Today on the flagship podcast of audio over Wi-Fi: The Verge’s Chris Welch shares his review of Sonos's Ace headphones.MoviePass, MovieCrash director Muta’Ali and CEO of MoviePass Stacy Spikes discuss what went wrong with the MoviePass subscription service and how that story was documented in the film.
Jennifer Pattison Tuohy answers a question from The Vergecast Hotline about smart home gadgets for renters.
Jennifer Pattison Tuohy answers a question from The Vergecast Hotline about smart home gadgets for renters.
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TechTranscript
00:00:00 Welcome to the Verge cast the flagship podcast of audio over Wi-Fi. I'm your friend David Pierce and I am currently
00:00:06 Waiting on my breakfast order that doesn't sound like big news
00:00:09 But you as I've mentioned on the show before whenever I get to a new city
00:00:14 I immediately go looking for like a handful of staples really great cup of coffee really great donut really great pizza is I think one
00:00:21 I forgot to mention the last time and a really great bacon egg and cheese
00:00:26 I haven't really found one in this neighborhood, but there's this place that I'm at right now
00:00:29 That is on the way to daycare for me
00:00:32 Which means I walk by it like
00:00:34 40,000 times a week and they just got a new name a new owner a new chef and a new menu
00:00:39 Including a breakfast sandwich. I keep hearing good things. This would be huge for me
00:00:43 This is where I'm at in life is a breakfast sandwich would would change things for me
00:00:47 So I ordered it was $8, which is a little high but manageable and we're gonna see how we do
00:00:53 Anyway, we have an awesome show coming up for you today. We're gonna do two things
00:00:57 The first thing we're gonna do is we're gonna talk about Sonos. There's a bunch of new Sonos gear Chris Welch reviewed at all
00:01:02 I have been wondering about the Sonos ace headphones forever and Chris has them. He's used them. He's tested them. He's reviewed them
00:01:09 We're gonna talk to him about it. And maybe if we're lucky here how it went
00:01:13 We're also gonna talk about the new documentary about movie pass
00:01:16 it's called movie pass movie crashed and it tells the story of
00:01:19 One of the fastest growing tech companies of all time and also one of the fastest dying tech companies of all time
00:01:26 It's a really interesting story because it is kind of every tech story all rolled into one bundle of total chaos
00:01:33 We're gonna talk to the director and the CEO get the whole story super fun episode
00:01:38 We're also gonna do a hotline question lots to do all that is coming up in just a sec
00:01:42 But first I hear my sandwich coming I can smell my sandwich coming. I'm very excited. This is the first guest. We'll be right back
00:01:51 Welcome back. All right small bacon egg and cheese update
00:01:54 It was good and it was on a biscuit which I liked very much
00:01:57 But this still isn't the one to be clear. It is again on my route to daycare
00:02:02 So I will be going there between you know, six and fifteen times a week, but I don't feel like I've solved this problem yet
00:02:08 So the hunt continues and to everyone who absolutely does not care about my quest for the perfect bacon egg and cheese. I'm very sorry
00:02:15 Anyway, let's get to the show
00:02:17 So Sonos has been rumored to be making headphones for years
00:02:22 And I think for obvious reasons this seemed like an exciting idea, right?
00:02:26 Sonos is one of the companies that cares the most about audio and you kind of figure that if any
00:02:30 Company was going to figure out how to do really good design really high quality audio really usable product though
00:02:37 That's kind of iffy for app based reasons
00:02:39 We've talked about on the show, but it feels like Sonos should be able to do a good job at this
00:02:43 Well now we get to find out so the new Sonos ace headphones are out there
00:02:48 $450 Chris Welch has been using them. There's also the Roam Bluetooth speaker, which I want to talk about
00:02:53 But I'm particularly curious about the ace because there's just something really hard about doing a pair of headphones like this
00:02:59 Correctly you look at something like the AirPods Max or the Bose quiet comfort headphones
00:03:05 And what you see over and over is that the combination of weight battery life overall comfort sound quality
00:03:13 noise cancellation
00:03:14 Easy connectivity. It's really hard to do all of those things simultaneously
00:03:18 correctly at any price
00:03:21 $450 is a lot to spend on a pair of headphones
00:03:23 but a really great pair of headphones that does all of those things well is like the white whale and a lot of companies are
00:03:30 Getting closer and closer. This space is really exciting actually, but we haven't quite gotten there
00:03:35 So I've been fascinated to know are the Sonos ace the ones did they get there?
00:03:39 Are they Sonos II and are they just an awesome pair of headphones? Chris Welch has reviewed them
00:03:44 He knows this stuff better than anybody else. I know time to talk about it. Chris Welch. Welcome back. Hello
00:03:50 Hello, Sonos just continues to take up your whole life and existence. Yes. How you feeling good?
00:03:57 We just got the review up of the new ace as did many other publications and seems like it's a fairly positive vibe so far
00:04:04 Yeah, people seem to people seem to like the thing. Yeah, I'm very curious how you review a pair of headphones
00:04:09 I want to get into the ace in particular, but like mm-hmm walk me through a
00:04:12 Day in the life of a Chris Welch headphone review
00:04:16 I mean, I've got my playlist of songs that I know so so well
00:04:20 And then I just you know, ride the subway walk around New York see how hot they get yada yada
00:04:24 It's like very warm in New York City right now
00:04:26 So that's been fun, but you know comfort my try and wear them all day here at the office
00:04:30 Once or twice just to see how they wear over time, you know, like I've got glasses
00:04:34 So I see how those do as far as like comfort goes, but yeah, nothing too crazy
00:04:38 You know, what are your favorite test songs? Like what's what's at the top of that?
00:04:42 I mean, I'm like a big Dave Matthews band guys. Nice
00:04:46 Gotta go back to those albums, which of the many jammy guitar parts. Can I hear most clearly here? Yeah, I love it
00:04:52 Exactly. So that's on there. But you know, yeah, there's Beatles
00:04:56 There's all sorts of stuff that I kind of just go through and cycle between but they had these sound quite nice
00:05:01 I think they're kind of like in between the Sony's and the AirPods max
00:05:04 There is some base to them
00:05:06 But yeah
00:05:07 They sound nice and warm and detailed and I don't have any complaints on that front is there I'm realizing I've never
00:05:13 Really known the answer this question
00:05:14 Is there like a sonos sound in the way that I feel like there is sort of a beats sound?
00:05:18 And to some extent there's kind of a Bose sound is there a sonos sound with the ace or with just so no stuff in general
00:05:25 I don't know
00:05:26 You know
00:05:27 They always like talk about how they have this like board of like sound experts who they like go to for every speaker and product
00:05:31 They're like gives them a device on how it should sound in the a deata. So these are pretty clean crisp
00:05:35 They're not like super bass forward. Yeah, they're fairly balanced
00:05:38 Like there's no like profile that I can really like tell so it's just and they're good sounding pair headphones
00:05:44 Okay, but they're comfortable as hell. That's like the main thing about these
00:05:47 It's like so the weight is like in between and the AirPods max and the Sony's but yeah
00:05:50 They just wear so much lighter than the AirPods max, you know, there's more plastic which is fine for headphones
00:05:56 I think you know, you certainly can't overdo it when it comes to metal and I think that's what we had for the AirPods max
00:06:01 But yeah, they feel great on your head over long time frames. Yeah, I think the AirPods max
00:06:06 One thing I like about those better is the fabric ear cushions. These were a bit hotter because they're like pleather
00:06:11 So in the summer in the spring, you know, you start to sweat and that makes a difference but on the whole they are just way
00:06:17 Way more comfortable. Yeah, I was surprised actually by how comfortable you found them given that they are not like
00:06:23 wildly heavier than say the the Bose quiet comforts, but
00:06:26 Meaningfully heavier and I think yeah the AirPods max for me in particular
00:06:31 Feel heavy on my head in a way that like the Bose ones you never don't know you're wearing headphones
00:06:37 But I don't sort of feel them like the gravity of them pulling down on my head with the AirPods max
00:06:41 I very much do and I was worried this was gonna skew closer to that
00:06:45 But it sounds like at least in the way that they wear they don't feel like that at all
00:06:48 Yeah, not at all. Super comfortable. The battery life is like 30 hours
00:06:51 So they last a long long long time say like on the hardware front. They got it. All right, honestly
00:06:56 So for a first time out, it's pretty impressive and the software features, you know, half of them work
00:07:01 I know just why I gave them a seven. I think some other publications are a bit a bit kinder while we're on the hardware
00:07:07 I want to talk about just the controls for a second in part because from the way you describe it
00:07:12 It sounds like Sonos got the how you use these headphones while they're on your head thing
00:07:18 Almost exactly right like this idea of there being one button that does everything and then I think you you slide the button to change
00:07:24 The volume I love that that that seems fantastic
00:07:27 Like is that is that as good as it seems to be in terms of actually like?
