ATP

00:00:00 ◼   ► How's that low level C audio code or whatever the hell it is you're working on I'm making progress

00:00:05 ◼   ► Do you have any hair left to pull out of your head Marco? No, this is why I cut it short

00:00:11 ◼   ► To make to make that impossible. I knew I was gonna be working on core audio this week

00:00:16 ◼   ► So I got a fresh haircut number two on the razor nice and that that means it's too short to realistically grab hold of

00:00:23 ◼   ► Like that. I'm good. Still got a handful

00:00:25 ◼   ► Maybe he might not have a little fingers like pincers

00:00:29 ◼   ► So any pre-follow-up stuff we need to worry about?

00:00:33 ◼   ► There is no pre-follow-up. Only post-follow-up and follow-up and more follow-up.

00:00:39 ◼   ► And lots and lots of follow-up.

00:00:41 ◼   ► Maybe the show is pre-follow-up.

00:00:43 ◼   ► At this point, should we just call this the Accidental Follow-Up Podcast?

00:00:46 ◼   ► Well, there's follow-up and then the main topics are really just pre-follow-up for next week.

00:00:49 ◼   ► It's so true. So let's do our follow-up so we can get to the pre-follow-up. We should probably

00:00:57 ◼   ► start with talking about our discussion about how to attract or encourage women

00:01:04 ◼   ► and girls to listen to the show. And unsurprisingly we got a lot of feedback

00:01:09 ◼   ► about this and I appreciate and I know we appreciate all the feedback. A lot of

00:01:15 ◼   ► it was really good, pretty much all of it was really interesting, and it's

00:01:21 ◼   ► It certainly opened my eyes a bit on it with regard to how

00:01:25 ◼   ► Men reacted to it how women reacted to it and and so

00:01:30 ◼   ► Just a few things. I think we should talk about

00:01:32 ◼   ► Upfront, I think first and foremost

00:01:35 ◼   ► we I

00:01:38 ◼   ► Would say we caught a little bit of flack about spending so much time talking about advertisers and Harry's

00:01:43 ◼   ► Specifically and I think that's reasonable

00:01:46 ◼   ► I think the the problem with the way the last episode went is that because we spent so much time talking about

00:01:52 ◼   ► Talking about the advertisers it appeared as though that was the thing we thought was the biggest

00:02:00 ◼   ► Priority just by virtue of the fact that we spent so much time on it and in reality

00:02:04 ◼   ► That's not at all what any of us think is the biggest priority the first thing to change

00:02:09 ◼   ► It's just as per usual

00:02:11 ◼   ► we got wrapped around the axle on that topic and I don't know if any of you have ever heard this show but

00:02:17 ◼   ► we sometimes get off in the weeds and that's exactly what happened and

00:02:20 ◼   ► And I think while the discussion I think was good

00:02:25 ◼   ► I don't mean for it and I'm pretty sure you guys don't mean for it to be representative of

00:02:30 ◼   ► What we think is the right approach to fix this problem. It just so happens. We got off in the weeds

00:02:36 ◼   ► I think actually I would back up for a second

00:02:38 ◼   ► Here's how I maybe we all have different opinions of this feedback, but here's how I would characterize

00:02:43 ◼   ► So first first of all, I want to say that I still feel like I'm I'm still processing that feedback

00:02:47 ◼   ► I agree like and all I mean partly because it's still coming in and partly because I think it was like

00:02:53 ◼   ► The most upsetting to me feedback that we've ever gotten in the show

00:02:57 ◼   ► And there was a wide wide range of responses. The feedback was all over the map

00:03:03 ◼   ► But the title of the top of that map was probably like you guys are dummies like I felt like this was

00:03:08 ◼   ► Skewed way negative like consensus is we are dummies

00:03:12 ◼   ► It's not to say that it's not useful. But like sometimes we get feedback

00:03:17 ◼   ► That's like just providing information or supportive or whatever, but pretty much all this feedback was telling us

00:03:23 ◼   ► Things that we missed or whatever. I mean some of it was I guess feedback because we solicited feedback, but it was fairly negative. I

00:03:32 ◼   ► Don't know if that surprised me. I think I was kind of dreading

00:03:35 ◼   ► discussing this topic because I kind of figured this would be the the feedback we would get but it's

00:03:40 ◼   ► The fact that I'm still processing it makes me feel like I don't I don't quite know

00:03:45 ◼   ► What to think and you I think what you highlighted is

00:03:49 ◼   ► Probably the only dominant theme that I saw in it because like I said, even though it was mostly negative

00:03:55 ◼   ► It was wide-ranging like people had very different ideas about what we got wrong, right? So a

00:04:01 ◼   ► Wide range all in the negative round, but the one thing a lot of people seem to agree on you already hit is that?

00:04:05 ◼   ► regardless of how they felt about the ads

00:04:08 ◼   ► That that was not the core issue

00:04:11 ◼   ► People who said you absolutely have to get rid of the ads

00:04:13 ◼   ► Also ads are not at the core issue people who said you absolutely have to keep the ads also the ad is not the core

00:04:18 ◼   ► Issue right so that I feel like is the only consensus that I could draw out of this so far two things

00:04:23 ◼   ► One that we didn't do a very good job and two that the ad is a distraction regardless of what people feel about it

00:04:30 ◼   ► What did you think of it?

00:04:33 ◼   ► Am I being too negative on the negativity, Marco,

00:04:35 ◼   ► or did you get that impression as well?

00:04:37 ◼   ► - No, that was pretty much it.

00:04:39 ◼   ► I mean, this was, I mean, I'm also still

00:04:43 ◼   ► processing a lot of it.

00:04:44 ◼   ► I would say just anecdotally,

00:04:46 ◼   ► I don't know if you guys feel the same way,

00:04:48 ◼   ► I would say anecdotally, this was probably the most words

00:04:51 ◼   ► we've gotten in feedback on any topic.

00:04:53 ◼   ► It has taken me a long time to even just read

00:04:57 ◼   ► the feedback email, there's been so much of it.

00:05:00 ◼   ► And most of it has been very informative.

00:05:02 ◼   ► I mean, overall, there was definitely a prominent pattern

00:05:07 ◼   ► to a lot of it that began with, I'm a man, but,

00:05:13 ◼   ► and then a giant wall of text that showed really

00:05:17 ◼   ► a pretty poor understanding of gender issues

00:05:20 ◼   ► and technology, or ever in life.

00:05:24 ◼   ► And that, I'm a little saddened by.

00:05:27 ◼   ► - Didn't you feel like, though, that was like

00:05:28 ◼   ► easiest feedback to handle.

00:05:30 ◼   ► Yeah, I ignored most of that.

00:05:31 ◼   ► Because, I mean, it's depressing that we're going to get that type of thing, but it's

00:05:36 ◼   ► the type of feedback you read and you're like, "All right, well, so I know these people are

00:05:41 ◼   ► out there, I know they're listening, they have different opinions and values than we

00:05:45 ◼   ► do."

00:05:46 ◼   ► But it's easier to, I don't know, I feel like it's easier to process, because I feel like

00:05:51 ◼   ► They, in many respects, they are who we are most capable of reaching, right?

00:06:01 ◼   ► Like if we can reach those people, then that will affect change, right?

00:06:05 ◼   ► If we can turn those people around or just even move them more towards what we think,

00:06:11 ◼   ► you know, our value system, that that will be a success.

00:06:14 ◼   ► And they were sort of showing us, here we are over here, if you feel like moving us

00:06:19 ◼   ► towards your way of thinking, "This is where we are, so now you know what you got your

00:06:24 ◼   ► work cut out for you."

00:06:25 ◼   ► Yeah, it was surprising to me. I think most of the email, while negative, was informative.

00:06:33 ◼   ► There was certainly a lot of, "Hi, I'm a dude," and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.

00:06:38 ◼   ► "Okay, so you should really improve it." But the thing that struck me was, gosh, the

00:06:42 ◼   ► immediate Twitter replies to the ATP account were

00:06:45 ◼   ► Disappointing and

00:06:48 ◼   ► I'm sir. I was certainly and remain taken aback by it because I

00:06:54 ◼   ► Was very surprised

00:06:57 ◼   ► About how many replies we saw which basically

00:07:02 ◼   ► made me think that

00:07:05 ◼   ► We were all members of the he-man woman haters Club

00:07:08 ◼   ► which I don't remember signing up for and I don't remember that being a thing and

00:07:12 ◼   ► That was that was a little bit disappointing not all of them, of course, but a lot of them

00:07:16 ◼   ► Well, I mean, I think that's that is the most much more interesting feedback to me also more upsetting but much more interesting

00:07:22 ◼   ► and because it's

00:07:24 ◼   ► It's I don't know it's giving us new information as opposed to just saying

00:07:28 ◼   ► Hey, there are people out there with regressive ideas about women and technology like really already knew that but

00:07:34 ◼   ► The other side of the coin is more enlightening and I would say for the feedback again trying to characterize it

00:07:39 ◼   ► we got more feedback from women than usual which is expected in this type of topic and

00:07:44 ◼   ► the reason I was emphasizing the wide range is

00:07:47 ◼   ► You know as I tried to emphasize in the last show like women are not a monolith

00:07:53 ◼   ► No individual woman who tweets at us or writes to us is is purporting to speak for all women

00:07:58 ◼   ► They are just individuals, right?

00:08:00 ◼   ► And that's why getting a lot of feedback is good.

00:08:03 ◼   ► Because otherwise, if you just get feedback from three people

00:08:07 ◼   ► and they all have three different opinions,

00:08:08 ◼   ► you have no idea what to think.

00:08:09 ◼   ► If you get feedback from 300 people,

00:08:12 ◼   ► then maybe you can start sort of slicing and dicing it

00:08:15 ◼   ► and trying to figure things out.

00:08:17 ◼   ► And so soliciting feedback is one thing.

00:08:19 ◼   ► And the second thing, which many people emphasize,

00:08:22 ◼   ► is you solicit the feedback and then

00:08:23 ◼   ► you have to actually read it and listen to it, right?

00:08:26 ◼   ► The difficulty in doing that correctly,

00:08:29 ◼   ► as on the last show I talked about,

00:08:31 ◼   ► one difficulty is try not to be defensive,

00:08:34 ◼   ► try not to feel like you have to answer everything,

00:08:35 ◼   ► try not to feel like every piece of advice

00:08:37 ◼   ► is an accusation, so on and so forth.

00:08:39 ◼   ► You know, try not to suffer from male answer syndrome,

00:08:41 ◼   ► all these bad instincts that are in me definitely,

00:08:45 ◼   ► and maybe in you too as well, you have to fight those.

00:08:49 ◼   ► But the second thing is, with this huge range,

00:08:52 ◼   ► even talking about something as silly as the ad,

00:08:54 ◼   ► which everyone more or less agreed

00:08:55 ◼   ► was not the core issue here. Just looking at the women who gave feedback on the ad,

00:09:01 ◼   ► you can't possibly do what "everyone" wants because they want contradictory things.

00:09:08 ◼   ► Some women said, "You absolutely have to keep the ad removing. It would be insulting."

00:09:11 ◼   ► Some women said, "You absolutely have to remove the ad. Its presence is insulting."

00:09:15 ◼   ► So if we get their feedback and we listen to it, at some point we have to do something.

00:09:22 ◼   ► And there is no course of action.

00:09:24 ◼   ► It seemed to me that a lot of the people writing in all camps, no matter what their opinion,

00:09:28 ◼   ► believe that they didn't seem to leave a lot of room for other possibilities.

00:09:34 ◼   ► Many people wrote in to say, "This is the situation.

00:09:37 ◼   ► You guys are dummies who are not seeing it.

00:09:39 ◼   ► And the answer is obvious.

00:09:40 ◼   ► Just do what I say."

00:09:41 ◼   ► Right?

00:09:42 ◼   ► But it's like, you know, just that one email, it's fine.

00:09:46 ◼   ► But it's like, you read one email after the next, after the next, after the next, and

00:09:49 ◼   ► like if I do what you want then these 10 people are gonna be upset if I do what

00:09:52 ◼   ► they want then these 50 people are gonna you know that's that's that's our job

00:09:56 ◼   ► our job is to solicit feedback accept it read it listen to it try to understand

00:10:01 ◼   ► it and then decide the what the right thing to do for us is right and that's

00:10:08 ◼   ► why I feel like I'm still processing because it's difficult right like you

00:10:11 ◼   ► know to sort of be in the people pleaser mode where you're like we're trying to

00:10:14 ◼   ► do the right thing here right we're trying to solicit feedback if only there

00:10:17 ◼   ► was a quote unquote answer, but there's not. There's lots of people's opinions and lots

00:10:22 ◼   ► of people's answers and we have to figure out how do we make forward progress on our

00:10:29 ◼   ► goals based on this feedback and it's just, it's kind of making my head spin at this point.

00:10:34 ◼   ► Well, but I think one thing I think that we can all agree on besides cheese, ding, is

00:10:41 ◼   ► that we got a lot of feedback because we asked for it and that's exactly what we want.

00:10:47 ◼   ► We were asking the question to our audience,

00:10:50 ◼   ► especially to the women in our audience,

00:10:53 ◼   ► what can we do to help address this massive gender imbalance

00:10:57 ◼   ► in our audience and in tech podcasting

00:11:00 ◼   ► and in tech as a whole.

00:11:01 ◼   ► This is a big problem.

00:11:03 ◼   ► I don't pretend to be an expert on this.

00:11:08 ◼   ► I'm far from it.

00:11:09 ◼   ► I do, however, want to improve it.

00:11:13 ◼   ► As a guy who is a smart ass and has always been a smart ass,

00:11:17 ◼   ► I've always had the problem of I rush right to

00:11:23 ◼   ► thinking I have an answer to something.

00:11:25 ◼   ► And as we saw in the email and as many women see

00:11:28 ◼   ► every single day, that's a very common thing

00:11:31 ◼   ► in this business.

00:11:33 ◼   ► And that's a very common thing among men in general.

00:11:35 ◼   ► The attitude that we just have an immediate answer

00:11:38 ◼   ► for everything and we know everything about everything

00:11:41 ◼   ► and we can quickly explain away anything or any problem.

00:11:45 ◼   ► One of the things that I think everyone would agree on,

00:11:50 ◼   ► which there isn't much in this argument

00:11:52 ◼   ► that everyone would agree on,

00:11:54 ◼   ► but I think everyone who's on the right side of this

00:11:56 ◼   ► can probably agree that especially we men

00:11:59 ◼   ► need to be listening more.

00:12:01 ◼   ► We need to be asking and listening more.

00:12:04 ◼   ► We just need to be listening

00:12:05 ◼   ► to what women are actually telling us.

00:12:09 ◼   ► It was very valuable to see all that feedback, even though a lot of it was contradictory

00:12:12 ◼   ► from women about what we should or shouldn't do.

00:12:16 ◼   ► The fact is we asked, we are listening, and we are going to continue to ask and listen.

00:12:20 ◼   ► And to all the men out there who responded in that matter-of-fact way, this is going

00:12:26 ◼   ► to be hard for you to change in your life.

00:12:29 ◼   ► It's certainly hard for us, but you have to be open to the idea that the first step when

00:12:35 ◼   ► this question is asked is to listen to what women are telling you, listen to what they

00:12:40 ◼   ► have to say, to ask them and to be listening and to care, not just to jump to thinking

00:12:44 ◼   ► you know the answer. Because really, that is such a big problem for so many people.

00:12:52 ◼   ► And it is really, this is really primarily a problem with men that do this. The fact

00:13:00 ◼   ► is the world is not a perfectly balanced place where everything is equal. It's far from it

00:13:04 ◼   ► and that's the whole problem we're trying to address,

00:13:07 ◼   ► it is okay to recognize that even if you think

00:13:11 ◼   ► you're being good, and even if you think

00:13:15 ◼   ► that you are helping, there are gonna be things,

00:13:19 ◼   ► and Jon, you talk about this a lot,

00:13:20 ◼   ► there's gonna be things that you subconsciously do,

00:13:23 ◼   ► or that you just do 'cause you've always done them,

00:13:25 ◼   ► or that's just the way you think,

00:13:26 ◼   ► that you think are normal and neutral, but they're not.

00:13:29 ◼   ► And so it is of utmost importance that men in particular

00:13:34 ◼   ► Don't just jump to thinking you know the answers here.

00:13:37 ◼   ► Really sit back and listen,

00:13:39 ◼   ► 'cause there's a lot that we need to hear.

00:13:42 ◼   ► - That's what I talked about on the Gamergate episode,

00:13:43 ◼   ► one of the suggestions I made to the audience

00:13:45 ◼   ► of people who may have been sort of sympathizing

00:13:47 ◼   ► with Gamergate, and I was trying to look for something

00:13:51 ◼   ► that I could suggest that would be actionable

00:13:54 ◼   ► and that I felt like would make real change

00:13:59 ◼   ► based on what has worked for me.

00:14:00 ◼   ► I was suggesting, I forget which Twitter accounts

00:14:03 ◼   ► I suggested but a bunch of people's Twitter accounts like the everyday sexism Twitter accounts

00:14:08 ◼   ► I probably I'm sure I suggested Brianna was the Twitter account like just follow these Twitter accounts

00:14:12 ◼   ► It was my suggestion, but then don't ever reply to them. Just read just read the tweets

00:14:17 ◼   ► And I said it's like the tweets are gonna make you angry. Sometimes you're gonna disagree with a lot of them

00:14:24 ◼   ► the whole idea is like a one-year plan of like

00:14:27 ◼   ► Subscribe and read the tweets like, you know make don't make it crazy volume

00:14:31 ◼   ► Just have it in the mix of your Twitter and I'm doing this in terms of Twitter, but you could do anything blog posts

00:14:35 ◼   ► You know who you?

00:14:36 ◼   ► Whose Facebook posts you read what sites read or whatever?

