Gadgetory

hey guys it's Neela here at The Verge I'm in our studio and Alexis Ohanian just say read it on your badge just as reddit does he does just say read it also but generally on Devon it ended up down Internet bro I just rolled in and demanded to go on air so here we are I got I got pretty feisty you guys had you guys had a nice comfortable sofas and I mean it's a very nice so thank you anyway so let's just you're here actually - you just had a press conference about a bunch of senators I did your fancy yeah what happened there well you know that a number of US Senator Wyden senator Moran myself and Scott case we all came there to basically have a press conference about this sort of state of the open Internet talking about Internet freedom and taking questions from the press but you know those two senators have been really at the forefront of championing this and and you know they represent very different political parties and yet like so many Americans can agree on the open Internet being awesome and wanting to preserve it at all cost right you know I think I don't know who I was talking to you but it was somebody told me that if you asked Americans to rank their primary needs they would pick the internet over water in many cases it wasn't it also over sex yeah where am I there is it's like you know it's the hierarchy of needs has been in like the internet has like snuck in over this hello yeah he could have never seen the internet coming right I didn't know man you don't have a ps3 he of maslow Samsung gs3 he's like oh game Cheney writing who's gonna be too busy playing Angry Birds exacta bother getting it all done well it's like yeah I will say this I come to CS every year and I for the past few years I did I tried to do a bunch of policy stuff like chase down Julius Genachowski last year I've talked to senators I've gone to the panels and not too harsh on your vibe but to me it seems like a lot of nothing gets set at CES about policy everybody comes here they take the closed-door meeting just with ATT you know Verizon waves its Hansen led into those meetings for some reason lot and they do not invite me to those meetings but how do you your the stuff that you're doing here the policy kind of stuff you do and yeah I know that you tell me your some of your policies very narrow it's the internet is good and everybody agrees with you it's a nice but how do you go from everybody agrees with you to making things happen that are good especially to show like this yeah and you know and in what is what is a little this what is a little disconcerting to is you know everyone here is pretty much on board with this like if there's a big echo chamber here because we're all and we've what no matter where we are in our necessary well pretty much support this and the people really need to convince you know why using the Verizon support this the ones who I actually get to talk to I do support it you're right the that I think the challenge for us and this is what I don't like thinking about policy specifically is this to make this an issue that is just I don't that is that is being tackled from know from from all of us doing our various things as voters as entrepreneurs and so when I see things like so specifically kazumi we did this internet 2012 bus tour right we did this bus tour from Denver to Danville to basically show off all of the innovation going on yes how could TCC did a fabulous job yeah and so we debuted our documentary called silicon Prairie which we showed it here but I'm more excited to be showing it in DC on Tuesday at the Newseum and hopefully get all these people in Washington realizing that like they all have a digital district I think that's that's my favorite catchphrase that they come out of this weekend because it's not just you know if you're in Silicon Valley it's it's every district in America has constituents who care about this and you know these policy discussions yeah they're not gonna go anywhere until it is so clear that every American cares about this that making a decision against the best interests the open Internet is gonna upset all of your voters and make sure you don't have a job well you know I think it's really interesting and it's funny how politics is changing in a place like Kansas City where Google drops in Google Fiber this and now there's just like vibrant startup economy you can't see that's just happening because there's real connectivity there yeah it's in a very serious way and that will change once you get a flood of entrepreneurs in a place where they haven't been the local community in the local politics will change and we and we see this happening we saw this happening in downtown's all over where you know for decades these downtown's were derelict these buildings were abandoned and startup communities are moving in there because they're getting you know large space great rates downtown hubs with bars and restaurants all set we're seeing these communities be reborn thanks to the Internet economy and what gules done has been so great because it's you know I I think what I like I I'd like to think of myself as a doer and I think some of the people doing great stuff right now are yeah that's the key word is that they're doing it and so Google actually did what everyone said was not possible to expensive we can't have the fastest enter in the world at a reasonable price but they're doing it and once you do it it becomes really hard for all their competitors to hem and haw about oh that's