00:07:31 Putting your hands up and using the thing because for me
00:07:34 It's like I have the Bose and it's just a bunch of sort of samey feeling buttons
00:07:37 Mm-hmm, and I've gotten pretty good at knowing which one is which but I'm still every time I put my hand up
00:07:43 I kind of like slide it down the cup to find the right head and it seems like Sonos just like
00:07:48 Figured it out from the job. Yeah. No, it's very good at the content key as it's called. I'm not sure about the name
00:07:52 Yeah, it's bad
00:07:53 Bad name, but it's great
00:07:55 So it takes some time to get used to just like finding it and like sliding it and like that difference
00:07:59 You don't want to press when you slide that takes like one day to get used to but on the whole yeah
00:08:03 It's very good compared to swipes on all these like Sony headphones and stuff like the tab gestures
00:08:08 Once you have gloves on forget about it. So
00:08:10 This kind of stuff works a lot better in my experience. So there's that button
00:08:13 There's a button for the noise cancellation mode and a power button and that's pretty much it. So that feels right
00:08:18 I will say I am just adamantly against touchpads on headphones. I just don't think they work
00:08:23 I just it's just a bad user experience. I'm not I'm out on it everywhere. It exists. So I'm very glad Sonos didn't do that
00:08:30 I'm with you. Yeah
00:08:31 Okay, so let's let's talk about the TV audio swap thing because there are a bunch of other interesting
00:08:35 Features that sort of are and are not here
00:08:38 But TV audio swap was the thing right like if Sonos is going to convince you to buy these headphones one is
00:08:44 It's a Sonos product Sonos tends to make very good sounding products, but the TV audio swap is the thing
00:08:49 Tell me about your experience with this. It's been mostly good
00:08:52 I had a few hiccups where it just like didn't work and Sonos tells me it's a bug
00:08:56 Of course, that'll be fixed soon like so many other things that are coming soon
00:08:59 But on the whole yeah, like I see you have an arc you just go home
00:09:02 You come home turn on your TV
00:09:03 Start watching something and you hold down the content key for like two seconds and then it just beams it right over to your headphones
00:09:08 And there's head tracking if you want that so you can like, you know move around and feel more immersed in your content
00:09:15 So it works for like anything plugged into your TV be like a gaming console, which works super well like surprisingly
00:09:20 So and it's just a nice little private way of watching TV and whatever else you want
00:09:25 Sonos seems to have this idea that it's for more than just
00:09:30 Watching something quietly while someone else doesn't want to watch it like right for me
00:09:35 I used private listening on Roku for months after I had a kid because you know
00:09:41 I have a guy have a kid in my arm, and I'm wearing headphones and
00:09:43 That is a way to listen to things quietly
00:09:46 But I get the sense Sonos thinks of this as like a like a lifestyle feature or is like an audio feature
00:09:51 More than just you can hear the audio but others can't like what what is the big sort of galaxy brain case for?
00:09:59 Audio swap and why you would wear headphones to watch TV
00:10:02 I think it can be more immersive like there's spatial audio a surround sound like they up convert stereo if you want that as well
00:10:07 So it does sound really good. I guess it's true. It's like a 5.1 system on your head. Yeah, that's fair
00:10:12 That's something and so there's that and then this fall there's a new feature called true cinema
00:10:16 That's gonna like map your room using both the sound bar and the headphones
00:10:19 So it sounds like more real this round sound effected like trick your brain into like actually thinking they're actually speakers around you right now
00:10:26 It's not quite that level
00:10:27 but they say sometimes this year that'll be there and Bose is also working on like similar ideas to like
00:10:32 Pair sound bars and headphones and earbuds together for like super immersion
00:10:36 So once that rolls out if you know works as advertised, that'll be interesting. But it's like very immersive. It sounds very nice
00:10:44 You don't have to like sacrifice audio quality just to not have your sound bar blurring away at night
00:10:48 Which is nice and you can game on it. Like I said, that's what I've done a ton and it's great
00:10:53 What's been your experience so far in terms of actually sitting down and doing it?
00:10:57 Like obviously when you're reviewing the product
00:10:59 You're gonna go through the work to sit down on the couch grab the remote grab your headphones do the whole thing
00:11:04 Do you think it as just a normal person in normal life?
00:11:07 You're gonna add headphones to the flop down on the couch mix. I think so. I've got roommates. So that's the main thing
00:11:13 Like what's that's really late at night and not gonna like have my arc going full blast while I'm watching, you know, Top Gun
00:11:20 Maverick, it's not super considerate. So that's there. That's a use case, you know late-night gaming yada yada past a certain point of night
00:11:26 It's like a super handy thing to have and it sounds for sure
00:11:28 So is that worth the cost of the headphones and an arc, you know, that's a pricey thing
00:11:34 I think in that case the key is to try and convince everyone in the house to split it and it's like listen
00:11:40 This is not for me. This is for all of us
00:11:42 It will be mine and I will own it and you can't use it
00:11:45 But it is for all of us and so this like what eleven hundred dollar purchase. We're just gonna split it together
00:11:51 It's gonna be no problem
00:11:52 Yeah
00:11:52 But it should be coming to the ray and the beam pretty soon
00:11:55 It's cool for the rakes like the race just took a basic like stereo sound bar
00:11:58 But now you're gonna get like Dolby Atmos like up res surround sound through your headphones, which is nice - nice to see
00:12:03 But yeah, like once they roll out that support once TV audio swap works on Android at all, that'll be a nice thing
00:12:09 So I think I'm gonna like go back and like readdress the score once some of these software updates go out for more people
00:12:14 Yeah, so it's the once it works thing that is killing me here, right?
00:12:18 Because the this is this is the story of Sonos these last few weeks is it rolled out this half finished app
00:12:25 supposedly in order to support these headphones
00:12:29 Which themselves don't feel finished from a software perspective and on the one hand if you want to pick a weakness of Sonos
00:12:35 It has always been its software
00:12:36 So I guess on the I shouldn't be totally shocked that it seems like it nailed the hardware and didn't finish the software like that
00:12:41 It's kind of a Sonos story. Mm-hmm. But on the other hand, I just can't stop thinking like why?
00:12:46 why ship any of this aid now and be in this order when it doesn't seem like
00:12:52 There was any real like rhyme or reason and none of its done. I don't understand the whole June time frame thing
00:12:58 I think maybe like they're like thinking like I was gonna have new air pods in the fall that would just drown out this if they
00:13:03 Waited until you know September but even like waiting until August would have given them like precious weeks to just polish everything a little bit
00:13:09 More and get it out the door as a fuller thing. Yeah, it's just a big rush and it's not clear
00:13:15 Why I mean people aren't like buying speakers and soundbars like they were during the pandemic
00:13:18 So that's the main like impetus for these coming out in the first place is Sonos a little Pelotoni in that way
00:13:25 Do you think that like it's a great product that is always going to be kind of a niche thing?
