AMD Proving to be Linux Chads AGAIN - WAN Show May 8, 2026

0:02 Alrighty, go for it.

0:06 What is up everybody and welcome to the WAN show.

0:11 I am coming at you live from a Microsoft Teams AI replace background.

0:16 Just kidding, Luke.

0:17 It's real.

0:18 I can prove it.

0:19 Oh yeah, look at that.

0:21 Look at the effects.

0:22 Look at the amazing effects.

0:23 I am in beautiful Connecticut today where I've been attending

0:28 a secret event that actually like has a live website.

0:32 Uh it was really cool.

0:34 I got to meet some incredible creators.

0:36 I met the one and only Alec from Technology Connections.

0:40 I also met Michael Reeves for the first time.

0:42 That was awesome.

0:43 Got to catch up with Tom Scott.

0:44 It's been an amazing amazing couple days.

0:47 So I'll be talking about that a little bit.

0:48 And I will also be talking about oh I don't know maybe the fact that sorry

0:56 GameStop has offered $56 billion for eBay

1:01 even though GameStop does not have 56 billion.

1:05 So I definitely have some thoughts on that.

1:07 What else have we got this week sir?

1:09 Well I I mean I offer 57 billion.

1:12 So okay now it's a bidding war.

1:16 Thank you.

1:17 That's helpful.

1:17 Yes, it's just it's just as legitimate of as an of an offer.

1:21 Uh did you mention the Valve thing?

1:22 I don't think so.

1:23 Valve imported 50 tons of something just being called game consoles for now.

1:28 We'll have to speculate on what that might

1:30 be because there's at least a couple things.

1:33 Um and Toyota built a $10 billion private utopia tech city.

1:39 What is what does that even mean?

1:42 And I got to throw one more in here because

1:43 our headline topic wasn't actually in our uh our four.

1:47 AMD is prepping full HDMI 2.1 implementation for Linux.

1:52 This is super exciting for anyone who's a big gamer on Linux who

1:56 or who just loves high resolution and high refresh rate displays over HDMI.

2:01 AMD just keeps being chatted and I absolutely love it.

2:05 Roll that intro.

2:26 The show is brought to you today by Tel, Zoho, MSI,

2:31 and Squarespace along with our rap partner Dbrand,

2:34 our chair partner, Razer, and our laptop partner Razer.

2:38 But I got to say, I am really missing my Razor chair right now.

2:42 There is negative lumbar support on the like

2:45 couch that I'm sitting in right now, and it is it is extremely uncomfortable.

2:50 Uh can't can't wait to get back to it.

2:52 But why don't we jump right into our first topic for today,

2:56 which has got to be the big news

2:58 that AMD is prepping full HDMI 2.1 implementation for Linux.

3:02 They submitted patches to add HDMI fixed rate link

3:06 or FRL support to their open-source Linux GPU drivers,

3:10 which is a huge step toward full HDMI 2.1 support on Linux.

3:17 FRL is part of the HDMI 2.1 standard and enables

3:20 the higher bandwidth that's needed for higher resolution and refresh rates.

3:23 This is all notable because in 2024,

3:27 the HDMI forum rejected AMD's earlier attempt to bring

3:31 HDMI 2.1 to its open source drivers over,

3:34 you guessed it, concerns about exposing proprietary details of the standard,

3:40 which ain't that the always way?

3:43 Anytime someone tries to do something really cool

3:46 and just do the work for somebody on Linux,

3:49 some standards body or some company is like, "M, yeah, no.

3:55 Uh, yeah, just no.

3:57 No." An AMD driver engineer confirmed on the Feronx

4:01 forums that a full implementation is on the way,

4:04 pending compliance testing,

4:06 and that display stream compression support will follow in a later patch.

4:11 and this change and the timing of it are, let's just say,

4:17 convenient and very interesting in light of one of our other headline topics,

4:22 which is, of course, the uh supposed what what was it?

4:26 50 tons.

4:27 Are these metric tons?

4:29 Are these imperial tons?

4:31 Um the 50 tons of game consoles

4:34 that Valve has apparently just imported because it was major topic

4:41 of discussion during the announcement of the Steam Machine that um hey,

4:47 it's got kind of a modern GPU in it.

4:49 Couldn't help noticing it doesn't support HDMI 2.1.

4:53 What's up with that?

4:55 Well, if AMD's implementation lands and passes compliance,

4:58 and the timing of all of this works out, it could be that Steam OS devices could

5:04 get HDMI 2.1 either at or closely near launch.

5:08 We don't know if Valve's been involved in these patches at all,

5:11 but just given how chatted they've been about

5:14 all of this, nothing would really surprise me.

5:16 Luke, do you want to jump right into the speculation

5:19 around the um very very soon upcoming Steam Machine launch?

5:26 Yeah, between April 30th and May 1st, Brah Lynch,

5:30 who was uh correct about the Steam

5:32 Controller import documents a couple weeks ago,

5:34 posted that the United States received a total

5:36 of 50 tons of game consoles from Valve.

5:39 It is unclear if this is the new Steam Machine, which is would be the console,

5:44 or the Steam Frame, which is Valve's new VR headset,

5:48 or possibly even just a bunch of Steam Decks, though unlikely.

5:53 Uh, but they were also game consoles when imported before,

5:56 so it wouldn't it wouldn't be too weird.

5:59 Uh, it's worth noting 50 tons is not maybe actually as much as you might think.

6:04 The steam machine was confirmed to weigh around six lbs,

6:06 which would be about 20,000 units, which

6:11 is probably not enough even if you think it's not hyper

6:14 compelling because if we look at like the the Steam controller,

6:18 which basically every review that I saw was like

6:21 it's a little expensive for what it is, and then it's just instantly sold out.

6:24 Like it's Steam hardware, it's just going to fly.

6:27 Um, so yeah, I I I mean,

6:29 if this is the entirety of the initial wave of the Steam machines,

6:34 I think they're just going to fly out immediately.

6:37 Uh, yeah, I um Is it our discussion question on this one

6:41 or is it our discussion question on a different one?

6:44 Uh, yeah, I don't remember, but I'm going to move our discussion question.

6:49 One sec.

6:50 Sorry.

6:50 Elijah included that the math to figure out that it was 20,000 units

6:53 is accounting for shipping weight and CC can weight and things like that.

6:58 Yeah.

6:58 Okay.

6:59 Um I guess my my question here is ah yes,

7:03 this is actually our discussion question

7:05 for the Steam controller selling out in 30 minutes.

7:10 Um, and it was, you know, given Valve's history with, you know, the Steam Deck,

7:15 was the day one sellout just unavoidable,

7:18 or should a company of Valve scale have been better prepared?

7:23 And I guess I have the same question when we come to the Steam Machine.

7:27 If, and this is a big if because we don't know for sure,

7:30 but if this is just 20,000 units of Steam machines for the US market,

7:37 is Valve being kind of irresponsible

7:41 in launching it with such limited inventory,

7:44 or is it possible that this is just,

7:46 you know, the the first shipment and, you know,

7:49 the next five CC cans coming in are going to mean

7:52 that we're actually going to have a reasonable amount of of launch inventory.

7:56 Like if they launch this with just 20,000 units,

7:58 is that just kind of asking for trouble from scalpers?

8:01 Because Steam controllers are going for like hundreds of dollars.

8:05 If this is the Steam machine,

8:07 basically everyone on the internet has been saying, "Ah,

8:10 I'm not that interested for a long time."

8:13 So like if you're if you're choosing Yes, I still think it's low personally,

8:16 but if you're choosing the stock for this, I can

8:19 understand being a little bit concerned compared to the Steam Deck.

8:22 Even compared to the Steam controller,

8:24 people were very interested in the Steam Controller.

8:25 They just said it was expensive and that Steam

8:27 hardware seemed just to be like whatever,

8:28 people are going to pay for it anyways.

8:30 Uh but the Steam machine,

8:31 like most the press I saw on it was saying it's not super compelling.

8:36 Um which I mean I still think it's cool.

8:39 Like if you're Valve,

8:41 don't you have kind of a don't you have kind of a responsibility to to make

8:46 your products available when you say they're

8:48 available and stop acting like a small company?

8:51 I think the Steam Deck,

8:53 if I remember correctly, sold out pretty much immediately,

8:56 but then had fairly rapid waves of restocks, did it not?

9:00 Sorry.

9:00 Uh oh, yeah.

9:01 Um, yes.

9:04 Yes, it it was restocked pretty rapidly,

9:07 so it was clear that they were kind of they kind of had staged shipments

9:12 that were sort of in various stages

9:15 of being transported across the ocean at the time.

9:17 Um, it's also possible,

9:19 though I'm just speculating on this, but it

9:21 is a pretty common strategy that they would have,

9:23 if they had like one shipment in their warehouse and like one at the dock

9:28 and one at the midpoint of the ocean and one that was just wrapping production.

9:32 Sometimes what'll happen is if things go way better than expected,

9:36 they'll actually take that one that is just wrapping production,

9:40 throw it on a plane,

9:41 and it'll actually beat any of those other ones to the warehouse.

9:44 So you can kind of you can kind of massage the availability of things that way.

9:50 Like we've we've had to do that with some of the cables.

9:52 We've had to air freight them rather than sea

9:53 freight them just because the demand is so ridiculous.

9:56 Um but I just I don't know man.

9:59 I seeing what they did with the controller is not really giving

10:02 me a ton of faith that Valve is adequately stocking this thing.

10:06 And at a certain point,

10:07 I've actually had a Valve employee say to me like unironically,

10:13 you know, something something, but like, you know,

10:18 we're a small company, so blah blah blah.

10:21 And I go, listen, revenue and profit-wise, you're not a small company at all.

10:29 As as a hardware company, they don't ship

10:32 that much hardware.

10:34 Um, and I I think that side of their business is is relatively small,

10:41 but still they they they could not be as you're saying.

10:44 Um, I think as well it's it's it's like scalper bait.

10:48 Um, there's there's tons of these controllers on like eBay and elsewhere.

10:53 Uh, I it's it's tough because I I I wish that they did

10:57 more to fight against that, but I don't necessarily know what they do.

11:01 That doesn't make it One of the things they could have done was they could have

11:07 just not called it the exact same name as the original Steam Controller,

11:11 which is causing a lot of OG Steam controllers

11:14 to be sold at scalper prices by, you know,

11:17 to confused relatives or giftgivers right now.

11:20 That's um That's true.

11:22 That's a really frustrating situation that was completely avoidable that I

11:26 raised with Valve when they did the unveiling and I was like,

11:29 "Hey, this is a really bad idea." I raised it

11:32 again in the review and then I just I don't know.

11:35 I was feeling kind of sassy and I sent them and I told you so as well.

11:38 I was like I basically linked them like a bunch

11:41 of scalper eBay listings and I was like, "Hey,

11:45 so just a, you know,

11:47 third time this was super avoidable and you guys didn't have to do this.

11:52 You could have just named it in a way that wasn't confusing." Yeah.

11:55 People are now calling it the Valve Steam Controller 2026 model.

12:01 And if Valve had called it that, I wouldn't have even been that mad.

12:06 Would have been a little bit better.

12:08 But they just called it Steam Controller.

12:11 Like guys, so avoidable.

12:14 And so I guess I'm just I guess I'm just kind

12:16 of this is just kind of a run of avoidable issues from them.

12:22 And I and I hope that like a I hope we give

12:26 Nintendo enough appreciation for what they did with the Switch 2 launch.

12:30 They took the time.

12:32 They delayed the launch.

12:34 They built up inventory to make sure that if

12:36 you wanted to switch to pretty much at launch, you could go and get one.

12:40 And that's that's something that is not necessarily good for their cash flow.

12:45 And to your point, can be a risky thing to do, but it's good for your customers.

12:50 And I I I want Valve to stop behaving like a scrappy startup

12:56 and act like a real company when it comes to their product launches.

13:00 And I realize this is kind of rich coming from the guy who

13:03 can't keep his cables in stock for more than flipping 20 minutes, right?

13:08 I get that.

13:09 But come on, man.

13:10 I definitely operate with constraints that Valve does not have.

13:17 Just doesn't have.

13:22 Yeah.

13:22 Um, with all of that said, hey, where are you at for Steam Machine?

13:28 Like I I feel like in the initial launch window, people were super excited.

13:34 The uh excitement kind of waned as we made our way into the RAM apocalypse

13:40 and and a lot of the pricing estimates for the Steam Machine started to go up.

13:44 Um Valve clearly has gotten their hands on enough RAM to manufacture

13:48 the thing cuz they haven't actually delayed the launch outside of Q2,

13:51 which means it's coming in the next 7 to 8 weeks.

13:56 Where's your bullishness right now?

13:58 I still think it's super cool.

13:59 I I uh I don't think the lack of interest

14:03 due to RAM apocalypse has anything to do with Steam Machine.

14:05 I think a very very significant amount of people are just not interested

14:10 in computers right now because they are in a lot of ways kind of boring.

14:15 Like the most interesting news in computer land

14:18 right now is people running away from Windows.

14:21 It's not it's not hardware.

14:23 And then hardware is super super super expensive.

14:27 uh it's it's just a terrible time to be into computers unfortunately.

14:31 So I think that is what reduced the interest in the Steam Machine.

14:35 Nothing to do with the actual Steam Machine itself.

14:37 Um really I I think so.

14:40 When when you look at handhelds,

14:41 people prefer the Steam Deck mostly over pretty much all the alternatives,

14:47 even though the Steam Deck is pretty old

14:49 and underperformant compared to alternatives at this point.

14:52 Um, and I I think there will be a market

14:54 of people that will really like a Steam machine.

14:56 People like Steam hardware.

14:58 It's another push forward for for Linux, for Steam OS.

15:02 I think both of these things are good.

15:04 I wouldn't be surprised at all if the Steam Machine is at least part of the kick

15:08 in the pants that that pushed AMD to try again to push for the HDMI 2.1 thing.

15:14 Um, I I think it it just keeps progressing this same

15:18 thing that we've been trying to push for for a while now,

15:21 which is which is Linux for more people.

15:23 Um, and that's great.

15:25 I think people will buy it.

15:26 I suspect if it's 20,000 units, it's going to disappear immediately.

15:30 Um,

15:32 I I don't suspect it's going to be like, oh my god,

15:36 this like incredible value option that a bunch of people

15:39 seem to think that it was going to be.

15:41 Um,

15:43 does it need to be?

15:44 I don't think so.

15:45 I wish it was too, but does it need to be in the grand scheme of things if

15:49 what the Steam Machine can accomplish is it can

15:53 is it can make PC gaming a more consolelike experience,

15:58 something that's easier to to get into, even if

16:01 it even if the money barrier is still there,

16:03 something that requires less sort of technical knowhow.

16:07 If it takes people out of their comfort zone and puts them into Linux,

16:12 if it creates an install base for Linux

16:15 that incentivizes developers to target this hardware platform,

16:18 like can we then can we then forgive Valve

16:22 if the Steam machine ultimately is not that affordable?

16:25 I like there there's some people in Flowplane chat.

16:28 Uh Mick Bane said that the Steam machine will need to be cheap.

16:31 U Deox said the deck hit a value proposition.

16:35 I hear what you guys are saying.

16:37 That's very true.

16:38 The controller sure as heck didn't.

16:40 Sold out in 30 minutes.

16:42 Um, I I don't think the machine is as compelling as the controller.

16:47 I don't think the machine is as compelling as the deck.

16:50 I think Valve knows both of these things.

16:53 I think for the people who kind of want a home theater machine

16:57 and it would be pretty cool to have a Steam OS powered home theater machine.

17:02 Yeah.

17:02 paired with the knowledge that is kind

17:06 of weird and a little bit uncomfortable for me,

17:08 but the knowledge that an incredible amount of people just buy pre-builds.

17:12 This is a cool Steam powered pre-build that is trendy because it's Linux

17:17 and Steam OS and it can play all your freaking Steam games and it's

17:20 on your TV and your cool new Steam controller works with it

17:23 and your Steam Deck and your Steam Machine are kind of in the same ecosystem.

17:27 Neat.

17:28 I still think it has all of those things.

17:30 I don't think it's going to be super price competitive.

17:33 I think for a lot of people,

17:34 it's going to price them out because any computer right now

17:37 is basically going to price out a massive amount of people.

17:40 It just is a fact at the moment.

17:42 Um, but especially if they're bringing in low volume,

17:46 I think it's going to do well for them.