not possible so that that kind of stuff is exciting right I want to look to activate more of those kinds of projects because it's gonna motivate other people to follow suit and actually realize how big of a deal this is do you think are you getting a good vibe at this at this show in particular yes I mean again it's the there is an active champion yes right if we're we're all you know don't get invited to 18 team meetings but those of us who are here and actively talk I just imagine them like everyone's got cat on there yeah they're all we're dressed on black and they're like a red tie you know it's like hmm yes what can we do about it we'll take Google Wallet off of the phone yes we cut a competition no you know if you go to horizons with and Verizon through three fairs are very impressive but you know if you go to it what's really interesting about it is the phones are pushed all the way to the back where Verizon doesn't want to talk about phones it's yes they want to talk about a bunch of other devices right here's a bunch of tablets here's like a some weird crap for your house it's all connected to our network but they don't want to talk about how when they bought the 700 megahertz spectrum from the government Google basically forced them to sign an open access provision so any device could use it it's been years and years and literally no devices that use that provision have ever come to the table yeah and that means that you know Vizio announced phones here they're nice you know they're competitive with Sony right 5-inch 1080p they're compared with any Android phone but they're going to China to sell those phones because they can't get on the American carriers here and that's like if the Internet's that important then we need to get 18t and Verizon in the conversation it really in a very proactive determined way and say the Internet's important the mobile internet I think is more important mmm well when you start talking about if not I mean don't get me started on the importance of tiny internet but yes big we need bigger phones and smaller and it is again it's so I mean when you hear stories like that and it's like they found more opportunity for their business in China like that is not a sentence that you'd like a as an entrepreneur here in the States like it hurts me to hear that utter and competition is ultimately gonna make all of our lives better as consumers and we just want better stuff and yeah you know incumbents may not like that but the spirit of this whole capitalist system is I think competition's gonna concert it's rough it's gonna have to disrupt you and and it's frustrating because we encountered this with soap and PIPA we continue to encounter it and I I mean fortunately we have a voice as consumer right we have more ways than ever to be able to let people know what's what and what's cool and we're talking this earlier there are more and more new and new entrants to the world of hardware thanks to things like Kickstarter thanks to all the new things that are you know showing up here at CES now that a few years ago we're in a garage that started out as conversation over beer so we should talk with this because should I know I feel like your your your foot in the door of the policy world is actually you want life to be better for startups because you're really start-up guy yes and so your policy so if I know it's very public but really you're just trying to make money with your startup it's very straight community solution which is great I don't know what I would do with my life if I did not have the startup economy I don't know I would probably be a lawyer right remember that here's what I think is a real interesting story at the CES there is a whole like giant collection of essentially Kickstarter projects here that are the story of the show so the pebble guys had a press conference this morning the SmartWatch that thing looks amazing we had the oculus rift on our show yesterday that's a Kickstarter project the immersive head-tracking we just we're actually just here with another guy the Central Standard Time inquiry Ennis watch all these indie hardware developers who are you know crowdfunded essentially and they're making cool products I think that's a great story here that there's hardware startups doing innovative things I think there are lots and lots of question marks about how they go from I'm a guy at a cool idea and raised 100,000 of million dollars - I'm a company yes how do they how do they make that job you know and I know I know the Pebble watch team well because they were in Y Combinator they did an interesting story because they could not raise money they went to AngelList you know they'd had the sort of blessing of YC they still can raise money because people were scared about hardware you know they built prototypes and they went to Kickstarter and you know very famously raised ten million dollars and I I hope I really hope not just because I'm friends with them but I really hope that they succeed and really deliver a great product we're all hoping it is because you know that's a ten million dollar campaign that everyone's looking at to see if this means you can start a real company I think I think there are a lot of doable smart people on both sides who think a they're definitely gonna make it right we're gonna crash out is this crowdfunding like the height bubble will basically pop there is I think there is we're undoubtedly due for a spectacular failure there's gonna have to be somewhere