00:13:30 just by virtue of a what it is and be what it costs and
00:13:34 Everybody who was gonna get one got one, which is great
00:13:38 but now puts you in a position of like there there probably aren't many people out there right now shopping for Sonos upgrades because everybody
00:13:44 Upgraded in 2020 and 2021
00:13:46 so now if I'm Sonos like it is the whole headphones push just
00:13:50 We need a whole new thing to give people so that they're not upgrading. They're actually buying like a net new object
00:13:58 Yeah, for sure. Okay, that's the main reason behind this. They've also got services, you know, they've got Sonos radio HD
00:14:03 Other Sonos Pro for businesses where they like manage all your speakers
00:14:06 So they're all trying to branch out and find like new ways of more income
00:14:10 But yeah, like you said like, you know, I've had an arc
00:14:12 It would take a lot for me to like upgrade a soundbar like there's not much this thing doesn't do that
00:14:16 I would need from some new version, you know same goes for the play 5 which has been around forever
00:14:20 So these are first and you can see like a world where they do, you know
00:14:23 Like not just headphones, but also earbuds and kind of like, you know, do the full thing. This is a good start
00:14:28 There are 450 bucks, which is a that's a lot of money, but people people spend a lot on this stuff
00:14:32 So Sony and Bose and everybody else, you know, they're all in the same territory pay for a first time out, you know
00:14:37 Super impressive. I think they've got a lot of bugs to work out. The app is still a causing chaos
00:14:42 I mean the Sonos subreddit is just I've never seen anything like it just every day still still people venting which I understand
00:14:50 You know people lose features
00:14:51 I'd be upset to like I'm with Neil I knew and I don't really use my sonar system
00:14:55 That way or I've noticed much different
00:14:57 But yeah, they should have just waited one or two more months put all the stuff out in the fall and had a way smoother experience
00:15:03 That like didn't cause cause this huge outcry
00:15:05 Yeah
00:15:06 I think to some extent
00:15:07 Sonos is lucky it got the hardware as right as it did because it'll it'll buy it a chance to do that
00:15:12 Like I think if there had been even one kind of big flaw in the hardware on top of all the stuff with the app
00:15:20 Yeah, this would feel almost dead on arrival. Whereas now it's like, okay
00:15:25 I think there's a reasonable chance that come this fall or like this holiday when a lot of people are Christmas shopping
00:15:30 This is going to be a damn good pair of headphones
00:15:32 Yeah, that is actually gonna make a lot of sense for a lot of people
00:15:34 I will say the thing about it that kills me the sort of dream that I think a lot of people have had for a
00:15:39 Sonos pair of headphones and what I'm seeing a lot of in our comments to on your review is
00:15:43 This idea that it should fit perfectly into my whole Sonos ecosystem, right that I should I want to listen to music on
00:15:52 The speaker in my kitchen while I make dinner and then pop on headphones and just boom the music switches
00:15:58 everything works great and then I can play from you know, my my record player and
00:16:03 the TV in my living room in the TV upstairs and
00:16:06 everything that is in the Sonos ecosystem just sort of beautifully flows around and this has been the promise of Sonos for forever and
00:16:12 The ace just doesn't feel like it comes anywhere close to that
00:16:17 Like the the content key thing you're describing where it sits down and it works with the ace
00:16:20 I am confident that will eventually work very well
00:16:23 I could be wrong about that
00:16:24 But it seems like that that is the sort of thing Sonos will eventually get right because it usually eventually gets that kind of stuff
00:16:30 Right, but it doesn't seem like there's any indication that this is going to be the like
00:16:33 Magical addition to my whole Sonos system that I wanted it to be so funny
00:16:39 You should say that last week
00:16:40 They had like a reddit ask me anything where people have asked about this a ton
00:16:44 So that they kind of said like we're just not there yet as far as the tech goes
00:16:47 So in terms of like CPU power these have a fraction of even like the Sonos room
00:16:51 I think it's a small processor in there then there's Wi-Fi to worry about battery worries
00:16:56 And so they're like we tried it like we prototyped those Wi-Fi's headphones that everybody wants and they sucked
00:17:01 so like we're just not there yet as far as like
00:17:03 Being able to do that and like have it be viable like they were like
00:17:06 They're like we tried it and it's just not the right time right now. So this is like a first step
00:17:11 I think and it makes sense is like a you know, halfway point between full-on like Sonos integration and
00:17:17 What we have now with the TV audio swap
00:17:18 So it's a good starting point, but I can see the point of like, you know
00:17:21 Do you really want like a short battery life just for Wi-Fi audio?
00:17:25 I mean I would sometimes but you know, give it like two or three four years
00:17:28 Maybe we'll see that kind of product eventually
00:17:30 That's fair
00:17:31 and I will say to Sonos is credit making a thing that is fundamentally just a very good pair of Bluetooth headphones is
00:17:36 The right thing and not something Sonos historically always does
00:17:40 So like making a thing that actually easily works with all of your non Sonos stuff is a victory
00:17:46 So I think if you if you're forcing me to choose I will take what they did
00:17:49 But it does it just feels like there's that little piece of sort of Sonos magic that nothing else can get to
00:17:55 That it didn't quite hit and that bummed me out. Yeah from an audio perspective. Does the Wi-Fi thing matter?
00:18:03 I just like sincerely don't know how much I should care that I can't do Wi-Fi audio versus just having the you know
00:18:09 Bluetooth codec support from my phone
00:18:11 There are always gonna be people who like swear they can tell the difference between lossless audio and you know
00:18:15 Like all these codecs I can tell maybe sometimes
00:18:18 It's just one of those things people just like want to have because they're spending all that money
00:18:21 I think they just want the best thing and so it makes sense to want that does it really matter?
00:18:25 It's gonna really come down to like each person individually
00:18:28 I can see like why you would want it as far as like a turntable in your system
00:18:30 And like an amp and like having like play that through your headphones, that'd be awesome
00:18:34 But unfortunately, we're not there quite yet. But like yeah, these sound very good. They're good headphones
00:18:38 So they've got several features that like all these high-end headphones usually do others like on head detection
00:18:43 So you can like take them off it'll pause all those like, you know, like the small quality of life things
00:18:47 There's multi points you can pair them with two devices at once and so they've covered a lot of ground
00:18:51 There's like wired USB C listening. So if you want lossless audio, there's your answer
00:18:55 So yeah, they've covered a lot of ground
00:18:56 but now we're in this like weird game of wait-and-see for like the Android support and
00:19:00 The beam and the ray and but that stuff should shake out like Sonos promises software fixes and they usually do make good on actually
00:19:06 You know putting them out. So yeah, we'll see how long it takes hopefully this month for some of this stuff
00:19:11 But there's no firm timetable just yet. So yeah, it does seem like audio quality wise
00:19:16 I feel like the the gold standard is like whatever new Sony
00:19:20 Hexadecimal thing I can't remember the name of thing the new Bose quiet comforts and the AirPods Max
00:19:27 I feel like that's kind of like the trio everybody thinks of there are some others in there
00:19:30 You know, there's the Sennheiser momentum fours. Those sound great
00:19:34 Those are probably my favorite sound quality headphones besides these at the moment
00:19:37 There's that and I call these brands like Bowers and Wilkins for like that true like audiophile segments
00:19:41 But like by and large like you said like for most consumers, it's Sony it's Bose
00:19:45 It's Apple and now hopefully someone else is what they want to happen
00:19:48 Well, it seems like from a sort of what it's like to wear and use and listen to them
00:19:54 Yeah, Sonos belongs there, but I feel like the one other piece of that we haven't talked about is the noise cancellation
00:20:00 Which to me I think is like maybe the most important feature for me
00:20:04 Like this is where I out myself as somebody who is like by no means an audio quality expert
00:20:08 But somebody who is constantly on planes. Mm-hmm
00:20:11 the ANC really matters to me which is why I've been a real like Bose loyalist over the years because Bose is just better at
00:20:18 This than everybody else. How did the ace shape up there? Bose is still better than everybody else, but these are good
00:20:23 You know, they're not like top tier level, but they're good enough for a plane ride or the train
00:20:27 You know, I've had them on the past two weeks and they're good for the subway my coffee shop
00:20:31 I can still hear like a little bit of racket when I work from the coffee shop on my block
00:20:34 but so they're not like Bose level of a total cocoon of silence, but
00:20:38 For most like everyday situations where you just want to like have some peace and quiet. It'll do the job just fine
00:20:43 What about the flip side the what is it called the like audio pass-through thing where it tries to pump in the outside noise?