00:14:39 ◼   ► Just read them even if for the entire year you absolutely 100% disagree with every single thing that you read

00:14:45 ◼   ► Because I feel like the osmosis of that like sort of just being in contact with those ideas

00:14:50 ◼   ► Will slowly affect your worldview because it's essentially forced listening. Like you're not really listening

00:14:56 ◼   ► You may be reading them like hate reading them like go look at these dummies. I disagree with everything. They so dumb

00:14:59 ◼   ► They don't know anything about anything right if you just keep reading them like and the everyday sexism one is a great example

00:15:05 ◼   ► It's like you just read day after day after day of like minor things that happen to people or situations

00:15:11 ◼   ► They're in I feel like it will eventually get through to you like this is not made up stuff and like

00:15:16 ◼   ► Because I think the volume is important right and so we are subjecting ourselves to this essentially voluntarily to try to you know

00:15:23 ◼   ► You know bring us bring us the feedback tell us what you think

00:15:28 ◼   ► Give us your ideas

00:15:30 ◼   ► And we just kind of have to soak in it like, you know, it's like by you know

00:15:35 ◼   ► We're soaking it into some degree but like by actually inviting it

00:15:38 ◼   ► We're kind of getting a big dose of it dumped on our head and that's part of the process

00:15:43 ◼   ► Of course, this is a podcast and this is follow-up. And of course we do have responses to things

00:15:49 ◼   ► so we're kind of violating our own rules here, but I'm the

00:15:52 ◼   ► the reason I suggested all that Twitter stuff is like that's how I feel like I got into this like just

00:15:58 ◼   ► And, you know, gamergate was a big part of it, but even before that, reading like every

00:16:02 ◼   ► single post about these things, reading people, following new people, looking at their tumblers,

00:16:07 ◼   ► following them on Twitter, just reading everything, mostly not responding to it, mostly not engaging

00:16:12 ◼   ► with people on Twitter, but just like reading it.

00:16:14 ◼   ► And gamergate was like, the peak was just like every day, like 17 new things to read.

00:16:19 ◼   ► And then following the links, following the threads, following the different people to

00:16:23 ◼   ► where they come from, what's their background, what have they written before, what have they

00:16:27 ◼   ► done, you know, like that kind of sort of, it's not sort of like ambient research or

00:16:33 ◼   ► whatever on the topic is I felt has been most influential in my life and changing myself

00:16:39 ◼   ► on these topics. And like I said, this feedback is part of that. And now that I've said all

00:16:45 ◼   ► those things to try to be deferential and everything, now I have to go and ruin it by

00:16:48 ◼   ► responding to what I think was the harshest criticism we got, because I think it's the

00:16:53 ◼   ► one thing, again, this isn't like, this wasn't the most common, but if I look, if I go over

00:16:56 ◼   ► to the most negative end of the spectrum of the feedback we got. It's not, believe it

00:17:02 ◼   ► or not, from the people who have regressive ideas about women in tech. Their feedback

00:17:06 ◼   ► tended not to be harsh, tended to be, I don't know, condescending and patronizing. But the

00:17:11 ◼   ► most harsh ones and the ones that felt the worst were feedback from women who, the gist

00:17:17 ◼   ► of this feedback was on the topic of changing the host lineup and changing the format of

00:17:25 ◼   ► the show saying essentially if you don't do one of those two things then it shows

00:17:30 ◼   ► you don't care about women at all and this is all BS front and that's the

00:17:35 ◼   ► harshest version of that there's just like you know saying these two things

00:17:40 ◼   ► are the test for you if you don't if you refuse to do things as we said I talked

00:17:45 ◼   ► about last show we didn't want to change the host line of the show we didn't want

00:17:48 ◼   ► to turn into an interview show we basically ruled those out and I feel

00:17:51 ◼   ► like people hearing that people hearing us say you know we read through this

00:17:55 ◼   ► big list of suggestions that people suggested to us. And then we ruled out those two right

00:17:59 ◼   ► off the bat. And it just feels like every other encounter women have had in technology

00:18:04 ◼   ► where it's like the people in the position of power hear their concerns and then immediately

00:18:10 ◼   ► dismiss them. So it's like slamming the door in their face. And I understand why people

00:18:13 ◼   ► are angry about that. I understand why we got that feedback, why the people are feeling

00:18:17 ◼   ► the way they did, why they felt compelled to go to the feedback forum and write those

00:18:21 ◼   ► things in. But I, you know, the... I responded to some of these people, and what I said in

00:18:30 ◼   ► all the responses was similar, was that, as I said in the show, that would... that would

00:18:35 ◼   ► absolutely make the show more appealing. You know, given, granted, like, this is feedback

00:18:43 ◼   ► we received, I agree with them. Where I disagree is, by us not doing those two specific things

00:18:50 ◼   ► and only those two specific things change the host lineup, turn the show, change the

00:18:53 ◼   ► show format to be an interview show, that somehow there's nothing else we can do to

00:18:58 ◼   ► make the show more appealing to women, to get more women listeners.

00:19:02 ◼   ► I totally disagree with that.

00:19:03 ◼   ► I think there are a ton of things we could do to find more, you know, to make the show

00:19:09 ◼   ► more inclusive, to find, attract more women to the show.

00:19:15 ◼   ► It's just a tremendous amount.

00:19:16 ◼   ► We read a whole bunch of them on the last show.

00:19:17 ◼   ► tons of people sent us feedback with ideas, right?

00:19:20 ◼   ► The only two things we ruled out

00:19:23 ◼   ► were changing the host lineup

00:19:24 ◼   ► and changing the format of the show to be an interview show.

00:19:27 ◼   ► Everything else, including the Harry's ad,

00:19:28 ◼   ► I might point out, was on the table, right?

00:19:31 ◼   ► And so that feedback, like,

00:19:33 ◼   ► like it hurt the worst because it shows that those people,

00:19:36 ◼   ► what they came away with was that we were,

00:19:38 ◼   ► that we were dismissing them,

00:19:40 ◼   ► that we were just doing exactly what has been done to them

00:19:43 ◼   ► in the entire technology industry for their entire life,

00:19:45 ◼   ► is just like, "This popular show that I listen to is going to address my concerns for a moment."

00:19:50 ◼   ► And door slammed in face, right? That's the experience they got out of the show, which

00:19:53 ◼   ► is terrible. Not our intention. Obviously we did a bad job, but I still have to say

00:19:58 ◼   ► that I feel like our show can exist in its current form and be better than it is. That

00:20:05 ◼   ► we can make positive progress towards our goal of inclusiveness. And maybe that's not

00:20:11 ◼   ► enough progress maybe we can make more progress by changing the show in those ways but I feel

00:20:16 ◼   ► like it's like that this show has value and can be better in its current form I don't know if that's

00:20:21 ◼   ► like so a lot of the worst feedback again made it sound made it feel like maybe feel like that

00:20:26 ◼   ► our show just should not exist like that it is an affront to the cause and that the world does not

00:20:32 ◼   ► need another three dudes text podcast and the best thing we could do is just change it in a

00:20:37 ◼   ► fundamental way so it's a different show and if we don't do that it shows we really don't care and

00:20:41 ◼   ► and you would just we don't want to do anything that will that will

00:20:43 ◼   ► perturb our happy little home in any way and I feel like that is a

00:20:46 ◼   ► Mischaracterization and that we were totally willing to do anything within the bounds of the current show

00:20:51 ◼   ► Again, we provided you know granting entirely that it would be make the show more attractive to women if we did those things

00:20:58 ◼   ► But I we want to have our show with the three of us. This is our show. I feel like I

00:21:02 ◼   ► You know, it's a valid thing to do to have the show with the three of us. I

00:21:09 ◼   ► Don't know I don't know how else to do characterize that without without just sort of reinforcing everything

00:21:14 ◼   ► They think that's basically like oh you just want to have your show and that's that I

00:21:17 ◼   ► I do want to have the show with the three of us and I

00:21:20 ◼   ► feel like that show can be better and I feel like some positive progress and making that show better is

00:21:25 ◼   ► It's positive right is it as positive as it could be if we you know and and you know

00:21:32 ◼   ► I don't want to go into the it's a I'm that's why I should have

00:21:37 ◼   ► getting more defensive by the moment. But if you go into the, you know, I'll stop myself here. But

00:21:43 ◼   ► what do you guys have to think about this topic? Yeah, I have all the feedback we got.

00:21:47 ◼   ► A lot of it hurt in the sense that it made me very angry because I was disappointed in in the very

00:21:56 ◼   ► chauvinistic things that I saw. But the stuff that actually hurt the in cut the deepest was when a

00:22:05 ◼   ► a woman would write in and say, like you had said, John, basically, if you don't fundamentally

00:22:10 ◼   ► change the show, then you're just a bunch of liars. And, well, John, like you said,

00:22:18 ◼   ► John, that absolutely would be the number one best way to put our money where our mouth

00:22:23 ◼   ► is. That is, I don't think it's unreasonable for us to take that off the table. And I,

00:22:28 ◼   ► and even though the show is in so many ways about binary, the show itself is not binary.

00:22:32 ◼   ► And there is a lot of in the middle that we can do to improve ourselves and to improve

00:22:38 ◼   ► the way we handle the show and just generally make things more inclusive without changing

00:22:45 ◼   ► the three of us.

00:22:46 ◼   ► And I should point out that we got a fair bit of women that wrote in that said, "I understand

00:22:52 ◼   ► why someone would ask you to change the lineup, but don't do that because the reason I listen,"

00:22:59 ◼   ► as several women that wrote in, the reason I listen is because of the three of you and

00:23:04 ◼   ► because of the chemistry you have and because of the way you beat each other up over white

00:23:07 ◼   ► cars and fish and so on and so forth. And if you change that lineup, it could ruin everything.

00:23:16 ◼   ► And so if this is the most hurt I've gotten, I'm still coming from a place of indescribable

00:23:22 ◼   ► privilege and I recognize that. But it was, it was really, it really bummed me out because

00:23:27 ◼   ► Because I feel like I want to work together, the three of us and the women that listen

00:23:34 ◼   ► and the men that listen, and I just want to work together to make this a more inclusive,

00:23:39 ◼   ► happy place.

00:23:41 ◼   ► And I feel like, just like you said, Jon, there is somewhere in the middle between doing

00:23:47 ◼   ► nothing and completely eviscerating the lineup as it exists today.

00:23:51 ◼   ► I would go even farther, because from my perspective, as I said, women are always trying to get

00:23:57 ◼   ► underrepresented in tech podcasts. And like we should, I think we linked to Rocket last week,

00:24:01 ◼   ► we should put more links in the show notes of other podcasts, tech podcasts that are very similar

00:24:05 ◼   ► to ATP, but have women on them. There's the Vector podcast with Georgia Dow and iMore, there's the

00:24:10 ◼   ► iMore podcast with Serenity and Ali and then Rocket. Like the fact that I can't name more than

00:24:17 ◼   ► a handful of these off the top of my head shows you there is not a lot of them, but they are out

00:24:20 ◼   ► there. And so women looking to hear other women's voices on the topics of tech, you

00:24:26 ◼   ► know, there are options and I think there should be more of them. You know, should

00:24:31 ◼   ► our show be one of them? Like our show is our show is the three of us, right? But

00:24:35 ◼   ► like from from my perspective, I think it's very possible that we can do maybe

00:24:41 ◼   ► not more good, but a tremendous amount of good by talking to our, you know, making

00:24:47 ◼   ► our show more inclusive so it doesn't feel like that if you're a woman

00:24:50 ◼   ► listening that you somehow shouldn't be and this isn't the place for you, right?

00:24:52 ◼   ► So a lot of the things are like, what can we do to change? Tons of things like, what can we

00:24:56 ◼   ► stop doing that is bad? What can we do that is that is repelling women, right?

00:25:00 ◼   ► Can we, you know, we only talk about a certain number of things each week.

00:25:04 ◼   ► Out of the huge range of things we could talk about, by picking different things to talk about,

00:25:10 ◼   ► can we change the show? And most importantly, I feel like, even if we are completely unsuccessful

00:25:15 ◼   ► in our efforts to get more women and girls to listen to the show,

00:25:19 ◼   ► by talking to the men who listen to the show, that is probably, realistically speaking,

00:25:24 ◼   ► our best avenue for positive change. Because if we could snap our fingers and convince all the men

00:25:29 ◼   ► on the show to get on board with our way of thinking about this, as regressive as ours even

00:25:35 ◼   ► may be, but just like to move them along the continuum, that would be a tremendous benefit.

00:25:39 ◼   ► And that's one of the pieces of feedback I have heard from a lot of people, especially people

00:25:41 ◼   ► deeply entrenched in this issue, is that if you can change... It's the men's behavior that needs

00:25:48 ◼   ► to change, right? So we were all about like, can we make the show more inclusive? Can we make sure

00:25:51 ◼   ► we're not doing anything to repel women? We had to get rid of the men to say, in a nice way,

00:25:57 ◼   ► we can't say like, "Oh, you guys are all bad people. You shouldn't listen." Like, that is not

00:26:00 ◼   ► it. That is not it at all. We want to be able to, like, bring people along with the ideas that we

00:26:07 ◼   ► have. And even if we're only just talking to men, that is a huge way that we can make a positive

00:26:14 ◼   ► of change in this area.

00:26:16 ◼   ► So I feel like the three of us, if we change the show

00:26:21 ◼   ► while keeping the format and while keeping the three of us

00:26:23 ◼   ► there, I still feel like we can do a massive amount of good

00:26:25 ◼   ► if we can just figure out how to do it

00:26:27 ◼   ► and get our acts together.

00:26:29 ◼   ► - We also got a lot of feedback that was suggesting

00:26:33 ◼   ► what would make the show more appealing to women,

00:26:38 ◼   ► but that's how the people presented it,

00:26:41 ◼   ► but in reality, it's not about,

00:26:44 ◼   ► it would make the show more attractive to anybody

00:26:46 ◼   ► of any gender, it had nothing to do with women.

00:26:48 ◼   ► So things like just making it easier for new listeners

00:26:53 ◼   ► to get into the show.

00:26:53 ◼   ► So not spending the entire show on follow-up,

00:26:56 ◼   ► not being too much inside jokes, stuff like that.

00:26:59 ◼   ► - Nobody said don't send the whole show on follow-up.

00:27:01 ◼   ► Don't try to throw a follow-up under the bus

00:27:03 ◼   ► and mix it into the other topic, nice try.

00:27:05 ◼   ► - A few did, but anyway, it was--

00:27:06 ◼   ► - Who did that, jump in that email.

00:27:09 ◼   ► - You think I keep email, that's great.

00:27:12 ◼   ► - I do read it, I don't keep it.

00:27:14 ◼   ► No, there are things about our show format

00:27:17 ◼   ► that we can definitely improve on,

00:27:19 ◼   ► things that will make it easier for any new listeners

00:27:22 ◼   ► to come in and to stick with us.

00:27:25 ◼   ► And that's, a lot of people frame those things as,

00:27:28 ◼   ► here's why women don't like your show,

00:27:30 ◼   ► which is a complete BS,

00:27:32 ◼   ► or it's at least not the whole story.

00:27:34 ◼   ► It's like, here's why a new listener might not stick around.

00:27:37 ◼   ► That's the real story.

00:27:38 ◼   ► And so there are things there that we need to

00:27:40 ◼   ► and should improve to get more women listening,

00:27:44 ◼   ► mostly because that's how we get more people listening.

00:27:47 ◼   ► Like it has nothing to do with women.

00:27:49 ◼   ► - Well, I mean, like I said on the past show,

00:27:51 ◼   ► you can, like some of them were, you know,

00:27:53 ◼   ► like, not that they said this, but as I said last time,

00:27:56 ◼   ► if we talked about politics, we would have much broader appeal

00:27:59 ◼   ► than if we talk about programming.

00:28:00 ◼   ► And a lot of people, we've always got complaints

00:28:02 ◼   ► when we go into the super programming stuff,

00:28:04 ◼   ► but bottom line is that's one of the things

00:28:05 ◼   ► that we wanna talk about.

00:28:06 ◼   ► We are three programmers on a podcast.

00:28:09 ◼   ► We're gonna talk about programming.

00:28:10 ◼   ► Some people love the programming, some people hate it.

00:28:14 ◼   ► That's more of just a narrow versus broad issue.

00:28:16 ◼   ► It is not specifically a gendered issue, I feel like.

00:28:19 ◼   ► But yeah, a lot of people say, "I'm not super into programming, so whenever you talk about

00:28:25 ◼   ► programming, I tune out."

00:28:26 ◼   ► And we've been getting that feedback for the life of the program.

00:28:28 ◼   ► There is a ceiling on our appeal.

00:28:31 ◼   ► If we did a show about politics, it would have way broader appeal, but that's not the

00:28:36 ◼   ► show we're doing.

00:28:38 ◼   ► So in many ways, it's the same type of thing.

00:28:42 ◼   ► Oh, so you want to broaden your eyes?

00:28:44 ◼   ► You want to get more women to listen?

00:28:45 ◼   ► Well, change what you talk about.

00:28:46 ◼   ► It's like, yes, OK, change what we talk about in what way?

00:28:48 ◼   ► Well, I would love it if you didn't

00:28:49 ◼   ► talk about programming anymore.

00:28:50 ◼   ► Well, yeah, there are lots of women programmers

00:28:54 ◼   ► who listen who like when we talk about programming.

00:28:56 ◼   ► We're doing a show about programming.

00:28:57 ◼   ► I would love it if you didn't talk about Apple.

00:29:00 ◼   ► Maybe more people would listen if we didn't talk about Apple,

00:29:02 ◼   ► if we talked about something with much broader appeal.

00:29:05 ◼   ► So that's something we have to deal with.

00:29:06 ◼   ► We're always trying to say, well, you know,

00:29:08 ◼   ► within the confines of what?

00:29:09 ◼   ► Oh, you wanted brought another show,

00:29:10 ◼   ► but you don't want to change your show.

00:29:12 ◼   ► We do want to change it within the confines

00:29:14 ◼   ► of the topic area, right?

00:29:17 ◼   ► And the three of us and everything.