to come and that raises millions on kick well actually won't even be able to raise on Kickstarter anymore because there are constraints about like a creative project versus a hardware on but you know crowdfunding is gonna involve someone will crowd fun a ton of money for something out of a garage that's gonna be spectacular failure and everyone's gonna be like dub TF but I think up dub TF yes I the broader hardware industry is resilient enough and the costs of getting this stuff started keep falling enough that that I think consumers so long as they're prepared with you know what they're doing taking setbacks gamble and accept the risk buyer beware but beyond that to know that like pre-order or beware I think it's gonna mean more innovation and more cool stuff and I hope I hope the larger companies look at this and instead of thinking I mean we all see this right we see hardware that you know it may be it's it's got some shine on it's got a little polish at Bell and whistle but at the end of the day no one probably actually wants it right and and let me ask you this how do you avoid making something no one wants well what if you started with this pre-order what have you started with that man so there's I mean there's two things there that I think are are gonna be challenges I think in the industry large because I I think looking at this CS I think the vibe of it is very much more like the beginning of like the computer era right bunch of guys and garages trying all kinds of crazy stuff they're enabled by basically smartphone platforms so people are like now I have a smart friend what else can I do with it and there's like try all this other stuff and I think that's where the Pebble watch comes in I think that's all the body tracking stuff the Fitbit but I also think that there is like you know two years ago I came to the show and a soos was here they're kind of a new company right they're just being introduced to the world and they had like a thousand crazy concepts and maybe nobody wanted them but like you put them on the map none of them ever shipped what I mean these are a difference I mean is there a difference between as soos and maybe some other Chinese company here that we've never heard of doing crazy stuff it's a big corporate level Samsung showing off curved phones that are never gonna ship and then this like economy of like little guys I you know I want to believe I really want to believe that the more people we can get trying crazy shit be better off as long as we know that most of its probably gonna fail as I mean as a start-up investor I certainly think about that with software right and and hardware is still more complex obviously you know you have a we have 10,000 broken widgets like it's a lot harder than just Matt Rogers from Nesta near and their startup and obviously they're well funded they've got a lot of very smart people from Apple and he was like to ship our first product took 70 people it's a thermostat right he's like you know they're using smartphone part they basically built the smartphone can control your your furnace any is like it took 70 people to make that project it's like I don't know that you can crowd fund your way into 70 people hmm yeah I mean it's to be seen I know the Pebble watch team is maybe two dozen yeah how many minutes and you know it's it we're still I guess what gives me hope and I am the glass is not half full but you guys it's the car waterfall it's not enclosed I announced mister guy and I really want to believe that long term it is gonna thank you well thank you that's very empowering of you long term is without empty I just wanna say we're coming from right now oh geez but I absolutely see a future where you know we are now what two three years into the Kickstarter experiment right it's still so early so early that the the long-term future just it makes a lot more sense to me that you would build something as intensive as hardware whether it's a thermostat or a watch based on demand as opposed to building it and trying it Hollywood style of just like throwing enough ads and trying to convince someone that sure you know John Carter is gonna be a good movie which I haven't seen that's presently John Carter's a terrible is a battle occur based on a classic it's like my cannon yeah but the thing is that the other movies that came out after after that you know there's so many other movies that ripped off through it well yeah but now John Carter seems cliché it's like uh it's like Van Halen Van Halen guitar solos seem really cheesy do you know and you think he he was the first guy who rocked out the guitar thing huh I'm easiness factor taxes well it's the price of fame someday if people are gonna think you're super cheesy they're so famous I think they already do does that mean I'm super famous or just super cheers the mayor of humans it's far off the road ah no I mean let me ask you this is there a not a danger that if you are Samsung or you are a sewer whatever lanova any of these huge companies you're just gonna start looking at Kickstarter hmm and you're gonna say man these four kids in a garage are generating a lot of demand for this watch but we're Samsung and we can kick out the watch tomorrow yeah and steal their thunder yeah and we don't have to do focus groups anymore the so yes in theory that makes sense it's dastardly but it's certainly been done before I mean I think dastardly is actually the ground state of the industry like when things aren't dastardly I'm like