17:47 And I welcome anything that uh is

17:52 honestly going to keep spicing up the competition

17:54 in the operating system space right now because

17:57 even if Microsoft is waking up a little bit, I need them to wake up a lot.

18:01 Um yeah, I um this is going to sound crazy.

18:06 Okay, bear with me for a second here.

18:14 So far, I like the new leadership at Xbox.

18:19 Yeah.

18:19 One of the first things she did was slash the price of Game Pass.

18:23 Um, yes, removed day one access to COD, which is, you know,

18:28 a a big boatload of suck for people who bought Xbox,

18:32 bought Game Pass just for COD,

18:34 but in my opinion, actually a boon for everyone who enjoys the variety of Game

18:40 Pass and appreciates that aspect of it more

18:43 and wants the subscription to be more affordable.

18:46 So, I I can actually I can I can get on board with that move,

18:51 especially as someone who doesn't play COD.

18:52 So, so take that take that for what it is.

18:55 Um, I already like what they're doing with changes to the branding,

19:01 changes to the messaging,

19:03 that whole that that whole this is an Xbox campaign where like a TV is an Xbox,

19:07 an iPad's an Xbox, everything's an Xbox.

19:10 I understood where they were.

19:11 I understood what that meant, right?

19:13 I didn't know anyone, but like you know how long was Microsoft going to beat

19:21 that drum that the Xbox is not a game console?

19:24 I mean, after the disastrous launch of the Xbox One with the connect

19:29 module and then eventually unbundling the connect module and going, "Oh, okay.

19:33 So, it's not a the center of your digital life or home media hub or, you know,

19:37 whatever." What it feels like to like how

19:40 long are they going to keep trying that?

19:42 And it seems like she's saying not anymore.

19:45 She's also saying, this isn't in the doc, but I wanted to bring this up anyways.

19:48 I'm going to share my screen.

19:49 I don't think you can see it, but I'll I'll I'll speak to it.

19:51 Uh, Microsoft gives up on Xbox co-pilot AI.

19:56 New Xbox CEO Asha Chararma continues to make her mark.

20:00 Windows is winding down.

20:03 Here's where I'm going with this.

20:04 Here's where I'm going with this.

20:06 So far, I like her.

20:09 And I think both you and I were really skeptical.

20:11 Yeah, because we were just like, "Okay,

20:13 so what?" She comes from like the AI side of the business.

20:15 What what her gaming street credit is functionally

20:18 other than other than reducing the price of Game Pass,

20:21 a lot of it right now is words.

20:23 So I like I like the words, but they're good words.

20:26 They're good words, but I'm still kind of holding powerful words.

20:30 Tears streaming down their face.

20:33 Uh I like these words.

20:35 They said, "These are the finest words that any

20:38 man or woman alive has ever has ever said.

20:41 I don't know if I'll ever taste words like this again." So, so I like her.

20:45 And I'm going to make a bold prediction right now.

20:51 With Sony being unwilling to just shoulder

20:56 the cost of selling consoles at a loss,

20:58 they in an unprecedented move, they raised the price of the PS5.

21:02 Sony has never raised the price of a console before.

21:05 You and you can make the argument that when they

21:08 when they did the uh the slim for the PS5, they effectively raised the price.

21:12 And in some ways they like kind

21:14 of did depending on what configuration you were buying,

21:16 but they also like didn't.

21:19 Um Sony raised the price of a current generation PlayStation 5.

21:23 Never been done before.

21:24 Uh Nintendo, this is in the dock for this week.

21:28 Nintendo is raising the price of the Switch, too.

21:31 That one I don't know if it's never been done before,

21:33 but it certainly is not common.

21:37 Valve has moved away.

21:39 They they or at least it looks like they have signaled a strong

21:43 intent to move away from what they did with the Steam Deck.

21:46 With the Steam Deck, they got really aggressive.

21:50 And from what I've heard, they weren't selling it at a loss.

21:52 That's not my understanding.

21:54 But what they did do was they made a huge commitment to AMD.

21:58 They did that custom silicon and that enabled them that was

22:01 a big part of what enabled them to hit a hyperaggressive

22:04 price point and really build an install base for this machine

22:07 so that developers would have a reason to care about it.

22:11 So, so far everyone except Microsoft is kind of on defense right now.

22:19 Do you kind of are you kind of picking up what I'm throwing down right now?

22:22 Yeah.

22:22 Yeah.

22:22 Yeah.

22:23 Yeah.

22:24 What if Microsoft doesn't have much to defend right now?

22:27 What if Microsoft is the one who comes in with Project Helix,

22:33 which is the code name for the nextG Xbox,

22:36 and does the like 299 and walks off stage?

22:42 And to be clear, it's not going to be $299.

22:45 Don't Don't live in a diluted la land where

22:48 you think you're going to get a console for

22:50 You said it.

22:51 No, no, I know.

22:52 I don't mean literally $299,

22:54 but honestly, you know, against the backdrop of of rising technology prices,

23:01 I think if they walked on stage and even said $4.99 at this point,

23:05 that would be a mic drop moment.

23:07 Um, I I I'm not I'm not sure how much hope I should have because Microsoft

23:10 has actually also said prior to Asha Sharma's

23:13 leadership that the nextG Xbox will be very expensive.

23:18 But like Microsoft has also done a two-tiered strategy already twice.

23:23 So just because the the X skew is really expensive,

23:27 that doesn't mean that there won't be a really compelling value option.

23:32 We don't know that.

23:33 So do you have Luke, can you find Check your pinky.

23:37 Can you just look at check your pinky?

23:41 Can you find even like a single tiny bone in your body?

23:45 like a pinky sized bone that contains any hope for Xbox

23:51 to be the savior of the next generation of consoles.

23:55 Can you find that hope?

23:59 He's trying he's trying folks.

24:01 He's Oh my god, the the brow furrow.

24:04 Oh, I'm watching I'm watching in real time as you're as you're trying so hard.

24:09 Oh man,

24:10 my my gut says no.

24:11 But you are saying one singular bone and I have I have a lot of bones.

24:15 Um yeah.

24:17 Can you bone this?

24:20 Uh I don't know.

24:21 I can I can hope.

24:22 I seriously doubt though.

24:23 If you look at

24:25 Microsoft's path with Xbox for so long now, the answer from them is for sure no.

24:34 Um, but you know, she's also clearly down to try

24:40 to change the path and change the strategy.

24:44 Um,

24:44 so maybe they figure out I think it really depends

24:46 on like what are the goals that have been given to her.

24:50 Is she supposed to make it so that Xbox isn't the laughingtock

24:53 of consoles anymore in regards to like when you're saying like, "Oh,

24:57 the other people are raising their prices."

24:59 And I'm sitting here being like, "Yeah,

25:00 and Xbox is raising their price on what?"

25:02 Like They don't have to raise their price.

25:04 No one's buying their consoles.

25:05 It doesn't matter.

25:06 Um like the what what is that what

25:09 is that random thing that outsold Xboxes for Christmas?

25:13 Oh, the uh Next Cube.

25:14 Not Not the Ouya.

25:16 The Yeah, next Cube or whatever it's called.

25:18 Is that Is that what it's called?

25:19 I Oh man.

25:20 What What is it called?

25:20 Is it called Next Cube?

25:22 Definitely not the Ouya.

25:25 Next cube.

25:26 I'm not.

25:30 Uh what am I thinking?

25:31 We don't even know the name of it, dude.

25:33 And it outsold Xbox.

25:34 That's That's my point.

25:36 So, like is is

25:39 from

25:39 Next Playground.

25:40 Next Playground.

25:41 NEX, not NEX.

25:42 So, you were you were close.

25:44 They they Xbox connected better than Microsoft was ever able to Xbox Connect

25:49 and managed to outsell the Xbox

25:51 with a console that effectively requires a subscription.

25:54 It's freaking wild that that thing is has found that market

25:59 that it has and absolutely killed it the way that they have.

26:02 Kudos to them.

26:03 Yeah.

26:03 And it's stomped.

26:04 So like is is the goal from higher than her that was given to her like

26:09 her KPI for for her not even Microsoft but for her was her KPI,

26:14 hey we want to be taken seriously in the console space again.

26:17 We want to sell some freaking consoles and get our name out

26:19 there and be a big player again cuz we're honestly not right now.

26:23 or was it just revenue line go up?

26:27 Cuz if it was just revenue line go or profit line go up

26:30 maybe cuz if it was just that she might be incentivized to focus

26:34 on what she's technically been focusing on so far at least publicly which

26:38 is game pass and and and pushing game pass even harder and getting pass

26:42 and not including COD in game pass because

26:44 that cost them a whole bunch of revenue.

26:47 Yeah.

26:47 Um, so like is it is it those things or is

26:51 it make Xbox a console that people actually buy again?

26:57 Because if it if it's this one, if it's,

26:59 hey, we're going to try to invest in the future.

27:00 We're going to try to get our market share back in the in the console space.

27:03 We're going to do these things.

27:04 We're we're going to um double down on consoles continuing to exist.

27:10 cuz it felt like in the era of like metaverse, VR, all that kind of stuff,

27:15 Microsoft was just going like, "No one's even going to have consoles anymore.

27:18 Let's ditch them." Um, but that seems to be going away.

27:22 Yeah.

27:22 What's up?

27:23 Okay.

27:23 Okay.

27:23 Okay.

27:24 Here's what I want to know.

27:25 This I'm actually like hyper interested in your perspective

27:29 on because I think that you almost have like two competing

27:34 fragments of your soul in your body that are almost

27:38 uh that have goals that are almost in in perfect

27:43 conflict with each other because on the one side

27:46 you were an Xbox kid and when you see

27:48 a green Xbox logo that makes a little lizard part

27:51 of your brain light up and go, "Yeah, Xbox." Yep.

27:57 Yeah,

27:58 exactly right.

27:59 Okay% Okay.

28:00 Other side other side of your other fragment of your soul

28:05 is PC gamer.

28:07 Why would I game on anything that I didn't

28:08 build with my own two hands or or Lionus'

28:11 children built me built it for me or you

28:13 know whatever you know some some variant of

28:16 why would I play on a computer that wasn't it didn't have child labor involved?

28:19 What are we talking about?

28:21 Good news, Luke.

28:22 You don't have to.

28:23 Um, none of us do if we're being very honest.

28:28 Yeah.

28:28 Dang.

28:28 Oh.

28:30 Uh, okay.

28:31 Let's move on from that really really fast.

28:34 Um, and and and and rooting for the customizability

28:38 and the DIY spirit of of PC gaming.

28:42 And I think that part of you has really embraced the way that Microsoft is

28:47 has is making the PC more Xbox like and buying a single license of an Xbox

28:52 game gives you the right to play on PC and and I I I

28:56 suspect you're also pretty down for like

28:59 the Xbox full screen experience and how it,

29:01 you know, makes your PC run slightly more efficiently and less

29:04 like a Windows machine and more like a gaming machine.

29:07 How do those two pieces of you reconcile with each other

29:12 when we know when we know in our heart of hearts

29:15 that the thing that makes a console generation successful more

29:20 than any other more than any other rule in the playbook exclusives is exclusive.

29:26 Yeah.

29:26 See, you knew exactly where I was going with it.

29:29 That's what sells consoles.

29:30 So, how can Xbox be come back to its

29:34 former glory without like Dead Rising and without

29:38 Halo exclusives and without without all these things

29:42 that made the 360 era the peak of Xbox?

29:46 What What would it look like for you?

29:48 Yeah, it's tough.

29:49 I The exclusives one is interesting because Sony

29:53 and Xbox both started pushing games to Steam.

29:57 Um, you can there's a there's a chart

29:58 that I saw recently that was super interesting,

30:00 which was like PlayStation exclusives and how

30:03 they performed on Steam and like Hell

30:06 Divers was way up there and but a lot of other things did pretty well,

30:10 but you know, Hell Divers killed it.

30:12 Um, but a lot of people like that that's a lot of PlayStation games on PC.

30:20 People are still buying tons of PlayStations.

30:23 So, like I I kind of feel like

30:26 uh you know them them putting Microsoft exclusives on PlayStation

30:31 might be the the too far move in terms of exclusives, but I don't know 100%.

30:36 I also don't know if this is just my brain trying

30:38 to convince me this is true or if I actually believe it's true.

30:41 But I don't know that putting games on PC ruins your console attractiveness.

30:47 Now, I would also have to dive deeper into the time.

30:52 dive first or can I counterpoint that first?

30:55 It's up to you.

30:56 I was going to add really quick thing basically,

30:58 but I don't know how PlayStation has done it.

31:00 I don't know if there's like an exclusive window

31:01 at the beginning and then they released it or or not.

31:05 That's exactly what I was going to bring up

31:07 is that the PlayStation 5 generation has been one of

31:12 shifting strategies for Sony.

31:14 Yeah.

31:14 At the beginning of the generation,

31:17 there was to anyone's going to come to another platform

31:24 or at the very least there was literally no given timeline.

31:29 Then Sony kind of started to do this thing

31:33 where it turned out they were actually selling like,

31:36 you know, a lot of PlayStation games on Steam.

31:40 and they started to talk about, you know,

31:42 when the window is going to open and when you'll

31:45 be able to buy these PlayStation games on other platforms.

31:48 Now, I don't think this has actually been confirmed formally.

31:52 Um, and someone can correct me if I'm wrong.

31:54 Hit me up in the chat, guys, but from my understanding,

31:57 Sony has now sort of started to look at these numbers

32:02 in the gear up to PlayStation 6 and gone,

32:05 "Okay, well, hold on a second.

32:08 Maybe we need to dial back this exclusives on PC,

32:13 on Steam strategy because are we selling enough PlayStation fives right now?

32:19 Um, I would say we're not.

32:22 That's that's my understanding of kind of where it where it's at right now.

32:29 Um,

32:30 so could you see a future where there's a window where

32:33 where Xbox exclusives exist on Xbox exclusively for some period of time,

32:39 a year, year and a half, two years even,

32:42 and then they kind of open up the floodgates and go, "Okay,

32:44 let's grab some more extra revenue now that this has

32:47 moved as many consoles as it as it will."

32:49 I honestly think even six months is would be completely fine.

32:53 The world moves so fast.

32:54 Now, one thing that I want to throw out

32:55 there is this chart from uh the Alina Insight newsletter,

33:02 uh Alina Analytics Substack.

33:04 Um copies sold, top PlayStation Studios games by copy sold.

33:09 You see Hell Divers 2 is way, way, way up here.

33:12 This is sold on Steam.

33:13 I don't have the stats for on PlayStation.

33:15 As far as my understanding goes, this game sold gang busters on PlayStation 2.

33:20 Uh well,

33:22 PlayStation as well.

33:23 Uh

33:24 thank you.

33:25 It was released simultaneously on PC and PlayStation 5.

33:28 It did release on Xbox, but it was way delayed on Xbox.

33:32 Um okay.

33:34 Oh, but closer to the window I was talking about.

33:35 Not a year or two years.

33:37 It looks like it was released on PlayStation and PC in February,

33:40 and it was released on Xbox in August.

33:43 Same year.

33:43 No, not same year.

33:46 Next year.

33:47 So, it was a pretty big window.

33:49 Okay.

33:49 like 18 months almost.

33:50 That's huge.

33:52 I mean, we're in pretty uncharted territory right now.

33:55 Uh, pun kind of intended here.

33:57 Um, where this whole thing with exclusive, but like not exclusive,

34:03 but maybe timed, but maybe sometimes not timed.

34:07 Um, you know, I think it's I think it's pretty pretty

34:10 obvious that Nintendo has has drawn a clear line in the sand.

34:15 they allow their IPs in other, you know, forms of media now,

34:19 like you, you know, there's that um there's that mobile Mario Kart game.

34:24 Um and and you know what, actually, I mean,

34:26 their IPs have actually I I remember um what's what was it?

34:31 Mario is Missing was like a PC a PC Nintendo

34:35 IP game back from when like I was a kid.

34:37 Um, so they they allow their IPs on other platforms,

34:40 but Nintendo seems pretty clear that if you want to play a Nintendo game,

34:44 you will play it on a Switch console or they will come after you.

34:49 Um, yeah.

34:50 Is this Did I imagine this?

34:52 Maybe it was something else.

34:55 No, I mean it shows Super Ness as the as the image,

34:58 but it says platforms MS DOSs, Macintosh, Windows, Nest, and Snoop Super Ness.

35:04 I remember seeing it for sale at London Drugs.