00:29:18 ◼   ► And that's like, to many people,

00:29:20 ◼   ► that is basically sort of like,

00:29:22 ◼   ► you don't really want to change.

00:29:24 ◼   ► You say you want to change.

00:29:25 ◼   ► You say you want to make the show more inclusive.

00:29:27 ◼   ► You say you want to make it more appealing,

00:29:28 ◼   ► but you don't want to actually change anything

00:29:29 ◼   ► about the show.

00:29:30 ◼   ► And I reiterate again,

00:29:31 ◼   ► I think there are just so many things we could change

00:29:33 ◼   ► within this format to do better.

00:29:35 ◼   ► Just a tremendous amount of things we can change

00:29:37 ◼   ► that we will hopefully be working on moving forward

00:29:40 ◼   ► that can make this show more inclusive

00:29:43 ◼   ► and change people's hearts and minds

00:29:47 ◼   ► who do listen to the show, men or women on whatever,

00:29:50 ◼   ► I don't know.

00:29:51 ◼   ► I just feel somewhat defeated by this entire topic.

00:29:56 ◼   ► - Yeah, and I think we should probably put a fork in it

00:29:59 ◼   ► for today and a couple of quick thoughts.

00:30:01 ◼   ► First of all, if you are listening to this and don't care for it, I am sorry to hear

00:30:09 ◼   ► that.

00:30:10 ◼   ► Please do not bother writing in to tell us that you don't care for it because this

00:30:13 ◼   ► is going to continue to happen and you can either carry on with the show or not.

00:30:20 ◼   ► But this is something that's very important to the three of us and we're going to keep

00:30:24 ◼   ► talking about it and that's just the way it is.

00:30:26 ◼   ► And it's absolutely on topic.

00:30:28 ◼   ► This is a major problem in the tech industry.

00:30:31 ◼   ► It is definitely relevant for tech podcasts to talk about this issue.

00:30:35 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:30:36 ◼   ► And the other thing, I'm seeing a lot of angst in the chat room right now that we're

00:30:41 ◼   ► doing a lot of navel gazing and talking about the show and talking about, "Oh, what could

00:30:46 ◼   ► we do?

00:30:47 ◼   ► What could we do?"

00:30:48 ◼   ► But not doing anything.

00:30:49 ◼   ► Two quick thoughts on that.

00:30:50 ◼   ► First of all, I think just talking about this is doing something.

00:30:52 ◼   ► I mean, would you rather us not talk about this?

00:30:55 ◼   ► I don't think that's really a solution.

00:30:57 ◼   ► And secondly, outside of the show, in Private Conversations between the three of us, we

00:31:02 ◼   ► are absolutely discussing pretty much anything that we've gotten in email.

00:31:08 ◼   ► We are discussing and considering pretty much everything.

00:31:14 ◼   ► Even things we probably don't want to do or may not do are on the table in Private Conversations

00:31:20 ◼   ► between the three of us.

00:31:21 ◼   ► I ask only that you bear with us and give us a chance to get our heads around everything,

00:31:25 ◼   ► us a chance to put things together and watch the space. I know it's probably not happening

00:31:31 ◼   ► as quick as it should, it's probably not happening as quick as it could, but we are working on

00:31:36 ◼   ► it and we are trying as hard as we can. And expect us to screw up, like expect us to do

00:31:43 ◼   ► badly again, you know what I mean? Like it's not, don't expect miracles, right? And we

00:31:48 ◼   ► will never go as far as some people want us to go. People will always be disappointed

00:31:52 ◼   ► in us. Like, people will be disappointed that this show exists at all, which is clear from

00:31:55 ◼   ► the feedback sometimes, right? But, you know, some people like it. It's like, I just feel like,

00:32:04 ◼   ► you know, that one of the traps that men fall into when they get into this topic is like,

00:32:08 ◼   ► I'm gonna, I'm gonna do good here. I am going to champion the rights of whatever, you know,

00:32:14 ◼   ► oppressed people that I'm getting behind this cause, blah, blah, blah. And then they get told

00:32:20 ◼   ► that what they're doing is wrong and they're like "but I was trying to help, well forget you guys,

00:32:26 ◼   ► now I'm not even going to help anymore" and it's like that's exactly, you just have to,

00:32:29 ◼   ► that's exactly the wrong attitude and we're trying mightily to avoid that. Like it's,

00:32:33 ◼   ► you have to understand that everyone is not going to agree with you, everyone is not going to like

00:32:40 ◼   ► you, and the closer you get to trying to make some kind of progress, the more angry people will be

00:32:44 ◼   ► that you didn't go far enough. And that is a positive force I feel like, pushing us in the

00:32:49 ◼   ► right direction not the wrong direction. I'm trying to get that as as a wind behind us.

00:32:53 ◼   ► As we become ever more disappointing to the people who are really invested in this cause,

00:32:58 ◼   ► I'm hoping we're actually moving more towards like we're making positive progress in that direction,

00:33:03 ◼   ► right? That we're not going the other way, that we don't get repelled by that, that we don't

00:33:06 ◼   ► that we don't start to resent the idea that boohoo people said mean things to us who are quote

00:33:11 ◼   ► unquote on our side. I want that to be a wind at our back rather than something deterring us from

00:33:17 ◼   ► pursuing this. So, Plex. Yeah, I spoke last week about how the Synology, or certain Synology,

00:33:26 ◼   ► specifically I think I cited the DS214 play as having the proper hardware to transcode

00:33:34 ◼   ► video and do so quickly, which makes it really great for Plex. A handful of people very gently

00:33:39 ◼   ► pointed out to me that I am full of crap, and that the 214 does indeed have the right

00:33:44 ◼   ► hardware. However, Plex does not have access to it because of whatever is going on within

00:33:51 ◼   ► the Synology. I don't know the technical details, but suffice to say I'm full of crap.

00:33:56 ◼   ► So what I have found, or I think a listener actually pointed out to me, is a list of all

00:34:02 ◼   ► the different network attached storage devices that Plex will run on. And it will, and it

00:34:08 ◼   ► It shows exactly what these devices can and cannot transcode in a reasonably performant

00:34:15 ◼   ► way.

00:34:16 ◼   ► So we will put that in the show notes.

00:34:18 ◼   ► I apologize if you took any action on my BS recommendation.

00:34:22 ◼   ► I did not realize that I was dead wrong, but hopefully I've caught you before you spend

00:34:26 ◼   ► any money.

00:34:27 ◼   ► I do love my Synology.

00:34:29 ◼   ► I do not have a 214 anymore.

00:34:32 ◼   ► I have one that is not at all well suited for transcoding.

00:34:35 ◼   ► And so I do recommend Synologies in general, but I cannot recommend the 214 that I previously

00:34:41 ◼   ► recommended because as it turns out, they are a terrible idea for Plex.

00:34:46 ◼   ► So check out that list and buy one that actually works to do the things I thought the 214 would.

00:34:52 ◼   ► Yeah, I had high hopes for that hardware transcoding, but I don't use Plex.

00:34:56 ◼   ► So what I found was that when the hardware transcoding was useful, it was good.

00:35:00 ◼   ► But if you are downloading more exotic, weird formats, or you have no idea what the hell

00:35:06 ◼   ► formats you are downloading, legally, of course, very often the hardware transcoding can't

00:35:10 ◼   ► handle it.

00:35:11 ◼   ► And there's one thing about software transcoding, it may be slower, but it can do a much broader

00:35:18 ◼   ► range of things.

00:35:19 ◼   ► So I find myself wishing that rather than hardware decoding, I really had a faster CPU

00:35:24 ◼   ► to do software decoding, software transcoding.

00:35:26 ◼   ► All right.

00:35:28 ◼   ► What is going on with iPhoto and Time Machine?

00:35:31 ◼   ► - I think this was right after last week's show

00:35:33 ◼   ► that we got this feedback direct link

00:35:35 ◼   ► to an Apple support article saying,

00:35:36 ◼   ► "Whatever happened to that thing?

00:35:37 ◼   ► "Did I imagine that Time Machine integration?"

00:35:39 ◼   ► Apparently I did not imagine it,

00:35:41 ◼   ► although this thing doesn't have screenshots.

00:35:42 ◼   ► It says, "As of iPhoto 11,"

00:35:45 ◼   ► which was version 9.2, obviously,

00:35:47 ◼   ► and OS 10 Lion 10.7.2 or later,

00:35:53 ◼   ► that's when iPhoto lost the ability to browse backups,

00:35:56 ◼   ► as they call it.

00:35:57 ◼   ► according to the Apple article,

00:35:59 ◼   ► this means that instead of restoring specific photos

00:36:01 ◼   ► within your iPhoto library,

00:36:02 ◼   ► you must restore your entire iPhoto library.

00:36:04 ◼   ► So I forget when iPhoto 11 was, I'm assuming 2011,

00:36:07 ◼   ► but that's when this feature went away

00:36:08 ◼   ► and there was no more integration.

00:36:10 ◼   ► And I assume this is a feature that was never public

00:36:12 ◼   ► for like third-party apps,

00:36:14 ◼   ► that it was something only iPhoto could do

00:36:15 ◼   ► 'cause it was written by Apple.

00:36:17 ◼   ► And it has fallen by the wayside, sadly.

00:36:20 ◼   ► Or maybe it's a good thing, I don't know.

00:36:22 ◼   ► - Our first sponsor this week is Cards Against Humanity.

00:36:26 ◼   ► And as usual, they have sent Jon a toaster to review in lieu of a sponsor read here.

00:36:31 ◼   ► So Jon, what is the toaster that Cards Against Humanity sent you to review this week?

00:36:35 ◼   ► So this week we've got the Cuisinart Custom Classic Toaster Oven Broiler, which I guess

00:36:40 ◼   ► has a sensible name.

00:36:42 ◼   ► It is model number T capital O capital B hyphen four zero, another model number with both

00:36:48 ◼   ► an O and a zero in it, which boggles my mind.

00:36:51 ◼   ► I don't know how they keep anything straight.

00:36:54 ◼   ► This is about the same size as my Breville 650L or whatever my model number is that I

00:36:59 ◼   ► always forget.

00:37:00 ◼   ► It is a legit four-slice toaster oven.

00:37:05 ◼   ► It's got four unshielded resistive heating elements inside it.

00:37:09 ◼   ► It has a very straightforward UI.

00:37:11 ◼   ► This is the first toaster that I did not ever need to look at the instructions for, which

00:37:14 ◼   ► is saying something.

00:37:15 ◼   ► It shouldn't be, but it is.

00:37:17 ◼   ► That's really sad.

00:37:18 ◼   ► Yeah.

00:37:19 ◼   ► Three knobs on the – I usually look at the instructions and figure out if there's some

00:37:22 ◼   ► nuance I'm missing.

00:37:23 ◼   ► Like I could usually operate any toaster, but then like, okay, but then what about,

00:37:27 ◼   ► you know, there's some nuance here that I'm probably missing.

00:37:30 ◼   ► I need to look at the manual.

00:37:31 ◼   ► This one has just had three knobs, one for function, like toast, broil, bake, reheat,

00:37:36 ◼   ► whatever.

00:37:37 ◼   ► One for temperature that goes from, you know, the normal range of toaster oven temperatures

00:37:40 ◼   ► in degrees Fahrenheit and one for toast shade and the toast shade one you set to like, you

00:37:46 ◼   ► know, it's a big range.

00:37:47 ◼   ► You set it to what you want and then there is a start stop button.

00:37:50 ◼   ► So if you find the correct setting for your toast every morning, you don't have to adjust

00:37:53 ◼   ► it, you just press the button, it does it repeatedly.

00:37:54 ◼   ► So that's all good.

00:37:57 ◼   ► There is no timer at all, which I didn't notice until a little bit later.

00:38:00 ◼   ► I'm like, you know what, there's no way for me to set this thing for 10 minutes, 15 minutes.

00:38:04 ◼   ► No timer at all, which is a very interesting simplification, almost an Apple-like move.

00:38:07 ◼   ► They're like, because it's very difficult to incorporate all those things together and

00:38:11 ◼   ► have all the desirable features of not having to figure out where the setting is without

00:38:15 ◼   ► either going to something digital like the Breville where you have, you know, a computer

00:38:18 ◼   ► display, right? Or LCD display. Or making your thing complicated. So there's just no

00:38:23 ◼   ► timer at all, this. Or if there is, I didn't find one because I didn't read the manual.

00:38:27 ◼   ► But I'm pretty sure there's no timer. Just a start/stop button.

00:38:29 ◼   ► Now, does that make it harder to use the oven feature? Because obviously with a toaster,

00:38:34 ◼   ► you don't really need a timer, you need the darkness knob, which it does have. But does

00:38:38 ◼   ► the lack of a timer make the oven feature less useful to you?

00:38:41 ◼   ► It depends. Like, you should know that it doesn't have a timer if that's something you

00:38:44 ◼   ► rely on. I find that with any feature except for toasting on my existing toaster oven,

00:38:48 ◼   ► I don't tend to use the timer. I just kind of like put it in. If anything, it kind of annoys me if the

00:38:52 ◼   ► timer is too low, like if I'm reheating something and the timer was like six minutes, I'm like,

00:38:55 ◼   ► "Oh, actually I want to just..." I usually just turn the knob and I say, "Just 30, 60 minutes.

00:38:59 ◼   ► Like I'm never... I'm going to take it out when I feel like it's done. I'm not going to forget

00:39:02 ◼   ► about it." Right? But if you want a timer, this is not the toaster for you. The knobs themselves,

00:39:06 ◼   ► really good knob feel. Actually, it's probably average knob feel, but compared to the knob feel

00:39:12 ◼   ► on these other toasters it is phenomenal right and by the way if you don't know

00:39:16 ◼   ► what the knob feel YouTube channel we'll put a link in the show you should check

00:39:19 ◼   ► it out it's just that's a thing wait really you don't never heard of the knob

00:39:23 ◼   ► feel YouTube channel no are you honestly surprised that we have never heard of

00:39:26 ◼   ► that yes cuz it's like a meme it's like it's not like an obscure you know it's

00:39:30 ◼   ► supposed to be funny like it's a guy who just films himself fiddling with knobs

00:39:33 ◼   ► and I think he made a terrible mistake at the beginning of like the his format

00:39:40 ◼   ► is he films his hand fiddling with knobs and then he doesn't say any words he makes noises

00:39:44 ◼   ► like grunts like mmm like that's that's it and he's really confined himself by not having

00:39:50 ◼   ► words like there's tons of these videos if he only had incorporated words it would be

00:39:54 ◼   ► a much richer experience i feel like anyway um these knobs are are weighty and smooth

00:40:00 ◼   ► and they feel expensive and like the best comparison is my Breville toaster which has

00:40:05 ◼   ► like the worst feeling knobs i've ever felt on an appliance in my life and i don't understand

00:40:09 ◼   ► Why this or all I do because they're made of plastic and they're flimsy, you know

00:40:12 ◼   ► But like why why didn't they spend more money? Right? Anyway, great knobs one big problem with these knobs though

00:40:16 ◼   ► You can't tell where the knobs are pointing

00:40:19 ◼   ► because like that the knobs have like a matte black plastic around them with ridges and one ridge is ever so slightly taller than all the

00:40:26 ◼   ► Other ridges and you can tell by feel where that ridge is

00:40:29 ◼   ► But by looking at it forget it like and there's no markings on the front of the knob like a little red triangle or something

00:40:34 ◼   ► So figuring out where the knobs are pointing like what what function is this set to what temperature is it set to you?

00:40:39 ◼   ► Basically have to feel on the thing, especially if your toaster is in a slightly darker, you know under a counter type area

00:40:44 ◼   ► They really blew it on those knobs. Great knob feel not great knobs and

00:40:50 ◼   ► It's got a tray in it. That's kind of like a u-shape like dip down which seems weird to me, but then I realize

00:40:56 ◼   ► What they want you to do and I actually confirm this by looking at the little pictures on the side of the boxes

00:41:01 ◼   ► You can there's two different sets of slots

00:41:04 ◼   ► You can slide the tray into but then within each slot you can flip the tray over to

00:41:08 ◼   ► Do plus or minus like an inch because of the dip and the thing it's hard to explain

00:41:12 ◼   ► I want to put a picture in the show notes

00:41:13 ◼   ► But anyway, there's essentially four different positions

00:41:15 ◼   ► You can put the thing in not just two two slots in each slot you can put in two different positions

00:41:20 ◼   ► That seems like an interesting idea to get more flexibility of like different positions

00:41:24 ◼   ► But overall I don't think it's worth it because like things get caught on the little u-shape thing

00:41:28 ◼   ► You're trying to slide a piece of toast out if you have four slices in there

00:41:31 ◼   ► So clever idea but in the end I would say ditched

00:41:34 ◼   ► This does have a thing that tries to pull the tray out when you open and close the door

00:41:37 ◼   ► But because you can reposition the tray they can't make a single mechanism to do that

00:41:42 ◼   ► They have to put kind of like a metal hook that catches the the tray in both positions

00:41:47 ◼   ► So if the thing is really high or really low it will catch a different areas

00:41:50 ◼   ► Like it's a difficult problem to solve I understand if you want to make a movable tray

00:41:53 ◼   ► How do you connect something to it so it comes out but again like it technically kind of works

00:41:58 ◼   ► But if you ever have to you move the tray manually when you close the door again

00:42:02 ◼   ► You let the little hook has to reengage and it bumps the tray up

00:42:05 ◼   ► Lots of weird compromises this machine. It's about a minute slower than my toaster to toast a piece of bread

00:42:10 ◼   ► but in all other ways it is very comparable to my toaster just a

00:42:15 ◼   ► Bit dumber and a bit clunkier but with better knob feel so that that was kind of long

00:42:20 ◼   ► I'm sorry

00:42:20 ◼   ► But this was actually a very interesting toaster to better knob feel but worse overall knobs because of it the difficulty and detecting yes

00:42:27 ◼   ► Yes, worse worse overall knob right totally because you can't tell where they're pointing

00:42:31 ◼   ► But it feels good to turn them so in summary. This is better or worse than the Breville

00:42:37 ◼   ► Oh, it's worse definitely

00:42:38 ◼   ► I mean the Breville has like digital timers and like you know the it's just way better to

00:42:43 ◼   ► Adjustments for a number of slices and and auto adjust the time based on the temperature inside the toaster the other Breville is a better

00:42:50 ◼   ► toaster

00:42:51 ◼   ► Functionally this just has some interesting aspects, and it is very similar to the Breville in terms of size

00:42:56 ◼   ► and even appearance

00:42:58 ◼   ► Do you think this is a good value for 80 bucks? It sounds like you're saying yes

00:43:01 ◼   ► Yeah, I mean it's a little slow like a minute slower to toast

00:43:05 ◼   ► That's that's in the borderline of like I feel like I feel like I would still probably take the black and Decker three knob over

00:43:11 ◼   ► This because at least that toast that's my big hang up. It's my personal thing

00:43:14 ◼   ► I feel I don't want to waste that long for toast if it's into the four minute range for a piece of toast

00:43:17 ◼   ► No, like I you know, I I would still probably take the smaller more conventional also three knob by the way black and Decker

00:43:25 ◼   ► Over this thing. It's just kind of a dead ringer for the Breville, but like I can see where that extra

00:43:31 ◼   ► You know hundred whatever dollars went for mine

00:43:34 ◼   ► Thank you very much to Cards Against Humanity for sponsoring our show once again

00:43:39 ◼   ► All right, we got some pretty good feedback from Kitty John. Do you want to talk about this?