something weird is going is that right okay fair enough but the thing the thing that I look at right now and present is that like every one of these every one of those hardware companies you just named they probably all sit around the boardroom with their Apple devices in her life so we need to do this and yeah there's there's that side of stuff there's a whole nother issue but like every one of them has an example of how to make this kind how to design this kind of thing that people clearly want right that's beautiful that's well design that's well thought out okay and yet they still can't really do a good enough job replicating it sure I mean that's there's there's been a lot of progress made but it's still like go accessories you can't counter that oh I mean I own if you have a device but it is I don't know sure it's hard to capture that spirit and I and I I am foreign to the world of hardware but I know for startups we are we are never afraid of being combin trying to copy what we do so specifically like the Hipmunk google launches Google flight search great job Google that's awesome we don't care because they don't care enough about solving this problem as our team does and I think in many ways validating your model precisely yeah and so I think and I know hardware's the different bug in but I think it's it's the same way for these upstart companies and if they were to get copied and replicated it's still when weather it wouldn't feel genuine it wouldn't work as well I just wouldn't I don't know it I don't I still believe they get executed nearly as well as a team that's so wholeheartedly focused on it right I mean I my response to that would be to focus on the hardware software difference because it's really hard to do software but I think if you are Samsung it's way easier for you to do hardware than any team of Indies and I think the cost and the scale and getting the distribution and going to Best Buy here Sampson gave me a hundred thousand I think your Samsung you can say we're gonna make a point shoot camera that's an Android device and make 18 key sell it even though it's not even though it's a more of a concept part than the kind of real products yeah once you bring 18 Verizon that just muddles everything open it come all the way right so important well wait a bit real quick though you mentioned something Best Buy is that a to sell hardware but what he's got a go some what is a Best Buy is that a is that it's a place where you don't buy Hardware where do you buy all your hardware to net you don't buy it all you got to go to Amazon like right so I'm just I I wear as as this world continues to get disrupted you know the importance that obviously you know it's still nothing to laugh at you get that where do you buy your having the internet you know where the regular people buy it from the Apple Store oh the regular people yeah they're not not the mayor not the Nerds yeah really yeah I mean okay yes I've seen the lines and yeah yes you've seen the massive success here they've done yes you see Microsoft Samsung racing to copy their strategy that is like well and that's and here's another example where yeah you know and I've walked by the Microsoft Store in New York and it's like okay it's sleek its polished but uh they don't have the hardware you can't sew software at the store right right an Apple strategy there's a software online mmm successful yes they saw all the hardware products in the store and when you go to the store to buy software they hand you a gift card until you go online yeah I need to spend more time in the real world thank your oculus rift off and come back to the brittle but this is interesting I do hope I mean again bring a lot of hope to this table cuz I got my glasses you see what happened is my glasses snap like way in the gray is as so long as our expectations are set appropriately as preorder errs or backers whatever you want to call it right I I can't help but feel like we're gonna get better stuff because you know for four decades you know these industries do that maybe they do a lot of navel-gazing no matter whether it's hardware soft whatever it is and to be able to just say like you've got a garage you can you know I've got a 3d printer like you do this Artie there I think I think there is an one and a hopeful note good I'll try I'll see you it I'll see if I can do this I need to give someone yeah please oh god just so good oh yeah that's it oh you're gonna like start crying no I will say this we talk a lot as we cover the show and we were here in force you've got 68 people rolling beans we talk a lot about how covering the show for us isn't necessarily all about the news the news is important and the product announcements are great whatever but the visceral experience of we're here the entire industry is here everybody you could possibly want to talk to is here and everybody thinks the world is cool and gonna do better stuff we're trying to communicate that to like basically myself as a teenager that's what I think of my reader eyes right I think if you like the mass of our readers is people who love technology who don't have the opportunity to come here who want to see what's going on and I think there's something far better about let's show them all these startups particularly hardware startups doing things like the oculus rift did we try this thing I'll have none you gotta find it the other is this immersive head tracking display it is like you are in another world it is the future for gaming