 Hey, welcome to Android faithful your weekly source for the latest news hardware and apps in the world of Android I'm Quinn to it now And I'm Jason Howell and I am Ron Richards and look at us. Here. We are back together Dancing party no Michelle unfortunately because he is Unroute to Samsung unpack tomorrow, which is pretty cool route. Yeah on route busy On on route I think on route on route in route in route But yeah, and route on route. Yeah So we got a shot this week, but it's but it's delightful to be back with you Jason when it's always fun, right? Without a doubt or not Without it without a doubt we would be remiss if we did not have a Guests that we do have the benefit of the doubt of having I want to keep doing the puns because we're very lucky to have tonight Mr. Adam Dowd joining us Almost thought you weren't there we saw a phone and thought maybe you were replaced by a phone That's that was that was my that was my evil plan all along The deep fakes are incredibly deep. I thought that wasn't actually a one-player. Is it a 12 12 is a one-plus I appreciate the doubt puns though. That's it's very unbranded Yeah, was when you say without a doubt that without a doubt without a doubt But then you are here so I would get confused about how to word that to turn it into a positive Yeah, yeah, well, you know no doubt about it. It can be difficult Once Huawei comes on the show and everything turns into a double you Adam I am so excited to have you on the show this week because I believe you are our first guests of guests of 2024 Am I yeah, so fun. They are yeah, so that that is a crown though That is an esteemed title to have at least until 2025 Nobody can take it away from me But yeah, but sure enough we wanted you on the show this week Not only talk about that needle device that you're holding up our video viewers saw the new the new hotness from one plus But also we're doing a little bit of a CES kind of wrap up and we are gonna hear from Michelle Because we did talk to him yesterday and recorded a bit with some of the stuff He saw at CES and then Adam we'd love to hear from you about what you saw at CES Because CES it feels like a month ago, but it was only last week It was so long ago like no I mean and and I can say it was genuinely a long time ago because I'm halfway back to feeling like a human Yeah, did you get the con flu? I really hope no no for years for years. I've been there and four years coming home healthy But that's because I haven't shaken a hand since 2020, so Team fist bump baby And it's funny like this year. Everybody was so amused by it like, you know, they'd be like, oh, you know Hi, I'm so-and-so and it'd be like I do this and they're like Are we at the point where we can be nostalgic about the pandemic and like be like, oh, like or is it still too real? Well, I do I do enjoy the fact I didn't enjoy the fact but I did find it fascinating when COVID hit in 2020 and There was all this kind of like what is going on? I saw one article that traced it to CES 2020 Oh, yeah, yeah Exactly so the one in shock me Yeah, all the folks all the folks coming over from China And then they traced it to whoever patient zero was and then went back to the Bay Area and then kind of how it went from there So CES not only gonna make us all Get exhausted but is also part of the decline of civilization and apparently also going to kill win that's The last screen can make fun of like I always have this big gas water bottle guess what I it bit me today That's big Did you did you just snort when was that a snort slightly snort all I got a sort of turtle a little bit going on So fun fact about the pandemic one of the first cases reported in the United States was in a hospital about three miles up from my house Yeah, yeah, one of the first US cases That that was officially identified as COVID-19 Because did that person go to CES? No, no, no No, but there were of quite a few of my you know of my friends and colleagues who came home from CES and you know, we're sick and For some reason lost their taste a sense of taste and smell and all the doctors at that point were like well, that's weird What's happening there a really bad cold? Yeah, yeah All right, well, I didn't mean to derail us with pandemic stories But so before we get to the CES goodness, there's some news to talk about right the aforementioned unpacked Yeah, and you know who isn't quite doing as well as they could be not related to the pandemic Or maybe kind of tangentially related is Samsung and in a report or some data that came out from the International Data Corporation IDC After 13 years of the tap at the top Samsung is no longer the world's largest smartphone manufacturer take your bets now for who it is Okay, betting time is over. It's Apple I was gonna guess a Tecmo I wish I wish so no in 2023 I iOS took over rather Apple overtook Samsung to become the world's largest Smartphone manufacturer that's after two there's 13 years of Samsung at the top they did take the crown from no key in 2010 and It kind of like it's really interesting because we talked a lot about data kind of at the end of 2023 why it where where everyone's seeing smartphone shipments go down throughout most of like Q1 Q2 of 2023 because of you know economic uncertainty instability crisis macroeconomic situations, but There was you know a lot of estimates that you know in Q4 part of the markets are gonna bounce back and no one bounced back harder then Apple going from 22 let me see there's the numbers 22.6 20 200 sorry 226.3 million units shipped in 2022 with a market share of 18.8 all the way up to now 234.6 million iPhone shipped and that's 20 point one percent of the smartphone market So that's a decent jump. It's more significant though that Samsung share has gone quite a bit down they now are at 19.4% of the market was 226.6 million units shipped and that's a drop from 2022 of 35.6 million units So it I mean yes, definitely it makes sense that Apple would probably be there to kind of like you know Take the title, but I think yeah the most significant part is that Samsung has just dropped enough to become number two Who is transition? Who is transition so we have your chart of basically top five The top five the top five listed of Come manufacturers are Apple With 20.1 percent Samsung with 19.4 percent market share Xiaomi with 12.5 percent Oppo with 8.8, which I assume includes one plus right or is it Oppo by themselves? Yeah, and then transition And it's not transition. It's transition Holdings is a Chinese manufacturer of mobile phones based in Shenzhen It is the it was the largest smartphone manufactured by sales in Africa in 2017 and also sells mobile phones in the Middle East South Asia and Latin America that sounds like techno. It's brands includes such brands as I tell techno and infinec So I made a joke Good on y'all Eight percent so so what would you all's guesses be for the major reasons why Samsung has dropped? You know so significant market share. What would your guesses be? Oh? Well, I know what IDC says Which sounds sounds pretty you know pretty pretty accurate They they noted the comeback of Huawei in China They noted you know the honor one plus Google being actually Competitive in the lower high-end which we still have to like find a name for the lower high-end is lower You know is the the minimal premium. I don't know what it is, but anyways So that's what IDC attributes this as but I mean but when you look at Samsung coming in second at 19.4 percent That's a 13.6 percent decline from the previous year. That is huge when you're talking these numbers and you look Oh, yeah, you know year after year what you're looking at here. That's a crazy Crazy drop well wait a minute. No hold on this chart saying something different though That was from a different part of the article and it said 13.6. I was like you got to be kidding me Well, no, okay, so it's a big drop though. It's like it's like no D-Map. No, so, okay, so this is Samsung 2023 market share 19.4 percent 2022 Market share 21 so that really only seems like a couple, but then they're saying that the growth So what is the growth because that is negative 13.6 percent? I'm guessing that shipments So if you go from 262.2 million Shipments to 220 35 is about 16 percent of 23 That's as hard transition went up 30 percent. Yeah, I was just gonna say yeah, that's that's pretty But I guess that makes sense with with Huawei kind of coming back in that I would assume the Chinese market has more of an appetite for domestic Phones and with Huawei kind of coming back that makes a lot a lot of sense though It is interesting to note that with Huawei coming back Xiaomi and Oppo did see drops as well in unit ship So it's kind of hard especially like it's hard to compare Android being the ecosystem it is with multiple OEMs to Obviously the other side has just one So it's always gonna be kind of like I guess in the zero-sum game in terms of like Android Android share It's always gonna be like, you know all all of the OEMs kind of like jostling and tussling Tussling for first throw this on the screen here because I kind of have this this reaction to cousin of Joss said I'm kind of shocked always thought Apple was the was only the king in the US like that's been the narrative is like Oh, well in the US Apple is really really popular But you go out to other markets and Apple's not nearly as popular But I mean these numbers seem on the surface to prove otherwise They're still they're still close to number one in Japan They only just dropped down from number one to number two in Japan, but it's still a big part of the market I think even Germany is iPhones number one and I want to say Sweden, but I I think there's like a Nordic a Schengen a Schengen zone country where they are number one and given that Germany and Japan are kind of like was it Are they number two and number three economies in the world? So that kind of makes sense. There's a lot of heavy lifting So yeah, yeah, I mean it's really interesting because there's I I mean say what you want about the iPhone SE there really is no Cheap iPhone version, I guess they're kind I guess the iPhone SE could be considered like an entry level, but I mean and and I can't speak to Overseas sales Prices and whatnot. I can only speak to what that phone costs here, which is a lot more than What you can get a cheap Android phone for so I mean it's yeah, it's more like mid-range price Yeah, it's definitely mid-range right 430. Yeah, so You know, it's just it's rather shocking when you consider the number of You know people whose only computing device is a smartphone You know Although I guess if you're going to make that argument Maybe the argument is to make you know, put all your budget into You know a higher-end phone so that you can so that you can get the most out of it But uh, yes, it's it's it's very surprising. I kind of thought that samsung or at least some android oem Would hold that title for longer But I guess that just goes to show it's apple's world and we're all just living in it Ah, but by percentage points. I don't know. I mean it's it. I don't know it's not it's not such a A bold position they're in now. It's 20 to 19, right? Like it's literally like less than a percentage point and like we could very well see samsung rebound in 24 Like I feel like this is like going back and forth Um, yeah, I mean if samsung was to I don't know have an announcement of a new device that might might change the tide I mean maybe then but you know, they're never going to do that right and they're not going to have ai at all Like they're not they're going to buck the trends