00:43:44 ◼   ► yeah, this was on the topic of

00:43:47 ◼   ► Watches replacing phones. I think we have another piece of feedback about this as well and her idea was

00:43:55 ◼   ► A lot of the features that the phone has, not the phone has, the watch has that don't

00:44:00 ◼   ► necessarily seem to be watch related, specifically all the little things about sending little

00:44:08 ◼   ► pictures to people and the 3D emoji and all the different fitness app type things.

00:44:14 ◼   ► Obviously you need to have an accelerometer in there or whatever, but the phone has an

00:44:16 ◼   ► accelerometer.

00:44:17 ◼   ► The phone has a screen.

00:44:18 ◼   ► The phone has all these things.

00:44:19 ◼   ► Why are they on the watch now?

00:44:20 ◼   ► In that aspect, this is true of a lot of Apple products.

00:44:23 ◼   ► the new glory product is seems to get a lot of the cool features first and then they trickle

00:44:29 ◼   ► down.

00:44:30 ◼   ► This happened a long time with like, hey, iOS got some cool feature and then eventually

00:44:33 ◼   ► it came to the Mac and then it reversed the direction a few times there.

00:44:38 ◼   ► I don't know if those things will ever come to the phone.

00:44:40 ◼   ► They're right that there's nothing stopping them from being on the phone, including all

00:44:43 ◼   ► the fitness tracking stuff, because hey, the phone's got an accelerometer and everything

00:44:45 ◼   ► too.

00:44:46 ◼   ► You can't do obviously the blood pressure or the pulse stuff, but everything else could

00:44:50 ◼   ► happen on the phone.

00:44:51 ◼   ► be a shame if all the advancement of those features happens on the watch instead of the phone,

00:44:56 ◼   ► but I would kind of understand it. And the second one is like things like watch faces,

00:45:01 ◼   ► with the complications on them and everything. The iOS home screen, as a bazillion people have

00:45:06 ◼   ► pointed out many many times, including many Android fans, the iOS home screen could be a

00:45:11 ◼   ► lot cooler if it supported essentially complications, otherwise known as widgets, or you know,

00:45:16 ◼   ► any kind of customization so you could make your lock screen or your home screen more customizable

00:45:21 ◼   ► than you can now. Apple has been moving slightly in that direction with the, you know, the

00:45:25 ◼   ► notification center and the ability to put widgets in there and stuff, but in the end,

00:45:29 ◼   ► the home screen, you know, springboard is still just a big grid of icons with some clumsy

00:45:34 ◼   ► foldering thrown in. And I think I would, you know, if I could have complications, you

00:45:40 ◼   ► know, in scare quotes on the iOS home screen, I think that would be a plus. But again, we'll

00:45:45 ◼   ► see if that ever comes, instead of back to the Mac, back to the iPhone in this case.

00:45:50 ◼   ► (laughing)

00:45:51 ◼   ► I mean, and part of the reason why I think we don't have,

00:45:54 ◼   ► you know, we have complications on the watch case,

00:45:55 ◼   ► but you don't have complications on your lock screen

00:45:57 ◼   ► on your phone, I think part of the reason why

00:46:00 ◼   ► is just inertia.

00:46:01 ◼   ► You know, like first of all, you do have

00:46:03 ◼   ► the Today View widgets, which I personally don't use,

00:46:05 ◼   ► 'cause I don't use Today View.

00:46:07 ◼   ► And I would definitely use lock screen complications

00:46:11 ◼   ► long before I'd use Today View stuff.

00:46:13 ◼   ► But keep in mind, so not only do they have

00:46:16 ◼   ► like an existing thing that kind of does that,

00:46:19 ◼   ► Because iOS has been around for so long

00:46:21 ◼   ► and is so powerful within the company,

00:46:24 ◼   ► even though it is not like the glory product

00:46:26 ◼   ► that the watch is right now,

00:46:28 ◼   ► there's inertia with managerial decisions there.

00:46:32 ◼   ► So somewhere in Apple, probably pretty high up,

00:46:35 ◼   ► there's some manager or VP holding tight to the idea

00:46:38 ◼   ► that there should not be widgets on an iPhone home screen,

00:46:40 ◼   ► as far as you know.

00:46:41 ◼   ► I mean, maybe iOS 9 changes this, who knows, but I doubt it.

00:46:44 ◼   ► So somewhere there's somebody who decided that

00:46:46 ◼   ► a long time ago and is sticking with that decision

00:46:49 ◼   ► is not letting that change yet.

00:46:50 ◼   ► And anything that's been around for a while

00:46:53 ◼   ► is gonna have these kind of people.

00:46:54 ◼   ► Like, there's been a lot of discussion this week

00:46:57 ◼   ► about the Mac App Store, because there was that app,

00:47:01 ◼   ► what was it called?

00:47:02 ◼   ► Reveal?

00:47:03 ◼   ► - Redacted. - Redacted, yeah.

00:47:05 ◼   ► That hit number one and made very little money

00:47:08 ◼   ► being number one.

00:47:08 ◼   ► And even though it's not quite number one,

00:47:10 ◼   ► it's not quite, anyway, doesn't matter.

00:47:12 ◼   ► Lot of discussion about the Mac App Store

00:47:14 ◼   ► and how much it sucks.

00:47:15 ◼   ► Personally, I think the Mac App Store situation,

00:47:18 ◼   ► it can be blamed on one major thing, and that's sandboxing.

00:47:22 ◼   ► You know, like the app review, the 30% cut,

00:47:26 ◼   ► lack of upgrade pricing, all those things hurt,

00:47:29 ◼   ► but none of them hurt as much as sandboxing did,

00:47:31 ◼   ► in my opinion.

00:47:33 ◼   ► I think sandboxing on the Mac has been a massive loss,

00:47:37 ◼   ► a massive net loss overall.

00:47:39 ◼   ► And it has cost the Mac App Store a lot of good apps

00:47:44 ◼   ► and a lot of developer goodwill.

00:47:46 ◼   ► But somewhere in Apple, there's clearly somebody

00:47:49 ◼   ► who has power who is keeping sandboxing there

00:47:52 ◼   ► and keeping sandboxing a requirement

00:47:53 ◼   ► to be in the Mac App Store.

00:47:55 ◼   ► And so, even though it looks like it might not

00:47:58 ◼   ► be the best idea for the product,

00:48:00 ◼   ► just the fact is when you have a big company,

00:48:02 ◼   ► you have people, you have power,

00:48:04 ◼   ► you have power struggles sometimes,

00:48:06 ◼   ► you have debates internally,

00:48:07 ◼   ► there's these other factors that keep things

00:48:09 ◼   ► the way they are, even if it's not ideal.

00:48:11 ◼   ► So in this case, the watch comes up

00:48:13 ◼   ► and the watch is kind of a clean slate.

00:48:14 ◼   ► I mean, you know, it seems to run some variant of iOS,

00:48:17 ◼   ► but it is basically a clean slate in like

00:48:20 ◼   ► the things it offers, the things it doesn't,

00:48:21 ◼   ► the UI it offers, where things are allowed,

00:48:23 ◼   ► where things aren't allowed.

00:48:25 ◼   ► And so it was able to do things that

00:48:27 ◼   ► we might not see for a while on iOS.

00:48:30 ◼   ► - Not the sidetrack on this thing,

00:48:32 ◼   ► but in the sandboxing, the guy at Apple who thinks

00:48:36 ◼   ► they should do sandboxing, I think I mostly agree with that.

00:48:39 ◼   ► Like, I think sandboxing is a positive direction

00:48:44 ◼   ► for the Mac to go, but the execution of that,

00:48:46 ◼   ► of the implementation of that policy

00:48:48 ◼   ► left a lot to be desired.

00:48:50 ◼   ► Having it become mandatory before it was full featured,

00:48:52 ◼   ► right, having there be so few ways for apps to,

00:48:57 ◼   ► to, you know, like to do things outside of sandboxing

00:49:02 ◼   ► on a case by case basis with exceptions.

00:49:04 ◼   ► Like it just, I feel like if sandbox,

00:49:07 ◼   ► even if sandboxing had sprung into existence

00:49:10 ◼   ► in its current state immediately,

00:49:13 ◼   ► like not that you can do that because you know it needs to be developed to some degree

00:49:16 ◼   ► but like the capabilities that were possible in sandboxing early on were just so limited

00:49:21 ◼   ► and so broken and so weird and so buggy to mandate people going to that was just that

00:49:26 ◼   ► was getting off on the wrong foot.

00:49:28 ◼   ► I think you do have to bring them back towards a sandboxing type environment but the way

00:49:32 ◼   ► to get there is like not the way they've done it so I feel like that is more of an execution

00:49:38 ◼   ► fumble than a theoretical fumble and I do think that there will always be things that

00:49:43 ◼   ► that are outside the sandbox and should be allowed to be on the Mac App Store with caveats,

00:49:48 ◼   ► with some kind of warning, blah, blah, blah, but like moving that direction is good. I

00:49:52 ◼   ► mean, maybe it's similar with all the other decisions that like you may agree with the

00:49:56 ◼   ► end state goal, but you don't agree that the way that Apple plans to get there is going

00:50:02 ◼   ► to be successful or has been beneficial.

00:50:04 ◼   ► Yeah, that's, I mean, that's basically how I feel. Like sandboxing in theory is a huge

00:50:09 ◼   ► security improvement. And I would like to be in the place where everything is sandboxed

00:50:14 ◼   ► properly, but I agree that the way it's been done has been pretty miserable. And the reality

00:50:22 ◼   ► is you have this system that is, you know, opt-in by a very small number of apps. It's

00:50:29 ◼   ► not preventing Mac malware. It's not preventing major apps from just going around the app

00:50:33 ◼   ► an app store and song themselves elsewhere.

00:50:36 ◼   ► There's still tons of software that is made

00:50:39 ◼   ► and run every day that's not sandboxed,

00:50:41 ◼   ► including a lot of Apple software,

00:50:43 ◼   ► because it's either not sandboxed or sandboxed technically,

00:50:46 ◼   ► but is given these blanket permissions

00:50:49 ◼   ► to do anything it wants,

00:50:50 ◼   ► and so it's kind of not really sandboxed.

00:50:53 ◼   ► So in theory, it's a great idea

00:50:56 ◼   ► if everything on the system can be properly sandboxed.

00:50:59 ◼   ► In practice, how do we get there?

00:51:01 ◼   ► What they've done so far has been miserable the best thing

00:51:04 ◼   ► For sandboxing like the best use to sandboxing and Apple is doing this as well as for Apple to sandbox its stuff

00:51:10 ◼   ► And it has been it's been sandboxing tons of its demon processes parts of the OS like

00:51:15 ◼   ► You know sandboxing has to exist Apple should be the primary user of it. They should be applying it

00:51:21 ◼   ► Pretty strictly to all parts of the OS that they possibly can to have them have the least privileges at least access so and so

00:51:27 ◼   ► And during that process, applying it to their GUI apps,

00:51:30 ◼   ► applying it to, you know,

00:51:31 ◼   ► they should be dogfooding this like crazy.

00:51:33 ◼   ► They should be ringing it out, figuring out everything.

00:51:36 ◼   ► And then offering it to developers as,

00:51:38 ◼   ► this is a way for you to write your app

00:51:41 ◼   ► in a way that you don't have to worry about some bug

00:51:42 ◼   ► hosing the entire person's computer.

00:51:45 ◼   ► Like sell it as a benefit, not as like,

00:51:47 ◼   ► you have to do this because we say so.

00:51:49 ◼   ► And if your app doesn't work because of it, oh well,

00:51:51 ◼   ► you get an exception that's on a ticking time bomb

00:51:53 ◼   ► that's gonna run out in about a year.

00:51:55 ◼   ► So either stop selling your app or make a new app.

00:51:58 ◼   ► Like it was just done so badly.

00:51:59 ◼   ► And I feel like the sandboxing technology

00:52:02 ◼   ► had to be developed, Apple should be using it.

00:52:04 ◼   ► All app developers can use it, should be using it,

00:52:06 ◼   ► but it should not be,

00:52:07 ◼   ► it should not have been warping the Mac app store

00:52:09 ◼   ► in the way that it did, pushing out good apps

00:52:11 ◼   ► entirely out of the store, making people discouraged

00:52:14 ◼   ► to not even want to develop a Mac app.

00:52:15 ◼   ► Because I know because they're like,

00:52:17 ◼   ► "Well, it doesn't even matter.

00:52:18 ◼   ► My idea won't even work with sandboxing anyway,

00:52:19 ◼   ► so why do I even bother?"

00:52:21 ◼   ► It's just been not great.

00:52:24 ◼   ► Yeah, it seems to me that a lot of times, Apple is "do as I say, not as I do."

00:52:32 ◼   ► And I think sandboxing is a great example of that.

00:52:34 ◼   ► And it's unfortunate because I think a lot of the pain that developers feel, Apple either

00:52:41 ◼   ► feels it and says, "Oh, we'll just not deal with that."

00:52:44 ◼   ► You know, "Oh, this sandboxing, we can't do what we want with sandboxing.

00:52:47 ◼   ► Well, screw it, we're Apple, we don't need to bother."

00:52:49 ◼   ► Or, you know, there are some times, like with CloudKit, where it's embraced.

00:52:56 ◼   ► It's CloudKit that I'm thinking of, right?

00:52:58 ◼   ► That photos runs on?

00:52:59 ◼   ► Yeah, okay.

00:53:00 ◼   ► So CloudKit gets embraced, and from everything I've heard, CloudKit is actually really solid

00:53:04 ◼   ► because Apple dogfooded it.

00:53:05 ◼   ► So it's unfortunate to me that more of that doesn't happen.

00:53:09 ◼   ► Or maybe if it is happening, that nobody knows it, because we're left to assume it's not

00:53:15 ◼   ► happening, and blame that as one of the big issues with, say, sandboxing. But maybe it

00:53:21 ◼   ► is happening, we're just not aware of it.

00:53:23 ◼   ► - I don't know, I mean, to me, like, the Mac App Store as a whole, to me, and I don't,

00:53:29 ◼   ► I've never had an app for sale in the Mac App Store, so I haven't seen that side of

00:53:33 ◼   ► it, but just from reading what our friends say who are in it, and from using it as a

00:53:38 ◼   ► user, it just, it seems like the Mac App Store is like Apple at its worst. Like, all of Apple's

00:53:44 ◼   ► like the worst things they do, they do most of those things

00:53:48 ◼   ► in the Mac App Store, and also there's very little upside.

00:53:51 ◼   ► So like in the iOS App Store, you have to put up with 30%,

00:53:55 ◼   ► you have to put up with all these rules and restrictions,

00:53:57 ◼   ► you have to do app review, but the upside is

00:54:00 ◼   ► you get access to this massive, massive customer base

00:54:03 ◼   ► that is just incredibly high in volume

00:54:06 ◼   ► and there's tons of money floating around

00:54:08 ◼   ► and it's fairly easy, well not fairly easy,

00:54:11 ◼   ► it's possible for many people to make a good living there.

00:54:14 ◼   ► The Mac App Store has all of the same downsides

00:54:18 ◼   ► as the iOS App Store, plus it has a way smaller

00:54:22 ◼   ► install base than iOS.

00:54:25 ◼   ► Even among people who use Macs,

00:54:27 ◼   ► a smaller percentage of them use the Mac App Store.

00:54:31 ◼   ► Also, the Mac App Store app is, I think,

00:54:34 ◼   ► one of the worst apps that ships with OS X.

00:54:37 ◼   ► I mean, it's just a terrible app.

00:54:38 ◼   ► It's buggy, it is confusing to navigate

00:54:41 ◼   ► even when it works properly,

00:54:43 ◼   ► It is visually really wacky and inconsistent

00:54:46 ◼   ► and dated looking.

00:54:48 ◼   ► I mean, there are so, it's just a terrible app.

00:54:50 ◼   ► - The mental model of it always blows my mind

00:54:52 ◼   ► because like how many people know

00:54:53 ◼   ► that if you click the update button

00:54:55 ◼   ► and immediately quit the app,

00:54:56 ◼   ► that the upstate still continues in the background?

00:54:58 ◼   ► Like who would guess that based on the model

00:55:00 ◼   ► of any app they've ever used?

00:55:01 ◼   ► Like, 'cause it's so integrated into the system

00:55:03 ◼   ► with the software update D

00:55:04 ◼   ► or whatever the hell's running in the background.

