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The Talk Show

24: It’s Like Drug Money, with Glenn Fleishman

 

00:00:00   I have a question that this is the type

00:00:01   of thing that this is why I need to hire

00:00:03   staff because if i had a staff I

00:00:06   wouldn't have to ask you this

00:00:07   ok but it's a protocol question I want

00:00:09   to get the protocol you know when you

00:00:11   meet the Queen of England there's a

00:00:12   reason it's very complicated protocol I

00:00:14   want to get this protocol right now do I

00:00:15   introduce you as jeopardy champion

00:00:17   Atlanta flash on and or do I introduce

00:00:20   you as to time jeopardy champion Glenn

00:00:22   fleischmann i think i think just

00:00:24   jeopardy champion otherwise it's

00:00:26   bragging i got you all right it's okay

00:00:28   to win but then you know you sort of

00:00:30   rubbing in some of those what's funny is

00:00:32   I I think I thread the needle little

00:00:34   neatly because i was i think i was a

00:00:35   pretty good player not a fantastic

00:00:37   player but I was between 27 de champions

00:00:39   it turned out so I met both of them at

00:00:41   the outgoing one who lost just before I

00:00:43   did and I'm at the incoming 121 just

00:00:45   after i did and i think both of them

00:00:47   would have completely clean my clock

00:00:49   because they had superb buzzer timing

00:00:51   and some better domain knowledge that

00:00:54   plays jeopardy so I got very lucky

00:00:56   wait picnic did you did you beat the 72

00:00:58   you the one who knocked the incoming

00:01:00   seven-time champion off though

00:01:02   no this is it was perfect she Stephanie

00:01:04   yas lost because they had another name

00:01:06   it's like a little family so she won she

00:01:09   comes in we get in there it's on there

00:01:11   on a Tuesday Wednesday for taping so I'm

00:01:12   going tuesday morning and they're like

00:01:14   oh well welcome stephanie is our

00:01:16   five-time returning champion and we all

00:01:17   look at each other and go oh shit right

00:01:20   like we have to deal with this person so

00:01:22   she plays two games at 85 games today

00:01:24   she placed two games she the third game

00:01:26   she plays which was not against me

00:01:29   the Final Jeopardy question was

00:01:30   ridiculous and even those of us sitting

00:01:33   audience is contesting sides afterwards

00:01:35   like we would have gotten it wrong it

00:01:36   was asking for the country that have the

00:01:38   largest state that would have been like

00:01:41   the six largest country in the world it

00:01:43   was a country and Stephanie wrote like

00:01:46   Outer Mongolia issued now someone else

00:01:48   wrote our products which is the correct

00:01:49   state the question was asking for the

00:01:52   country so the winner was sort of a

00:01:53   fluke she wanted Final Jeopardy India

00:01:55   then I be this lovely woman named

00:01:57   Meredith and I won twice next morning

00:01:59   come back and went to shows 45 that day

00:02:02   come back the next morning and I lose

00:02:03   the first game because I'm just fried

00:02:05   the woman who beat me she wins one more

00:02:07   game and she loses to the next seven-day

00:02:10   champion teeth whitener very nice guy

00:02:12   also got ya i imagine that is like a

00:02:15   typical power law distribution where

00:02:18   everybody everybody who gets on the show

00:02:20   is good i mean it's the other qualifying

00:02:22   process is enough that everybody who

00:02:24   gets on his is pretty good even even

00:02:27   someone who ends up not doing too well

00:02:28   in an episode is probably a pretty good

00:02:30   you know neighborhood trivia champion

00:02:32   they win a lot so right the people get

00:02:35   there should really be able to mean the

00:02:36   game mechanics of being you know on a

00:02:39   stage and and so be confronted with that

00:02:41   might get you but you everyone knows you

00:02:44   know a lot of stuff so yeah so I was

00:02:46   with the the outliers of the things they

00:02:47   do a lot of stuff in the game now to

00:02:49   prevent people who win from keeping

00:02:51   winning by giving them better training

00:02:54   so giving out new contestants better

00:02:56   training so we get is more her soul

00:02:58   there's more buzzer practice and all

00:02:59   that and that's level things out since

00:03:01   Ken Jennings but I was between two

00:03:02   people who end up being the number 14

00:03:05   number 15 all-time money winners on

00:03:08   jeopardy which is like a long history

00:03:09   it's right for 30 days to get away a lot

00:03:13   less money but they gave me a lot of

00:03:14   money for a long time so I'm not you

00:03:16   know I'm like the number 220 all-time

00:03:18   winner out of that is still be pretty

00:03:20   good i'm happy with the skills because

00:03:22   they give me more money so even a basic

00:03:23   game with more but like so I was between

00:03:25   two outliers like these people are

00:03:27   actually a 97 99 percent jeopardy

00:03:29   players right and I'm like a 85th

00:03:32   percentile keep her 80th percentile

00:03:34   Michael it's okay i want somebody

00:03:36   unhappy but it was there was funny it

00:03:38   was funny and they're both nice people

00:03:39   too and Billy back for tournament of

00:03:40   champions

00:03:41   I'm gonna watch them kill each other how

00:03:42   many you have to win five to get on

00:03:44   Tournament of Champions three but then

00:03:46   there's a threshold of money and and at

00:03:48   this point someone keeps a tally of it

00:03:49   looks like you have to at least fifty

00:03:51   thousand dollars which is minimum of

00:03:52   three games but up least fifty thousand

00:03:54   dollars now to get in huh

00:03:55   given how well people have done so so

00:03:58   it'll be it'll be a pretty fierce

00:03:59   competition I think for the all-time

00:04:01   rankings they should inflation adjust it

00:04:03   and it's socially it you know because i

00:04:06   think what they did is they doubled the

00:04:07   money at some piano is language why it's

00:04:10   like art fart Fleming was one thing that

00:04:12   came from the series back

00:04:13   I think it used to be like another top

00:04:16   money you could win it was it was hard

00:04:17   to win more than several thousand

00:04:18   dollars but there's a baseline routinely

00:04:20   yeah the baseline that's just call it X

00:04:22   is the first round you know now what is

00:04:26   it like 200 bucks

00:04:28   it usually a hundred dollars on on this

00:04:29   alex trebek one but that should just be

00:04:31   called X and then whatever you win has

00:04:34   to be a multiple of that I agree because

00:04:36   then it's right if it's sort of like

00:04:38   movie earnings to his you-know-whats

00:04:40   notice know you're sleeping beauty or

00:04:42   out of phantasia there's some movie that

00:04:44   was the that's still in current dollars

00:04:46   some billions of dollars that made might

00:04:48   be gone with the wind acting was that

00:04:49   it's one of those can go on with the

00:04:51   wind that cost me thousands of dollars

00:04:53   in jeopardy

00:04:54   no its final jeopardy question list i

00:04:57   think it might think i'm not trying to

00:04:58   torment you here but I do that I believe

00:05:00   that inflation adjusted if you just

00:05:02   count ticket sold instead of counting

00:05:04   dollars just count how many people put

00:05:06   their butts in the seats to see the

00:05:08   theater I think it was gone with the

00:05:10   wind now I think that's eventually look

00:05:11   at prices of stamps with gasoline and

00:05:13   people are like stamps cost ridiculous

00:05:15   amounts like know just different

00:05:16   relation postage is the cheapest it's

00:05:17   been practically since Benjamin Franklin

00:05:19   or whatever you know and gasoline is

00:05:21   actually it's expensive but it's not

00:05:22   that expensive compared the nineteen

00:05:24   seventies right now right

00:05:26   i just paid 369 so you have people don't

00:05:28   like math little thing with the movies

00:05:30   is that the movie industry is such a

00:05:32   cutthroat I'm on top right now thing

00:05:34   that nobody has any interest in in

00:05:37   remembering how popular jaws was right

00:05:39   it's really just you know like whatever

00:05:42   was the most popular movie of the last

00:05:43   six months is really all that matters

00:05:45   and that's all anybody wants to promote

00:05:46   but it's it's like if you look back and

00:05:49   see that jaws grossed 300 million

00:05:51   dollars or 275 million dollars or

00:05:53   whatever but then realized that

00:05:55   first-run movie tickets for like a

00:05:56   buck-fifty it's you know it's ridiculous

00:05:59   exactly i'm everyone i paid i went to

00:06:01   the first THX 1140 check sound movie

00:06:04   that ever went to was robocop is open

00:06:06   new theater and eugene oregon i paid i

00:06:09   don't know it seems like a crazy i was

00:06:10   at five dollars in 1984 something it was

00:06:13   it seemed obscene was a 415 I was like

00:06:16   oh my god it was then you know that's

00:06:18   when pay $11 in something and I think

00:06:20   that's actually cheap inflationary terms

00:06:22   relative to what I paid for that I do

00:06:24   there it is it it's a paths

00:06:26   rite of passage in the united states

00:06:28   that eventually it's it's when you

00:06:29   become a full-fledged adult is when

00:06:32   you're outraged by the price of X that's

00:06:34   right right and I remember being a

00:06:37   teenager and here in my dad complain

00:06:39   about movie ticket prices I just

00:06:40   remember thinking well that's just

00:06:41   proved that you're an old man you know

00:06:43   you're out of touch now now it's my turn

00:06:45   i'll try to explain inflation to my kids

00:06:47   my five-year-old a year old and they

00:06:49   they can sort of get some of it and I

00:06:51   had this experience not that long ago so

00:06:53   the oatmeal god is that cartoon he

00:06:55   raised a returner thousand dollars

00:06:56   despite a douchebag who is suing him

00:06:58   over something that was ridiculous and

00:07:00   he was in town I don't you know talk to

00:07:02   my boy editors and I can go cover this

00:07:03   ensure so I call my colleges only all

00:07:06   very nice guy and Matthew and he's like

00:07:08   yeah come on down and so it's me and him

00:07:10   and this friend of his who's packing

00:07:13   some heat going to license and he'll

00:07:15   pick up the money and his girlfriend his

00:07:17   mother's mother helps fulfill all his

00:07:18   mother does always some packaging like

00:07:20   sends all the mugs and t-shirts up from

00:07:22   a small town in Washington so in this

00:07:24   room with like hundreds of thousands

00:07:25   dollars like you want to help make sure

00:07:27   some family kiddo it's like drug money

00:07:29   it's like these big bundles twenty

00:07:31   dollars and you don't understand how

00:07:33   truly ridiculous money is why wasn't in

00:07:35   cash he wanted to take he spelled out fu

00:07:40   and douchebag in cash to send to this

00:07:42   lawyer said I'm gonna take pictures of

00:07:44   this money than I raised that i'm

00:07:45   sending to charity so we took it all of

00:07:47   the bank made pictures out of it let's

00:07:49   put it on the floor in bundles of

00:07:51   pictures and hand-picked money back the

00:07:53   back and dispersed it's the charities

00:07:55   and it's just a big you so but you

00:07:58   handle cash and the absurdity of money

00:08:02   as a system error symbolic part of our

00:08:04   economy it is even worse when you handle

00:08:07   large amounts of it doesn't matter if

00:08:08   it's yours or not you're looking like

00:08:09   what does this mean it's all this

00:08:11   printed paper like this is a huge amount

00:08:13   of cash and it just it like it just

00:08:15   seems like even more absurd than it

00:08:17   already

00:08:17   you you'd really do that I've you know

00:08:19   I've I've met you several times at

00:08:20   conferences in the UU instantly come

00:08:23   across as a very trust trustworthy man

00:08:25   like I'm not surprised i don't think

00:08:27   that if I had been writing that story i

00:08:29   don't think i would have been invited to

00:08:30   help count the cash it was like a nice

00:08:32   like his friend there is packing but no

00:08:34   it was I'd met him before but stover

00:08:36   great buddies or anything it's just as

00:08:37   good guy and and that's what I was like

00:08:39   this is you know like when a small room

00:08:41   whatever but it's awfully nice that you

00:08:42   trust i'm gonna hundreds of thousands of

00:08:45   dollars in my hands right i I've had

00:08:47   that experience secondhand I just not

00:08:50   with what was in my hands but watching

00:08:52   other people were in casinos where I

00:08:57   like I've gone by the high-limit

00:08:59   baccarat rooms and the like it

00:09:02   Bellagio and you can just look in and

00:09:04   see and you see that guys are playing

00:09:06   with yellow chips and yellow chips are

00:09:07   5,000 each and they're just putting out

00:09:09   stacks of them i mean yeah i don't even

00:09:12   know to the point where you can't even

00:09:13   clearly count them you know where it's

00:09:15   easily 25 30 35 thousand dollars of that

00:09:19   and then I just think well that's that

00:09:22   to me isn't insane i would die would die

00:09:25   of a heart i like to gamble I I know I'm

00:09:27   not averse to gambling but if I had 35

00:09:30   thousand dollars in front of me on a

00:09:32   planet world player of cards i would

00:09:34   have a heart attack and I well here's

00:09:35   the thing i can do a callback now which

00:09:37   is some there in jeopardy and I'm like

00:09:39   I'm gonna bet everything I could come

00:09:41   from my trip solid at five thousand

00:09:43   dollars but I had this great

00:09:44   conversation with an IBM scientists

00:09:46   recently who worked on the Watson team

00:09:50   that won at jeopardy in 2011 and there's

00:09:53   all this discussion about the natural

00:09:54   language processing that Watson did and

00:09:56   they'd like it

00:09:57   dozens of scientists worked on this for

00:09:59   four years I mean I being but millions

00:10:01   and millions of dollars with the staff

00:10:02   time in addition to tens or hundreds of

00:10:04   millions of computer resources because

00:10:07   they have all these interesting things

00:10:09   are going to do with it now but they

00:10:11   thought jeopardy was the right challenge

00:10:12   makes a big splash it's good marketing

00:10:13   but it's a great challenge right so

00:10:15   natural language processing it was

00:10:16   astonishing that it did as well as it

00:10:18   did but he was working on the wagering

00:10:20   side of it

00:10:21   and how you so they would take the

00:10:23   output like the question what kind of

00:10:25   clue would come up the subsystems that

00:10:27   did all that would you know incredibly

00:10:29   rapidly have to process it before it

00:10:31   rang in it would produce a confidence

00:10:33   score instantly and keep refining it and

00:10:35   he was constantly processing and the

00:10:37   confidence score would let it choose

00:10:39   whether to wager and it also used to

00:10:42   pick which the daily double square our

00:10:44   daily doubles might be under because

00:10:45   they place them not it's not even

00:10:47   pseudo-random replaced traditionally in

00:10:49   certain places and so you can predict

00:10:51   them and so bye-bye other wagering

00:10:54   simulation of other players to test the

00:10:56   system and pre-selecting we're using

00:10:59   Bayesian analysis other things with the

00:11:01   daily double score might do better

00:11:03   elsewhere might be they dramatically

00:11:05   improve the odds of winning and so the

00:11:07   natural language processing was very

00:11:08   impressive but the wagering part was

00:11:10   actually did all these monte carlo

00:11:12   simulations they're like you know we

00:11:13   don't believe the average jeopardy

00:11:14   player will be familiar with the what's

00:11:17   the guy the John the movie about a

00:11:21   fellow is slightly is mentally ill

00:11:23   limited by the statistician Malaysian

00:11:25   really think that I know you mean it was

00:11:27   a rather like Ron Howard movie

00:11:29   yeah so like we don't we don't think

00:11:30   that every jeopardy players can have you

00:11:32   know Monte Carlo simulations running in

00:11:34   their head but all the simulation of

00:11:36   wagering and strategy by other people

00:11:38   by analyzing the archive of all the

00:11:41   wagers and decisions people have made

00:11:42   throughout the entire history of

00:11:43   Jeopardy affected it and they made weird

00:11:47   bats like on daily double straps maybe

00:11:49   we're better and I'm like I read this

00:11:50   paper i said i would change my strategy

00:11:52   and the scientists said this guy Jerold

00:11:54   sorrow said he'd worked previously in

00:11:56   backgammon like computer become making a

00:11:59   backhand simulations I could win our

00:12:01   systems that could be human players he

00:12:03   said in every game in chess backgammon

00:12:06   bridge whatever which the computers

00:12:09   finally improve on and can be the

00:12:11   Masters the games people start playing

00:12:13   the game differently because they

00:12:14   understand that the way they're playing

00:12:16   it isn't as efficient and isn't as a

00:12:19   doesn't have the same odds probability

00:12:21   of winning as the way computer plays it

00:12:23   without any of those constraints right

00:12:24   now without any sort of fear right or

00:12:27   the computer says I'm ninety-seven

00:12:29   percent confident the answer so i'm

00:12:30   gonna wager you know 73,000 there was

00:12:32   one player this one human player in

00:12:34   jeopardy Roger Craig was a number for

00:12:36   money winner and won the tournament

00:12:37   champions in 2011 and he would do this

00:12:41   thing where he would double down double

00:12:42   down double down he was 77 thousand

00:12:44   dollars in one day he did that thing

00:12:46   pushing all the markers Ford the 77,000

00:12:50   the most one by anybody on Jeopardy

00:12:52   effort and one day I think engines had a

00:12:54   75 grand a one-day because you do that

00:12:56   maybe like he's got you know you've got

00:12:57   thirty seven thousand five hours what

00:12:59   you can do is like a wager all haha

00:13:02   really really any do it and you know

00:13:04   that's hard to do it's real money you

00:13:07   know and the funny thing is that

00:13:08   actually is i think it's it's that it's

00:13:11   a very simple game overall jeopardy but

00:13:13   i think that the daily doubles is just

00:13:15   the right amount of of like a wild card

00:13:20   it's like an asterisk in the game that

00:13:22   makes it a game and the truth is on your