35:06 I've never heard of this before.

35:08 Anyway, I I never actually played it.

35:10 I just remember seeing it.

35:11 I did not like it so much.

35:13 Oh, well, okay.

35:14 Maybe maybe maybe that was the one.

35:16 Maybe that was what chased them off the PC in the first place.

35:20 Maybe.

35:21 Um, but okay.

35:22 So, you've laid out your ideal strategy, which is that Microsoft doubles down

35:26 on the Xbox hardware being affordable, right?

35:29 I where I don't know if you actually said that, but it was kind of Yeah,

35:32 I asked question.

35:33 If they want consoles to if they want

35:35 their console to continue to exist in a meaningful way,

35:38 they need to make a splashback cuz they're going

35:40 to have to win everyone that went to PlayStation 5 back,

35:45 which is going to be tough.

35:48 Yeah.

35:48 So, they're going to need to come in swinging with something big.

35:50 They It would be real good for them if they had a Halo like game,

35:56 which what what's the last like Microsoft Studio game?

36:02 Forza, I guess, would be the last one standing.

36:06 Forza Horizon 6 is coming.

36:09 It'll be it'll be too early for the console launch.

36:11 Um, but in terms of like blockbuster first party Microsoft game

36:19 or even exclusive game, like I I'm having a hard time even even thinking of any.

36:26 Yeah, Lightning XCE in chats like I don't know.

36:29 Halo 2 remake again.

36:32 Yeah, like yikes, man.

36:34 So, I don't I don't know what they have to like

36:38 really bring people in and and Halo has diminished pretty hard.

36:45 Um, yeah, I don't I honestly don't know if they're capable of bringing it back.

36:49 Starfield was kind of um Yeah,

36:54 I'm not confident in Bethesda being able to release a good game.

36:58 Don't worry, Activision Blizzard will do it.

37:02 Uh yeah.

37:02 Okay.

37:03 Uh sure.

37:07 I don't know.

37:07 They sure spent a lot of money buying some stuff.

37:11 Okay.

37:11 Noi put together a comprehensive list for us.

37:14 Here we go.

37:16 Cool.

37:16 Microsoft Flight Simulator 2024.

37:19 Gears of War Reloaded.

37:21 I can You look like You look like I I know

37:23 it didn't happen because I'm not in the room with you,

37:25 but you look like someone farted.

37:28 And that's what you look like.

37:29 I know it didn't happen cuz I'm not in the room with you is hilarious.

37:33 He farts on wro so much and you guys have no idea.

37:40 Age of Empires 2 definitive edition.

37:43 Is that helping?

37:47 Uh new fable.

37:50 You know what a killer dude.

37:52 the new Fable that doesn't have uh

37:55 uh character physical changes based on karma status.

37:59 What?

38:00 Really?

38:00 Yeah.

38:00 Did you hear about that?

38:01 How's it even fable?

38:02 Right.

38:02 Like what are you doing?

38:04 Uh new Fable won't have we made a different game and slapped the name on it.

38:10 This is one of those things that I just kind of I look at and I go,

38:13 look, I understand from a game developer standpoint

38:17 and even from like a fan and community standpoint,

38:20 you know, the sequel shouldn't just be like slap a coat of paint on it,

38:24 Force Awakens it, and just make the same thing again,

38:28 you know, but how can you not Yeah.

38:33 How can you How can you take something that was like like

38:36 a core standout differentiating feature of the original and just go, "Eh,

38:44 dude." When when people would tell me

38:45 about Fable when Fable was first coming out,

38:48 that was the thing that they would tell you.

38:50 That was it.

38:51 It's an RPG and the actions that you

38:54 do physically change your character based on carbo status.

38:57 It's like, "Oh, wow.

38:57 Interesting." Uh, Boom pointed out.

38:59 It's like Civ 7 forcing you to switch civs all the time.

39:04 Amazing example of just like what are you doing?

39:07 Like I I honestly have no interest in ever launching Civ 7 again.

39:12 That that game is just cooked in my mind.

39:15 Like I don't even care about cosmetics.

39:17 Like you know this.

39:18 I've never spent a dollar on cosmetics in my life.

39:21 And just just out of silent protest

39:25 towards horse armor and everything that followed it.

39:28 I mean, you know this, too.

39:29 I played a bunch of Halo Infinite.

39:31 I earned a bunch of helmets and armor and like what skins.

39:35 And I stubbornly played with the stock skin no matter what my rank was.

39:40 I actually even did the same thing in Clare

39:42 Obscure where they're not even they're they're not even purchasable.

39:45 I just I played with the stock outfits the whole

39:48 game because I'm just like I don't know whether

39:51 I'm old school or whether I just like can't

39:53 stand the idea of microtransactions and cosmetics in my game.

39:56 I just I don't I don't want to even allow myself

40:00 to assign a value to my character looking a little bit different.

40:04 And I'm probably Yeah,

40:06 I'm probably I've gone too far and that that's that's like that's totally fine.

40:12 But even for someone like me who goes out

40:15 of my way to proudly publicly not care about cosmetics in Fable,

40:22 there would have been times when I was like,

40:25 "This quest would be easier or this situation would be easier if I just murdered

40:30 the crap out of everyone and I didn't

40:33 because I didn't want to like Senator Palpatine myself." Yeah.

40:38 And I and I wanted to so so tying the moral choice

40:43 to your physical appearance in that way really impacted gameplay for me in a way

40:51 that I think would actually be even more impactful in the era of in-game

40:57 cosmetics and in-game outfits and and to to not do that is like actual insanity.

41:05 People are saying,

41:06 crazy to me, by the way, that apparently Frais has announced

41:09 that they are going to maybe be walking

41:13 the the force changing of civs back or something.

41:17 I don't know the details.

41:18 No one linked an article, but multiple people said this um

41:22 look like I don't know.

41:23 People are saying it might be a different mode now.

41:25 Um yeah, they did with the time of update something test of time.

41:31 I I don't know, but some something may

41:33 have changed or be changing or something like that.

41:35 But honestly, like I I played one match of Civ 7 and every

41:41 single Civ game that I remember playing since I think Civ 4,

41:46 you play it on launch and it's like it's a little rough,

41:49 but I see the bones.

41:50 This will be cool.

41:51 We'll come back in some updates.

41:52 They release some expansions and it becomes really, really good.

41:55 And then you wait and the next game comes out and the same thing happens.

41:58 Civ 7 was the first time that I played it and was like, "The bones are rotten."

42:03 Oh, here it is.

42:03 pcgamer.com.

42:05 Civ 7 players can once again play as a single civilization

42:08 in a massive overhaul update that is tentatively coming in spring.

42:12 So, it's not here yet.

42:14 These these updates are similar in scope to an expansion.

42:17 So, there's hope, Luke.

42:19 Maybe I I won't completely give up.

42:21 But I will say like I I specifically remember playing Civ 6 and being like,

42:27 "Oo, I don't like a lot of these systems.

42:29 I don't like how this works." But, you know, they do this every time.

42:32 I'll just wait and then it'll get good.

42:33 And then I like Civ 6 now.

42:36 I didn't have that reaction playing Civ 7.

42:38 And you know, if they can pull it out, they don't have Luigi anymore.

42:42 So that'll be rough.

42:43 If they can pull Jeez, that'll be rough.

42:46 they can pull it off.

42:48 I think it would be considered a win though.

42:50 They lost their ace in a hole.

42:51 They lost their their

42:52 I don't want to talk about I don't want to talk about Xbox forever.

42:55 Uh that was that was crazy what you just

43:00 said and I'm glad I was talking over it.

43:03 Um, I want to play a fun game before we

43:05 before we finally move on from like talking about Xbox,

43:08 but Amir in float plane chat kind of inspired a little

43:12 short conversation that I want to have with chat here and said,

43:16 "If Microsoft bought Project Red and made

43:20 the Cyberpunk sequel an exclusive to Xbox, I would definitely go back.

43:26 I think that's literally the only title I can think

43:28 of that would bring me back to Xbox." And I actually want chat.

43:32 I want you guys to kind of give me your line.

43:36 Give me your bribe that it would take for Microsoft to to to win you back.

43:41 An interesting question.

43:42 Yeah.

43:43 Force you back to Xbox.

43:45 Witcher 4 and Cyberpunk 2087 or something.

43:50 Both coming to the new Xbox console would

43:53 be pretty that would be a pretty big pull.

43:56 One of the things GTA 6 it's not happening.

43:59 It's not relevant.

44:00 I shouldn't say it's not relevant.

44:01 It's very relevant to this conversation.

44:05 Yeah.

44:05 Give me something a little more realistic.

44:07 I I think something that's kind of funny about that argument to me is

44:10 the thing that would bring you back to Xbox is them buying another game studio.

44:17 Yeah.

44:17 And seeing how they've handled the ones that they have like

44:20 I I would prefer that just doesn't happen.

44:23 I think, you know, okay, they have new leadership.

44:25 I need to I need to try to remember

44:26 that and have some hope cuz she's been doing,

44:29 you know, she's been saying good things and has done a good thing so far.

44:34 Um, but yeah, Peter, just one more hit, bro.

44:39 Yeah, I don't know.

44:40 I don't know, man.

44:42 Oh, man.

44:42 Uh, Elijah says, "Elder School 6 being exclusive might.

44:47 Cat OS is like Portal 3." Okay, we all know that's never happening.

44:52 Uh, people got me, man.

44:53 Titanfall 3.

44:55 Titanfall 3.

44:56 If they actually made a genuinely good successor to Titanfall 2,

45:00 let's go.

45:01 That That would be my hook 100%.

45:03 I would be done.

45:03 I'd be cooked immediately cuz that's the in my opinion,

45:06 Titanfall 2 is I I don't know how nobody freaking

45:10 played it cuz EA is dumb and never marketed it.

45:13 But you look at reviews on Steam, overwhelmingly positive.

45:16 Everyone loved it.

45:17 The community is super strong.

45:19 That's the like Halo.

45:21 That's their halo.

45:22 If they market Titanfall 3 properly and they get

45:24 the IP somehow and they get some of the the spirit

45:28 that actually made Titanfall 2 and they make

45:30 a genuinely good successor to it, that game would

45:33 combat is so fun.

45:34 It's so fun.

45:36 That game is just and and it's it's one

45:38 of those things where it's like um like you

45:40 know how you know how wine connoisseurs will talk

45:43 about the body and the aroma and the whatever.

45:46 You know, I we can be the same about games, right?

45:48 where we start to kind of pick them

45:50 apart and we talk about the innovative mechanics

45:52 and the stunning visuals and blah blah blah

45:54 blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah.

45:57 But at the end of the day, does any of it matter unless it's fun?

46:02 Titanfall 2, I could say a lot of really

46:05 sort of pretentious things that are really good about it,

46:08 but at the end of the day, it's fun.

46:12 Sometimes you're in a mech and it's never not fun.

46:15 the weight and the like the momentum of this mech.

46:18 You can like feel it.

46:19 I was never even like a mech warrior kid, but it was like me

46:23 satisfying

46:23 and it was great.

46:24 And and and those combat sequences made sense.

46:27 You had big weapons and you fought big stuff and then

46:30 you kind of it's kind of like like power '90s Power Rangers,

46:33 man, where then that didn't mean that you

46:36 could just solve every problem with your big mech.

46:38 Sometimes you had to fight on the ground and like cool like mirror's edge

46:43 like uh parkour and like running and sliding

46:46 and like really satisfying gun combat too.

46:49 It's just such a fun game.

46:51 Okay.

46:51 Okay.

46:51 I think I think we're starting to lay a groundwork here, Luke.

46:55 So, they need to actually somehow turn around

46:58 Bethesda and make a good Elder Scrolls game.

47:01 That would be massive as well.

47:03 They need to they need to do Titanfall 2.

47:07 Um, you know, COD is going to be COD, right?

47:10 So, you know, but I don't I don't think I

47:12 don't think at this point you can make COD Xbox exclusive.

47:16 I don't think there's any putting closing that Pandora's box again.

47:20 Yeah, I don't think they should, to be honest.

47:22 Just keep saying um like if I'm trying to think if I'm trying to fully put

47:28 my Microsoft hat on, I don't think they should do that with COD.

47:32 I don't think so either.

47:33 Yeah,

47:33 take taking COD off PC would be crazy work at this point.

47:37 Obsidianbased New Vegas sequel.

47:41 I don't think they can do I don't think they

47:43 even should do a New Vegas sequel to be honest.

47:45 I think just doing an Obsidianbased Fallout though could be

47:48 pretty sick if if they if they get Bethesda to just

47:51 really actually make a good game again and they focus

47:55 on on uh Elder Scrolls 6 and just leave them there.

48:02 Yeah.

48:02 and take get Obsidian to wake up and make things and make Fallout.

48:08 That'd be awesome.

48:09 If they somehow get the IP and actually do right by it with Titanfall,

48:15 that would be amazing because honestly, I don't think they can make Halo.

48:22 I feel like Halo's like aged out.

48:25 I don't know how you fix it.

48:26 I think may maybe if you get off of Spartans

48:29 or something like if you if you focus on like

48:32 is even Halo without Spartans though like come on.

48:34 Yeah, if if you somehow focus on like

48:36 without ring shaped planets too,

48:39 you know, like what are we even what are we even talking about?

48:41 Yeah, I'm not sure.

48:42 Yeah, people said ODST.

48:44 There's ODST.

48:45 We should move on.

48:46 Uh Madscribe says, "Hey, Steam Controller has a reservation queue now.

48:49 So if you want one, uh that's probably the way to do it.

48:52 if you don't want to get scalped on that.

48:54 And uh man, don't pay $300 for a Steam controller.

48:58 It's a good controller.

48:59 At $100, it was kind of hard for me to wholeheartedly recommend.

49:04 At $300, it is impossible for me to recommend.

49:10 Um go go sign up for the queue.

49:12 Give Valve your money.

49:13 Not predatory scalpers.

49:14 I don't know why I have to say this.

49:16 If we all just got together and never paid a scalper for anything,

49:20 they wouldn't exist anymore and it would be a better world.

49:23 Um, don't do that.

49:25 Uh, but let's uh let's let's let's move on.

49:27 Uh, we should probably get some sponsors done.

49:29 Hey, Dan, I can't see your your thing.

49:31 Or why don't I jump into the CW announcements first?

49:33 We actually have a a pretty loaded up week for CW.

49:37 Some of you have noticed this already, but to celebrate our new website, Dbrand.

49:44 Uh, Luke, do you want to share your screen?

49:45 Uh, yeah.

49:46 Let me get there.

49:48 Dbrand products, select Dbrand products are

49:51 now available on ltstore.com with exclusive colorways,

49:59 ghost and green circuit that look absolutely flipping amazing.

50:05 And the best part is that unlike

50:08 if you order these products from Dbrand's website,

50:12 you will actually get both the ghost circuit skin

50:16 and the green circuit skin for the product that you select.

50:21 So, we've got skins for uh Switch 2 as well as for um Steam Deck,

50:27 for key modern phones.

50:29 Uh I've actually gotten a ton of comments.

50:33 Uh where is it?

50:34 Where's my phone?

50:34 There it is.

50:35 I've gotten a ton of comments on my green circuit skin here.

50:39 It's got just like very OG classic circuit board vibes.

50:44 And then we've got the uh the white one.

50:46 The ghost circuit has like a super cool kind of prismatic.

50:50 Uh you'll have to find maybe another shot to Dan has some

50:53 shots on his computer that show how it kind of catches the light.

50:57 Uh Dan, do you want to just uh do you

50:59 want to show those and just go back to uh Yeah,

51:02 you can kind of see it on the on kind of the bottom there.

51:05 What else you got?

51:06 Hit me.

51:07 Yeah, you can see it kind of at the bottom of the phone there.

51:09 Yeah, super cool.

51:13 Dude was up in float plane.

51:14 Chad says, "I knew you were using a skin that wasn't a thing before.

51:17 You ignored me for a reason.

51:18 I understand.

51:19 I'm not mad at you anymore.

51:20 I'm glad we're good.

51:21 I'm glad we're good." Dude was up.

51:24 Anyway, freaking excited about this partnership.

51:28 Uh so now if you wanted to get a a Dbrand case for uh for your device,

51:33 then you can also pick up some awesome stuff from ltstore.com at the same time.

51:38 And I've got a couple of things that you

51:40 can uh that you can pick up that are new.