00:55:06 ◼   ► Like the fact that it could be downloading updates

00:55:08 ◼   ► when the, like, it just totally breaks the model

00:55:10 ◼   ► of an app that most people are used to.

00:55:12 ◼   ► on the Mac, so it's super confusing.

00:55:15 ◼   ► - Yeah, I mean, so the Mac App Store,

00:55:17 ◼   ► like it has all the downsides of the iOS App Store,

00:55:21 ◼   ► plus a number of additional downsides,

00:55:24 ◼   ► and very little of the same upside.

00:55:26 ◼   ► And so it's no wonder that no one's in it,

00:55:29 ◼   ► and there's no activity there.

00:55:31 ◼   ► - The biggest downside is, sadly,

00:55:33 ◼   ► that, sadly for everybody involved,

00:55:35 ◼   ► that there are alternatives to it.

00:55:37 ◼   ► Like, for all the things that developers hate

00:55:40 ◼   ► about the iOS App Store, about the 30%,

00:55:42 ◼   ► about not having your own customers, about not even be able to respond to reviews in

00:55:45 ◼   ► the app, like just all those terrible things.

00:55:47 ◼   ► On the Mac people are like, "Oh, well we don't have to deal with that, we'll just sell it

00:55:51 ◼   ► ourselves."

00:55:52 ◼   ► Right?

00:55:53 ◼   ► We're already a big company, we already know how to sell things, we don't have to sell

00:55:54 ◼   ► in the Mac App Store, we have the alternative, right?

00:55:56 ◼   ► And so that means that they get all the benefits of being able to talk directly to their customers,

00:56:02 ◼   ► be able to sell updates, like all that stuff, but they also get all the downsides that Apple

00:56:06 ◼   ► is trying to help them to avoid.

00:56:08 ◼   ► Like essentially, if there had been only one place where you could get software ready for

00:56:11 ◼   ► your Mac, and I'm not recommending this because I am an old cranky man who likes things the

00:56:15 ◼   ► old way. But anyway, if that had been the case, the Mac App Store, ironically, would

00:56:19 ◼   ► actually be much better, because people would be forced to get into it, that would probably

00:56:24 ◼   ► force Apple to deal with some of its rules, you know, like...

00:56:28 ◼   ► Well, that hasn't happened on iOS. It has, though, because like, I mean, think

00:56:31 ◼   ► about the, oh, no interpreters. Okay, well, I guess games can have interpreters because

00:56:34 ◼   ► they all use scripting language. That's a perfect example of, let's make a bunch of

00:56:39 ◼   ► really strict rules and then let's have unforeseen consequences and what EA

00:56:44 ◼   ► says look you got to let us run Lua scripts that's how our whole games work

00:56:47 ◼   ► EA is big enough for them to go all right all right you can't run

00:56:50 ◼   ► interpreter unless your game running a blah blah blah blah blah and like every

00:56:54 ◼   ► other place where something has been restricted in the iOS App Store if a big

00:56:58 ◼   ► enough or enough important companies you know if it's if it's stopping them from

00:57:02 ◼   ► selling in there or if they if they can't get their applications I'm like

00:57:06 ◼   ► just think of what the Mac App Store would be like if that was the only way

00:57:08 ◼   ► Adobe could get Photoshop onto the Mac. It would have to be very different.

00:57:12 ◼   ► Sandboxing could not exist. What is Apple gonna say? We're not interested in

00:57:16 ◼   ► Photoshop for the Mac anymore, sorry. You know, something would have to give. This

00:57:21 ◼   ► is all just a fantasy hypothetical scenario, not something I recommend you.

00:57:24 ◼   ► It could never actually happen for the Mac being the way it is. General purpose

00:57:27 ◼   ► computer is not a closed system like iOS blah blah blah blah. I understand all this.

00:57:30 ◼   ► I'm just saying like, due to that reality, the Mac App Store is even worse. It's

00:57:37 ◼   ► even further handicapped by the existence of a better, readily available alternative

00:57:43 ◼   ► that Mac developers are already experienced with.

00:57:45 ◼   ► All right, our last piece of follow-up is from Sarah, and she had some very interesting

00:57:50 ◼   ► points with regard to the watch, which, John, you alluded to earlier. Do you want to tell

00:57:55 ◼   ► us about these?

00:57:56 ◼   ► Yeah, this was about Marco talking about, again, the watch replacing the phone. And

00:58:03 ◼   ► And I said that I hadn't heard anyone saying that, and Marko said it, other than the people

00:58:07 ◼   ► looking at his watch and saying, "Oh, that's the new thing, that's going to replace the

00:58:09 ◼   ► phone now, right?"

00:58:10 ◼   ► Which is really just, you know, a sort of excitement about a new thing and not a particular

00:58:14 ◼   ► plan to do so.

00:58:16 ◼   ► Here's an actual plan to do so.

00:58:17 ◼   ► She says, "As soon as the watch has a cellular radio, I'll be ditching my phone and going

00:58:21 ◼   ► with a watch plus iPad setup."

00:58:24 ◼   ► And the reasons for this are things that hadn't occurred to me, because I don't have these

00:58:27 ◼   ► problems and the problems are women's clothing don't have as many pockets.

00:58:32 ◼   ► you don't always have a place to your phone and the alternative of putting in a bag is

00:58:35 ◼   ► a pain she refers in his email to the tyranny of the handbag is a real thing describes a phenomenon

00:58:42 ◼   ► that I admit I also have not seen says if you've ever been to a nightclub you'll have seen women

00:58:46 ◼   ► dancing awkwardly unable to move properly because they can't put their bag down anywhere or a group

00:58:50 ◼   ► of women dancing in a circle with their bags on the floor in the center so they can keep them safe

00:58:53 ◼   ► but the women can still dance uh this is not this is not a good situation and not something that

00:58:59 ◼   ► comes up. The idea is if you can have a watch on your wrist you don't have to worry about a

00:59:04 ◼   ► pocket to find to put the thing in. You don't worry about putting something valuable in your

00:59:07 ◼   ► purse and finding someplace safe to put your purse. And I've seen a lot of watch reviews and a lot of

00:59:13 ◼   ► it is about like the freedom of not having to fish your phone out of your pocket. I think there is a

00:59:19 ◼   ► potential freedom in not only not having to fish your phone out of your pocket but maybe not having

00:59:24 ◼   ► to have your phone to perform some limited set of tasks. Like if you just want to sort of be in

00:59:28 ◼   ► touch by phone and be able to send and receive text messages in some rudimentary way, maybe

00:59:34 ◼   ► the freedom that affords is worth the massive drop in functionality that you would be sacrificing

00:59:40 ◼   ► by not having a phone but only having a watch.

00:59:42 ◼   ► So there's one vote for a person who's willing to do that as soon as the watch becomes a

00:59:48 ◼   ► little bit more independent.

00:59:49 ◼   ► Yeah, that's a very good point that we didn't think of because we didn't ask, and this is

00:59:55 ◼   ► one of the things we're trying to improve.

00:59:58 ◼   ► - And you, if you went on a dog walk, right?

01:00:01 ◼   ► If you could go on a dog walk with Bluetooth headphones

01:00:03 ◼   ► and you know, I mean, you'd probably do this now

01:00:04 ◼   ► with just preloading stuff onto the watch or whatever,

01:00:06 ◼   ► but like, wouldn't it be nice?

01:00:08 ◼   ► You always say like, I don't necessarily take my wallet,

01:00:10 ◼   ► don't necessarily take my keys,

01:00:11 ◼   ► but I do always take my phone.

01:00:13 ◼   ► Would you feel like you could get into a place

01:00:15 ◼   ► where you're gonna go out for a dog walk

01:00:16 ◼   ► and just like not have, just have your watch on

01:00:19 ◼   ► and that's it?

01:00:19 ◼   ► Like if you're, what would they need to add to your watch

01:00:22 ◼   ► for you to do that and not have to feel

01:00:23 ◼   ► like it's an inconvenience?

01:00:25 ◼   ► - Well, it would need to be able to run overcast.

01:00:27 ◼   ► That's number one.

01:00:28 ◼   ► independently of the phone, so not with WatchKit,

01:00:30 ◼   ► an actual native Overcast app that would have my stuff

01:00:32 ◼   ► on it synced and everything.

01:00:33 ◼   ► So that's what I would need to do that.

01:00:35 ◼   ► The reality is I wouldn't face this problem personally.

01:00:37 ◼   ► - You always have a pocket for your phone,

01:00:39 ◼   ► but I'm saying like, what if you didn't have to take it?

01:00:42 ◼   ► It's like, oh, well Overcast is,

01:00:44 ◼   ► because Overcast is not an app

01:00:45 ◼   ► that you're constantly interacting with for the most part.

01:00:47 ◼   ► Like you're listening, right?

01:00:48 ◼   ► So it's the ideal case of like,

01:00:49 ◼   ► oh, well if that's all you need,

01:00:50 ◼   ► if you just need your podcast,

01:00:51 ◼   ► if you just need a native Overcast on your watch

01:00:53 ◼   ► and your watch has a cell radio or whatever,

01:00:56 ◼   ► If you got all that, you can snap your fingers and have it,

01:00:59 ◼   ► would you find yourself,

01:01:00 ◼   ► like you'd be taking your phone out of habit,

01:01:01 ◼   ► but then eventually you'd be like,

01:01:03 ◼   ► maybe you'd use it if you wanted to send

01:01:05 ◼   ► a long text to somebody,

01:01:06 ◼   ► you don't want to dictate it into your wrist, I don't know.

01:01:08 ◼   ► I don't have a watch, so I can't really make a call on this.

01:01:11 ◼   ► - Yeah, I don't know.

01:01:12 ◼   ► I mean, I see why a lot of other people would want this.

01:01:16 ◼   ► Like runners or joggers, they could use it

01:01:19 ◼   ► 'cause the chances of a phone flying out of your pocket

01:01:23 ◼   ► if you try to keep it in jogging shorts is way higher

01:01:25 ◼   ► than if you keep it in the jeans and terrible cargo shorts

01:01:28 ◼   ► that I wear when I walk my dog.

01:01:30 ◼   ► - Yeah, they don't even need cell radio,

01:01:31 ◼   ► they just need a GPS.

01:01:32 ◼   ► - Yeah, and a lot of the exercise trackers

01:01:36 ◼   ► have GPS for that reason.

01:01:38 ◼   ► Apple Watch doesn't yet, but we'll see about that.

01:01:41 ◼   ► And that's why I can see the Apple Watch adding GPS

01:01:45 ◼   ► before I see it adding a cell radio, necessarily.

01:01:48 ◼   ► - Yeah, and it has lower power.

01:01:50 ◼   ► My wife has a big Garmin, a Garmin basically wristwatch,

01:01:53 ◼   ► it's the ugliest thing you've ever seen in your life,

01:01:55 ◼   ► but a big Garmin GPS wristwatch.

01:01:56 ◼   ► And she has an iPhone 5S, right?

01:01:58 ◼   ► But she doesn't like to run with the phone

01:01:59 ◼   ► 'cause it's big, right?

01:02:01 ◼   ► So she puts the Garmin,

01:02:02 ◼   ► and why doesn't she just have a step tracker?

01:02:04 ◼   ► Like she wants to know exactly how far she ran

01:02:07 ◼   ► and maybe the route she took.

01:02:08 ◼   ► And step tracking is not as accurate as GPS

01:02:11 ◼   ► for measuring the thing.

01:02:12 ◼   ► So she wears the big bulky Garmin thing.

01:02:13 ◼   ► So she didn't even want to watch,

01:02:15 ◼   ► but maybe if, Apple Watch that is,

01:02:18 ◼   ► if the Apple Watch had GPS,

01:02:20 ◼   ► I think she could be compelled to buy one

01:02:22 ◼   ► or become more interested.

01:02:23 ◼   ► - Well, and I'll tell you what,

01:02:24 ◼   ► I don't think the Apple Watch can do distance accurately

01:02:28 ◼   ► without the phone present, 'cause I don't know how it would.

01:02:31 ◼   ► - Well, the documentation that I've read,

01:02:32 ◼   ► although I haven't tried this,

01:02:34 ◼   ► is that if you keep the phone with you,

01:02:37 ◼   ► it'll obviously use the phone's GPS

01:02:40 ◼   ► to kind of cross-reference and corroborate what it thinks,

01:02:42 ◼   ► but it knows how tall you are,

01:02:44 ◼   ► it knows how many steps you're taking,

01:02:46 ◼   ► and so it makes a best-guestimate

01:02:48 ◼   ► based on what it thinks your stride is

01:02:50 ◼   ► and how many steps you've taken

01:02:51 ◼   ► to guess how far you've run. And I think that it will kind of train itself based on the

01:03:00 ◼   ► times that you actually have your phone with you and do the same things.

01:03:03 ◼   ► Yeah, I think I saw Ren tweet something like showing she brought a GPS with her and also

01:03:08 ◼   ► the, uh, also the Apple watch after she had calibrated and show they were only off by

01:03:11 ◼   ► like, you know, a fraction of a mile or something to try to show that it was, you would think

01:03:16 ◼   ► that step tracking could always, would always be off by some amount, but that actually it

01:03:19 ◼   ► get pretty close. But it's not just distance. The people who want GPSs, they want to see

01:03:23 ◼   ► their route. They want to see a map. I ran through the park. I did this. Here's where

01:03:27 ◼   ► I was going slow. Here's where I was going fast. That's what you want. So you need two-dimensional

01:03:31 ◼   ► positioning at the very least.

01:03:33 ◼   ► And for whatever it's worth, the two-dimensional positioning and distance tracking when I have

01:03:37 ◼   ► the phone with me on my dog walks is great. I verified there's a site called GMAP pedometer

01:03:44 ◼   ► that lets you just like it's an overlay on Google Maps and you can just like

01:03:49 ◼   ► click out the route you took and it'll tell you how long that was. I love

01:03:52 ◼   ► tracking this now like so I've never been into activity before. I've never

01:03:57 ◼   ► tracked anything about my activity. I've never cared about fitness. I've never

01:04:01 ◼   ► regularly done any fitness except I do walk my dog most days and we have a very

01:04:06 ◼   ► hilly town and we walk between three quarters of a mile and two and a half

01:04:11 ◼   ► miles depending on weather and ability and everything. So I've now actually been really

01:04:17 ◼   ► enjoying tracking that and seeing, oh, I have, I've only gone 1.2 miles, maybe I should,

01:04:23 ◼   ► you know, take this turn here and go up this block and add and I keep finding myself like

01:04:28 ◼   ► adding to the route just to help me, you know, finish up my circles on the watch or to beat

01:04:34 ◼   ► yesterday's record or whatever. It's really, you know, this gamification stuff of fitness,

01:04:40 ◼   ► I know that it might not work forever.

01:04:42 ◼   ► This stuff tends to work for a week

01:04:43 ◼   ► and then you give up on it.

01:04:44 ◼   ► - You don't have the antibodies.

01:04:46 ◼   ► That's what's happening here.

01:04:47 ◼   ► You've been infected by fitness gamification

01:04:50 ◼   ► and you have not built up an immunity to it

01:04:52 ◼   ► from having had 17 different Fitwits

01:04:54 ◼   ► go through the wash or whatever else.

01:04:55 ◼   ► So this is your first experience with this

01:04:57 ◼   ► and it does have hooks.

01:05:00 ◼   ► It has hooks.

01:05:02 ◼   ► - I'm under no impression that this will last forever.

01:05:05 ◼   ► I hope it does, but I know myself and how lazy I am

01:05:08 ◼   ► and how much I hate fitness, so this will probably wear off,

01:05:12 ◼   ► but right now, just wanting to finish those circles

01:05:16 ◼   ► has gotten me to move more

01:05:18 ◼   ► and to complete my goals every day.

01:05:21 ◼   ► On my watch face, I have only a couple complications,

01:05:27 ◼   ► and one of them is the activity rings.

01:05:30 ◼   ► Whenever I look at the watch, I'm seeing that.

01:05:33 ◼   ► So it's not like this thing I have to remember to check,

01:05:35 ◼   ► like a Fitbit or even a pedometer app,

01:05:37 ◼   ► with the David Smith speedometer app.

01:05:39 ◼   ► I have to remember to check those.

01:05:41 ◼   ► This, I don't even have to remember to check.

01:05:43 ◼   ► It's annoying me on the watch face every day

01:05:46 ◼   ► until it's complete.

01:05:48 ◼   ► And so that, it actually does work.

01:05:50 ◼   ► Before the watch came out, I was concerned

01:05:54 ◼   ► about the big sensor bulge on the bottom of it

01:05:56 ◼   ► for the fitness sensors.

01:05:57 ◼   ► And I made a couple remarks to friends saying,

01:05:59 ◼   ► "You know, if they made a version

01:06:01 ◼   ► "that didn't have that sensor bulge

01:06:03 ◼   ► "and lacked all the fitness features,

01:06:05 ◼   ► "I'd rather have that version

01:06:06 ◼   ► "because it would be thinner.

01:06:07 ◼   ► It might be more comfortable than not having that bulge there.

01:06:10 ◼   ► It might be lighter, blah, blah, blah.

01:06:12 ◼   ► Yeah, turns out I use those features and I love those features.

01:06:16 ◼   ► So I'm really glad there is no option not to have them because I would have picked that

01:06:20 ◼   ► option and I would have missed all this and missed out on the health benefits and stuff

01:06:23 ◼   ► thereof.

01:06:24 ◼   ► So, yeah, I'm very happy with this.

01:06:27 ◼   ► Real time follow up on my wife wanting an Apple Watch.

01:06:29 ◼   ► She emphasizes that the main reason why she doesn't want the watch is because she can't

01:06:33 ◼   ► wear it at work for security reasons.