00:13:24   first day the day you won your opponent

00:13:28   had a lead that shit could have been in

00:13:30   surmountable going into Final Jeopardy

00:13:32   could have been unbeatable but she

00:13:34   wagered enough on a daily double and

00:13:37   lost to give you a chance

00:13:39   yeah this is it's a heartbreaking moment

00:13:41   which has been preserved on youtube

00:13:43   someone's posted about three minutes of

00:13:45   it and I didn't realize when playing the

00:13:47   game until I watched interviewing party

00:13:48   had a bunch of people at a sports bar

00:13:50   even we're watching and I'm like oh my

00:13:53   god she could have one I had no idea

00:13:54   because it's so fast right the average

00:13:57   question goes by the the new question

00:13:59   every 12 seconds thinking some of the

00:14:01   research shows so you know you're in

00:14:03   there there's display you can look up up

00:14:05   to the left of the big board you can see

00:14:07   like a little LCD display of the three

00:14:09   players course you can glance up there

00:14:11   while you're playing when you're

00:14:12   figuring out strategy and so in the heat

00:14:15   of the moment if she had a minute to

00:14:16   think about it she would about five

00:14:17   dollars which is technically the lowest

00:14:19   daily double back

00:14:20   instead she got 1,200 and that was the

00:14:22   craziest question answer is

00:14:24   dendrochronology yeah

00:14:25   is it on my god the poor woman yeah so

00:14:28   she right so she had twice more than

00:14:30   twice as much cited could have read in

00:14:32   one and he went right runs just over

00:14:33   twice what you had to just under twice

00:14:35   what you had and the Daily Double was

00:14:37   right at the end and she had no chance

00:14:39   to get another question to go back up

00:14:41   and more than double and so then one

00:14:43   more and that was a gentle i know i was

00:14:45   watching at home I recognized it

00:14:46   instantly because i was really obviously

00:14:48   I was rooting for you I thank you and I

00:14:50   mean you will be on the talk show if you

00:14:52   were one time jeopardy loser cleanse and

00:14:54   it's like there's not much but yeah it's

00:14:56   like my was really really i thought all

00:14:58   she's kind of two and then I thought old

00:15:00   a lot an inch did battle and I was like

00:15:02   oh give her an impossible question and

00:15:03   then they gave her an impossible

00:15:04   question are we going that's a

00:15:05   ridiculous question like this 13 letter

00:15:08   working like all come of course i was

00:15:09   watching one of my friends was at the

00:15:11   viewing party

00:15:12   his dad was a forestry says

00:15:13   dendrochronology like oh my god really

00:15:16   ya Yin right now because it is you know

00:15:18   somebody's somebody knows generating

00:15:20   science but it's funny and then we go

00:15:22   into the Final Jeopardy that game and

00:15:23   this is a great thing about other things

00:15:26   that playing a game show about knowledge

00:15:27   teaches you is there's a Bob Harris

00:15:30   wrote this great book called prisoner of

00:15:31   Tribeca spits and about his be 15 times

00:15:34   back when you only went five times when

00:15:35   he came back and they brought much like

00:15:37   four tournaments because he's one of the

00:15:39   most interesting nice guys he's got a

00:15:40   new book coming out about

00:15:41   microenvironment micro investing but a

00:15:44   microloan so he's been traveling on the

00:15:46   world meeting with people that he's loan

00:15:49   money to over kiva it's he sent me an

00:15:52   advanced copy it's really cool is really

00:15:53   neat guy but he was this great book

00:15:55   that's kind of memoir and kind of full

00:15:57   of strategy about playing the game and

00:15:59   this difference between no knowledge and

00:16:01   ferd knowledge and I don't think I

00:16:03   understood that as much until I played

00:16:05   the game the final question on day one

00:16:07   the Final Jeopardy was about a city the

00:16:10   city him that's germany had a different

00:16:12   name from 1953 to 1991 1933 to a night

00:16:16   yet nineteen nineteen fifty three

00:16:18   dimensionality what was it and I'm like

00:16:19   what you know and I don't know the

00:16:21   answer

00:16:21   I don't know the answer and I know the

00:16:22   other two players I sort of know what

00:16:24   they know what is up probably playing

00:16:25   the game and I'm like I studied German

00:16:28   four years in college I'm like I know

00:16:30   cabinets a german city that's not a

00:16:31   problem i know the wall thought 1990 and

00:16:35   I'm doing this you know this

00:16:35   ratiocination you're like the Germans

00:16:38   hated Stalin so it's not

00:16:39   that after Stalin Lenin was a Russian

00:16:41   Tsar Leningrad I'm like it has to be

00:16:43   Karl Marx but I don't know that in the

00:16:44   sensation of inferred knowledge is weird

00:16:47   and then it's that I got the really yeah

00:16:48   that's it you got enough money they want

00:16:50   the city name or who was named after the

00:16:52   one who was named the city was named

00:16:53   after the city of him electricity

00:16:55   it's karl marx shot yeah i would another

00:16:57   name of the city but in hindsight I my

00:17:00   guess was stolen and and I thought in

00:17:02   your right this way you're on Jeopardy

00:17:04   winning and I'm at home losing a little

00:17:06   hey colin is inferred knowledge i knew

00:17:09   from the years that had to be communists

00:17:12   related that's when exactly that's when

00:17:14   that you know that the Russians took

00:17:16   control over half of germany after world

00:17:17   war two and that's when they lost it

00:17:19   I and so I thought well I don't know

00:17:22   Stalin and and that's that's as far as I

00:17:25   thought and then you're smart enough to

00:17:27   think well they hate the Germans hated

00:17:28   stolen and you know maybe the the

00:17:30   Russians couldn't impose that on them

00:17:32   and if so of course you go back you in

00:17:35   begin the scope and go right back to the

00:17:37   you know the granddaddy of communism you

00:17:39   go to Karl Marx but you're staying in

00:17:41   that quantum state you're shorting out

00:17:43   of the system we call the hospital

00:17:44   episode was the schrödinger's cat box

00:17:45   because you're here sitting there in a

00:17:47   state of which you what you've don't

00:17:49   know if you won or lost because you

00:17:51   don't firmly know that it's accurate you

00:17:53   can only deduce it's accurate so there's

00:17:54   no way to know until someone provides

00:17:56   affirmative knowledge that your crime

00:17:58   would have felt roots I would have felt

00:18:00   real good though if I'd come up with

00:18:01   karl marx I would have been sitting here

00:18:03   thinking it's got to be marks outside

00:18:05   because I was like I got one you know

00:18:06   one chance but yeah it's funny it's a

00:18:09   it's a funny it's a funny game and

00:18:11   people are strangely fascinated about it

00:18:12   even though a lot of people everyone

00:18:14   told me

00:18:15   yeah I love jeopardy and watched it for

00:18:16   10 years just because people kept the

00:18:19   core they don't to broadcast TV if i

00:18:21   didn't have the viewing party i think

00:18:22   half the people there wouldn't have been

00:18:24   able to watch it at home because they

00:18:25   don't have

00:18:26   form of television or access to cable or

00:18:29   whatever time have I had to do african

00:18:31   if we talked about this online or not

00:18:33   but as i explained to you my theory of

00:18:35   everything it's a theory but i think

00:18:37   it's so short

00:18:38   why does jeopardy come on before wheel

00:18:41   of fortune not vice versa in my market

00:18:44   it comes on how does is destroy your

00:18:46   theory yeah varies by market

00:18:48   what's your theory though because wheel

00:18:50   of fortune makes you feel smart and

00:18:52   jeopardy makes you feel dumb

00:18:54   yeah and you couldn't make you feel too

00:18:56   dumb they're always striking a balance

00:18:58   there i was watching the secret wheeling

00:19:01   the secret to wheel of fortunes

00:19:02   popularity is that the optimal strategy

00:19:06   is not to solve the puzzle as soon as

00:19:08   you can

00:19:08   it's to keep racking up money once you

00:19:11   know the answer to the puzzle and get a

00:19:13   big dollar symbol and pick the tea which

00:19:16   you know that there's three of and so in

00:19:18   the meantime the audience has all of

00:19:20   this way more time to figure out what

00:19:22   the puzzle is oh no you're right that's

00:19:24   exactly it's a perfect right because the

00:19:26   the one the players want to keep it

00:19:27   going as long as they can as long as

00:19:29   they have money on the board but

00:19:30   jeopardy don't i'm at Johns up but the

00:19:32   the play this bounced again i was

00:19:33   watching one night and they did a

00:19:35   category about it i watched excessively

00:19:37   after i got the caller's beyond and i

00:19:39   went back and read archives and so forth

00:19:41   in a they had a cat was all about

00:19:42   Huguenots and I'm like really haha

00:19:45   Huguenots and the players there i'm even

00:19:47   alex is for canada alex trebek is like I

00:19:50   think no one got any of the answers

00:19:52   right here like really about you can I

00:19:55   mean it's a little obscure you know ask

00:19:57   you know technology might be bad but you

00:19:59   gotta have stuff to people at home feel

00:20:01   like they could have known even if they

00:20:03   don't know it all right let me take a

00:20:05   break and talk about our first sponsor

00:20:06   it's great i'm so happy about both

00:20:09   sponsors today I'm happy about all of

00:20:11   our sponsors every week but today in

00:20:12   particular because first sponsor we've

00:20:15   got talks back on board now you know

00:20:18   talks when this is kind of amazing

00:20:20   you don't talk two topics that i just

00:20:22   got a delivery of Tanks coffee i can

00:20:24   even tell you about what it's like

00:20:25   that's me taking a sip i'm drinking

00:20:28   tonics coffee right now

00:20:29   tonks is a small company and you sign up

00:20:33   they send fresh beans to you from all

00:20:35   over the world and the coffee is just

00:20:37   great

00:20:39   and and here's here's the things they

00:20:42   want me to tell you number one they want

00:20:43   they want you to know that contrary to

00:20:44   what you might think going to the coffee

00:20:47   shop in the barista makes it some kind

00:20:49   of latte and then milk ends up looking

00:20:51   like the Mona Lisa and you think well

00:20:52   that's good coffee is impossible

00:20:54   guess what making great coffee like

00:20:56   serious world-class great cup of coffee

00:20:58   in your own kitchen is super simple some

00:21:01   of the best ways to make coffee are so

00:21:03   simple blow your mind

00:21:04   get great beans or grind them just pour

00:21:07   hot water over it into a filter and

00:21:09   you've already got a great cup of coffee

00:21:11   I the guys from tonks find the best

00:21:14   coffee beans from the top producers all

00:21:17   literally all over the world

00:21:19   I they nailed the roast and they get

00:21:21   them in your mailbox at the peak of

00:21:23   freshness and they send her my love

00:21:24   their envelopes are the the limb

00:21:26   packages i think they everything about

00:21:29   these guys to me is if you set out to

00:21:31   this is my this is what i'm thinking is

00:21:33   if you set out to make the best coffee

00:21:36   company in the world you'd come up with

00:21:38   something like punk maybe not the

00:21:40   biggest certainly not the biggest I

00:21:41   don't think tanks as big as starbucks i

00:21:44   don't know yet might because i'm talking

00:21:46   the best if your goal is to set out to

00:21:49   do the best coffee in the world would

00:21:51   come up with something like tonks great

00:21:53   beans everything about them i just i

00:21:55   love the the packages that there things

00:21:57   come in they'd just the little Ziploc

00:21:59   seal is it I don't either with a lot of

00:22:01   bags with ziplock i often have a hard I

00:22:03   takes me like three steps to get it with

00:22:05   the talks one always first one is

00:22:07   transparent so you can see the beans it

00:22:09   comes and you're looking at the beans

00:22:10   and it's got a neat little silkscreen

00:22:12   message about what's in there and a

00:22:14   little note about it and but I don't

00:22:16   feel like they're fussy or favorite it's

00:22:18   like it's like they love their coffee

00:22:20   they have no attitude about the coffee

00:22:22   what they're doing is they're producing

00:22:23   something really good and I'm they're

00:22:25   not my spots of the responses i can talk

00:22:27   about the money wisely behave like

00:22:28   reducing its really that's like a

00:22:31   delicious product that's designed to be

00:22:33   consumed but they're not coffee create I

00:22:35   mean there are praising the fact that

00:22:36   they're interested in it but it's not

00:22:38   that you need to get a

00:22:39   ten-thousand-dollar espresso machine and

00:22:41   spend a week in Italy learning how to do

00:22:43   it it's like you can use an aeropress

00:22:44   you use a final espresso machine you

00:22:46   could use a hundred-dollar espresso

00:22:48   machine the bird grinder I think a

00:22:50   vertical

00:22:50   that's what I keep hearing and and i

00:22:52   support that you want a burger grinder

00:22:54   that's where you put the money but then

00:22:55   after that you make another way to make

00:22:57   it anywhere and you get a good one and

00:22:58   the last year forever but there it

00:23:00   really is not they're not asking you to

00:23:01   put out a huge capital outlay on on

00:23:03   fancy equipment or time-consuming

00:23:04   processes and they're also have

00:23:07   tremendous customer service and a great

00:23:10   website where you go there and they have

00:23:12   videos and things about you know just

00:23:14   here's how to make a great cup of coffee

00:23:17   ah most things i like about them too is

00:23:20   they don't want to grow too fast that's

00:23:22   what i was talking for another soon to

00:23:24   be announced meal radio syndicate

00:23:26   broadcast i'm working on a document for

00:23:29   that so here this in december or

00:23:30   something my interview with them and the

00:23:32   thing is they don't wanna get big fast

00:23:33   they they want to get big that'd be

00:23:35   great right there not an ambitious but

00:23:37   they aren't there like you know we did

00:23:40   have a million customers day one social

00:23:41   marketing Facebook advertising Twitter

00:23:44   spamblocker like they like growing the

00:23:47   growing well they're getting great

00:23:48   word-of-mouth they are trying to scale

00:23:50   it little by little so they don't get

00:23:52   they don't have to deliver inferior

00:23:54   product is just love that there's no

00:23:56   doubt in my mind that their number one

00:23:58   priority is best coffee in the world and

00:24:00   everything else is secondary that they

00:24:02   want to be profitable i'm sure they want

00:24:04   to grow that you know obviously they

00:24:06   want to grow that's why they're

00:24:06   sponsoring the show to get more talk

00:24:08   show listeners to just give them a shot

00:24:10   on here's the last thing a couple

00:24:12   episodes ago in the last time they

00:24:14   sponsored it and I was talking about how

00:24:17   they're literally all over the world but

00:24:18   I didn't have the list off the top of my

00:24:20   head here here's they sent me this there

00:24:22   in Africa they have sourced beans from

00:24:24   Kenya Ethiopia i'm drinking some stuff

00:24:26   from Ethiopia right now and I Rwanda

00:24:29   Tanzania in Central America they have

00:24:32   sourced beans from Guatemala El Salvador

00:24:33   Nicaragua Costa Rica Honduras and in

00:24:37   South America Colombia Brazil Ecuador

00:24:40   Bolivia Peru so I'm telling it literally

00:24:42   all over the coffee growing world these

00:24:44   guys are getting the best beans

00:24:46   here's how much they believe in it free

00:24:47   trial you just sign up go to talk start

00:24:50   or gon x.org sign up you get a free

00:24:54   trial the beans will show up at your

00:24:56   house in a couple of days

00:24:57   fresh sealed and I'm telling it you're

00:24:59   going to try these beans and you're

00:25:00   going to sign up and become a regular

00:25:02   mr. thanks talks it's good it's good i

00:25:06   even ate some beans raw because they

00:25:08   look so delicious that I definitely

00:25:10   could my design schools my son loves eat

00:25:12   a couple of coffee beans raw let's go

00:25:14   ahead and I i will also about he didn't

00:25:17   know he has no idea that their sponsor

00:25:18   of my show you i don't think he knows I

00:25:20   have a show I think talks whenever I

00:25:23   make coffee i say hey you want a couple

00:25:24   of beans and he'll take through for

00:25:25   coffee beans and I gave him the talks

00:25:27   ones and he gave me after he chewed the

00:25:29   one he gave me the nose like the guy in

00:25:31   Pulp Fiction they hey that was pretty

00:25:32   good like that that's good coffee the

00:25:37   other ones were particularly beautiful

00:25:38   color to his olive color it's funny I've

00:25:41   never been I've never been like a

00:25:42   fetishist of coffee anymore so 40 but

00:25:46   not even that but I like a good i like

00:25:47   to make it taste good and isn't better

00:25:49   and has kind of richness interesting and

00:25:51   coming from the town of starbucks so

00:25:53   here's a long story by the way so back

00:25:55   in 2005 a colleague says hey there's a

00:25:57   coffee shop in town that just opened up

00:25:58   and they're turning Wi-Fi off on

00:25:59   weekends

00:26:00   how crazy is that so New York Times

00:26:03   weirdly one of the only direct

00:26:04   assignments instead of me pitching they

00:26:06   call me up and say can you write a story

00:26:07   about this thing's sure so we go and

00:26:09   meet these owners young idealistic

00:26:10   owners who sold the business with a few

00:26:12   years because running a coffee shop is a

00:26:14   horrible horrible business they wanted

00:26:17   to have a community place and the

00:26:19   weekends with Wi-Fi on people never

00:26:21   talked was absolutely signs a crypt they

00:26:23   hated it so they turn Wi-Fi off for the

00:26:25   weekends so the birds vibrator story

00:26:27   about it get some really interesting

00:26:28   play and some other places also start

00:26:31   turning Wi-Fi off it's never really a

00:26:32   trend but it's interesting so the guy

00:26:34   roasting for them is Tony connect me the

00:26:37   hawks and he is i do my first copy i go

00:26:40   there he shows me are you copying in the