of ai Yeah That seems like a good segue We are we are kind of bearing the lead a little bit in that tomorrow is samsung's galaxy unpacked event It is on and I believe 1 p.m. Eastern Do the math. I'm so sorry. I can't do it for pacific. That's like 10 10 a.m pacific um, and yeah, we're we're all you know, uh Waiting with beta breath for the announcement of the next s24 series But thanks to evan blast over on twix. Uh, at least for a little bit not anymore Evan did post some marketing images I gave us a little bit of a leaky peeky into what would be announced tomorrow Some of the most notable things is that samsung might be following google lead in offering seven Years of android updates. Of course one of the big things for the pixel event this year was a resounding or astounding rather Seven years of updates for the for the pixel eight. Well, guess what? Samson could be like well hold my not my beer. Hold my hold my smartwatch hold my big speed Um, some of course reports are claiming that this would be not just seven years of major updates But also security patches as well um, and of course There's gonna be a I I mean like Really like really I mean is that a surprise now? What is notable though is that the marketing images did indicate that galaxy AI features will be free through 25 which seems to imply that at some point they won't be free possibly foreshadowing subscription based AI features Maybe maybe maybe I don't know. Good luck with that And now subscription in general subscription AI features I don't I don't know There you know all the AI services are doing this right like they give they give you a piece for free And then if you want to you know get kind of unlimited access to this stuff They they charge you for it. Oh dear drug that I just I don't understand what they'd be charging for because you know I don't either having gone to I was at you know snapdragon summit when they introduced the snapdragon 8 gen 3 and all the you know the one of the big emphasis emphasis the size emphasis on the snapdragon 8 gen 3 Announcement was you know this npu that's going to do all this stuff on device So I'm like I don't even know how they would justify a subscription service to For for the AI features that's all happening on your device. It's it seems like it seems like a heated seat subscription all over again If you follow that metaphor, I guess we'll see how many AI features will be online only versus on device I know on device was as you know as alluded to Kind of a big deal for google, but we'll see what happens with samsung And kind of maybe part of one of those features that We wonder whether we'll play subscriptions for is something called circle to say circle to search Which is a rumored AI feature on samsung but powered by google and it sounds like just basically An upgrade of google lens where you can Quote circle hi highlight Scribble or tap to pinpoint what you're curious about and those screenshots necessary and quote and the marketing pictures had shown, you know, uh kind of Predictably an s-pen kind of like going around and like circling things and enabling google lens So we'll see what that looks like, but that is a samsung AI feature, but is powered by google. So We'll see what happens tomorrow That's samsung galaxy unpacked. Well speaking of that. So we will i'm not that i'm aware of jason You're not doing any live coverage of unpacked, right? Like none of we're so we are not covering unpacked live Um, i'm actually busy while it's gonna be happening. So I can't be doing it But um, but uh jason and win if you're around watching it live And if you want to write in the discord for patrons, you could you could potentially do that But when you're gonna be on daily tech news show tomorrow, right to talk about it I will not not not three hours after the event. I think I will be on dtns To talk to tom and the crew about what's happened at samsung galaxy unpacked So it won't be quite live, but it'll be very very close. So that's fun So go to go to twitch.tv slash good day internet tomorrow at 4 p.m Eastern to see when on dtns or download it when it comes out of the podcast That'd be great. And then also as we mentioned our good friend Co-host michelle ramon is going to be there live at the event And he's going to be back on the show next week to tell us about all the things that all the things that he saw But maybe for patrons will have some bonus content for you later this week on patreon where you can get a sneak peek of his thoughts on On what is going to be announced So stay tuned to patreon if you're a paying member We're doing a lot more bonus content. So you want to do that go to patreon.com slash android faithful But hey, if you've got any questions for michelle leading into next week Either post them on patreon or shoot us an email at contact at android faithful.com That way michelle can make sure he's asking the right questions or or preparing anything for you for next week So we can get everybody's questions answered. So please do that. So It'll be big big samsung show next week, right So cool Like to like to point out that your email address and url at game are on point. So well done Leveled up since jason joined the team. It's fantastic. Yeah, so there it is. So Um, but yes, should I just leave this up there the whole time? Just You don't want to burn in on the screen, you know, that's all sure But um, all right, so moving on from samsung that said, um, not so great news coming out of mountain view out of google Unfortunately, um, I will tell you I am sick of hearing about layoffs. It has been Mentally exhausting and my heart goes out to people who are impacted by those layoffs Because google had another round last week And they've got another round going around this week too, which is just to say and I heard ad sales people Are getting hit this week, but last week Google had layoffs in their hardware division Which was hit along with a restructuring announcement And semaphore followed with a report that the assistant team saw quote-unquote hundreds of layoffs So the google assistant team Specifically was impacted last week And so anybody who listens to the show or has listened to the show that works at google that was involved in assistant or in hardware We feel for you. We hope you land on your feet. It's never an easy thing to go through But as if layoffs wasn't enough google then followed up announcing that Uh 17 quote-unquote underutilized features were being removed from assistant, which this whole thing By whom? Yeah, right this whole cracked me up like not only the fact that they're removing features from assistant But felt the need to communicate and detail The 17 features that would be removed and some are so mundane and bizarre like it's so I don't understand this at all but so Basically, no more media alarms. No more Inassistant no more rescheduling events in your calendar via assistant Even getting rid of step-by-step recipes on the on the on the hub Which was a launch feature if I remember correctly. That's my memory, but it's that yeah, it never worked that well But anyway, go ahead. Okay. Well, um, so there's they should have made it work. Well then Yeah, using your voice to broadcast a message to your google family group, although you can still broadcast to devices Yeah, when I first read this one, I was like, you gotta be kidding because I do use that right Jason You use that a lot. I I use it to broadcast devices to the devices in the home But I don't really use it tied to a google family I don't know what the difference is to be honest, but I know that I can have done it You know many times just broadcasting and then the one that the so there's the whole list is up It's it's been covered on various blogs. It's on google's blog as well and in their support section You can see all the individual things. Um, yeah, they can't ask to meditate with calm anymore I mean that that has all the I'm so infuriated. I need a meditation to calm down That has all the earmarks of a partnership came to an end. Yeah I love I love how they're there it should have a tm next to it Yeah, exactly Their alternative is you can still ask for meditation options with media providers such as youtube. Oh, okay But um, so the full list of all the 17 features that are there out there You can go find it. You can see what now you can't do But the big one that I was kind of shocked by was that they're removing the microphone in the google search bar On android phones, which uh, wait, what in the assistant? What what what what? Where is that? What they're removing the microphone so you cannot go ahead and go to an article Yeah, I use that thing all the time. I know I I use it too. I don't understand that Yep So my big question here and a lot of the users upon this news reacted similar to adam with what the hell And now people are asking like what resources were spent supporting those features Aren't those things that you just build and then they go or you know and like You know was the stopwatch really putting that much of a strain on resources that they cut it But but my bigger picture question is is that this seems like a positioning move And that they're they're clearing out any tech debt or any Partnership debt like pa like column or stuff like that. Maybe they've got data on what people are using or not using And they're making it more streamlined But like this feels like a setting the table for a future thing and I want to know Now i'm waiting to hear what are we going to get because of all these cuts? What is this leading towards why cut the microphone from that? Yeah, you know my hope is that this is going to lead to They're changing the interface with assistant or barred or somehow barred is going to get involved Two words two words and they also happen to be letters a I Yeah They're there, you know, google is obviously really doing what every other company You know a tech company in the world is doing right now And they're dropping any of their roadmap and focusing entirely on ai because if you aren't there in 2024 then you're nowhere I think that's how they all feel Yeah, I mean going back to some of these features though You want to know why people aren't using them because nobody knew they existed like using What was it? It was it was towards the top using media alarms music alarms or radio alarms I didn't know you could do that. Yeah, like well The discoverability isn't is a problem folks and no one's going to use features if they can't discover them Yeah, so oh man, that's so So do you so do you think that the so do you think that the assistant as a whole in the product way exists now is It's more feature complicated or feature rich than users need like that's what it sounds like right like it's it's It's a multi layered onion of things that a lot of people don't even know they can do with it years ago Yeah, well, I feel like this has been an issue for a really long time that assistant offered so many features And that was a selling point, but then from the user perspective It's like I don't even know where to begin like I I got to know that that exists and then I got to know the syntax in order to call it up And then I got to use it a handful of times to like ingrain it in my brain to use it in the future And like most users just aren't spending that much time That's why people just use these things for like weather and Play this song, you know weather and timers to remember Weather timers and lights. That's that's the entirety and let you know what I've actually switched to The other popular assistant that I'm not going to say because I don't want to trigger, you know a thousand devices. It's Bixby, right? Yeah, that's the one definitely No, I've actually switched to using amazon service because honestly, it's faster like my my co-host cliff and I did a kind of a speed test on a few routines between google assistant and and amazon's assistant and Amazon beat it like hands down every time it wasn't even it wasn't even close Um, just to reinforce something that ron said that even if something is a simple feature And it feels like a one-in-one like stopwatch or something that just feels like why would you have to you know ever improve on that? If something exists in your code base, it's going to have Tech debt on it even if it's really simple that may eat maintenance making sure that you don't break it And if you ever want to pivot and make something lighter better faster It's still a thing that you need to move So I I totally get it like why take away something that shouldn't be that difficult to maintain But it's not nothing everything. It's a weight. Everything. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That makes sense And I mean, you know, there was there was that uh that push I don't know how many years ago at this point where I feel like you had to go to a website for Google assistant to see all of the things it could do and I mean it was just it was blindingly The list and like your eyes kind of glaze over and you know again It goes back to the point like on one hand. Yay, that's a lot of features it can do But on the other hand like it's just it's too Complicated half of it. Yeah Yeah, you're not and I think that you know part of the reason that google and other companies are going all in on ai is because they've figured At least the current iteration of ai is because they've they've realized That there is a better way to do all these things and not require certain Specificity and like the syntax and the approach on the user's side Suddenly these things are becoming a lot more user focused or user able for people who aren't Nerds and uh, that's really appealing because then suddenly they've got way more opportunities for Lock-in and all these other things that are going to make them gobs of money. So So that's where we're at Moving on from the assistant. We've got not man. We're not not android 15th. It's not the 15th of android That's an entirely different time and place Android 15 the floodgates are apparently open because last week we talked a little bit about android 15 So I think every week now we're gonna have little pieces of information about it Last week it was voice activation this week michael wrote for android authority about the possible return of widgets To the lock screen. Can you believe that it's been since what was it android 5 lollipop was when we last had Widgets on lock screens. I really hope that's crazy and apparently they're coming back And michael said that this evidence can be found in the android 14 qpr 2 beta That is pointing to a return of this there might be a very specific way and how it's executed It might have an allow list so only certain apps are allowed to do it You'd have to like swipe inward from the right on the lock screen to reveal what they call the The communal space the widget space Refer to the code anyways but Yeah, there you go And then there's also the just the fact that iphone brought widgets to its lock screen iowa 16 And you know, it's it's the push and pull of mobile, right? Like google did it and they were first to it and we can all applaud google for that But then google stopped doing it and then apple did it and now google's doing it again, you know So it's like right you should just stayed with it Anyway, so what widget are you missing from your lock screen that you wish was there? That's a good question I don't know what widget i put on my lock screen to be honest Yeah, because didn't google move away from widgets on lock screen partially for the whole privacy and security thing It's like if you got widgets on your lock screen, then you're letting people into the experience bypassing any of the lock security and you know Well, I mean I'm not going to put my work email widget on the on the lock screen But you know whether that'd be nice, you know, I wouldn't do I wouldn't put a calendar on a lock screen Uh media controls like play media controls I gotta imagine they're gonna have a very Specific feature set or functionality set that it will work with in order for this to happen And that's you know and that said it is so early I mean Michelle's poking around qpo 14 qpr and we're we're we're hearing little things at 15 It might not even make the cut so right. Yeah, that's that's always that's always a consideration Just because it's here today doesn't mean it'll be there tomorrow Well, I mean they're they're trying to like bring face unlock back They've got like watch to unlock back so you don't actually stay on your lock screen that long So that's true at the time my lock screen disappears before I actually see what's on it Yeah, it's weird although I can do although I can do that neat cinematic photo treatment to my lock screen wallpaper now I did that on my tablet. It's like makes my family go Move around cinematically. Um, all right. Well, we'll see about that Uh, but uh, one last bit of news about android. Uh, they actually had a big announcement over at ces That that was a big reveal The hugest announcement ever the the android bug droid Uh, which got a redesign a couple months ago. They revealed its name You know, we've called it you called the droid the little bug droid the android guy Uh, its official name is the bot No bot. That's it the bot BOT, you know I was at that media event and I do not remember them saying that but I'm gonna go with it He's cut lore for you there. Yeah. Yeah. All right. Let's move on All right. Well, we're gonna move on to our patron pick of the week So every week on monday at 12 p.m. Eastern We put up three stories for our lovely patrons to vote on and pick the one that we Talk about as a group And so patrons like Michael O'Hara from texas got to vote on three stories this week and the ones that didn't win That y'all didn't want to hear about at least our patrons want to hear about The lowest actually was it was pretty close in third place second and third place Um, but the losers this week the ultimate loser this week was uh threads will allow you to follow mastodon users So I guess fediverse not getting too much love, but that got 27 of the vote. It's neat though. It's cool And it is it delivers on a promise. Yes. Yeah, exactly Um, so 20 percent, uh, and I really was hoping that more of you be interested just from a I don't know So it's the economic political standpoint. Um, google wants more gambling apps in the play store Oh, that would have been a great discussion, but that only would have been a nice ces tie in True very true. Um, but unfortunately 20 percent, uh, of you only voted for that But the winner with 45 percent this week is google messages is working on selfie gifts and I know it Loves the messages my goodness messages stories. Um And messages features and and google messages can continuing just like the future rollout train that they've been doing For like the last what year now of just adding all kinds of stuff in this current feature is still hidden But was found by you know, of course assembly bug You know always digging into the apk's and finding fun stuff and basically this will allow you to Long press the camera icon and google messages and it will pop up a specialized viewfinder with a little hey ready for your close-up mr. Deville and allow you to uh kind of count down three seconds and then Recreate a short video that will be converted to a gif that you can then insert into your google messages Okay, there you go. That's a selfie gif a gif see a gif So it's like a gif reaction of you. Yeah a gif reaction It's not too unlike the custom was it the wasn't there like a covered like a pet pet reactions or something like a like a month ago There you go You and your pets can just react to stuff and messages. I really want to see when this rolls out. How many people actually use it I'd be curious. I don't know like twice and then so that we can read about it It's so we can read about it being retired a year Yeah, yeah And jason's gonna be like I did that all the time. Yeah I will say that someone on patreon commented on this And there's always a messaging story and I have no interest and I just laughed. I'm sorry Yeah, we brought brian commented. He said uh almost every poll has a messages related stories zero interest Well, it is interesting because they keep winning I gotta tell you messages and weather are the two always win right when Yes, they do and I I always hesitate to suggest them But some of y'all want them and some of y'all really don't so how about this? How about this next week? There will be no message Related patron pick for those of you who do not care about messages. I mean, I mean, however, there will be three weather related Let's make sure we make a note of that jason because in a week from now I could very easily forget that you said that on the show. I'll remember I'll remember All right Yeah, we really appreciate the feedback too on on what y'all do and do not want to hear about and vote on so Either way, we really appreciate it. You're heard brian. Don't worry. Yes. You are very much so We appreciate it. Yeah, go to patreon.com slash android faithful sign up and you can vote every week So that's awesome. So cool All right, should we get into some hardware? This is the hardest of hardware actually because Initially michelle. I think was going to be able to join tonight Right, uh, but he could not because he is en route. If not, you know down Where the samsung event is going to be held. So he's going to be on on the scene for that But we did get a chance to chat with michelle Yesterday, so we had we actually had a pretty lengthy conversation with him We're not going to play the full conversation here. We're going to play a part of it And then if you want to watch the rest well, hey patreon.com slash android faithful it's some of our bonus content for you But why don't we check out this uh, this Kind of chat with michelle from yesterday about some of the things that he really wanted to discuss from the consumer electronic show All right, so we are here with michelle Who unfortunately couldn't join us for the regular show this week, but is able to give us some time to talk about his adventures in vegas michelle did the bail money get through to you in time Thanks for the offer rod, but I did not need to request any money from you all thank you this time This time this time. Let's give you you took notes for next year, right? Absolutely, so All right, cool. Well, so you we wanted to make sure that you had some time to tell us about some of the cool Stuff you saw at ces. So what's first up on the docket? So first up, I mean the consumer electronics show obviously it encompasses much more than his mobile tech But unfortunately there's not a lot of mobile tech to be found in ces every year Most of it has to deal with the way you interact with your other devices in your connected home such as your smart speakers your displays your tvs your fridges your Ovens and everything and so on and so forth, but there were a couple of mobile related announcements the most the biggest one I would say would be the ROG phone 8 or as wrong luck to say the rock phone Rock till I die I'll I'll be honest. I say rock privately because it's just easier to say but It's officially the ROG phone. Yep. You just doubted yourself