01:06:36 ◼   ► So I should have I should have thought of that why it doesn't have a camera or anything has a microphone

01:06:41 ◼   ► I think she can't have anything with Bluetooth or something what that's so peculiar

01:06:45 ◼   ► There's lots of she has lots of security restriction where she works, but anyway yeah

01:06:49 ◼   ► Otherwise I assume she would get it just to try it out. Just to see what it's like

01:06:53 ◼   ► Yeah, I would I'd like to echo everything that Marco said and we're gonna well

01:06:58 ◼   ► I guess rather than talk about in a minute. We'll just talk about it right now. I did get an Apple watch I

01:07:04 ◼   ► Ended up I think I had already talked about how I had ordered one on launch day at about 7 10 after 7 in the morning

01:07:10 ◼   ► on Eastern Time

01:07:12 ◼   ► What ended up happening was a listener of this show Natan gesher was nice enough to offer me a spare watch that he had had

01:07:18 ◼   ► He became upon the spare watch because he had ordered to the one that I always wanted which is the 42 millimeter space black

01:07:24 ◼   ► Sport space gray, excuse me sport

01:07:26 ◼   ► He ordered one of those and then ordered a different one. I believe it was the 42 millimeter white sport and

01:07:33 ◼   ► decided that, oh, he actually liked the white sport or whatever it was, I'm pretty sure that's right though,

01:07:39 ◼   ► and he was kind enough to offer to sell me the extra 42 millimeter space gray sport that he had.

01:07:47 ◼   ► And so that's what I did. It was extremely gracious of him. He didn't need to do that. He could have

01:07:52 ◼   ► absolutely raked me over the coals in terms of cost. So I am forever indebted to Natan. But anyways,

01:07:58 ◼   ► I got my Apple watch and I really like it and

01:08:01 ◼   ► Hopefully by the time this airs I will have put up my review of the Apple watch on my blog

01:08:07 ◼   ► And so hopefully you will see a link in the show notes

01:08:09 ◼   ► If you don't then yell at me to publish it

01:08:11 ◼   ► but either way I completely agree of Marco with everything you said that having the Rings as a complication which I do and

01:08:18 ◼   ► Seeing the nudge to stand up in seeing oh god

01:08:22 ◼   ► I really need to just go for like a 10-minute power walk around the neighborhood that

01:08:27 ◼   ► Absolutely has gotten me moving more than I did before and yes

01:08:30 ◼   ► Maybe in a month or even in a week that'll all go away, and I'll just find this to be

01:08:35 ◼   ► Silly, but today. I love it, and it's absolutely causing me to move more

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01:09:12 ◼   ► They also have an upgrade this past fall and spring called Viking which evolves around

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01:09:21 ◼   ► They've even added the ability to track who has read critical information on your intranet

01:09:26 ◼   ► to keep everyone on the same page. It's kind of like read receipts and email, although

01:09:29 ◼   ► less annoying. And it helps you track whether employees have read it and acknowledged policies,

01:09:34 ◼   ► signed off on legal agreements, or confirmed completion of training materials. Very important

01:09:39 ◼   ► for a lot of businesses to be able to have confirmation of those things.

01:09:43 ◼   ► And all of Igloo is built on a very advanced HTML5 platform. It's fully responsive and

01:09:49 ◼   ► And it offers all these features, all of its features,

01:09:51 ◼   ► the document tracking, annotations, document viewing,

01:09:55 ◼   ► all sorts of stuff, tracking things, wikis, all this stuff.

01:09:57 ◼   ► It offers all of this in HTML5,

01:10:00 ◼   ► so you can do all those on mobile devices.

01:10:02 ◼   ► It's really quite impressive.

01:10:03 ◼   ► You can preview annotate documents, edit, track changes,

01:10:06 ◼   ► all this stuff, no matter what device you're on.

01:10:09 ◼   ► Full functionality, whether it's a computer,

01:10:10 ◼   ► iPhone, Android phone, or even a Blackberry.

01:10:13 ◼   ► They make it work on all these devices through HTML5.

01:10:16 ◼   ► And also because it's responsive,

01:10:18 ◼   ► it looks good on all those devices.

01:10:20 ◼   ► When new devices come out, new screen sizes come out,

01:10:22 ◼   ► Igloo already works on them.

01:10:24 ◼   ► So if your company has a legacy intranet

01:10:26 ◼   ► that looks like it was built in the 90s,

01:10:28 ◼   ► you should definitely give Igloo a try.

01:10:31 ◼   ► They are even completely free to use

01:10:33 ◼   ► for as long as you want for groups of 10 or fewer people.

01:10:36 ◼   ► So really, if you have a small company or group

01:10:39 ◼   ► for 10 or fewer people in it,

01:10:40 ◼   ► you gotta give Igloo a try.

01:10:41 ◼   ► I mean, it's free, you have nothing to lose.

01:10:43 ◼   ► If not, you can go check it out,

01:10:45 ◼   ► and you should still give it a try,

01:10:46 ◼   ► because it is really very reasonably priced after that.

01:10:49 ◼   ► And really, you can get a free trial, of course.

01:10:52 ◼   ► So, there's so much about igloo to like.

01:10:54 ◼   ► It is really for businesses that need an internet,

01:10:57 ◼   ► which is most businesses, you gotta check it out.

01:10:59 ◼   ► It's so much better than everything else

01:11:00 ◼   ► after that does this.

01:11:02 ◼   ► So sign up for a free trial today

01:11:04 ◼   ► at igloosoftware.com/atp.

01:11:07 ◼   ► Igloo, the internet you will actually like.

01:11:09 ◼   ► Thank you very much to Igloo.

01:11:11 ◼   ► Igloosoftware.com/atp.

01:11:13 ◼   ► - Yes, please resist the urge to write your own internet.

01:11:16 ◼   ► - Please, for everyone involved.

01:11:18 ◼   ► It never works out.

01:11:19 ◼   ► - Nope, amen to that.

01:11:21 ◼   ► All right, so Facebook came out with instant articles.

01:11:25 ◼   ► - The gist of it is that Facebook has now launched

01:11:28 ◼   ► this platform system, whatever you wanna call it,

01:11:32 ◼   ► for publishers like the New York Times and Buzzfeed

01:11:35 ◼   ► and TechCrunch, like for major publishers.

01:11:38 ◼   ► I don't know, I think it works with any webpage,

01:11:40 ◼   ► but we'll see, anyway.

01:11:42 ◼   ► They've launched this thing where publishers

01:11:43 ◼   ► can now have articles that pop up and can be read

01:11:48 ◼   ► completely within the Facebook apps and the Facebook site.

01:11:52 ◼   ► I think the site, at least the apps.

01:11:53 ◼   ► The apps are what matters most anyway for mobile stuff.

01:11:56 ◼   ► And so the idea here is interesting.

01:11:59 ◼   ► So, you know, there's, so publishers,

01:12:01 ◼   ► so the idea is they don't want you going

01:12:04 ◼   ► to the publisher's websites to read them

01:12:06 ◼   ► or popping up a web view in the app,

01:12:10 ◼   ► like on the newyorktimes.com or whatever.

01:12:12 ◼   ► want the article to display directly within the Facebook app, natively in the interface,

01:12:17 ◼   ► have all the images and stuff loaded up there and be able to do dynamic, cool animated stuff

01:12:22 ◼   ► and everything else. I have a pretty cynical view of this, but I think it's inevitable.

01:12:29 ◼   ► Jon, what do you think?

01:12:30 ◼   ► >> Jon Streeter The first part of what I was interested in

01:12:32 ◼   ► was the instant part, because just technologically, like, you know, this is a native app, you

01:12:37 ◼   ► know, as Gruber said, it looks like it's by the same people who did the paper app. I saw

01:12:40 ◼   ► tweeted by Mike Mattes, that's how I find out about it, so I assume he's involved.

01:12:44 ◼   ► It's very slick looking.

01:12:45 ◼   ► The pitch to the user is you're going to launch Facebook anyway.

01:12:52 ◼   ► You're going to scroll through your Facebook feed, right?

01:12:55 ◼   ► That's something you're going to do anyway.

01:12:57 ◼   ► When you see something interesting in your Facebook feed, like someone posted an article

01:13:01 ◼   ► like "Oh, I saw this girl, you might want to check it out too, or have some commentary."

01:13:05 ◼   ► When you tap on that, whether it's like a movie review or something for you to be outraged

01:13:09 ◼   ► about and then yell about on Facebook or whatever it is, they want you to be able to tap on

01:13:14 ◼   ► that thing and not have to wait for a web page to load.

01:13:17 ◼   ► They want you to tap and immediately be reading the article, right?

01:13:20 ◼   ► And of course all the demos are of, you know, articles from National Geographic or something

01:13:23 ◼   ► with a beautiful picture in it or whatever.

01:13:26 ◼   ► But as I think as Gruber emphasized, like, unlike Marco's traditional criticism of paper,

01:13:31 ◼   ► which is that the app looks great if all your friends are beautiful people who are always

01:13:34 ◼   ► on vacation in California, which we should have a ding for that too.

01:13:39 ◼   ► The instant thing is like, okay, well, this is not articles that your friends made.

01:13:44 ◼   ► These are articles in, you know, the New York Times or, you know, the Huffington Post or

01:13:48 ◼   ► whatever.

01:13:49 ◼   ► Like, these are professionally produced things, you know, and the chances of them looking

01:13:53 ◼   ► nice and enticing your timeline is really high.

01:13:56 ◼   ► But they want to make it so that when you're scrolling through your timeline that you can

01:13:58 ◼   ► consume those as easily as you can read a comment from somebody.

01:14:02 ◼   ► They just want you to tap on it, and it's instantly there.

01:14:05 ◼   ► And that is a, if that works as advertised, that's a great end user benefit because people

01:14:12 ◼   ► do scroll through the timelines and people do want to occasionally read things.

01:14:15 ◼   ► And I know that I often feel I would like to read that, but I don't want to wait for

01:14:19 ◼   ► the thing to load, which sounds so stupid.

01:14:20 ◼   ► It's like you can't wait two seconds for something to load.

01:14:22 ◼   ► Like you're on wifi, you're on iPhone six.

01:14:23 ◼   ► It's not going to take an age to load, but sometimes you're just like, just the idea

01:14:27 ◼   ► of the screen blanking, going through a spinner and having to hit the back button, blah, blah,

01:14:30 ◼   ► like just waiting for that.

01:14:31 ◼   ► I don't know.

01:14:32 ◼   ► Maybe we're all spoiled, but you've seen.

01:14:35 ◼   ► I would use the analogy of like the studies that I think Google or Yahoo did or whatever

01:14:39 ◼   ► of like, what does an extra 200 milliseconds of response time on a server do to the purchase

01:14:44 ◼   ► rates of items in a store?

01:14:46 ◼   ► And it's like tremendous effects of a tiny speed change of page loading.

01:14:53 ◼   ► You would think like, does shaving 200 milliseconds off of the product page make a difference

01:14:59 ◼   ► in sales?

01:15:00 ◼   ► And the answer is like, yes, a tremendous difference.

01:15:03 ◼   ► There's a huge cliff after which people just aren't interested and lose, you know

01:15:06 ◼   ► Like and so that effect I think is real for people as they say

01:15:09 ◼   ► Marco can add a filter that makes my voice sound like his here engaging with content as in reading the stuff

01:15:16 ◼   ► Reading the stuff that's in the time like someone posted link to an article. Are you gonna actually read that article?

01:15:20 ◼   ► You're just gonna scroll right past it if it loads quote unquote instantly

01:15:23 ◼   ► Then you won't and the reason I think this is an interesting reframing is because as we all know

01:15:29 ◼   ► It can't actually like there's nothing instant. All it's doing is pre-loading it right? That's all you know. It's just

01:15:34 ◼   ► Spending a different time doing it rather than waiting and you know

01:15:38 ◼   ► Tons of browsers do is Chrome

01:15:40 ◼   ► I think was the first one to really aggressively do it like prefetching all the pages linked from a page

01:15:44 ◼   ► Google prefetches the first search results so in Chrome, so you know like

01:15:48 ◼   ► We're going to load it before you tap it so that by the time you do tap it. It is loaded

01:15:52 ◼   ► It's also it's also presumably loading less stuff like you know it's probably also

01:15:57 ◼   ► not loading the million different JavaScript trackers.

01:16:00 ◼   ► It'll load some of them because it is compatible

01:16:02 ◼   ► with publisher's tracking system, the publisher's ad systems.

01:16:06 ◼   ► So it will be loading some of that stuff,

01:16:08 ◼   ► but I think I would bet, and it's not loading

01:16:11 ◼   ► giant style sheets, giant JavaScript includes

01:16:14 ◼   ► for the site theme and the header and everything.

01:16:16 ◼   ► - You don't think it is?

01:16:18 ◼   ► - I'm betting that it's only loading the article

01:16:22 ◼   ► plus tracking stuff and ad stuff.

01:16:24 ◼   ► Not necessarily the tremendous sidebars,

01:16:26 ◼   ► all the related content, I mean, if you look at,

01:16:28 ◼   ► if you look at a typical article page for a major site,

01:16:31 ◼   ► there's so much other crap on that page,

01:16:34 ◼   ► and so many includes for style and JavaScript and stuff,

01:16:38 ◼   ► like there's so much stuff.

01:16:40 ◼   ► A lot of that's still gonna be there in the Facebook version

01:16:42 ◼   ► 'cause they're gonna want their tracking

01:16:43 ◼   ► and they're gonna want their money,

01:16:44 ◼   ► and Facebook supports those things.

01:16:45 ◼   ► But I bet it's gonna be a lot less

01:16:48 ◼   ► just by not having like the headers, the footers,

01:16:49 ◼   ► the sidebars, all that crap that's always loaded.

01:16:52 ◼   ► - I was just thinking they would want it to be

01:16:53 ◼   ► more time for that filter again, a richer experience,

01:16:56 ◼   ► which is code for gonna take a year to download

01:16:58 ◼   ► 'cause it's gonna have a lot of stuff in it.

01:16:59 ◼   ► But it could be better.

01:17:01 ◼   ► It's conceivable that it could be a lighter weight

01:17:03 ◼   ► due to the shared resources

01:17:04 ◼   ► among all of these instant articles.

01:17:06 ◼   ► But basically it's time-shifting.

01:17:09 ◼   ► It's clever pre-caching of things

01:17:11 ◼   ► that we will fetch it for you

01:17:14 ◼   ► so that when you tap it, it is there,

01:17:15 ◼   ► which is a great idea for a thing,

01:17:17 ◼   ► but trying for an application benefit,

01:17:19 ◼   ► but trying to sell that as instant,

01:17:21 ◼   ► I don't see how that can fulfill its promise

01:17:24 ◼   ► because it's gotta download this thing sometime.

01:17:27 ◼   ► And if your connection is slow and you launch the app

01:17:29 ◼   ► and you scroll through it, it's not good,

01:17:31 ◼   ► and you tap on the first thing you see.

01:17:33 ◼   ► And if it doesn't have, you know,

01:17:35 ◼   ► it's gonna have background downloading.

01:17:36 ◼   ► Like I'm sure they're gonna do everything on their power

01:17:38 ◼   ► on the iOS platform to try to get this stuff downloaded

01:17:40 ◼   ► before you tap on it.

01:17:41 ◼   ► But sometimes you're gonna win the race.

01:17:43 ◼   ► And when you do that, are you gonna be like,

01:17:44 ◼   ► hey, I thought this was supposed to be instant

01:17:45 ◼   ► because it won't, it won't be instant.

01:17:47 ◼   ► It's a reasonable selling point that like,

01:17:50 ◼   ► but like putting it right in the name

01:17:52 ◼   ► may end up backfiring them.

01:17:53 ◼   ► So that's one thing, just simple technology behind

01:17:57 ◼   ► what is this thing, what is the selling point

01:17:59 ◼   ► for users or whatever.

01:18:00 ◼   ► - Well, I mean, do you think the name is actually meant

01:18:04 ◼   ► to be like, this is why Facebook is doing it?

01:18:08 ◼   ► Or do you think the name is a red herring

01:18:10 ◼   ► to convince people that they should do this thing

01:18:12 ◼   ► that massively benefits Facebook?

01:18:14 ◼   ► - Well, that's what I'm getting at.

01:18:15 ◼   ► So like, this is the end user, this is the end user story.

01:18:17 ◼   ► Why would a user be interested in this feature?

01:18:20 ◼   ► Instant articles, you wanna read them,

01:18:21 ◼   ► you don't have to wait, good.

01:18:22 ◼   ► But it is the least interesting aspect of this feature

01:18:26 ◼   ► from a sort of strategic perspective,

01:18:27 ◼   ► because the strategic perspective is Facebook saying,

01:18:30 ◼   ► we want to be the place where people get your content.

01:18:35 ◼   ► Don't send them to your website.

01:18:36 ◼   ► In fact, why do you even bother having a website?

01:18:38 ◼   ► Why don't you do everything through us?

01:18:39 ◼   ► We have this great ad network.

01:18:40 ◼   ► We can do cool ad targeting.

01:18:42 ◼   ► You could advertise through us.

01:18:42 ◼   ► We'll let you keep 100% of the revenue

01:18:44 ◼   ► from all the people who go through blah, blah, blah.

01:18:46 ◼   ► It's totally great, guys.

01:18:47 ◼   ► Come right in.

01:18:48 ◼   ► You know, like, I hope all of the content providers

01:18:51 ◼   ► smart enough to not sort of fall into this trap because it's giving Facebook a tremendous

01:18:57 ◼   ► if this was super successful and it became one of those things like well you gotta have

01:19:00 ◼   ► a Facebook Instant Article you can't there's no way you can get any traffic without doing

01:19:03 ◼   ► that that spells bad news for everybody except for Facebook everybody consumers you know

01:19:09 ◼   ► websites everybody and so I really now that I want to say that I hope it doesn't succeed

01:19:15 ◼   ► but like I kind of I kind of do hope it doesn't succeed not because it's not a benefit to

01:19:20 ◼   ► the end user, but because I don't want Facebook to be the gateway for most of the things that

01:19:28 ◼   ► people read, because, ugh, no, I don't.