00:20:49 How is that that sounds actually very very good
00:20:52 That's like the air pods max have the best pass-through mode of all and these are like not too far behind that honestly
00:20:57 Oh, wow, okay
00:20:58 It's like that's where Sonos really came through and kind of surprised me because the air pods max are drastically better than the Bose
00:21:04 Yeah, those are great
00:21:05 These are like a stone's throw away pretty close and then Bose and Sony are not not so hot when it comes to the pass-through
00:21:11 Mode, but yeah, so it's not world-class ANC, but it's close on the transparency mode front. So pretty good all in all
00:21:17 so it seems like even if you're not a Sonos person and you're just
00:21:21 Wanting to buy a really good pair of headphones to pair with your computer and phone and whatever if you don't have any other Sonos
00:21:27 Gear. Mm-hmm. This is probably like a hundred dollars more than you want to spend on this pair of headphones
00:21:33 But like absolutely belongs on the poke around the Amazon listing. Yeah set is that is that a fair characterization?
00:21:40 Yeah, but surely I don't know who's gonna start their Sonos journey with headphones that cost this much
00:21:44 But I'm sure some people will you know, there'll be a person who just buys these and then thinks these are great and buys
00:21:50 You know the whole the arc obviously you would get first if you want to actually use the core feature
00:21:55 But yeah
00:21:56 I mean, they're great like they belong the same conversation as everybody else as far as like sound quality fit and finish and comfort
00:22:02 Like I said, the comfort is really, you know
00:22:04 Go to your local Best Buy and try these and you're gonna be pretty surprised by how good they feel
00:22:08 I think it's big win for Sonos, honestly
00:22:10 Especially if you go back to that like Sonos has to find a thing to sell people who don't want Sonos gear, right?
00:22:16 That's a big win and I I would bet I could be totally wrong
00:22:19 But I would bet that we're gonna get to like Black Friday and this thing is gonna be three hundred and forty nine dollars
00:22:23 That'd be nice. That would help for sure. But even now they're great
00:22:27 I think the white one are my favorite compared to the black. No, the black is fine
00:22:30 But the white ones are really nice-looking. Yeah, they're really nice-looking
00:22:33 So that's the way I would go if someone wants advice which ones have you been testing the most the white ones?
00:22:37 I worry would get sort of a like gross patina on them after wearing them for a while. Yeah
00:22:43 So far, they still look good. The case is getting pretty pretty dirty the white case, but it's got a nice green interior
00:22:50 So, you know the black ones get all smudgy
00:22:52 They've got like an anti-fingerprint coating on them to help with that a little bit
00:22:55 But they still pick up smudges and stuff like all black plastic gadgets tend to do but personal preference as always
00:23:02 Yeah, I will say for for all of the kind of missing Sonos II stuff
00:23:07 I'm very impressed that Sonos did as well as it did here just to make this good a pair of headphones
00:23:12 Just absent all the other stuff
00:23:13 Just this good a pair of headphones on its first try out of the gate
00:23:16 Gives me great hope for what Sonos might be able to do here pretty good. I think Patrick Spence's job is safe for now
00:23:22 I mean give me a couple app updates until I feel very confident about that, but I
00:23:29 Like the thought so far. I just also forgot one other ace question that I forgot to ask
00:23:34 We're gonna come on and we're gonna do a full
00:23:36 Fancy headphone mic test at some point because that's a thing we need to do the people love when we put horrible sounding audio on
00:23:42 The verge cast we haven't done in a while Chris. We're gonna have to do it
00:23:45 But give me the give me the quick feeling of how the microphone is on the ace pretty good pretty good
00:23:51 If you go to the review, there's an embed of me testing them that I put out today
00:23:56 We got the Sonos things here in New York trying to give you a sense of how they sound
00:24:00 How clear they are and whether they're suitable for phone calls on the go. So let me know what you think
00:24:07 They're clear. I'm not one to like really take calls outside
00:24:11 I just don't enjoy it for myself or the other person on the line
00:24:13 So I try to avoid it but sometimes you know
00:24:15 You're at the coffee shop on a zoom call and do you seem like that work just fine?
00:24:18 They do a decent job of like canceling out background noise and all that and you come through clearly
00:24:22 So I'm not sure what else you would really ask for beyond that
00:24:25 So before I let you go, you also have the new Rome the new blue speaker. You haven't published your review
00:24:31 That's coming later this week. Give me a preview how you feel so far. They added a button. That's really the
00:24:36 What it comes down to?
00:24:39 Yes
00:24:40 So the first room had a combined power and Bluetooth pairing button and you had to set it up at home first before you could
00:24:45 Use it as a portable speaker, which never made any sense. So they fixed that you can use it out of the box now
00:24:50 Whoop-dee-doo, but there's a new button. It sounds the exact same
00:24:53 So if you've heard it before you've heard this one battery life is the same
00:24:56 Some people haven't like had the best time with the Rome over time
00:24:59 I guess the battery ages not so well
00:25:01 So someone else told me that they've done some work there to make it last longer
00:25:04 But yeah, it's the same speakers before same price just a new button comes in colors. It's small. It's a good bathroom speaker
00:25:11 That's how I use mine for the shower. But yeah, it's not my top tier favorite sound most gadget there
00:25:17 But I mean buttons are good. We hear on the verge cast. We believe in buttons, you know this so I will take it
00:25:22 Love buttons. Yes. All right. Well, it's very upsetting that I want to buy one of these now and I will not forgive you for that
00:25:28 I also want to buy an ace now
00:25:29 I like don't have a sound bar and all of a sudden like Oh
00:25:32 $1,200 is a perfectly rational amount of money to spend
00:25:35 Upgrading my TV audio today like what could possibly go wrong?
00:25:39 There's the arc and there's an arc to coming and even like a higher-end sound bar. They're working on
00:25:43 I don't don't tell me this
00:25:45 Is not helpful
00:25:47 All right, we got to take a break and then we're gonna be right back to talk about movie pass Chris
00:25:52 Thank you as always my pleasure. Thanks y'all
00:25:55 Welcome back in the top drawer of my desk here. I have this pile of cards
00:26:06 Does everybody have a pile of cards somewhere? I sort of assume everybody has a pile of cards somewhere
00:26:12 Mine is just a bunch of random junk mostly
00:26:15 It's gift cards with like 19 cents still on them a bunch of expired credit cards that I don't know what to do with
00:26:22 This one I think is a Chick-fil-a rewards card that somehow I have I don't know and in that pile the other day
00:26:29 I found this red master card that says movie pass in big letters up in the top left corner
00:26:36 It ends in seven zero nine nine just in case you're curious. I got this card
00:26:40 I think in 2017 maybe 2018 it apparently expires January of
00:26:45 2025 but I'm confident that I'm never going to get to use it again. In fact, I've never used it once
00:26:51 I never even managed to get this card
00:26:54 Activated because by the time I signed up for movie pass the company was such a mess that it never even
00:26:59 Responded to my customer service emails. I looked back through and all I have is a bunch of one-sided requests being like hi
00:27:06 I would just like to use the card that I'm paying you for please
00:27:10 Nothing if you were online in the summer of 2017, you probably remember movie pass
00:27:15 There's a decent chance
00:27:16 You were a user of movie pass that you got a card and then went and saw a million movies all at once
00:27:21 It was an all-you-can-watch movie theater subscription ten bucks a month to see up to one movie a day. That was it
00:27:28 Those were all the rules at least for a while
00:27:30 It was a great product for anyone who likes watching movies and it was a truly
00:27:35 Horrific business it took less than two years for the company to burn through
00:27:40 250 million dollars and shut down the product entirely which is honestly in a certain way kind of impressive
00:27:46 Anyway, there's a new documentary out now on max called movie pass movie crash and it tells the story of movie pass
00:27:54 greatest thing
00:27:57 Movie pass movie pass movie pass the popular movie ticket app movie pass. We remember them whatever happened to those guys
00:28:05 It's a story about wild corporate greed about a lot of bad decisions and I think at its core
00:28:12 It's about how two black founders found themselves
00:28:15 Ousted from their own company and really their own story by a couple of fast-talking
00:28:20 Wheeling and dealing white dudes. I was like we need to pump the brakes a little bit
00:28:25 I just thought that it would be better if he wasn't a part of the team
00:28:29 Like the heart of movie pass the deeper you got in the more you realize
00:28:34 All of this was part of a bigger story
00:28:38 The doc is fascinating
00:28:40 I really
00:28:41 Recommend everyone watch it whether or not you still have your red movie pass card lying around a couple of days after I watched
00:28:47 The doc I got on a call with two people to talk about it
00:28:50 Stacey spikes co-founder and CEO of movie pass. My name is Muta Ali and I'm a film director
00:28:56 I should point out by the way that Muta Ali is the director of this film also just in case that wasn't clear
00:29:02 This is sort of a spoiler I guess but the bones of the early movie pass story is this
00:29:07 Stacey and his co-founder Hameh Watt started movie pass in 2011 and it's more expensive than it turned out to be it's doing