00:26:41   back and I get a taste all this great

00:26:42   coffee and then the guys you know is i

00:26:45   think what's the opposite of of a bad

00:26:46   pennies like a good penny just keeps

00:26:48   turning up wherever there's good coffee

00:26:49   turns up again and again and again and

00:26:51   it turns out everyone in the world knows

00:26:53   talks what is the opposite of event and

00:26:56   I don't know it's a great pennies shiny

00:26:58   penny right but very nice guy and he's

00:27:00   always had the same commitment to it and

00:27:02   you know it's coffee is a great story

00:27:04   because it spans the globe and it spans

00:27:06   this huge stretch of modern civilization

00:27:08   and you can just become such a fetishist

00:27:11   about every

00:27:12   little blah no granny whatever or you

00:27:14   can just drink it could cup of coffee

00:27:15   but I like the good cup of coffee part

00:27:18   better ma'am I you know speaking of good

00:27:21   pens your sort of a good penny and that

00:27:23   you you've had a crazy variety that

00:27:28   you've written for it an ordinate and on

00:27:30   a regular basis and inordinately wide

00:27:32   variety of publications you just

00:27:34   mentioned in New York Times you're now a

00:27:36   regular contributor to The Economist ah

00:27:39   you have been associated with tidbits as

00:27:43   long as I can remember I ever since Adam

00:27:46   and Tommy expanded beyond just adamant

00:27:49   on yeah i mean i remember you your

00:27:50   byline being in 10 minutes

00:27:52   how long have been writing for typic

00:27:53   since like 1994 yeah that's what I mean

00:27:57   having i sent them a letter I sent them

00:27:58   a letter once they ran and I was so

00:28:00   excited I started writing for them after

00:28:01   they lived in seattle when I first moved

00:28:03   out here in that 93 i mean we're talking

00:28:05   about before the web i mean we're

00:28:08   talking about when it when a lot of

00:28:10   people were probably still reading

00:28:11   tidbits as the a weekly HyperCard stack

00:28:13   those were the days of tidbits is now we

00:28:16   believe it's the longest continuously

00:28:18   published publication on the internet

00:28:20   because there's an irish newsletter that

00:28:22   stopped publication we think a quick now

00:28:24   are the last one since like 99 because

00:28:27   there was one they've been watching

00:28:28   there was one in China that fell away so

00:28:30   in terms of actually coming out on a

00:28:31   regular basis for you know x years i

00:28:35   think we are now the longest which is

00:28:36   which practices and it's astounding

00:28:38   really committed to think that it you

00:28:40   know the the upheaval that it went

00:28:42   through in the first decade uh just in

00:28:45   terms of format you know what is what is

00:28:46   the format for an Internet publication

00:28:49   oh yeah and like dealing with servers an

00:28:51   email an apple you know essentially

00:28:52   almost imploding underneath it and then

00:28:55   coming back and I mean the thing that's

00:28:57   funny so here's the best thing about

00:28:57   Adam and Tanya thanks as as people is

00:29:00   they do a lot of what they do to help

00:29:01   their friends make livings and do

00:29:03   interesting things they're really like

00:29:04   facilitators like they make a great

00:29:06   living with what they're doing they

00:29:07   figured a really good model with the

00:29:08   ebooks with tidbits and so forth and

00:29:10   they're charming people and great

00:29:12   friends but they also they spend a lot

00:29:14   of their time making sure that other

00:29:16   people they work with have a good

00:29:17   experience and can make a good living

00:29:19   from what they do and it's it's like

00:29:21   they're so non greedy about it's just

00:29:24   delightful

00:29:25   yeah so amazing other publications that

00:29:27   you have been associated you write for

00:29:29   Boing Boing I sorry just a bit right

00:29:32   occasionally Mars tecnica and yeah i got

00:29:35   this funny thing is i like i like people

00:29:37   it's this weird thing I like people and

00:29:38   i've been i started my career because I

00:29:41   was I was actually trained as a graphic

00:29:43   designer first typesetter than a graphic

00:29:45   designer was the career I was going to

00:29:46   go into but it turned out i've always

00:29:48   had an aptitude for computers so I wound

00:29:50   up becoming this guy who's like a

00:29:52   translator like oh you graphic designer

00:29:55   you're trying to use desktop publishing

00:29:56   only explain the steps to get there and

00:29:58   that's just been kind of my career goes

00:30:00   now I mean the Congress I'm the guy

00:30:01   where like we don't understand you know

00:30:04   nobody in house understands or cares

00:30:05   about networking protocols could lend

00:30:08   write something about this and so i'll

00:30:09   write something on the blog or sometimes

00:30:11   I'll pick something about a topic that's

00:30:13   really its they're interested in it but

00:30:15   it's really obscure the staff members or

00:30:17   their science geeks they have PhDs and

00:30:19   physics and economics and everything

00:30:21   else but the technology side they're not

00:30:23   familiar with it but other you know

00:30:24   they're very few programmers in-house

00:30:26   and so forth so I get to be the

00:30:27   explainer of certain aspects of Twinkie

00:30:29   digital things they are two and your

00:30:33   newest gig which is where I guess sort

00:30:36   of where I'm coming with this is you or

00:30:38   I don't forget your title exactly

00:30:39   executive editor executive at your

00:30:41   market when I had some conversations on

00:30:43   the magazine Marco Arment still nascent

00:30:47   I think it's a dead issue number three

00:30:49   is the current issue that's right number

00:30:51   for his next week I which is just an at

00:30:54   will as soon as I saw the announcement

00:30:55   was like God why didn't i wish i had

00:30:57   suggested this because this is such a

00:31:00   perfect match and I'm i want to be able

00:31:02   to take credit for making this happen

00:31:04   this is such a perfect fit

00:31:06   yeah it feels if it's in the Marcos

00:31:08   wheelhouse to where it's like Instapaper

00:31:09   it's like Instapaper except he's making

00:31:12   the articles that you will then read

00:31:13   later

00:31:14   you're such the perfect fit though

00:31:16   because you you know you have such a

00:31:18   variety of interests you know you're not

00:31:20   just you know you used to write up i

00:31:22   think it's past tense i don't think

00:31:24   you'd keep it up and what the what the

00:31:25   Wi-Fi blog

00:31:27   oh yeah that was interesting i spent

00:31:28   like a decade writing your Wi-Fi

00:31:30   networking news which was a blog that

00:31:32   was all

00:31:32   out Wi-Fi you think what the house that

00:31:34   it but it was great it was a decade of

00:31:36   upheaval in the community the community

00:31:39   Wi-Fi and then the all the standards

00:31:41   chain right all the devices and in

00:31:43   compatibilities standards wars and then

00:31:46   then citywide Wi-Fi municipal Wi-Fi and

00:31:49   those who have an end and then what

00:31:51   happened is was very interesting thing I

00:31:52   don't think it was that goes eight years

00:31:55   nine years into it and suddenly all the

00:31:57   interesting Wi-Fi disappeared because it

00:31:58   just started to work and the rise in

00:32:01   good mobile broadband like 3g had no 3g

00:32:04   was suddenly everywhere 4gs standards

00:32:07   that you know hspa+ and some of the

00:32:09   faster 3g stuff was starting to get out

00:32:11   there and LT was on the roadmap and

00:32:13   suddenly people didn't need to know

00:32:15   about Wi-Fi anymore because they could

00:32:16   just connect whenever they needed to and

00:32:18   the whole the traffic just fell out the

00:32:21   bottom and which is fine things have a

00:32:22   lifetime but i was i was sort of sitting

00:32:24   one day I'm like I should stop doing

00:32:26   this because know what's reading it for

00:32:28   it sort of reminds me of a equivalent to

00:32:31   Matt Howie's PVR blog which was wildly

00:32:35   popular actually for a while but then

00:32:37   everybody you know PVR's kind of became

00:32:39   a you know like like like indoor

00:32:43   plumbing

00:32:44   you know like no you know what truly

00:32:46   fascinating and life-changing and I but

00:32:51   then it you know you just sort of

00:32:52   assumed that it's there is no other a

00:32:54   big deal because the implosion of the

00:32:56   gadget blogs to that sort of happens I

00:32:58   mean you still have you know that the

00:32:59   verge is not a gadget blog it's a

00:33:00   general computing thing that's more like

00:33:03   you know macworld plus you know some of

00:33:06   like a hifi stereo publication plus a

00:33:08   business publication or on gizmodo is no

00:33:11   longer exactly a gadget thing neither

00:33:13   isn't gadget they write about all kinds

00:33:15   of stuff and there's a hundred thousand

00:33:17   sites that used to and some still update

00:33:19   things that are about every little gijoe

00:33:21   ah

00:33:21   and I think and that's what happened

00:33:24   Wi-Fi to was like when stuff just works

00:33:26   and there's a sufficient amount of it

00:33:27   and you don't have to make the same

00:33:29   kinds of decisions used to about what

00:33:31   you're going to get then the necessity

00:33:33   of going to site so still people who

00:33:34   obsessively check on every new thing

00:33:36   that's coming out but I think the

00:33:37   lifespan of those is really expired in a

00:33:40   way that they used to capture the

00:33:41   attention like 2003-2006 say

00:33:44   that's the sort of passed by ma'am I I

00:33:47   told him good

00:33:48   yeah that too and yeah it's you know

00:33:51   it's what I've often said the people

00:33:53   that you know for a guy who started

00:33:54   writing about apple and his own site in

00:33:56   2002 I I always thought if I did I

00:33:59   wouldn't pick a name that had the word

00:34:01   mac in it and you know that was never

00:34:03   really on the table but it really in

00:34:05   hindsight is turned out pretty well

00:34:06   known i think that's the thing i think

00:34:08   by not dumb

00:34:09   the most interesting stuff that happens

00:34:11   now is deliberative and I think you know

00:34:13   the verge still published as a lot of

00:34:14   news but i think you know you want

00:34:16   extreme you have any business insider or

00:34:18   even national weather still there

00:34:20   plowing out as much news is they can all

00:34:21   the time some of its you know I'd say

00:34:23   master likes of mashable Business

00:34:25   Insider let's say none of it's good but

00:34:26   they know they've got a business model

00:34:28   but then you know I've talked to Brian

00:34:30   laminate something for his wire-cutters

00:34:32   site and he's the one of the people that

00:34:33   gizmodo four years really drove that

00:34:36   frenzied pace and now wire cutters like

00:34:38   it's the best stuff like I really

00:34:40   in-depth stuff and it's like he's doing

00:34:41   nothing changes on there from day to day

00:34:44   until we post new i mentioned a couple

00:34:46   episodes ago forget who was on the show

00:34:48   here with me but we were talking about

00:34:49   the wire cutter and what a great site it

00:34:52   is and compare and contrast to consumer

00:34:54   reports which is really really

00:34:56   problematic but they're trying to do the

00:34:58   same thing which is I you need to buy a

00:35:02   new TV

00:35:04   I you just what's the best TV to buy and

00:35:07   you go to the wire cutter and they just

00:35:08   tell you here's the best TV to buy

00:35:10   that's it

00:35:11   let's get this one or if you're you know

00:35:12   it and i'll give you like three options

00:35:14   like he's just the best big TV to buy

00:35:16   here's the best one if you're on a

00:35:17   budget and you know here's the best one

00:35:19   if you want something small TV that's it

00:35:22   and that's all they tell you to do and

00:35:23   then let's give you a link that will

00:35:25   explain their we know maybe why it's

00:35:27   good but that's it there is no like 888

00:35:30   by seven grid of features and check

00:35:33   pluses and minuses and edit its Apple

00:35:37   like in its simplicity but justice but

00:35:38   but I had been a cop with peter rojas he

00:35:41   came through seattle a few months ago

00:35:42   and I've never met him in person but we

00:35:45   had correspondence for years and he

00:35:46   founded on gizmodo and then found it in

00:35:48   gadget

00:35:49   and then founded GD GT and I was a good

00:35:52   and and you know so G so he can say he's

00:35:55   responsible for all the horror right but

00:35:57   but I mean it was with the word it was

00:35:59   different when he was involved money

00:36:00   each time he left the publication's

00:36:03   transformed into something else I think

00:36:04   two and the whole industry changed but

00:36:06   GD GT is its wire cutter like also it's

00:36:09   it's here some really good information

00:36:11   on a focus subject we're not going to

00:36:13   bombard you because I think there's a

00:36:15   limited audience this is what just about

00:36:16   the liveblog things still like you know

00:36:18   the fact that millions of people will

00:36:20   tune in to these liveblog transcripts of

00:36:22   Apple events

00:36:23   what are you going to hear that's live

00:36:25   that's not I never understand that like

00:36:27   why can't you wait and someone writes

00:36:28   analysis or you can watch it yourself

00:36:30   when the video is posted but there are

00:36:32   obviously a lot of people who are

00:36:34   obsessed with the latest newest absolute

00:36:36   the second information and then I think

00:36:39   a much bigger audience it's like just

00:36:41   give me the lay of the land I don't need

00:36:42   to read every last bit give me the

00:36:44   information so i can make a value of

00:36:45   decisions

00:36:46   exactly now i agree that a night and I

00:36:48   also think I i think it should be i try

00:36:54   to do this i always try to keep in mind

00:36:56   with what i do a daring fireball that

00:36:57   obviously there's some people who are

00:36:59   loading the site multiple times

00:37:01   throughout the day but i always have in

00:37:03   my mind somebody who's really busy

00:37:04   hopefully working on some really cool

00:37:07   and they going to let they're going to

00:37:08   load it once at the end of the day just

00:37:10   to see what happened and I want the site

00:37:12   the homepage to breed and make sense and

00:37:15   sort of give you an overview of what you

00:37:17   need to know did you miss anything today

00:37:18   or is it just a bunch of the you know

00:37:21   goofy pictures of cats or something like

00:37:23   that but he's going to use RSS anymore

00:37:25   given RSS reader and I do i do but I

00:37:28   much comparing spiritual you did before

00:37:30   very little twitter is really over taken

00:37:33   it to a large extent I really what I I

00:37:35   there's like a reckoning coming where I

00:37:36   should really I I should wipe out all of

00:37:39   my RSS subscriptions and start over from

00:37:41   scratch and do it in a very different

00:37:43   way where it would be more like here's

00:37:45   the Dozen feeds that i don't i know that

00:37:47   i don't want to miss a thing and no

00:37:49   longer the here's a hundred feeds and

00:37:52   i'm going to skim what's new to see what

00:37:55   jumps out is breaking like twitter has

00:37:57   really overtaken that as the

00:38:00   I just what's going on right now am i

00:38:04   missing something that's breaking and

00:38:06   twitter is an aggregator me it's crowd

00:38:09   its crowd-sourced knowledge and on

00:38:11   average if you follow people i mean it's

00:38:13   sort of funny thing by figuring out who

00:38:15   you follow you only follow people are

00:38:16   interesting you and subscribe to them or

00:38:18   unfollow if they stop being interesting

00:38:20   to you overwhelm you and so who's left

00:38:23   for people who are likely to post things

00:38:24   you're interested in and you can see the

00:38:26   same URL from a bunch of people or the

00:38:28   weekend tweeted that they're interested

00:38:29   in so it's like I don't I i still have

00:38:32   our SSI hundreds of things in there but

00:38:34   a lot of them are like places where

00:38:36   otherwise wouldn't go in there just

00:38:37   obscure enough but i keep unsubscribing

00:38:39   feeds in our sense because i'm like i

00:38:41   don't need the new york times in my RSS

00:38:43   if there's an interesting article I mean

00:38:44   they're going to see it when i visit the

00:38:46   homepage at some point it'll show up 15

00:38:48   times and Twitter

00:38:48   yeah i totally agree it is twitter is

00:38:50   sort of Twitter works that way by doing

00:38:53   and I think that you have to do but you

00:38:55   have to be willing to unfollow the

00:38:57   people you no longer find interesting

00:38:58   you know and don't don't don't think

00:39:01   it's like I i know i don't have a

00:39:03   facebook account that I understand

00:39:05   though that like unfollowing or whatever

00:39:07   they call it somebody on facebook is

00:39:09   considered like rude it is a leg-up you

00:39:13   need something you might take personally

00:39:14   that somebody is no longer friends

00:39:16   friends with you on facebook

00:39:18   whereas to me the following unfollowed

00:39:21   you should never take that personally on

00:39:22   twitter i don't care people on follow me

00:39:24   because I'm tweeting about baseball or

00:39:25   something like that I don't care except

00:39:27   fine come back and haunt you know I

00:39:29   don't people have to tell you people

00:39:30   like I'm gonna follow you because I

00:39:31   don't really care if you're following or

00:39:32   not that's why don't you write whatever

00:39:34   are you a twitter reader or your Twitter

00:39:36   scanner

00:39:38   what's the difference well so people

00:39:40   like my good friend Lex Friedman he

00:39:42   reads twitter he very carefully curates

00:39:45   who he follows so the volume isn't too

00:39:47   high and has to meet me at times because

00:39:49   I go off and I knew I system

00:39:51   I i saw this guy i'm a skimmer I cuz i

00:39:53   have like I followed thousand people and

00:39:55   I dive in and I look I'll scan a little

00:39:57   bit and then

00:39:57   go back to the pit up to the top and

00:39:59   forget about it now and it's in it is

00:40:01   also part of the brilliance of the the

00:40:04   concept of twitter is the you know and

00:40:08   it's just been one of the great examples

00:40:09   in my mind of how not putting a feature

00:40:12   in is design and that's the lack of red

00:40:15   on red status that's a 10 in the early