though. So so is it is a true Michelle that this phone is beyond gaming now? Because that's what the website is telling me. I think definitely think I definitely think that they are shifting away from being just a pure Gaming first gaming only handheld like they've they've made a lot of improvements that make this feel more just like a phone for regular users That's also really good for gaming So one of the things I immediately noticed when I picked it up is wow It's just so much lighter and easier to hold from the previous models Like the previous models had really sharp edges. They were very it was very boxy This one had kind of rounder smoother edges. It was lighter. It was much easier to hold I also had additional features that people might have been missing in earlier generations such as wireless charging finally And also as an ip68 rating So like these are two features that you might want in a regular smartphone But you know ROG kind of just you don't really need wireless charging for a gaming phone You know, you just need fast wired charging You don't really need wire wire proof for for a regular gaming phone, right? But now we have these Features that you would consider basic for flagship phones Now it's in the ROG phone as well and you still have a bunch of the gaming central features such as the air triggers For like inputting certain taps on the sides of the screen You still have the controller support You still have the of course the gamersc RGB logo on the back if you have the regular ROG phone 8 and then you also have this LED display on the back the dot matrix display I think it's actually mini some some led display on the back of the pro and the pro edition And you also have much improved cameras. You have a 50 megapixel. I think I forgot is it 50 megapixel camera My memory and they also. Oh, sorry. Yeah, and then you also finally have a telephoto camera 3x optical zoom telephoto camera So a lot of features that everyone's been asking for you know, I want to use my My ROG phone as a regular phone for everything and now you can't like there's barely any compromises in that regard in terms of specs It does seem like it's a it's a maturity of the republic of gaming as if you know, they finally they've ratified the constitution And now that now they have an entire infrastructure to worry about and in addition to gaming You also have to pay your bills on the phone, right? So Yeah So I guess I guess what I'm wondering here is in the broadening out of the appeal of this device is it And I don't know that you would if you would have the answer to this or maybe you asked You know, they have questions why we're there about this But is this a sign that the gaming phone Focus wasn't working or is this a sign that? Yeah, we've kept all the gaming stuff that you have come to expect And we've made it more accessible in other words like are they are they trimming back Like cutting you know cutting back on the game focused phone thing that was largely The reason for this phone's existence for many years Or are they adding more general appeal to it? Does that make sense? So I didn't get like, um, I didn't get a chance to ask Kind of like the deep philosophy behind why they're making so many of these changes I do kind of get the sense that they were kind of Targeting like they were kind of Back in themselves into a corner with the niche they were targeting, right? There's only so many mobile There's only so many people who game on mobile Versus a lot of people who might occasionally game and still want some of those features So like they're trying to broaden their horizons and like a lot of the features they used to be adding like were extremely niche Like maybe only a couple of gamers would take advantage of them versus like now They still have a lot of those features that might be useful for the average gamer Like the tap the triggers and a lot of the features that are built into game genie and the cooling stuff like that but like they're not Focusing on that aspect anymore. They have the marquee gaming features But they're also now trying to broaden the horizons and trying to get people who don't consider themselves hardcore mobile gamers Do you think it's fair that maybe some of I mean it still seemed like there might be some thing there for hardcore gamers in some of the accessories that might be available for the rog8 like, um, you know But yeah, like is that maybe Like how they're still going to keep I mean it's still called the republic of gamers They're trying they're trying to have their cake and eat it too When I know you're talking about because like they were they um, and I was scrolling through their website They have this like snap on cooler there Yeah, the arrow cooler, which is like straight up in like You're a gamer. You're gonna be pushing your processor to limit You've got to cool your phone down But like when you're not playing the game you snap it off And then you can go take awesome pictures with the camera system and use it as a regular phone like I think I think Michelle, I think you're right. I think they're trying to they're trying to toe the line between keeping their loyal audience You know kind of savvy, but maybe I'm a normal user who's curious about a gaming phone, right? And this is a way to go to it. So Yeah, and speaking of the accessories There's actually an interesting Change they've made in this year's controller accessory that comes or it doesn't come with the rog phone But it's it can be purchased separately Um, this year the rog test and mobile controller is a new gaming controller That's not only compatible with the rog phone But it's also compatible with all android devices that have a usbc port So the previous the kunai gaming controllers used to be only available for the rog phone But this one is um, you know, as I said can be compatible with any phone that has a usbc port And one of the cool things about it that I noticed is you can actually fold it up fully like you can fold it up three times there was like very thin and compact And um, that's something that I haven't seen very many controllers do because like I have a game sur x2 It's a very sturdy controller that works with a lot of different devices But it just takes up a lot of backspace and it's not portable at all But this thing not only can be folded up But it also feels really good like the construction was very sturdy And it had, you know, the usual gaming support all the buttons that you expect um sticks felt great the The shoulder buttons felt pretty good and um, if you do use this with Asus or an rog phone, you do get the Additional features such as you're able to map touch inputs onto touch screen like taps Which is not something you're natively able to do an android without the use of a third party app Which is a bit of a hacky work around but um, yeah, it's very nice to see this controller being made and I Would consider picking one up like it gets really compact I really like that because even as someone who has a steam deck and my husband has a steam back even though Nominally, it's very portable. It's still a whole other device that is not small And I think that's you know, like not to compl- for this very first world problems about complaining The steam deck is hard to carry around with all of our Christmas gear But I do think this is actually very intriguing and to get people who are maybe Gamer curious or just maybe like more like casual gamers into this form factor that is very popular And yeah, like um, when you apply the test and it does have that Uh, nintendo switch steam deck kind of uh landscape, but with like the controls on the side of the screen I think it's actually a really smart idea to make that generally android compatible to get people Kind of into the space of handheld gaming as it is in 2024 So that controller Is gonna cost is gonna cost. What is it gonna be michelle? Isn't like it's like around 140 bucks or so or I don't have the pricing and availability information like I looked at the press release. It wasn't mentioned there either Yeah, I don't think they announced I don't think they announced I saw some I saw some rumors pre-cs That thing was expected between 139 and 159 So I guess the question is whether or not you're a if you're a gamer Is that truly worth the cost and I but it does look very very cool I mean if it's that high that would be pretty pricey for this sort of device aren't these things usually sub 100 Yeah, like I feel like 99 is a good is a good cost for this, right? So yeah, we'll see we will see Interesting. So cool. So that's the report from the republic of gaming. Thank you. I'm glad you're I'm glad you got through customs You got your passport stamped. I hope while you pass through So michelle what else were you able to see at ces? So like I did mention earlier, there's not a lot of mobile related announcements and samsung this year also did not have a lot of mobile specific announcements, but If you're really into the smart things ecosystem, you know, there are a lot of ways where you can treat your smartphone As the hub to control all your devices and one thing I really appreciated walking around their their showroom floor on at ces is that Just the sheer scale of the samsung ecosystem and how crazy interconnected it is like Obviously like they showed off on a lot of new TVs, but they also had like new ovens new Washing machines dryers and everything is smart things integrated like on their tea on their Refrigerator you basically have a giant android tablet mounted to the front of it and it runs full fledged android apps And also you have smart things integration onto it So if you get a call on your phone you can quickly pick it up on your fridge Or take a call on your oven, which has a small display on the front Just the crazy amount of integrations that samsung showed off Um, but on the visual display side of things like if you were looking at, you know, all these new tv's these ak these ak tv's these um Super high-end expensive mini led tv's like why should I care about any of the stuff they're announcing, right? This is kind of one of those things you have to really see to understand and if I did if I was not there I would not really get why these new displays and things are being announced like Why would I care about ak for example and like the kind of argument they're showing is that sure Not a lot of content is being made for ak right now But even despite that this new upscaling technology the new upscaling chips that we have Are Really good good enough to where you can actually Enjoy 10 adp even 720p content upscaled all the way to ak and you get a appreciable boost in quality when you do that And it's all powered by like a new upscaler chips and all that and then there's also a whole bunch of other related Features that you might not appreciate now, but you appreciate later like I don't know if you have it Anyway, you have a tv that's in like a central living room and you have Light anywhere that's coming into it. You just you realize how much the visual experience is degraded just by The light shining on the tv you can see your own reflection You can see the reflection of the light bulbs on the tv They had this anti glare Coating that they're applying to the new OLED series this year that Made a dramatic difference in reducing how much light was shown reflected back onto you There's just so much tech related that you just kind of have to see to believe and Like don't don't don't think about the price if you think about the price, you're gonna be like never mind I don't care about this anymore And that's the whole part of