight ups for running the firmware and you know in China these tend to be insidious things where you know vendor firmware vendors you know so I'm wondering like how much homework do you have on this stuff and you know what are your like do you have any contingency plans if something happens like you know what's up well so we've been working very very closely with the manufacturer and obviously there's never a 100% guarantee that everything everything will go right and we're not expecting it we are expecting it to but you never know what could happen and that's why we've set up our entire contract with the manufacturer set up so we can put them accountable for any issues that may come up whether it's software or hardware issues we can hold them accountable for anything that happens and that's why we're if we if and hopefully when we get funded we will be visiting China ourselves to oversee the production of the phones of software and everything in between in addition in addition I think you know right now we're working with the manufacturer to allow for software updates but obviously we would like to bring them home and I think that's Duke basketball right the goal is to be able to find enough phones and get started and get the ball rolling and maybe then you know look at VC funding later on that helps us grow and bring it to you know our team at home do the servers and do dogs I think that's definitely the trajectory of our growth but you gotta start somewhere I think that's you know we're we're saying is that we're starting here this is our help us get started and this might be one phone it might not be the best but trust us now and what we build in the future is stellar spectacular and we'll continue to work within the movement and philosophy that we believe in which is the Frank movement of honest technology that is for the everyday consumer yeah so how can expect next year that you're gonna release like a $2,000 premium on that right now I can screenshot that you know I mean everything can happen just as you know what you've said about the soccer you know so like a couple more I think these should be good to wrap up on although you know I just forgot them because my mind is all in a tizzy from that I was on your mind because my jet jet lagged mind wasn't gonna help us with in that case I'm gonna try it because you were you had a great train of thought in terms of revolving around the user and you know this soul putting faith in a company and it's concepts and then you have the product itself which you know isn't really spectacular what do you think what would you like people to pay more into if they're going to put in their hard-earned cash into this do do you want them to think more about as the canadian company that was led that is led by 70 year old motto ins or the phone which itself is you know fits their needs and fits their image of what they do in their daily lives you know I'd say the unibrow but yes sorry I didn't catch you there okay it's always gonna be a bit of both but you know I mean you would hope you know they have you in the back of their minds they have Frank as a brand name that represents something you know why the crowdfunding can be you know first to be successful we need people to actually want the product right we need people to believe in us for the future and the longevity and take a chance on that and believe in the movement and believe in what we're doing we need them to want the product we need that to you know look at the phone and say you know what this does everything I wanted to do this was built you know with me in mind and a little extra this is a device that can do everything I wanted to do email text called tweet snapchat Instagram but he can do everything I wanted to do and work but at the same time it is you know made by a 17 year old one who had a dream and is you know looking to fulfill it and I think that's a fun part of the story to be able to buy into and to saying that they were here to build consumer technology that is made by other consumers and you know is honest yeah obviously been one of the one of the issues that we've been talking about with other brands and is this something because I know this is early days yet for your IndieGoGo campaign but is trying to find that kind of resonance you know we can talk about specs and we can talk about bang for buck and you know the the sort of Internet fixation with worth it or not thumbs-up thumbs-down when we're talking about different tech reviewers but have you noticed any traction on the Frank brand resonating sort of more emotionally with potential consumers significant yeah and we've seen a lot of people with new marketing tactics and we've gone through the past two months you see a lot of people who really really loved it and thought it was hilarious and that thought it was something that they could relate to just because it was a very human sort of thing and the person a lot of times you're talking to on Twitter or Instagram Facebook is the founder of the company right we're not hiring some sort of PR company so we we like to make that very very personal and with that you see a lot of people appreciate that and if you email Frank you always get a response very quickly people people have really really appreciated all the little things that we put into making sure Frank is a very very consumer first brand and its consumers making things for consumers and I think that's very very important because that's why I started this in the first place and why that's why the hodge started in the first place you don't want to talk about me talking to some bots on the phone saying please press one foot you know and I think that's why a lot of people we found has really enjoyed what we've been doing so far and it's resonated with quite a few people and you see that and you know just just to quickly