00:40:18   years in 2006-2007 that the screaming

00:40:22   from people who were you know RSS

00:40:24   addicts who were who wanted red on red

00:40:26   status for tweets was it was cacophonous

00:40:29   and Twitter you know didn't ignore they

00:40:32   were like no that's actually the point

00:40:34   is not to be have red on red you're not

00:40:36   supposed to see all the tweets you just

00:40:38   take a look at what's going on now and

00:40:40   scroll back as you know couple minutes

00:40:42   if you want and if you really want to

00:40:44   see them all that's up to you and you'd

00:40:46   keep scrolling down the timeline until

00:40:47   you see the one that you know you saw

00:40:49   last night but we're not going to keep

00:40:50   track of that for you because we don't

00:40:52   want to encourage that behavior you run

00:40:54   a pole sometime I just I've asked

00:40:56   occasionally informally and i'm stunned

00:40:58   how many people among my followers say i

00:41:01   read twitter i'm like oh I put it i

00:41:03   think that you know there's a little bit

00:41:04   of OCD there may be that when you and I

00:41:08   you know I have that to some extent or

00:41:10   unread counts do make me anxious

00:41:12   yeah so people are like they don't they

00:41:13   can't just go to the top ignore that

00:41:15   they might miss something I mean the

00:41:16   internet is all about the internets

00:41:18   motto is you might miss something right

00:41:20   on i do read all of my mentions maybe

00:41:24   not religiously i mean i might be some

00:41:25   days where I'm busy or if I'm offline

00:41:27   for most of the day for travel or

00:41:29   something like that that I I won't but

00:41:32   in general you could there's a very high

00:41:34   chance that on a given day any of mine

00:41:37   I'm gonna read all of my mentions and

00:41:39   they're certainly far more voluminous

00:41:40   than a typical twitter user but it's

00:41:42   actually not that hard to keep up with

00:41:44   way easier than keeping up with email

00:41:47   yeah and I think about dimensions are

00:41:48   are more like someone I mean it's like

00:41:50   an email replacements 140-character

00:41:52   email replacement someone bothers to do

00:41:53   that i feel like i should respond to

00:41:55   them or acknowledge it because otherwise

00:41:57   it's rude

00:41:58   I mean you've got a high asymmetry to

00:41:59   that's the thing is you must get a lot

00:42:00   of talk i have interesting conversations

00:42:02   with people about the scale of Twitter

00:42:04   from you know thousand followers to

00:42:06   10,000 sort of exponential thing up the

00:42:08   people with you know several million and

00:42:10   it's fascinating how variable the

00:42:13   interaction can be some people with very

00:42:14   few followers spend all their time and

00:42:16   mention land and others with millions of

00:42:18   followers people either to count or they

00:42:20   just say like hey you're great but

00:42:22   there's no communication right now i

00:42:25   find it to just be super efficient and

00:42:27   it it forces people who want to contact

00:42:30   me to be brief

00:42:32   yeah it's right it's in and in general

00:42:35   if you can keep your emails to within

00:42:37   the general length of a tweet it's a lot

00:42:39   more likely that i'm going to read it

00:42:41   and reply but the interaction is so much

00:42:44   easier because going through email you

00:42:47   have to select it and then it opens and

00:42:50   it's just the whole thing if you just

00:42:52   want to bring a link to my attention

00:42:54   like hey I I can't believe grouper

00:42:56   hasn't link to this yet this is so

00:42:58   obviously daring fireball material I it

00:43:01   is way more likely that i will see it if

00:43:02   you tweet to me then if you email it to

00:43:05   me and I don't you know because it's

00:43:08   it's just an easier work fly just have

00:43:10   to scroll through a list and eyeball

00:43:12   them as opposed to clicking down through

00:43:13   a list in and out in and out in and out

00:43:15   well attention is a precious commodity I

00:43:17   keep thinking like attention is the one

00:43:19   thing you can't get more of you can't

00:43:20   build more of it you can you have to a

00:43:23   lot it in its it's you know that's what

00:43:25   facebook is trying to buy our attention

00:43:26   and sell it to people and the I all this

00:43:31   is another call back when this is the

00:43:32   idea behind marcos the magazine is that

00:43:35   he's trying to not overwhelm people and

00:43:37   it seems sort of philosophy with

00:43:38   instapaper to is that it's you want to

00:43:40   read it you can do it later out of the

00:43:41   flow of your right of your so the

00:43:43   maelstrom of all the stuff that's coming

00:43:45   through and I think that's one of the

00:43:47   guiding things behind the magazine is

00:43:48   like interesting stuff that you're not

00:43:50   necessarily going to find everywhere

00:43:52   else and just enough you know it's in

00:43:54   magazines always curation but it's just

00:43:56   enough that it'll be interesting enough

00:43:58   to read every issue but you won't feel

00:43:59   like oh god I mean running for the

00:44:01   Economist that's the thing i always here

00:44:03   is I know plenty of people who read it

00:44:04   but they think of it sometimes homework

00:44:06   they have the issues piled up there

00:44:08   again you don't have to read everything

00:44:09   you can throw issues into the recycling

00:44:11   but people look at it as it's this is

00:44:14   something I'm supposed to do or they

00:44:15   enjoy it too and they make the time

00:44:17   for that but the economy I don't have

00:44:19   time to read the comments every week I

00:44:20   try to be a good hunk of it but I you

00:44:21   know I feel like that I I don't have an

00:44:24   economist subscription but i do have I

00:44:26   do subscribe to The New Yorker and it i

00:44:28   feel that exact same way sometimes I

00:44:30   come I come downstairs and look in the

00:44:32   mail and there's a new issue of The New

00:44:34   Yorker and I can't believe it because it

00:44:35   seems like it seems like the other one

00:44:37   just came yesterday I and i would have

00:44:40   to say that the number one reason i'm

00:44:41   not a subscriber to the economist is

00:44:43   simply because of how agitated i am by

00:44:45   the gigantic pile of New Yorkers in my

00:44:47   office i got the new yorker and the

00:44:49   economist I I'm not sure that's a

00:44:50   winning strategy for me I should

00:44:52   probably settle down but you know

00:44:53   there's always it's like there's always

00:44:55   a long feature the new yorker that I

00:44:57   that I love I mean the one thing that

00:44:59   the reason I got into the magazine by

00:45:00   the way the reason I pitched Marco on

00:45:02   being the editor is because I mean a I

00:45:05   knew he's a he's a technology guy is

00:45:06   also a good editor i like how we headed

00:45:08   to the first two issues very much but

00:45:10   you know there's this list of things he

00:45:11   can do and the stuff is able to offload

00:45:13   a whole pile of stuff onto me so we can

00:45:16   focus on the areas that he really likes

00:45:18   to spend time but the the thing that

00:45:20   appealed to me was his view of what the

00:45:24   magazine is there's nothing like that

00:45:26   right now you can't find a publication

00:45:29   that wants to run articles that are of

00:45:31   interest to people interested in

00:45:32   technology that are either about

00:45:34   technology or are made about medical

00:45:36   technology the new yorker doesn't really

00:45:38   run stories that are of interest to

00:45:40   people who know something about

00:45:41   technology know even when they're about

00:45:44   it so I like the idea that we're going

00:45:45   to have things that are have a human

00:45:47   focus you know they might be about like

00:45:49   you know Lexus the Lexus references

00:45:50   article and wet shaving or Dan Moore and

00:45:52   I'm making tea that there are things

00:45:54   that if you like tech you're going to

00:45:55   like to hear about things associated

00:45:57   with it I've got a friend who'd as a

00:45:59   letterpress guy and his beautiful writer

00:46:02   I want him to write about what that

00:46:03   means because people who were involved

00:46:05   in electronics don't necessarily know

00:46:08   the joint interesting sort of the

00:46:10   trickiness of letterpress all I am so

00:46:12   good at letterpress it is unbelievable

00:46:14   that fat letterpress that letter

00:46:17   forehead the inky kind of letter I had a

00:46:19   quick letterpress I I can't I've mice

00:46:22   win rate was about 5% really i would

00:46:25   play now maybe i'm playing its people

00:46:27   too hard we should find easier players

00:46:28   maybe

00:46:29   all the people i know are much better

00:46:32   wordy who did who did you play who'd you

00:46:34   find difficult we never play ever I

00:46:36   never end up playing everybody I'd like

00:46:39   basically the macworld editorial staff

00:46:41   among other people and some other

00:46:42   friends and it's funny I know a million

00:46:44   words I've had rounds where I was

00:46:46   playing with the friend Sarah and she

00:46:48   wrote a poem out of the word em up with

00:46:50   because we have this great list of

00:46:52   things including some very dirty ones

00:46:54   the middle of the dirty words and I and

00:46:57   but I couldn't win i just i don't have

00:46:59   the strategy for to have the words but i

00:47:00   seem to like and I played I don't know

00:47:02   about 60 games and i won like five of

00:47:05   them and I thought this is probably not

00:47:06   my game

00:47:07   maybe i'll come back to it but it's hard

00:47:09   to always lose a game in the early part

00:47:11   of the game being able to find the

00:47:12   biggest words is the best skill but once

00:47:15   you get to the middle of the game it's

00:47:16   it's all strategy and and you can win

00:47:19   i'm not good at finding it

00:47:21   wow that's a great word words i'm i'm

00:47:24   most of my words are like third grade

00:47:26   words but they're strategically placed

00:47:29   yes well I've seen some of your word

00:47:32   list so i posted on the Twitter yeah i

00:47:35   do we know the words a lot of

00:47:37   letterpress but I didn't just back to

00:47:41   the magazine

00:47:42   here's the thing is it's right the thing

00:47:43   that it that makes you such a great fit

00:47:45   and it fits with this show that you're

00:47:47   talking about doing which is a you know

00:47:50   just the idea of how disintermediated

00:47:53   can you get and just go back to the

00:47:55   simplest thing economically that'll work

00:47:58   and look at the magazine me now

00:47:59   everybody knows the did it gets a little

00:48:02   complex here because the name of the

00:48:03   magazine we're talking about is the

00:48:05   magazine

00:48:05   no I that make it more confusing

00:48:07   overtime but the magazine industry in

00:48:10   general is is widely regarded as being

00:48:12   in a period of upheaval and that this

00:48:14   you know it could be on the verge of

00:48:17   collapse and that there's you know

00:48:18   there's certain big big ones that are

00:48:21   probably going to do just fine just

00:48:22   because they're you know the economist

00:48:24   in The New Yorker certainly right there

00:48:25   among them because of the quality of

00:48:27   them in the New Yorkers mostly been

00:48:29   operated a loss for most of its history

00:48:31   i'm not sure if its profit moment but it

00:48:33   is almost always been operated a lost is

00:48:35   the fasting part but people who run

00:48:37   including sign of house

00:48:39   now for the last six decades they loved

00:48:41   it so much they just they keep it

00:48:43   running

00:48:43   I'm the economist i would hope just by

00:48:46   the title is is that ok that's good i

00:48:49   think they've doubled their circulated

00:48:51   in the last 10 years ago they took away

00:48:52   Time and Newsweek decided that stupid

00:48:54   was better than smart right so they went

00:48:55   stupid I mean time was thing that i read

00:48:57   as a kid when you're like a newsweek was

00:48:59   a slightly easier version of it but I

00:49:01   wasn't bad and US News and World Report

00:49:03   I mean that was often has incredibly

00:49:05   good stuff in it and you know lots of

00:49:08   publications like that now you point out

00:49:09   like the Atlantic and Harper's as the

00:49:12   ex-employers along with the new yorker

00:49:14   of a certain kind of style but for

00:49:15   Newsweek like what you read in America

00:49:17   that's you know so 2 times we said the

00:49:20   stupid or the better the more black

00:49:21   people we are without forgetting their

00:49:23   news organizations could and the cons

00:49:25   picked up all the subscribers you wanted

00:49:26   to read something with words of three or

00:49:28   more syllables and occasionally and you

00:49:30   know the scope of the magazine at least

00:49:32   right now is less than the scope of

00:49:34   those other magazines for talking right

00:49:37   now so far three issues it's about i

00:49:39   think it's four or five articles per

00:49:42   issue articles or somewhere around

00:49:44   thousand to 1500 words that seems to

00:49:48   mean I don't know that's right in the I

00:49:49   mean the thing is this is where so this

00:49:51   podcast I'm going to do which is

00:49:52   tentatively titled the disruptors that

00:49:54   the notion is that like we've had tools

00:49:56   to create stuff for decades now you know

00:49:58   i was involved in early desktop

00:49:59   publishing audio came after that you

00:50:02   know all the digital tools in there to

00:50:03   make things and now we're now your

00:50:04   digital tools that let you control make

00:50:06   3d objects and cnc routers and and you

00:50:09   can get a 3d printer in your house for a

00:50:11   thousand bucks or less much last season

00:50:13   so we're at the revolution where you can

00:50:15   have all the digital tools you need to

00:50:16   create stuff and the next wave is

00:50:18   funding disputed production

00:50:21   manufacturing distribution and that's

00:50:23   where I keep seeing things like the

00:50:24   magazine fits in that beautiful it's

00:50:26   like make you still you have to be in

00:50:28   bed with Apple they're taking a

00:50:29   30-percent cut their your distribution

00:50:31   channel but you if you have an audience

00:50:34   you're not mr. mediated by it gatekeeper

00:50:37   that says you're not allowed to reach

00:50:38   that audience Apple would be delighted

00:50:40   for you to have 10 million people paying

00:50:42   you so they get thirty percent of it as

00:50:44   in the past where newsstands new getting

00:50:46   a magazine on a physical newsstand there

00:50:49   is a lot of organ

00:50:50   Skyrim connections in the past there's

00:50:52   these placement fees the reason

00:50:53   magazines a new stands costs like seven

00:50:55   dollars and this yearly subscriptions

00:50:57   like twenty dollars has to do with the

00:50:59   incredible intermediation that adds cost

00:51:02   and so you know you take that one step

00:51:04   further and digital distribution we

00:51:06   don't have to build the distribution

00:51:08   platform just the content and the medium

00:51:10   it's great well the other things too

00:51:12   though that saddle traditional x

00:51:14   long-standing newspapers and magazines

00:51:16   are the incredible bureaucratic bloat of

00:51:21   the organizations that is that took

00:51:23   place over the 20th century where I am I

00:51:26   used to work at the philadelphia

00:51:27   inquirer not on the editorial staff but

00:51:29   in the promotion's Department to an

00:51:31   graphic design work long time ago but I

00:51:34   got to know the company and it was

00:51:35   interesting division of the the

00:51:38   newspaper to work in because it

00:51:40   effectively we did like the house ads

00:51:42   like ads for the inquirer itself or if

00:51:46   the automotive sales department you know

00:51:48   that people who said that the car ads

00:51:50   needed like a flyer or something for

00:51:52   thing that they were doing we would make

00:51:55   that form so i got to know all these

00:51:56   people throughout the company and it was

00:51:58   amazing to me just draw dropping how

00:52:00   many people work there who not not

00:52:04   talking about the newsroom not talking

00:52:05   about reporters photographers editors

00:52:07   people who actually made when I thought

00:52:09   of is the newspaper but everybody else

00:52:10   it was massive and I'm sure that but you

00:52:13   know there's I know in fact I know that

00:52:14   they've had a lot of layoffs and buyouts

00:52:16   and stuff like that in the years since I

00:52:18   work there but it was just jaw-dropping

00:52:21   how many people work they're doing

00:52:23   things other than what I thought of is

00:52:25   the business of doing the newspaper well

00:52:27   it's it's crazy but newspapers used to

00:52:29   make like twenty-five percent profit

00:52:31   margins year after year that was larger

00:52:33   and you can have anything that was so

00:52:35   you could have any number of executives

00:52:36   middle managers members of the family

00:52:38   who were too idiotic to send it to other

00:52:40   companies promotions people layers of

00:52:43   editors reporters your reporters working

00:52:45   and features for three years and

00:52:47   producing 50,000 words at the end and

00:52:50   magazines were I think a little bit more

00:52:52   variable but many had extremely high

00:52:54   profit margins there was no other place

00:52:55   for advertisers together it was a that

00:52:58   in fact was a point of contention when i

00:52:59   was there because it was at the time

00:53:01   it was a knight ridder newspaper The

00:53:03   Inquirer out and daily news that the

00:53:05   Philadelphia Inquirer and Daily News are

00:53:06   jointly published by a flattering to

00:53:09   know what the company's called anymore

00:53:10   but there is one company that publishes

00:53:11   to newspapers and they were owned by

00:53:15   knight ridder and knight ridder

00:53:17   considered at the time is like the mid

00:53:19   to late nineties their flagship

00:53:21   newspaper to be the San Jose Mercury

00:53:23   News I and it was always a little bit of

00:53:26   a point of contention because I think

00:53:28   journalistically the Philadelphia

00:53:29   Inquirer had a better reputation and on

00:53:31   the eighties the Philadelphia Inquirer

00:53:32   one more pull it serves than the New

00:53:34   York Times or The Washington Post I mean

00:53:36   it was truly at a a world-class arguably

00:53:40   maybe in the eighties maybe maybe the

00:53:41   best newspaper in the country in the ath

00:53:43   yeah about the inky and it was so that

00:53:46   was sort of a sore point of contention

