ATP

00:00:00 ◼   ► Last little bit there is worth adding.

00:00:02 ◼   ► No, well, it wasn't bolded.

00:00:04 ◼   ► I got scolded earlier than I should.

00:00:06 ◼   ► Sorry.

00:00:07 ◼   ► All right.

00:00:08 ◼   ► We'll just have to edit all this out.

00:00:10 ◼   ► Let me take a note.

00:00:11 ◼   ► Jon gets angry at Casey.

00:00:15 ◼   ► You got to be serious with these bolds, Jon.

00:00:17 ◼   ► I already did trim this down, you realize.

00:00:19 ◼   ► It's not like I just copy and paste the thing.

00:00:21 ◼   ► This is the trimmed version.

00:00:22 ◼   ► The bolds just to let you know which parts are important.

00:00:25 ◼   ► All right.

00:00:26 ◼   ► So let's get started.

00:00:28 ◼   ► we have to with follow-up. We have another instance of a fairly long email that I'd

00:00:36 ◼   ► like to read most, actually a couple instances of this that I'd like to read pretty much

00:00:40 ◼   ► in their entirety because I think they're really, really fascinating. I would never

00:00:43 ◼   ► generally do this but now I'm making the exception the rule because these are really

00:00:47 ◼   ► good emails.

00:00:48 ◼   ► - You do it like every two weeks and I always, and I have to edit it in some way because

00:00:52 ◼   ► it's like nothing is more boring and harder to follow than listening to somebody read

00:00:57 ◼   ► like a six paragraph email in a podcast.

00:01:01 ◼   ► - All right, all right, I'll try to make this

00:01:04 ◼   ► as quick as I can since John has done us the service

00:01:07 ◼   ► of bolding certain sections in the show notes.

00:01:09 ◼   ► So we got some feedback from an anonymous Microsoft employee

00:01:13 ◼   ► on the facial recognition in Windows.

00:01:15 ◼   ► And they said all the Surface devices

00:01:17 ◼   ► since the Surface Pro 4,

00:01:18 ◼   ► which is the last two generations apparently,

00:01:20 ◼   ► have supported Windows Hello.

00:01:22 ◼   ► This is different than Hi Sierra.

00:01:24 ◼   ► This is Windows Hello, which uses an infrared LED,

00:01:27 ◼   ► infrared depth camera and RGB webcam to authenticate via your face. This technology is derived

00:01:31 ◼   ► from the Kinect and has in general been super well received. It's fast, very reliable, and

00:01:36 ◼   ► works in the dark. And this includes a link to a video which we will put in the show notes.

00:01:40 ◼   ► It is also tricky to fool, arguably more secure than a fingerprint, and it can even tell twins

00:01:44 ◼   ► apart. We'll put a different link in the show notes for that. When Microsoft tried to scale

00:01:48 ◼   ► this down to mobile devices in the Lumia 650 and 650 XL, the same technology didn't work

00:01:52 ◼   ► for a number of reasons, including power, cost, and constraints.

00:01:56 ◼   ► Size constraints, that is.

00:01:57 ◼   ► The Lumia device is shipped in 2015, and while the Surface Solution didn't scale down effectively

00:02:01 ◼   ► then, I have no difficulty believing Apple could scale down to a full-face solution like

00:02:04 ◼   ► Windows Hello in 2017.

00:02:07 ◼   ► That said, most good solutions I've seen require at least two cameras, IR and RGB, to get depth,

00:02:13 ◼   ► verify it's a fleshy 3D object, that's such a funny word, fleshy, but anyway, and capture

00:02:18 ◼   ► enough identifiers as well as an IR LED to function in mixed lighting conditions. Heavy

00:02:22 ◼   ► backlighting and bright sunlight are especially challenging. It's hard to see how these would fit

00:02:27 ◼   ► into the quote-unquote forehead of a bezel-free iPhone without significant cutouts in addition

00:02:33 ◼   ► to what's already required for the front-facing camera and proximity sensor. Blah blah blah.

00:02:37 ◼   ► All that to say it is fast, dependable, delightful face recognition that is absolutely possible and

00:02:44 ◼   ► and is in fact par for the course

00:02:45 ◼   ► on some high-end Windows devices like the Surface.

00:02:47 ◼   ► Yes, it does introduce some UI requirements

00:02:49 ◼   ► for explicit confirmation of intent,

00:02:51 ◼   ► for example, with purchases.

00:02:53 ◼   ► It's just a matter of time

00:02:53 ◼   ► before someone makes it work on a phone.

00:02:55 ◼   ► I wouldn't be at all surprised

00:02:56 ◼   ► to hear Apple had done that.

00:02:59 ◼   ► - This is a thread of feedback with all the people,

00:03:02 ◼   ► all the Windows users telling us about Windows Hello,

00:03:04 ◼   ► which we discussed on the show many, many months ago.

00:03:06 ◼   ► And as this person pointed,

00:03:08 ◼   ► the reason I picked this email out is

00:03:09 ◼   ► it is a Microsoft employee,

00:03:10 ◼   ► and they talk specifically about the challenges

00:03:13 ◼   ► getting it down into a phone because obviously you have luxuries on even just a laptop form

00:03:18 ◼   ► factor that you don't have on phones.

00:03:19 ◼   ► You've got a lot of space to put sensors in there, you've got a lot more power, you've

00:03:22 ◼   ► got a lot bigger battery, usually you have more computing power, although these days

00:03:26 ◼   ► the phone is probably faster than half of the things they listed.

00:03:30 ◼   ► So we'll see.

00:03:31 ◼   ► So yes, face recognition on Windows Hello is there.

00:03:33 ◼   ► We've got varying reports, some people say it's amazing, it already exists and it's wonderful,

00:03:36 ◼   ► other people said I can't get it directed out into my face, it takes like 3 to 5 seconds

00:03:39 ◼   ► and it doesn't work half the time and I hate it.

00:03:42 ◼   ► So mixed results, but in general,

00:03:44 ◼   ► I think mostly people like Windows Hello

00:03:46 ◼   ► and think that it works well.

00:03:47 ◼   ► It's just a question of can you get this in a phone?

00:03:51 ◼   ► - I love that the new Windows did it

00:03:54 ◼   ► is a lot like the old Opera did it.

00:03:56 ◼   ► Like that Windows is now so marginalized

00:03:59 ◼   ► that the cutting edge features of the Surface hardware

00:04:03 ◼   ► and the stuff that's the whole pure

00:04:04 ◼   ► Microsoft Stack hardware to software,

00:04:06 ◼   ► so few people, relatively speaking,

00:04:09 ◼   ► are using that and enjoying that to the point,

00:04:12 ◼   ► especially around these parts,

00:04:14 ◼   ► around Apple-y tech podcast circles,

00:04:17 ◼   ► that we have no idea what they're doing.

00:04:20 ◼   ► And they're doing important stuff and innovative stuff,

00:04:25 ◼   ► and they just want everyone to know that so much,

00:04:27 ◼   ► and meanwhile we're all like,

00:04:28 ◼   ► hmm, no one's ever done this before.

00:04:30 ◼   ► It's exactly why the Opera people were always so mad,

00:04:35 ◼   ► 'cause Opera was doing all these great features

00:04:37 ◼   ► that other browsers would add five years later

00:04:40 ◼   ► and act like no one had ever done that before.

00:04:41 ◼   ► And everyone else believed it.

00:04:43 ◼   ► - But the reason people didn't know about it

00:04:44 ◼   ► because in the case of Opera is that Opera was,

00:04:47 ◼   ► would fall down on like the basics.

00:04:49 ◼   ► Like that people didn't use it not just because

00:04:51 ◼   ► it was obscure and weird, but because it just wasn't

00:04:53 ◼   ► as good a web browser in most cases as other ones

00:04:55 ◼   ► for like boring practical reasons, you know?

00:04:58 ◼   ► - Windows is not as good of an operating system.

00:04:59 ◼   ► That's why we don't use these things.

00:05:01 ◼   ► - Anyway, so, Windows certainly doesn't have the mind share,

00:05:05 ◼   ► but like Windows Hello, like I said,

00:05:06 ◼   ► We talked about it on this very podcast.

00:05:07 ◼   ► It was not like we didn't know that it existed.

00:05:10 ◼   ► And a lot of these features,

00:05:11 ◼   ► I think we talked about the Samsung face recognition.

00:05:13 ◼   ► A lot of these features we do know

00:05:14 ◼   ► have even been tried in phone form factors before,

00:05:18 ◼   ► but the reason we don't have them in front of mind

00:05:22 ◼   ► is because, I mentioned the Amazon Fire phone last time

00:05:26 ◼   ► with the five cameras and all the sensors and everything.

00:05:27 ◼   ► It's like, if they don't work really well,

00:05:29 ◼   ► it's like, oh, well, yeah, they tried to do a thing,

00:05:32 ◼   ► but they essentially failed.

00:05:33 ◼   ► And so it will rise to the level of public consciousness

00:05:36 ◼   ► if it becomes popular and everyone agrees

00:05:40 ◼   ► that it works really well.

00:05:41 ◼   ► And if it worked really well, it would be everywhere

00:05:43 ◼   ► and every phone would be using it.

00:05:44 ◼   ► And so like, no one has really cracked it.

00:05:46 ◼   ► Kind of like a fingerprint sensors

00:05:47 ◼   ► that essentially work really well everywhere now.

00:05:49 ◼   ► And so they're very, very common.

00:05:50 ◼   ► And so that's why everybody knows unlocking the phone

00:05:53 ◼   ► with your finger is a thing.

00:05:55 ◼   ► Whoever was first with that and getting it to work,

00:05:57 ◼   ► obviously we know about it from the Apple world,

00:05:59 ◼   ► but for all we know, Android was doing it, you know,

00:06:01 ◼   ► years before.

00:06:02 ◼   ► But anyway, that technology is kind of settled

00:06:04 ◼   ► and it works just fine.

00:06:05 ◼   ► Face recognition is still in the realm of,

00:06:07 ◼   ► maybe on some desktop computers and some operating systems,

00:06:09 ◼   ► some people think it works great,

00:06:11 ◼   ► but no one has really nailed it on the phone

00:06:13 ◼   ► to the point where it's better than fingerprint unlock

00:06:16 ◼   ► or typing in a code or whatever.

00:06:18 ◼   ► - I also still do think that there are significant challenges

00:06:21 ◼   ► with face recognition as an unlock method

00:06:23 ◼   ► around the issues of how do you confirm the authentication

00:06:28 ◼   ► and what do you do if you don't want

00:06:29 ◼   ► to authenticate something?

00:06:31 ◼   ► And one person, I think it was on Twitter,

00:06:33 ◼   ► pointed out the example of like,

00:06:35 ◼   ► what if someone takes your phone out of your hand

00:06:37 ◼   ► and holds it up to your face?

00:06:39 ◼   ► And then, if the only confirmation thing is,

00:06:42 ◼   ► recognize your face and then tap a thing on screen

00:06:45 ◼   ► to say, okay, then somebody can take your phone

00:06:49 ◼   ► and just authorize it right there in front of you

00:06:51 ◼   ► and then walk away.

00:06:52 ◼   ► - I was gonna make another Indiana Jones reference,

00:06:54 ◼   ► but Raiders of the Lost Ark reference,

00:06:55 ◼   ► but I know you don't know that one.

00:06:56 ◼   ► Kinda like the watch authentication,

00:07:00 ◼   ► where once you unlock your watch,

00:07:01 ◼   ► as long as it's on your wrist, it stays unlocked.

00:07:05 ◼   ► But if someone wants to steal your watch,

00:07:06 ◼   ► it automatically locks when it leaves your wrist.

00:07:08 ◼   ► So I can imagine a similar feature

00:07:11 ◼   ► where the gesture of picking it up

00:07:14 ◼   ► and putting your finger on part of the screen,

00:07:16 ◼   ► your finger has to be there,

00:07:18 ◼   ► then the camera recognizes you,

00:07:19 ◼   ► then you press the screen or slide in a direction

00:07:23 ◼   ► or whatever.

00:07:24 ◼   ► And if any point in that chain,

00:07:26 ◼   ► like that your finger leaves the phone surface

00:07:29 ◼   ► or wherever you're supposed to be holding down,

00:07:31 ◼   ► then it's all over.

00:07:32 ◼   ► So someone pulls a thing out of your hand,

00:07:34 ◼   ► well, it doesn't work either, does it?

00:07:38 ◼   ► I don't know, it's a difficult problem.

00:07:39 ◼   ► You'd have to incorporate the fingerprint sensor, I guess.

00:07:42 ◼   ► - Right.

00:07:42 ◼   ► - But the whole point is that--

00:07:43 ◼   ► - In which case you have a fingerprint sensor.

00:07:45 ◼   ► - Yeah, we're trying to avoid that.

00:07:47 ◼   ► - And the thing is, the more complex that the gesture is,

00:07:50 ◼   ► or the more requirements it has to succeed

00:07:53 ◼   ► and to unlock the phone and to keep the phone unlocked,

00:07:55 ◼   ► the more often that it won't work in legitimate use.

00:07:58 ◼   ► the more legitimate use cases you have,

00:08:00 ◼   ► where like, okay, well, what if I want to authenticate

00:08:02 ◼   ► my phone while it's sitting on a table,

00:08:03 ◼   ► and I just put my thumb on it now,

00:08:04 ◼   ► but if you have to have your hand on a certain part,

00:08:06 ◼   ► like, Touch ID is so good, and I feel like

00:08:11 ◼   ► it solves or avoids so many of these other

00:08:14 ◼   ► weird little problems that it would really take a lot

00:08:19 ◼   ► to make it worth not using Touch ID anymore.

00:08:23 ◼   ► - I don't know, I'm glad this is still a rumored feature,

00:08:26 ◼   ► so we don't even know if it's shipping at all,

00:08:27 ◼   ► won't have to consider this but well i guess we'll all find out i i still think it would be neat to

00:08:32 ◼   ► like just have it sort of work by magic and just pick up your phone and use it and it's just

00:08:36 ◼   ► automatically unlocked because you're you i would probably sacrifice that for for the security of

00:08:42 ◼   ► like oh what if someone rips the phone out of your hand because you know that's not that common

00:08:47 ◼   ► enough occurrence in my in the circles that i travel in but uh for other people i mean obviously

00:08:53 ◼   ► if you have an option to turn this on or off that would really help let people decide what they're

00:08:56 ◼   ► security profile is and we said in the last show if you're in a situation like

00:09:01 ◼   ► in an airport or going through immigration in some country you'd want

00:09:04 ◼   ► to avoid both touch ID and the face recognition because you can be you know

00:09:08 ◼   ► compelled to unlock your phone in that way there are other ways where you can

00:09:10 ◼   ► lock down your phone so that you have to enter a big long password which they

00:09:14 ◼   ► would have to you know use what was it a rubber hose cryptography pipe wrench

00:09:19 ◼   ► cartography this depending on what version but there's an xkcd comic or

00:09:23 ◼   ► from the idea that the SKCD comic is derived from.

00:09:26 ◼   ► They just beat you with a pipe wrench

00:09:27 ◼   ► until you tell them the password.

00:09:30 ◼   ► - This reminds me also of the watch unlock on the desktop.

00:09:35 ◼   ► So if you have an Apple Watch that is actively unlocked,

00:09:40 ◼   ► I forget the exact requirements,

00:09:41 ◼   ► I think you're all on the same iCloud account

00:09:42 ◼   ► or something like that,

00:09:44 ◼   ► and you've enabled everything on every device,

00:09:46 ◼   ► then what you can do is,

00:09:47 ◼   ► if your watch is physically close to say your iMac

00:09:51 ◼   ► or something like that,

00:09:52 ◼   ► and you tap a keyboard button or a mouse button to wake it up,

00:09:56 ◼   ► then it will see if your watch is nearby, and if it's nearby and it's

00:10:00 ◼   ► authenticated, etc., then it will go ahead and unlock the Mac

00:10:04 ◼   ► for you. And that seems perfectly reasonable until you think about, say, an

00:10:10 ◼   ► office where, you know, most of us work in cubicles, and so

00:10:14 ◼   ► what if I'm a couple cubes down or maybe the next cube over,

00:10:18 ◼   ► and somebody goes up to my work machine and smacks the keyboard and it feels like my watch

00:10:26 ◼   ► is close enough, then guess what?

00:10:28 ◼   ► That thing's getting unlocked.

00:10:29 ◼   ► And on the surface, that's terrible.

00:10:32 ◼   ► But in reality, you should, in theory, be close enough that you can hopefully see what

00:10:38 ◼   ► is going on with your device.

00:10:40 ◼   ► And if you're not close enough to see what's going on, it hopefully wouldn't allow itself

00:10:43 ◼   ► to be unlocked.

00:10:44 ◼   ► It's a similar kind of problem, right, where there's a pretty reasonable explanation, or expectation,

00:10:51 ◼   ► I should say, that you are close and that is the intended results for your device to unlock,

00:10:56 ◼   ► but you don't know for sure. Now, the difference is, which I didn't get a chance to talk to you

00:11:00 ◼   ► before the chat room started yelling at me, that you get a notification on your watch, "Hey,

00:11:04 ◼   ► such-and-such has been unlocked." But it, to me, rings a similar set of potential problems,

00:11:11 ◼   ► and for me it's been working out really well and it's super convenient. So I kind of

00:11:14 ◼   ► of agree with you, John, that in the circles I travel in, eh, I'm not too worried about it.