00:29:15 Okay, they have about 20,000 subscribers not taking over the world but coming along
00:29:19 They hired this guy Mitch Lowe who says he was a co-founder of Netflix
00:29:23 But that turns out to not really be the case for interesting reasons who then links movie pass up with a company called Helios and Mathison
00:29:30 And its CEO Ted Farnsworth who injects a bunch of marketing money into movie pass in order to help it grow and along the way
00:29:38 Mitch Lowe and Ted Farnsworth start testing ideas to see how they might help the thing grow into the stratosphere
00:29:45 We had grown to 20,000 subs and if you go and you look at the Netflix growth curve it has this long
00:29:53 Slow arc and then there's this hockey puck
00:29:56 It just starts to take off and we had a very similar trajectory in that we were a multi-million dollar revenue company
00:30:04 We weren't that far from profitability. We were at a $30 price point
00:30:09 We knew we were in the ballpark, but we got there with no advertising was only word-of-mouth
00:30:14 And so we had never had an ad budget
00:30:17 And so really it was we had figured out what our customer acquisition cost was
00:30:23 We wanted to do the deal just to get ad budget but still grow with the right per month
00:30:30 Subscription price and so that's what you wanted to do
00:30:34 You you needed to leave the garage and you had a really hardcore
00:30:39 Fanbase that people that just loved the service and it was break-even and so now great add that
00:30:47 well, it broke apart when HMNY they were coming in and they secretly ran a test and
00:30:54 Mitch had given them access to our
00:30:57 Login page and they went online and they put the new price point up and tested it
00:31:05 We thought our site had been hacked and we were like, hey our sites been hacked
00:31:09 Somebody just put up a landing page for 10 bucks and and they were like no
00:31:14 No, Mitch gave Ted and his team
00:31:17 Access to the website landing page and no one ever told us of the engineering team
00:31:22 And so when you clicked on the button, it didn't let you sign up
00:31:26 They were just using it to gauge interest and they were like we've got a hit and I said well
00:31:31 If you want to make it even bigger make it five bucks a month
00:31:33 If you want to make it bigger than that make it $1 a month. I said make it 99 cents
00:31:37 Yeah
00:31:38 Giving money away is pretty easy
00:31:40 I kept thinking that watching this that like if you just give people money, they'll take it
00:31:45 It will be very successful at giving people money and it's a race to the bottom when you have no competitors like whoa
00:31:51 But why why don't you walk your way down in price?
00:31:55 Ten bucks a month for all the movies you can watch was just never going to work to be clear
00:32:01 It was awesome for moviegoers
00:32:03 and one of my favorite things about the doc is all the folks in it who saw hundreds of movies for a fraction of the
00:32:08 Price, I love that for moviegoers, but it was never sustainable
00:32:12 Lowe and Farnsworth had this big idea about collecting data about those moviegoers and then selling it back to theater chains and
00:32:20 Eventually, they seemed to think movie pass would get so big and so powerful that they'd be able to negotiate a piece of ticket sales
00:32:28 And even concessions from those theater chains that didn't happen
00:32:31 Even at the time we all kind of knew it wasn't gonna happen and just in case you think that's 2020 hindsight
00:32:37 Here is a clip from a verge video in July of 2018
00:32:41 I mean look the whole thing really is a mess and it comes down to the fact that movie pass doesn't make money
00:32:45 The company hopes that when it hits a certain subscriber base size all the math will magically work out
00:32:50 But in the meantime, it's burning through cash
00:32:51 Causing the stock price of its parent company to plummet the fix apparently seems to be to get its customers to just stop going to
00:32:57 Movies or if they do to pay up that last point is a good one
00:33:01 By the way at one point to stop the money bleeding
00:33:04 Movie pass started to create weird new rules for what you can see and when and its executives are actually under investigation
00:33:11 For even doing worse things like allegedly breaking the product on purpose
00:33:16 So that people would stop using it at big movies
00:33:19 The whole thing was just a mess and a big part of the movie pass movie crash story is
00:33:24 Stacy saying that aloud internally and getting pushed out of the door for it
00:33:28 You had the founder who built the plane saying it can't handle these G forces. There's no way the math is gonna work
00:33:36 What made it worse to me is you had customers?
00:33:41 Saying I am willing to pay more to help you be solvent
00:33:46 Like when your customer base is saying that that's crazy, right if people are like, this is so awesome
00:33:53 I went to 400 movies last year
00:33:55 Please charge me more because I know I'm saving a lot of money. I'm still I've got so much upside
00:34:02 I'll pay you a hundred bucks a month and I'm still saving money and when your customer base is saying that and
00:34:08 Your founder is saying that then the writings on the wall and that's part of the plan
00:34:13 You figure it out you experiment and you find the right place great
00:34:18 You found an entry point that consumers love it now find a profitable
00:34:24 Place to be at and if that's 30 bucks a month
00:34:27 Yeah, you might lose a third of these people but you're still the biggest subscription company in the world
00:34:32 So a part theatrical so I that was the hard part was just adjust your pricing
00:34:38 It's like what's wrong with that? You're fired get out
00:34:41 Part of the reason I've always been interested in the movie past story is that the rough shape of that arc is something we've seen
00:34:49 So many times in tech you prioritize growth at all costs you lose a giant amount of money and then something
00:34:57 Something you'll become so big and so powerful that you can either raise prices or find new ways to make money
00:35:03 That's the uber story. That's the Lyft story. That's the bird story. That's the instacart story
00:35:08 That's the tick-tock story on and on and on sometimes it works
00:35:12 Usually it doesn't it definitely didn't for movie pass
00:35:16 And in fact, I think movie pass might have sort of speedrun that whole story quicker than just about anybody
00:35:22 The other kind of tech trope about movie pass that kept jumping out to me was the whole
00:35:27 Fast-talking founder with big ideas who might be full of crap
00:35:31 But everybody keeps listening to anyway thing which is obviously a staple of Silicon Valley and for Mutali
00:35:38 Poking at that idea and in this case who played that part for movie pass was a big part of the movie pass documentary
00:35:45 When I was doing research a lot of people in social media who were trying to discover
00:35:50 What's the real story behind movie pass?
00:35:52 Some of them were speaking with the understanding that
00:35:55 Mitchell Owen Ted Farnsworth were really the founders they were speaking and having these deep dives into movie pass and not even mentioning
00:36:03 Stacy and I felt that they might need to enter the story through their perspective
00:36:11 It serves us in a couple ways because it's a little bit of a reveal for people who don't know
00:36:15 It might make some people uncomfortable who do know and maybe oh
00:36:19 Did these filmmakers even know who the real founders and what we pass are and they question that and hopefully keep watching and not assume
00:36:25 The work but it also plays into part of the premise which kind of revealed itself in the more
00:36:32 crystallized form once we were later on in production is it has to do with
00:36:36 Racial bias and people's assumptions about who plays what role especially in a tech company and maybe if you did enter this story assuming that
00:36:43 Okay. Yeah, Mitch is the leader and Stacy's just kind of complaining
00:36:48 Maybe he doesn't know how to ride this rocket ship like Mitch does, you know
00:36:53 Because Mitch is the founder of Netflix and all of a sudden your biases played against you and then you're like, oh
00:36:59 Maybe I need to rethink how I was thinking about this
00:37:01 And and so that little pivot in terms of the plot structure or that little inverse order helps play into that
00:37:08 I will say that it was a battle internally, you know, I didn't mean this is a collaborative thing
00:37:13 And so I at first didn't want to start the story that way but then there's an actual
00:37:20 Arguable point someone can make that we need to start with the excitement
00:37:24 We need to start with the millions of people coming into movie past and in my mind part of me is like well
00:37:30 You can't look over Stacy and I'm a like all these ten years of development
00:37:35 They did before that and so it was a lot of back and forth and and I actually needed to see it done both ways
00:37:41 before I actually
00:37:43 Was on board with this little trick because I think it was Archie Gibbs who suggested it to me that oh
00:37:49 Maybe we should trick people at the very beginning and I was like
00:37:52 I don't know exactly what that would do to me in terms of how I feel about this story and I didn't like it until
00:37:59 I decided to like roll it out the way that we did, you know and like roll it out so that it really emphasizes
00:38:06 that Stacy and I may were in a position of vulnerability a position where they weren't in control of the ship and
00:38:13 Okay, that's normal. They're not the founders and then you realize oh
00:38:17 They are the founders and they're not in position to drive this thing and then you might feel a little bit more concerned about them
00:38:23 And so it was a lot involved. It was a lot involved and I'm glad we ended up doing that the way
00:38:27 It's kind of fun. It really does work. It's it's quite a it's quite a twist whatever seventeen and a half minutes in the movie
00:38:32 Yeah, Stacy. How did that part of the process?