for gaming we can run around one is this the one the Carmack pitch yeah a starter video or look you know that's so on and we hit us okay I mean that thing is amazing all you did say was Carmack and they're done they were here we did we had them on our show top shelf yesterday and then they set up in the little office in a trailer and we had a line 30 people are steps to the line waiting to try this thing out for a minute each because it is so crazy and I think saying and the inventor II was the guy who invented it and his product right now you know here to announce the product eyes plastic case but the one that we use was like literally like wires and circuit boards and a box together yeah and it's like well that's awesome right I mean it that's like you don't have to go work for Samsung yeah you don't have to try to get a job at Apple yeah which is a daunting task you can just try to make stuff and what is so what is so big it's working gentlemen what is so important about that storytelling is it is showing and it is showing it when it's just an ugly hack it is showing it before it's the polished thing and we're all looking at that comes out of the box and smells all new like because when you look at that and you see the ugly hack you're like wow like this started out as a pretty humble looking piece of hardware and it makes some teenager think oh okay this is accessible this is how I do it I show you will finish the iPod in your life come on I don't know I don't know Japanese miniature Asian experience let alone an army of under page Chinese employees to manufacture at scale soon we'll have those than throughout our line because of the open Internet think about it wait what I don't know I'm just trying to I'm trying to get you to well no I mean that I will say that I will say that the thing that's different about the isuzu concept cars and the bunch of any people trying to make stuff and maybe failing is that that story is inspiring yeah the suits making weird stuff is like maybe even maybe you can buy this maybe you can yeah I don't think there's a lot of kids out there trying to build their own cars after car shows they're probably not ya know but they who knows if 3d printing takes off like we hope it will like you what's your you have a 3d printers startup in your labs I I do not actually well you know down the street from me is MakerBot right make a muscle represent in Brooklyn yeah but they you know I I'm so I love talking to 3d printing enthusiasts because they are there they're there are 10 years and if yes they're already living in they know exactly that I'm a little bit more cost in terms of where this is all going I mean I'm I'm I I expect a really hopefully awesome future where yeah but you know the idea of doing may be impractical oh man dude this is true there's a lot of Hope going on here but they're you know we're manufacturing does actually start coming back here and actually rapid prototyping can happen for an upstart we actually met one in Boulder on the bus tour that does all of their prototyping right there they got a 3d printer they make these badass sort of like 21st century Legos these little cubes that stick together and start worrying or spinning and rotating anyway they do all of their manufacturing except for a few basic circuits right there in Colorado and they can do so with some 3d printers and and it's like again it's still so early but you can get a glimpse in know what's gonna hopefully be a pretty awesome next five to ten years so two questions Jenna sure what's your what's the best thing you've seen here so far the best thing aside from The Verge contest had me beat me to it um well I and again I'm biased because I'm chummy with the pebble guys but I am I'm really really hopeful I'm just continuous to be like like I I really think it's gonna I mean I'm looking forward I got the black one I'm really hoping it meets and lives out the expectation so yeah I probably pebble and then what was your second question my last question is the question I'm asking everybody what what apps are here on screen I don't know my doing my phone on me I think okay let's see Evernote how good um I want to turn my phone off because I want to be a responsible interviewee I haven't no alien blue of course for reading the reddit we don't have an official app at reddit there's an Australian developer who's awesome made the alien blue read it out which you should all download and a bunch of random stuff I only recently discovered Gmail as an app on the iPhone I'm just using the janky what is wrong with mail it's really good weeks I know and I think I used to it's like proof that Google is getting really good at design yeah we'll be while apples like East figure out cloud service oh man have you tried Maps lately okay well we were out of time thank you so much lesser people who are watching you should stick around top shelf is coming up at 3:00 for some time very soon three o'clock tops tops coming to three so stick around we're actually gonna have all of the watches we've been talking about the pebble the Central Standard Time in the world's thinnest one we're gonna have a bunch of stuff this would be great I won't be here it'll be David Pierce and some other guys sounds good to me and then and that show will surely start telling I'm sorry you're done that's got this what no cut it off oh come on army first an environment you're hired thank you looking forward wonder why Alexis Ohanian everyone your cleanup with this