00:11:18 ◼   ► By the way, Casey, as the person who knows that they've seen Raiders, can you, do you,

00:11:22 ◼   ► uh, do you know what reference I was going to make before I bailed?

00:11:25 ◼   ► No, I definitely do. I've seen Raiders many times, but I do not know the reference.

00:11:29 ◼   ► The beginning bit with the idol? Like, you gotta take the idol off, but put a sandbag of equal

00:11:34 ◼   ► weight, like someone takes something out of your hand, but while maintaining contact with the part

00:11:37 ◼   ► that you're, it's kind of like stealing your watch while keeping something touching the sensor on the

00:11:42 ◼   ► the bottom so it stays unlocked. You know, I bet Apollo Robbins could do that.

00:11:45 ◼   ► Yeah, I was just about to ask, who's that guy that can do that unbelievable, like, stealing

00:11:51 ◼   ► stuff while you're talking to him? That's his next level. He gets an Apple sponsorship.

00:11:54 ◼   ► Like, he can remove people's watches without them knowing, but can you do it while at the

00:11:58 ◼   ► same time, like, keeping something touching the proximity sensors underneath the watch

00:12:02 ◼   ► so it remains unlocked? That's the trick. All right, moving on before I get stuck in

00:12:07 ◼   ► some Apollo Robbins videos, because they are mesmerizing.

00:12:11 ◼   ► All right, an anonymous Apple source familiar

00:12:13 ◼   ► with MDNS Responder has also written in.

00:12:15 ◼   ► They said, now I'm quoting, you said,

00:12:18 ◼   ► "MDNS Responder was a mess and had tons of bugs."

00:12:20 ◼   ► - John said that, we didn't say that.

00:12:22 ◼   ► - Fair enough.

00:12:24 ◼   ► I couldn't let that pass without a response.

00:12:25 ◼   ► The reasons for the Bonjour rewrite were entirely political,

00:12:29 ◼   ► nothing to do with MDNS Responder.

00:12:32 ◼   ► If you're a manager looking for something for your team

00:12:34 ◼   ► to do, rewriting some extra software seems much safer

00:12:36 ◼   ► much existing software, excuse me, seems much safer and much more predictable than thinking

00:12:40 ◼   ► of something new for yourself.

00:12:41 ◼   ► Rewriting something from scratch, as we all know, is a terrible idea.

00:12:45 ◼   ► And there's a link to the seminal Joel and Software blog post about this very thing.

00:12:51 ◼   ► Coming back to the email, if you measure it in admittedly crude, simple numerical terms

00:12:54 ◼   ► of number of devices deployed, MDNS responder is arguably the most successful piece of software

00:12:59 ◼   ► ever to come out of Apple.

00:13:00 ◼   ► As well as being on almost every Apple product, it's also many other devices, almost all network

00:13:04 ◼   ► printers, TiVo, network cameras, etc., and in every Android device, which is not just

00:13:08 ◼   ► Android phones and tablets, but also Android-based accessories.

00:13:13 ◼   ► If you consider the quality and robustness of the MDNS Responder code is illustrated

00:13:17 ◼   ► by the fact that even after being neglected for five years, finding an old copy of MDNS

00:13:22 ◼   ► Responder from a previous OS version and installing it on Yosemite still worked better than Discovery

00:13:26 ◼   ► D software Apple briefly shipped before reverting back to MDNS Responder.

00:13:31 ◼   ► I'm amused that you heard that the return to MDNS Responder was instigated by a celebrity

00:13:35 ◼   ► emailing Tim Cook.

00:13:36 ◼   ► You're right about that part, except it wasn't Bono.

00:13:40 ◼   ► Wasn't Bono.

00:13:41 ◼   ► It was Vint Cerf.

00:13:42 ◼   ► Fair enough.

00:13:43 ◼   ► And who is Vint Cerf?

00:13:44 ◼   ► Can you explain to the audience?

00:13:45 ◼   ► That's why we have a link to the Wikipedia page.

00:13:46 ◼   ► One of the fathers of the internet.

00:13:48 ◼   ► An old guy who did lots of important work on the early internet.

00:13:51 ◼   ► Is that you?

00:13:52 ◼   ► No, I'm not that old.

00:13:55 ◼   ► So first, getting back to the part of the MDNS Responder being a buggy.

00:14:01 ◼   ► the basis for that. Like, first of all, being neglected for five years is never good for

00:14:05 ◼   ► any piece of software. Second, as a regular user, it was not uncommon to have weird problems

00:14:11 ◼   ► with your Mac and to have the solution be killing mDNSResponder. Right? I think, I don't

00:14:16 ◼   ► know if you guys remember that, but I certainly do. Right? So whether you want to consider

00:14:20 ◼   ► it a buggy mess or whatever, it is something that would be a candidate for, "Hey, this

00:14:27 ◼   ► Essential piece of the system seems like it might be getting a little creaky and if someone has a good idea about how to vastly

00:14:32 ◼   ► Improve it by all means do it

00:14:34 ◼   ► The John software thing about you should things you should never do you should never write software blah blah

00:14:39 ◼   ► That's been hashed out to death

00:14:40 ◼   ► I mean, it's it's a good presentation of a particular of one side of a particular issue

00:14:45 ◼   ► But of course sometimes you do have to rewrite things so many good things that we love came from the decision to rewrite things

00:14:51 ◼   ► You just have to know when to do it and when not to do it was basically Joel's point

00:14:53 ◼   ► But it was expressed in a very hyperbolic way of like oh you should just totally never do this

00:14:57 ◼   ► Let me tell you all the great things that are about like software that already has all the corner cases and

00:15:02 ◼   ► You know all the education all the things that you've learned over the years, right?

00:15:07 ◼   ► baked into it but

00:15:10 ◼   ► On the Mac we have examples of rewrites that are great and a lot of you know

00:15:14 ◼   ► Important things that we have on the Mac today are because someone decided to abandon some old code and rewrite it and we have some

00:15:19 ◼   ► Cautionary tale so I think there's a reasonable mix and I think it's not

00:15:23 ◼   ► You know out of bounds to say that MDNS responder as it was a candidate because it did cause real-world problems for regular people

00:15:29 ◼   ► To the it wasn't zapping the PRAM point

00:15:31 ◼   ► But it was the point at a certain point in the history of the Mac that

00:15:34 ◼   ► Killing in the NS responder to fix a whole host of problems

00:15:37 ◼   ► It became like one of those things you might just want to try because it could be what's going now

00:15:41 ◼   ► Politically speaking who knows maybe that's because they said oh just don't ever fix MDNS responder for five years

00:15:47 ◼   ► Whoever this person who is wrote in seemed to think the project was neglected

00:15:51 ◼   ► But obviously discovery D was not a successful rewrite and whatever reason

00:15:55 ◼   ► That the rewrite was undertaken and the people who did it and whether they had the expertise or really understood

00:16:01 ◼   ► What mdns responder was doing and how it did it and all the decisions that led to its design and all things they learned

00:16:07 ◼   ► It just seems like it was not

00:16:08 ◼   ► It was not a a project undertaken with the right attitude and by the right people. But anyway this

00:16:16 ◼   ► As to the idea of MDNS responder being on lots of different systems, this is news to me as well. I

00:16:22 ◼   ► Suppose it's got to be an open source component or maybe it's part of

00:16:27 ◼   ► Some wider like I don't whether it's part of Darwin or some even bigger open source component

00:16:32 ◼   ► I don't know

00:16:33 ◼   ► I mean

00:16:33 ◼   ► I only know it because it's that process that I had to kill my Mac sometimes it was super important and then most people know

00:16:38 ◼   ► Because it's the thing that came back to replace discovery need to make your max work again

00:16:41 ◼   ► Well, I did some very very quick research

00:16:43 ◼   ► sorry for everyone who knows a lot more about it than this,

00:16:44 ◼   ► but, so Bonjour is the zero-conf networking protocol

00:16:49 ◼   ► that Apple popularized under that name,

00:16:52 ◼   ► and basically if you wanted to use a network printer

00:16:55 ◼   ► or use network shares that were just listed by their names

00:16:58 ◼   ► that would automatically find each other,

00:16:59 ◼   ► there's a very good chance it's using this Bonjour protocol.

00:17:02 ◼   ► Part of the Bonjour software is MDNS Responder,

00:17:06 ◼   ► which is the demon on the systems that manages that.

00:17:09 ◼   ► That apparently, MDNS Responder itself is open source

00:17:12 ◼   ► under the Apache license.

00:17:14 ◼   ► And so it apparently went into all sorts of things

00:17:18 ◼   ► that had to support ZeroConf networking

00:17:20 ◼   ► and/or the Bonjour protocol.

00:17:23 ◼   ► - I think you mean rendezvous.

00:17:25 ◼   ► - Right.

00:17:25 ◼   ► - What a better name rendezvous was.

00:17:27 ◼   ► Like, so ZeroConf is the techie nerd name for the technology.

00:17:31 ◼   ► And then rendezvous was how Apple branded it.

00:17:33 ◼   ► But then in one of the rare cases where Apple

00:17:35 ◼   ► lost or decided not to fight someone challenging their,

00:17:38 ◼   ► I forget what the situation was,

00:17:39 ◼   ► whether they just said, "Oh, nevermind, we'll pick

00:17:41 ◼   ► in your name or they actually lost the court case,

00:17:43 ◼   ► they have to change it, so they change it to Bonjour,

00:17:44 ◼   ► which is not bad, but boy, rendezvous was better.

00:17:47 ◼   ► - Yeah, exactly.

00:17:48 ◼   ► So anyway, so it appears that like lots of different

00:17:50 ◼   ► operating systems and devices like printers and stuff

00:17:53 ◼   ► all embedded MDNS Responder because it was open source.

00:17:57 ◼   ► So apparently that's why it kind of went

00:18:00 ◼   ► in all these different things and went everywhere,

00:18:02 ◼   ► and is apparently in Android as well,

00:18:04 ◼   ► which is pretty impressive.

00:18:05 ◼   ► That is, I gotta give this guy credit

00:18:08 ◼   ► for pointing out the stuff.

00:18:10 ◼   ► That is really quite widespread.

00:18:13 ◼   ► And I always just assumed it was just an Apple thing,

00:18:15 ◼   ► but nope.

00:18:17 ◼   ► - Oh, I would add that the idea of it being successful

00:18:19 ◼   ► and it being deployed everywhere are two

00:18:20 ◼   ► very different things.

00:18:22 ◼   ► There's lots of software that's deployed everywhere.

00:18:24 ◼   ► The success, if success is just measured by how far

00:18:29 ◼   ► and wide you spread, all sorts of terrible things can be

00:18:31 ◼   ► considered quote unquote successful.

00:18:33 ◼   ► - Windows.

00:18:34 ◼   ► - Not even, even if you just take some terrible code

00:18:39 ◼   ► in the core of Unix that's just been passed around

00:18:41 ◼   ► 'cause it's sort of unimportant, but it's just,

00:18:43 ◼   ► that's where a lot of bugs and buffer overflows come from.

00:18:46 ◼   ► Some really old library and some BSD Unix variant

00:18:51 ◼   ► that just gets passed around and no one ever looks at it

00:18:54 ◼   ► and it's just this gross crusty little corner and yeah.

00:18:57 ◼   ► Anyway, I don't know exactly why MDNS responder

00:19:02 ◼   ► was chosen as a victim for a rewrite,

00:19:06 ◼   ► but I think it was a reasonable decision,

00:19:09 ◼   ► but it was followed up by terrible execution.

00:19:12 ◼   ► So you gotta have both parts of it.

00:19:14 ◼   ► If you identify the parts of your system

00:19:16 ◼   ► that could benefit from your rights

00:19:17 ◼   ► and then you do a bad job, you have not succeeded.

00:19:20 ◼   ► - For what it's worth, opensource.apple.com/source/mdnsresponder

00:19:26 ◼   ► - Oh, and by the way, now that we know more

00:19:28 ◼   ► about the open source nature of this,

00:19:29 ◼   ► maybe it wasn't such a good candidate

00:19:30 ◼   ► because when there is a project,

00:19:32 ◼   ► like an open source project that lots of other people use

00:19:35 ◼   ► that is sort of being worked on.

00:19:37 ◼   ► Like other people have a stake in this.

00:19:38 ◼   ► Like if MDNS Responder really is broken or whatever,

00:19:40 ◼   ► presumably there's lots of people

00:19:41 ◼   ► from lots of different companies

00:19:42 ◼   ► that are motivated to make it not suck, right?

00:19:44 ◼   ► And you say, you know what?

00:19:46 ◼   ► We're gonna write our own thing.

00:19:48 ◼   ► It's like saying we've been using WebKit,

00:19:49 ◼   ► which everybody helps update,

00:19:51 ◼   ► but we would like our own engine.

00:19:52 ◼   ► So we're just gonna start our own from scratch again.

00:19:54 ◼   ► It's probably not a great idea.

00:19:55 ◼   ► Now, MDNS Responder is not the same thing as WebKit,

00:19:57 ◼   ► obviously in terms of complexity and importance,

00:19:58 ◼   ► but if everyone else in the industry

00:20:00 ◼   ► is using MDNS Responder

00:20:01 ◼   ► and presumably updating it and fixing it,

00:20:03 ◼   ► and you decided to go down your own,

00:20:04 ◼   ► boy, you better have the best team available with lots of people on it to equal the effort

00:20:09 ◼   ► and smarts and experience of everyone else who's maintaining MBAs responder. So perhaps

00:20:14 ◼   ► it wasn't actually such a great candidate.

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00:22:00 ◼   ► All right, Sid Polk writes, "I was at Apple when DYLD 2 was developed and released. There

00:22:08 ◼   ► was a guy who worked on Linkers. He was bothered one day by how slow DYLD was, so he spent

00:22:13 ◼   ► the weekend writing a new one from scratch, because why not? It was eventually released

00:22:17 ◼   ► in a software update during the 10.3 cycle, but the release notes for it were included

00:22:22 ◼   ► in the 10.4 release. The engineer who wrote DYLD 2 also wrote DYLD 3. I trust him specifically

00:22:30 ◼   ► Also, this is what public betas are for.

00:22:32 ◼   ► We did not have those in 2003, which is kind of funny.

00:22:35 ◼   ► Yeah, I think people are surprised at exactly how few people are responsible for such important

00:22:41 ◼   ► parts.

00:22:42 ◼   ► So this isn't like they always assume there's like hundreds of engineers.

00:22:44 ◼   ► When you learn this, like, I forget what Twitter's employee count was.

00:22:46 ◼   ► Some, this is something I've seen like 3000 employees or something.

00:22:50 ◼   ► You're like, what are all those people doing?

00:22:52 ◼   ► And then you learn like, how many people work on, you know, the dynamic linker for the Mac

00:22:57 ◼   ► operating system and iOS and tvOS and watchOS. And you're like, "Boy, that's probably a team

00:23:02 ◼   ► of a couple hundred people." And it's like five people. It's like five people. And really,

00:23:05 ◼   ► like two or three of them are doing the bulk of the work. And the guy who did the DYLD,

00:23:10 ◼   ► you know, is largely responsible for the DYLD3, also was responsible for DYLD2. And he did it in

00:23:14 ◼   ► a weekend in an earlier, more innocent time, pushed it out in a software update in the middle

00:23:18 ◼   ► of the 10.3.x cycle. It was a different time. But even today, teams at Apple are smaller than

00:23:26 ◼   ► than you think.

00:23:27 ◼   ► And that gets back to the whole like how money can't solve your talent and retention problems.

00:23:32 ◼   ► Like if you could mold money into the shape of people, golem style or golem style, I don't

00:23:36 ◼   ► know how to pronounce it in this context, Apple would do it but they can't.

00:23:40 ◼   ► They actually have to hire people and keep them happy and give them interesting things

00:23:43 ◼   ► to do.

00:23:44 ◼   ► And you need the right people and very often some of the best software is written by very

00:23:47 ◼   ► small teams of people who really know what they're doing and are very enthusiastic rather

00:23:51 ◼   ► than hundreds and hundreds of people being directed by 17 levels of management.

00:23:55 ◼   ► Fair enough. Also, it's Gangnam Style. Actually, I probably even pronounced that wrong.

00:24:01 ◼   ► There you go.

00:24:02 ◼   ► All right. Anyway, please cut that from the show so I don't get a million pieces of feedback.

00:24:06 ◼   ► Anyhow, Aaron Kirkland writes in, "On my Mac 2FX, I had…" That is not a very good

00:24:13 ◼   ► name, if I'm honest. But anyway, "On my Mac 2FX, I had…"

00:24:16 ◼   ► What's not good about 2FX? That's one of the best Mac names ever. One of the best Macs ever.

00:24:22 ◼   ► F-X! Who doesn't like F-X?

00:24:24 ◼   ► It's pronounced "IF-X".

00:24:25 ◼   ► It's got an X in it, so it's cool. It's a pun for "FX".