51:43 For this week, we're launching our LTT precision multi-bit standard kit.

51:48 So, a little while ago, we rebranded the Precision Kit Pro,

51:53 and that was in preparation for this because we

51:55 now have two tiers of our precision multi-bit screwdrivers.

51:59 This one is designed for everyday repairs, upgrades, and tinkering.

52:02 It covers the most useful precision bits in one compact package.

52:06 Has the same premium LT build quality with an anodized aluminum handle,

52:10 magnetic bit retention, a stainless steel internal shaft,

52:13 and an end cap that spins suspiciously

52:16 well for something meant to be a screwdriver.

52:18 It builds on the bestselling Precision Pro, and it packs the most useful bits,

52:22 a removable crossbar for stubborn screws, that's new,

52:25 and a magnetic organizer case into one compact everyday kit.

52:30 So, the main difference here, guys,

52:32 is that it um it hold on, I'm actually trying to think.

52:39 Uh how many how many bits changes?

52:41 So, this one has 31 and the big one has 61.

52:45 And then Luke, if you zoom in, you can actually see there's

52:48 a hole through the driver now that you can use that torque bar on.

52:52 Um, and so it doesn't have the internal bit storage in the driver anymore.

52:56 But some people actually prefer this style anyway.

53:00 So, uh, we've got that launching this week.

53:03 And then finally, we're adding new colors to the blank t-shirt lineup.

53:08 Uh, we're getting a seasonal refresh with grape, jade gray, and cafe.

53:14 Excuse me.

53:15 Coffee.

53:16 Same lightweight fabric, refined fit,

53:18 and all the overthinking that went into making a genuinely good blank tea.

53:22 And also available in tall because finding basics

53:26 that actually fit shouldn't feel like a side quest.

53:28 Love that.

53:29 Love that tagline.

53:30 So guys, you can check out the new blank tease.

53:35 I think that's it for creator warehouse stuff.

53:37 Oh, okay.

53:38 This is interesting.

53:40 We have a new mailing list.

53:42 We're offering a singleuse 10% off LTT store coupon for people

53:48 who sign up to be notified on all future drops.

53:51 We have 85 plus more products still launching this year

53:55 and you can be among the first to know.

53:57 The coupon is valid for the next 7

53:58 days and you can sign up at ltdstore.com/pages/welcome.

54:04 Uh oh, I guess we should jump into uh a few comms.

54:07 Uh, we believe that when you throw money at your screen,

54:10 when you're watching your favorite creators or podcasts or whatever else it is,

54:13 that you should get more than just

54:15 the self-satisfaction of supporting a show that you like,

54:18 you should get quality products in the mail.

54:21 So, we did away with super chats and Twitch bits and all that other stuff.

54:25 And we consolidated all the contributions to the show into checkout messages.

54:30 All you got to do to send a checkout message is what Luke's doing.

54:33 He's presumably adding something to his cart.

54:36 There he goes.

54:37 He's adding something to his cart and he's going to show you guys the interface.

54:40 Once you're in the checkout,

54:41 you will see the box to type up a little checkout message.

54:46 There it is.

54:47 You can choose your color.

54:48 You can make your name show up if you wanted to um if

54:53 I don't know if you want your name to show up on screen,

54:54 you can make it anonymous.

54:56 And then when you guys are done typing up your message while we're live,

55:00 it'll go to producer Dan.

55:02 There he is.

55:03 who will respond to it or curate it for me and Luke

55:07 to respond to and we'll show you guys how that works.

55:09 You want Do we Do you have a couple uh check out messages for us, Dan?

55:12 I do.

55:13 Yes, I got a few here.

55:15 Hello, LLD.

55:16 Live leaks and damage control.

55:18 How many times have you blamed a company for a product not

55:21 working when it's because of you and you will not admit it?

55:28 Uh, I've definitely blamed companies for things not working.

55:32 um because and and it turned out to be user error.

55:37 Um I I can't I I am open to a time that I have done that and not followed up.

55:46 Uh

55:47 can you think of can you think of the most

55:48 maybe interesting one when it was it wasn't Jimmy Fallon show?

55:53 That one just actually didn't work.

55:54 Um, can you can you think of maybe the most interesting one

55:58 where it was user error and you ended up figuring out later?

56:03 Uh, let me think.

56:04 I'd say that happens a lot more like live on Wow, where I'll be like, "Oh,

56:09 I can't get my, you know,

56:11 my iPhone to do this because I'm I'm not facteing everything for W show." Yeah.

56:15 Yeah.

56:15 Yeah, that's true.

56:16 I don't fact fact check everything in my life anyway.

56:20 Um, oh yeah, of course, of course chat's going to go there.

56:26 Billet Labs, question mark.

56:28 I mean, my my issue with Billet Labs

56:30 was not that the temperatures weren't good, though.

56:33 Um, the reason that I was dismissive of the product

56:35 is for all the reasons that it failed anyway, which is that it was expensive.

56:39 It didn't fit in any case that existed or would ever exist.

56:42 Based on your technical thing,

56:44 you were saying that you didn't because you guys did use it wrong, right?

56:48 You used it on the wrong card or something.

56:49 Yeah, we used it on the So,

56:50 so they told us it might work on this GPU, but it's designed for this other one.

56:55 And I put it on the GPU that it didn't work on, and the temperature sucked.

57:00 But by that time, I had already had to modify my motherboard to get it to fit.

57:04 I had already determined that it was not actually

57:08 like good to put in any case anywhere ever.

57:13 Um, I had already be from my experience

57:17 as a water cooling product product manager,

57:20 I had already determined that there was never

57:23 going to be a follow-up to this thing

57:24 cuz that that I don't think people even like remember this video at this point.

57:28 They're just like mad, right?

57:30 Um, so part of the pitch for it was like, hey, if your GPU changes,

57:34 but you keep your CPU, you don't have to throw away the whole thing.

57:37 You could like you could like have like a GPU replacement.

57:39 Yeah, they never made that because that was never

57:42 All I was trying to bring up was that I think we did talk

57:45 on W show about how you technically didn't use the the fully appropriate card.

57:50 So, it wasn't it wasn't that you didn't address that.

57:53 Oh, yeah.

57:53 No, we Oh, we totally addressed that.

57:55 It just wasn't the problem with the product.

57:57 The problem with the product was that it was

57:58 a bad product and it didn't matter how how

58:01 it performed because there's a you can only you

58:05 can only get water cooling to ambient temperature, right?

58:09 And water cooling CPUs and GPUs has been mostly

58:12 an optimization problem for like many years at this point.

58:15 We saw this when we did water cooling through the ages.

58:17 So no amount of of narrowing of of reducing that sort of that narrow

58:23 performance band was going to make

58:25 this totally senseless product make any sense.

58:28 So and I've been completely validated on that.

58:33 They did one production run and then never made it again.

58:36 uh in spite of all of the attention that it got,

58:40 like millions upon millions upon millions of impressions for this product.

58:43 I mean, I still don't think it was handled properly, but No, no, it wasn't.

58:47 No question.

58:48 No question, but it was doomed from the start.

58:51 And I just I don't think I need to go over it all again.

58:58 Um, how about another one?

58:59 What else we got?

59:00 Anyone got anything?

59:03 There was, wasn't there some time you said something about

59:05 a drive on like the PlayStation or something and uh Oh, yeah.

59:11 But we did a whole video.

59:13 No, I'm not.

59:13 No, no, no.

59:14 I The core question, cuz we got way off track here.

59:18 The core question was,

59:19 what do you think was the most interesting time

59:22 that something went wrong because of user error and then,

59:26 you know, we we addressed it or whatever

59:28 because it's going to happen many many times.

59:29 We've been making content for way too many years.

59:31 So, what do you think is the most interesting one?

59:33 I I don't need you to like defend something.

59:36 It's just what what do you think was the most interesting one?

59:39 I mean, I don't think the uh the PlayStation one might not be a good example.

59:43 I was just trying to throw options out there.

59:45 When I'm when I'm thinking interesting, I'm thinking like it was, you know,

59:50 the reason why the user error happened might have been because

59:53 they did something in a in an interesting but non-standard way.

59:56 Okay.

59:56 So, it kind of like was intriguing when you figured out that it it

1:00:01 was it was user error and it

1:00:03 ended up making the product like cooler potentially,

1:00:06 not temperature- wise, like interest.

1:00:08 I mean, it wasn't user error, but I think my favorite product that I was

1:00:12 ever completely wrong about was probably the Logitech G-Cloud.

1:00:16 I just completely underestimated what a great experience that product

1:00:22 would be for the right for the right user.

1:00:25 And it's still not something that I find myself using.

1:00:28 Like there's one in our warehouse.

1:00:29 I I don't use it.

1:00:31 But um when I did take it home and use it for a while, I was like, "Oh,

1:00:36 I get it now." Cuz it was like so light and um the battery life was so great.

1:00:42 And I had been so so dismissive of that.

1:00:47 Um, I think that's probably I think that's probably the the the coolest

1:00:59 product that I've ever been like totally totally wrong about.

1:01:04 Can you think of any like are there are there any that you were just like,

1:01:07 "Yeah, this this thing is useless and stupid." But like

1:01:11 I mean we've disagreed on on things many a time over the years,

1:01:15 but that makes sense.

1:01:16 I I I can't really think of like um again

1:01:24 that isn't really at the core of the the question.

1:01:27 So I think I think we just move on to the next one.

1:01:31 Sure.

1:01:31 Yeah.

1:01:31 And you know what?

1:01:32 Realistically there's probably something that I've gotten wrong

1:01:37 um that I just don't even know yet.

1:01:39 like if if anyone that's why I kind of wanted to go to chat

1:01:42 because if there was something that you guys saw that uh that that we

1:01:47 kind of that we got that we got wrong that I have not

1:01:50 acknowledged yet then I'm I'm happy to I'd like to bring back Kickarted.

1:01:57 Kickstarter is not like the same anymore.

1:02:00 It still exists but it's it's a totally different world.

1:02:03 It's honestly I'm assuming like a marketing probably better now.

1:02:08 Yeah, it it used to be like the freaking

1:02:11 wild west and now there's there's a lot of companies

1:02:13 that like are Kickstarter companies kind of like they they

1:02:17 almost exclus like they they barely even have their own websites.

1:02:20 They basically just function through Kickstarter.

1:02:23 Um Kickstarter is where they launch every product product that they make.

1:02:27 Um like these are these are totally a thing.

1:02:30 Um which is which is cool.

1:02:33 It just makes it less interesting in a kick farted stance.

1:02:37 For people that don't know what we're talking about,

1:02:39 we used to have a series called Kick Farted.

1:02:40 I don't think there was a I think there's maybe like three of them.

1:02:42 We did like two episodes or three or something like that.

1:02:45 Yeah.

1:02:45 Yeah.

1:02:45 But it was we would we would back a Kickstarter

1:02:48 and the idea was that we'd actually hope that it did ship,

1:02:52 which was another flaw with the plan because

1:02:54 sometimes they just wouldn't end up shipping at all.

1:02:57 Um, but we would back a Kickstarter, hope that it would ship, and then,

1:03:02 you know, our bet basically was that it was going to be junk.

1:03:06 Yeah.

1:03:06 If it's good, then it's a review of a cool product,

1:03:09 and then if it's bad, then it's kickarted.

1:03:11 Kickfarted.

1:03:12 But it turns out the the the overlap between ideas that were good enough

1:03:16 to eventually get manufactured but so bad

1:03:20 that they were completely dead on arrival and just worse crashing basically

1:03:27 is Yeah.

1:03:27 It's like really really really small.

1:03:31 Yeah.

1:03:31 Yeah.

1:03:33 Yeah.

1:03:34 It was fun to make those.

1:03:35 I had a they were they were fun to shoot.

1:03:37 They were fun to write for.

1:03:38 Uh it was actually kind of fun testing those types of products.

1:03:42 Um, but yeah, it's just the like limited inventory of what types of things

1:03:48 you can actually do that with just sort of kind of ran out.

1:03:53 I'm sure there's been examples since then,

1:03:54 but we haven't paid enough attention that you would

1:03:57 have to to be able to do that over time.

1:04:00 And I don't think really anyone has like

1:04:03 Kickstarter was had this like super super powerful

1:04:08 moment uh of of relevance and I I think it's kind of in the past now.

1:04:17 Yeah.

1:04:18 I mean there are still things that just go freaking gang busters on Kickstarter.

1:04:22 No, dude.

1:04:22 I mean I'm holding one.

1:04:25 Yeah.

1:04:25 Yeah.

1:04:25 Yeah.

1:04:25 That's a good example.

1:04:27 Um, like Kickstarter is still a really big deal.

1:04:30 It's just not um,

1:04:33 you know, it's not in the news like every freaking week like it was before.

1:04:38 Like, yeah, this the Slay the Spire Downfall board game uh, campaign.

1:04:44 It's it's a it's a board game that raised $7.6 million.

1:04:53 Wow.

1:04:53 But then I mean that's like that's an established IP too.

1:04:57 That's what I'm saying.

1:04:58 A lot of Kickstarter now.

1:05:00 Yeah.

1:05:00 Just using it as using it as marketing slash as a as a cash flow exercise.

1:05:05 like we've got a product coming.

1:05:08 It's the one that I was alluding

1:05:10 to that in order for us to manufacture enough of them

1:05:16 um probably the best way to raise that money

1:05:21 outside of like you know taking private equity

1:05:24 or venture capital or whatever outside of taking

1:05:26 outside capital would probably be to essentially you crowdfund

1:05:32 the the costs of the first production run um

1:05:37 by announcing it early and and like doing a Kickstarter campaign.

1:05:40 I don't think that we would bother to use the Kickstarter platform if it was us.

1:05:44 Like I got to imagine there's like a Shopify plugin for that, right?

1:05:50 But pre-orders basically.

1:05:53 I mean, essentially,

1:05:55 but part of the fun of Kickstarter is that it's at like different tiers.

1:05:59 So, if you get in really really early, it's at like a crazy good price.

1:06:02 Or it comes with extra it comes with a hat that's like,

1:06:06 "Yeah, I backed it first." like building these kind of these bundles.

1:06:09 We have the ability to do that.

1:06:11 Yeah.

1:06:11 Yeah.

1:06:11 I think we could do that.

1:06:13 Remember the wave system that we had for the backpack?

1:06:15 Yeah, I wave system.

1:06:17 Pretty sure you could just use that to to like change it as it goes.

1:06:21 Master of Nun says, "Aren't there strict

1:06:23 rules regarding the use of crowdfunding capital?

1:06:25 I don't believe you're allowed to spend that money." No, no, no.

1:06:27 But we would be spending the money to make the product, so that would be fine.

1:06:30 So that that's what I mean when by like

1:06:32 raising money to do the first production run.

1:06:34 It would be to to make the products that people are are buying.

1:06:39 Uh you're just you're selling it at a discount so

1:06:42 that you can um so that you can scale it up faster.

1:06:46 Uh so that you can get the money in ahead of time so that you can

1:06:50 produce it all all in one go rather

1:06:52 than doing a small production run and then selling

1:06:55 that and then using that cash to buy

1:06:57 twice as many and then selling that and then

1:06:59 using that cash to buy twice as many which is like a many monthsl long process.

1:07:06 Yeah, like I'm going through the technology section on Kickstarter right now.

1:07:10 I'm Yeah, bring it up.

1:07:12 Let's see.

1:07:13 I don't

1:07:13 I can see your screen share.

1:07:15 Oh, really?

1:07:16 Cool.

1:07:16 There's like a calima.

1:07:18 What's a calima?

1:07:19 It's a musical.

1:07:21 You You push down the like metal prong.

1:07:23 It goes.

1:07:24 Yeah.

1:07:25 Uh

1:07:27 Okay.

1:07:26 So, okay.

1:07:27 There's a 3D printing modular arm system.

1:07:31 Neat.

1:07:31 I mean, I'm assuming you're just I want to see the kale limb, but actually

1:07:35 cuz it looks like an electronic calima.

1:07:37 It is sick.

1:07:40 Yeah.

1:07:39 Okay.

1:07:39 That raised half a million USD.

1:07:42 But are like is Linus Tech Tips going

1:07:43 to make a video about an electronic Calima?

1:07:45 Probably not.

1:07:46 Heck no.

1:07:47 So that's not it's not really like topic relevant for for us.

1:07:51 Um if it makes Dan happy, it's relevant for us.

1:07:54 Luke, come on in.

1:07:55 There's a Is that a granular delay?