00:53:47   but here's why the San Jose Mercury News

00:53:49   was considered the flagship of nitrate

00:53:51   and had a higher profit margin it was up

00:53:53   in the higher twenties and the enquirer

00:53:54   floated around 20 and I like nineteen

00:53:57   percent was considered bad and 20 21 was

00:53:59   a good core but that's sad days of 19

00:54:01   right but that was it i mean there would

00:54:03   be like a quarter like 1997 one of the

00:54:05   quarters it came in and it was nineteen

00:54:07   percent profit margins and it was like

00:54:09   who

00:54:09   maybe they're going to have buyouts and

00:54:11   here's the thing and this is of course

00:54:12   the time when you still have the union's

00:54:15   stranglehold rightly or wrongly I mean

00:54:17   I'm not trying to be anti-union but it's

00:54:18   like you had i know i gotta tell you I

00:54:20   was a typesetter strange the types are

00:54:22   never worked in newspapers but I work

00:54:23   with older typesetters and work with all

00:54:25   these people in the printing industry

00:54:26   and they always had the story in the

00:54:28   newspaper printing plants to be the guy

00:54:29   who is like the line type operator and

00:54:31   the Linotype machines that were taken

00:54:33   out 20 years before and he's been

00:54:34   drawing a salary for 20 years the guy

00:54:36   who you know was the LED polar or

00:54:38   whatever like all these jobs and there's

00:54:40   the guy and then lots of plants were so

00:54:42   Union run that there is like a big stop

00:54:44   button management roles but came in they

00:54:46   would hit the stop button stop the

00:54:47   presses until management left like that

00:54:49   was there right

00:54:50   and so you had even with incredibly

00:54:52   bloated inefficient printing plants that

00:54:54   were padded with all these people who

00:54:56   did nothing and all these extraneous

00:54:58   employees and union benefits and

00:55:00   everything else even with that they're

00:55:01   getting twenty and twenty-five percent

00:55:03   profit margin right and it so what I

00:55:06   love about something like the magazine

00:55:08   is that the magazine is to me i have

00:55:11   always seemed like what I do a daring

00:55:12   fireball is being a reset button on

00:55:14   of what would it take to set up a new

00:55:18   business that is sustainable and the

00:55:21   employee count is 1 me and I'm a little

00:55:24   lucky there because i have a computer

00:55:25   science degree and I used to do web

00:55:27   programming and so in terms of actual

00:55:29   and there really isn't day the day

00:55:31   there's not much web mercury I need to

00:55:33   do to keep it going but i did get to I

00:55:35   in its early days you know I could set

00:55:37   everything up i could move servers i can

00:55:38   do stuff like that by myself if there is

00:55:40   a problem i can ssh into the server and

00:55:42   but clumsily full around and see if you

00:55:45   know what the hell's going on here so

00:55:48   it's a little easier to be a one-man

00:55:49   show or at least starting 10 years ago

00:55:51   with a technical background today I

00:55:53   think it's easy with with you know

00:55:55   things like Tumblr and square space and

00:55:58   the ways that you know the wordpress

00:56:00   hosting sites wordpress.org and it's

00:56:02   really easy for someone who doesn't have

00:56:04   a technical background to do the same

00:56:05   thing I think today wasn't so easy 10

00:56:07   years ago

00:56:08   yeah it was kinda cool that with the

00:56:10   magazine's he's an iOS programmer and he

00:56:12   spent you know nice is he can just make

00:56:14   an iOS app it's not just make but you

00:56:17   know it's it's some amount of effort

00:56:19   that he knows what it takes to do it and

00:56:21   can replicate it and it's kind of the

00:56:23   equivalent of like okay how do i set up

00:56:24   an apache server in 1997 right exactly

00:56:27   well any other thing that he has it's a

00:56:28   nice advantage to is with instapaper

00:56:31   under his belt and with a happy fairly

00:56:35   large customer base he kind of knows

00:56:37   what people like experience-wise I you

00:56:42   know what I want in an app that they're

00:56:44   going to a reading experience on these

00:56:46   handful of devices ipads iphones what

00:56:51   are they gonna do what works what is

00:56:53   what did they click on what are they

00:56:54   like

00:56:55   so he was able to build that and that's

00:56:57   a huge advantage on but then

00:57:00   fundamentally just economically it it's

00:57:02   so simple you just hit the reset button

00:57:04   start from nothing

00:57:05   okay now you've got ya a two-dollar

00:57:08   subscription per month you get two

00:57:11   issues per month and with you know ten

00:57:15   twenty thousand subscribers all of a

00:57:17   sudden or whatever the numbers you know

00:57:19   just throwing out numbers like that i

00:57:21   actually don't know but you know it's

00:57:23   obviously hit a point though where with

00:57:24   X thousands of dollars a month you

00:57:27   can hey 45 writers for an issue a nice

00:57:32   you know industry competitive amount for

00:57:35   the articles you can pay an editor and

00:57:38   you can have money left over for profit

00:57:41   for the publication

00:57:43   yeah and that's what house even getting

00:57:45   into advertising it happen is you

00:57:47   haven't even started and that's apple

00:57:49   thing thirty percent off the top to

00:57:50   write and bully for them in so yeah

00:57:52   that's the that's the thing is when

00:57:53   Marcus put out some numbers but you know

00:57:56   he said after the first issue posts me

00:57:58   to look you know this is becoming

00:57:59   sustainable venture he's paying nearly

00:58:01   magazine rates for writing I i was

00:58:03   surprised and pleased what he wants

00:58:05   offering this is my i'm going to be you

00:58:08   know

00:58:08   Candyman here this next year like I'm so

00:58:10   excited about the amount of money i'm

00:58:12   going to be able to pay other people for

00:58:13   good writing is actually more exciting

00:58:15   to me then whatever money I make from

00:58:17   working on it because there's such a

00:58:18   dearth of opportunities for people to

00:58:20   both be published and to be paid an

00:58:23   appropriate livable like just even

00:58:26   livable wages not he's not paying a wage

00:58:28   that means that people can make two

00:58:29   hundred thousand dollars a year if they

00:58:31   wrote full-time for he's paying wages in

00:58:32   these people can actually live a

00:58:34   probably lower to middle class existence

00:58:36   which is where we've gotten writing I i

00:58:38   got paid fifty cents of word by the new

00:58:40   york times in 1998 and and then many

00:58:42   years later too although they changed a

00:58:43   bit

00:58:44   I was told by friends that the New York

00:58:46   Times paid fifty cents a word in 1970

00:58:48   you know it's really not that it's yes i

00:58:51   would say that's not good because that

00:58:53   Lord article is a lot of work and a lot

00:58:55   of worry come away with him

00:58:57   let me check for 505 yeah so I mean

00:58:59   that's this is part of the thing is like

00:59:01   publications have evolved to a point at

00:59:03   which they believe if you look at the

00:59:05   management structures in the top-heavy

00:59:06   structures of most publications they

00:59:08   believe writers are interchangeable and

00:59:10   uninteresting and I mean writers are

00:59:11   branded or a big brand-name malcolm

00:59:13   gladwell things and not choosing new

00:59:16   yorker of this of all places but there's

00:59:18   this attitude that the content is the

00:59:20   least important part of the packaging

00:59:22   reselling marketing advertising around

00:59:24   it is and this attitude is pervasive and

00:59:27   so Marco i think is coming out of the

00:59:28   way around like if you're starting from

00:59:29   scratch

00:59:30   how would you build a publication date

00:59:32   can be an iOS app it's the easy smallest

00:59:33   lowest-hanging fruit to reach the

00:59:35   largest number of people with the least

00:59:37   amount of effort it's got millions of

00:59:39   people in saudi

00:59:40   already who know and trust in those

00:59:41   products so he doesn't have to worry

00:59:42   about the marketing side of reaching

00:59:45   those people and then he started out

00:59:47   with the idea of going to pay a

00:59:48   competitive rate which we hope will

00:59:50   improve over time and see echoes and so

00:59:53   right now it's sustainable we could do

00:59:54   this forever and I also think you know

00:59:56   compared to traditional magazines which

00:59:59   are so

00:59:59   are so

01:00:00   heavily add based and therefore have

01:00:02   these you know and there's the whole

01:00:04   complex whole situation with advertising

01:00:06   in a magazine like New Yorker Sports

01:00:09   Illustrated or the economist and you

01:00:11   know selling these backpage ads and

01:00:13   inside front cover ads and and then

01:00:15   filling up the back of the book with all

01:00:16   the little lads

01:00:18   its enormous amount of work something

01:00:20   like the magazine can start from scratch

01:00:21   and go with the like less of an

01:00:24   advertising model more of a sponsorship

01:00:26   model and maybe just have one sponsor

01:00:28   per episode

01:00:29   I and and maybe leave money on the table

01:00:33   that way but also not have to have a

01:00:36   full-time ad sales staff don't even have

01:00:39   to have anybody

01:00:39   there's a funny thing that happened at a

01:00:41   time like I can tell you firsthand with

01:00:43   you go with the sponsorship model you

01:00:45   don't need anybody you know you can do

01:00:47   it yourself

01:00:48   yeah this is and that's what is pursued

01:00:49   but there's this funny thing is once you

01:00:51   get to a certain level of scalar

01:00:53   interest you can ask for a premium rate

01:00:56   and not have to be selling a thousand

01:00:58   little pieces and have somebody in

01:00:59   charge of it but I'm you know so mark

01:01:01   and I have this discussion i'll expose

01:01:02   the discussion we have he's talked about

01:01:04   it publicly as he he wants to be every

01:01:05   other weekend he's thought about it

01:01:07   talking publicly about it perhaps being

01:01:08   weekly I would agitate potentially

01:01:11   foregoing weekly at some point although

01:01:12   that'll you know mean a lot different

01:01:14   editorial schedule and so forth

01:01:16   he's worried it'll be too much for

01:01:17   people to read that if he's promising

01:01:19   for 5 articles every two weeks if we

01:01:22   certainly did say just for articles

01:01:24   every week that maybe more attention

01:01:26   than people want to give so with

01:01:27   subscriptions go up because it's a

01:01:29   better value it's more articles or

01:01:31   subscriptions go down because people are

01:01:33   saying all now this has become a chore

01:01:35   so that is even a fascinating position

01:01:37   to be and where you're saying we could

01:01:39   potentially you know either some dollars

01:01:41   which there and could we do double

01:01:43   subscriptions by having more probably

01:01:45   not in that ratio but don't have become

01:01:48   more appealing to people if there's more

01:01:49   content because it's more likely they'll

01:01:51   be interested in something in every

01:01:53   issue right and maybe now if they don't

01:01:55   like the 4 5 articles they have to wait

01:01:57   two weeks and they resubscribe if they

01:01:59   don't like everything or two or three H

01:02:01   so there's that's that's part of what we

01:02:03   have to be much more interesting every

01:02:04   other week

01:02:05   and perhaps weekly as well I like a

01:02:08   problem it is but I think it's uh you

01:02:11   know i-i've when Marco first ran the

01:02:13   idea past me hey do you think this makes

01:02:15   sense i I really you know I just thought

01:02:17   yeah of course it's decided this is I

01:02:20   think it's a sure thing I think it's a

01:02:21   question of how big of a hit is it gonna

01:02:23   be

01:02:23   Edwards that was my spot I thought it

01:02:25   was just a great idea and a great

01:02:27   opportunity and you know i do I I'm

01:02:30   could not be more bullish on that the

01:02:32   prospects going forward of the magazine

01:02:35   it's great now the whole challenge now

01:02:37   is to get interesting people who want to

01:02:38   write you know deep interesting things

01:02:39   that we've had some I mean the early

01:02:41   response was great and I've been going

01:02:42   through a lot of what I did for

01:02:43   marketers go through hundreds of pitches

01:02:45   that we've gotten and we're trying to

01:02:48   find more research to reported stories

01:02:49   because we're paying enough to get

01:02:51   people to go out and do that kind of

01:02:52   thing so we'll have personal essays will

01:02:54   have you know general essays about

01:02:56   things that like you know wet shaving

01:02:58   and cup of tea i keep going back to

01:02:59   things like gina trapani he's great

01:03:01   piece about uh vitro fertilization or

01:03:03   partners such a one of my favorites so

01:03:05   far maybe my favorite maybe my favorite

01:03:06   piece from the magazine so far they're

01:03:08   all my children so I can't play

01:03:09   favorites but it was I think it hit a

01:03:11   perfect balance between personal story

01:03:13   research and technology and and like

01:03:16   this this sort of thing that's totally

01:03:18   Universal the people the feeling you

01:03:19   have when you read it right and so we're

01:03:22   striving for some balance of those

01:03:23   components in every story and so we're

01:03:25   you know we're kind of bunch of really

01:03:26   fun stuff i went to library of

01:03:28   congress's buried archives in Virginia

01:03:32   and I'm writing an account of that of

01:03:34   where they keep their audio-visual

01:03:35   materials and vaults in Culpeper

01:03:38   Virginia so that'll that'll be fun to

01:03:40   write you're going to do it for the

01:03:40   magazine

01:03:41   yes this is I pitched it before I got

01:03:43   the editor yes here's my question for

01:03:45   you and and this is one it is one of the

01:03:47   questions I have written out here for

01:03:48   you is because you have this widely like

01:03:52   i said before you the economist New

01:03:54   Yorker you you pitch you you you still

01:03:56   write freelance for a lot of different

01:03:58   publications now that you're the editor

01:03:59   of the magazine how much how hard is

01:04:03   that going to be for you to decide where

01:04:04   to do your writing like should I still

01:04:06   pitch this 4x publication or should I

01:04:09   just do this for the net for the

01:04:10   magazine well i'm going to be mark i

01:04:13   just talked about this recently in fact

01:04:14   is that not about my side of it by

01:04:16   neither of us want to dominate be

01:04:17   dominant voice and especially every

01:04:19   other week so you are trying to some of

01:04:22   the writers are early issues

01:04:24   we're trying to space them out too so I

01:04:26   i will be surprised if i write more than

01:04:28   every four issues if that just because

01:04:32   then it becomes too much as it should be

01:04:34   a platform for me and marcos written

01:04:36   more the early days because you know

01:04:38   he's trying to set the tone and so forth

01:04:39   and he'll probably be in less than less

01:04:41   to for the same reason why room for more

01:04:43   voices but there is this thing which is

01:04:45   I did this I'd through a just a fluke

01:04:48   interview the fellow who's the head of

01:04:49   the audio section at the library of

01:04:50   congress and he said I've never out you

01:04:52   have time come out to culpeper and I did

01:04:54   I didn't have an outlet for it and the

01:04:57   inside i feel i got from seeing what the

01:04:59   library of congress is doing with our

01:05:00   audio-visual history there's not really

01:05:03   a place that would run an article like

01:05:05   that aspects of it maybe some technical

01:05:08   thing about how you extract sound from

01:05:10   wax cylinders or so I'm gonna peace a

01:05:14   year ago in fact based on some an

01:05:15   interview i did with this fella about

01:05:17   the phonogram right this obscure thing

01:05:19   that prevents audio from being used the

01:05:22   phonogram light right last 200 years

01:05:23   this point everything Edison's first

01:05:25   utterance 'as on a wax cylinder are

01:05:28   still under protection by the photograph

01:05:30   right until 2067 it was this crazy thing

01:05:34   everything in audio no audio will expire

01:05:37   until 2067 from the audio part of the

01:05:40   protection as opposed to the copyright

01:05:41   of the underlying composition or words

01:05:44   and it's this is historically weird

01:05:45   thing to ever think about that for the

01:05:46   Economist it's perfect weekends for the

01:05:48   blog and and it highlights is really odd

01:05:51   aspect of where digital culture collides

01:05:53   with analog culture and to some extent

01:05:55   science so but to find a place where i

01:05:57   can write about you know what's the

01:05:58   what's the inside impact and seeing our

01:06:01   cultural memory in this form and the

01:06:03   restrictions on scanning access to it

01:06:06   because of copyright and other bakeries

01:06:08   there's not really not that we do that

01:06:10   now the Atlantic there are places like

01:06:11   the Atlantic New Yorker Harper's they

01:06:13   might run articles like that but it

01:06:14   would be much bigger this would be

01:06:16   something I'd spend months on the

01:06:18   compensation would probably not good

01:06:20   enough for it I've talked to people

01:06:22   who've written freelance for some of

01:06:23   these publications and the experience is

01:06:25   magnificent but they can't put money on

01:06:28   the table to say the contract

01:06:29   or a staff job to have money on the

01:06:31   table can't put on the table put money

01:06:33   on the table unless they have an ongoing

01:06:35   relationship where they're just

01:06:36   committed to writing some amount it's

01:06:38   tough business so being able to write

01:06:39   short interesting things so he's like

01:06:41   well you know a thousand-word range and

01:06:44   get paid well for them is actually sort

01:06:46   of hard to find unless it's either very

01:06:48   technical or very poorly with you not

01:06:52   coming will pay for getting tiny number

01:06:53   of cents per word now I think it's very

01:06:55   exciting and I can't you know I think

01:06:57   the fact that said the magazine is

01:06:59   already paying competitive rates and

01:07:01   like you said maybe as time goes on

01:07:02   maybe even might push that forward and

01:07:05   actually pay leading rates

01:07:08   I'm and why not i mean what if that