00:24:29 ◼   ► It was the name of a movie in the 80s about special effects. They don't make those anymore.

00:24:33 ◼   ► Now you see them, which is about magic or something. Terrible.

00:24:37 ◼   ► Do you remember "Movie Magic"? That was a great TV show.

00:24:40 ◼   ► F-X is the whole--neither one of you has probably seen F-X, and it's probably a terrible 80s movie.

00:24:44 ◼   ► But, Casey might like it.

00:24:46 ◼   ► Why do you say that? Because I have terrible taste?

00:24:49 ◼   ► You're playing Hunt for Red October.

00:24:51 ◼   ► Don't you make fun of Hunt for Red October, man. I will fight you.

00:24:54 ◼   ► I know, I'm just saying, you're not going to turn up your nose in a movie with slightly dated tropes or whatever.

00:25:00 ◼   ► Anyway, FX was a great movie to catch.

00:25:02 ◼   ► This movie's terrible. Casey would like it.

00:25:04 ◼   ► I know, right? I'm glad somebody else heard that.

00:25:06 ◼   ► It's a great movie to catch on a Saturday when you're 12 years old.

00:25:09 ◼   ► I don't know if I love you John or if I hate you, probably a little of both.

00:25:14 ◼   ► On my Mac 2FX, horrible name or not, writes Aaron Kirkland, I had a floppy disk autoloader.

00:25:19 ◼   ► Why are we still talking about this?

00:25:20 ◼   ► I had a floppy disk autoloader that would hold 25 disks for unattended, retrospect backup,

00:25:26 ◼   ► and it relied on auto-inject.

00:25:29 ◼   ► This is the discussion actually I was having with Merlin at some point, although I think

00:25:32 ◼   ► it was off the air, but I had this recollection that there were devices that would do the

00:25:37 ◼   ► floppy swapping for you?" But I'm like, "That's probably just something I was thinking of

00:25:42 ◼   ► when I was a kid. I don't think those things ever existed." Because when you're swapping

00:25:45 ◼   ► floppies manually, you're like, "Surely I can make a machine, some sort of Rube Goldberg

00:25:50 ◼   ► machine to do this for me, right?" But this person says that apparently such a thing actually

00:25:56 ◼   ► existed. So I had convinced myself that it was just like a false memory, but then I asked,

00:26:01 ◼   ► "Do you remember the make and model?" And he didn't. I would love to, if anyone, anyway,

00:26:06 ◼   ► If anybody knows more about these, can provide a picture or a name or something to Google

00:26:11 ◼   ► so we can find one of these things and see what it looks like, I would love to see such

00:26:13 ◼   ► a thing.

00:26:14 ◼   ► You can always rely on the world of large-scale backup hardware, like tape drives and everything

00:26:21 ◼   ► else, for the weirdest stuff out there.

00:26:23 ◼   ► You can do large-scale backups onto 3.5-inch floppy disks.

00:26:27 ◼   ► That sounds great.

00:26:28 ◼   ► Right.

00:26:29 ◼   ► Well, you know, because there was a need for that.

00:26:31 ◼   ► Not everybody needed that at that time, but someone needed it and someone was willing

00:26:35 ◼   ► to pay thousands of dollars for that probably.

00:26:37 ◼   ► - Yeah, Retrospect by the way was a Mac backup program,

00:26:40 ◼   ► which someone in the chat room was saying was terrible,

00:26:41 ◼   ► but I think it had some kind of neat features.

00:26:44 ◼   ► I used it for many years.

00:26:46 ◼   ► - All right, any other follow-up kids?

00:26:48 ◼   ► - We're still in follow-up.

00:26:49 ◼   ► - I know, this was a long one.

00:26:52 ◼   ► Those emails were good though, so.

00:26:53 ◼   ► - That's true, they were pretty good.

00:26:54 ◼   ► - I'll give John a buy on this one.

00:26:57 ◼   ► 'Cause we all know good follow-up is our fault,

00:26:59 ◼   ► but bad follow-up is John's fault.

00:27:01 ◼   ► - That sounds right.

00:27:03 ◼   ► works for me. We have a consensus. All right, so Chief Waffler and Chief, what'd you buy

00:27:10 ◼   ► these days? This was not a waffle. This was just straight-up

00:27:13 ◼   ► upgrades. You have to narrow it down, that question,

00:27:16 ◼   ► Casey, if you want an answer. What did you buy in the last 48 hours?

00:27:21 ◼   ► It was the biggest thing, physically speaking, that you purchased recently.

00:27:26 ◼   ► What impulse buy, what multi-thousand dollar impulse buy did you just do?

00:27:31 ◼   ► So we've had our wonderful Plasma 42 inch Panasonic 85U TV for about 10 years.

00:27:41 ◼   ► And it's fine, it's great, but in the room that we have it in, we have a pretty large

00:27:50 ◼   ► first floor great room in our house.

00:27:52 ◼   ► when I first got this TV, I was still in apartments,

00:27:55 ◼   ► and it was great for apartments.

00:27:57 ◼   ► In the room we had it in, it was a little small

00:28:00 ◼   ► for the setup we had in that room, but it was still fine,

00:28:02 ◼   ► so I was just waiting for it to die before I replaced it.

00:28:05 ◼   ► And I didn't want it to die for a long time

00:28:08 ◼   ► because a nice 1080p plasma

00:28:13 ◼   ► was still kind of the best thing you could get for a while.

00:28:16 ◼   ► And I also didn't want it to die for a while

00:28:18 ◼   ► because over time, like when I bought it,

00:28:21 ◼   ► you could get a 42 inch screen that was like the highest quality type of screen.

00:28:27 ◼   ► Today, if you want a great image quality TV, the smallest you can get them in is usually

00:28:33 ◼   ► 55 inches.

00:28:36 ◼   ► And for a long time, I was kind of hoping that my TV would hold out longer and longer

00:28:40 ◼   ► and longer because A, 55 inch plasmas were huge.

00:28:45 ◼   ► 'cause plasma's still retained quite a bit of thickness

00:28:49 ◼   ► and bezel width, even until the end of plasmas,

00:28:53 ◼   ► compared to the other technologies.

00:28:55 ◼   ► And so a 55 inch plasma's a pretty big thing,

00:28:58 ◼   ► and I thought that would be too big for the room

00:29:00 ◼   ► and for the TV stand and everything else.

00:29:01 ◼   ► So I really didn't want to upgrade to that.

00:29:04 ◼   ► I also, like 1080p was great,

00:29:06 ◼   ► and I already had 1080p with great color,

00:29:08 ◼   ► great black levels, great brightness, everything else,

00:29:11 ◼   ► 'cause plasmas are awesome.

00:29:13 ◼   ► So I was basically, I didn't want to have to replace my TV

00:29:17 ◼   ► until I could get a really great 4K HDR OLED TV,

00:29:22 ◼   ► 'cause I hate LCD.

00:29:25 ◼   ► Like LCD is a terrible TV technology.

00:29:27 ◼   ► The only thing good about it is that it costs almost nothing

00:29:30 ◼   ► that's it.

00:29:31 ◼   ► Everything else about LCD TVs is terrible.

00:29:34 ◼   ► So I wanted to just go from plasma to OLED.

00:29:38 ◼   ► And don't even give me anything about LED TVs

00:29:40 ◼   ► 'cause we all know that's fake.

00:29:41 ◼   ► That's a wonderful marketing sleight of hand.

00:29:44 ◼   ► I can't believe they pulled it off, but they did.

00:29:46 ◼   ► Anyway, when we were at the beach last week,

00:29:49 ◼   ► the house had a really big, cheap LCD TV

00:29:54 ◼   ► that was about 50 inches.

00:29:55 ◼   ► And Tiff messaged me one night saying,

00:29:57 ◼   ► "Okay, we can get a bigger TV."

00:30:00 ◼   ► I said nothing.

00:30:03 ◼   ► - And within 45 seconds,

00:30:05 ◼   ► it was already ordered and on its way.

00:30:08 ◼   ► - Why was she saying that?

00:30:09 ◼   ► because she was watching the cruddy, the LCD TV in there.

00:30:13 ◼   ► Was it like, why does that mean we can get a big,

00:30:15 ◼   ► was the one in the house too small for her?

00:30:18 ◼   ► - I think she was, I think seeing the cruddy one

00:30:20 ◼   ► finally convinced her that a bigger TV can look really nice.

00:30:24 ◼   ► - Oh, was this one bigger?

00:30:27 ◼   ► Oh, it was 50, you said 50.

00:30:28 ◼   ► - Yeah, it was 50.

00:30:29 ◼   ► And ours was 42. - So it was 50 compared

00:30:30 ◼   ► to a 42, and so she was like, wow, this 50 inch

00:30:33 ◼   ► feels so much bigger.

00:30:34 ◼   ► She's probably sitting closer to it than your other two.

00:30:37 ◼   ► - Yeah, she also was sitting closer to it, yes.

00:30:38 ◼   ► But anyway, I've been dying to get a 4K OLED TV

00:30:42 ◼   ► ever since I saw one in Best Buy last year.

00:30:46 ◼   ► And I already had all the research done

00:30:49 ◼   ► that if I had the reason to get a 4K TV this year,

00:30:54 ◼   ► that I would get an LG, whatever the LG 4K OLED

00:30:58 ◼   ► series of the year was.

00:31:01 ◼   ► 'Cause all the reviews seem to be in pretty wide agreement

00:31:04 ◼   ► that that's basically the best one out there.

00:31:07 ◼   ► So finally Tiff said, "Okay, we can get a bigger TV."

00:31:12 ◼   ► And I said absolutely nothing about it until it arrived.

00:31:18 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:31:20 ◼   ► Because I did not want to bring the conversation back up

00:31:23 ◼   ► to have it maybe be back down or have her mind changed.

00:31:27 ◼   ► - This, I'm not sure if this is indicative

00:31:30 ◼   ► of you having mastered marriage

00:31:32 ◼   ► or you having a real and true problem with buying shit.

00:31:36 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:31:37 ◼   ► or maybe both to be honest with you.

00:31:39 ◼   ► - Tiff did not appreciate this strategy.

00:31:42 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:31:44 ◼   ► - Oh man, so where are you sleeping tonight?

00:31:51 ◼   ► Are you sleeping on the couch?

00:31:53 ◼   ► - This resulted in a, to get me back for it,

00:31:57 ◼   ► she periscoped me undoing all the wires

00:32:00 ◼   ► and stuff with the old one,

00:32:01 ◼   ► which is basically just a periscope of my butt

00:32:03 ◼   ► leaning over the TV stand for like an hour.

00:32:06 ◼   ► And now we are even but

00:32:08 ◼   ► By the way, the small TV problem remains

00:32:11 ◼   ► We have a small TV in our bedroom and it was so hard to find a small television

00:32:16 ◼   ► forget about like the best picture quality just like not the worst picture quality because

00:32:22 ◼   ► Small televisions are like oh someone's gonna use in their kitchen

00:32:25 ◼   ► So put the crappiest thing you can in it and it hasn't gotten better over time as everything's crept up

00:32:31 ◼   ► It used to be that the good TVs were 42 then the good TVs were 50

00:32:34 ◼   ► this is the minimum size.

00:32:35 ◼   ► Now, like you said, the good TV is a 55 minimum size.

00:32:39 ◼   ► Everything's creeping up.

00:32:40 ◼   ► So to try to find, like now it's a choice of this

00:32:43 ◼   ► kitchen TV or 55 inch?

00:32:45 ◼   ► And in between, it's just a no-land's land of crap.

00:32:48 ◼   ► - Yeah, basically.

00:32:49 ◼   ► - So I'm sorry, what model did you order, Marco?

00:32:52 ◼   ► - So I did exactly what I had been researching to do.

00:32:55 ◼   ► I did a quick double check before

00:32:57 ◼   ► just to make sure nothing had changed,

00:32:58 ◼   ► but everyone seemed to agree.

00:32:59 ◼   ► So I got the LG 2017 4K OLED series

00:33:02 ◼   ► that has sevens in the names,

00:33:06 ◼   ► and they put a number in front,

00:33:07 ◼   ► or a letter in front of them to indicate,

00:33:09 ◼   ► as far as I can tell,

00:33:11 ◼   ► nothing except like the sound bar that's included.

00:33:14 ◼   ► So you can pay like a small,

00:33:15 ◼   ► or well, none of these are small amounts.

00:33:17 ◼   ► You can pay a smaller amount

00:33:19 ◼   ► to get one with just like regular TV speakers in it,

00:33:21 ◼   ► like on the back.

00:33:22 ◼   ► And then you can pay like $1,000 more

00:33:24 ◼   ► to get a little sound bar on the bottom.

00:33:26 ◼   ► And I hate sound bars anyway,

00:33:27 ◼   ► so that was not gonna be a thing.

00:33:29 ◼   ► And then you can pay $1,000 more than that

00:33:31 ◼   ► to get even better of a soundbar on the bottom or something.

00:33:35 ◼   ► And so the one I got is the base model of the 2017 one,

00:33:38 ◼   ► which is the LG C7 TV.

00:33:42 ◼   ► So it's amazing.

00:33:44 ◼   ► - At 55 inches?

00:33:45 ◼   ► - Yeah, 55, yeah.

00:33:47 ◼   ► - So why didn't you go to 65?

00:33:48 ◼   ► - Well, first, I knew I had to sell this when it arrived.

00:33:53 ◼   ► And now that we see it in the room,

00:33:57 ◼   ► I think I actually probably could have pulled off 65.

00:34:01 ◼   ► But the reason why I'm glad,

00:34:03 ◼   ► I'm pretty sure I'm happy enough with the 55 now,

00:34:06 ◼   ► is that first of all, it is a substantial upgrade from 42.

00:34:09 ◼   ► But the good thing is that the TV itself

00:34:11 ◼   ► does not look that much bigger on the shelf

00:34:14 ◼   ► because there's such a difference in bezel width.

00:34:16 ◼   ► Like the new one has almost no bezel at all,

00:34:19 ◼   ► and the old one, the bezels were like

00:34:21 ◼   ► three inches on all sides or something like that.

00:34:24 ◼   ► It's a huge difference in bezel width and thickness.

00:34:28 ◼   ► Like the new one looks really sleek

00:34:30 ◼   ► and has a screen that is more than 10 inches bigger,

00:34:33 ◼   ► but it doesn't look like that much bigger of a TV.

00:34:36 ◼   ► Which is nice because we don't want the TV

00:34:39 ◼   ► to like dominate the look of the room.

00:34:41 ◼   ► Like when you get a TV that's too big for the room

00:34:43 ◼   ► or that's even just like kind of big for the room,

00:34:46 ◼   ► that is like, your eye is drawn to that.

00:34:48 ◼   ► Even when it's off, like you just have

00:34:49 ◼   ► like this big black wall in your room.

00:34:52 ◼   ► Like, it's something that is very dominant,

00:34:54 ◼   ► and because, like, our TV is not like in some, like,

00:34:58 ◼   ► back room of the house, it's like the main room,

00:35:01 ◼   ► like, you walk into our house and you're in this, like,

00:35:02 ◼   ► main room that has the TV and the living room

00:35:05 ◼   ► and the dining room all, like, in one big room.

00:35:08 ◼   ► To make the TV substantially bigger,

00:35:10 ◼   ► I think would look too big for the room.

00:35:13 ◼   ► But now we have the actual screen size of the bigger TV

00:35:17 ◼   ► without it looking that much bigger.

00:35:18 ◼   ► So it's almost like we got the extra screen size,

00:35:20 ◼   ► like for free visually.

00:35:22 ◼   ► - But they had to put the touch ID in the back though, right?

00:35:24 ◼   ► And it's got a brow.

00:35:25 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:35:27 ◼   ► - The only thing is,

00:35:28 ◼   ► TVs have gotten a lot more full of crappy software

00:35:31 ◼   ► since I last bought a TV 10 years ago.

00:35:33 ◼   ► - Worst products through software.

00:35:35 ◼   ► - Yeah, exactly. - Evergreen.

00:35:36 ◼   ► - Like this TV takes a good 20 seconds to boot.

00:35:40 ◼   ► I don't know why a TV has to boot,

00:35:42 ◼   ► but fortunately if you just put it in like standby mode,

00:35:45 ◼   ► instead of turning it off.

00:35:46 ◼   ► - 'Cause it's got a web-os.

00:35:48 ◼   ► I have to say it like,

00:35:49 ◼   ► Yeah, all software on TVs is terrible, but everyone agrees this is the best software

00:35:54 ◼   ► on TVs, or close to the best.

00:35:55 ◼   ► I mean, there's some disagreement, but if you want any kind of quote-unquote "smart

00:35:59 ◼   ► TV" features, the web OS things that LG uses are the least disgusting, let's say that.

00:36:06 ◼   ► Because nobody does what Panasonic used to, which is completely utilitarian, minimal,

00:36:12 ◼   ► like my first Panasonic Plasma had like the volume, the little volume bar that appears

00:36:16 ◼   ► on the screen when you change the volume, was really small and was jammed against the

00:36:21 ◼   ► bottom edge of the screen so it obscured as little of it.