1:07:57 What what is all this cool audio crap on on

1:08:00 It seems like there's a decent amount of interesting uh audio stuff.

1:08:04 Floor washing robot.

1:08:08 Um I don't know, man.

1:08:12 Wow.

1:08:12 A table RC tank.

1:08:14 Like a lot of this isn't stuff that I would see and be like, "Oh, yeah.

1:08:17 Kick farted.

1:08:18 Cool.

1:08:18 May maybe some AI glasses." This all looks like relatively competent,

1:08:23 but then there's so many AI glasses coming out that I feel

1:08:26 like we'd be better off just making videos about AI glasses in generalist.

1:08:31 Yeah.

1:08:31 Like it it doesn't really scream that it needs a kick farted.

1:08:34 There's a keyboard.

1:08:36 Look at this lens.

1:08:37 That is comical sticking off that phone lens.

1:08:40 Yeah.

1:08:43 Okay.

1:08:43 So, it's just like I don't know, man.

1:08:45 I don't see Kickfarter making sense here.

1:08:47 Mick Bane says, "Uh, LMG doesn't need Kickstarter, just use pre-orders." So,

1:08:52 pre-orders have always been kind of an uncomfortable thing for me.

1:08:56 And isn't it kind of the same deal?

1:08:59 Oh, it's totally the same deal, but we've we've always shied away from it.

1:09:03 Like, if you recall,

1:09:04 like even the screwdriver in the backpack where we made major bets,

1:09:06 we we basically were like, "You should never pre-order." Um,

1:09:11 you know, I don't know for sure that you'll like it.

1:09:13 you should wait for third party, you know, uh, evaluations.

1:09:17 Um, at this point, I am I am starting to recognize that at the scale

1:09:23 that we're operating at and at the experience that our team has,

1:09:27 um, I'm a lot more confident taking people's money

1:09:31 ahead of time for something that is on track,

1:09:36 that is is hitting all of its milestones.

1:09:38 Um, and the project, which is no, is not the battery bank.

1:09:42 It's actually a different one.

1:09:43 The project is coming along really,

1:09:46 really well to the point where if I know that this thing is going

1:09:54 to absolutely be super super exciting for people

1:09:59 and they're going to absolutely freaking love it.

1:10:01 And if there's some something else that we could

1:10:04 do uh or even nothing else that we could do.

1:10:07 I was thinking like we could do like

1:10:09 a satisfaction guaranteed uh policy or something like that.

1:10:12 But I I don't think for sanitary reasons this would be

1:10:16 a good product for us to take a bunch of returns for anyway.

1:10:19 Uh so that could get complicated.

1:10:21 I don't know.

1:10:22 I'll have to think about it some more.

1:10:23 Interesting question from Mc Bane.

1:10:25 Why not enable pre-orders for the cables?

1:10:28 You've already shipped a ton.

1:10:29 Okay.

1:10:30 All right.

1:10:30 Yeah.

1:10:30 And you know what?

1:10:31 I could do that.

1:10:32 I could I could take realistically I

1:10:35 could probably have like millions of dollars

1:10:37 sitting in the LMG coffers right now who want to wait for a cable.

1:10:42 But riddle me this right right now.

1:10:47 McBain, you're probably a little irritated that you'd like

1:10:51 to buy this cable and you can't get it.

1:10:54 But what if it takes 6 months?

1:10:57 What if I had your money then?

1:11:00 How irritated are you?

1:11:02 And that's always that's always been the challenge for me.

1:11:05 Like we're our manufact is is completely beyond

1:11:16 the expectations that we had and that they had.

1:11:19 Um and so I don't know I like we're we're in uncharted territory here.

1:11:27 don't know how long it's going to take us to to be

1:11:31 able to meet the demand that is there for these these freaking cables.

1:11:36 And so I um I don't know how to I don't know h man.

1:11:42 Yeah.

1:11:42 So, so it comes back to me saying

1:11:44 the same taking the same principled stance I had before,

1:11:46 which is I really don't want to have your money

1:11:48 and be in a position where you know there could be

1:11:52 a mismatch between what I'm promising and what you're expecting both

1:11:56 in terms of timeline and in terms of of product quality, right?

1:11:59 So, I uh yeah, and and someone had a good suggestion.

1:12:06 Uh I I missed whose uh I missed the username for it,

1:12:09 but it was um uh you know, you could just take like a little bit of pre-order.

1:12:14 What about a little bit of pre-order?

1:12:15 So, we actually did that.

1:12:17 Uh remember when there was like a second wave that like went up for sale?

1:12:21 That was someone else in the company making a decision

1:12:24 that we were going to take pre-orders on the cables we

1:12:28 were going to make out of the extra cable stock

1:12:31 that we had that was like sitting staged ready to go.

1:12:37 people still lost their minds waiting for those and it causes a whole bunch

1:12:43 of tickets to customer service who otherwise

1:12:45 just wouldn't have to deal with that.

1:12:46 And and what I said when I was kind

1:12:48 of lecturing not one person but like the team that made

1:12:52 that decision on like why I had decided we weren't going

1:12:56 to do that was guys why did we make this decision?

1:13:02 Did it lead to a better experience for our customer?

1:13:05 Yes or no?

1:13:06 Is it just a communications problem?

1:13:08 Uh yeah.

1:13:09 Well, that's part of it, but communication's hard.

1:13:11 You can put as much communication on a web page as you want.

1:13:13 People won't read it.

1:13:14 Doesn't matter.

1:13:16 So, so did this make did this make the experience better for our customer?

1:13:19 Yes or no?

1:13:20 It no or neutral basically was the response.

1:13:23 I'm like, okay, did this make us more money?

1:13:26 Right?

1:13:26 Like that motivates businesses, right?

1:13:28 Businesses make decisions to make more money.

1:13:31 And the answer again is no because we were

1:13:34 going to sell those cables the second that they reached

1:13:36 our dock regardless of whether we took people's money ahead

1:13:38 of time or whether we take people's money when they arrive.

1:13:41 So again, the answer is no.

1:13:43 So all we're doing is we're putting a little bit of cash

1:13:45 in our bank account from our customers today and we're holding it.

1:13:51 So why don't we let them keep it?

1:13:54 Um,

1:13:55 is it a communication thing because the backpacks I I

1:13:59 don't I don't remember if people were upset or not, but it as the waves went on.

1:14:05 Yeah.

1:14:05 We would just tell people the estimated shipping time.

1:14:08 Uh, from from my interpretation of the story that you just told

1:14:12 is we didn't tell people that there would be a different shipping time.

1:14:15 Um,

1:14:16 um, we did, but maybe we could have done it like even more in your face.

1:14:20 Um,

1:14:22 but even then, you know, you still get even with the wave system,

1:14:25 we still had people who were upset about

1:14:26 that like and who just felt it was really ridiculous.

1:14:30 I get that.

1:14:31 I get that.

1:14:32 Um, and so I've just I've always had uh,

1:14:35 you know, sitting next to shout out Corbin from NCIX.

1:14:39 All right.

1:14:40 I I I worked in customer service sometimes in the early days,

1:14:43 not because it was necessarily in my job description,

1:14:46 but because when we had like holiday rushes and and big sale events

1:14:50 or big launches and stuff like that, uh customer service would get overwhelmed

1:14:54 and they would just kind of call on random people who knew our system

1:14:58 well enough and were technical enough and I happened to be one of them.

1:15:00 So, you know, sometimes I would work in customer

1:15:02 service and I would I I would sit there.

1:15:06 I'd sit in the bullpen and, you know, I'd hear the exasperated voice of Mr.

1:15:13 Corbin uh explaining to someone for the for the for the 13th

1:15:17 time on this call that, hey,

1:15:19 when you ordered this, it said ships in 7 8 to 11 days, or you know, whatever.

1:15:25 It says special order ships in 8 to 11 days.

1:15:28 uh we shipped it on the 10th day.

1:15:31 Shipping's not magic.

1:15:32 It's still going to be a little while.

1:15:33 That doesn't mean delivered in that number of days.

1:15:35 And the site was so clear.

1:15:37 It said ships in or like like whatever whatever the word was.

1:15:40 Um but people they they don't they don't read and now

1:15:45 that's customer services problem and it causes it causes stress and frustration.

1:15:49 And what if we just avoided all of that?

1:15:52 I I don't want to out the company, but I had a I I bought a thing.

1:15:57 I was going to say recently.

1:15:58 It's not even recently anymore.

1:15:59 Uh a while ago, and I was emailing them monthly

1:16:03 asking for updates because they weren't giving me any updates.

1:16:06 And their their website didn't say anything about delays or anything.

1:16:09 I think it might have said I I ended

1:16:12 up looking at the website and I couldn't find it,

1:16:14 but I think at the time that I ordered it,

1:16:16 it might have said that it might take a month.

1:16:18 Uh, and we we passed the 3month point

1:16:21 of again they never sent any form of update.

1:16:24 I kept reaching out to them.

1:16:26 Um, and they they emailed back.

1:16:28 I think it was like yesterday or something and we're like, "Yeah, really?

1:16:31 Oh, this is like right now." Yeah.

1:16:33 They're like, "Yeah, we're shipping we're shipping it Monday." I'm like, "Cool.

1:16:36 Thanks.

1:16:36 It's been it's by the time it gets here,

1:16:38 it will have been like three and a half months for one thing.

1:16:41 That didn't warn me of that at all.

1:16:43 It's very annoying at this point.

1:16:45 It's It's I think it's the longest I've waited for something

1:16:49 that I've ordered that didn't have like a very specific,

1:16:54 you know, this product is not ready yet.

1:16:56 It will release at whatever time because there are

1:16:59 there are definitely things that um I'm trying to think.

1:17:04 Um you know, like a shirt that was made for some event

1:17:10 that it's a Trump phone, right?

1:17:11 But Oh my goodness.

1:17:12 No, it's not a Trump phone.

1:17:14 Um, it's fitness equipment.

1:17:15 I just don't want to call it the brand because like fitness equipment.

1:17:20 Whatever.

1:17:20 Uh, what are we supposed to be doing right now?

1:17:22 Oh my gosh.

1:17:22 Was that one comm?

1:17:25 Okay, hit me with another, Dan.

1:17:27 Sure.

1:17:28 Um, I am looking this year to upgrade my TV

1:17:31 from a 77in OLED to something in the 98 to 100 in range.

1:17:36 currently looking at the TCL X11L or wait for what Sony True RGB brings.

1:17:43 Uh, will I regret going away from OLED?

1:17:47 Okay, so you're clearly a mad baller because you're upgrading a 77 in OLED.

1:17:54 So, honestly, the biggest thing that that's piqued my interest on that is

1:17:58 you have the throw distance for this to make any sense.

1:18:01 Yeah.

1:18:01 First up, congratulations.

1:18:03 um

1:18:05 TV you have you have achieved much and uh and my and hats off to you.

1:18:10 Um, second of all, right now is kind of we're I hate to be that guy, right?

1:18:20 Because I think that for for a long time I have beat

1:18:25 the drum of if you wait if you're always waiting for the next thing,

1:18:29 then you will never just get to enjoy anything because you'll always

1:18:33 be waiting for the one that's right around the corner that's better, right?

1:18:36 Um, however, the time is now May,

1:18:40 which is exactly when the new models are starting to trickle

1:18:45 into stores that were like first unveiled at CES this year.

1:18:49 Um, and as we head into back to school and especially Black Friday,

1:18:57 there will be deals.

1:18:59 Now, as someone who's upgrading a 77in OLED,

1:19:02 you sound like you might be the sort

1:19:03 of person who doesn't care about getting a deal.

1:19:06 If that's the case, I haven't actually tried the X11L series yet.

1:19:13 What I have done is I have used TCL's

1:19:17 like last last generation kind of similar class of TV

1:19:22 in the form of the that 115 in that is still

1:19:25 in my theater room in spite of everything else that exists.

1:19:28 And TCL at their very high end makes a very fine TV.

1:19:33 I haven't seen the X1L yet.

1:19:35 I I'm hoping too soon.

1:19:37 The other thing that I'll say,

1:19:38 and this is probably going to complicate your decision more than help it,

1:19:42 is that I have seen Sony's RGB back lit LED um LCDs, and they are absolute fire.

1:19:50 They are so cool.

1:19:54 Um it was in a pretty controlled environment and I didn't

1:19:58 actually get a chance to look side by side with an OLED.

1:20:04 Oh, actually uh Oh, yeah.

1:20:05 No, I didn't get a chance to look side by side with an OLED,

1:20:08 but if I was a betting man and I didn't have a budget, which you might not,

1:20:13 uh I would say that True RGB is going to be

1:20:17 pretty killer and take this all for what it is, right?

1:20:20 Like Sony sponsored our trip to go check it out.

1:20:23 So, full disclosure, everything.

1:20:25 Um and you know, we saw it

1:20:27 within the confines of of their controlled environment.

1:20:31 So, take that all for what it is.

1:20:33 Uh, but it looks really good.

1:20:35 It looks really, really good.

1:20:39 Okay, moving on to some more topics.

1:20:43 All right, Luke, do you want to pick one or two?

1:20:46 Sure.

1:20:47 Let's see what we got here.

1:20:50 Oh, yeah.

1:20:51 Let's go over this charade.

1:20:54 Um, yeah.

1:20:55 Oh, I knew it.

1:20:56 I knew it.

1:20:56 I was hoping you were going to pick that.

1:20:58 Nice.

1:20:58 Yeah.

1:20:58 GameStop offers 56 billion in value for eBay,

1:21:04 but struggles to explain how it'll gather up all that value.

1:21:09 Uh, on May 4th, GameStop,

1:21:11 because they try to use the force to make this happen, I don't know, whatever.

1:21:15 Uh, GameStop made an entirely unsolicited 56 billion

1:21:19 offer to buy eBay at $125 a share.

1:21:22 The offer letter stipulated that the amount would be paid half in cash,

1:21:25 half in GameStop stock.

1:21:28 GameStop's operational/st strategic plan was that its roughly 1,600

1:21:33 US retail stores would become eBay drop off intake,

1:21:36 fulfillment, and live commerce hubs, which actually sounds kind of smart.

1:21:40 Uh, with CEO Ryan Cohen promising $2 billion a year in cost cuts,

1:21:45 including $1.2 billion from eBay's marketing budget alone.

1:21:50 The bid seemed weird because the market valuation of GameStop

1:21:53 is around 11 billion while eBay is roughly worth $48 billion.

1:22:01 Is this is this like me um you know offering to uh

1:22:06 I've got my uh I've got my float plane shirt on here.

1:22:09 Okay.

1:22:10 Is this like me offering to buy YouTube?

1:22:13 You know

1:22:14 like this isn't even a

1:22:16 I think the scale isn't even close to be honest.

1:22:18 But you get what I mean, right?

1:22:20 Like they're a lot closer.

1:22:21 But they're the smaller company and they're not even offering a merger of peers.

1:22:26 They're like, "We're going to acquire." What are you even talking about?

1:22:29 Anyway, sorry.

1:22:30 Flow plane trying to buy YouTube's toe.

1:22:33 Um, yeah.

1:22:36 I mean, there's a lot of funny stuff with this.

1:22:38 I I think it's literally just a stunt, but we'll we'll we'll get into that.

1:22:41 Uh, about

1:22:42 Why do you Why Why can't Why are you

1:22:44 feel so compelled to spoil the punchlines for things, Luke?

1:22:47 But there's so many good reasons why and people got to absorb it as we go

1:22:51 through about 9 billion of the which has

1:22:53 me interested in if GameStop's valuation includes their cash.

1:22:58 But anyways, about 9 billion of the cash

1:23:01 for the offer would come from GameStop's War Chest with the rest being raised

1:23:05 through a debt instrument from TD Securities.

1:23:08 uh a a subsidiary of TD Bank provided a highly confident letter

1:23:15 indicating a potential commitment to provide

1:23:19 approximately 20 billion of the cash.

1:23:21 Um half of the offer in debt financing what?

1:23:28 Okay, I'm a little bit lost here.

1:23:29 But anyways, um yeah, it's it feels like Sam Alman being like, "Yeah,

1:23:33 I'll buy all the RAM." It's like that level of like

1:23:36 I don't I don't think they actually technically have to do it,

1:23:38 but they've said that they probably will.

1:23:40 Um Cohen went on CNBC's Squawkbox where the hosts

1:23:44 flagged that the value of all of GameStop's

1:23:46 stock is just over 11 billion and half of the stock um half of the stock,

1:23:53 half of the acquisition offer require about 28 billion stock.