01:07:09   drove subscription what if we could get

01:07:10   I mean this is the thought of it that

01:07:12   it's completely contrary to the way the

01:07:13   magazine industry is gone and i'm not

01:07:15   talking out of school here I mean this

01:07:16   is I tried you know private discussions

01:07:18   or private but this is the you know also

01:07:19   this isn't some of my head is what if it

01:07:22   were that we could pay of the best rate

01:07:24   in the magazine industry what writers we

01:07:26   get and this is not to be offensive to

01:07:28   the writers have been there already we

01:07:29   have some great people are a terrific

01:07:30   writer is writing for us already

01:07:33   but what if we could get the leading it

01:07:35   but we would all agree i mean i know i'm

01:07:36   not the leading rider in the country i

01:07:38   know there's people who I would be

01:07:39   delighted to have their words the

01:07:41   magazine's People I pick up publications

01:07:43   going to buy them because articles by

01:07:45   them in there what if some of the

01:07:46   leading on fiction writers in the

01:07:47   countryside oh well I should be in the

01:07:49   magazine and so we have people like me

01:07:51   and the magazine who are very you know

01:07:53   where we are competent hard-working we

01:07:54   write good stuff people like to read

01:07:56   this and we have people who are names

01:07:58   because they're very very very good

01:07:59   these are the people you idolize you

01:08:01   know a jon krakauer something like that

01:08:04   he demands a huge feet what if we can

01:08:06   pay rate where he's an entrepreneur do

01:08:07   that but we could be that same thing to

01:08:08   him and I can say to pay the same fee

01:08:10   too damn moron or whatever

01:08:12   yeah no I think it's a terribly excited

01:08:14   astok the other one last thing but on

01:08:16   the magazine before we look over that is

01:08:17   is the other thing too that reminds me

01:08:20   of the early days of the web is that the

01:08:22   magazine itself that the app is better

01:08:24   than as good or better than all of the

01:08:28   big-name magazine app store it is truck

01:08:31   and it's totally true the weather and it

01:08:33   is this 20 is this in Congress thing and

01:08:36   i saw it was one of the reasons that a

01:08:37   decade ago I saw daring fireball is an

01:08:40   opportunity is either

01:08:41   but I can make a better a better website

01:08:44   then these guys these big name cup guys

01:08:46   you haven't over from print can do

01:08:47   because i'm going to do something that

01:08:48   is clean i'm going to do something that

01:08:50   is not cluttered I'm gonna do something

01:08:52   that is that looks good and instead of

01:08:56   looking back and there are some

01:08:58   magazines that have gotten better over

01:08:59   time the new yorker app has gotten a lot

01:09:01   better over time where it's not it's no

01:09:03   longer published as a series of static

01:09:05   images its actual text and they use

01:09:07   fonts and they sort of have a magazine

01:09:10   the magazine type layout now where you

01:09:12   go side to side between articles but an

01:09:13   individual article Scrolls down but it

01:09:17   used to be and you can still easily find

01:09:19   big-name print magazines that have apps

01:09:22   where I get completely lost two clicks

01:09:25   into the thing where am i how do I get

01:09:27   back

01:09:28   how do i go to the next article I mean

01:09:30   easily you just get it's so easy to get

01:09:33   lost and the magazine is just simple

01:09:35   table of contents on the left article

01:09:38   Scrolls down

01:09:39   yeah i mean this is where I think you

01:09:41   get that benefit maturity is that you

01:09:43   know I we all have pity for the magazine

01:09:45   publishers in that notion of pity i

01:09:47   Guess's they didn't invest money

01:09:48   figuring out how to do it right in

01:09:50   mobile formats for the most part before

01:09:53   like the ipad came along right in some

01:09:55   did some early out but even doing it

01:09:57   correctly you know for decent web

01:09:59   browsers in 2008-2009 and so you're

01:10:02   still watching 02 or two years in the

01:10:05   ipad you're still watching them fumble

01:10:06   around to figure it out and you're

01:10:08   gradually seeing the clarity and there's

01:10:09   a huge divergent paths between the ones

01:10:11   that you're like I like the new yorker

01:10:13   app now i can use it it's good the

01:10:14   economist app started out I think a

01:10:15   little rough not bad but now it really

01:10:18   has that iconic feel of the magazine

01:10:20   without being beholden to write and I i

01:10:22   actually i'll often have read the whole

01:10:24   issue on the phone and get the print

01:10:26   issue and I'm like oh I don't need this

01:10:28   anymore just realized i read it but in

01:10:29   my mind I can hardly differentiate the

01:10:31   experience because the branding and the

01:10:33   sort of is our are equal and I think so

01:10:36   Marco gets the advantage of having spent

01:10:37   years figuring out what that experience

01:10:39   should be and then he supplies the

01:10:40   lessons you can learn from scratch and

01:10:42   not having to answer to any idiot

01:10:44   dumbass protectionists pull your head

01:10:47   out of your ass guys above him so that

01:10:49   when the magazine launch he could

01:10:51   actually honestly on ironically

01:10:54   promote as features that you can select

01:10:56   and copy text and it's later though

01:10:59   right

01:11:00   it we laugh but that actually is a

01:11:02   competitive advantage that the magazine

01:11:04   has over most magazines in newsstand is

01:11:07   that you tense can swipe partial page at

01:11:09   a time don't have to swipe the screen at

01:11:11   a time right is a future

01:11:13   alright i have a couple of things i

01:11:14   wanna talk about let's take a break it

01:11:16   and i want to tell you about our second

01:11:17   sponsor I and i am really really

01:11:19   impressed by this app it's an app for

01:11:22   the iphone and ipad called gritter gri

01:11:26   DD itor and it's a photo editor for

01:11:30   iphone and ipad and I talked about this

01:11:32   on the show before and it's just it this

01:11:34   is like the perfect type of thing I'm

01:11:35   talking about where I have been

01:11:38   frustrated with the photo editing apps

01:11:40   i'm talking about things like correcting

01:11:42   exposure brightness applying filters and

01:11:47   looks color balance and stuff like that

01:11:48   to photos as your posting from the

01:11:50   iphone and that I feel like a lot of

01:11:52   these apps are way too fiddly and that

01:11:55   they're sort of stock UI wise in ways

01:11:58   that aren't aren't that I don't I just

01:12:00   feel like there's something out there

01:12:01   that is different and I'll tell you what

01:12:02   gritter is really really different and I

01:12:05   really like the way that goes the basic

01:12:06   idea is you pick a photo to start with

01:12:10   you go just pick a photo from your

01:12:11   camera roll that you want to edit and it

01:12:14   starts out in the middle of a grid and

01:12:17   in all four directions there are filters

01:12:21   and adjustments so for example you might

01:12:24   have at the top brightness and on the

01:12:26   right

01:12:27   I something like a toy camera filter and

01:12:32   the grid gets filled in with if you go

01:12:35   straight up towards brightness with a

01:12:36   series of thumbnails of your image

01:12:38   getting brighter and brighter and

01:12:39   brighter until you get to a maximum

01:12:40   brightness and on the right as the

01:12:43   filter this toy camera style filter gets

01:12:46   stronger and stronger and stronger but

01:12:48   then along the diagonal you get

01:12:50   thumbnails that are a combination of the

01:12:52   two brighter and this filter and you can

01:12:54   pick how strong they are and you can

01:12:57   just scroll around what I guess I would

01:12:59   call the canvas of this grid of

01:13:01   thumbnails and just see them and see how

01:13:03   this works and if you don't like what

01:13:05   you see

01:13:07   you can just set a new set of filters

01:13:08   and new sort of combination of these

01:13:10   things but the thing that I really like

01:13:11   about it is that as you explore these

01:13:14   combinations of the things it's all

01:13:16   visual and you don't have to sit there

01:13:18   and play with like how strong it's

01:13:21   making you just see it already because

01:13:23   the thumbnails are already on string on

01:13:25   screen

01:13:26   I I haven't seen there's a whole bunch

01:13:28   of photo editing apps for the iPhone

01:13:29   that to me work with the exact same user

01:13:31   interface and there's different you know

01:13:33   you can it's up here taste how much you

01:13:35   like them

01:13:36   this one has an interface that to me is

01:13:38   like nothing else I've seen before

01:13:40   really really like it i and i will

01:13:43   emphasize that there's two different

01:13:45   type of things you can do with the

01:13:46   adjustments in greater one our basic

01:13:49   edit controls these are things like

01:13:50   brightness contrast sharpening ah and

01:13:54   then second are the Instagram style

01:13:57   filters these vintage type things

01:14:00   ah like bleach bypass toy camera stuff

01:14:03   like that

01:14:04   I and so if you are interested in that

01:14:08   whole sort of retro filtering sort of

01:14:10   adjustment type thing it's still great

01:14:12   app because you have these basic things

01:14:14   like making a brighter darkness sharper

01:14:17   adjusting the filtered going black and

01:14:20   white

01:14:21   ah or the other way around if you only

01:14:23   are interested in putting filters on

01:14:25   your on your pictures it's a great

01:14:26   collection of filters and I really

01:14:28   really like the way that you get to

01:14:31   adjust how strong it is so you can just

01:14:33   go a little tad in this direction or you

01:14:36   can go really really strong in this

01:14:37   direction and you can see it before

01:14:39   before you finalize it really really

01:14:42   good app i've been using a lot the last

01:14:44   two weeks for the pictures i've been

01:14:46   posted to instagram i it's it's really

01:14:50   really impressive and I think the

01:14:52   developer has a lot of good ideas going

01:14:54   forward for how it's going to improve

01:14:55   with new new filters and adjustment so

01:14:57   you can check it out there's two ways to

01:14:58   check it out

01:14:59   you can go to grid or dot-com gri DD

01:15:03   itor grid with 2 d's itor calm / the

01:15:09   talk show

01:15:10   I or you could just go to the app store

01:15:12   and search for greater you can tell this

01:15:15   is one of those things to where i can

01:15:17   just I just love when a sponsor is

01:15:19   clearly

01:15:20   a listener of the show because ty

01:15:25   shimizu the developer of the app in the

01:15:27   email was where we're talking about what

01:15:29   I should talk about on the show he said

01:15:31   at the end feel free to mispronounce

01:15:32   creditor as long as I spell it out but

01:15:36   I'm not quite sure Adam is pronounced it

01:15:37   i feel like i've gotten into this thing

01:15:39   now we're unexpected mispronounced all

01:15:40   the sponsor names but like talks it's

01:15:43   impossible to mispronounce it it's

01:15:44   actually tonic something no no greater

01:15:47   and greater this is you know this is I

01:15:51   think this is a great where maybe maybe

01:15:53   grid or daring fireball theme in general

01:15:55   I think and one of the things that I

01:15:57   think it's like I love the fact that we

01:15:59   have all of these small developers many

01:16:01   people figure out a way to make either

01:16:03   part or all of their living and

01:16:04   sometimes have many employees even but

01:16:07   they're still these independent shops

01:16:08   auteur vision you know the clarity of

01:16:11   purpose

01:16:12   they're not answering to other people

01:16:14   there's no investors it's just a

01:16:15   bootstrap themselves they're doing

01:16:17   something that is what they want to do

01:16:19   and coincidentally something that we all

01:16:20   like him on a bike that's great yeah our

01:16:24   knowledge economy great great app really

01:16:26   really encourage you guys to buy it and

01:16:28   and support to show and support really

01:16:29   really innovative to me and interface in

01:16:32   in photo editing for iOS

01:16:35   so where it shows already gone long but

01:16:36   I want to talk a little bit about some

01:16:38   of the news that's going on this week

01:16:39   the big news i think it's an office key

01:16:41   Steven Sinofsky getting getting the boot

01:16:43   from Microsoft holy cow will the yeah

01:16:45   and I think you can exchange we

01:16:46   exchanged tweets about this the the

01:16:48   analysis I've seen a few places was he

01:16:50   was seen as the successor and was

01:16:53   clearly told he wasn't gonna be alright

01:16:55   and so he said alright well that's

01:16:56   enough I'm done you know if I'm not

01:16:58   there is no there's a glass ceiling and

01:16:59   bomber standing on it so goodbye and and

01:17:02   that would make sense and yeah I not

01:17:05   tell you know I met with him for the

01:17:07   first and I guess only time that he's

01:17:09   going to be a Microsoft I met with him I

01:17:11   got a nice little 10-minute meet you

01:17:13   know at the windows 8 event in New York

01:17:17   two weeks ago I and i'm not going to say

01:17:20   I have any you know whether he had any

01:17:22   inkling or not I you know I don't think

01:17:24   I would have been able to pick up on it

01:17:25   anyway but I i I'd I can't help but

01:17:29   think that he didn't because I do feel

01:17:31   that he had a lot of ideas

01:17:33   going forward you know like one of the

01:17:35   things we had talked about was that uh

01:17:38   that windows 8 was designed with a more

01:17:44   like iOS style update schedule in mind

01:17:47   where it's going to be a lot easier for

01:17:49   people who have let's say like a surface

01:17:51   to get an upgrade you know when if

01:17:53   windows 8.1 comes out or something I

01:17:55   don't pick a version number but it's

01:17:57   gonna be a lot more like a way that iOS

01:17:59   devices and Android devices more like

01:18:01   the mobile world where device updates

01:18:03   can get pushed to you and you can stay

01:18:05   you know new features can be added than

01:18:08   the old pc world where it has been a bit

01:18:11   of a grind a lot of people don't upgrade

01:18:13   until they buy a new machine and he

01:18:16   seemed very excited about that

01:18:18   yeah i'm i'm wondering if it's uh you

01:18:20   know they shipped eight and they huddled

01:18:22   with the board and whatever else he said

01:18:24   ok you know I did this thing we've got

01:18:26   the markets out there we did an

01:18:27   incredible thing and what's next and was

01:18:30   told bombers here frist reupping MCO or

01:18:34   not gonna get more responsibility

01:18:35   because it was weird you know he didn't

01:18:37   fail he did a great job

01:18:38   I mean for all the flaws that you want

01:18:40   to that we could point out with windows

01:18:41   8 or surface or strategy that there's a

01:18:43   lot of things but i think this is

01:18:44   Microsoft's the best thing they've done

01:18:47   I don't know since when well he has 22

01:18:50   successfully sort of he has two

01:18:52   successes under his belt with Windows

01:18:54   and Office was always offers never hit

01:18:57   those roadblocks you know he used to be

01:18:59   in charge of office and office continue

01:19:01   to ship on time through that dry period

01:19:04   the XP years where I for vista was stuck

01:19:06   forever you know the one was called long

01:19:10   war and they haven't given me actually

01:19:11   had to give it a new name just because a

01:19:13   long-winded had been it just have gotten

01:19:15   so old you know

01:19:17   so windows vista shipped and was you

01:19:20   know widely you know it collectively

01:19:23   considered a bat you know pretty pretty

01:19:25   terrible release unpopular not not well

01:19:27   designed

01:19:28   that's when he took over windows he had

01:19:30   nothing to do with this day he was in

01:19:31   charge of office then so they have said

01:19:33   all right

01:19:33   sonakshi's done a good job with office

01:19:35   will give him windows windows seven was

01:19:37   he is a huge hit

01:19:38   absolutely and worship and release it

01:19:41   was a improvement in every way and just

01:19:43   shot on dresser address with lsr it's

01:19:45   got that had better security

01:19:47   enrich mobile said that windows seven

01:19:48   had better security than of which 10

01:19:52   tops 6 or 10 i said that they had done

01:19:53   so much more that was right and you see

01:19:55   that that's when all the malware people

01:19:58   look better to you moved to flash and

01:20:00   third-party apps because they could no

01:20:01   longer exploit windows look better work

01:20:03   better solved

01:20:04   what was the biggest technical problem

01:20:06   which was security stuff and I can't

01:20:08   emphasize it enough most importantly

01:20:10   shipped on time then windows 8 huge

01:20:14   innovation in terms of the interface in

01:20:17   that conception of it you know the true

01:20:20   revolution in the interface of windows

01:20:22   shipped on time right whether or not you

01:20:25   agree with the choices they made they

01:20:27   were not modeled choices i mean you

01:20:28   could say that model energy eternity too

01:20:30   many fish and fowl and whatever but in

01:20:32   terms of execution they did exactly what

01:20:34   they said and they will be improvements

01:20:36   it's kind of a 1.1 certain aspects of

01:20:38   weathering surface is entirely new kind

01:20:40   of product for them what they're trying

01:20:43   to achieve with it but I mean all that

01:20:44   aside it's like yeah they did it they

01:20:46   manage stupid windows 7 windows 8

01:20:47   they've got windows phone 8 is a witness

01:20:50   phone was a huge deal i think you don't

01:20:53   you get that out the door and then to

01:20:54   upgrade that and they've made painful

01:20:56   picturemate steve jobs like choices

01:20:58   whether like although i think it was

01:21:00   unfortunate for windows phone 7 owner

01:21:02   and thought you'd be able to get an

01:21:04   upgrade 28 they still did it didn't say

01:21:06   because this is the problem i know a guy

01:21:08   were continuing engineering at Microsoft

01:21:10   for a number of years until several

01:21:11   years ago it was in the XP to vista and

01:21:14   that days and there was so much croft

01:21:16   they had a support forever in windows

01:21:19   one of the reasons windows never got

01:21:20   better until I would say seven is that