00:36:23 ◼   ► Like nobody does that now.

00:36:25 ◼   ► Now you change the volume and it's like a giant fairy comes out and waves a magic wand

00:36:29 ◼   ► and sparkles fly from it and this bar full of bubbling liquid moves forward and this

00:36:33 ◼   ► pulsing pattern is like, "Oh my God, just change the volume."

00:36:38 ◼   ► The good thing is it's actually, you know, even though that the software is really kind

00:36:43 ◼   ► of overbearing. It doesn't seem like it's horrible software. It's just software where

00:36:50 ◼   ► I don't really need there to be software. But the good thing is it also has built-in

00:36:53 ◼   ► apps for Netflix and Amazon Video.

00:36:57 ◼   ► Every TV has that now.

00:36:58 ◼   ► I know, I know. This is, again, like the opera people. It's like, "Yes, we know. We invented

00:37:02 ◼   ► this years ago." Yeah, I know. So it's new to me, and it's actually kind of nice.

00:37:07 ◼   ► And it's got the little accelerometer remote with a little mouse cursor thing, which I

00:37:12 ◼   ► which I thought would be terrible, but having used it, it's actually pretty good.

00:37:16 ◼   ► We have different opinions about that.

00:37:17 ◼   ► No, you don't like it?

00:37:18 ◼   ► I mean, the alternative is using like a five-way pad to move a little thingy around.

00:37:22 ◼   ► I like the little accelerometer cursor thingy.

00:37:26 ◼   ► I have not found it to be to have the precision I want.

00:37:29 ◼   ► Maybe that's just me.

00:37:30 ◼   ► Maybe I don't have the precision I want, but...

00:37:32 ◼   ► Would you prefer to go tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap?

00:37:35 ◼   ► Because I find it...

00:37:36 ◼   ► I find it...

00:37:37 ◼   ► Put it this way.

00:37:38 ◼   ► I find it more precise than the other main thing I use to navigate stuff on TV, which

00:37:41 ◼   ► which is a stupid Apple TV remote

00:37:42 ◼   ► where I'm forever trying to swipe vertically

00:37:44 ◼   ► and horizontally and it's misinterpreting me.

00:37:46 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah, 'cause yeah, so for the listeners

00:37:48 ◼   ► who might have missed what we were talking about here,

00:37:50 ◼   ► the remote to this behaves a lot like a Wiimote,

00:37:53 ◼   ► where the TV somehow sends,

00:37:56 ◼   ► I don't know if it's only accelerometer

00:37:57 ◼   ► or if it's also a division-based thing

00:37:58 ◼   ► like the Wiimote had with the little IR bar,

00:38:00 ◼   ► but somehow the remote, you just wave it around

00:38:04 ◼   ► and it moves a little mouse pointer thing on screen.

00:38:07 ◼   ► And it doesn't, I don't,

00:38:08 ◼   ► I'd say it does not work as well as a Wiimote does

00:38:11 ◼   ► in that way.

00:38:12 ◼   ► It isn't as precise or stable.

00:38:14 ◼   ► So it's fine.

00:38:17 ◼   ► Ultimately, I'm assuming that there's gonna be

00:38:20 ◼   ► a 4K Apple TV update this fall.

00:38:23 ◼   ► Once we have that 4K Apple TV,

00:38:25 ◼   ► I don't expect to ever use the built-in software

00:38:27 ◼   ► on this TV again.

00:38:28 ◼   ► It's the kind of thing I'm just like setting it up once,

00:38:30 ◼   ► going through all the picture settings,

00:38:31 ◼   ► trying to find out how to make it look normal,

00:38:33 ◼   ► and then you just leave it after that.

00:38:36 ◼   ► So I don't expect the software of this TV to matter at all to me after this week.

00:38:41 ◼   ► Except for potentially the boot time and whatever the volume control looks like when you move

00:38:44 ◼   ► it up and down.

00:38:45 ◼   ► That's, well, I don't use the volume control on the TV.

00:38:48 ◼   ► Who uses TV speakers?

00:38:49 ◼   ► Animals.

00:38:50 ◼   ► That's who.

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00:40:04 ◼   ► That's betterment.com/ATP.

00:40:07 ◼   ► Betterment, investing made better.

00:40:09 ◼   ► - Watching you briefly on the Periscope

00:40:15 ◼   ► tried to adjust the picture, I have some advice.

00:40:17 ◼   ► - Oh, here we go.

00:40:19 ◼   ► Here we go.

00:40:20 ◼   ► - I knew you would, I'm so happy you did.

00:40:22 ◼   ► - This is how TIFF gets you back.

00:40:23 ◼   ► It's not the butt cam 2017 edition.

00:40:26 ◼   ► It's giving Jon insight into how you set up the TV.

00:40:29 ◼   ► Just come to our house and do it for me.

00:40:31 ◼   ► - Well, I mean, it's a periscope,

00:40:32 ◼   ► and he's under the public eye,

00:40:34 ◼   ► and he's just fiddling around with things.

00:40:35 ◼   ► But in general, what you were doing

00:40:37 ◼   ► is exactly what people shouldn't do

00:40:38 ◼   ► when they adjust their TV,

00:40:39 ◼   ► which is play with the settings and try to see,

00:40:43 ◼   ► try to think, does this look right?

00:40:44 ◼   ► Turn this on, turn this off.

00:40:45 ◼   ► What does this mode mean?

00:40:46 ◼   ► Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

00:40:47 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:40:48 ◼   ► So you're never gonna arrive in anything that way.

00:40:50 ◼   ► So first of all, the thing that Marco knows

00:40:53 ◼   ► and that everyone else should know is when you buy a TV,

00:40:56 ◼   ► no matter where you get it from,

00:40:57 ◼   ► almost all the time it is configured badly.

00:41:01 ◼   ► It might still be in showroom demo mode

00:41:04 ◼   ► where everything is like super saturated

00:41:06 ◼   ► and super bright with all the effects on.

00:41:08 ◼   ► But even if it's not,

00:41:09 ◼   ► the sort of standard default modes on most TVs

00:41:11 ◼   ► is not quote unquote accurate.

00:41:14 ◼   ► It's not what the people who created the content

00:41:18 ◼   ► were expecting you to see

00:41:19 ◼   ► because they're sort of creating it

00:41:20 ◼   ► and mastering it in a particular color space

00:41:23 ◼   ► with the expectation of things to look a certain way.

00:41:26 ◼   ► The only way to get a television configured correctly is to use some sort of calibration

00:41:30 ◼   ► thing, whether it's an app or a Blu-ray or whatever.

00:41:33 ◼   ► And the tricky part is the place where your configuration thing comes from, like the source,

00:41:43 ◼   ► affects how you're configuring it.

00:41:46 ◼   ► If you can get a configuration thing to run on your Apple TV and your adjustments are

00:41:51 ◼   ► per input, that will correctly adjust the Apple TV input.

00:41:54 ◼   ► But then how do you correctly adjust the input that is, you know, if you use that same setting

00:41:59 ◼   ► and apply it to your other inputs, or some TVs don't even let you do, like how do you

00:42:03 ◼   ► apply that to the Blu-rays in it?

00:42:04 ◼   ► How do you apply it to one of the cables in it, or whatever?

00:42:06 ◼   ► That's something you just have to sort it out on every TV.

00:42:07 ◼   ► But either way, you have to get a calibration thing.

00:42:10 ◼   ► There's tons of calibration things that are out there.

00:42:11 ◼   ► They give you grayscale things, and they tell you what it should look like, and all sorts

00:42:15 ◼   ► of color patterns.

00:42:16 ◼   ► And then you have to basically mess with the menus of your television to get the test patterns

00:42:23 ◼   ► to look correct.

00:42:24 ◼   ► To do that, to figure out, I don't know what all these words mean, I don't understand what

00:42:29 ◼   ► these, you know, the settings are like, auto, you know, dynamic, fresh, dank, like, you

00:42:36 ◼   ► know, what the hell?

00:42:37 ◼   ► Like, what do these words mean, right?

00:42:40 ◼   ► Oh my goodness.

00:42:42 ◼   ► Sometimes if you look in the manual, they'll translate them to, like, the actual meaning,

00:42:45 ◼   ► But most of the time what you want to do is seek out on the internet one of those forums

00:42:49 ◼   ► where people spend a million years adjusting their TVs and people have like basically settings

00:42:55 ◼   ► lists for the television.

00:42:57 ◼   ► In order to get this particular exact make and model of television to pass a reasonable

00:43:02 ◼   ► calibration test, here's all the things I had to change it to.

00:43:05 ◼   ► And sometimes they'll hopefully say, "Here's what these settings actually mean."

00:43:08 ◼   ► And this sounds like a long way to go.

00:43:09 ◼   ► Like, "Oh, I got to go to internet forums and scroll through like web bulletin boards."

00:43:13 ◼   ► like 2003 and just find setting packs for people and download them sometimes and it's

00:43:21 ◼   ► like here's the thing you only have to do this essentially once and then just to you

00:43:25 ◼   ► know adjust over every few years right once you get it set up and calibrated according

00:43:30 ◼   ► to that the calibration app and you and you kind of know what the settings do and you

00:43:33 ◼   ► know which ones to how to turn everything off and what the different things mean mostly

00:43:37 ◼   ► all you need to do is adjust like contrast brightness and a few other things as the screen

00:43:42 ◼   ► ages and it drifts a little bit.

00:43:46 ◼   ► And that's really the only way to do it.

00:43:47 ◼   ► You can't do it by looking at people's faces and saying, "Does that skin look right to

00:43:50 ◼   ► you?"

00:43:51 ◼   ► You will never do it that way.

00:43:52 ◼   ► You can't do it by looking at video and saying, "Does that motion look right to you?"

00:43:53 ◼   ► You need to use a calibration app.

00:43:56 ◼   ► And there's tons of them out there, or calibration DVD or calibration Blu-ray or whatever.

00:44:01 ◼   ► The hardest thing to do is cadence, which you probably don't care about, to see if you're...

00:44:06 ◼   ► You don't even have a Blu-ray player, do you?

00:44:07 ◼   ► Like to see if you can...

00:44:08 ◼   ► I have the PS4.

00:44:09 ◼   ► Yeah, well, do you ever watch anything?

00:44:11 ◼   ► Do you ever watch anything that you care is showing 24 frames per second cadence?

00:44:14 ◼   ► If you don't care about that, you don't need to do it.

00:44:15 ◼   ► But that's the hardest one to do.

00:44:16 ◼   ► The only way I've found to do that one is to use a camera and configure it to use a

00:44:20 ◼   ► shutter that's open for a second and run a pattern that, you know, does something over

00:44:25 ◼   ► the course of a second.

00:44:26 ◼   ► And you can see if you see even lighting in the one second exposure.

00:44:29 ◼   ► If you don't see even lighting, then you're seeing three, two pull down because one frame

00:44:33 ◼   ► was shown three times.

00:44:34 ◼   ► The other frame was shown two times.

00:44:35 ◼   ► And the three times one is brighter than the two times one.

00:44:37 ◼   ► So you get this sort of checkerboard,

00:44:39 ◼   ► bright dim, bright dim thing.

00:44:41 ◼   ► That's how you know you're getting the wrong cadence.

00:44:43 ◼   ► True 24 frames per second cadence,

00:44:44 ◼   ► everything will be exactly equal brightness

00:44:46 ◼   ► because it was 24 frames and each one of them was shown,

00:44:48 ◼   ► you know, for the same amount of time.

00:44:50 ◼   ► That's the hardest to calibrate.

00:44:51 ◼   ► I don't know how to do that with an app.

00:44:52 ◼   ► I just know how to do it with a camera and an app,

00:44:55 ◼   ► but the other ones just, you know, get an app.

00:44:57 ◼   ► And easiest for you, you have an Apple TV.

00:45:00 ◼   ► There are apps on the App Store,

00:45:02 ◼   ► like THX apps or whatever, like go find one, download.

00:45:05 ◼   ► Doesn't really matter which one it is.

00:45:06 ◼   ► all kind of have a similar test pattern, some of them might be better than others, and just

00:45:10 ◼   ► spend a day with it. And it's important to calibrate it both during the daytime and at

00:45:14 ◼   ► nighttime and figure out the balance of brightness, especially for televisions. I don't know if all

00:45:19 ◼   ► that, oh it's not as bright as LED backlit LCDs, but I think it's brighter than most plasmas, but

00:45:24 ◼   ► sometimes you have to make a trade-off between does this look right at nighttime versus does it

00:45:28 ◼   ► look right in day. And your television, and I believe most televisions, have an ambient light

00:45:31 ◼   ► sensor. They can be like, "Don't worry about it, you just calibrate it and I'll use the ambient

00:45:35 ◼   ► light sensor to adjust the brightness for you. Sometimes you want that because it's helpful,

00:45:39 ◼   ► but other times it'll just screw with your settings so you calibrate it and then night comes

00:45:43 ◼   ► and the ambient light sensor screws with all your settings and you can't see anything in the dark

00:45:46 ◼   ► scene. So if it was up to me I would pick a good medium setting and turn off all the dynamic stuff

00:45:53 ◼   ► and say this TV is going to look like exactly like this all the time please do not dynamically

00:45:56 ◼   ► adjust anything. But anyway it's it's a lot harder than just let me go through the menus and try a

00:46:02 ◼   ► few things. And I think it's worthwhile. I think it's worth adjusting. Because if you do, if you

00:46:07 ◼   ► spend the day adjusting it, and maybe three months later or six months later, run through the

00:46:13 ◼   ► adjustments again just to make sure the thing hasn't drifted. And then save the original setting,

00:46:17 ◼   ► and in the middle of the movie, switch back to the other setting and be like, "Oh, God,

00:46:21 ◼   ► it's just terrible." It's like suddenly everything was... You know that... It's like a festival in

00:46:27 ◼   ► India or something, we use colored powders to throw all over everything. Suddenly everything

00:46:30 ◼   ► is like super oversaturated it's like it doesn't it doesn't look right it doesn't

00:46:34 ◼   ► look natural it looks like someone has thrown festive colored powders over

00:46:38 ◼   ► everything new television you don't want that just ask Marilyn you don't want the

00:46:40 ◼   ► powders well so did you did you just fiddle with controls and you're like

00:46:47 ◼   ► good enough and that you're never gonna revisit it I at least did just finish

00:46:51 ◼   ► fiddle with controls and say good enough I don't know if I will ever revisit it

00:46:55 ◼   ► or not I probably will because we only been we only had like one night with it

00:46:58 ◼   ► so far to really play with it.

00:47:00 ◼   ► So we will probably still be messing with some stuff.

00:47:04 ◼   ► I will say though, that this is probably going to be

00:47:08 ◼   ► an area of my life that I choose the Casey path.

00:47:12 ◼   ► - Attaboy.

00:47:13 ◼   ► - The path of not being very picky.

00:47:17 ◼   ► - It's just one day, in your case,

00:47:21 ◼   ► one day over the next 10 years

00:47:22 ◼   ► that you're gonna own this television.

00:47:23 ◼   ► Just spend the time.

00:47:24 ◼   ► - Yeah, you said it would also be one day

00:47:26 ◼   ► doing boot camp on Windows to set up the gaming for TIFF.

00:47:29 ◼   ► - It would have if I had done it.

00:47:31 ◼   ► - Right, so come over, take a day off of work.

00:47:35 ◼   ► - That's the other option, you can pay someone

00:47:36 ◼   ► to calibrate it for you, but I think it's a rip off,

00:47:38 ◼   ► you just do it yourself with an app.

00:47:40 ◼   ► If the next time I'm at your house,

00:47:43 ◼   ► if you give me some time, I will do this to your television

00:47:46 ◼   ► 'cause it's a service I provide.

00:47:48 ◼   ► - How busy could you be, just come tomorrow?

00:47:50 ◼   ► - Oh, at the very least, make sure you have

00:47:51 ◼   ► the size set correctly, can I at least

00:47:52 ◼   ► convince you to do that?

00:47:54 ◼   ► - You mean like instead of like fake overscanning

00:47:56 ◼   ► and then I'll review it. - Yeah, exactly.

00:47:58 ◼   ► Make sure that it's actually showing.

00:47:58 ◼   ► - I think I have it correct.

00:48:00 ◼   ► I haven't tested anything that can verify on the edges, but.

00:48:03 ◼   ► - Well, you know how you can tell

00:48:04 ◼   ► whether you have it correct?

00:48:05 ◼   ► Calibration app.

00:48:07 ◼   ► It's like the first thing they're gonna do is like,

00:48:08 ◼   ► hey, can you see all the pixels of a 1080 in a 4K picture,

00:48:12 ◼   ► or is it cutting off the stuff around the border

00:48:14 ◼   ► because you have fake overscan on it?

00:48:16 ◼   ► - All right, send me the name or a link to an Apple TV app

00:48:21 ◼   ► that you think I should try, and I will give it a shot.

00:48:24 ◼   ► but I really can't, I don't think I'm gonna spend a day

00:48:28 ◼   ► on it, that seems like a lot.

00:48:29 ◼   ► - Well, I say a day 'cause, you know, whatever.

00:48:32 ◼   ► But it could turn into a day depending on how obsessed

00:48:35 ◼   ► you get about it.