it's part of ces which is like some of it is like we see you know product announcements which we talk we're going to talk about on the regular show and and We talked about on this episode and all that sort of stuff But then also it's like what is the future of tech coming? What is the and I joked about it last week? I think or the other week we're saying how you know There's always the enormous tv that you can't buy now, but in three years is going to be the one in cosco, right? And there'll be any more enormous one that year at ces. Yeah, it's always like three to five years in the future You know, it's like you're seeing it now and it's ridiculously expensive And that's kind of the beauty of of actually going to the consumer electronic show You know, there's a lot of technology that's there that's never going to make it But there's a lot of technology that's there that you know, you're looking at some point in the future Even though you see it now that doesn't mean it's happening now for everyone But it will hair, you know for large screens like Come on like that's that's kind of a no-brainer at some point these tvs that are that large are all going to have some sort of anti-clair protection Similar to what you saw there just a matter of time Some of the other wild stuff that they showed off actually like that I really hope to see I don't remember the name of it But they have these they're their freestyle two projectors they showed off this technology where You know how like if you wanted the best visual experience when using a projector You got to have it on a perfectly flat display or like a projector screen, right? Well, if you don't have a perfectly flat, you know big area to display it Like they showed off this demo where they had this projector wrapped on like a corner of a wall And it was like obviously very visually distorted But they had this feature where it Corrects for it and it corrects for it really well to where it looks like Even though you're projecting on this corner of a wall It corrects it and it kind of looks like you're still look you're projecting onto a flat wall. It was really cool That is that is awesome. So overall Michelle thumbs up on CES. You had a good time Absolutely thumbs up very cool. Well, thanks for giving us some of your time to Breakdown kind of the big things you saw but hey, there's more Uh patrons of android faithful can ever head over to patreon.com slash android faithful And if you are a pain patron you can get we're gonna have a little bit of bonus content of michelle's adventure Some of the other cool stuff he saw at the show. So you definitely want to stay tuned check that out But in the meantime, we're gonna get back to the episode. Thanks michelle. Enjoy the enjoy the rest of your week We'll see you next week, man See you We're back Anybody who went to CES by the way, I'm not jealous at all That's good. That's good because Damn near killed me We're dying to know what was the coolest thing you saw CES if I had to narrow it down. So am I limited to just android stuff? No, no anything. Oh overall, yeah Man, like I keep coming back to this and I don't want to keep going back to this well, but So I went to go see a company called brain. Uh, they make a Us portable speaker with an integrated with a with a built-in subwoofer which in and of itself is not amazing but Just the sound that comes out of this thing is Incredible like he did a side-by-side demo with a popular Speaker manufacturer and like, you know, here's ours and here's theirs and like I saw this demo done a couple of different times and like Everybody that saw this demo their face was just like I mean like how could not believe that this is so and there's a picture of the brain on the On the screen there. This is about the size. Actually, it's a little bit smaller I think than the subwoofer that I have for my computer speakers But the difference is is that this has a subwoofer That sounds just as good as as my computer speakers If not better in fact, I I'm going to say it sounds better, but That also contains the mid-range speakers and the high-end tweeters And a 12-hour battery like it's just remarkable how they've miniaturized The subwoofer technology so that they can fit all of this into a very portable package And I was just I was obviously just blown away. I was blown away by the by the demo and um You know, I I'm going to be reviewing it for slash here So I'll be able to try it out for myself But you know the it has a full ip rating. It's ip 5 7 So you can put it out by the pool if you want. It's just ridiculous the amount of tech that they have in this thing I hadn't even heard about that so Yeah Yeah, and then um And as cliff points out in the chat. I did get a few pairs of pairs of glasses while I was there I've got oh do I have I have one pair here. These are called the dusk sunglasses, which uh, hey, you know, it's uh It's I'm walking around inside, but I gotta go outside now. So let's turn that off That's pretty cool. Those glasses dim themselves for our listeners. Yeah, that's pretty cool um, so my biggest complaint about um audio sunglasses And that's what these are these are audio sunglasses is when I get in my car and I drive a target I'm listening to the android faithful podcast when I get to target I want to keep listening to my podcast and now I have a choice I I either have to stop listening to my podcast or I have to be that guy walking around target in my sunglasses like hey everybody I'm awesome. Don't worry about me. Um, but now I could just be like, oh, I'm inside. So boop There's there's just regular glasses now and I can just walk around and do things Um, so yeah, this is actually like the gen one version of dust There's a gen two that's coming out this summer That they're gonna be kicking over my way which because like right now these are a little bit on the dark side But the the new gen will be even Even clearer, which should be cool Um, and then the other pair of glasses that I got the cliff was talking about is uh, The meta ray bands I picked up a set of those while I was there Dude, I thought I was literally as you were talking about the those other glasses I pulled up the meta ray bands to check the price because I really want I think I want them Are they cool? Do you like them at them or? So I've only used them a little bit, but I you know as I told cliff I think our social media game is gonna be uh, gonna go up a few notches now because these are They're pretty cool. And you know the the the camera quality is pretty good Um, the only thing I don't like is that you're kind of limited to just meta stuff, which you know, duh Um, so like I can share to instagram But I can't share to the tiktoks of the youtube's like if if I could stream to youtube with these things I would have bought a pair months ago Uh, because they would they might have been the new skippy, you know, no, but um, uh, but yeah So those are pretty awesome. And then I actually have another I have another pair of glasses coming from a company called solos And uh, their deal is they have a chat gpt integrated into the sunglasses So you can be like walking around and be like, hey chat gpt. I want to go to You know see the best Football stadium in chicago and it'll tell me like how to get there. I don't know whatever it was I'll figure out a use case an ai an ai assistant in your ear via the glasses. That's pretty cool Exactly exactly. So yeah a lot of cool stuff and then like one last little android thing and I'll I'll make this quick I I sat down for a demo with google um for google duet, which is their enterprise version of barred basically and um I sat down they said They had a google sheet up in front of me and they said go ahead and type in a prompt So I just start typing and I'm typing and I'm typing on one of the demo guys like whenever someone has a long prompt I always like to come over and see what they're doing and so I had uh, I had google duet plan out a vacation for my wife and I To a city that's not too far from chicago called galena, illinois And I said, you know, I want to have a romantic dinner And I want to visit at least three wineries and I forget what the other prompt was and it like Came up with like a whole itinerary for like three days With like actual like I I've eaten at that place. I know where that is like, you know Actual places that exist and it listed it like hour by hour. Uh, it was kind of cool It was kind of I was kind of excited by that. Um, so I just thought it was a little fun A little anecdote. Well, it's funny because I I did not go to CES as aforementioned But I I sure as hell pre-ordered one of those rabbit AI devices as soon as I saw it Because that demo blew me away even though it is I don't think it's running android Although we'll find out what it's running But it but it's you know, basically the little star trekky type device where you talk to it and it It seems like the the next generation of interface Away from smartphones instead of actually tapping and doing stuff You're talking to the vice and one of the demos was plan me a vacation and it shows how it plans it out I don't think I would ever plan a vacation that way I'm too anal when it comes to my travel planning, but um, it seemed very cool and for 199 bucks I was like pre-order do it, you know, like, yeah, I want to play with that guy So so I'll bring it on the show Jason to win when it when it comes in in April Little outside of android, but AI it's hard to avoid that, right? So I wouldn't be surprised if there's some android in there somewhere to be honest It you know, because that's that's just kind of what things what runs things these days But yeah, I'm looking forward to trying that out myself cool Well, that's ces uh and uh going back to glasses to do a little shameless plug patrons go to patreon.com slash android faithful We're gonna publish that video tonight after the show air after the show airs And you can see more of what michelle saw at ces including Some glasses that weren't have not been talked about on the show yet. So you'll you'll find out so cool Yeah, but can they Do this Adam I want you to leave those glasses on and tell us about the one plus 12 I will do that, sir Okay, you don't actually have to leave them on if you don't if you don't want to but It'll make your your like hands on a lot cooler It might it might or it might be nerdy or who knows so So I can't get really too far into the device Just because i'm not allowed to yet But this as my as my video intro showed this is the one plus 12 and In a first for the one plus as a company they are bringing the one plus 12 are which I do not have yet They're bringing the the the one plus 12 are to the us market. So they're kind of positioning this as the flagship and One plus told me they actively want people to compare this to the s24 ultra like that is that's their goal Yeah, um ambition right there. It sure is And then the one plus 12 are is one plus getting back to their flagship killer routes Which should be fun. Uh fun fact. I unboxed this this phone on the benefit of a doubt youtube channel Link i'm sure probably in the show notes or something or maybe cliff will drop it in the chat while we're talking um But uh, yeah, so this is uh, I've I've pulled up some key specifications for you Um, we're running android 14 which I can't show you Um, it's uh snapdragon 8 gen 3 This is going to come in a 12 or 16 gigabyte ram configuration Storage is going to be 256 or 512 There's an excuse me in-screen fingerprint sensor Uh, yeah, you usb 3.2 the battery is a massive 5400 milliamp hours Supports 80 watt wire charging