add to that you know we're very much aware of the fact that you know whenever a new phone comes out the first thing people do is take it and say what does it compare to every other and you start comparing specs right you got this thumbs-up thumbs-down and we we know that's gonna happen we knew that was going to happen what we wanted to shift the story blunt control store we wanted to say you know we thought our to ourselves what's the worst thing that anyone can say about our phone and it's that it's just another phone so how can we own that and that's part of our marketing but at the same time allow them to to review these facts review the balance but give them a story to believe in give them a brand to to buy into because it is you know normally with more options and we have these days where as consumers to buy from we look at the philosophy of companies and who we want to support who we want to give our honey to and you know a lot more Millennials who were targeting are socially conscious consumers and they're socially conscious about whether they're giving their money to and who they're supporting and they're doing that and there's been a bit you know big movement a lot of people that have come on support to Google said you know we're really proud that you're Canadian really proud that you're young guys trying to make it I need a new phone anyway so I'll buy it from you right so it was I needed a new phone and I like with your messages so it gives us an extra extra liver uh I think that that definitely does give you an extra liver and you know I mean when you're so transparent you know when you have so transparently very young members of your crew obviously I think that kind of breeds some sort of them there's always going to be that generational gap where the oh if it's not the Millennials it's going to be the next generation down so many restaurants by only ordering avocado toast like steak and lobsters all over the place and now I can't because you Millennials aren't buying premium talking to a Southern California I mean I mean the one final question I have emo is you know to those you know to anything that's you know like Millennials are killing this and you're a millennial starting up this this whole operation here what's your clap back to people of a different generation who think now we've already gotten a couple tweets saying like why don't you just go back to your dorm room and study somewhere instead of trying you know what I'd like to say that we're like a phoenix right you kill it once it comes back and I think it'll come back a lot stronger and that's that's pretty much what we're trying to do you can kill a current business model you can kill whatever it is but as long as we're bringing it back or making it better I think that's that's even better for the industry spread America and I think what I'm trying to do even though people are gonna be like oh go study I'm like thank you very much that's how I got here but I mean a lot of people gonna be saying that and credit I don't find it to be a bad thing that I am young I think that's all the better so by the time I'm their age hopefully I'll be doing something even even bigger and better with Frank and I think what we can do is just take this to a whole other level and what at the very least what we're trying to do is get these big companies even if people don't want to buy our phone at the very least if this generates enough traction we can get them to notice and you'll have your Samsung's in your apples all them you have to take notice because people people know that this is this isn't just it's not right and you can do so much more and so much better for so much less well it does seem that you've got half your wits about you and that's certainly to be appreciated in this kind of climate so moe Omer and fadh al-khattab both means dreams I was I was too where can people find more information on the project on the phone I'm sure there are probably some specs drunkies that are gonna want to dive into that and then also that IndieGoGo link yeah Frank is a phone calm you go there to the IndieGoGo page with more information on our phone specs the details your final video you'll find that big use what carries it works on all that stuff a little bit about our story and all that so check out Frankie's a phone calm and we really hope we can get a lot of support from different individuals to really build this and really make this movement grow to support to young guys here in Ottawa who are trying to try to disturb some disrupt not this disturb and disrupt you know greatly so around the phone you can just send us an email I'll probably personally answer it myself so yeah excellent good to know well folks I think it's time to put a pin in it this episode of the pocket now weekly is come and gone this show is over the conversation continues on Twitter where you can find Jules is at point Jules and I'm humbly axe I'm gadget guy I really want to thank you guys for joining us Frank is a phone calm for more info on the phone and the IndieGoGo campaign and I hope people go and check it out pocket now is around the web on Twitter Instagram Facebook Google+ YouTube and our home site pocketnow.com also for Spanish speakers the new yes pocketnow.com to help with a language that I'm not very good at shows like this can't exist without your support sharing the weekly anywhere you can share and leaving reviews anywhere you can leave reviews on podcasts once again we want to thank this week's sponsor hellofresh they're helping us keep the lights on and keeping us well fed with tasty home-cooked meals but there obviously wouldn't be a show if it weren't for our listeners and subscribers who have kept us on the air since 2012 the PocketNow weekly we'll be back next week with all kinds of delicious technology goodness so make sure you tune back in