00:48:36 ◼   ► - Let me guess, not terribly obsessed.

00:48:38 ◼   ► Also, Marco, there's an easy way to fix this problem.

00:48:41 ◼   ► - Stop caring?

00:48:42 ◼   ► - Well, that's the most easy way to fix it,

00:48:44 ◼   ► the second most easy way, and by the way,

00:48:46 ◼   ► I highly recommend that, it's wonderful, ignorance is less.

00:48:50 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:48:50 ◼   ► - Or have terrible vision like Casey,

00:48:52 ◼   ► where you can't tell what's going on anyway.

00:48:53 ◼   ► That's also an easier fix, but it also affects other parts of your life.

00:48:57 ◼   ► Take your glasses off. Everything looks great.

00:48:59 ◼   ► But no, the second easiest way to fix this is to tell Jon that you have three dozen bagels

00:49:06 ◼   ► of various varieties that are all on the approved bagel list, and all he has to do is come pick them up from your house.

00:49:12 ◼   ► Oh, and by the way, fix a TV. Jon has free time. He can do it.

00:49:15 ◼   ► Yeah, that seems reasonable. I would do it for three dozen bagels.

00:49:18 ◼   ► Problem solved.

00:49:19 ◼   ► All right, so you happy with it?

00:49:22 ◼   ► Again, I've only had like one night to watch it so far.

00:49:25 ◼   ► But so far, yes.

00:49:27 ◼   ► It is not as dramatic of a change as I would have guessed.

00:49:31 ◼   ► Maybe if we went all the way to 65, it might have been.

00:49:35 ◼   ► If you went from a crappy LCD to this, it would be.

00:49:37 ◼   ► You're just used to black levels that are reasonable anyway.

00:49:40 ◼   ► But I mean, I feel, although, obviously I'm way more sensitive to this than most people,

00:49:44 ◼   ► but when I went from my previous Panasonic Plasma to my current Panasonic Plasma, I was

00:49:49 ◼   ► startled by how much better the black levels improved.

00:49:51 ◼   ► Just like when you turn it on it's got like a logo like whatever on a black background

00:49:56 ◼   ► and I could tell wow this is you know in my opinion quote unquote dramatically better

00:50:00 ◼   ► than my previous plasma but if you had gone from LCD to OLED and you turn on the LCD and

00:50:05 ◼   ► it's just you know like whatever Samsung and then a black background and this thing it

00:50:08 ◼   ► turns it on it says LG in a black background you would be startled by exactly how black

00:50:12 ◼   ► it is but going from plasma maybe not as startling to you maybe you don't notice much although

00:50:16 ◼   ► I have to say, your plasma is old enough that it is still several generations behind the

00:50:22 ◼   ► best plasmas got before plasmas went away.

00:50:24 ◼   ► So right, because they got so big, I couldn't upgrade.

00:50:27 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:50:28 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:50:29 ◼   ► But like, yeah.

00:50:30 ◼   ► And also, like, I've seen very little 4K content on it so far, because there isn't that like,

00:50:35 ◼   ► right now, the only way I have to get 4K in there is the built in Netflix and Amazon apps.

00:50:39 ◼   ► The Amazon app, I had a very hard time getting it to show me anything in 4K.

00:50:44 ◼   ► The Grand Tour.

00:50:45 ◼   ► No, it showed me Grand Tour in HDR,

00:50:49 ◼   ► but 1080p for some reason.

00:50:50 ◼   ► Like I couldn't get it to set me up to 4K.

00:50:52 ◼   ► I don't know why, maybe it's the settings.

00:50:54 ◼   ► I looked in the settings, couldn't find anywhere.

00:50:58 ◼   ► I was able to see real 4K with Netflix.

00:51:01 ◼   ► I watched a little bit of House of Cards.

00:51:04 ◼   ► And so that was nice.

00:51:05 ◼   ► But House of Cards is a pretty dreary gray show.

00:51:09 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:51:10 ◼   ► So like the--

00:51:11 ◼   ► - In so many ways.

00:51:12 ◼   ► - Yes, exactly.

00:51:13 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:51:14 ◼   ► So I wasn't able to really see like, you know,

00:51:17 ◼   ► what is like a beautiful nature scene?

00:51:19 ◼   ► Like I want like the stuff they show on the demo reels

00:51:22 ◼   ► in Best Buy, like all like the beautiful nature scene.

00:51:24 ◼   ► - You need planet earth, just go get, oh well.

00:51:27 ◼   ► - I have planet earth, but I don't know how to get it in 4K.

00:51:30 ◼   ► - Yeah, the other thing is that you should look,

00:51:33 ◼   ► go to one of those viewing distance calculators.

00:51:35 ◼   ► It could be that your viewing distance

00:51:38 ◼   ► and your television size is such that

00:51:40 ◼   ► you're gonna have difficulty discerning 4K versus 1080

00:51:44 ◼   ► at that combination. So you're saying I should have gotten the 75. Yeah, well, you have to

00:51:49 ◼   ► use one of those calculators to see, but I was surprised when I did the tape measure

00:51:52 ◼   ► thing to see like here's where I sit on my couch and here's how far away my television

00:51:55 ◼   ► is. Yeah, yeah. I would have to step up to bigger than 55 to really get the benefit of

00:52:01 ◼   ► 4K. I mean, not that it matters, like you don't have a choice anymore essentially. You're

00:52:04 ◼   ► going to get a 4K TV whether you want it or not, which is fine, but all I'm saying is

00:52:08 ◼   ► that don't get hung up on the 4K too much until you've done that measurement to see,

00:52:13 ◼   ► my eye even resolve the difference in dot pitch essentially between 1080 and 4K at this

00:52:19 ◼   ► size television at this distance?

00:52:21 ◼   ► Well, and it isn't just about being able to resolve individual pixels. You can look at

00:52:28 ◼   ► the screen of an iPhone 7 and then next to it an iPhone 7 Plus. The 7 Plus screen has

00:52:33 ◼   ► a much higher DPI and the 7 Plus screen looks better. And you might not be able to identify

00:52:40 ◼   ► "Oh, I can see pixels on this one and this one I can't."

00:52:43 ◼   ► I can't really see them on either of them, but--

00:52:45 ◼   ► - 7+ is non-native res, though.

00:52:47 ◼   ► Maybe you're just responding to the blurring.

00:52:49 ◼   ► And the aliasing.

00:52:50 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:52:52 ◼   ► - Yeah, maybe, who knows, probably not.

00:52:53 ◼   ► But anyways, and there's also HDR,

00:52:56 ◼   ► the different contrast ratios,

00:52:58 ◼   ► so there's a huge amount of improvement

00:53:00 ◼   ► to picture quality here that was not just the resolution.

00:53:04 ◼   ► - Yeah, the frame rate and color range,

00:53:06 ◼   ► potential frame rate and color range differences

00:53:08 ◼   ► or what you want, although a lot of 4K content,

00:53:10 ◼   ► especially like on Netflix,

00:53:11 ◼   ► is also very heavily compressed, so, you know,

00:53:14 ◼   ► not that you're gonna run out and buy a Blu-ray player,

00:53:16 ◼   ► but if you really wanted to see

00:53:17 ◼   ► what this television could do,

00:53:18 ◼   ► Blu-ray is your highest quality,

00:53:20 ◼   ► the highest quality video that you can bring to your home

00:53:23 ◼   ► still comes on a plastic disc, which is sad, but true.

00:53:26 ◼   ► - But is there 4K Blu-ray, is that a thing?

00:53:28 ◼   ► - Mm-hmm.

00:53:29 ◼   ► - Really, I didn't know that.

00:53:31 ◼   ► Can the PS4 non-pro do that?

00:53:34 ◼   ► - I have no idea.

00:53:36 ◼   ► - Ah.

00:53:37 ◼   ► I don't have a 4K TV and I have no idea.

00:53:39 ◼   ► That's one of the things keeping me away from 4K

00:53:41 ◼   ► is I realize I have to just rip out my old setup

00:53:43 ◼   ► 'cause I'm pretty sure my receiver,

00:53:44 ◼   ► maybe it has 4K pass through on one of its inputs

00:53:47 ◼   ► or whatever, but I just have to start over.

00:53:49 ◼   ► - Like 40 people in the chat just said no, no, no, no.

00:53:53 ◼   ► None of the PS4s can do this.

00:53:54 ◼   ► No, please don't.

00:53:55 ◼   ► Oh my God, no, no, no.

00:53:57 ◼   ► So apparently I have to get an Xbox One SX1X,

00:54:00 ◼   ► but I don't know what that is.

00:54:02 ◼   ► - No, don't.

00:54:03 ◼   ► Or you could just get a Blu-ray player.

00:54:04 ◼   ► They're pretty cheap and you can get a good one.

00:54:06 ◼   ► - The Blu-ray players are pieces of crap.

00:54:07 ◼   ► I hate them so much.

00:54:09 ◼   ► I hate like, just the Blu-ray spec is the worst thing

00:54:12 ◼   ► that has ever happened to movies.

00:54:13 ◼   ► - True, everyone hates it, but it's still,

00:54:16 ◼   ► if you want to get like 100 and something gigabytes

00:54:18 ◼   ► of the highest quality video of your favorite movie,

00:54:22 ◼   ► I mean, at the very least you gotta get the Blu-ray

00:54:23 ◼   ► and then rip it on your Mac and then find a way

00:54:26 ◼   ► to play it losslessly off of whatever device you put it on,

00:54:28 ◼   ► which I also still haven't mastered

00:54:29 ◼   ► because of the 24 frames per second cadence problem,

00:54:32 ◼   ► as previously discussed.

00:54:33 ◼   ► Although, someone did mention this Plex VEL

00:54:35 ◼   ► for the PS3 and when I revisited it

00:54:37 ◼   ► and I saw Plex was already installed on my PS3,

00:54:39 ◼   ► I think I already tried it, but Plex changes fast,

00:54:41 ◼   ► so maybe it got fixed, I don't know.

00:54:42 ◼   ► - I mean, the good thing is, again,

00:54:43 ◼   ► this fall, when the Apple TV 4K presumably exists,

00:54:47 ◼   ► I have a feeling that's gonna be my answer to this.

00:54:49 ◼   ► I think I'm just gonna buy 4K stuff on iTunes

00:54:52 ◼   ► and call it a day.

00:54:53 ◼   ► - Yeah, you hope they have it for sale.

00:54:54 ◼   ► - I know, I really hope they have it.

00:54:56 ◼   ► I also, I kinda hope that I can maybe upgrade

00:54:59 ◼   ► some things I've already bought.

00:55:00 ◼   ► I bought Planet Earth 2 on iTunes,

00:55:03 ◼   ► And I know that is available in 4K somewhere.

00:55:06 ◼   ► And I would hate to have to rebuy the whole thing

00:55:11 ◼   ► at an undiscounted new price to just get that,

00:55:14 ◼   ► but I probably would anyway, 'cause it's so good.

00:55:16 ◼   ► (laughs)

00:55:18 ◼   ► That's something, if you really wanna show off 4K,

00:55:20 ◼   ► you need bright nature scenes.

00:55:22 ◼   ► Or even just, I wanna see the Apple TV screensavers in 4K.

00:55:26 ◼   ► - Yeah, I was thinking that earlier.

00:55:27 ◼   ► - They're gonna look amazing.

00:55:29 ◼   ► - I don't think the source video is 4K, though.

00:55:31 ◼   ► I've watched it on my Mac.

00:55:32 ◼   ► - Oh, I've had issues. - Are you sure?

00:55:32 ◼   ► - It looks so great.

00:55:33 ◼   ► I think it's just 1080.

00:55:34 ◼   ► Like when you run aerial,

00:55:36 ◼   ► the aerial screen saver on your Mac,

00:55:37 ◼   ► I'm always struck by how,

00:55:38 ◼   ► on the 5K iMac anyway,

00:55:39 ◼   ► I'm like, "Ooh, that's blurry."

00:55:40 ◼   ► Like this looks much better on my TV.

00:55:41 ◼   ► - Really? - 'Cause my TV is 1080

00:55:43 ◼   ► and my 5K iMac is, you know,

00:55:45 ◼   ► whatever giant resolution it is.

00:55:46 ◼   ► - Well, that doesn't mean that the source is not 4K.

00:55:49 ◼   ► That just means that Apple is not publishing

00:55:52 ◼   ► more than 1080 worth of, you know, streams.

00:55:54 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah, yeah.

00:55:55 ◼   ► I'm just saying like, are they gonna quote on,

00:55:56 ◼   ► are they gonna remaster it?

00:55:57 ◼   ► Is it gonna go back to the red 8k footage or whatever the stuff was taken from and remake all those videos?

00:56:02 ◼   ► also, if you

00:56:05 ◼   ► happen to see the back of a truck roll by Marco from what I can tell grand tours between 20 and 30 gigs for

00:56:12 ◼   ► 4k and and there are trucks that have it

00:56:15 ◼   ► But how do I get them onto my TV in a way that actually can play 4k?

00:56:19 ◼   ► If you're gonna see 4k content, please don't make it the grand tour. I know that's

00:56:23 ◼   ► 4k old man wrinkles

00:56:26 ◼   ► No, no, no, I agree, I agree. I'm just trying to think of something that you would potentially,

00:56:32 ◼   ► at least slightly enjoy, and typically is well shot and pretty. Yes, I understand your

00:56:36 ◼   ► point about the old man wrinkles and you're right, but I mean, generally speaking, it's

00:56:41 ◼   ► visually a nice looking show. Well, anyways, to get it on your TV, well, why not do, can

00:56:47 ◼   ► you do 4, you can do 4K over HDMI, although usually it's 30 frames per second, except

00:56:52 ◼   ► in this case, that'd be fine.

00:56:54 ◼   ► I mean, I'm pretty sure that there is a new HDMI spec that this TV supports that does

00:56:58 ◼   ► 4K 60, I think.

00:56:59 ◼   ► Oh, there you go.

00:57:00 ◼   ► I don't know.

00:57:01 ◼   ► So do it with your – play it with your computer.

00:57:02 ◼   ► Yeah, it's going to be fine.

00:57:03 ◼   ► You have a – what version of HDMI?

00:57:05 ◼   ► I'm assuming as well.

00:57:06 ◼   ► I don't know.

00:57:07 ◼   ► But I would look it up before I spent the money on it instead of after.

00:57:10 ◼   ► You don't understand.

00:57:12 ◼   ► I got approval that I – I believed I had a narrow window of opportunity.

00:57:17 ◼   ► Well, here's the thing.

00:57:19 ◼   ► But what Marco did is like, look, if any TV is going to support all the things, make it

00:57:24 ◼   ► the most expensive one.

00:57:25 ◼   ► And it's essentially what you did.

00:57:26 ◼   ► You didn't get the most expensive one because you avoided that weird soundbar crap and everything,

00:57:29 ◼   ► which I agree is not a good idea.

00:57:31 ◼   ► But that's really all you can do.

00:57:34 ◼   ► The problem is though, sometimes you look at the most expensive one and it still doesn't

00:57:38 ◼   ► have support for the latest whatever that's just about to come out.

00:57:40 ◼   ► And so you're like, "Okay, I can't buy a TV this year.

00:57:43 ◼   ► I gotta wait till next year."

00:57:44 ◼   ► But I think you're probably safe.

00:57:45 ◼   ► Yeah, because it seems like that the 4K world has pretty much reached the point that it's

00:57:52 ◼   ► safe to buy it.

00:57:53 ◼   ► Close.

00:57:54 ◼   ► Like, would you?

00:57:55 ◼   ► Well, it's close.

00:57:56 ◼   ► I mean, it's the same reason a lot of people give bad reviews to this TV.

00:58:00 ◼   ► It's like, "Well, it's the best picture quality we've ever seen, but it costs a

00:58:02 ◼   ► whole jillion dollars."

00:58:03 ◼   ► And obviously, that's not a barrier for you, but for other people, it's like, "Maybe

00:58:08 ◼   ► wait one more year, two more years for the same quality television to come down from

00:58:14 ◼   ► the middle of the pack or whatever, right?

00:58:16 ◼   ► And the other thing with the smart TV stuff is over the years, a lot of that LG smart

00:58:20 ◼   ► TV stuff, like I don't know if they weren't using enough RAM or slower processors or whatever,

00:58:24 ◼   ► but that has gotten faster too.

00:58:26 ◼   ► And it's like when it first came out, well, it kind of works, but in two years presumably

00:58:30 ◼   ► they'll put better chips in their TVs and it will get faster, and it has.

00:58:34 ◼   ► So I think you bought the earliest you could possibly buy and still get all the things,

00:58:40 ◼   ► all you had to sacrifice for was a little bit of money and some yelling from your spouse.

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01:00:13 ◼   ► Before we leave the TV topic, I'll take one other brief...

01:00:21 ◼   ► I don't know why I bother, but brief run at trying to convince you/the audience to invest

01:00:29 ◼   ► in a multi-channel audio solution.

01:00:32 ◼   ► I know you think stereo is just fine.

01:00:34 ◼   ► I know you think you don't need a subwoofer and left and right channel is fine.