01:21:23   seven cut off a lot more of the past

01:21:25   that's why you have this big XP seven

01:21:27   gap you can't just move and you couldn't

01:21:29   move everything XP to vista either but

01:21:31   seven they just said we're not

01:21:32   supporting contain engineering for stuff

01:21:34   that ran 15 years ago and that's the

01:21:37   same painful choice they made with

01:21:38   Windows Phone 8 whether or not they

01:21:40   should engineered phone 7 to be

01:21:42   upgradeable or not they still made that

01:21:43   decision i'm definitely and I think the

01:21:47   other thing that was very clear to me

01:21:49   always iives you know it only reaffirmed

01:21:51   what my guesses were coming into meeting

01:21:54   and talking to him but even with just 10

01:21:57   minutes talking to him he is clearly a

01:21:59   product guy

01:22:00   like he he knows the surface and he

01:22:05   knows what Windows 8 is he

01:22:07   it is what he wants it to be and he

01:22:09   really had a vision for what it what it

01:22:11   would be

01:22:13   he is not absolutely was not just a 80

01:22:17   time at the top of the pole like he

01:22:18   drove the design of it and in ways that

01:22:21   I think we're very clearly that you need

01:22:23   somebody like that you know that the

01:22:25   auteur at the top of the you know

01:22:28   enormous engineering team behind the

01:22:30   whole thing to drive it with a vision

01:22:32   for where it's going so I would believe

01:22:34   it was a it was a you know

01:22:36   ok it's time to time to figure out my

01:22:38   next plan is and they said just keep

01:22:40   doing what you're doing i said i've been

01:22:41   here 20 years that's ready i'm ready to

01:22:43   treat to do something else with my money

01:22:44   and I talking about right

01:22:45   many millions and millions of dollars

01:22:47   you can start your company there's lots

01:22:49   a lot of stuff that happens in Seattle

01:22:50   that could be interesting and he could

01:22:52   do something green field that's not

01:22:53   beholden to the past and take his

01:22:55   expertise and do thats ok well the

01:22:57   interesting thing that will end it just

01:22:58   you know it just does seem oddly

01:23:00   coincidental a lot of people are drawing

01:23:02   drawing connections to scott forstall

01:23:04   attacked and for the obvious reason that

01:23:06   he was in charge of the the company's

01:23:09   flagship OS right that's that's both of

01:23:12   those guys iOS is clearly apples windows

01:23:15   i had a reputation for being difficult

01:23:19   to work with have a you know you know

01:23:21   seems like similar complaints about

01:23:23   their their management style or

01:23:26   collaboration across the company and

01:23:29   perhaps you know or ambitiously both a

01:23:33   wanted to be CEO of the company

01:23:36   yeah I think that's it is right they

01:23:38   bump up against that and these are

01:23:39   people who built huge victims and and

01:23:42   loyalties inside the company apart from

01:23:44   say loyalty to the CEO of the company

01:23:46   and their decision and I also yeah I

01:23:48   also think there's a lot of loyalty

01:23:49   underneath them in their divisions to

01:23:51   both of them like one thing that I think

01:23:53   is sort of maybe it's gotten

01:23:54   misperceived out there with forestall is

01:23:57   that the the sort of yeah everybody

01:23:59   knows he was kind of difficult to work

01:24:00   with so you know it's not totally

01:24:02   shocking that this happened very

01:24:04   surprising the difference between

01:24:05   surprising and shocking right it's

01:24:07   surprising but not shocking but then I

01:24:09   feel like that's been

01:24:11   hold up into this nut shell of well

01:24:13   forestall was an asshole so good riddens

01:24:14   and that's not the case at all

01:24:16   there are people who worked under

01:24:17   forestall who I've heard from who are

01:24:19   very very anxious and nervous because

01:24:21   they think you know that maybe forestall

01:24:23   was the last you know that he was enough

01:24:25   like steve jobs and had that his

01:24:28   ambition was good for Apple because it

01:24:31   made him not complacent and you know one

01:24:34   of the things i heard from somebody

01:24:35   worked under him yes he was an asshole

01:24:37   and and difficult to work with across

01:24:39   divisions but a lot of that he used to

01:24:42   protect his people and my projects that

01:24:45   they were doing and that the people a

01:24:47   lot of the people who worked under him

01:24:48   felt like forestall had their back and

01:24:52   it's the people who were outside his

01:24:53   team who didn't like him

01:24:55   yeah so it is absolutely in no way like

01:24:58   a no-brainer hey apples better off

01:25:00   without forestall I mean that's yeah

01:25:01   that's what I hear as well as that he

01:25:03   had he had a lot of loyalty it was just

01:25:05   if you want to do something didn't want

01:25:06   to do if you're outside this group then

01:25:08   it's gonna be a pain

01:25:09   you know I can't wait to live from

01:25:10   singleton do when the talk that Michael

01:25:13   op gave about was probably about

01:25:15   building teams like someone has to be a

01:25:16   dictator

01:25:17   I mean that was part of this i love this

01:25:18   talk and i can't wait till it's up

01:25:19   online because everyone should watch

01:25:22   this and it's about it's a really

01:25:23   beautiful talk about the importance of

01:25:25   somebody making a decision and how a

01:25:27   group can make the decision that someone

01:25:30   has to make a decision how to get to a

01:25:31   point when someone's gonna say this is

01:25:33   it as opposed to the you know Monty

01:25:35   Python like we have a rotating executive

01:25:37   authority and we have a council that

01:25:38   proves the maximum of the anarchic

01:25:40   syndicated notes like now someone has to

01:25:42   make a decision that's the only way good

01:25:44   things happen is there is a person who

01:25:45   says that in the end and that's the boss

01:25:47   or at some other point in a group

01:25:49   whatever but you make that decision

01:25:51   absolutely and it comes to making those

01:25:55   decisions the one thing that strikes me

01:25:56   as a big difference between the

01:25:58   Microsoft and Apple situations is that

01:26:00   you look at microsoft and over the last

01:26:01   five years or so maybe even fewer than

01:26:04   that but that the list of top-level

01:26:06   executives who were in charge of product

01:26:09   stuff who then I don't you know whether

01:26:11   they were pushed or whether they jumped

01:26:12   who knows but who left is a pretty

01:26:15   significant here's the list island is

01:26:16   you've got Robbie Bach who I African

01:26:19   with exactly i think he was involved

01:26:20   with xbox

01:26:21   yeah he was a

01:26:23   he was he would say a lot about to say

01:26:26   but we had a roadblock i think was over

01:26:28   top xbox and zune i think was under his

01:26:30   authority j allard who is xbox and finer

01:26:33   bach and showered together we're the

01:26:36   guys who computed to be behind the

01:26:39   career tablet project that got scrapped

01:26:41   at internets disputed how far along it

01:26:43   was but that it was a couple years ago

01:26:45   though and there's you know a potential

01:26:48   there that those guys could have shipped

01:26:50   a8 innovative tablet type project a

01:26:53   couple of years ago if they had been

01:26:55   allowed to Ray Ozzy out you know

01:26:58   obviously was widely seen as a possible

01:27:00   next CEO of of the company and Stephen

01:27:04   Elop who is priced out and now is the

01:27:06   CEO at nokia and this is not you know i

01:27:10   wish i had written her name down and but

01:27:13   it was it's enough skis

01:27:15   second-in-command who's taking over

01:27:17   windows for now we actually sounds

01:27:19   kick-ass i was reading about her

01:27:20   background and her approach and the pic

01:27:22   the way they're even the people school

01:27:23   stuff that's talked about is like she

01:27:25   could be a rich she sounds like she's

01:27:27   going to be a really terrific

01:27:28   replacement from where she comes from

01:27:31   I gotta look this up because it's that's

01:27:33   good job what you think i can google for

01:27:36   sandusky replacement exactly a lady

01:27:39   replacement for Snuffy so important

01:27:40   others to women this is a microsoft

01:27:42   elections always been having literally

01:27:44   much Julie larson-green ya-ya and she

01:27:47   just she sounds absolutely phenomenal in

01:27:50   a very positive way right and and she is

01:27:52   getting a lot of credit for spearheading

01:27:54   the design of metric oil when I still

01:27:56   can

01:27:57   Richard insist on calling metro which is

01:27:59   great so it does sound like there's not

01:28:00   exactly it's not like you know there's a

01:28:02   vacuum that Sinofsky is out and Beyonce

01:28:05   before raising he left he really he

01:28:07   really architect the entire approach to

01:28:09   data storage and the clouds everything

01:28:11   microsoft was doing some sort of law

01:28:14   school with Azure and

01:28:15   SkyDrive and all the things around the

01:28:18   microsoft live for windows live whatever

01:28:20   they call it i think all of that stuff

01:28:22   either he is responsible for or moved it

01:28:25   all together and I think it's hidden

01:28:26   from most people

01:28:27   what a transformation that is from a

01:28:29   company that was based on you know

01:28:30   everyone has a personal computer and all

01:28:32   the data store locally situation right

01:28:34   absolutely and I think that's ir

01:28:36   solutely think that's a big part of the

01:28:38   appeal of Windows 8

01:28:39   yeah is that it's it's built from the

01:28:41   ground up with and windows phone 8 that

01:28:43   it's built with the ground up that you

01:28:45   give it your your live.com or whatever

01:28:47   they call it now your Microsoft you know

01:28:49   their equivalent of iCloud you give it

01:28:51   your login and your data just sinks to

01:28:54   the class kind of love that because

01:28:56   that's something that Apple could do I

01:28:58   still have this idea that Apple is very

01:29:00   solipsistic that it thinks it talks

01:29:02   about sharing and Home Sharing and

01:29:03   networking whatever but it still thinks

01:29:05   about one person in one computer and one

01:29:07   person on one computer and I'll and over

01:29:09   time it's gotten better but the fact

01:29:11   that that they don't they don't give you

01:29:14   enough

01:29:14   I mean I cloud doesn't really think

01:29:16   about you being in different places at

01:29:17   different times on different devices the

01:29:19   way people actually do it it's getting

01:29:21   there

01:29:21   I think it still needs more important a

01:29:22   great way to put its lipstick that is

01:29:25   true that the company is there it in

01:29:28   Apple's DNA get home sharing for

01:29:31   instance related items like oh this will

01:29:32   be great it's like i'm sharing a home

01:29:34   story about copying stuff between

01:29:35   machines apple is always about copying

01:29:37   not syncing and not sharing they want to

01:29:39   move copies of data that's itunes match

01:29:42   and you know they move it stream it

01:29:43   whatever in and i can tell you that

01:29:45   other people have said like I wish my

01:29:46   ipad could have user account so I could

01:29:49   have my kids stuff on in my I mean yeah

01:29:50   that's not a the wouldn't break apples

01:29:53   model of how the ipad work would be an

01:29:56   enhancement but they just want you to

01:29:57   buy multiple iPads i guess i don't know

01:29:59   but anyway no offense to Julie

01:30:01   larson-green who does seem like it's a

01:30:02   good choice to take over windows but

01:30:04   she's she's moving up into the executive

01:30:07   ranks at Microsoft in terms of

01:30:08   long-standing top-level product first

01:30:11   focus executives they're all out like

01:30:14   yeah

01:30:15   whereas at Apple it's still even with

01:30:18   you know that some reasonable amount of

01:30:20   turnover over the years you know it with

01:30:22   the Bert Ron leaving and are between Ian

01:30:25   before him and

01:30:26   Rubenstein Rubenstein intelligence

01:30:29   liddell there's a long wait but the

01:30:30   funny thing is a long list of people

01:30:32   left Apple at a high level but they're

01:30:33   so long list of people have been there

01:30:35   for a long time right johnny is Johnny I

01:30:37   people are throwing up so you have ten

01:30:39   year plus veterans or 15-year veterans

01:30:41   are people go back to next even having

01:30:43   lost like seven or eight names you get

01:30:45   the stuff right

01:30:46   so in the the you know not to be

01:30:49   gruesome but let's say they hit by a bus

01:30:50   scenario where tim cook needs to be

01:30:52   replaced suddenly are surprisingly I

01:30:55   they have a wide range of candidates

01:30:59   right there within the company to think

01:31:01   about microsoft doesn't it does seem

01:31:04   like there's a bit of a Shakespearean uh

01:31:06   you know that bomber is a sort of

01:31:09   nervous king who soon as anybody you

01:31:13   know rises up there they're out you know

01:31:15   their heads come off

01:31:16   I think it's true and it's very easy to

01:31:17   fail at microsoft and the things you

01:31:19   need to succeed and obviously the

01:31:20   remarkable job actually succeeding at

01:31:23   them is I it's that it's so hard to get

01:31:26   anything done that requires breaking

01:31:28   silos there and I think surface i want

01:31:31   any windows phone seven and eight

01:31:33   surface even some smokes and zune

01:31:36   because it left them in the ear creating

01:31:37   new silo that just bypassed all the

01:31:40   existing departments and in windows 8

01:31:42   all these things required cooperation

01:31:45   and integration among people who don't

01:31:47   want to work together and he made it

01:31:48   happen and I mean that's what I'm

01:31:49   excited about the new Apple organization

01:31:51   is the old sort of breakdowns and make

01:31:54   sense in the new thing of like services

01:31:56   software and hardware is much more

01:31:58   sensible in terms of what they need to

01:31:59   get done they have to work at a high

01:32:01   level across those groups but Microsoft

01:32:03   has so many films that it is very very

01:32:05   easy to be put in charge of high-profile

01:32:07   project and fail because you cannot

01:32:09   break through the other high-profile

01:32:11   people who don't want to do the thing

01:32:13   you need

01:32:14   i seed I could not agree more and i

01:32:16   really think you just nailed it and I do

01:32:18   think that is too and that's what I'm

01:32:19   left at looking at the difference

01:32:20   between Apple and Microsoft from a

01:32:22   structural standpoint especially post

01:32:24   forestall is this lack of product

01:32:28   focused silos right where we're

01:32:30   forestall had he owned iOS he you know

01:32:33   forestall was iOS and that was his

01:32:36   fiefdom and it was obviously if you look

01:32:38   at Apple what what what iOS means

01:32:40   Apple it's a powerful fiefdom uh there

01:32:43   isn't anything like that left anymore

01:32:45   and and I think the idea is going

01:32:47   forward if Apple is going to continue to

01:32:49   stay on top they need the same sort of

01:32:52   mindset they've had for the last 15

01:32:54   years which is this lack of fear of

01:32:56   cannibalizing themselves

01:32:58   mhm right where it doesn't matter if the

01:33:01   iphone makes people stop selling buying

01:33:04   music playing ipods because they're just

01:33:07   playing music on their iPhone because

01:33:08   they're still buying another Apple

01:33:10   device it doesn't matter if the ipad

01:33:12   makes people stop buying macbooks or buy

01:33:15   fewer of them because they're buying an

01:33:17   apple device and so if they come up with

01:33:20   something that makes people say i don't

01:33:22   know stop buying iphones or stop buying

01:33:24   iPads as long as it's an apple product

01:33:26   it's ok but they don't want to have

01:33:28   powerful executives in charge of those

01:33:30   things who are blocking it

01:33:32   this is the first time Microsoft been in

01:33:34   that position where they had the thing

01:33:35   that could replace their cash cow right

01:33:38   because they own stuff and the way they

01:33:40   didn't licensed and have a stake in the

01:33:42   success of the phone 8 people stopped

01:33:43   buying pcs they're great they're like if

01:33:46   they sell a billion surfaces and pc

01:33:48   sales drop 95% they're in great shape

01:33:51   and that's the first time since ever

01:33:53   that's been true for Microsoft time so

01:33:56   the way and the way Apple setup is that

01:33:58   are there shouldn't be executives

01:34:00   blocking that because whatever the new

01:34:01   great thing is the hardware is going to

01:34:03   be designed by jony ive and the software

01:34:06   i guess now we'll be visually and maybe

01:34:08   you know it's it's unclear what is roll

01:34:11   software will be but you know it is

01:34:13   going to be design is johnny knox that

01:34:15   that's what he does so it doesn't matter

01:34:16   what product the marketing is going to

01:34:19   be done by phil schiller doesn't matter

01:34:21   it doesn't know shoulder doesn't have to

01:34:22   worry about something it's not like

01:34:24   those shoulders in charge of ipad

01:34:26   marketing is in charge of all Apple

01:34:28   marketing the software is going to be

01:34:30   engineered by craig federighi is team

01:34:32   right so nobody really has a product

01:34:36   centric fiefdom to protect as long as

01:34:40   it's something new from apple i think

01:34:41   it's a very interesting way to structure

01:34:43   the executive executives of the company

01:34:47   and generally not guaranteed to work i

01:34:49   mean the big problem is you've got to

01:34:50   come up with these ideas in the first

01:34:51   place but

01:34:53   I think that's clearly the vision I've

01:34:56   is the is the vice president of director

01:34:58   of bauhaus I think he's gonna be all

01:35:00   form follows function whatever that

01:35:02   means inside the company where he

01:35:04   doesn't have to direct the way the

01:35:05   hardware works but he's not responsible

01:35:07   for the interaction with it as I think

01:35:10   he has been I'm so I want to know a big

01:35:12   bob mansfield comes up with what is his

01:35:14   next direction because he's he is

01:35:16   clearly like I think Bob Mansfield

01:35:18   nobody's been underrated but the guy is

01:35:20   responsible for so much innovation there

01:35:22   have so much the behind-the-scenes

01:35:24   things clearly the manufacturing side

01:35:26   and the advances of hardware he has been