01:19:31 ◼   ► - I mean, unfortunately, I think that's the reality, you know? And that, you know, I think

01:19:38 ◼   ► we've been feeling for a while, and a lot of people, I don't think, are ready to see

01:19:42 ◼   ► or admit this yet, but the web is really dramatically losing relevance. Not the internet, but the

01:19:50 ◼   ► the web as viewed in web browsers,

01:19:54 ◼   ► that is so dramatically losing relevance

01:19:56 ◼   ► in the age of mobile and apps and native stuff now,

01:20:00 ◼   ► and social stuff.

01:20:01 ◼   ► The web is losing.

01:20:03 ◼   ► It's not going to die.

01:20:05 ◼   ► - I don't know if it's losing.

01:20:06 ◼   ► I feel like this goes in cycles.

01:20:09 ◼   ► Like you said, it's not gonna die.

01:20:12 ◼   ► You can't kill it because it is unkillable, right?

01:20:14 ◼   ► But it does go inside.

01:20:16 ◼   ► It's kind of the same things that people said

01:20:17 ◼   ► about giving Apple power by like,

01:20:19 ◼   ► you shouldn't have a website.

01:20:20 ◼   ► should just have an app, right? And that's the same exact situation. You wouldn't

01:20:24 ◼   ► want to give Apple that power at all. But the way that looks like it's shaken out

01:20:27 ◼   ► to me is that every website has an app, but it has not made the websites go away.

01:20:32 ◼   ► And this Facebook thing looks much more capable of making the websites become

01:20:37 ◼   ► like a relic. There's a New York Times app, but there's no way the New York

01:20:40 ◼   ► Times app is ever going to make the New York Times website go away. There's a New

01:20:44 ◼   ► York Times, if there was a New York Times instant article thing, because Facebook

01:20:47 ◼   ► is just so much bigger than Apple

01:20:48 ◼   ► and has already succeeded, has already gotten so far

01:20:52 ◼   ► in getting everybody to consume everything

01:20:53 ◼   ► through the Facebook feed that it's terrifying.

01:20:55 ◼   ► They are closer to being able to suck publications in

01:20:59 ◼   ► and make their websites irrelevant.

01:21:02 ◼   ► - Right, I mean, this is way bigger

01:21:04 ◼   ► than Google News ever was back in the day,

01:21:06 ◼   ► when that was a big deal and publishers

01:21:08 ◼   ► were trying to threaten to sue them

01:21:10 ◼   ► but then they didn't wanna be blocked by them or admitted

01:21:12 ◼   ► 'cause that would be even more disastrous.

01:21:14 ◼   ► This is like that times 10.

01:21:16 ◼   ► I really do think that web browsing is really in trouble,

01:21:21 ◼   ► and as a result, publishers are in trouble.

01:21:24 ◼   ► I wrote an article with a terrible title about this

01:21:27 ◼   ► about a year ago or something.

01:21:29 ◼   ► I think it's very clear that all of this social usage,

01:21:34 ◼   ► all the time people are spending using apps

01:21:37 ◼   ► and using social networks on their phones and stuff,

01:21:40 ◼   ► some of that is additive when people are just waiting

01:21:43 ◼   ► in line at the bank or something

01:21:44 ◼   ► where they weren't doing these things before.

01:21:46 ◼   ► But a lot of that is also time that has been taken away

01:21:50 ◼   ► from browsing the web, reading publishers' sites,

01:21:53 ◼   ► reading RSS and stuff like that for the geeks.

01:21:56 ◼   ► This has actually been,

01:21:59 ◼   ► all this social activity is competing with that

01:22:03 ◼   ► and has taken a lot of it.

01:22:05 ◼   ► I worry a lot about the future of the web.

01:22:08 ◼   ► I really don't think this is a small trend

01:22:11 ◼   ► or a temporary thing or something that is guaranteed

01:22:14 ◼   ► to just have the pendulum swing back the other way eventually. I think this is a major shift

01:22:19 ◼   ► that people have voted with their time and with their activity and with their attention.

01:22:24 ◼   ► They have voted for centralized proprietary ecosystems focused on social and snackable

01:22:31 ◼   ► listicle traffic in these social networks, Facebook mostly, some Twitter, stuff like

01:22:37 ◼   ► that. People have voted. That's where they're going. That's what they want the Internet

01:22:41 ◼   ► to be. People on the whole don't care about the open web, they don't care about everyone

01:22:46 ◼   ► having their own site that they own and control and being able to browse things through open

01:22:50 ◼   ► standards, people don't care. A few geeks care, even we have moved so much of our activity

01:22:55 ◼   ► to Twitter and stuff, like this is a massive trend that I think it would be unwise to ignore.

01:23:02 ◼   ► And unfortunately, you know, just like when we moved from the previous systems that we

01:23:09 ◼   ► had to the web, there was a lot of good that came from that,

01:23:12 ◼   ► a lot of big numbers that came with that,

01:23:15 ◼   ► a lot of new abilities that came with that,

01:23:17 ◼   ► but not everything transitioned over.

01:23:19 ◼   ► Not everybody was a winner there.

01:23:22 ◼   ► And a lot of things just, well,

01:23:24 ◼   ► that thing that used to work now doesn't.

01:23:27 ◼   ► Or that role that you used to have,

01:23:29 ◼   ► now we don't need you anymore.

01:23:31 ◼   ► That is happening now with the move towards apps,

01:23:34 ◼   ► the move towards social stuff,

01:23:36 ◼   ► and with so much traffic to web publishers

01:23:39 ◼   ► now coming from mobile and social usage,

01:23:42 ◼   ► not coming from blog links and search engines

01:23:46 ◼   ► and people browsing in web browsers on their computers.

01:23:50 ◼   ► That shift is happening and has happened.

01:23:53 ◼   ► We are already very much into that shift.

01:23:56 ◼   ► - I characterized it as a series of swings

01:23:58 ◼   ► but not so much as a pendulum,

01:23:59 ◼   ► 'cause like you said, one thing does supplant the other,

01:24:02 ◼   ► but almost in terms of that we're getting

01:24:06 ◼   ► a more balanced situation now and the sort of supremacy of the web was

01:24:10 ◼   ► actually unbalanced because what the web let you do originally was read stuff

01:24:15 ◼   ► like articles right and for a long time that since that was so dominant and it

01:24:21 ◼   ► was like that defined the internet was the web right and what the web let you

01:24:25 ◼   ► do is read stuff people were spending a lot more of their time reading stuff

01:24:30 ◼   ► even if you want to lump RSS into that. And now we've shifted because there's

01:24:37 ◼   ► ways to do things other than read stuff. You can text people, text messaging was

01:24:41 ◼   ► one of the first shifts. Now I'm not just reading stuff, I'm writing stuff, right?

01:24:44 ◼   ► You can play games, you can watch little movies, you can, you know, use native apps

01:24:50 ◼   ► to do things that are very different than reading a big page of stuff. And so

01:24:56 ◼   ► So I feel like this is an adjustment in terms of activity choices.

01:25:00 ◼   ► Like people are reading the web less because they're doing things more.

01:25:03 ◼   ► What are they doing on their phone?

01:25:04 ◼   ► They're not doing the equivalent of reading the web, they're doing something different.

01:25:07 ◼   ► And why couldn't they do that on the web?

01:25:08 ◼   ► Because the web took a long time to get that kind of interactivity and everything.

01:25:12 ◼   ► So I think maybe we're more imbalanced now.

01:25:14 ◼   ► The reason this instant article thing is scary is because it is asking people to do the one

01:25:21 ◼   ► thing that the web is best suited for, like reading stuff, publishing, a publishing platform,

01:25:28 ◼   ► anybody can make a website, you can start publishing stuff, the entire world can read

01:25:32 ◼   ► it, and what kind of stuff?

01:25:34 ◼   ► How about a bunch of text and pictures, right?

01:25:36 ◼   ► That is like the core competency of the text, reading things, of the web, reading things.

01:25:41 ◼   ► If Facebook can get that into there, it's not even an interactive thing, it's not a

01:25:45 ◼   ► social network, like the article's in a social network.

01:25:49 ◼   ► reading the article, right? If they can pull that away from the web, now you're really

01:25:54 ◼   ► starting to pull at the core of what the web does in a non-proprietary way. It's as if

01:26:01 ◼   ► someone tried to replace email with a system that was exactly like email but 100% proprietary.

01:26:06 ◼   ► And that so far hasn't worked, despite email being super terrible, way worse than the web

01:26:09 ◼   ► ever was in terms of no authentication and spam and all the other things that we hate

01:26:13 ◼   ► about email. The web has a leg up on that.

01:26:16 ◼   ► Well, has that not worked? How about iMessage?

01:26:19 ◼   ► But that's not email. Email is when you write a long form thing. Even text messaging hasn't

01:26:23 ◼   ► like, you would think, "Oh, I have a hundred ways I could write to somebody. I could send

01:26:26 ◼   ► them a Twitter DM, I could write to them in Slack, I could do this, I could do that,"

01:26:28 ◼   ► and yet email survives, despite it being terrible.

01:26:31 ◼   ► Facebook messages are pretty big.

01:26:33 ◼   ► I know, but perhaps the main thing keeping email alive is that you can't even sign up

01:26:38 ◼   ► for any service without an email. It is the linchpin of our entire system, right? What

01:26:42 ◼   ► are you going to put in the, you know what I mean? I feel like the web has that same

01:26:45 ◼   ► longevity, but it would be a huge mistake for anybody publishing on the web to give

01:26:49 ◼   ► Facebook too much power. And with web publications struggling to figure out their monetization

01:26:54 ◼   ► strategies and all this other stuff, they are vulnerable to being like, "Well, we've

01:27:00 ◼   ► got to do something, and Facebook has a great advertising platform and they have a hodgillion

01:27:04 ◼   ► users." And then you just wait a year and Facebook starts turning the screws and being

01:27:07 ◼   ► like, "Actually, we're not going to show your article to a lot of people unless you

01:27:10 ◼   ► pay us," which is their whole big thing.

01:27:13 ◼   ► That's the thing, I mean, this is why this is such a terrible situation. I mean, I think

01:27:18 ◼   ► because of the move towards everything being mobile, because so much traffic to publishers'

01:27:25 ◼   ► websites now has to come from social sources, I'm not sure publishers have much of a choice.

01:27:30 ◼   ► You know, it's just like when Google News, you know, when people threatened and made

01:27:35 ◼   ► them block them and then like begged to be let back in. There's all these like, you know,

01:27:38 ◼   ► where like one party has just tremendous power on the web

01:27:42 ◼   ► and publishers pretty much have to play ball with them

01:27:45 ◼   ► because they can't afford not to have that audience,

01:27:48 ◼   ► not to have that traffic.

01:27:49 ◼   ► Facebook is that platform today

01:27:52 ◼   ► and publishers depend so much on getting social traffic

01:27:57 ◼   ► and Facebook is so good at delivering that traffic sometimes

01:28:02 ◼   ► and only if you pay and being really cagey about it.

01:28:05 ◼   ► Like this is, of course that's their plan.

01:28:08 ◼   ► Of course their plan is to move even more activity

01:28:12 ◼   ► into Facebook.

01:28:13 ◼   ► It comes from not only a position of greed,

01:28:18 ◼   ► but also a position of just arrogance.

01:28:20 ◼   ► Like our app is better than your website.

01:28:23 ◼   ► You are incapable of making pages that load quickly

01:28:27 ◼   ► even though this can be solved by smart web design

01:28:29 ◼   ► and a good CDN.

01:28:30 ◼   ► - And a lot of times they're right though, unfortunately.

01:28:32 ◼   ► - Well that's, yeah, but not every time.

01:28:34 ◼   ► But anyway, this move is them just

01:28:38 ◼   ► "Hey, you know what? We are so powerful that you have to play ball with us. We're going

01:28:43 ◼   ► to offer this thing now, and our partners who use this, their stuff is going to rank

01:28:49 ◼   ► a lot higher than a random link to an arbitrary site now in the timelines." As you said, they're

01:28:54 ◼   ► going to start turning the screws, right? They are so good at that. That's what they

01:28:58 ◼   ► do.

01:28:59 ◼   ► You would think they would figure it out by now, like kind of have the music labels figured

01:29:01 ◼   ► out after the iTunes thing, like maybe don't give one company too much power, right?

01:29:05 ◼   ► Yeah, well, ask the music labels how well they're doing right now.

01:29:07 ◼   ► Well, but like I mean they eventually figured it out and now it's kind of like accepted wisdom in the in the digital publishing

01:29:13 ◼   ► You know digital media like music movies or whatever that it is a huge mistake

01:29:17 ◼   ► To put all your eggs in the basket of one technology company

01:29:20 ◼   ► Despite the fact that all the media companies have proven they can't do the technology themselves. They've learned I think just just received wisdom now

01:29:26 ◼   ► Even if you can't do any of this tech yourself, which you can't because you suck

01:29:30 ◼   ► Never give one company all your stuff. Never let Apple get too big never let Amazon get too big never let you know

01:29:36 ◼   ► like and they all know that right and maybe they know it too well and are being stubborn with things like TV where they could be

01:29:42 ◼   ► Making progress blah blah blah, but you would think in the web

01:29:45 ◼   ► They would also know that by now as well that like I mean, let's look at ebooks and Amazon like oh boy

01:29:50 ◼   ► That was it was a real big mistake to give Amazon that much power in the e-book industry

01:29:53 ◼   ► Right, and they tried to balance it with Apple and then you know that didn't quite work out the way they wanted it to right

01:29:59 ◼   ► So I'm hoping everybody in web publishing even though they're in the same dire

01:30:02 ◼   ► Situation of like we can't figure out how to monetize we can't reach our audience social is taking over blah blah

01:30:06 ◼   ► I hope that someone in the meeting raises their hand and says, "This is all good and

01:30:11 ◼   ► all, and I love these numbers and the projections and blah blah blah, but we really need to

01:30:15 ◼   ► hedge because if we put all our eggs in the Facebook basket, they will own us and it will

01:30:20 ◼   ► be bad."

01:30:21 ◼   ► - See, I think you're right, they should be saying that.

01:30:25 ◼   ► However, I don't think they have another choice.

01:30:27 ◼   ► And that's why Facebook can do this.

01:30:28 ◼   ► This is like, the internet is really, you know, we like to think that the internet is

01:30:32 ◼   ► this platform that enables all this openness and everything, and it does, and it can.

01:30:36 ◼   ► But it also enables massive consolidation of power and consolidation of attention and

01:30:43 ◼   ► usage into these proprietary lockdown systems.

01:30:45 ◼   ► We keep seeing it again and again with everything you use listed.

01:30:48 ◼   ► And that's only going to continue.

01:30:50 ◼   ► And it's very clear that when you have these centralized systems like Facebook, like Twitter,

01:30:55 ◼   ► like Amazon, you can offer benefits, like Google, you can offer benefits that get people

01:31:02 ◼   ► in in such massive numbers that you just get a,

01:31:05 ◼   ► like that private company gets a tremendous amount of power

01:31:08 ◼   ► and can basically dictate their terms

01:31:10 ◼   ► to the rest of the world then.

01:31:12 ◼   ► Everything, like we're saying this is really,

01:31:14 ◼   ► potentially really bad and they shouldn't give Facebook

01:31:16 ◼   ► all this power, but the fact is Facebook

01:31:17 ◼   ► already has this power and if someone's not gonna play ball

01:31:20 ◼   ► with Facebook, they're just gonna start losing

01:31:23 ◼   ► Facebook search traffic, or Facebook social traffic

01:31:25 ◼   ► and they're gonna be forced to play ball.

01:31:28 ◼   ► They're gonna, their hands are gonna be forced.

01:31:30 ◼   ► Well they've got the same game plan as the music labels after going too far in the Apple

01:31:34 ◼   ► direction.

01:31:37 ◼   ► Their best and their only hedge is unfortunately to try to spread a little bit of your content

01:31:42 ◼   ► to another proprietary centralized thing.

01:31:45 ◼   ► Like in other words Twitter with the cards and whatever.

01:31:47 ◼   ► Like can they play Twitter vs Facebook off of each other?

01:31:51 ◼   ► Facebook is just so massively bigger than that anyway but that's what they've got.

01:31:55 ◼   ► The option is let's also keep talking to Twitter about their thing and whatever new social

01:31:59 ◼   ► network thing, like let's also talk to them about like no exclusivity deals, try to hedge

01:32:05 ◼   ► your bets the best you can. So you know Amazon's music was nothing when iTunes was dominant,

01:32:10 ◼   ► but by being given tons of attention, by being given DRM free music before Apple was given

01:32:15 ◼   ► it by all the music labels and everything, it helped make Amazon into perhaps not the

01:32:20 ◼   ► competitor they all wished it was, but at least iTunes is now not the only game in town.

01:32:24 ◼   ► Of course Spotify and all the streaming services, right, even that, the streaming services,

01:32:29 ◼   ► I bet music labels want to spread things around with a different streaming service so they

01:32:32 ◼   ► wouldn't like one to be dominant.

01:32:33 ◼   ► It's just something that tends to happen.

01:32:36 ◼   ► Amazon is massively dominant in online commerce.

01:32:38 ◼   ► Walmart is massively dominant in the US in retail.

01:32:41 ◼   ► Facebook is massively dominant online in social.

01:32:44 ◼   ► It's a bummer.

01:32:45 ◼   ► - But there's something else here though which I think is worth pointing out.

01:32:49 ◼   ► There's a difference in the power balance between your examples that you just gave for

01:32:52 ◼   ► the most part and this which is like if a popular kind of product is constantly being

01:32:57 ◼   ► being searched for on Amazon and Amazon doesn't have it,

01:33:00 ◼   ► that makes Amazon look bad.

01:33:01 ◼   ► Amazon kinda needs that.

01:33:02 ◼   ► With the music label negotiations,

01:33:04 ◼   ► like there's only what, four music labels?

01:33:07 ◼   ► You know, if a big music store launches

01:33:09 ◼   ► and they don't have one of them, that's a big problem.