or 50 watt wireless charging. Hi. Hi. Hi And uh, yeah, that's I mean that's like most of the most of the sexy stuff Uh NFC yeah display. Oh a 6.82 inch display So it is a big boy um And uh, oh uh cameras on the back uh 50 megapixel main camera I don't know which one of those that is uh, and then there's a 48 megapixel ultrawide camera and then a 64 megapixel 3x optical, um optical periscope Zoom lens, which is a very similar setup to the one plus open Um, which I I can tell you the cameras on this are phenomenal So I would imagine that uh, that dna will carry over to the One plus 12 Um, yeah video is 8k 24 fps 4k at 30 60 fps Uh, you know, I think that's about it for like the sexy stuff, but yeah And um, the phone is off right now because I can't show you what it looks like when it's on and that's uh, that's the phone It's a phone and it exists. I feel like I feel like I'm at the same time both excited and enthused and anti-climatically let down Okay in one way Well because because I feel like coming off of the high of the one plus open and like that that you know really and adam I think you and I I think we we we're in agreement that the one plus open the was the phone of the year 2023 Best phone of the year favorite phone. I've ever reviewed. Yeah, so like The one plus 12. It's like well, it's just a phone. It's got the same camera as the open. It doesn't fold. I don't know No, yeah, no, that's that's legit. Um, that is legit. I can say that the software Is a little shit. What am I allowed to say? I don't know. Um, I like the software a little bit better than the one Plus open because the one plus open is like one of my key pain points on the one plus open is that it's locked to the uh, to the uh, the four columns of uh, of Of icons, so that's not the case on the one plus uh, 12 shoot. I don't know. I better not say anything else Yeah, we know we don't want you to stay But but anyway, um, I like the color way. I will say I like the way Yeah, yeah It has kind of like a kitchen counter kind of look to it. Um, it's like a granite a granite look to or a marble look to it Um, so this is the green and they have an ebony version as well if I remember correctly Um, yeah, so it's I mean Honestly, I this is don't sleep on this phone because I know this is uh, you know, the reviews are going to be dropping for this Probably a little right around the same time as the s 24 ultra. I don't know what uh, I am not reviewing that phone So I don't know what what the embargo is or anything like that But this phone is going to be dropping right around the same time do not sleep on this phone because I mean if the one plus open is any indication and actually the one plus 11 was a very very good phone. Um This is going to be Possibly the phone to beat for For uh, uh 2024. I mean, I think this and it's january 16th everyone It is january 16 weeks in and out of making a bold prediction and samsung has its announcement tomorrow Right, but you know what? I this is an informed opinion folks. I mean, I trust you adam. I trust you so Don't sleep on this phone. This is uh, this is uh going to be a that's going to be a it's going to be a trip Let's just I will say one thing that's going through my mind and I don't know why it's occupying mine space right now but you mentioned you compared um Something to the kitchen counter and I was wondering if we'll ever see a formica phone Oh, that'd be pretty that'd be pretty cool phone like crafted out of uh, you know etched formica Yeah, I mean we've had wood phones. We've had leather phones. So why not formica and we've had Macha dial I know You see formica is just waiting in the wings waiting for its moment the formica phone It sounds good. This is kind of macha dial-ish. I see you know Cool. Yeah, it's it's yeah, it's it's gonna be fun. It's gonna be fun. Yeah, right on Well, I'm I'm enjoying the I the the one a plus assance that we're going through right now one one plus assance Um, I think that you know, I I'm just I'm every time I see something coming from one plus I'm excited again. Um, and I feel like it's been a while since we've had that so Nice. Yeah. Yeah, so I still have not got my hand On the the fold or the uh, the the open the open Yeah, the open is the open is a damn fine phone. Uh, the open was actually it was my companion phone to the iphone that I was carrying around at uh, at um CES that along with the uh, the pixel 8 pro which I used Predominantly for like recording interviews and stuff because of the live trans just transcription and stuff like that. So, um, you know, I Yeah, I mean the one plus the one plus open was a great phone for like checking out my schedule and seeing like where I had to go, um, but And I know a lot of people that would normally have already switched back to A different foldable that are still carrying the one plus open because it is such a good phone and that that Arguably continues into the one plus 12. Yeah, okay All right, very cool. Well, thank you adam for for bringing the show and tell Um, I can't wait to check it out myself. Yeah, I wish I had the 12 r but It's it's it's being shipped as we speak. All right. So there it is in the bitter cold that we're going for Indeed So one last little bit of hardware from ces, uh, which is near and dear to my heart, um, our good friends at a wireless We're at the show, um showing off the a wireless two Part do if you're following along Um, it's mostly and if and for those who might not remember didn't watch all that android a wireless Was the the little dongle that could that kicked off the revolution of android auto wirelessly in in the car Um, I feel it was a two years ago. Okay a wireless one came out. Maybe two two plus years ago And I jumped on it. I jumped on the indiegogo got the the first rev of it the little hockey puck Version of it Love the fact that it could use a it could use that android auto in my car wirelessly Up until the usb connectors in my in my car broke and now I haven't been able to use anything But i'm getting that fix But so they're back with a wireless two This is mainly the functionality is generally the same. It's mainly a hardware revision If you're uh, those are folks who are watching our video show can see the difference the Version one puck is on the right is a little square kind of hockey puck style and the new version is a little sleeker Got a it's a little thinner. It's more rectangular. It's got a neat little blue blue light button A little more curvier And that button is a multifunction button that helps with pairing and switching between devices Which I gotta admit after using the initial first version the lack of a physical button was frustrating So i'm glad to see they they um, they brought that out there. Um, it's gonna be released later this year. No price as of yet Um, but if you're on the fence about it, they are great That these this team is kicking butt in terms of bringing wireless connectivity android auto to cars So I would definitely encourage you to check it out. So It was so it was such a cool idea Motorola ripped it off Yep, exactly. So I know you got a good one. Someone rips it off. Yep. Yeah, all right So that's gonna wrap up our hardware chatting Yeah, we can start off some app news with some little more transportation driving related news and you might be if you're a fan of ways Know that when it comes to using google maps in a tunnel, you might have to worry unless You have been able to make use of ways's beacon program So ways for a long time in tunnels have used bluetooth beacons to kind of continue to Provide you directions and navigation Even while, you know, the gps is not working because you're you know, probably in a concrete tube And this beacon program is pretty widespread. They've got You know beacons in major cities across the world, New York City, Chicago, Paris, Brussels Apparently have like 18 kilometers worth of tunnel beacons in australia But it only really worked in ways and it's Kind of odd since, you know, google has owned ways since what 2013 But now google maps are starting to support the bluetooth beacons from the ways program You can view it in a new tunnel navigation setting. You just go to your google maps Go to settings navigation settings and driving options This is enabled by default or sorry disabled by default my bad the opposite It's disabled by default But if you want those nice bluetooth tunnel beacons go and check that out in your google maps In your google maps settings And yeah, it should help you with more seamless navigation while underground So go ahead and try some And I do think actually then the feature by the way is not available on google maps for ios We all make noises I did not know these bluetooth beacons existed and now i'm completely like tin hat like stop tracking me For whatever reason and I only go through one tunnel in the midtown tunnel in new york It's too late ron. They've been tracking you for years They already know everything about you guys I did not something you probably know about it. Like it's in the geocaching world, right? Yeah, no, I think this this was kind of news to me actually and the fact that ways has had this going for a while Yeah, no, this was total news to me. Yeah, and tons and tons of them. I mean like major cities. It's cool and creepy I will say the number of times I have told people not to use ways or google maps in the new york city metro area Like recently is like more than I would it's like keeps coming up. I'm like, oh, yeah, don't use that because for whatever reason both ways and google maps um Behave as if they've never been to new york In the way in the ways that they tell you like I'll I'll put it in the direction I'm like, why are they going that way and I'll drive it, right? Like, you know, I'll I'll be like, well, I'll give it the benefit of the doubt, you know They know what they have better for the doubt. Um, they know it knows what it's doing But like after after being born and raised in the york metro area knowing these parkways like the back of my hands Nine times out of ten. They are bad directions Isn't that everybody though like I get directions in my hometown and I'm just like, why am I why are you sending me there? There is a there's a roundabout that google maps is Absolutely in love with about five miles from my house If you're going anywhere near this roundabout it will take you through that roundabout Um, yeah, and I have no idea why but I will say I do love a good roundabout by the way I will just drive around about in circles My husband is uh went to high school in a one-light town in north dakota and when he took me It was no longer a one-light town. It was a one roundabout town It was uh, it was like a big deal for that roundabout to go in So they didn't have a light anymore. They just had a roundabout. No, no And main street was like two two seconds long. He was like, okay, we're going on main street That's it main street is the roundabout I will I will give I will give my kids credit We drove we drove through a roundabout and they were about four at the time and they had the appropriate reaction And they're like, whoa circles Like they were like they even picked up on the fact that we were going in a circle Really? Let's just stay on it for five minutes You know, now I'm wondering have I ever my son's a driver now I wonder if I've ever actually taken him through a roundabout and I don't know that I have and that's something I probably should do sometime soon Make me kind of first few times Turn left on the roundabout. Yes, that must be what I do All right, uh speaking of roundabouts, uh, you could do a roundabout