00:38:35 Yeah, I don't know how involved you were kind of with the the overall production
00:38:38 But like watching a lot of this sort of twists and turns of it play out again all these years later
00:38:44 Obviously, it hasn't gone away. You've you've been involved
00:38:47 This is the thing you live through but how does it feel to see all of it sort of put into one place in order?
00:38:51 I mean, I think it was what Mutale did so I've seen you know
00:38:56 We work and Theranos and all of them
00:38:59 I think we all kind of travel in a pack and we watch these things and I think what he did was closer to
00:39:06 The Steve Jobs Apple story because it's the only thing, you know, they had a lot more airtime on
00:39:13 CNBC or MSNBC or all of the different shows that they were on Yahoo Finance
00:39:19 Where they were being presented as that and called themselves the founders
00:39:24 so whoever thought of it or whichever way it is a master stroke in storytelling because it's not straight linear and
00:39:31 You know a third of the way through it's then brings you back to the beginning to the origin story
00:39:38 I thought it was a master. He did make me nervous the first 15 minutes
00:39:43 It's like he was sitting next to me in the theater when I was seen at the first time and he got a couple of
00:39:49 side-eye glances
00:39:51 Like any and he literally said just wait for it wait for it cuz I didn't know what was happening
00:39:57 And he literally had to tell me hang on
00:40:00 Cuz I wanted to pause the film and go have a conversation
00:40:04 In the first cut he should have just cut you out entirely just as a just as a bit
00:40:09 Just really make you sweat for a while. Yeah, my wife was there with me and she she goes
00:40:13 Did they know you were the founder and I go? Yes. I said, yes. Hang on
00:40:18 He waited until the end we were at almost a big picture lock by the time Stacy saw it
00:40:23 So it wasn't like he had a big chance to change much. So it was it was do or die at that point
00:40:28 One thing I've always wondered about movie pass is could it have worked if they hadn't grown too fast burned money at unprecedented rates
00:40:37 Made a series of ridiculous bad decisions. Is there a stable idea underneath here?
00:40:43 Both Mutale and Stacy agreed that the $10 a month thing killed movie pass
00:40:48 But both seem to think that it didn't necessarily have to I think there were a series of
00:40:53 Figures that took place that allowed movie pass to crash in a way that it did the biggest though
00:40:59 I think is having 995 is that price point for promotional purposes turning into this is our price point forever
00:41:07 And I wonder Stacy, you know, I think we said it was 48 hours when you had the price at 995 and then you gained
00:41:14 175,000 new subscribers in two days if you had cut it off then
00:41:19 Maybe that would have been the secret to success because you would have gotten that marketing boost or what do you think?
00:41:26 Yeah, I think and we talked about it. We said great turn that off tell everyone. This is a promotional price point and
00:41:34 Just give them a heads up. This is a promotional price point. You're all month to month at some point. This will normalize
00:41:41 But enjoy it for now, right?
00:41:43 Yeah
00:41:44 and then I would take certain segments and I would have said these people are going up to 30 like test different zones and different
00:41:51 things test your different price points see what
00:41:54 Elasticity you have if we go up to $50
00:41:58 How high is the churn if we're at $30 or if we're at 25?
00:42:02 But what's the lowest we can go based on the behavior we're seeing and then you move your price and you're gonna get some churn
00:42:08 But you've got so many people excited off the original
00:42:11 Idea that they keep going and that's all you had to do and you and we would be sitting here
00:42:18 Talking about a really big company a big global
00:42:22 Company that was way because in AMC or a regal would never have been able to catch up to you
00:42:29 To be fair, of course Stacy believes all of that
00:42:32 He's actually the CEO of movie pass again after being ousted from the company in 2018. It went through all of its disasters
00:42:39 He bought the company back in 2021 and actually relaunched it last year
00:42:44 There were a bunch of new things about it some web 3 stuff that I thought was kind of weird at the time
00:42:50 But doesn't really seem to have come to anything but it operates very differently from a technology standpoint
00:42:56 We had some of the innovation
00:42:58 So we had our first year back and we were profitable and we added a credit system where we knew we needed a governor
00:43:05 to be between the consumer the product and the marketplace and in any
00:43:12 Marketplace you need to show value to the consumer so that the consumer can have alignment with the company and in
00:43:20 version one whether you went to
00:43:23 Say an AMC where there maybe wasn't a partnership or you went to a B&B where there was
00:43:30 In the app you couldn't see the difference and though we were getting
00:43:34 Wholesale pricing from someone else there was no display of that
00:43:39 So this version we simply said let's use a credit system
00:43:43 To show alignment when the price is cheaper and say let's motivate them by giving them a certain number of credits
00:43:52 So that now they are aligned with saving money the way we're aligned with saving money that didn't exist in v1
00:44:00 But we knew that was the pathway because we were beginning to test that in
00:44:04 2016 and so when I said guys, let me tell you how to get there a raise the price B
00:44:10 We have this variable pricing capability. They're like no this $10 price point is so awesome
00:44:16 We're adding a quarter of a million. I'm like you're losing $30 per person per month
00:44:21 So I think that the technology its subscription
00:44:25 This isn't this isn't new since newspapers were born. We've had subscription businesses
00:44:31 So a lot of it's not new but the way to use the tech is new
00:44:36 So now we built it with machine learning and AI engines, which is very different
00:44:41 So I think the technology was there just stupid was driving the bus and that's all it
00:44:48 The problem with that theory though is that the movie theater industry looks really different now than it did in 2018 or
00:44:55 2011 for that matter when they first started working on this
00:44:58 We're in the midst of one of the worst box-office runs in a long time
00:45:02 We just had the worst Memorial Day at the movie theater in three decades and by at least one measure that I saw ticket sales
00:45:09 Are 22% below where they were at this point a year ago and a full 41% down from 2019
00:45:17 It's kind of like the pandemic happened and movie theaters just never came back which makes sense, right? We're streaming more
00:45:23 We're on Netflix more. We're home more. Maybe movie theaters are just over
00:45:27 This is not remotely surprising to anyone who is like living life and watching TV more often
00:45:34 But Stacy doesn't think it's the case. This guy loves the movies
00:45:38 I am NOT a filmmaker, but I love and respect what people like Mutale will spend
00:45:46 three-four-five six seven years on bringing a
00:45:49 90-minute story to screens and telling this they are our
00:45:55 profits they are our
00:45:58 Freedom fighters they bring stories that otherwise would never get seen
00:46:03 It's such an important art form that is under attack that if you know, you have the burden of responsibility
00:46:11 that you have technologies that can double the attendance of movie going and you can create
00:46:18 Efficiencies in a in a sector that doesn't work with itself when you see a Netflix they can go into a space
00:46:26 Dominate that space from top to bottom because they have the direct-to-consumer
00:46:30 Relationship and no one ever built anything from the consumer point of view and empowering the consumer
00:46:38 So I think it's a beautiful moment in time because I don't want that cinema died on my watch
00:46:43 You know that it was a simple technology upgrade
00:46:47 I want the Mutale ease of the world to forever be able to tell stories in such a powerful medium and
00:46:54 Theaters shouldn't be these things on their last legs. It's just stupidity and arrogance and pride
00:47:01 That's preventing technology from unlocking such great opportunities
00:47:07 We're in such a beautiful moment that if we can get out of the way, I think that
00:47:12 Storytelling will go to the next level because I think we're on the verge of a new golden age of cinema
00:47:19 from we see how
00:47:21 Storytelling creation is just mind-blowingly
00:47:26 Changing and you see how even the sight and sound experience in the theater is changing
00:47:31 But what it takes to get people there isn't changing and that's the part that we're focused on and I feel blessed to be able
00:47:39 To have the privilege to be able to do that. Yeah, basically other than Dune
00:47:43 It's been a disaster at theaters this year and I'm curious from both of your perspectives
00:47:48 Like what do we do next with movie theaters? I agree. It could be easier
00:47:51 I agree buying it should it could be cheaper all this stuff
00:47:53 But I do wonder does something fundamental in the movie going experience need to change here
00:48:00 Cinema has a PR problem. It doesn't have an attendance problem. You notice that this past weekend
00:48:06 Okay, more people went in four days to the movies
00:48:12 then everyone who will attend an
00:48:15 NFL game in an entire year in four days. That's how many people went to the movies
00:48:21 Okay, you don't get at a football game. They don't tell you how many tickets are sold at every single game
00:48:28 I think that we need to stop reporting box-office numbers because we're focused on the wrong things
00:48:35 We're not focused on movie making we're focused on movie going and it doesn't matter how great the movie was
00:48:41 Because most really big films didn't gross at the box office over time
00:48:48 They became part of our culture. And so we're focused on the wrong thing because everything is determined by one number
00:48:56 What was the gross of the box office this weekend compared to last year or the year before?