01:00:40 ◼   ► I mean, the way I was going to try to convince you was to think about how concerning it is

01:00:46 ◼   ► when viewing an LCD screen in non-native res, but that is now an outdated analogy, because

01:00:52 ◼   ► as you were just saying with the 7+, if you make the pixels small enough it doesn't matter,

01:00:55 ◼   ► but there's no equivalent to making the pixels small enough in the world of audio.

01:00:59 ◼   ► So lots of these shows that you like, including probably House of Cards, have a 5.1 mix.

01:01:08 ◼   ► They have six channels of audio, maybe they have seven, I don't know, but they have multi-channel

01:01:12 ◼   ► audio.

01:01:13 ◼   ► That's what they're putting out, and some of them don't have a stereo mix, so you have

01:01:17 ◼   ► to take that 5.1 and downmix it through some voodoo into, you know, Dolby ProLogic or something,

01:01:24 ◼   ► into a stereo mix, and that adds stuff.

01:01:27 ◼   ► It adds artifacts and weirdnesses that are not there.

01:01:29 ◼   ► Like you're taking—someone did—

01:01:30 ◼   ► I mean, hang on.

01:01:32 ◼   ► What doesn't have a stereo mix?

01:01:33 ◼   ► Like, whenever I've, like, ripped DVDs and stuff, there's always a stereo track.

01:01:37 ◼   ► things that fall off the back of trucks sometimes don't have stereo mixes to give just one example

01:01:42 ◼   ► Like most of the stuff I watch is legal like almost everything I watch is on the Apple TV

01:01:47 ◼   ► And do I when I rip my own blu-rays?

01:01:50 ◼   ► I don't put a stereo mix on them sometimes they animate things sometimes don't have stereo sometimes

01:01:54 ◼   ► They'll be like stereo Japanese and 5.1 English, but no stereo English

01:01:58 ◼   ► I don't know about iTunes, but all I'm saying is like the 5.1 mix is available right and a

01:02:04 ◼   ► reasonable 5.1 setup

01:02:06 ◼   ► with a 5.1 mix going straight to it sounds better than stereo. If you

01:02:12 ◼   ► don't have places for speakers I can kind of understand that. We don't. But I

01:02:16 ◼   ► think you do. You've got a big room. It's great that room. Let me tell you about

01:02:20 ◼   ► your house, Marco. I think you can find, I mean I found places in my totally awful

01:02:27 ◼   ► should never have any kind of television in a carriage house weird thing. It makes,

01:02:32 ◼   ► I didn't think it would be a big deal either. I held off doing it forever. I have some fairly cheap

01:02:38 ◼   ► cruddy 5.1 speakers. It sounds so much better to have dedicated left, right, back,

01:02:45 ◼   ► you know, center channel. It's a big difference. I would encourage you to, if you, I mean, I know

01:02:53 ◼   ► you don't care that much about movies, but these days TV shows have 5.1 mixes. It makes a difference.

01:02:59 ◼   ► 5.1, I mean it's like Games of Thrones or something.

01:03:01 ◼   ► A 5.1 mix with a subwoofer of a good TV show is just plain better than stereo.

01:03:07 ◼   ► Consider it.

01:03:08 ◼   ► It's not like you've done nothing to preclude it.

01:03:10 ◼   ► You didn't buy a TV with a weird soundbar, which is like the worst of like let's just

01:03:13 ◼   ► forget about multi-channel and just do some weird stuff up front and try to fake it out.

01:03:17 ◼   ► I think you have the room, especially with these very tiny speakers.

01:03:20 ◼   ► Like mine are very small, like I don't know how big they are.

01:03:23 ◼   ► They're like the size of a big iPhone kind of speakers.

01:03:25 ◼   ► You're like, "Oh, those can't possibly sound good."

01:03:28 ◼   ► They're wired, they're passive wired, you know, they don't need to be plugged in anymore,

01:03:32 ◼   ► they're not Bluetooth or any sort of other weird thing.

01:03:35 ◼   ► You can get those speakers for a reasonable price and hide the subwoofer somewhere in

01:03:39 ◼   ► the corner and it sounds awesome.

01:03:41 ◼   ► Consider it.

01:03:42 ◼   ► You know, I don't think that either Marco or I is denying that it's better.

01:03:46 ◼   ► It's not that we're saying it's not better.

01:03:49 ◼   ► It's just, and now I'll speak for myself, I would love to have that setup, but it's

01:03:55 ◼   ► not worth the energy to me to make it happen because to do it right I would have to put

01:04:00 ◼   ► like wires under the floor and and you don't always have to you just have to be a little

01:04:05 ◼   ► bit creative like I don't have wires under my floor or through my ceiling right but you

01:04:10 ◼   ► can you can find ways to like the wires are smaller than you think they are and you can

01:04:15 ◼   ► be creative with where you route them and I don't think Marco would even have to be

01:04:18 ◼   ► that creative and worst case Marco can throw money at this problem and actually get wireless

01:04:22 ◼   ► ones because then you don't have to worry about it.

01:04:25 ◼   ► If you want to spend more money than I was willing to spend on it, because I was like,

01:04:28 ◼   ► "I'm not going to spend a lot of money on a 5.1 system.

01:04:30 ◼   ► I don't even know if I like this, but since I'm getting all this stuff, I might as well

01:04:33 ◼   ► try it."

01:04:34 ◼   ► And I bought the cheapest one I possibly could.

01:04:35 ◼   ► It was well rated.

01:04:36 ◼   ► They said, "If you want to spend a couple hundred bucks and get six speakers and a subwoofer,

01:04:42 ◼   ► do this."

01:04:43 ◼   ► And I did that, and I was amazed.

01:04:45 ◼   ► And they're very small, and so I'm not planning on replacing them with fancier, more expensive

01:04:48 ◼   ► ones.

01:04:49 ◼   ► Marco's excuse was he was tired of hooking up all that stuff moving from apartment to apartment

01:04:53 ◼   ► But he's been in this house for a long time now so that excuse doesn't work

01:04:55 ◼   ► The other excuse is it doesn't work in his doesn't work in his room

01:04:58 ◼   ► But you know again this would take more than a day

01:05:01 ◼   ► I feel like I need to map out some some wire routes

01:05:05 ◼   ► Where to put them in places where you wouldn't notice them and hops wouldn't eat them, and it would be just fine

01:05:10 ◼   ► Hops doesn't eat speakers

01:05:13 ◼   ► My dog eats everything so now I'm mapping my dog onto all dogs

01:05:18 ◼   ► "You can't put wires in a house, the dog will eat them!"

01:05:20 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:05:21 ◼   ► Hopps will lick them.

01:05:23 ◼   ► - Yeah, Hopps will look at them and back away slowly

01:05:25 ◼   ► 'cause he's scared of them.

01:05:27 ◼   ► So yeah, I mean, and Casey's right,

01:05:31 ◼   ► I never said that surround is not good or better.

01:05:35 ◼   ► Like surround, I had surround for a long time.

01:05:38 ◼   ► Granted, this was a long time ago.

01:05:40 ◼   ► You know, I stopped hooking up the surround speakers

01:05:43 ◼   ► at least 10 years ago, and the speaker set

01:05:47 ◼   ► that they were part of, I don't even own anymore.

01:05:50 ◼   ► So, it died long ago.

01:05:51 ◼   ► So, I know it's good.

01:05:55 ◼   ► But again, I'm gonna have to pull a Casey here

01:05:58 ◼   ► and say, I just don't care.

01:06:01 ◼   ► Because most of the benefit is for movies.

01:06:05 ◼   ► - But TV shows are in 5.1 now, is what I'm saying?

01:06:07 ◼   ► - I know, I know.

01:06:09 ◼   ► But what I care about is the sound should sound good

01:06:15 ◼   ► and clear, and it should be usable to fill the room

01:06:20 ◼   ► with music when I want music in the room.

01:06:22 ◼   ► And a standard stereo set works great for that.

01:06:26 ◼   ► I should also point out, I don't have a receiver.

01:06:30 ◼   ► I drive the speakers currently with a stereo,

01:06:33 ◼   ► with a little tiny stereo speaker amp

01:06:35 ◼   ► that is about the size of like four decks of cards stacked.

01:06:39 ◼   ► Like, it's a really small speaker amp,

01:06:42 ◼   ► one of these little like class D things.

01:06:44 ◼   ► And it's great.

01:06:46 ◼   ► And it has a remote support,

01:06:47 ◼   ► so the Apple TV controls the volume on it,

01:06:50 ◼   ► like the Ritz remote, 'cause it learned the IR thing.

01:06:52 ◼   ► It's a great, simple setup.

01:06:55 ◼   ► The TV stand that we have is a non-negotiable

01:07:00 ◼   ► piece of furniture with the Historical Society.

01:07:02 ◼   ► - I know, discussions are ongoing

01:07:03 ◼   ► with the Historical Commission regarding the receiver.

01:07:06 ◼   ► - There is no receiver that exists

01:07:09 ◼   ► that I have been able to find that will fit in this stand.

01:07:12 ◼   ► - Why don't I make a receiver the same size and shape

01:07:14 ◼   ► as say an old Bell telephone.

01:07:16 ◼   ► - They don't make them that small.

01:07:19 ◼   ► Even the low end receivers have these giant cases now

01:07:22 ◼   ► because they use the same case design

01:07:24 ◼   ► whether you have like two or seven channels,

01:07:27 ◼   ► they just put like different numbers of cards in them.

01:07:29 ◼   ► - So I think the solution here that we've learned

01:07:31 ◼   ► is I just need to install a surround system

01:07:34 ◼   ► and a receiver in the beach house

01:07:36 ◼   ► and then have Tiff watch a movie on it late at night

01:07:38 ◼   ► and then she'll send you a text that says,

01:07:39 ◼   ► okay, we can get a receiver.

01:07:40 ◼   ► - Maybe, yeah, we'll have to play with that.

01:07:42 ◼   ► - Start your research now.

01:07:43 ◼   ► But yeah, so, (laughs)

01:07:46 ◼   ► yeah, like I am totally fine with our basic stereo setup.

01:07:51 ◼   ► It's a really good stereo setup

01:07:52 ◼   ► because the speakers are my favorites, the Paradigm Adams.

01:07:57 ◼   ► I love the Paradigm Adam speakers

01:07:59 ◼   ► because they're like 200 bucks each,

01:08:01 ◼   ► so it's like about 400 bucks a pair,

01:08:03 ◼   ► and they are the best bookshelf speakers I've ever heard.

01:08:06 ◼   ► And I've heard many that it costs way more than that

01:08:09 ◼   ► and they don't sound better.

01:08:10 ◼   ► Like the Adams embarrass everything else

01:08:12 ◼   ► I've ever tried.

01:08:13 ◼   ► Like they are just so damn good.

01:08:15 ◼   ► - You can use them as your left and right channel

01:08:17 ◼   ► and then only by the backs and the center and the subwoofer.

01:08:20 ◼   ► - Here's the problem now.

01:08:22 ◼   ► The new TV is just bigger enough

01:08:25 ◼   ► that the Adams no longer fit on the stand next to it.

01:08:28 ◼   ► - Oh no.

01:08:28 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:08:30 ◼   ► - So I have to either get those little pole speaker stands

01:08:34 ◼   ► for them, which I don't love that option

01:08:36 ◼   ► because that seemed like it would be,

01:08:39 ◼   ► to get something top heavy in a house

01:08:41 ◼   ► that often has children running around

01:08:42 ◼   ► and it does not seem like a good idea.

01:08:45 ◼   ► So I don't love that option.

01:08:46 ◼   ► Also, those stands are really expensive.

01:08:49 ◼   ► And you can get new speakers for not that much more money

01:08:53 ◼   ► than those stands.

01:08:54 ◼   ► So I'm looking into floor-standing options now,

01:08:58 ◼   ► but it's very early in the search.

01:09:00 ◼   ► - Just screw some tiny little wings onto the edges

01:09:02 ◼   ► of the TV stand.

01:09:04 ◼   ► That'll fit.

01:09:05 ◼   ► - But yeah, right.

01:09:07 ◼   ► Well, if I can somehow drag them behind a truck

01:09:10 ◼   ► for a while first and like spray paint them in weird ways.

01:09:13 ◼   ► It might matter. - It's gonna be distressed.

01:09:14 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah, distress it in like the most hipster way

01:09:17 ◼   ► possible and then it'll look right.

01:09:19 ◼   ► - Talked about that on the upcoming rectifs just for you.

01:09:21 ◼   ► - Awesome. (laughs)

01:09:23 ◼   ► But yeah, so now I'm looking into like floor speakers,

01:09:26 ◼   ► but I'm probably just gonna get more Paradigm.

01:09:29 ◼   ► Paradigm makes floor speakers too and they're similarly,

01:09:32 ◼   ► from what all the reviews say, they are amazing values

01:09:35 ◼   ► and amazing sound quality for what you're paying, so.

01:09:38 ◼   ► - So I take it you didn't like measure the top surface

01:09:40 ◼   ► of your table and the width of the television.

01:09:42 ◼   ► You didn't do this math beforehand,

01:09:44 ◼   ► so you got it, you took it out of the box,

01:09:45 ◼   ► you put it on there, okay, let me put the speakers back on,

01:09:47 ◼   ► and you're like, oh, they don't fit.

01:09:49 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:09:50 ◼   ► - Pretty much, I did the math a year ago.

01:09:52 ◼   ► Like with the TVs that were out a year,

01:09:54 ◼   ► when I first started doing all this research,

01:09:56 ◼   ► I did it then, and I knew then that I could get

01:09:59 ◼   ► a 55 inch TV and that it would intrude

01:10:02 ◼   ► roughly halfway into my speaker on either side.

01:10:04 ◼   ► So I knew this was probably--

01:10:06 ◼   ► - Oh, so you already knew that you had a,

01:10:08 ◼   ► You ever see I've seen this in a lot of people's houses two possible solutions

01:10:12 ◼   ► I've seen in real life one put the speaker slightly behind the television to put the speakers in front of the television

01:10:18 ◼   ► I've seen both those solutions both of them boggle my mind. Those are both terrible solutions

01:10:22 ◼   ► They think like this is fine like and I can't decide which is worse blocking the television or having speakers firing directly into the back

01:10:30 ◼   ► Yeah, that's I don't have a hard time figuring that out too I think I

01:10:36 ◼   ► I mean, either way, you're making something suck terribly.

01:10:38 ◼   ► So yeah, I don't know.

01:10:40 ◼   ► - Are these bookshelf speakers that you love,

01:10:42 ◼   ► are they super expensive?

01:10:43 ◼   ► Let me look at them.

01:10:44 ◼   ► - No, they're 200 bucks each.

01:10:45 ◼   ► So a pair is 400 bucks.

01:10:46 ◼   ► - I think we have different definitions of a super.

01:10:48 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:10:50 ◼   ► - For bookshelf speakers made by a company

01:10:52 ◼   ► that is respected in the world of speakers,

01:10:55 ◼   ► 400 bucks for a pair is not incredibly expensive.

01:10:59 ◼   ► - My whole set of speakers was like $400.

01:11:02 ◼   ► It's six speakers for that price.

01:11:04 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:11:04 ◼   ► Speakers are kind of like watches, unfortunately.

01:11:08 ◼   ► Where you think, if you're not a watch person,

01:11:11 ◼   ► you don't really know how expensive watches are.

01:11:12 ◼   ► And speakers are like, "Oh, I'm gonna buy some speakers.

01:11:14 ◼   ► "How much could they cost?"

01:11:15 ◼   ► Like, "What, is this filled with diamonds?"

01:11:17 ◼   ► I don't know.

01:11:18 ◼   ► (laughs)

01:11:19 ◼   ► And those, you're right,

01:11:19 ◼   ► those are cheap in the grand scheme of things.

01:11:21 ◼   ► But I was thinking, "Oh, bookshelf speakers,

01:11:23 ◼   ► "and Marco likes them.

01:11:24 ◼   ► "Maybe they're, you know, 50 bucks each."

01:11:26 ◼   ► Nope.

01:11:27 ◼   ► (laughs)

01:11:27 ◼   ► - Nope, sorry.

01:11:29 ◼   ► But come on, for good speakers, that is not ridiculous.

01:11:33 ◼   ► - It's not, you're right.

01:11:34 ◼   ► It's not like they're $900 each,

01:11:36 ◼   ► but when I hear bookshelf speakers,

01:11:38 ◼   ► I start thinking like, oh, this is for people

01:11:40 ◼   ► who don't wanna spend big money on fancy speakers.

01:11:43 ◼   ► - No, 'cause I've had two pairs over the years.

01:11:46 ◼   ► The second pair of them is on my desk.

01:11:48 ◼   ► These are my computer speakers,

01:11:50 ◼   ► 'cause computer speakers are the biggest rip-off

01:11:52 ◼   ► in the world. - Oh, they are the worst.

01:11:54 ◼   ► - My entire time using a computer,

01:11:56 ◼   ► ever since I have had a sound card,

01:11:59 ◼   ► I have used regular speakers instead of computer speakers,

01:12:02 ◼   ► 'cause every time I've tried computer speakers,

01:12:04 ◼   ► I have been dramatically disappointed by how crappy

01:12:07 ◼   ► they sound compared to how much they cost.