with your hand while wearing a smart watch And it would act as if it were a mouse I was just watching this this is interesting. I love this so much by the way This is this might vindicate the pixel watch for me. Yeah well Just just I don't get too far ahead of your ski there Ron There is an asterisk that involves the pixel watch, but anyways Oh Double point is the name of the company while mouse is the name of the product It was intro to the consumer electronics show So you could have you could have done this you could have seen this adam Maybe I know I know You want to keep the secret I did kind of Get through your story and I'll tell you my on my part of it. Okay. All right. So what does it do? It turns android smartwatches asterisk Into gesture based bluetooth mice So you can wave your arms to move a mouse on uh on like a windows linux mac os ipad os You pinch to click so it's that kind of motion, right? It works on some wearos devices galaxy watch 4 through 6 is what I specifically read Not without bugs on the pixel watch. So Maybe that means it will work eventually. They're working on it. They're ironing out the kinks But for right now you don't want to get a pixel watch for the wow mouse because you're not going to have a good day Um and apparently it does all of this via bluetooth hid which stands for human interface devices Something by the way the apple watch cannot do well now wait because I went to go see a company called mudra bands that actually does this with an apple watch Um, but not like this No, so I don't know like I'm I'm curious as to like what hardware is involved Yeah, I don't know do this because there's not a whole lot here in the story about like Because like mudra band like broke it all down. They're using like biometric sensors and the band is like really thick I mean, it's it's it's not subtle Um, and this is just a watch band that you add to your apple watch But yeah, basically the same thing is you can do the wingardium leviosa thing and move your cursor around and And and you know click and you know pull back things and do do minority report stuff You know Some input last year on triple a where I distinctly remember like pinch to click But I don't remember whether it was what you mentioned adam or something else Like hold on. I'm going to google now. I just brought that up and I have no no This sort of innovation and interface Similar to the rabbit p1, which is why I got something like I want to see the next gen interfaces, right? I want to see the how do these devices allow us to interact with it with computers and devices in different ways And the idea that you're wearing a smartwatch, which is tracking your and like why can't you use it as a controller? I think that's all right I want to be crazy using my computer or my phone with hand gestures and things like that Like I I think that's super cool and star truckie and I'm all about it. So yeah, I'm pretty good on the train. Sorry Yeah, yeah, go ahead I was gonna say wait until you get in the train with three dozen people doing the same thing and Oh, right No, and they're all controlling each other's devices too. No, I'm What I'm super interested in though is like I've been giving this a lot of thought because you know, obviously mudra left an impression on me Um, I've been giving us a lot of thought like when would I want to actually do this and what I keep coming back to is The one demo that they showed me was not controlling like a computer or a tablet But controlling your apple tv like if you're thinking about it, you're sitting on the couch You don't need a you don't need a remote control anymore. You just like do uh That and then there's your user interface and now I want to pick that movie and I want to watch that and I'm going to scrub it back And you know, that's that's the yachts It is it is the it is the 21st century equivalent of the clapper to turn your lice on it all Clap on clap off But sometimes sometimes adam though you just want to be reclining With a with a lazy hand in your lap And a and a you know a piece of technology there What can I tell you is go like this Jason can I tell you by the way I was I was recently lounging on my couch with a piece of technology in my hand the google tv chromecast Remote and that thing is so tiny the number of times it slips out of my hand and falls out like like I need a more I need like a I need a remote to go like a case to go that put that remote in like a bumper to get a little more But I mean here's the thing like when you're working on a computer You're actively engaged. You're leaning forward. You're typing. You're doing these things So like the screen or the mouse is not that far away from you When you're late lounging back like this, this is a tv pose You know, this is what you're gonna do when you're watching videos and stuff like that And I could definitely see the use case for like I want to watch a youtube video So I do the thing and the whatever but for me it's much more a tv watching thing Well, I'll I'll I'll I'll I'll take you one step further Adam because if you pair if you pair this with those XR or AR glasses where you can see your computer display in front of you now you can lean back in your chair and Use your hands to gesture and interact your computer and then give me the little projection keyboard that we've seen in the past Jason like I know we've seen that years ago where like You put light projects on a table and you can type and that sort of like I want the next generation of interfaces I'm tired of mice and keyboards like like give me like because you could Being able to do not what we're doing with doing the show But being able to like prep for the show while leaning back on the couch would be so cool Yeah, and um and just speaking to that like the meta quest three Does hand tracking really remarkably well like so much so much better than the og quest You know you can you know you can reach out and grab ui and put it wherever you want You can reach over there and you could even type you know you can do this and you know It'll it'll it'll track you very well. You don't even need a smart watch is what i'm saying But what I am saying is if you had a smart watch and it was paired to your to your vr goggles Now we're now we're getting into some minority report stuff You know that's that's exciting Do you remember the old microsoft hollow lens demos like the first hollow lens demos that was like the the heads the The headset that went on and the person was fixing the plumbing and like that sort of thing Yeah, like that's the mechanic under the yeah Yeah, yeah, yeah Yeah, it's uh, yeah, I I'm I really want to know more about this so I think I know who i'm gonna be emailing tomorrow Um, yeah, I would like to know more and I would like it to work on the pixel watch So there it is so all right cool. Well, thank you jason for that little bit And we're gonna wrap this show up because we're gonna we gotta let adam get back to his family But we got a couple emails first I said that knowing So as always you can email us at contact at android faithful.com We love to hear from you and we got some we've got so much responses to stuff We've talked about in the show already like guys keep it coming Please tell us your thoughts and all this and your opinions and things like that And I love our first email, um, which kind of educates us a bit Our first email comes in from ian from wantage in the uk Wantage wantage. I don't know how to pronounce that But ian writes in and says hey guys Really pleased to have discovered the new podcast stuff for being a long-term listener based in the uk And a former recipient of the email of the week on all about android congratulations In the last episode of android faithful There was a mention of e-sims where you said you don't have that much experience with them So I thought I'd give you mine. I was lucky enough to visit australia over christmas for a family wedding I traveled with a I I traveled with my family with our uk phone contract and it would have cost 6.5 6.50 I don't know how to say pounds but 6.5 pounds per day. I I have not traveled. I all of a sudden can't talk It would have cost us over six pounds per day per person of rome and a total of 416 pounds Instead when we arrived I signed up for four e-sims from a local provider giving us calls sms and data for a total of 32 pounds That's amazing savings Adding the account as an e-sim meant our existing number still worked Which was useful for sms two-factor authentication messages. Also. There was no chance of misplacing our uk sims Recently I discovered there are lots of companies offering data only e-sims I'm off to france this week for work for my private For work and for my private phone. I have a data only e-sim for $1.79 for one gigabyte Perfect for my needs win mentioned in japan. She had a pocket wi-fi But perhaps a data only e-sim may be a more straightforward alternative So having two sims supported on android phones where one is an e-sim can make traveling a little easier when comes to mobile data Keep up the good work. We love the show. Ian Hall wanted uk and thank you Ian for giving me a practical execution of how an e-sim Could work and provide value especially in a two-sim phone Um, I had a hard time wrapping my head around e-sim's and this kind of painted the picture perfectly around exactly what it can do Oh, yeah, totally. Totally and just for future reference six pounds 50 pence six pounds 50 pence I knew that I've been in england. I knew that see I was fully expecting I was fully expecting this email to say I just thought I wanted to give you some of my experience on e-sim's They suck love Ian No, I've realistically though I switched uh, so iphone is e-sim only obviously And so when it was time for me to I had to keep an iphone active So I got a mint I got a mint sim, um, which is now a subsidiary of t-mobile So I didn't go far from the tree, but it was kind of cool because when it was time to Activate the phone. I just downloaded the mint app and I you know made a payment on the account and said, okay Now push this button to install the e-sim and by the bang by the boom it was done the problem with e-sim's is when you want to move From one phone to another like as long as you're going to stay within the family. You're good um, but uh, I I walked into a t-mobile the other day because it was time to Move out of the iphone and move back into android And I you know, I told the I told the people the guy at the counter I said, okay. This phone is my primary. This phone is my secondary I need this phone to be my primary and this phone to be my secondary And the second the guy started taking the case off of my iphone to look for the sim tray I knew I was going to be in trouble uh because it doesn't have one and so uh after you know kind of I hate to say a customer explaining that Um, then we we finally got it all sorted out But uh, but yeah, just like moving e-sim's from one device to another Is a still pretty much a nightmare and uh, thanks apple for that So it's a little early for e-sim's. Let's say it's still early. Yeah, still working at the kinks Ian, sorry So my husband and I are kind of like been going to japan like off and on for several years Him decades now and we just always did pocket wi-fi out of reflex I typed in japan travel e-sim and there's like a bajillion results. Apparently we just So I will say um, I'm going we're probably going to go back and march and I will try it Ian on your recommendation because I mean the pocket wi-fi is just use mobile data anyway So I might just try it. I I do take your warning seriously