01:35:29   key and making those things happen that

01:35:31   allow the company to you know sell the

01:35:33   ipad at five more dollars introduĂ§Ă£o

01:35:35   forth so I want to know what he's

01:35:36   working just think about what what I

01:35:38   mean I think mansfield gets a huge

01:35:39   amount of credit for this I think I

01:35:41   believe I'd be shocked if he didn't but

01:35:43   I just think about what happened to

01:35:46   battery design over the last 10 years

01:35:47   like it used to be something I mean I it

01:35:50   I can't even remember the last time that

01:35:51   I saw a review of an apple product where

01:35:53   it did complain about the unremovable

01:35:56   battery like they've finally crammed it

01:35:58   through everybody's heads out there that

01:36:00   this is the way to go with battery

01:36:02   design is you know I see more and more

01:36:03   you see more reviews what they're

01:36:05   complaining about the battery life of

01:36:06   other devices that's flipped on its head

01:36:07   right tremendously you know whens other

01:36:10   devices now have built-in batteries too

01:36:11   because they've gone with the shapes

01:36:12   lithium right thing as well but these

01:36:14   crazy shapes that like II almost spill

01:36:18   like a liquid through every available

01:36:20   likes home every available square

01:36:23   millimeter of space inside the device is

01:36:26   taken up by a battery

01:36:27   ah i think is a huge you know mansfield

01:36:31   driven innovation I think that the you

01:36:33   know the way that people think about

01:36:34   battery-powered devices is hugely

01:36:39   influenced by what he's done over the

01:36:40   last 10 years

01:36:41   what's funny is i got the craziest

01:36:42   comment on an economist blog entry about

01:36:44   skeuomorphism and I wasn't saying Scott

01:36:47   Forstall was fired because it but I said

01:36:49   we could see changes because he was a

01:36:50   proponent of it and I've is not and a

01:36:52   lot of people hate some of the where's

01:36:54   the script installer piece called sku

01:36:56   you right and they're screaming a crazy

01:36:59   comment on it was like Apple does not

01:37:01   make hardware for the Apple contracts

01:37:03   all its hardware manufacturer it is not

01:37:05   responsible for them like you can be

01:37:07   get to respond to it was just this it

01:37:09   was just this wonderful thing it's like

01:37:10   I don't think you understand what making

01:37:12   means any more like making is now you

01:37:14   know the unit's it's the fabulous chip

01:37:17   design thing that goes back now for

01:37:18   decades practice be is companies that

01:37:21   make electronics are responsible for so

01:37:25   you know it's the architectural side of

01:37:27   it the manufacturers now we competitive

01:37:29   they can find the best firm to do it

01:37:31   once this whole thing about samsung

01:37:32   maybe they stopped working with Samsung

01:37:34   great there are plenty of other

01:37:35   companies would be delighted to pick up

01:37:37   a multi-billion dollar contract for

01:37:39   screens and other things you might take

01:37:40   the time to get production ramped up but

01:37:42   but it's out there well and look at what

01:37:44   Apple is done with things like unibody

01:37:47   aluminum construction right i mean this

01:37:49   is something that note there were no

01:37:50   devices that were like this and now all

01:37:53   of apples devices are like this where

01:37:54   they start with blocks of aluminum and

01:37:56   drill the case out of one solid piece of

01:38:00   aluminum I mean is there anything left

01:38:02   Apple makes it isn't can't be described

01:38:04   that way the mac men no women started

01:38:07   the mini I've got in front of the mini

01:38:09   well no I think they do I don't think

01:38:11   that's actually constructed a feeling it

01:38:13   right now but it is a part of the apple

01:38:15   TV is not aluminum right that's plastic

01:38:17   that's right but that's about no I think

01:38:19   you're right the airport extra port

01:38:20   express holistic to gadgets maybe but I

01:38:23   still think that the best way to think

01:38:24   of apple TV is not really as a device

01:38:26   but as I kept peripheral yeah absolutely

01:38:29   only a couple on apple TV 2 add Wi-Fi

01:38:31   and then your kid you know it could be

01:38:33   Apple express TV and you're all done i

01:38:34   guess the mac pro is probably not you

01:38:36   know body I don't know what not yet when

01:38:38   the next one will be obviously right

01:38:40   next one will be but all the macbooks

01:38:42   are the imax are now with the the latest

01:38:46   revisions to the iphone and ipad they

01:38:48   all are you know it's you know and

01:38:51   that's it's hugely innovative that you

01:38:53   start with these blocks of aluminum and

01:38:55   drill things out of it and it gives

01:38:56   their products this incredible build

01:38:59   quality and feel dif that is unlike

01:39:02   everybody else you know like a truly a

01:39:05   blind person can really sense a visceral

01:39:08   aesthetic difference between Apple

01:39:10   products and competing products and they

01:39:12   started down this path materials science

01:39:14   has been

01:39:14   an overlooked part of efficiency

01:39:16   overlooked as you see it's sort of from

01:39:17   the outside but I think like even the

01:39:19   Bondi blue the original translucent

01:39:21   plastic they use that no one else was

01:39:23   using for computers i think it was

01:39:25   already in vacuum cleaners wasn't famous

01:39:26   things at the time but I think Apple

01:39:29   since I've came on and since jobs came

01:39:31   back they have looked material advances

01:39:34   as a way to more fully express the

01:39:36   vision in a way that other companies

01:39:38   have been unable to other companies say

01:39:39   I all they're doing that will do that

01:39:41   because we can use that material to as

01:39:43   opposed to why is no other firm looking

01:39:45   for the next interesting material

01:39:47   advances that would give them a unique

01:39:49   innovative look I mean Samsung we're

01:39:51   looking at the Prophet samsung is

01:39:53   producing now I want samsung I want

01:39:55   microsoft to be making stuff that is as

01:39:58   interesting as what Apple does with the

01:40:00   same functionality in the same build

01:40:02   quality there's no excuse from not doing

01:40:04   it I would often or design side I don't

01:40:06   think Samsung even tries but i will give

01:40:09   it I'll give i will give Microsoft

01:40:10   credit with the surface for trying and I

01:40:12   think that the surface is he is the

01:40:14   closest I've seen you know to to apple

01:40:17   style build quality it is very nice i

01:40:19   think and they also even from a material

01:40:21   standpoint I don't think it's as nice as

01:40:24   the aluminum but i do think that the

01:40:26   magnesium whatever stop witnessing is a

01:40:29   pretty good don't you want don't you

01:40:30   want to wake up one day and say company

01:40:32   X is doing something that is new I mean

01:40:35   that's what we all felt about the UI for

01:40:36   metro was like oh my god microsoft is

01:40:38   broken the window broken through the

01:40:40   glass here and done something I want the

01:40:42   same thing harbor I want to get up one

01:40:43   day and say this thing is oh my god what

01:40:46   they're doing with the technology with

01:40:48   the science it's beautiful it's

01:40:50   functional

01:40:50   it's unique and it's an advanced and I

01:40:53   want someone to do that that's not apple

01:40:55   and it's not a company that sells

01:40:56   twenty-thousand-dollar components of

01:40:58   some kind

01:40:59   right exactly i mean it talked to gone

01:41:01   on long enough to let me toss out

01:41:03   something I have to bring it up because

01:41:04   I've seen it on twitter too many times

01:41:06   because it sounds so soap opera be

01:41:09   perfect is the idea that either one or

01:41:12   both of scoffs kira or forestall will

01:41:14   switch teams and maybe forestall will

01:41:16   take takeover software microsoft and/or

01:41:18   Sinofsky would would end up at Apple

01:41:20   that would be hilarious i don't know

01:41:22   what the culture class was like I can

01:41:23   imagine forestall going to Microsoft

01:41:24   because they're looking for something

01:41:26   different innovative

01:41:27   give him a ton of power and he could

01:41:29   just come in and do what he wants to do

01:41:30   break heads fire people and hire new

01:41:33   folks and it makes changes i wonder if

01:41:35   Sinofsky come brought into apple would

01:41:38   be able to be slotted into a position

01:41:39   where he would feel like he had enough

01:41:42   authority has of the sanctions I don't

01:41:44   think there's any chance to knock

01:41:45   Goodwin up at Apple because i don't

01:41:47   think there's room form right Craig

01:41:49   federighi is already there charge of

01:41:50   software and I think that's the only

01:41:52   sort of position that that that he would

01:41:54   take I think it's more likely that he's

01:41:55   gonna do something you know like Tony

01:41:57   Fadell who started nest

01:41:59   exactly and i think the same is true for

01:42:01   forestall 2 i'd i would he is so

01:42:03   ambitious and he's clear he is so smart

01:42:06   and so successful

01:42:10   there is no doubt in my mind we have not

01:42:12   heard the lost last of scott forstall

01:42:14   but i would expect it to be something

01:42:16   more like what Fidel did with his own

01:42:18   startup and being the CEO and doing

01:42:22   something outside you know I don't know

01:42:23   you know who would have thought

01:42:24   thermostat by know it's all that looks

01:42:27   like a sonos solace was not top level of

01:42:30   people but some great mid-level Apple

01:42:32   people started sonos and it's like the

01:42:33   gold standard around 14 10 8 or 10 years

01:42:36   now and so does is the apple of you know

01:42:39   home stereo equipment something out

01:42:42   there that under our noses and none of

01:42:44   us see it but something like that i was

01:42:46   cars because a car automotive systems

01:42:48   are terrible almost uniformly and

01:42:51   Microsoft actually develops one of them

01:42:53   you do there's there are six million

01:42:55   systems equipped with onstar that are

01:42:57   turned on right now I mean there's I

01:42:58   forget the number that have onstar

01:42:59   built-in that are activated there is

01:43:02   room for some really tremendous work at

01:43:03   automotive integration in car

01:43:05   entertainment systems and logistics and

01:43:08   whatever and that's the space enforcer

01:43:11   has exactly the right experience outside

01:43:13   we forgot the automotive side with the

01:43:14   making that part work and there's a ton

01:43:17   of money there

01:43:18   the thing I can't ask my prediction I

01:43:19   couldn't see forestall going to

01:43:21   Microsoft either unless they wanted to

01:43:23   give him something new that he could do

01:43:26   from the ground up

01:43:27   he's not going to take over windows

01:43:28   though because he already had an OS that

01:43:30   was exactly what he wanted it to be iOS

01:43:33   there's nothing in iOS that forestall

01:43:35   didn't want in it

01:43:36   right it's exactly you know it is the

01:43:38   the everything including the programming

01:43:41   language you use to make it and the

01:43:43   framework which is you know this second

01:43:45   generation version of the next thing

01:43:46   that forestall had been working on since

01:43:48   1989 anyway with all exactly what he

01:43:51   wanted and all of it very very different

01:43:53   than windows there's no way he's gonna

01:43:55   go in there and take over windows

01:43:56   because obviously don't ask you

01:43:58   something quickly though the fireworks

01:43:59   were so long so OS 10 running an arm

01:44:01   right gonna happen

01:44:03   oh def i think i would be shocked if

01:44:05   it's not already running arm just love

01:44:07   story that's a forestall feeling but

01:44:08   it's your anyway they've got to have it

01:44:09   in the lab of course they have right i

01:44:11   wouldn't be surprised if it's the exact

01:44:12   same lab where it used to run on Intel

01:44:15   excite you know visit every disease ALS

01:44:17   is on arm so of coordinates

01:44:19   I don't know who I don't know exactly

01:44:21   how compiled into virgins at the kernel

01:44:22   level one suspect that they have

01:44:24   commonly been running stuff on multiple

01:44:26   kinds of chips including arm since they

01:44:29   released a OS 10 or two years or three

01:44:32   years for the least os10 in iOS form1

01:44:35   assume so I heard that rumor and I was

01:44:37   like that doesn't seem like a big

01:44:38   transition at all I mean will be hard

01:44:40   for the programmers but you know rosena

01:44:42   made that transition if they can do the

01:44:44   same kind of thing they can have a new

01:44:45   Rosetta forearm if it's good it's

01:44:47   capable which i think it was i would be

01:44:50   flabbergasted

01:44:51   if they didn't have as an engineering

01:44:54   principle throughout all of Mac os10 I

01:44:57   you know a hard-and-fast rules in place

01:45:01   that you've you know don't put any it

01:45:03   don't program anything Intel specific in

01:45:05   here or if you really do need to go and

01:45:07   do something in assembler here's you

01:45:09   know block it off very very neatly so

01:45:12   that it can be duplicated you know in a

01:45:14   in a in a processor agnostic fashion but

01:45:19   it seems totally logical to me I heard

01:45:20   the rumor and I was like well fine I

01:45:22   mean why not because that uncouples

01:45:24   again from another point failure and

01:45:26   they have much more control over arm its

01:45:29   chips it's just a question of their

01:45:31   forties and I do think it's easy to

01:45:33   forget just how much more performance I

01:45:36   heavy Mac os10 is than iOS just based on

01:45:40   you know just based on the fun of on the

01:45:41   the the the rules for process lifetime

01:45:47   you know that you can run multiple

01:45:48   things side by side

01:45:49   and that your will your Safari tabs

01:45:52   continue processing javascript in the

01:45:54   background as opposed to on iOS where as

01:45:56   soon as you leave safari it's all put to

01:45:57   sleep but think about all the stuff

01:45:59   they've added to Mac os10 in the last

01:46:01   two releases along those lines of if you

01:46:04   follow these api's your app might be put

01:46:07   to sleep right and i think that you know

01:46:09   and I think that has performance

01:46:11   benefits on Intel but i think it's very

01:46:13   very clearly about keeping our options

01:46:15   open going forward I mean imagine that

01:46:17   there's that whole thing to those you

01:46:18   can I mean there could be armed trips

01:46:19   with you could have 16-core 32 or arm

01:46:22   chips are multiple I mean the not their

01:46:24   magic or anything but I think apples

01:46:26   that everything can with grand central

01:46:28   or your grandcentral all their

01:46:30   multiprocessing multi-threading and all

01:46:32   that is that conceivably you can slip

01:46:34   stream in a super cord getting that's

01:46:36   not eight you know what's the topic the

01:46:39   mac pro is a torque whatta ya want

01:46:41   everything I think I've got a 16-2 16

01:46:44   but conceivably you know I keep reading

01:46:45   about that's the only know but it is all

01:46:48   about ass advanced yeah

01:46:50   grand central dispatch is all about one

01:46:51   thing which is the idea that you're

01:46:53   going to have slower more

01:46:55   energy-efficient kors but more of them

01:46:57   and that that's how performance is going

01:46:59   to increase and how can you best take

01:47:01   advantage of that in a way that's

01:47:03   friendly to developers as it doesn't

01:47:05   make their minds explosive all the ways

01:47:08   that that parallel programming

01:47:09   traditionally could yeah I now and

01:47:12   imagine just imagine a macbook air

01:47:15   that's arm-based how much thinner and

01:47:17   lighter it could be it could be could

01:47:19   you know all of a sudden it might make

01:47:20   our existing errors look patent heavy

01:47:23   I mean apples design apple designs in

01:47:27   eggs in X in X inexorably go in the

01:47:30   direction of thinner thinner and lighter

01:47:32   yeah i'm not even think like imagine

01:47:34   something that's a madness smaller than

01:47:36   a mac mini I mean I assume that for

01:47:38   apple that they that the mac mini

01:47:40   actually feels big to them now so

01:47:42   something that was even smaller and all

01:47:43   the capability it's going to solid-state

01:47:45   you only sold with a solid state drive

01:47:47   with arm processors that runs cooler has

01:47:49   thunderbolt and USB 3 and and that's it

01:47:52   and I would also say to don't don't

01:47:55   count them out on the ipod front either

01:47:58   in terms of like getting don't not just

01:48:01   thinking about arm chips that

01:48:03   are powerful enough to run Mac os10 in

01:48:06   any fashion but I think to about armed

01:48:08   ships that are small enough to be on

01:48:11   like nano typed yes yes because they

01:48:14   have their that's that it's the

01:48:15   diversity of the arm ecosystem that I

01:48:17   think is it's not only can they bit out

01:48:19   where it gets made them greater

01:48:21   flexibility and control and costs and

01:48:23   sources but that the range of arm is so

01:48:27   huge compared to what Intel can offer

01:48:29   them right now on the sort of monolithic

01:48:31   if you scale what think about like an

01:48:34   ARM chip or a system-on-a-chip and

01:48:35   apples perspective where you're thinking

01:48:37   about a device that says like watch size

01:48:40   like like the old man knows but

01:48:42   therefore because it's so small you

01:48:44   don't need to worry about powerful

01:48:45   graphics processing because whatever

01:48:47   this screen has even if it's a Retina

01:48:48   screen at that size it's not going to

01:48:50   require significant graphics processing

01:48:52   I just think about a little tiny super

01:48:55   low power thing with the cpu of like an

01:48:58   a5 bluetooth for and you know what kind

01:49:01   of crazy things you can do with such a

01:49:02   little little thing you have the I

01:49:04   people

01:49:05   Oh grant somebody that I did not buy

01:49:07   Apple watch but I don't know where it is

01:49:10   that when sometimes the devil elevation

01:49:13   doc finished shipping last month and

01:49:14   they now have lightning adapters and

01:49:16   soon sunday lightning connectors yeah

01:49:18   I'll come it'll all come around

01:49:19   yeah well Glenn thank you very much for

01:49:21   being as a great show pleasures i want

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