01:12:09 ◼   ► Regular, even cheap regular speakers.

01:12:11 ◼   ► Like when I first started doing this,

01:12:14 ◼   ► I just had like, it was like a little pioneer

01:12:16 ◼   ► integrated stereo thing that I just had like in my room,

01:12:19 ◼   ► like you know, with like the two speakers

01:12:20 ◼   ► and the big unit in the middle that has like the cassette

01:12:22 ◼   ► deck and the CD player all in one.

01:12:24 ◼   ► And the whole thing was probably like 200 bucks.

01:12:26 ◼   ► I just used those speakers as my computer speakers.

01:12:29 ◼   ► And that sounded a million times better

01:12:30 ◼   ► than anything else I'd ever heard.

01:12:31 ◼   ► - How are you amplifying them?

01:12:33 ◼   ► - You were going through the big receiver-y thing?

01:12:34 ◼   ► - Yeah. - The big, eh.

01:12:36 ◼   ► - Yeah, and the ones on my desk now,

01:12:37 ◼   ► I have a second one of those tiny little

01:12:40 ◼   ► Class D desktop amplifiers,

01:12:42 ◼   ► and that amplifies them just fine.

01:12:44 ◼   ► Like, there are better ways to amplify speakers,

01:12:47 ◼   ► but they're all much larger,

01:12:48 ◼   ► and so, you know, you can do it.

01:12:51 ◼   ► I've tried powered monitors,

01:12:53 ◼   ► and powered monitors sound okay,

01:12:57 ◼   ► but these paradigm atoms, again,

01:12:58 ◼   ► they just kick their butts.

01:12:59 ◼   ► Like, it's not even close.

01:13:01 ◼   ► They just sound a million times better,

01:13:03 ◼   ► And a pair of powered desktop speakers

01:13:07 ◼   ► is not that much cheaper than these paradigms.

01:13:11 ◼   ► You're getting into the $400 territory

01:13:13 ◼   ► pretty fast with those, and they really don't sound good.

01:13:17 ◼   ► Even good ones from brands like Klipsch and KEF

01:13:21 ◼   ► and Bose and B&O, brands that have a lot of fans,

01:13:26 ◼   ► and I know I shouldn't have put Bose in that list,

01:13:28 ◼   ► I'm sorry, but it has a lot of fans.

01:13:31 ◼   ► I've tried a lot of these.

01:13:32 ◼   ► In some cases, I've bought and returned them

01:13:34 ◼   ► 'cause they were so bad.

01:13:36 ◼   ► For whatever reason, there seems to be very little

01:13:39 ◼   ► correlation between how much you pay for a set of speakers

01:13:43 ◼   ► and how good they sound.

01:13:44 ◼   ► Everyone has their one thing that,

01:13:47 ◼   ► "Oh, I bought this one pair of these 60 years ago

01:13:50 ◼   ► "and they sound great."

01:13:51 ◼   ► And that's, once you find that,

01:13:53 ◼   ► it's really hard to try anything else

01:13:56 ◼   ► because you try something else and you get it

01:13:59 ◼   ► and it's on the worse end of the spectrum.

01:14:02 ◼   ► I get the feeling you can, you know,

01:14:03 ◼   ► anybody can slap together some drivers

01:14:05 ◼   ► into a box of particle board

01:14:07 ◼   ► and say they're a speaker manufacturer, and it shows.

01:14:10 ◼   ► - I've been surprised by the speaker system.

01:14:14 ◼   ► I got some Logitech speaker, you know,

01:14:15 ◼   ► typical desktop speaker, computer speakers

01:14:18 ◼   ► for my PlayStation 4, and I've gone through a series

01:14:21 ◼   ► of quote-unquote computer speakers on my Mac,

01:14:23 ◼   ► and they all sound terrible,

01:14:23 ◼   ► including the ones that I'm currently using,

01:14:25 ◼   ► but I don't use them for anything.

01:14:26 ◼   ► They're fine.

01:14:27 ◼   ► They were cheap and they were okay.

01:14:31 ◼   ► But for the PS4, again I'm playing games there which is mostly like gunfire and explosions.

01:14:37 ◼   ► I was surprised at how good the 2.1 set up, two stereo speakers and a comically large

01:14:45 ◼   ► subwoofer to get all those explosions to sound good.

01:14:48 ◼   ► It makes a big difference when for a PS4 that you're not playing on a TV, you have a gaming

01:14:53 ◼   ► monitor, 4K gaming monitor, 2.1 Logitech speaker system, and a PS4.

01:15:00 ◼   ► So much more impressive than just a PS4 hooked up to someone's cruddy LCD TV playing through

01:15:05 ◼   ► the TV speakers.

01:15:06 ◼   ► I don't know if I can wholeheartedly recommend the product because it's kind of expensive

01:15:11 ◼   ► and the power button flakes out, but I did buy a second one.

01:15:14 ◼   ► When I got my PS4 Pro and I shifted my old PS4 up to my son's room, I got a second one

01:15:20 ◼   ► of the exact same speaker set.

01:15:22 ◼   ► knowing that the power button is going to eventually flake out.

01:15:26 ◼   ► You just have to wiggle it the right way, and then it's fine.

01:15:28 ◼   ► That is saying something.

01:15:29 ◼   ► If you're willing to rebuy the same thing a second time,

01:15:32 ◼   ► that does say a lot.

01:15:34 ◼   ► Yeah, and again, this is after years and years

01:15:37 ◼   ► of terrible computer speakers, often by Logitech,

01:15:39 ◼   ► often by the same exact company.

01:15:41 ◼   ► And I realized how much I liked them when I went to get speakers.

01:15:43 ◼   ► I'm like, oh no, what if they don't make this anymore?

01:15:45 ◼   ► Because that's always the problem with computer speakers.

01:15:46 ◼   ► Like, if you find a set that you like and they break,

01:15:49 ◼   ► they don't make them anymore.

01:15:50 ◼   ► But they do still make them.

01:15:52 ◼   ► and I bought a second one and so, you know,

01:15:54 ◼   ► when mine eventually break, I will scavenge the new ones

01:15:57 ◼   ► from my son's room and use them.

01:15:59 ◼   ► - You know what's awesome about buying regular speakers?

01:16:01 ◼   ► First of all, they're for sale for more than like a year,

01:16:03 ◼   ► and then second of all, they last forever.

01:16:06 ◼   ► They really, you know, you can get speakers

01:16:08 ◼   ► that last 50 years.

01:16:09 ◼   ► Like, you know, eventually the cones often dry out

01:16:11 ◼   ► and have problems, but like, they last a long time

01:16:15 ◼   ► because they're just passive devices that they don't,

01:16:18 ◼   ► at least if they're, usually if they're really good,

01:16:21 ◼   ► There's no electronics in them.

01:16:23 ◼   ► There are circuits inside of them,

01:16:26 ◼   ► there's like the crossovers and stuff,

01:16:27 ◼   ► but there's not much there and they just last.

01:16:31 ◼   ► And it's like the Mac Pro thing.

01:16:34 ◼   ► Like my iMac is having all these weird problems now

01:16:36 ◼   ► and I'm gonna have to upgrade the entire computer

01:16:39 ◼   ► if I want an upgrade,

01:16:40 ◼   ► but you get a decent pair of speakers

01:16:42 ◼   ► and if the amp flakes out, you can just replace the amp.

01:16:47 ◼   ► If you want bigger speakers

01:16:48 ◼   ► but you already have an awesome amp,

01:16:50 ◼   ► you can replace the speakers.

01:16:51 ◼   ► Like, having components is, turns out, really nice.

01:16:54 ◼   ► Which, like, all of our parents discovered 40 years ago.

01:16:58 ◼   ► - Yeah, speaking of my dad, who is a huge stereo file,

01:17:02 ◼   ► and you know this because he believes in vinyl.

01:17:04 ◼   ► Anyway, he has a set of Dalquist speakers that I,

01:17:08 ◼   ► he tells me were in his dorm room

01:17:10 ◼   ► when obviously he was effectively a kid.

01:17:13 ◼   ► Now, I'm sure the cones have been replaced on these,

01:17:16 ◼   ► you know, and presumably whatever minimal electronics

01:17:19 ◼   ► in there have been replaced from time to time. But to your point, Marco, I mean, these are

01:17:23 ◼   ► 40-ish year old speakers that he is still using to this day. Not as his primary speakers

01:17:31 ◼   ► on his nice stereo, but as the surround sound system and his accessory setup, if you will,

01:17:38 ◼   ► his second setup. So yeah, this stuff lasts forever.

01:17:41 ◼   ► >> The other thing I find about speakers, though, is they're very often ugly. Like,

01:17:47 ◼   ► But I wouldn't want them sitting next to my computer.

01:17:49 ◼   ► For TV, usually you can hide them, but some of them, especially the fancier they get,

01:17:54 ◼   ► like even the boring ones, they're just plain ugly.

01:17:57 ◼   ► I don't know why speakers need to look like anything except for like the world's most

01:18:01 ◼   ► understated rectangular solid.

01:18:04 ◼   ► Like why do they need to be weird shaped or have things poking out of them or be shiny

01:18:08 ◼   ► or draw any attention to themselves at all?

01:18:14 ◼   ► And even the ones that are supposed to look like boring little cubes always have some

01:18:16 ◼   ► little flourish or chamfer or other thing to make the boxes look weird and I wish they

01:18:23 ◼   ► didn't do that.

01:18:24 ◼   ► Well, this is another reason why I love my Paradigm Atoms because they come with, you

01:18:29 ◼   ► know, like the black cloth grills that you can just stick on there and then it just looks

01:18:35 ◼   ► like a boring speaker.

01:18:37 ◼   ► Like it's a black cloth rectangle sticking on the front of a wooden rectangular solid.

01:18:43 ◼   ► Like that's it.

01:18:44 ◼   ► It's very simple, it comes in like four different colors.

01:18:47 ◼   ► Like it is, again, it's possible to do great speakers.

01:18:51 ◼   ► - It's got the wood grain if I'm looking

01:18:52 ◼   ► at the right one here.

01:18:53 ◼   ► I can't, 'cause I would not put that next to my computer.

01:18:56 ◼   ► - I have it next to my computer, it looks great.

01:18:58 ◼   ► And you can also get it without,

01:18:59 ◼   ► you can get it in different colors, different finishes.

01:19:02 ◼   ► - Yeah, they look nice with them without the speaker covers

01:19:04 ◼   ► in the front, very simple.

01:19:06 ◼   ► That would be fine, but, and they are just normal

01:19:08 ◼   ► rectangular solids, but the wood grain, I don't like.

01:19:11 ◼   ► That's part of the reason my current, what are these,

01:19:13 ◼   ► I don't even know what the hell they are.

01:19:15 ◼   ► They're probably like creative, yeah,

01:19:16 ◼   ► they are creative, these terrible creative speakers

01:19:18 ◼   ► I have hooked up to my computer.

01:19:21 ◼   ► They look nice.

01:19:22 ◼   ► They don't sound like right, but they look okay.

01:19:24 ◼   ► (laughing)

01:19:25 ◼   ► - I will say, one of the most attractive speaker things

01:19:28 ◼   ► I've ever seen was computer speakers.

01:19:30 ◼   ► It was, what was, John, you would know,

01:19:32 ◼   ► like those clear plastic carbon carton sticks

01:19:35 ◼   ► with the big like lamp thing as the subwoofer.

01:19:38 ◼   ► - Sound sticks with the big jellyfish subwoofer.

01:19:40 ◼   ► - Yeah, yeah.

01:19:41 ◼   ► I like the subwoofer. That looked cool. Like the subwoofer did look like a jellyfish and

01:19:46 ◼   ► it was really neat and clear or whatever. But the sound sticks, uh, and like, I thought,

01:19:52 ◼   ► too many holes.

01:19:53 ◼   ► Well, I still, I honestly, I'm not even sure I've ever even heard those. I have no idea

01:19:59 ◼   ► how they sound, but I honestly think like that should go down in history of computer

01:20:03 ◼   ► industrial design. Like that was so, that's such a great design.

01:20:07 ◼   ► I like the cube speakers better in terms of visuals.

01:20:10 ◼   ► Like, you remember the G4 Cube came with, like, these two little round balls that were

01:20:15 ◼   ► just a single, single little cone in them.

01:20:19 ◼   ► Same kind of visual language of clear, but you could see the electronics.

01:20:23 ◼   ► Oh, I think I know what you mean.

01:20:25 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:20:26 ◼   ► They nicely match the thing.

01:20:27 ◼   ► The Soundsticks always just seem so—they still look like giant octopus tentacles.

01:20:30 ◼   ► I know people—I think—is it Dan Morin?

01:20:33 ◼   ► I think some people we both know got those back in the day and still use them and still

01:20:38 ◼   ► have them. To your point about component stuff, it's like, "Oh, what other stuff do you have

01:20:42 ◼   ► from the era of the G4 Cube that you're still using?" But if they're just plain old speakers,

01:20:46 ◼   ► you can just keep using them because they're speakers and they work with every Mac that

01:20:49 ◼   ► you buy and everything works out.

01:20:51 ◼   ► That's the thing. So many of like, and even getting back to receivers and stuff, so many

01:20:56 ◼   ► of the receivers these days, the receiver is integrating certain HDMI standards that

01:21:02 ◼   ► that go out of date quickly, certain,

01:21:04 ◼   ► maybe it has network streaming standards,

01:21:07 ◼   ► maybe it has Bluetooth or AirPlay,

01:21:10 ◼   ► or integrates with Pandora.

01:21:11 ◼   ► I mean, even my new TV now has dedicated hardware buttons

01:21:16 ◼   ► on the remote for Amazon Video and Netflix,

01:21:19 ◼   ► and that's probably not gonna age that well

01:21:21 ◼   ► in the grand scheme of things if TV still lasts 10 years.

01:21:24 ◼   ► And it's nice to keep things,

01:21:27 ◼   ► you give up on some of the cool integration

01:21:30 ◼   ► of having things all in one,

01:21:31 ◼   ► this one box does all these different things

01:21:34 ◼   ► and has integrated Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, all this stuff.

01:21:37 ◼   ► You give up on some of that

01:21:38 ◼   ► if you go the separate component route.

01:21:40 ◼   ► There's usually still a way to achieve it.

01:21:41 ◼   ► You just might need multiple parts.

01:21:43 ◼   ► But I feel like long-term,

01:21:46 ◼   ► you're setting yourself up for a better outcome.

01:21:48 ◼   ► And again, this is again why I really want to wait

01:21:51 ◼   ► for the Mac Pro tower

01:21:53 ◼   ► rather than buying the iMac Pro this winter.

01:21:56 ◼   ► Because I like having separate components

01:21:58 ◼   ► because most of the time in my life,

01:22:00 ◼   ► have done things that way and the few times I haven't I've usually come to regret it.

01:22:05 ◼   ► But you won't, you'll buy the iMac, bro.

01:22:07 ◼   ► So the sound sticks are still available, by the way.

01:22:09 ◼   ► They're still for sale.

01:22:10 ◼   ► The sound sticks are apparently up to three.

01:22:12 ◼   ► Sound Sticks 3 by Harman Kardon.

01:22:14 ◼   ► Wait, really?

01:22:15 ◼   ► 170 bucks, you can order them right now?

01:22:17 ◼   ► That's actually not that expensive for what that is.

01:22:19 ◼   ► Yeah, I mean, I think they look cool.

01:22:21 ◼   ► I've never heard them so I can't vouch for how good they sound compared to anything.

01:22:25 ◼   ► I mean, you can look at it.

01:22:26 ◼   ► I mean, you can see the components, like, "Well, there's that size driver for the subwoofer

01:22:29 ◼   ► and there's these little tiny drivers for the left and right speakers and it is what

01:22:34 ◼   ► it is.

01:22:35 ◼   ► The other thing is I have a feeling this is probably a design that looks better in pictures

01:22:38 ◼   ► than it does like in real life covered in dust and with the thing with the plastic faded

01:22:42 ◼   ► and cracked and scratched.

01:22:43 ◼   ► I bet the plastic holds up pretty well but I just don't like how it even looks in pictures.

01:22:46 ◼   ► Like I like the subwoofer.

01:22:47 ◼   ► I think that's a cute design but the sound sticks they look like octopus tentacles and

01:22:51 ◼   ► I don't like the little cheerio life preserver bass thingies.

01:22:55 ◼   ► Don't like them.

01:22:56 ◼   ► Yeah I guess those little basses aren't that great either.

01:22:59 ◼   ► You know you're ruining this for me.

01:23:00 ◼   ► This is, why do I do a podcast?

01:23:01 ◼   ► - Just get the subwoofer and keep it on your desk

01:23:03 ◼   ► 'cause of curiosity, but fill it with M&M's.

01:23:05 ◼   ► Pour it down the little, you know.

01:23:07 ◼   ► - That's the other funny part too is like,

01:23:09 ◼   ► you put subwoofers usually out of sight.

01:23:12 ◼   ► - Put them like on the floor.

01:23:13 ◼   ► Like you're not supposed to have this anywhere

01:23:15 ◼   ► where it's visible.