1:23:58 Yeah.

1:23:59 Basically, there isn't enough equity or enough cash to make this make sense.

1:24:04 And half stock, half cash also doesn't really make any sense.

1:24:07 And if we go check out uh GameStop stock and we look at the last five days,

1:24:14 I mean, it even went down.

1:24:17 So, it's worth less today than it was uh when a month.

1:24:20 It's up.

1:24:21 Yeah, it's down 4% because people saw this and were like, yikes.

1:24:25 Uh which is kind of funny.

1:24:27 Um, yeah, the the the the the CEO

1:24:32 apparently just kept on saying when asked like,

1:24:35 "How does this make any sense?" Like,

1:24:37 "Where are you getting all that value from?" He just kept saying,

1:24:39 "Uh, half cash, half stock." Uh, and then saying, "It's on the website.

1:24:43 Go check it out there." It it it gets explained on the website.

1:24:46 Um, yeah.

1:24:48 Amazing.

1:24:48 I missed this part.

1:24:49 He eventually told the host,

1:24:50 "I don't understand your question." It's like, dude, okay, sorry.

1:24:56 Carry on.

1:24:57 He was framing the I don't understand your question

1:25:00 as if there was enough stock and cash available.

1:25:05 Therefore, the question didn't make any sense, but clearly there isn't.

1:25:10 Um, fantastic.

1:25:12 Morgan Stanley analyst then piled

1:25:13 on with a research note calling GameStop and eBay

1:25:16 fundamentally different businesses with no real overlap

1:25:19 and noted that if the deal somehow closed,

1:25:22 it would be the largest leveraged buyout in history.

1:25:25 Then on May 6th, Cohen created a new eBay.

1:25:28 This is my favorite part.

1:25:29 He created a Cohen, the CEO of GameStop,

1:25:32 created a new eBay account under the username Ryan5050.

1:25:36 You know, 50 cash, 50 stock.

1:25:39 Um, presumably a nod Oh, yep, there it is.

1:25:41 Presumably a nod to the half cash,

1:25:43 half stock split and then started listing personal items

1:25:46 in his words to help fund the eBay acquisition.

1:25:49 Uh, including, if I remember correctly, some socks and and other things.

1:25:55 Um, Frank Sadali, Safali, I don't know, um,

1:26:02 of the Video Game History Foundation then flagged on Blue Sky that several

1:26:06 of Cohen's listings appeared to come from the the Game Informer vault,

1:26:12 which housed decades of rare gaming memorabilia that GameStop

1:26:16 kept after shutting the Game Informer magazine down.

1:26:19 Okay.

1:26:20 Yikes.

1:26:20 Uh then late that same night, eBay suspended Cohen's account,

1:26:24 citing concerns that his activity um was was putting the eBay community at risk.

1:26:30 As far as my understanding goes, they have reinstated his account.

1:26:34 I don't think that's in here.

1:26:35 Um, analysts have pointed out that the whole thing likely comes down

1:26:38 to Ryan Cohen trying to trigger a performance gate in his compensation package,

1:26:43 which would unlock 35 billion in potential stock options if he increases

1:26:49 the company's market value to hundred billion

1:26:52 and achieves 10 billion in cumulative Ebida.

1:26:58 You know what's funny is that is so

1:27:01 much better analysis I guess of what he's doing.

1:27:05 See, I thought this was as simple

1:27:07 as GameStop hasn't been in headlines enough lately.

1:27:11 I need GameStop in the headlines so that people

1:27:15 like pump it as a meme stock again.

1:27:18 I like I was thinking like 3D chess.

1:27:20 That's like that's like 4D chess.

1:27:23 So if I need to reach a revenue target,

1:27:29 I just go out and I borrow enough money

1:27:33 to buy a company that already has that much revenue.

1:27:38 It's brilliant.

1:27:39 I don't think I think if anything leaking that like that was the goal might have

1:27:45 been part of the 3D chess because I don't think this was ever going to happen.

1:27:49 Um well no it was it was never going to happen but like maybe he is del

1:27:53 I mean we have no idea how much ketamine the average CEO is on right so like

1:28:00 maybe in his mind this is serious

1:28:07 you should just you should cold call Taran and ask him

1:28:12 oh hey Linus you need a plug or what?

1:28:15 We're we're concerned that you're not taking enough ketamine.

1:28:17 Um all right I'll ask him.

1:28:19 We're We're looking at We're looking at LMG's trajectory

1:28:22 and we're thinking you might need to take more ketamine.

1:28:25 I I forgot where I worked and that he would actually do that.

1:28:29 Oh, I I I knew he was going to do it.

1:28:31 What have I done?

1:28:32 Hey, how's it going?

1:28:33 Uh, hey, you're live on the WAN show.

1:28:35 Hold on.

1:28:36 I'm just trying to figure out where the speaker hole on my phone is here.

1:28:39 Uh, can can you guys hear him?

1:28:40 Okay.

1:28:42 Yes.

1:28:41 Yeah, he's coming through.

1:28:43 Okay, you guys got him.

1:28:43 Um, so we're just having a a conversation right now um about sort

1:28:50 of like CEOs and and their typical

1:28:54 ketamine consumption and we were just wondering like

1:28:57 how much ketamine do you consume?

1:29:01 I've had no ketamine so far.

1:29:03 I have asked doctors for ketamine and they said no.

1:29:07 Really?

1:29:08 What did they explain why they said no?

1:29:10 I mean I if this is getting too personal then

1:29:12 feel free to to to nope out but like I I

1:29:17 like is this for recreational use or is there a medical condition?

1:29:20 I'm like recreational and then that's when they hang on.

1:29:23 Okay.

1:29:23 All right.

1:29:24 Understood.

1:29:24 Um that's actually really Oh, you know what?

1:29:28 Chad's got a question for you.

1:29:29 Um Denrix asks, "Did you tell them that you've been diagnosed with CEO?"

1:29:36 Oh, no, I haven't.

1:29:37 Is that a Is that a real condition?

1:29:39 Uh, well, that's what we think because because of how

1:29:43 how how people are CEOs and are being treated with ketamine,

1:29:47 we assume that that was a causation relationship rather than just a correlation.

1:29:53 Can I ask can I ask questions as well?

1:29:56 Yeah, absolutely.

1:29:56 Absolutely.

1:29:57 This is an open This is a safe space.

1:30:00 Oh, when am I when I'm at work, does it seem like I'm under the influence?

1:30:07 Um, thank you everyone.

1:30:08 Uh Taran Taran Tong, CEO of Linus Media Group.

1:30:11 Bye Taran.

1:30:12 Uh I'll see you next week.

1:30:14 Um wow, what a great what a great conversation.

1:30:17 That was tremendous.

1:30:19 Uh should we go ahead and maybe do whatever it is that Dan wants us to do?

1:30:24 Dan is currently flagging two more.

1:30:27 Let's Dan is currently flagging two more topics.

1:30:30 Yeah, let's let's do some more topics.

1:30:31 We can do this other weird one.

1:30:33 This is good news show.

1:30:34 Toyota built a10 billion private utopia tech city.

1:30:38 Last week, RS Technica got an inside tour of Toyota's woven city.

1:30:43 The $10 billion private city of the future sounds very Disney.

1:30:47 The company has been in Japan has built in Japan.

1:30:52 Yeah, there we go.

1:30:52 That makes a lot more sense.

1:30:53 Uh and the picture they painted was a mix uh was mixed at best.

1:30:58 Toyota chairman Akio Toyota uh first announced woven city

1:31:02 at CES 2020 as part of a pivot from car maker

1:31:06 to mobility company and the first 100 residents handpicked alpha

1:31:11 testers that Toyota calls weavers moved in 6 months ago.

1:31:16 Despite the city branding,

1:31:18 only about 10% of the planned 175 acre site is actually built so far,

1:31:23 although these things take time.

1:31:24 residents act as alpha and beta testers for a rotating slate of Toyota tech.

1:31:32 Interesting.

1:31:32 Toyota's stated rationale for the heavy surveillance is

1:31:36 Yeah, this is where things get a little dystopian.

1:31:39 The with the woven city telling ours uh that onboard car

1:31:45 sensors can't reliably spot a kid darting out from behind a truck.

1:31:50 So, street level cameras everywhere is part of how

1:31:54 Toyota plans to hit its zero accidents goal.

1:31:58 In practice, the camera density is striking with ours counting eight

1:32:03 at a single intersection and a halfozen even in small coffee shops,

1:32:08 all feeding into Toyota's AI vision engine,

1:32:11 which can track people across cameras based on their clothing.

1:32:15 Toyota built a cons a consent system called data

1:32:18 fabric that lets residents opt in or out per service.

1:32:22 And 98% of Weavers, I'm paraphrasing, because they were handpicked,

1:32:29 have agreed to camera equipped robots in their apartments.

1:32:35 I guess we all have robot vacuums.

1:32:36 Not all of us, but a lot of people do.

1:32:38 Mine's been broken for a year, but it is what it is.

1:32:40 Uh the company's longerterm plan is to refine the AI vision

1:32:44 engine inside Woven City and then sell it to actual municipalities.

1:32:50 Toyota also confirmed that chairman Ao Toyota has been

1:32:54 uploaded to the city's cloud as AO Toyota AI,

1:33:02 a chatbot trained on a decade of his speeches and writings.

1:33:06 Really?

1:33:12 Wow.

1:33:12 I think this has got to be

1:33:17 Wow.

1:33:18 Wow.

1:33:18 We have no idea what to spend our copious amounts of money on.

1:33:25 Wow.

1:33:27 So, let's do this.

1:33:27 And this is coming from someone who just attended an event

1:33:32 that was held in an abandoned power plant because a billionaire

1:33:42 saw that it was like kind of an eyesore for his neighbors

1:33:46 and decided to buy it to turn it into a park.

1:33:54 Wow.

1:33:54 Very nice.

1:33:56 Yeah, this is like this is actually peak.

1:34:01 My my my steak is too juicy.

1:34:05 My my family is too perfect.

1:34:08 My money my money bushels are overflowing.

1:34:12 I simply have no idea what to do with it.

1:34:15 This is like, you know, reminds me a lot of what what was the Disney thing?

1:34:21 What was the Disney thing?

1:34:22 The like city Disney City thing.

1:34:25 Oh, the town of tomorrow, right?

1:34:27 Yeah.

1:34:27 Yeah.

1:34:28 Yeah.

1:34:28 Disney.

1:34:29 This feels like like modern that Epcot.

1:34:34 That's the one.

1:34:34 Epcot.

1:34:35 Yeah.

1:34:35 Yeah.

1:34:35 Yeah.

1:34:39 Yeah.

1:34:38 Did Epcot have like insane surveillance?

1:34:41 I don't know if I don't know if our corporate overlords had imagined that yet

1:34:45 cuz this to me feels like I know what you're saying.

1:34:48 We don't know what to spend our money on.

1:34:50 I I don't think that's true at all.

1:34:51 To be honest, I I don't get that read from this in the slightest.

1:34:54 I really,

1:34:55 no, not even a little bit.

1:34:55 I get flock from this.

1:34:57 I get uh Toyota attempting to make technology to sell the governments,

1:35:02 which is literally what they're saying.

1:35:03 They're planning on selling this to municipalities.

1:35:06 Uh they want to be flock.

1:35:08 They want to have AI enabled cameras all over the place tracking everyone,

1:35:13 measuring everything,

1:35:14 and then selling it to governments and probably

1:35:16 also companies for advertisement and everything else.

1:35:19 I this Yeah, I I don't get the same read as you on this.

1:35:23 So, so basically it sounds like because we're

1:35:28 neither of us is what they're saying it's for.

1:35:30 They're saying it's for, you know, connected cities for like, you know, reducing

1:35:34 No, they're saying it's for what I said.

1:35:37 Well, no.

1:35:38 I mean, they didn't say anything about crime.

1:35:39 They said, you know, like car accidents basically.

1:35:41 Yeah.

1:35:42 But they said they're going to sell it to municipalities.

1:35:45 No, no, I I No, I got that part.

1:35:46 But like flock is is uh is is for surveillance and and like uh suspect tracking.

1:35:54 Sell it to municipalities.

1:35:55 What are you going to be used for?

1:35:56 No, no, I know.

1:35:57 I know.

1:35:57 But the part is that I said they didn't say that though.

1:36:00 They did.

1:36:00 So they haven't said the quiet part out loud.

1:36:02 What they're saying is we're a mobility company

1:36:05 and this is about mobility and making it

1:36:08 like so that every car it has a brain on board it that is being fed

1:36:14 data from these AI enabled cameras so

1:36:17 that it would never like accidentally hit a kid

1:36:19 who's like darting out from between two cars

1:36:21 or you know chasing a ball or whatever.

1:36:24 Um, so your theory then is that whether Toyota intends it or not,

1:36:29 this will be this will be sold as a as a as just a mass surveillance tool.

1:36:35 Yeah.

1:36:35 I mean, cuz it the the whole cars angle doesn't make sense

1:36:38 when there's cameras inside of coffee shops and inside of your home.

1:36:42 So, I I read the RS article and um they

1:36:47 go into a little bit more depth about how, you know,

1:36:51 Toyota's culture and Japanese culture and and like privacy are are sort

1:36:57 of really central to this and what their plan is for anonymizing things.

1:37:01 Like that's that's part of why the individual

1:37:04 tracking is based on the clothing that you're wearing.

1:37:06 It does not use facial identification for instance.

1:37:11 However, I think that anyone as technical as anybody at Toyota working

1:37:18 on this project or anyone from ours Technica or anyone in our audience

1:37:21 is going to know that there's it's like just because you're not using

1:37:25 facial tracking doesn't mean that you can't pin this down to an individual,

1:37:29 especially if you've got a large enough set of data

1:37:32 monitoring like a fixed number of local residents, right?

1:37:35 Like whether we're talking about the outfits that they

1:37:38 normally wear or whether we're talking about gate analysis,

1:37:41 looking at how they walk, right?

1:37:43 Like it's um there's a lot of ways like

1:37:45 an actually pretty wild amount of ways to identify people.

1:37:48 Tell me this.

1:37:51 Okay, this is a hypothetical to be very very clear.

1:37:54 Tell me this.

1:37:56 If Toyota could solve privacy for this, if their pitch that this is

1:38:03 a mobility solution that does not store in any accessible way,

1:38:09 this is a huge if, I know,

1:38:11 does not store in any accessible way personally identifiable information.

1:38:16 And it is purely a machine vision system that sends feedback to to cars

1:38:23 and bikes and and these like smart equipped vehicles to prevent accidents.

1:38:28 Is this something that you could see having any kind of future?

1:38:32 I'm I'm going to be I need you to understand

1:38:35 I know I'm going to be super annoying for a second.

1:38:40 One thing is you said they if even if they don't store

1:38:43 the data and stuff the problem is there's other types of attacks.

1:38:46 So like it will be a privacy nightmare because everything

1:38:51 if they could solve it if if

1:38:53 I know

1:38:53 this is an if.

1:38:55 But the problem is is that if is impossible.

1:38:58 I know but try to try try try to try to play

1:39:01 if it is the world's perfect uh given by some deity not of the earth

1:39:09 um data that's what we're assuming

1:39:11 that is completely unhackable that is completely literally

1:39:16 impossible then yeah I mean I don't I don't know if I really care um well for me

1:39:21 if if it can never be if it is completely uncorruptible

1:39:24 and is only ever used for good and is completely unhackable,

1:39:28 then it's like, okay, so I'm actually going to argue against my point now.

1:39:35 Okay, and I'm going to say it has no future because then nobody would want it.

1:39:39 It would be too expensive to implement purely to save a handful of lives.

1:39:43 I mean, think about how many intersections you drive

1:39:46 through in a typical city that obviously need better signage,

1:39:49 but because that would cost a few hundred, it's not going to get implemented.

1:39:53 So this as like Toyota imagining this mobility future

1:39:58 where everything every object in a city is tracked.

1:40:02 I think even if they could solve it but this is why I wanted to have

1:40:06 the conversation right because you know it has to kind of boil down to like

1:40:11 if their pitch is right is there a future and I still think the answer is no.

1:40:15 Yeah.

1:40:16 Yeah.

1:40:16 because I'd love to be wrong

1:40:18 and and you know people people can say what they want but ultimately when

1:40:22 it comes down to municipal budgets um what are people going to vote for?