00:49:01 We need to stop reporting those numbers and get back to the days when I was a kid
00:49:07 You didn't report grosses of Star Wars
00:49:09 It wasn't until IMDB and certain other things came online that my mom would call up and go
00:49:16 Oh, you know what such and such gross this weekend
00:49:18 We became obsessed with that and you'll hear even with YouTube and a lot of creators. They say I stopped watching
00:49:26 My view number I started focusing on content and I started focusing on doing the right content
00:49:34 And it will take care of itself
00:49:36 Movie going is healthy when you stop comparing it to these numbers that every Monday morning
00:49:42 You have a report card that you failed no sports do this
00:49:46 No other industry the travel industry they report quarterly where some single companies
00:49:53 But you do not get group wide grosses every weekend on a business. You don't have it
00:49:59 So I think that's detrimental to us. It gives us a very big PR problem. Definitely. That's a good take
00:50:05 I have not heard that before. I actually really agree with that. Who's Ali? What do you think our movie theaters?
00:50:09 You're you're making stuff for the Internet who cares about movie theaters, right? No, I care about movie theaters
00:50:15 I the most fun I've had out this year has been at movie theaters, but it was screening movie past movie crash
00:50:21 I think that's probably why but that in-person
00:50:24 Experience is something that will always be better than watching it at home and speaking of Dune
00:50:31 I just watched Dune 2 for the first time with my brother and we watched it on a TV and I
00:50:38 Wish that we had watched it in the theater. Maybe the second time I felt that way like oh this movie was so great
00:50:44 I wish that I'd seen it in a theater out with other people that sort of glow that happens when you go and that
00:50:51 communal experience that Stacy was referring to it's something special that
00:50:56 Culturally, I think we're gonna turn back toward after we get enough of sort of the convenience of watching movies on our phone
00:51:04 And I think we'll be going is still gonna thrive and I think maybe it's just time for us to be reminded of how special
00:51:11 It is. I like it
00:51:12 I will say Dune 2 ripped in theaters like it's one of the maybe the best theater going experience not to make you feel bad
00:51:19 One of the best movie theater experiences I've had in a very long time the movie is just so loud
00:51:23 It's still playing some places see it in Dolby Atmos
00:51:26 Because the sound design in there is just insane. I haven't seen anybody's house that can do Dolby Atmos
00:51:34 He's right about that. I think and I agree that there is still something to be said for going to the movies
00:51:40 I certainly felt it with Dune 2 still thinking about that movie and I think there's a lot more to change
00:51:45 About the movie going experience than just the way we buy tickets and what they cost
00:51:49 But the way we buy tickets and what they cost is definitely a start
00:51:53 All right, we got to take a break and then we're gonna come back and take a question from the Verge cast hotline
00:51:58 We'll be right back
00:52:00 All right, we're back let's get to the hotline as always the number is 866 verge 1 1 the email is verge cast at the verge
00:52:14 Calm we love all your questions
00:52:16 Thank you to everybody who's reached out with thoughts about what's going on with open AI and how the verge and everybody else should talk
00:52:21 About this stuff, please keep them coming
00:52:23 It's been really interesting to hear all of your thoughts and it's really helpful as we think about where we go from here this week
00:52:28 We have a smart home question
00:52:30 Hi, my name is Chris. I'm from Los Angeles. So this is a question about the smart home. So probably hi Jen
00:52:37 How are you? So I have home assistant running on a
00:52:42 Little Raspberry Pi and I love it. It's actually pretty good. It's pretty flexible
00:52:46 I have like two stupid things I need to do that Apple home doesn't let me do and it's great
00:52:50 I have speakers and lights. Is there a reason to add like a third thing?
00:52:54 I like kind of can't come up with like I rent and so like I'm not gonna get all new blinds, right?
00:53:00 Like I don't have a gate in front of my house. I don't want to do a smart lock
00:53:03 I don't think unless there's one that's safe. I feel like the smart homes kind of just like in a really bad spot
00:53:09 Generally, but like in a like non starter kind of spot for renters. Am I wrong in that?
00:53:14 Let me know because I would love to be proven wrong in that like, please I would definitely love that
00:53:18 But I don't know you let me know. Thanks. Bye. All right. Well asking you shall receive Gen 2e. How are you? I'm good
00:53:24 Thanks. Hi Chris - very excited to answer this question because it's a topic I get asked a lot
00:53:30 So yeah lots to dive into in your question there the first one. I'm gonna say
00:53:36 Renters. Yes, there is lots of great stuff you can do, especially if you have home assistant
00:53:41 I mean Chris you already set up pretty well for doing some cool stuff. I'd actually say there's sort of two
00:53:47 Answers here. Like if you're a renter there are options if you're a renter with home assistant, there are way more options
00:53:53 Oh interesting. Okay, just because you know, it sounds like Chris is maybe you know, quite technically advanced
00:53:59 I mean if you have home assistant, I think with this we're safe to assume on a raspberry pie. Yeah
00:54:04 You know what you're doing and then also he mentioned Apple home
00:54:08 So I'm assuming that's his main platform that does narrow your choices down
00:54:13 But then home assistant widens them back up again, but just to answer that overall question about renters
00:54:18 I do think there are more and more options for renters and you mentioned door locks door locks actually are in a better space for renters
00:54:25 And they have been for a long time
00:54:26 There's the August Wi-Fi smart lock which has been sort of our number one choice for renters because it's retrofit
00:54:32 So you're not having to replace your door lock which your landlord may not like but you still get to control
00:54:38 The lock in a way that is useful for a smart home perspective
00:54:42 That's the one that just goes like on over top of the existing lock, right?