adam that it might be a pay pita, but And tried it gotta get into the 21st century over with our japan data. Dang. Yeah. Yeah, totally And if you're if you're on t-mobile pay him for 35 bucks. They'll give you unlimited data for like a week. It's great I did run my data really like google fi data real hard in japan, unfortunately, so Oh, yeah. Yeah. Yeah, we're bad. Anyway anyway Anyway, anyway, well our next email comes from chat in san antonio and yes, the the pocket the pocket pocketcast the pot see i'm so used to using pocketcast it's kind of like Kleenex in my brain podcast apps are but um chat in san antonio had something to say about some podcast app recommendations we got recently in your january 9th episode a listener recommended the podcast addict app I want to second that i've used beyond pod Beyond pod dogcatcher and others. I use pocketcast faithfully until their disastrous redesign Ever since i've happily used podcast addict recommended chat in san antonio beautiful disastrous redesign. I didn't think the pocketcast redesign was disastrous. I know a lot of blowback But that's a little hyperbole chat. I love you chat, but it might be a little hyperbole No, I I've heard good things about podcast addict. I I'm a pocket pocket cast user myself I mainly like it because of the web interface and I don't know if pocket podcast addict has that but you know, I can I can pull up A pocket cast on my computer if I wanted to and love that. Yeah play that pocket cast dot com I think you need to be a pocket a pocket cast plus customer though. Yes Yeah, and it was like I think it was a ten dollar lifetime membership when I got it. So Me too. It's like 999 Yeah, exactly. So well a lot of people are kind of echoing that I hate pocket cast redesign So, I mean y'all do us a favor and give us and in maybe blow by blow. What is it? You don't like about it? I mean, I I'm kind of neutral on it. I don't know But my biggest problem with it My biggest problem with it is I went through and made folders for all my for all my podcast and it doesn't go From device to device which kind of is really irritating Um, so never do that again. Yeah, but hey podcast addict I I loved seeing the recommendations come through and the community kind of echoing that And you know, even here in our live show in the chat some people talk about how they how they like it So that's awesome. I love I love the circle of feedback. That's what that makes makes this so special So feedback Yeah, and and I can't think of a better way to close the circle jason the next one Okay, we'll skip to the next one And it is ed ross from gossport uk who says given the conversation in last week's episode I thought you might like to see this if Projected on my wall. Oh, there's no image here. It's in the next slide. The next slide. Oh, it is. Okay. It's in the slide Okay, if projected on my wall the image is about 140 inches Set up amazon fire tv stick connected to an epson projector and audio provided by two amazon echo studio speakers All the best. So this is in response to my challenge last week We're talking about stupidly sized television shown at ces that we wanted to I wanted someone with a tv over 100 inches To take a picture of them watching the show But ed showed me up with 140 inches of his projected Watching the show which is horrifying because a hundred that means that each of our each of our boxes are roughly about What's 140 divided by three math is hard, but it's really not how that works Bigger than they need to be let's just say that That is almost life-sized perhaps It's not how that works No, that is awesome though. That is that is pretty awesome That's horrifying to think that i'm that big on somebody's wall. I'm sorry. I apologize in advance. I'm sorry It's only good if it's that big That's that's how you that's how you savor an episode of android fatefuls to go larger than life-size Yep Thank you for sending that in ed ross and thank you adam for being an amazing guest each and every time We have you on whatever show we happen to be doing Uh, it's always good to hang out with you man. Well, I appreciate that. I appreciate the invitation to hang out It was a good time Good time head by all. What do you want to leave people with you want to point people anywhere in particular? Oh, sure. Sure. You could find me on all the places at dead technology All the places except twix because I don't do that anymore But no, so like, uh, you know, I got the threads. I got the instagrams I got the tiktoks. Actually, I don't really have a tiktok. But anyway, um, but yeah So that's that's me and then if you want to find out where i'm writing That's going to be the slash gear that's going to be the the fobs And I've got a couple of other clients that i'm working on so keep it in the down low for now Um, and then uh, if you want to see me if you want to see more of this and let's be honest Who doesn't um if you want to see more of this you can join myself and my podcast partner clifton thomas Who is in the chat as we speak uh on benefit of the dow that's youtube.com slash benefit of the dowed doud Not doubt because we have a branding problem, but that's all It didn't start as a branding problem. It started as like a cool joke Yes, like a cool similarity and then you realized as you went deeper into it. Oh, wait a minute. Yeah I'm guessing anyways. I probably lost more than a few listeners to who are looking for a benefit of the doubt But yeah, that's okay. It's worth it. It's worth it. It is the the pun is always worth the uh loss listeners. That's right Yeah, that's right, but yeah, we're we got some momentum. I'm happy about it right on well. It's great to see you adam Thank you again. We'll have you back soon Um, we'll also have you back soon because you're on every week win As well as what's going on with you? Yeah, I'm an android developer. That's my day job I'm I'm back to working so the android brain is going and hopefully one day There will be more android technical talks for you If you're the android developer type to view on my website randomly typing calm where I have video Talks and associate video and code and you can also find me mostly on instagram and threads where I follow adam I'm very much so not on twix these days At queen code monkey and when threads actually does allow you to follow the the meta the feta verse not the meta verse The feta verse uh, you might I maybe you'll find me more active on at queen code monkey Wait, hold on queen code monkey at method on that social That's how many threads y'all I can't keep it's so long. It's so long. Do we do this? How do we do this? I don't know. Do we keep it straight? How do we have anyone else to keep it straight? I don't know You got to be dead technology on all the things like as soon as there's a new social network I go grab dead technology never touch it again. It's great. No same here I'm with ron xo that I jump on ron xo is that I need the app that allows me to type something once and post it to all of them Yeah, that's what the feta verse should do right and so like so like if once blue sky can connect to mastodon and threads And they're all in together then great I can just do the one Published and then it'll be fine and my life will be easier That said you can follow me at ron xo across all the various different places. I'm most active on instagram Um lately. I'm in christmas trees. So uh, if you like christmas trees check that out It's a yearly tradition. It is it really is I took a good one today. I have one in the snow I didn't post that I appreciate your year's long dedication. I feel bad for my family because the thing was here's the thing So the folks who don't know every year. I'm gonna tell the story now because why not we're running along. Um, yeah When I lived in san francisco I You would often see christmas trees not at the holidays Ie as the one that started this when I saw a christmas tree out on the sidewalk in august Oh, really in san francisco It's not a you know, some stoner. Oh, yeah, let's throw out the christmas tree Right, and so like it was very funny that we would see christmas trees not in the season Then that led me to any time I saw a christmas tree to post it which now has become Posting christmas trees after christmas. That's my thing. Um, but once I moved from new york city where you could often see a christmas tree on the sidewalk In february I'm now in the suburbs where people get to get those trees the hell out of their house very quickly So it's the new year's tradition. Yeah exactly. Yeah But anyway, uh, but yeah, follow me on ronix. So across all the various social stuff and also, um If you like pinball, please check out scorebit in the google play store It is a mobile app that lets you track your pinball scores me and my Friends over at scorebit work very hard on that. Um, if you downloaded it, hey, give it a review That helps us So, uh, I would appreciate even if you haven't used it or downloaded it. Give it a review. Give it five stars Come on android faithful help me out. Um, and that's in the google play store sco rb it scorebit very easy to do Um, appreciate everyone appreciate you Scorebit, thank you ron. So before we sign off Can I just do one last little tribute to uh, to cliff who is still in the comments cliff? The gaffer's tape is back, baby. So that's for you. Anyway, go ahead. I'm sorry. You can do your thing now jason I hope you got that cliff because I have no idea what he's talking about I'll tell you how fair. Okay. All right good. Um, what about me? I guess you probably just want or I probably just want you to go to free jason newsletter.com free jason newsletter.com I'm not trapped anywhere. It's just a free newsletter and it involves me and it's a dot com So go there and actually i'm telling you to go there because tomorrow I'm gonna have the big announcement. I've got it. I've got a big announcement everybody. It's finally here I've got an announcement and it's gonna happen tomorrow. So free jason newsletter dot com You can also go to uh raygun dot fun and that has like all my social links and you know, it's everything all in one place But uh, there you go. That's all I'm gonna say about that I'm not gonna spoil it But I know the announcement and it's very cool and you're all gonna want to tune in to make sure you find out What it is because I'm excited about it And it's not that I'm at the samsung event because I won't be no It's that it's that he has joined android faithful again For 2024 they renewed me for the season Hey, there you go. Yay. No, no, no it is it is a worthy announcement jason. I'm excited to see it hits the line today So thank you, man. And no, uh cousin of joy. I'm not running for president. Um, maybe maybe next year How can you run for president? You're still in jail Yeah, well jason after that after after that uh performance in iowa yesterday. There's no way your campaign was shot All right, one of these days you think I'd learn my lesson anyways Let's close the show We do the show every Tuesday evening subscribe at android faithful dot com Send us email like we said contact at android faithful Dot com and of course you can support us directly through the patreon We really appreciate when you do that because you know, you're supporting us Each of us directly in doing the show and we're offering extra bonus stuff for you in exchange And also we just love you and thank you for enabling us to do this each and every week It's android faithful. We're so happy to have you all on board and we will see you next time that is next Tuesday on this show Take care, buddy Oh show dance is getting weird