1:40:28 I mean uh looking at like Langley right now

1:40:31 for example we're we're we're doing some weird stuff.

1:40:37 Hey Luke.

1:40:38 Okay, hold on a second though.

1:40:39 Hold on.

1:40:41 Yeah, hold on.

1:40:40 Let's um let's back up a little bit here because

1:40:43 I actually might be about to argue against myself again.

1:40:46 What if we what if we didn't do this with cameras?

1:40:48 Like what if we could do this with a point cloud device?

1:40:51 Like what if we could do this with lidar?

1:40:53 You'd still be able to Oh man.

1:40:56 No, because you'd still be able to see a blob coming out of this square blob

1:41:03 at this time every day and going

1:41:04 to the other square blob at that time every day.

1:41:07 Yeah, never mind.

1:41:07 I talked myself out of it again.

1:41:11 Because like to to me like the you know the cameras

1:41:13 and the data analysis and no matter how much computing,

1:41:16 no matter how cheap cameras are going to get,

1:41:17 they're always they're always going to have some cost.

1:41:19 You also just can't get around it.

1:41:21 Like if if surveillance is being done,

1:41:25 it it can be hacked and it you know on a technical level it can be hacked.

1:41:32 On a social level it will almost certainly be corrupted.

1:41:35 There's like there's every example of, you know,

1:41:37 police officers using tracking equipment to track their girlfriends

1:41:42 to see if they're cheating or or or yeah,

1:41:44 following ex-girlfriends and ex-wives and whatnot.

1:41:46 There's there's every example of all these different

1:41:48 things where if it if it's a social system,

1:41:50 it can and almost certainly will be corrupted.

1:41:52 And if it's a technical system, it can be hacked.

1:41:55 And those things just like seem to effectively be laws of the universe.

1:41:58 So, it's tough when you have a system like

1:42:00 this because you just know both of those things are true.

1:42:03 I'm going to throw another wrench into the gears.

1:42:07 Yet another wrench because I just I

1:42:08 think this is just a really interesting conversation.

1:42:12 Uh it's not interesting enough for me to have spent my10 billion to, you know,

1:42:17 prove that it's not going to work or whatever.

1:42:20 I'm But I'm glad Toyota did it because

1:42:25 Yeah.

1:42:25 Yeah.

1:42:25 Sure.

1:42:26 Um, I I I I have a 10 billion offer, $10 billion offer in to buy the city.

1:42:33 All they need is a $10 billion loan,

1:42:35 but but TD TD seems like their game for this sort of thing.

1:42:38 So, uh,

1:42:39 they totally totally do it.

1:42:40 Um, so yeah, let me let me throw this out and go, okay, but hear me out.

1:42:47 As our methods for tracking these things get

1:42:51 more and more ubiquitous and more and more

1:42:54 precise and more and more absolutely everybody has

1:42:58 them on their person at any given moment.

1:43:04 How different would the point cloud system be?

1:43:09 I think you could make a strong you can make

1:43:11 a strong argument that the camera system is is different,

1:43:16 but like it how different would it be?

1:43:19 Hit me up.

1:43:21 I mean, that's already a problem, right?

1:43:22 I think we talked on a fairly recent WAN show about

1:43:25 a crime scene where Google got what is the right term for it,

1:43:29 subpoenaed or something uh for information on what devices were

1:43:33 in the area at the time in this like big window.

1:43:36 Um,

1:43:37 so they were poking around in the phones of people

1:43:40 and we know from there was no reason to suspect them.

1:43:42 We know from the Snowden era, I don't know if he's still doing public stuff, uh,

1:43:46 but we know from when he was like a a big

1:43:48 deal in the news um that when when he was roaming around,

1:43:51 you know, he's throwing phones in in uh freezers and stuff like

1:43:56 that to try to Faraday cage them um because they were already a problem.

1:44:01 So, it's like it's it yeah, I mean, that's definitely part of it,

1:44:05 but it's I don't know,

1:44:07 adding more fuel to the fire because the phones aren't perfect.

1:44:10 You could decide to leave it at home.

1:44:12 Um I remember when we talked about that story of the Yeah,

1:44:14 someone said geofencing warrant.

1:44:16 When we talked about the story of the geofencing warrant,

1:44:18 it was kind of like astonishing to me that you would

1:44:20 bring your cell phone to a crime scene because it's like,

1:44:23 yeah, I mean, you can obviously be tracked.

1:44:25 What are you doing?

1:44:27 Um, well, that's the thing with criminals, Luke.

1:44:30 Yeah.

1:44:33 Yeah.

1:44:33 Um, so yeah, it's tough.

1:44:36 It's tough.

1:44:37 It's also ultimately our opinion on it isn't really going to matter, I think.

1:44:43 Uh, like every single person I've ever

1:44:47 heard of who has talked about flock in any way has been like, "Wow,

1:44:51 this is obviously bad and evil and a terrible system." Um,

1:44:54 and they're all over the place.

1:44:57 So, I don't know.

1:45:01 All right.

1:45:01 Uh, well, it's Good News W show,

1:45:03 so we're not going to linger on this any further.

1:45:05 Why don't we instead talk about our our our sponsors for today's show?

1:45:11 The show is brought to you today by T.

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1:46:10 That's not what they do.

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1:46:17 The show is also brought to you by Zoho.

1:46:19 Zoho's OP Manager Nexus is a full stack observability platform that lets you

1:46:23 and your IT team see everything that's happening

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1:47:24 All right, some float plane announcements.

1:47:26 Do we have any of those?

1:47:28 Uh, we probably do.

1:47:29 I assume we do.

1:47:30 All right, we got some float plane announcements.

1:47:32 We received an anonymous report that one of the two wise

1:47:36 when late competitors thinks that the other is not trying so hard.

1:47:42 I wonder who it could be.

1:47:43 I try.

1:47:44 I try hard.

1:47:45 What do you mean?

1:47:46 What do you mean you don't think I'm trying hard?

1:47:49 Nope.

1:47:49 So, to I think you try hard to cheat.

1:47:50 I think you try hard to push Sammy to cheat for you.

1:47:54 No, I actually I actually don't.

1:47:55 Um, so to spice it up,

1:47:57 Luke promised that if this week's why is Wan late video got 2,000 likes,

1:48:03 he will ride a unicycle to Wan.

1:48:06 To answer the question once and for all, what is easier?

1:48:10 Lionus getting to set on time or Luke learning to ride

1:48:14 a unicircle unicycle unicycle to get to the WAN show, which I cannot do.

1:48:21 Yeah, I would not succeed at I I don't know if you will ever be able to do that.

1:48:26 No offense, but not with that mindset.

1:48:28 You're not like

1:48:30 I don't think I have the

1:48:32 agile of very topheavy.

1:48:36 Yeah.

1:48:36 Um I I don't mean this in like a I don't mean this in like an offensive way.

1:48:40 I just mean it like I just mean it in like an objective observation

1:48:44 way that I I don't you didn't put that you

1:48:47 put a lot of points in strength and not

1:48:49 that many in dexterity like you got some in there I think

1:48:53 but like unicycle dexterity

1:48:55 Ford explorer of the person yeah I'm not sure I'm not sure

1:49:00 uh explorer please excursion is more like it

1:49:04 uh okay in other news

1:49:06 I don't think that's quite accurate to be completely honest

1:49:09 but Excursion's not a That's not That's a powerful vehicle, sir.

1:49:13 No, I just Does it tip over when you turn around a corner?

1:49:19 Uh h okay, you know what?

1:49:20 That's fair.

1:49:21 Uh map in float plane chat says unicycle not that hard to learn.

1:49:27 And Charcoal says he has to ride a unicycle, not ride it.

1:49:30 Well, I haven't even been on a bike in many years.

1:49:36 Apparently, I I read this online, so take it with a grain of salt.

1:49:40 You don't forget.

1:49:44 Well,

1:49:44 like a unicycle, but he never learned a unicycle.

1:49:46 No, he he he said he hasn't ridden a bicycle in a long time.

1:49:49 Oh, well, yeah.

1:49:50 Thank you, Dan.

1:49:51 That's very helpful.

1:49:52 You're welcome.

1:49:53 I appreciate your compliment.

1:49:56 Uh, yeah.

1:49:57 Okay, so this will be interesting.

1:50:00 We also have Wait, how many likes is the video at now?

1:50:05 Oh my goodness.

1:50:06 It's at 1,400 likes with zero dislikes.

1:50:11 Yeah, for

1:50:11 it's it got it it got like 16 likes in the time it took me to refresh this page.

1:50:16 Yeah, you can be the first one to dislike it.

1:50:19 Uh, no.

1:50:19 I'm going to like it right now.

1:50:21 Okay, now it has 1461.

1:50:23 Hold on.

1:50:23 I'm going to refresh it again from your account cuz it's the same account.

1:50:28 You didn't.

1:50:29 How dare you?

1:50:30 I downloaded How dare you?

1:50:32 I was the first person to download it.

1:50:34 Let's go.

1:50:35 I would I would unbelievable.

1:50:36 Let's go.

1:50:38 All right.

1:50:38 Uh Luca, you'll have to do screen cap for this.

1:50:40 Uh in other news, we also have badges now.

1:50:43 Designed by the one and only Ashley from the Creator Warehouse team.

1:50:46 Float Plane now supports badges so you can flex your vanity cosmetics.

1:50:52 Right now, we only have length of active subscription,

1:50:55 but we're looking to add more cool things like

1:50:58 if you were subscribed during big events like Scrapyard Wars

1:51:01 or what tier of sub you're on and even badges

1:51:04 to recommen to recognize super active members of the community.

1:51:09 We should make it a crystal.

1:51:12 It should just be Dan, can you send that over to Ashley?

1:51:15 It should just be like a gem because I don't I can't think of a more

1:51:20 ludicrously oh my god get a life

1:51:22 active member of our community than Crystal Fier8.

1:51:26 Don't take this the wrong way Crystal just wow.

1:51:31 Um anywh who uh some badges can be added retroactively so be sure to join.

1:51:38 If you have some suggestions you can go ahead leave them in the comments.

1:51:41 Um someone said Langley house cats and the vessel logo for OG.

1:51:45 So, yeah, we're definitely working on some stuff.

1:51:53 Crystal, I don't I don't I don't mean this.

1:51:54 I don't I don't mean this in in any way

1:51:56 other than you spend a lot of your life on LMG.

1:52:01 It's great.

1:52:02 I'll see you at the next I'll see you at the next whale.

1:52:07 Uh, we also have a video of the damage that Sammy did

1:52:12 to that monitor that he brought on to WAN show last week.

1:52:16 U I don't know if Luke is launching that or if it's already launched and we

1:52:19 promised to improve float plane and we're looking

1:52:21 to provide more benefits for subscribers at lmg.gg/flane.

1:52:24 So now is a great time to join.

1:52:26 Can't wait to see you there.

1:52:28 All right.

1:52:30 PK7 says, "Get a life respectfully,

1:52:32 but we do enjoy having you here for real." Yeah.

1:52:35 Yeah, dude.

1:52:36 It's great.

1:52:37 It's great.

1:52:37 No, I mean, we do.

1:52:38 We do.

1:52:38 We We enjoy Crystal's company.

1:52:40 We legitimately do.

1:52:44 Oh my goodness.

1:52:47 Okay.

1:52:47 Well, no, no, no.

1:52:48 I found I I'm ignoring you entirely.

1:52:50 I found the part of the video where the monitor gets impaled.

1:52:56 Ashley is very confused.

1:53:00 What What exactly am I messaging?

1:53:02 Just just the the one for for engagement for like hyper engagement.

1:53:06 It should be like a a gem.

1:53:08 It should be it should be a crystal.

1:53:12 Do we have more than one?

1:53:13 Ashley.

1:53:15 Uh yeah, Ashley W.

1:53:17 We we actually have Yeah, we definitely

1:53:21 Ashley.

1:53:20 Way to go.

1:53:21 Way to go, Dan.

1:53:23 That moment when you really do need a company directory because

1:53:27 it has gotten to a point where you can't know everybody.

1:53:29 Didn't check.

1:53:30 Yeah.

1:53:30 Don't you actually didn't you like work on it?

1:53:33 Yeah, sort of.

1:53:35 Dan, what the heck?

1:53:36 I don't update it.

1:53:37 That's That's HR doesn't maintain it.

1:53:41 Okay.

1:53:41 All right.

1:53:42 That's good.

1:53:42 Love it.

1:53:43 Um Oh, hey.

1:53:46 Uh Polarise asks, "Are you guys participating in the Boink Pentathlon?"

1:53:50 I haven't put anything into it yet other than some prizing.

1:53:53 So Chewy messaged me earlier this week and he was all like, "Hey,

1:53:57 you mentioned on Wan Show that you like want to do

1:53:59 prizing for Boink Pentathon." And I was like, "Yeah, sure.

1:54:03 Can we do that?" And he was like, "Okay,

1:54:05 are you good with $1,000 worth of LT store gift cards?" And I was like,

1:54:10 "Sure." So we're doing 10 $100 LT Store gift cards as part

1:54:14 of the prizing for the Boink Pentathlon over on the landship.com forum.

1:54:19 If you don't or if you're not familiar with it,

1:54:20 Boink is a distributed computing project that helps contribute to science.

1:54:25 So, you can use idle cycles from your computer

1:54:28 to help make the world a better place.

1:54:30 It's pretty cool and you should go check it out.

1:54:32 Maybe Dan could throw a link in the uh in the video description.

1:54:38 Uh yes, sorry, I was just sending a a group

1:54:40 message to all the Ashley's that I work with.

1:54:42 All right, cool.

1:54:44 Nice.

1:54:45 By the way, Dbrand sent out a thing during the show.

1:54:48 I think probably when we announced it.

1:54:50 I don't know if they were watching or not,

1:54:52 but I I just noticed this in my email.

1:54:55 Uh the the subject is now available on a worse website.

1:55:00 And then they have like a stock going down emoji.

1:55:04 If you open it, it says now available on ltdstore.com.

1:55:09 you know, without spoiling anything,

1:55:13 I may get my opportunity to to to to to fire back.

1:55:18 Um, but I'm not going to spoil anything.

1:55:22 Oh, man.

1:55:23 These guys.

1:55:24 God, I love Dand.

1:55:25 Okay.

1:55:26 They're out of control.

1:55:29 Completely out of control.

1:55:32 Yeah.

1:55:32 What's next?

1:55:33 All right.

1:55:34 Let's uh let's have a look here.

1:55:35 Let's have a look here.

1:55:36 Uh we kind of already talked about the Steam

1:55:38 controller being uh sold out after 30 minutes.

1:55:43 You can join a queueing system to make sure Oh,

1:55:45 to make sure that you get one from them

1:55:47 at at MSRP rather than at scalper prices.

1:55:50 Scalpers are lame.

1:55:51 Don't buy it from scalpers.

1:55:52 The last bit is Valve released the CAD files for the external shell

1:55:56 of the Steam Controller and the Steam

1:55:58 Controller Puck under a Creative Common license, which is super cool.

1:56:00 if you for whatever reason wanted to like

1:56:03 make accessories that it you know like a little

1:56:05 cradle for it to sit in or anything cool

1:56:07 like that and you always love to see it.

1:56:09 Okay, this is cool.

1:56:10 TCL um unveiled a 0.01 hertz laptop display earlier this week.

1:56:22 This is so cool.

1:56:24 It's designed to extend battery life by drastically

1:56:27 reducing how often the screen redraws static content.

1:56:32 It was showcased at SID display week in Los

1:56:34 Angeles in a 14-in 1920 x 1200 laptop.

1:56:38 So, this panel can refresh as slowly as one frame every 100 seconds,

1:56:46 far below the one herz screens that have

1:56:48 previously been developed by companies like Intel and LG.

1:56:52 The coolest part though, and this is where it gets real,

1:56:55 is that the display is divided into 12 zones

1:56:59 that can independently shift between 120 Hz and 0.01 hertz,

1:57:07 allowing you to have high refresh rate in areas like an active video window,

1:57:13 while the rest of the screen remains nearly static, not being updated.

1:57:18 TCL estimates that the technology or TCL sees

1:57:22 specifically estimates that the technology can add over

1:57:25 an hour of video playback time and the LCD

1:57:28 panel uses the company's proprietary oxide TFT back plane.

1:57:33 Um our discussion question is is 12 zone refresh switching switching enough

1:57:38 for a seamless UI or will the lack of granularity cause noticeable artifacts?