01:23:16 ◼   ► - The thing about subwoofers is you can put them anywhere.

01:23:18 ◼   ► Who's to say?

01:23:19 ◼   ► You know, you put them out of sight

01:23:19 ◼   ► 'cause usually they're these big black, you know,

01:23:21 ◼   ► cubes that you just wanna get rid of,

01:23:23 ◼   ► but this one is so nice.

01:23:24 ◼   ► Put it on your desk and you know,

01:23:26 ◼   ► because humans cannot localize low frequency sound

01:23:28 ◼   ► as well as high frequency sound.

01:23:30 ◼   ► It doesn't matter where you put it.

01:23:33 ◼   ► - I will say on that though,

01:23:35 ◼   ► I greatly prefer just big speakers

01:23:38 ◼   ► that have their own woofers

01:23:39 ◼   ► that can produce the low frequencies well enough

01:23:42 ◼   ► to the sound of little satellites

01:23:44 ◼   ► and then one subwoofer somewhere in the room.

01:23:47 ◼   ► - I have heard this from you before

01:23:48 ◼   ► and I think your opinion of this

01:23:50 ◼   ► is based on some very terrible 5.1 setups early on.

01:23:53 ◼   ► - No, no, no, my opinion of this is based on liking music.

01:23:55 ◼   ► That's what it is really.

01:23:57 ◼   ► I totally agree with you that if what you're optimizing for

01:24:00 ◼   ► is movies and TV sound,

01:24:02 ◼   ► then having a subwoofer is cooler.

01:24:05 ◼   ► Like it sounds cooler that way.

01:24:06 ◼   ► Like you get more of like the big booms from explosions

01:24:08 ◼   ► and stuff like that.

01:24:09 ◼   ► But I don't like the way music sounds

01:24:12 ◼   ► through that kind of setup.

01:24:13 ◼   ► I think it sounds weird and unnatural

01:24:15 ◼   ► and not how that was intended.

01:24:17 ◼   ► I would rather have speakers that are pretty good

01:24:21 ◼   ► at TV and movies and also really great at music

01:24:25 ◼   ► than the opposite.

01:24:26 ◼   ► I mean, you can choose your left and rights to be standalone left and right channels that

01:24:31 ◼   ► can reproduce all the frequencies.

01:24:32 ◼   ► I mean, your receiver usually controls like, you can control like the crossover, like what,

01:24:37 ◼   ► you know, you could shift the cutoff of which frequencies go to the subwoofer for mixes

01:24:41 ◼   ► that don't separately address it.

01:24:43 ◼   ► But if you've got left and right channel speakers that can handle all the frequencies, you don't

01:24:47 ◼   ► have to send anything to subwoofer in the case where you're just playing music.

01:24:50 ◼   ► Although multi-channel music is a thing.

01:24:53 ◼   ► Jason Snell's house I heard was a crowded house 5.1 mix. It's not

01:24:57 ◼   ► everybody's thing but it is a thing. Thanks to our three sponsors this week

01:25:01 ◼   ► Betterment, Audible, and Squarespace and we will see you next week.

01:25:07 ◼   ► And now the show is over, maybe leave with me to begin

01:25:12 ◼   ► Cause it was accidental, accidental, accidental, accidental

01:25:18 ◼   ► John didn't do any research, Marco and Casey wouldn't let him

01:25:23 ◼   ► Cause it was accidental, accidental, accidental, accidental

01:25:29 ◼   ► And you can find the show notes at ATP.fm

01:25:35 ◼   ► And if you're into Twitter, you can follow them

01:25:40 ◼   ► S-C-A-S-O-Y-M-I-S-S-H-E-C-U-S-M-A-R-C-O-E-R-M-E-N-T-M-A-R-C-O-A-M-E-T-S-I-R-A-C

01:25:55 ◼   ► USA, Syracuse, uh, it's Axing Out!

01:25:59 ◼   ► Axing Out!

01:26:01 ◼   ► Hey, they're gonna be like a channel, Axing Out!

01:26:05 ◼   ► Axing Out!

01:26:07 ◼   ► But, Axing Out!

01:26:09 ◼   ► Do we have a multi-channel vinyl? 5.1 vinyl?

01:26:14 ◼   ► They don't even have stereo!

01:26:16 ◼   ► You just buy five records and you play them all at the same time.

01:26:18 ◼   ► Like, what was it? The Flame Lips did a thing.

01:26:21 ◼   ► The Flame Lips did a thing where you buy, wasn't it?

01:26:23 ◼   ► wasn't it you buy two vinyl albums and you play them both at the same time?

01:26:26 ◼   ► I have no idea. Or maybe they're CDs. Anyway.

01:26:30 ◼   ► Let me like what I like. Let people enjoy things, Jon.

01:26:37 ◼   ► I'm letting you enjoy things. I'm telling you you might enjoy a thing where you get to play

01:26:40 ◼   ► two records at the same time. Double the fun, right? It's like double mint gum.

01:26:44 ◼   ► And yeah, as part of the challenge is, you know, you like the ceremony, now you have a physical

01:26:49 ◼   ► challenge where you have to drop the needle. You have to drop the needle on the beginning

01:26:53 ◼   ► track in exactly the same spot exactly at the right time because you don't want the

01:26:55 ◼   ► music to be out of sync.

01:26:58 ◼   ► Was it Double Dare that had physical challenges? They actually phrased it as physical challenges.

01:27:05 ◼   ► Yes, that was Double Dare. I was going to make that reference, but I didn't bother,

01:27:08 ◼   ► but there you go. You got it.

01:27:09 ◼   ► Are you proud of me, Jon?

01:27:10 ◼   ► I am.

01:27:11 ◼   ► All I want is for you to be proud of me, Daddy.

01:27:13 ◼   ► Did you read that story, by the way, about Double Dare?

01:27:17 ◼   ► And there was the big like, you know, inside story of Double Dare.

01:27:21 ◼   ► I think there was a separate story about like the videophone that you get as a prize in

01:27:24 ◼   ► Double Dare.

01:27:25 ◼   ► I know exactly the videophone you're thinking of.

01:27:28 ◼   ► I don't recall having seen the story about that.

01:27:32 ◼   ► But I did read and freaking loved the oral history of Double Dare, which was actually

01:27:39 ◼   ► written, which is a little weird.

01:27:40 ◼   ► I mean, I guess it was, it was, it was oral history.

01:27:44 ◼   ► Sounds like a written history.

01:27:45 ◼   ► But nevertheless, it was,

01:27:48 ◼   ► oh, I think there might have been

01:27:49 ◼   ► an associated brief podcast,

01:27:50 ◼   ► which I never bothered listening to.

01:27:51 ◼   ► Maybe that's what it was.

01:27:52 ◼   ► It doesn't matter.

01:27:53 ◼   ► If you are a child, or if you were a child of the '80s

01:27:56 ◼   ► and watched "Double Dare" on Nickelodeon,

01:27:58 ◼   ► this is absolutely worth your time.

01:28:01 ◼   ► It was a fantastic read.

01:28:03 ◼   ► - And now you have to find that link for the show notes.

01:28:05 ◼   ► - I already have it.

01:28:06 ◼   ► This is my other job,

01:28:08 ◼   ► other than being chief summarizer in chief.

01:28:10 ◼   ► - I love "Double Dare."

01:28:11 ◼   ► - "Double Dare" was the best.

01:28:12 ◼   ► And that's the thing, I've actually said to people,

01:28:14 ◼   ► I don't think I've ever said it on the show, but I've said to people in real life,

01:28:18 ◼   ► because apparently this isn't real, but anyway, do you remember that when you were a kid,

01:28:23 ◼   ► the grand prize from Double Dare was, as already mentioned, a video telephone,

01:28:30 ◼   ► where you would get two of them, I believe, and you could put one in one person's house

01:28:33 ◼   ► and one in the other person's house, and you would get like a postage stamp,

01:28:37 ◼   ► and that's not much of an exaggeration, a postage stamp-sized image that had a frame rate

01:28:42 ◼   ► of like one new image every five to 10 seconds.

01:28:46 ◼   ► And that blew my mind when I was 10 or whatever.

01:28:50 ◼   ► And now, in my pocket, I can have an HD call

01:28:56 ◼   ► with anyone on the planet anywhere I am.

01:29:00 ◼   ► I mean, the future's amazing.

01:29:01 ◼   ► You know what else is amazing about the future,

01:29:03 ◼   ► speaking of net neutrality?

01:29:05 ◼   ► Net neutrality's pretty amazing.

01:29:06 ◼   ► - Is it so amazing? - You should play for it.

01:29:08 ◼   ► - I think it would be amazing if we maintain it.

01:29:10 ◼   ► I think, I'm not sure the future's gonna be so amazing

01:29:12 ◼   ► in that department.

01:29:13 ◼   ► So true.

01:29:14 ◼   ► So what's going on with this?

01:29:16 ◼   ► Why do we care about that today as we record on Wednesday the 12th?

01:29:19 ◼   ► Why don't I go through Net Neutrality all over again?

01:29:22 ◼   ► I think people who don't know what it is or what we're talking about, there is a video.

01:29:29 ◼   ► It's a video from Vi Hart explaining Net Neutrality in her unique way.

01:29:36 ◼   ► It's actually an updated version of an older video, which gets us more towards why we're

01:29:41 ◼   ► talking about this again, where she just took her old video and then bookended it by a preface

01:29:46 ◼   ► and then the things that have changed.

01:29:48 ◼   ► This is a battle that we thought we had, if not won, at least sort of got things moving

01:29:53 ◼   ► in the right direction, but for a variety of depressing reasons, things are moving back

01:29:57 ◼   ► in the wrong direction in these parts on seemingly all fronts, and Net Neutrality is no exception,

01:30:03 ◼   ► so you get someone who used to be, what was it, a lawyer for Verizon or whatever, you

01:30:10 ◼   ► You get some industry person in to come in and do something that most people in the United

01:30:14 ◼   ► States don't want, which is roll back net neutrality to make it so that big corporations

01:30:19 ◼   ► can charge different amounts of money for different customers of the internet instead

01:30:24 ◼   ► of just being a common carrier, blah, blah, blah.

01:30:26 ◼   ► Watch the video to have explained.

01:30:29 ◼   ► The annoying thing about this is you get fatigued.

01:30:34 ◼   ► How much do I have to hear about and care about net neutrality?

01:30:37 ◼   ► we go through this all where we all got all up in a tizzy and everyone write your congressperson

01:30:41 ◼   ► and it seems like we're doing that all the time and how many things can I possibly care

01:30:44 ◼   ► about and I don't, you know, I've heard about net neutrality too much. I don't even care

01:30:49 ◼   ► anymore. Just don't bother me. Or if you do want to do something about it, you're like,

01:30:53 ◼   ► "Well, what do I do? I did a bunch of stuff last time. Do I do that same stuff again?"

01:30:57 ◼   ► Ars Technica has a good article here entitled "How to Write a Meaningful FCC Comment Supporting

01:31:02 ◼   ► net neutrality. Now, the depressed person in me who sees everything falling apart in

01:31:07 ◼   ► his country these days thinks it doesn't matter how meaningful your comment to the FCC is,

01:31:13 ◼   ► because the stupid Verizon lawyer who's running the thing is going to ignore it and do whatever

01:31:16 ◼   ► the hell big corporations want, because he doesn't care what people want, he doesn't

01:31:19 ◼   ► care what's good for long-term anything, all he cares about is screwing everything up.

01:31:23 ◼   ► And that's exactly why he was appointed to his position. Anyway, but if you are not in

01:31:27 ◼   ► that type of dark mood for the moment that you read this article, this will help you

01:31:31 ◼   ► do the best that you can possibly do instead of just clicking a bunch of buttons and filling

01:31:35 ◼   ► out this thing or how can you write a meaningful comment that has a chance of influencing things

01:31:40 ◼   ► and who knows it kind of sort of worked last time before everything started moving backwards

01:31:44 ◼   ► again and it might work this time so two links in the show notes one watch Vi Hart's video

01:31:50 ◼   ► for it's not the best explanation of net neutrality because it's many faceted and she particularly

01:31:54 ◼   ► you know a lot of times they pick an analogy like it's kind of like if this happened and

01:31:57 ◼   ► And you know, in some ways it's better to just straight up explain it without analogy,

01:32:02 ◼   ► but the analogy she uses is reasonably representative, even if it does gloss over a lot of things

01:32:07 ◼   ► and there are other aspects of it.

01:32:08 ◼   ► But anyway, watch that to have it explained, and it's fun and interesting.

01:32:11 ◼   ► And if you already know what it is, but you feel fatigued by the idea of trying to battle

01:32:16 ◼   ► against this again, give the "How to Write a Meaningful Comment" thing a read to see

01:32:21 ◼   ► if you can do more than just check a box or put your name on a list or whatever, but actually

01:32:26 ◼   ► pour out a little bit of your heart and your angst and even your anger in the most constructive

01:32:31 ◼   ► way possible and, you know, do what you can do to fight the same fight that we continue

01:32:37 ◼   ► to be fighting over and over and over and over and over again. There's also a great

01:32:42 ◼   ► video, it's only about three and a half minutes from CGP Grey, that was from the last time

01:32:47 ◼   ► we were all at this exact same rodeo. This one's from 2014, so maybe it wasn't the last

01:32:53 ◼   ► time but you get my point. That is also very good. I've seen this by heart video

01:32:57 ◼   ► or at least the the original iteration thereof probably also from 2014 which it

01:33:02 ◼   ► is excellent as well. Yeah this it's it's important I think and well I was gonna

01:33:09 ◼   ► say I think that anyone who really has any inkling as to what's going on that

01:33:14 ◼   ► isn't paid by one of these big corporations will say net neutrality is

01:33:17 ◼   ► the only way to go but you know then we elected who elected so obviously people

01:33:22 ◼   ► think differently. So anyway, if you care about things like this podcast and you want to get it

01:33:28 ◼   ► reasonably quickly and not have people get in the way of it, maybe talk to your representatives

01:33:32 ◼   ► about net neutrality. Not that, by the way, a lot of the examples they give you of like,

01:33:36 ◼   ► here's what could happen if we didn't have net neutrality. The difficulty is if you wanted to be

01:33:42 ◼   ► like, if you wanted to actually extrapolate, like you had to put money on it, like what would

01:33:47 ◼   ► actually happen if we go back to neutrality. It's such a sort of systemic boil the frog kind of

01:33:53 ◼   ► thing that we're already halfway through to that it's difficult to convince people exactly how bad

01:33:59 ◼   ► it would be. Like the things that we describe are like, "Oh, your podcast will download slowly."

01:34:03 ◼   ► Yeah, that could happen, but in general, the powers that are lobbying behind this,

01:34:12 ◼   ► They want the net not to be neutral. They're not that dumb. They would do it in the same way they've

01:34:17 ◼   ► done everything else. How do we all of a sudden wake up and find ourselves with only one ISP

01:34:21 ◼   ► choice in half the country? They did that slowly and insidiously by merging and lobbying to allow

01:34:27 ◼   ► larger and larger companies to merge together. It's kind of like a thing like, "What do I care

01:34:30 ◼   ► if Time Warner is purchased by whatever or this cable company buys that? I don't care. Whatever.

01:34:35 ◼   ► I just want my TV." People don't care at that level. Slowly, these giant companies are doing

01:34:41 ◼   ► things behind the scenes that is making people's lives, like that is closing the door on things

01:34:46 ◼   ► that can make people's lives materially better. You could have faster internet access for less

01:34:50 ◼   ► money. They're essentially taking away something that you never had, like progress essentially.

01:34:56 ◼   ► And you don't know how cheap broadband is in the rest of the world and how other people have

01:35:00 ◼   ► choices and how if you have a common carrier that people can actually compete based on price and

01:35:03 ◼   ► features. If you've never experienced that, it's a lack of something like, "I've never known it

01:35:09 ◼   ► it could be this way.

01:35:10 ◼   ► Therefore, the lack of it doesn't make me feel

01:35:12 ◼   ► like I'm losing anything, but you are, right?

01:35:14 ◼   ► That's how they do it.

01:35:15 ◼   ► And so if they made the net non-neutral

01:35:18 ◼   ► and cut all these deals and extorted money from,

01:35:20 ◼   ► as they've already done from Netflix,

01:35:21 ◼   ► to get their bits to carry over the wires

01:35:23 ◼   ► and start ups that you've never heard of

01:35:25 ◼   ► and never will hear of

01:35:26 ◼   ► or not allowed to enter against the big,

01:35:27 ◼   ► like you will not notice,

01:35:29 ◼   ► so most people will not notice the lack of things

01:35:31 ◼   ► that you could have had,

01:35:32 ◼   ► but that is really the worst effect of this stuff.

01:35:35 ◼   ► Stuff that people, that you will never get

01:35:38 ◼   ► because competition has been eliminated

01:35:42 ◼   ► and people in the middle are extracting value

01:35:46 ◼   ► from everybody else.

01:35:47 ◼   ► And it's like, you may have like a mid-level malaise

01:35:51 ◼   ► of like, oh, Comcast is all I can get and I hate Comcast,

01:35:53 ◼   ► but it's like, oh, you know, I hate airlines.