00:54:45 Right of the back of your deadbolt you actually do have to remove the thumb turn
00:54:49 But everything else stays as is that is pretty clever
00:54:53 Which makes it very easy also means you can take it with you when you if you move to another apartment and also they've just
00:54:59 Yale has just come out with a new retrofit smart lock
00:55:02 So there's another good option there and they both both Yale and August who are owned by the same company in their sister brands
00:55:09 They have come out with a new keypad that has a touch
00:55:12 Fingerprint reader in it so you can now use a fingerprint to unlock your August Wi-Fi smart lock
00:55:18 That is the thing about the smart home that feels the most sci-fi to me, by the way the fingerprint thing
00:55:23 It just yeah, it's it's the most like mission impossible thing that I have tried in the smart home and I cannot recommend it enough
00:55:30 And that well, they've now got facial recognition
00:55:32 So I haven't tried that yet, but that came out at CES, but yes the and the fingerprint is great. It's really easy
00:55:39 It's my favorite way of unlocking the door Apple home key is also a really useful way if you use Apple home
00:55:44 Unfortunately, there are not any retrofit door locks that work with Apple home key right now because it's all inside the house
00:55:51 So there's nothing to do the NFC and although these new keypads do have NFC in them
00:55:58 So it's potential we may see home key come to some of these retrofit locks and that brings me to the second retrofit lock
00:56:04 I would recommend which is actually coming out this month
00:56:06 And when I say recommend I haven't tested it yet
00:56:08 But I have tested some of their past products and they've been good a Cara is coming out with a retrofit smart lock
00:56:15 So the same concept you can just replace the thumb turn on your deadbolt
00:56:20 And then you put a you can put a keypad out in the front of your house so that you can access it
00:56:25 that also has a fingerprint reader that does have NFC in and
00:56:29 I would not be surprised if at some point in future that could support home key because a Cara already does support home key in
00:56:36 Some of its products so there's lots of options now. They didn't used to be so that's nice for home kit Apple home compatible
00:56:44 Retrofit smart locks. Do you think that's a good like third place to start the lock thing? I do
00:56:49 I think locks are actually my favorite smart home device most useful easiest for everyone to use not complicated
00:56:57 mostly
00:56:59 And provide real value, you know being able to unlock and lock your door remotely if there's a problem
00:57:04 There's so much value I think in smart locks and the safety issue. It's just as easy
00:57:10 I think if you're concerned about someone hacking your smart door lock, don't be it's just as easy for someone to break a window
00:57:16 It's easier much easier
00:57:18 To break a window than it is to hack your smart lock and in terms of whether someone's gonna knock your door down again
00:57:24 Regular door lock smart lock not a big difference
00:57:26 So yeah, I would not worry about the safety side unless you have someone who's really smart a big hacker
00:57:33 Who's after you in which case maybe?
00:57:36 But in terms of the third thing
00:57:38 I mean it differs I think for renters perhaps from people that own their homes because you know
00:57:44 A smart thermostat is a big one right energy management, you know bringing that into your smart home
00:57:49 I would say if a smart thermostat is the research shows that the top three
00:57:53 Devices people use in their smart homes as smart video doorbells. Mm-hmm smart cameras, which are kind of the same
00:58:00 Smart thermostats and then robot vacuums. Oh interesting. Okay, as well as smart light bulbs are in there number four
00:58:07 Then the robot vacuums, so you've already got the smart light
00:58:10 I mean a video doorbell is you can do a battery-powered one as a renter. So that's a good option
00:58:14 Yeah door locks actually, you know aren't in the top categories
00:58:18 I think it's just still still a bit of a niche
00:58:21 But I do find it like I said one of the most useful smart devices in my home and you use it every day
00:58:27 And yeah, there's a lot of innovation in this space, too
00:58:30 But for Chris who has I think you know that was probably and a more advanced smart home user
00:58:37 What I would recommend as like the third thing based on what he has is more automation
00:58:42 Mm-hmm
00:58:43 so that is using sensors making your home smart not just
00:58:47 Having a few smart devices in it and because he has home assistant, you know using devices like motion sensors contact sensors
00:58:55 Smart plugs smart buttons to kind of bring everything together and work more seamlessly
00:59:00 I'm going back to a Cara who I mentioned at the beginning
00:59:03 That's a really good option for someone that's using Apple home and home assistant because you can actually
00:59:08 That most of their Zigbee devices will pair directly to home assistant and they have great inexpensive motion sensors smart buttons
00:59:15 so things like he can have his lights turn on when he opens his front door or
00:59:20 What would be really fun for him to try actually is the fp2 present sensor?
00:59:24 Which is in a Cara device and that and I think works really well in an apartment setting because I've struggled to get it to
00:59:31 Work in my home because I have so many people in my home
00:59:33 It uses millimeter wave sensing which is a really interesting
00:59:36 Development in the smart home sensing radar sensing to use presence detection versus motion detection
00:59:43 So if he's sitting in his living room watching TV or your lights won't turn off because you haven't moved
00:59:48 Right, so and I find that that's a really interesting sort of development in the smart home and for Chris
00:59:54 The fp2 does work with home assistant we can include in the show notes
00:59:58 this is great blog that this one guy wrote exactly about how to integrate it with home assistant and
01:00:02 What benefits there are so, you know for for Chris, I think more automation, you know
01:00:08 Making your home smarter because things like sensors contact sensors. You can take them with you when you leave - but yeah
01:00:14 So there's lots and then the one the final thing I would say that a lot of people are interested in and works for both
01:00:20 Renters and homeowners is a smart security system
01:00:23 There's a lot of benefit there
01:00:25 Especially because if you can integrate with say your door lock and your video doorbell if you want a video doorbell
01:00:30 So there's a lot the smart home has to offer for renters and it does seem like I think the stigma that
01:00:36 Anything beyond the very basics requires opening up your walls
01:00:39 I think is so much less true than it was even just a couple of years ago that a lot of the stuff you're describing
01:00:45 used to be a lot of work and
01:00:47 Now it's a lot of like battery maintenance and that's kind of it in a lot of these cases
01:00:52 especially like I think about ring has done a really good job of this of making it basically that you can just
01:00:57 Hang a doorbell on your wall and like I have a lot of feelings about people in
01:01:01 Especially like apartment buildings and condo buildings who have video doorbells that just go out into the hallway
01:01:08 Yeah, I have a lot of like moral quandaries with that
01:01:11 But the idea of what it can accomplish for you this stuff in general is a lot simpler than it gets credit for for people
01:01:17 I think now especially if you've gone through the work to set up a raspberry pie running home assistant
01:01:21 Like you have the chops to do most of the smart home stuff that is available to you at this point for sure
01:01:26 Yeah, and there is there's a lot and in terms of the doorbell actually, I just this actually happened last week
01:01:32 So this is news for you on the verticast
01:01:34 Arlo has some good battery-powered doorbells and their first generation one just became home kit compatible
01:01:41 Oh cool. There was only one battery-powered doorbell that worked with Apple home before that was the a Cara now the Arlo
01:01:48 Essential first gen battery-powered doorbell will work with home kit. So not home kit secure video, but with home kit
01:01:55 So Chris if you were thinking about a video doorbell, those two would be a good option
01:01:59 Cameras are a whole different thing. And as you say, especially if you're recording your neighbors walk past your house every morning
01:02:05 But if that's something you're interested in
01:02:07 Those are two good options and a door lock and then motion set and get some sensors gets get your house to be really smart
01:02:13 And that's really fun
01:02:14 I think especially if if you're the type who wants to sort of experiment and play just adding sensors and smart plugs to everything you
01:02:22 Can think of opens up so many things and for me
01:02:24 It's like most of the stuff that I've tried ends up being sort of useless
01:02:27 But just it's just fun to play with and be like, okay whenever I get to like the fourth step to the basement
01:02:34 What should turn on? I don't even know. Let's just have some stuff happen
01:02:38 And it's just yeah
01:02:39 Just that and and the sensors are cheap and they're everywhere and they're easy to pick up and move around and I think I think that's
01:02:44 A good call just like buy some sensors spend a Saturday playing with them and and see what works for you
01:02:50 I like that a lot see what happens. Yeah
01:02:52 Awesome. All right, Chris. I hope that helps Jen. Thank you as always. Thank you
01:02:57 All right, that is it for the verge cast today
01:02:59 Thank you to everyone who is on the show and thank you as always for listening
01:03:02 There's lots more on everything we talked about at the verge comm we have Chris's Sonos reviews
01:03:07 We have a movie pass movie crash review everything you want plus again lots going on in tech. It's WWDC next week
01:03:13 There's lots to see check out the verge comm and as always if you have thoughts questions feelings or headphones
01:03:18 You think we should buy instead of the ace email us at verge cast at the verge comm call the hotline
01:03:24 866 verge 1-1. I particularly want to hear what you're excited about at WWDC
01:03:29 We have a bunch of WWDC stuff coming lots of AI stuff presumed for next week
01:03:33 A few of us will be on the ground
01:03:35 Really want to know what you think is coming and whether you're excited about what we're gonna see from Apple in this next year
01:03:40 So hit us up first cast of the verge comm
01:03:42 866 verge 1-1 we love hearing from you
01:03:45 This show is produced by Andrew Marino Liam James and will pour the verge cast is a verge production and part of the Vox Media
01:03:50 Podcast Network Eli Alex. I will be back on Friday to talk about like I said WWDC plus a whole bunch more
01:03:56 We'll see you then rock and roll
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01:04:05 (electronic music)