01:33:11 ◼   ► That's gonna result in lots of people looking for stuff,

01:33:14 ◼   ► not finding it, and that negatively affecting the chances

01:33:17 ◼   ► that they're gonna keep using that music service

01:33:18 ◼   ► or keep buying from that store

01:33:19 ◼   ► or even keep bothering to search there.

01:33:21 ◼   ► With Facebook and these publishers,

01:33:24 ◼   ► Facebook doesn't really need any of them, like at all.

01:33:26 ◼   ► Like this is purely for the publisher's benefit

01:33:30 ◼   ► to be in this system.

01:33:31 ◼   ► If the publishers, if any one publisher

01:33:34 ◼   ► or any group of publishers decides they're not gonna do it,

01:33:36 ◼   ► Facebook couldn't possibly care less.

01:33:38 ◼   ► They don't need them.

01:33:39 ◼   ► - Well they don't need them, but they want them.

01:33:40 ◼   ► They want their place to be the gateway to this.

01:33:42 ◼   ► They don't want, I mean, you know, share on Facebook.

01:33:45 ◼   ► Like you can go to a website and there's share buttons

01:33:46 ◼   ► underneath every article to share the article

01:33:48 ◼   ► on every possible social service,

01:33:50 ◼   ► but that's not the integration that Facebook wants.

01:33:53 ◼   ► They want you to go to Facebook to find the article,

01:33:55 ◼   ► not go to the website to find the article

01:33:56 ◼   ► and hit a share button to share with people on Facebook,

01:33:58 ◼   ► although they do want you to do that

01:33:59 ◼   ► because they want people to be, you know,

01:34:00 ◼   ► looking at things on Facebook.

01:34:02 ◼   ► But it's the inversion of like, you know,

01:34:04 ◼   ► website, what website?

01:34:05 ◼   ► We own you.

01:34:06 ◼   ► The only, you publish your content through our system

01:34:08 ◼   ► on our terms to the people we say you can reach, right?

01:34:11 ◼   ► And I guess the web, keeping the websites themselves

01:34:14 ◼   ► are a hedge on that, but I don't know.

01:34:17 ◼   ► Like, I don't know what the best move for them is

01:34:19 ◼   ► because they do need to reach people.

01:34:20 ◼   ► Like, all I can think about is how much it could be worse.

01:34:24 ◼   ► Like, imagine if Facebook owned YouTube.

01:34:26 ◼   ► we'd all be screwed. Like it's game over. And YouTube itself is pretty dominant, but

01:34:33 ◼   ► then you see Twitch and you're like, well maybe Twitch is keeping YouTube honest. Does

01:34:37 ◼   ► Google own Twitch now? I keep forgetting. Didn't Amazon buy them? I don't know. Anyway,

01:34:40 ◼   ► consolidation is evil. Well, everything old is new again, and so I suspect that before

01:34:47 ◼   ► too long we'll be seeing keywords on commercials, and we'll talk about that right after this

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01:38:31 ◼   ► All right, so Verizon bought AOL, which is weird.

01:38:38 ◼   ► Yeah.

01:38:39 ◼   ► What's that all about?

01:38:40 ◼   ► I don't know. Some people said it was about ad technology. I don't know.

01:38:44 ◼   ► That seems to make sense to me, because what else could it be about?

01:38:47 ◼   ► Dial up? I don't know.

01:38:49 ◼   ► I mean, they do have a bunch of popular websites, and some of the spin has been like,

01:38:53 ◼   ► "Oh, this is about content." I think what they have, like Huffington Post is TechCrunch there, too.

01:38:57 ◼   ► theirs too. Like they have a bunch of properties like everybody's like a holding company at

01:39:01 ◼   ► this point. But from everything I've read what the CEO did to make the company desirable

01:39:08 ◼   ► as an acquisition is focused on how like trying to make this company a compliment for the

01:39:15 ◼   ► things that other companies might need, you know, so they're advertising technology to

01:39:18 ◼   ► serve you know, whatever. Boy, you need this filter a lot. Serve rich ads, video ads to

01:39:23 ◼   ► to people targeted, you know, if someone is looking

01:39:27 ◼   ► for that ability and the ability to reach a large number

01:39:29 ◼   ► of people, that's what AOL has packaged themselves up into.

01:39:32 ◼   ► And I saw all the depressing numbers of like how low AOL

01:39:35 ◼   ► has fallen from, you know, the time when they were doing

01:39:37 ◼   ► the Time Warner merger for 380 billion or whatever.

01:39:40 ◼   ► Now they sold themselves for four.

01:39:43 ◼   ► Part of it is like the name AOL.

01:39:45 ◼   ► Like the company has always been increasingly more

01:39:47 ◼   ► than what we think of when we think of AOL.

01:39:50 ◼   ► But then I just think about all those people

01:39:51 ◼   ► still charging for dial-up and I just get angry.

01:39:54 ◼   ► Is the logo still lowercase, so it just looks like AOL?

01:39:56 ◼   ► Yeah, and I want to be clear.

01:39:59 ◼   ► Angry AOL, not because I think that people shouldn't have dial-up, but I'm angry at our

01:40:05 ◼   ► situation in this country.

01:40:07 ◼   ► If your best internet option within your budget is dial-up on AOL, we are failing as a country

01:40:14 ◼   ► to, you know, like, I feel like at this point, broadband, affordable broadband internet access

01:40:20 ◼   ► should be important enough that it should be subsidized, you know, maybe not subsidized,

01:40:26 ◼   ► but like, we should, whatever we have to do to make it affordable, as affordable as having

01:40:31 ◼   ► a telephone line is, that's what internet access should be. And if your only option

01:40:35 ◼   ► is literal dial-up over a modem to AOL, then things have gone horribly wrong.

01:40:40 ◼   ► Yeah, I'd say so. I don't know, Ben Thompson had a pretty good take on this that I skimmed

01:40:46 ◼   ► very quickly before we recorded, and it seems like it is about ad technology. I don't know,

01:40:53 ◼   ► it's just, AOL has a bunch of internet properties, like TechCrunch for example, and there was

01:41:00 ◼   ► a time where I really hated TechCrunch, but I actually have come back around and it helps

01:41:05 ◼   ► that our friend Matt Panzerino is there. But there's a lot of really good properties there,

01:41:10 ◼   ► And I'm gonna be fairly sad when Verizon inevitably forces editorial opinions on all of them.

01:41:17 ◼   ► Don't you think they'll sell them before they do that?

01:41:19 ◼   ► I would assume that if they're not interested in content, they'll sell those things off.

01:41:22 ◼   ► Maybe.

01:41:23 ◼   ► I don't know.

01:41:24 ◼   ► I mean, they probably do make money, though.

01:41:26 ◼   ► I don't know.

01:41:27 ◼   ► You know, I've never worked with a big publisher.

01:41:29 ◼   ► I have no idea how, you know, in theory, they all attempt to maintain editorial independence

01:41:36 ◼   ► from their corporate high-up owners.

01:41:38 ◼   ► In practice, I don't know how hard that is.

01:41:40 ◼   ► If I had to guess, I'm guessing that they can usually

01:41:45 ◼   ► do that most of the time, but maybe sometimes

01:41:48 ◼   ► it gets weird or hard, I don't know.

01:41:49 ◼   ► - I don't know if Verizon is like Roger Ailes,

01:41:51 ◼   ► I don't think they have a big ideological slant

01:41:55 ◼   ► that they're going to impose on the Huffington Post

01:41:56 ◼   ► and TechCrunch.

01:41:57 ◼   ► - Yeah, probably not.

01:41:59 ◼   ► - Notice I add the Verizon tracking cookie

01:42:00 ◼   ► to all the sites, you know?

01:42:02 ◼   ► Actually they already have that because it's already

01:42:03 ◼   ► on their network, anyway.

01:42:05 ◼   ► Verizon just wants your eyeballs and your monthly check,

01:42:10 ◼   ► Right, and so this is just furthering their goals.

01:42:13 ◼   ► Would it be, can we think of someone

01:42:15 ◼   ► who we would rather have had buy AOL?

01:42:18 ◼   ► Would we rather have AOL go bankrupt?

01:42:19 ◼   ► Like what are the alternative scenarios

01:42:22 ◼   ► for the future of AOL that we would like better

01:42:24 ◼   ► than Verizon buying them?

01:42:25 ◼   ► I mean like what I'm getting at is that it's not,

01:42:30 ◼   ► I didn't you know, sort of cringe

01:42:32 ◼   ► when I saw this announcement in the same way I did

01:42:34 ◼   ► when I saw like Facebook bought Instagram, right?

01:42:36 ◼   ► Like sometimes you see a consolidation,

01:42:38 ◼   ► like oh no right this one it's like yeah all right I mean like could be worse

01:42:43 ◼   ► right like Verizon could merge with Comcast like there are many more worse

01:42:47 ◼   ► doomsday scenarios than uh than Verizon buys AOL I mean Verizon could just agree

01:42:52 ◼   ► to just stop competing with Comcast and stop building out FiOS yeah they can

01:42:57 ◼   ► only do that with billions and billions of speaking of subsidies with billions

01:43:00 ◼   ► and billions of dollars from the government they need more billions now

01:43:03 ◼   ► - Nope, they can't do it anymore.

01:43:06 ◼   ► - Well, good talk.

01:43:06 ◼   ► I guess, is there much else to say on AOL Verizon?

01:43:10 ◼   ► - I don't know, basically what I had to say is that

01:43:13 ◼   ► of all the mergers that have taken place

01:43:15 ◼   ► between big companies, this one seems like,

01:43:18 ◼   ► all right, whatever.

01:43:19 ◼   ► - Yeah, is this, so, off the top of my head, I don't know.

01:43:23 ◼   ► The AOL Time Warner thing, between that and HP Compaq,

01:43:29 ◼   ► which was the worst merger in history?

01:43:33 ◼   ► AOL Time Warner.

01:43:34 ◼   ► - That was bigger than HP Compaq?

01:43:35 ◼   ► - Yeah, because HP Compaq, these were similar

01:43:39 ◼   ► and did similar things, and it's a consolidation

01:43:41 ◼   ► that made some sense, especially in a market

01:43:43 ◼   ► where Microsoft was grabbing ever larger values

01:43:46 ◼   ► of the PC market, and the hardware vendors

01:43:48 ◼   ► were being pushed harder and harder,

01:43:49 ◼   ► that there's gonna be consolidation among them,

01:43:51 ◼   ► and they both had kind of an enterprise angle.

01:43:53 ◼   ► Like, HP Compaq makes some sense, and it only looks bad

01:43:56 ◼   ► because the entire PC sector was contracting

01:43:58 ◼   ► as Microsoft sucked all the oxygen out of it.

01:44:00 ◼   ► AOL Time Warner was a fantasy of like,

01:44:02 ◼   ► the internet and Hollywood are together and we're going to have TV shows on it. It's just

01:44:07 ◼   ► a fantasy of some C-level executive's head, like billions of dollars and little birdies

01:44:12 ◼   ► and stars spinning around people's heads thinking this is going to be the new Juggernaut. And

01:44:17 ◼   ► it was just like, boy, you know, I just feel like that was a much bigger disaster.

01:44:22 ◼   ► Thanks a lot to our three sponsors this week, Cards Against Humanity, Igloo, and Squarespace,

01:44:29 ◼   ► and we will see you next week.

01:44:30 ◼   ► Now the show is over, they didn't even mean to begin

01:44:37 ◼   ► 'Cause it was accidental, oh it was accidental

01:44:44 ◼   ► John didn't do any research, Marco and Casey wouldn't let him

01:44:48 ◼   ► 'Cause it was accidental, oh it was accidental

01:44:54 ◼   ► And you can find the show notes at ATP.fm

01:44:59 ◼   ► And if you're into Twitter, you can follow them @C-A-S-E-Y-L-I-S-S

01:45:08 ◼   ► So that's Kasey Liszt, M-A-R-C-O-A-R-M

01:45:13 ◼   ► E-N-T, Marco Arment, S-I-R-A-C

01:45:18 ◼   ► U-S-A, Syracuse-a, it's accidental

01:45:23 ◼   ► They didn't mean to, accidental

01:45:28 ◼   ► ♪ Tech podcast so long ♪

01:45:31 ◼   ► - Didn't even get to talk about your audio engine.

01:45:35 ◼   ► - We can talk about that now,

01:45:36 ◼   ► but there's not that much to say.

01:45:37 ◼   ► I'm working on my streaming engine.

01:45:40 ◼   ► - What streaming engine is this?

01:45:41 ◼   ► What number?

01:45:42 ◼   ► What attempt number?

01:45:44 ◼   ► - I think four?

01:45:45 ◼   ► Every couple of days on Twitter,

01:45:48 ◼   ► somebody asks the Overcast account,

01:45:50 ◼   ► "When are you gonna add streaming?

01:45:52 ◼   ► "God, finally," you know, something like that.

01:45:54 ◼   ► And--

01:45:54 ◼   ► - They do have a point.

01:45:56 ◼   ► You're doing the voice for the finally thing,

01:45:57 ◼   ► but streaming was discussed on this very program

01:46:00 ◼   ► a fairly long time ago as an important

01:46:02 ◼   ► upcoming feature for Overcast.

01:46:04 ◼   ► - Yeah, my goal was to add it like last fall.

01:46:07 ◼   ► That hasn't happened yet.

01:46:08 ◼   ► And it's not because I haven't been working on it.

01:46:11 ◼   ► It's because I haven't gotten it to work yet.

01:46:14 ◼   ► I've been making progress, and I haven't,

01:46:16 ◼   ► you know, I haven't been working on only streaming

01:46:19 ◼   ► in Overcast for the last year or whatever.

01:46:21 ◼   ► Like I've been doing other things as well.

01:46:24 ◼   ► - Yeah, like walking your dog.

01:46:25 ◼   ► - Like walking my dog, yeah, well that's testing

01:46:27 ◼   ► overcast, no, I mean, you know, simple stuff like,

01:46:30 ◼   ► you know, like the entire rest of the app

01:46:33 ◼   ► that I've been working on, stuff like that.

01:46:35 ◼   ► I have tried to write a streaming engine for overcast

01:46:40 ◼   ► on a number of occasions, and I keep doing it badly.

01:46:45 ◼   ► The one I've been writing over the last two weeks

01:46:48 ◼   ► is significantly better, I've gotten significantly further

01:46:51 ◼   ► than I've gotten with any other attempt before.

01:46:54 ◼   ► I think I'll be able to do it,

01:46:56 ◼   ► I think the one I'm writing now is going to be the one.

01:47:01 ◼   ► So John Beals in the chat is asking,

01:47:03 ◼   ► "Is there an off-the-shelf streaming solution?"

01:47:05 ◼   ► I have looked at a couple of packages,

01:47:07 ◼   ► I have even tried to integrate some of them

01:47:09 ◼   ► that claim to offer this.

01:47:11 ◼   ► None of them have worked for me.

01:47:13 ◼   ► And some of them, they haven't worked for me

01:47:16 ◼   ► because they have just annoying shortcomings

01:47:20 ◼   ► that would be a problem in my app.

01:47:21 ◼   ► Things like, "Oh, this will support streaming of everything

01:47:25 ◼   ► except MP4 files.

01:47:27 ◼   ► That's a bit of a problem for podcasts,

01:47:29 ◼   ► since any AAC-encoded podcast is wrapped

01:47:31 ◼   ► in an MP4 container.

01:47:33 ◼   ► Or simple things like, no way to get ID3 information.

01:47:37 ◼   ► Well, that might be a problem for me in the future,

01:47:39 ◼   ► if I wanna parse that.

01:47:41 ◼   ► Or like, no ability to jump around in certain formats,

01:47:45 ◼   ► in certain cases.

01:47:46 ◼   ► Like, there's problems and limitations

01:47:48 ◼   ► with a lot of these other packages out there

01:47:49 ◼   ► that if you're writing an app where you are streaming

01:47:53 ◼   ► from a known set of sources that you know,

01:47:55 ◼   ► like if you control the source end,

01:47:57 ◼   ► and you can say, well, we are only going to serve

01:48:00 ◼   ► MP3 format streams, for instance.

01:48:02 ◼   ► And so you know what you're gonna be reading,

01:48:04 ◼   ► and you have control over that.

01:48:06 ◼   ► You have a lot more options then.

01:48:08 ◼   ► First of all, if you don't need smart speed,

01:48:10 ◼   ► you can just use AD player.

01:48:11 ◼   ► Like that's the basic thing.

01:48:13 ◼   ► Like for most people, you don't need to be working

01:48:16 ◼   ► at this level, because most applications,

01:48:20 ◼   ► A.D. player will work just fine for you.

01:48:23 ◼   ► The only reason I need to be at this level

01:48:25 ◼   ► is to get smart speed working.

01:48:27 ◼   ► Now, another option, the guy who makes RSS radio,

01:48:30 ◼   ► this is one of the only other apps

01:48:33 ◼   ► that has silent skipping as a feature.

01:48:36 ◼   ► I met him at NS Conference this year,

01:48:38 ◼   ► he's a really nice guy.

01:48:39 ◼   ► And I asked him, 'cause I know that he supports streaming

01:48:42 ◼   ► and he has silent skipping, and I asked him how he did it.

01:48:44 ◼   ► And he said he just doesn't have silent skipping

01:48:48 ◼   ► and effects when it's streaming.

01:48:50 ◼   ► And he just has two different paths in the code

01:48:53 ◼   ► where like if he's playing a video

01:48:56 ◼   ► or if he's playing an audio file off a stream,

01:48:59 ◼   ► he just uses AVPlayer, and then if he's not,

01:49:01 ◼   ► he uses his other audio engine where he can do effects.

01:49:05 ◼   ► And I could go down that route too.

01:49:08 ◼   ► I'm just choosing not to.

01:49:09 ◼   ► So I could've offered streaming at the very beginning

01:49:12 ◼   ► and just say, well, you can stream,

01:49:14 ◼   ► but then smart speed won't work if you stream.

01:49:18 ◼   ► I'm just choosing that I don't want that.

01:49:20 ◼   ► Like I don't want that to be my solution.