1:57:42 I mean, I I think the answer to that is probably

1:57:45 just going to come down to driver and operating system management so

1:57:50 that you just if you have a window like an active video

1:57:54 window or something like that that slightly overlaps one of the control zones,

1:57:58 it'll just activate everything that's around it.

1:58:01 Um, so just yeah, as long as you're not using the entire screen,

1:58:04 there will be some savings and I'm here for it.

1:58:08 more battery life in devices is like honestly been like kind

1:58:14 of life-changing over the last couple generations of laptops for me.

1:58:17 Whether I've been using a MacBook Neo or whether I've been using uh like

1:58:20 a Stricks Halo or uh man like

1:58:23 Panther Lake is freaking incredible for battery life.

1:58:26 I just now that I dock at work, I just not that kind.

1:58:31 Never think about the battery life of my laptop pretty much

1:58:34 because it'll work for like an entire weekend without me having

1:58:36 You're so distracted talking.

1:58:38 Yeah, buddy.

1:58:39 I mean, you don't need your laptop battery life anymore.

1:58:41 That's right.

1:58:42 Moved on to bigger and better things.

1:58:46 Especially better.

1:58:47 Better is key.

1:58:49 Safer even safe harbor.

1:58:52 Um, that felt wrong.

1:58:54 It's sticky.

1:58:56 Jibus.

1:58:58 Uh, hey, why don't we talk about why don't we

1:59:01 talk about something that I actually missed um last week.

1:59:06 Uh, this was announced last week, I believe,

1:59:08 but on May 1st, ask.com was officially shut down.

1:59:13 I know, I know this is supposed to be good news when and this is truly tragic,

1:59:19 but formerly Ask Jeeves the butler is no more.

1:59:28 And uh I don't know.

1:59:29 I don't know.

1:59:30 This actually this actually kind of kind of hit

1:59:32 me in a uh more than I expected it to.

1:59:37 Like I don't know Luke, do you remember the early days of using search engines

1:59:41 like back when Alta Vista was king and also Ask Jeeves?

1:59:44 I always like Pile.

1:59:46 Yeah.

1:59:47 So, Ask Jeie's claim to fame was that it was, I believe,

1:59:51 the first natural language search engine because you

1:59:55 know how you can kind of switch you

1:59:57 can put on your like I am an advanced search wizard hat and you can use

2:00:02 like boolean operators and you can um uh and you can sort of go into like

2:00:09 power user mode using a search engine uh

2:00:12 rather than just asking it a natural language question.

2:00:14 That was like how they all just worked back in the day except for Ask Jeeves.

2:00:20 They had this this cute butler mascot and you would just type

2:00:24 in a natural language question and it was like actually pretty good.

2:00:28 Um little bit of history in our notes here.

2:00:30 It launched in 1996 out of Berkeley with a now familiar pitch.

2:00:35 Type a full question in plain English and get an answer.

2:00:38 IA bought it for over a billion dollars in 2005.

2:00:43 dropped Jeeves in 2006, rebranding to ask.com,

2:00:47 but never seriously caught up to Google

2:00:50 or even Yahoo despite multiple relaunches.

2:00:55 Um, dropping the Chiefs was a mistake in my opinion.

2:00:58 I don't think they were ever going to catch up,

2:01:00 but I think they should have, if they wanted to make uh,

2:01:05 you know, a zone for themselves, they should have,

2:01:07 I think, laid into the Jeieve side of things even more,

2:01:11 especially in a world where like I feel like one

2:01:16 of the things that's almost holding back the the relation the the emotions

2:01:23 that people feel towards their their AI chat bots is the lack

2:01:27 of a of a of an avatar like uh like a jeez.

2:01:31 I think if anything the timing for Jeves could

2:01:34 be better than ever if it was powered by AI

2:01:37 almost agentic search.

2:01:39 So you should you could tell it to go look for something and it might

2:01:41 actually even take a bit but it goes and like tries to gather things for you.

2:01:45 Or even does something for it.

2:01:47 Yeah.

2:01:48 Like it goes and it tries to find you know the which VPN Hey Jeeves.

2:01:53 uh which regional VPN do I have to use

2:01:56 in order to get the best price on this ticket?

2:01:59 Uh please make sure you're using an IP

2:02:01 other than mine to search cuz like I'm sure

2:02:03 you've run into this loop where the second time

2:02:06 you look at something the price goes up, right?

2:02:09 And it doesn't matter like you know which region you pretend to be

2:02:12 from or like what computer you like somehow

2:02:15 they follow you and they know oh yeah,

2:02:18 they've looked at it twice, they're going to book it.

2:02:22 Like I' I'd be so down for that.

2:02:26 Yeah.

2:02:29 Um Bolster says, "You're saying you don't like Cortana?" No,

2:02:32 I mean what I didn't like about Cortana was that it was just useless.

2:02:35 It just sucked.

2:02:36 The honestly the idea I was really excited when Cortana was first announced.

2:02:41 Yeah, me too.

2:02:42 And then it was just terrible.

2:02:44 The problem wasn't the packaging.

2:02:46 The problem was the product.

2:02:47 The packaging was actually fantastic.

2:02:49 The little circle was good.

2:02:51 the Cortana voice was like obviously fantastic and then just garbage product.

2:03:00 Yeah, once again just the timing for the branding

2:03:03 and the usefulness of the product just didn't quite line up.

2:03:09 Okay, this is going to be a controversial take.

2:03:13 Are you ready?

2:03:16 No.

2:03:17 What happened to Good News Wow.

2:03:19 No.

2:03:19 No.

2:03:20 doesn't feel like it's been in full force this show.

2:03:23 The good news.

2:03:24 No, no, no.

2:03:24 Oh, dude.

2:03:25 There's lots of good news coming.

2:03:26 There's good news.

2:03:27 All right.

2:03:27 Okay.

2:03:29 Nintendo is joining its competition in raising the price of their consoles.

2:03:33 There's lots of good news coming.

2:03:34 You'll pay more for consoles.

2:03:37 No, no, this is the good news part.

2:03:38 The good news is that Nintendo is giving several months

2:03:42 of warning before the change in price goes into effect.

2:03:47 So, basically, here's a quote.

2:03:49 In light of changes in market conditions,

2:03:51 Nintendo has revised the MSRP of the Switch 2 around the world

2:03:55 and the Switch One along with playing

2:03:57 cards and the Nintendo online membership in Japan.

2:04:00 The price of the Switch 2 is going to go up around $50 globally.

2:04:04 Uh complete pricing is in the Nintendo link if you want to show it.

2:04:07 That's a smaller increase than both Sony

2:04:10 and Microsoft put in place for their 2020 hardware.

2:04:13 So, like hardware that theoretically they paid

2:04:16 the development cost on a long time ago.

2:04:20 Outside of Japan though, consumers, even though it's a $50 increase compared

2:04:24 to the much higher ones from Sony and Microsoft,

2:04:27 consumers will have until September 1st to buy one at the current price.

2:04:33 As far as price increases go, giving people what what do we got here?

2:04:39 Yeah, we've got over 3 months to save up and buy

2:04:44 a Switch 2 if we want it at the current price.

2:04:47 That is I mean, is that worth nothing?

2:04:51 It's not like Nintendo chose for component costs to go up.

2:04:56 Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait.

2:04:57 Why is the online subscription going up?

2:05:01 Uh, is that I think that's only in Japan, though, right?

2:05:04 Uh, but it say Japan.

2:05:07 Yeah, maybe that doesn't line up though.

2:05:14 Open price.

2:05:19 I don't know what open price means.

2:05:21 It's one interesting thing from this is

2:05:22 that the European and American pricing is matching up.

2:05:26 Now, the current price was cheaper in the US by 20 bucks.

2:05:31 Um, and they're now aligning.

2:05:32 Canada are, you know, we still suck.

2:05:35 So, it is what it is.

2:05:37 Um, yeah.

2:05:41 Interesting.

2:05:43 If they were going to do it, I appreciate the heads up.

2:05:47 Yeah.

2:05:47 I mean, that I guess that's that's that's

2:05:49 the most silver lining thing that I can It's not the silver lining show, Lionus.

2:05:55 It's our show.

2:05:58 But the good news is that they gave us warning and so

2:06:01 I need to make sure I talk about it on WAN show

2:06:03 so that if you really wanted to switch too then you can

2:06:06 get it now still for the original price before it goes up.

2:06:10 That's the good news Luke because if we didn't talk about

2:06:14 this and someone got blindsided by it on September the 2nd that's on us.

2:06:21 No, we got to give people a shot.

2:06:22 I'm not shouldering that responsibility.

2:06:24 We can't we we got to bring We got to bring the people

2:06:28 We got to bring the people the news they need to know.

2:06:30 Okay, this is important news.

2:06:33 Cuz like 50 bucks is 50 bucks is 50 bucks, man.

2:06:39 Like if you were going to do it anyway, then

2:06:42 if No, I mean, if you were going to buy one anyway,

2:06:44 then I'm sure you'd rather buy it for $50 less.

2:06:46 That's like That's like half a Nintendo game.

2:06:50 Dude, all this informs me is if you were thinking about

2:06:52 selling your Switch 2 that you should wait a little bit.

2:06:56 True, true.

2:06:59 Yeah, true, true.

2:07:00 Do you Is there anything that would compel you

2:07:02 to buy a Switch 2 yet at this point?

2:07:04 I have one.

2:07:05 Or sorry, compel you to use it and I'm upset about it.

2:07:08 Um I still haven't busted out Donkey Kong.

2:07:11 Um I've been busy with other things, but that that

2:07:14 Did you buy it though?

2:07:14 Like you own it already?

2:07:15 I I bought it mostly for Emma because she was a really big fan of the like

2:07:20 um old school Nintendo era Donkey Kong games.

2:07:24 Um but I mean I was I would say I was interested in it.

2:07:27 We my family was real big into the yellow cartridge Donkey Kong 64 game.

2:07:32 Uh that game was sick, but I didn't really play many of the other ones.

2:07:36 Um and other than that, I haven't personally heard

2:07:40 of a Nintendo game that has been super attractive yet.

2:07:44 There hasn't been a uh Yeah, I don't think so.

2:07:51 Modern Pokemon games are not that interesting to me.

2:07:54 I haven't seen a I I could see a like Breath

2:07:56 of the Wild style Zelda game coming out and being like,

2:08:00 "Nice, I'm happy." Yeah,

2:08:03 the um the conspiracy theory is that Star Fox was uh or Foxmick,

2:08:08 whatever his name is,

2:08:09 was shoehorned into the uh Mario Galaxy movie

2:08:13 because there's a game coming ended up being true.

2:08:15 So, the the Star Fox announcement just came out.

2:08:17 Oh, I didn't even know that was a thing, but it just makes sense.

2:08:20 Um yeah, I didn't know any part of that story.

2:08:23 Yeah, without people knowing anything else,

2:08:26 just Star Fox being in that movie was like,

2:08:29 "Okay, this is an IP that Nintendo has not made a game about.

2:08:34 Not made a game with in like a very long time."

2:08:37 Dude, I never played the original Star Fox,

2:08:39 but I I think I would be interested in picking this up.

2:08:44 Um Oh, it looks kind of sweet, actually.

2:08:46 Original Star Star Fox was like revolutionary

2:08:51 and a game that I just could not get into.

2:08:55 I was a Pilot Wings kid 100%.

2:09:00 Yeah.

2:08:59 No Star Fox for me.

2:09:02 You'd love the new one.

2:09:02 The gameplay is incredibly tight and satisfying.

2:09:05 What have you played it?

2:09:06 Have people was there like a somewhere that you could play this?

2:09:14 Wait, it's a Star Fox 64 remake.

2:09:20 Remake.

2:09:24 Oh, that's honestly disappointing.

2:09:29 Okay.

2:09:31 Oh, no.

2:09:31 Nintendo says it's based on the classic.

2:09:36 Hold on a second.

2:09:37 Oh, wait.

2:09:38 based on the classic space shooter Star Fox 64,

2:09:41 but with redesigned characters and upgraded visuals.

2:09:45 All righty then.

2:09:46 Well, that was a cool conversation while it lasted.

2:09:48 All right.

2:09:49 So, this went from that makes me excited to have had a Switch

2:09:52 2 to me considering it's probably going to be full fat price or close.

2:09:56 I'm going to do better.

2:09:57 I'm going to do better.

2:09:58 All right.

2:10:00 On Monday, Blackber's stock jumped 13%.

2:10:06 Yes, that BlackBerry, is it still a Canadian company?

2:10:11 Yes.

2:10:12 Really?

2:10:12 13% in pre-market trading after a Wall

2:10:14 Street Journal feature reminded everyone that BlackBerry,

2:10:17 a decade after ditching phones,

2:10:19 does in fact still exist and is profitable again.

2:10:24 What

2:10:26 the driver of the new profit, pun intended, is QNX,

2:10:30 a real-time operating system that BlackBerry acquired in 2010

2:10:34 that uh I was reading a couple articles about this.

2:10:36 I kind of went down the rabbit hole cuz I was like, what?

2:10:38 So that BlackBerry acquired in 2010 and that just

2:10:42 was like kind of quietly doing their own thing,

2:10:45 being mostly ignored by BlackBerry,

2:10:48 but that now accounts for about half of the company's revenue

2:10:52 and is embedded in roughly 275 million cars on the road today.

2:10:59 So this is separate from the like you know Android Automotive

2:11:03 or like whatever operating system you interface with in your car.

2:11:09 This is running things like collision warnings, blind spot monitoring.

2:11:14 So like when when the LED lights up on your mirror,

2:11:18 QNX is doing that, adaptive cruise, lane keep assist.

2:11:23 um they they knew they were going

2:11:25 to lose the infotainment war like a decade ago.

2:11:28 So they've pivoted deeper and deeper

2:11:31 into like real time safety critical features.

2:11:35 Yeah.

2:11:35 Sweet.

2:11:36 Um BlackBerry's Q4 revenue, and this blew my mind, hit $156 million,

2:11:43 up 10% year-over-year with QNX itself bringing in 78.7 million, up 20%.

2:11:50 Um although it is worth noting that the stock is still down

2:11:53 about 96% from its 2008 peak uh when it topped 83 billion.

2:11:59 They're on top of the world.

2:12:00 That's kind of whatever.

2:12:01 Yeah.

2:12:01 Yeah.

2:12:02 Yeah.

2:12:02 Yeah.

2:12:02 Yeah.

2:12:02 Yeah.

2:12:03 But still interesting.

2:12:04 I mean that's pretty cool.

2:12:06 What a turnaround story.

2:12:07 The fact that they are making money again is pretty

2:12:10 What is the rest of their money?

2:12:12 Where are they making the rest of the 70 whatever million dollars?

2:12:16 Uh I don't know.

2:12:17 for a while they were in like secure messaging.

2:12:20 Um, they still have secure communications.

2:12:22 Okay.

2:12:24 Yeah.

2:12:24 All I really cared about was this QX thing and like, sorry, who are these guys?

2:12:29 Where did this come from?

2:12:31 How is this worth $78.7 million a quarter?

2:12:36 Yeah, it just blew my mind.

2:12:38 Yeah, they do like sovereign onrem

2:12:40 infrastructure for like governments, NATO stuff.

2:12:45 Yeah.

2:12:46 Okay.

2:12:46 I mean, Blackberry was known for that.

2:12:48 They were known for security.

2:12:51 Yeah.

2:12:51 Um All right.

2:12:52 And I just I thought I thought it was pretty cool that Blackberry's back, baby.

2:12:56 More like Backberry.

2:12:59 Okay.

2:13:00 I got another one.

2:13:00 I got another one you're going to like.

2:13:02 Uh a scientific team in China mounted a prototype

2:13:07 10 megawatt nuclear power unit to a truck.

2:13:12 This thing is designed to act as a portable power bank.

2:13:16 that is expected to last several decades without requiring a recharge.

2:13:22 So to put it in context,

2:13:24 10 megawws is about the power of a medium-sized AI data center.

2:13:29 And this could be just like on the back of a truck.

2:13:33 Uh applications include, sorry, pretty wild.

2:13:37 Yeah.

2:13:37 Applications include powering remote regions,

2:13:41 emergency power restoration during disasters, and propelling maritime vehicles.

2:13:47 Imagine that for a second, Luke.

2:13:50 We have nuclear sub at home.

2:13:53 Like what?