The Xbox Ally can't hang with the Steam Deck | The Vergecast - video Dailymotion

The Verge

We’re very bullish on the handheld future of gaming. But we’re not bullish on the new ROG Xbox Ally. The Verge’s Sean Hollister joins the show to explain why this Xbox-branded device barely feels like an Xbox, and why it’s definitely not a threat to the Steam Deck, before he and David debate whether the future of Xbox is even in good hands. After that, The Verge’s Hayden Field walks David through a couple of important recent studies, asking the same basic question: is AI making us dumb? Finally, Sean returns to answer a question from the Vergecast Hotline (call 866-VERGE11 or email vergecast@theverge.com!) about hybrid computers, which are an extremely 2012 idea and also maybe the future of computing. But probably not.

Transcript

00:00:00welcome to the verge cast the flagship podcast of the xbox button i'm your friend david pierce

00:00:07and i am doing a thing that i have to do like two or three times a year now which is charge

00:00:11a bunch of ipads uh if you're watching this on youtube you'll be able to see it but there's a

00:00:16there's a stack of tablets on a shelf behind me and it's a bunch of different ipads there's a

00:00:24remarkable tablet in there there's a thing called the daylight computer and uh for some

00:00:29reason or another a few times a year i have to use a bunch of them to test something uh this time

00:00:34it's new ipads there's a new ipad pro uh i have it i've been reviewing it and uh in order to test it

00:00:41i have to get out every other ipad that apple makes and and test them all uh so i've been doing things

00:00:46like pull a four-year-old ipad pro out and install ipad os 26 on it it's a delight my life is just

00:00:55filled with software updates that make everything glassy and make me like them less um

00:00:59tech journalism is a delight what are you gonna do anyway we are not here to talk about ipads we

00:01:04did that last week we'll do more of that later we are here to do two things first we're going to

00:01:09talk about handheld consoles and specifically these new ones the xbox ally and the xbox ally x

00:01:15that are supposed to be the ones that point to the true future of handheld gaming and maybe don't

00:01:21then we're going to talk about well frankly whether ai is making us stupid and then we have a

00:01:26question from the verge cast hotline lots of fun stuff to get to today but first um i have like

00:01:32a hundred gigabytes of things downloading right now and i have to go check and see what my data

00:01:37cap situation is wish me luck this is the verge cast we'll be right back all right we're back

00:01:43sean hollister's here hi sean hi sean i feel really bad because every once in a while i feel like i just

00:01:49drag you on this show to yell at you about the state of console gaming and once again we're here to do

00:01:54this and i'm sorry to subject this to you once again i just love yelling and being yelled at about

00:02:00the state of console gaming though let's do it so okay so i want to in this case like start pretty

00:02:06specific and then sort of like blow up to the size of the universe and and i think the place to start

00:02:11is with the devices you just reviewed last week the the xbox ally x and the xbox ally uh two i would say

00:02:22like pretty hyped pretty interesting handheld consoles so i guess first before they i mean

00:02:28they look huge but we'll talk about that in a second um why were people excited about this like

00:02:34what what is sort of riding on these devices in a way that isn't on your average like you know

00:02:38lenovo legion go console this has been microsoft's market to lose it has an xbox in your home and that

00:02:48xbox has been slowly drifting away it hasn't sold quite the way they wanted to in the meanwhile the

00:02:55steam deck and the nintendo switch are the new hotness you can take your games with you everywhere

00:02:59you can play all these games not just all these pc games but all of these playstation games that have

00:03:05been ported to pc anywhere you want on the go microsoft has all these pc makers lined up for

00:03:12something similar something that could be that pickup and play handheld but it hasn't unified

00:03:18them in any meaningful way because windows is just a nightmare for handheld gaming it requires you

00:03:25it requires these pc makers to do all these things put all these things into their devices that have

00:03:30nothing to do with gaming that distract from gaming microsoft's own like employees are trying to get

00:03:36you to do various kinds of upsells they want you to buy microsoft 365 they want you to put office on

00:03:43your handheld they want you to put copilot on your handheld it's all getting in the way

00:03:46they just need to take ownership of this thing and give us an operating system that asus and acer and

00:03:53msi can build something cool and useful around so and hold on so but you raise an interesting point

00:04:01because i think there is an interesting gap that you just described there that i hadn't really

00:04:07thought of where on the one hand if i'm lenovo or asus or somebody else i have like signed a series

00:04:11of agreements with microsoft for what i'm going to do with windows and that includes things like

00:04:16all the horrifying stuff that microsoft makes you do with windows you know who doesn't have to abide by

00:04:22the licensing agreement you make with windows is the windows team and microsoft so it is like

00:04:28is the difference between this one that this is by just by virtue of being called xbox there was an

00:04:34assumption that okay microsoft and the xbox team and the windows team were involved in this in a

00:04:38different way and thus could maybe like had a different set of levers to pull to make this thing work

00:04:45that's the excitement like i cornered i cornered one of the one of the architects of this initiative

00:04:52at cns last year and i got him to tell me that we're going to be bringing microsoft's going to be

00:04:58bringing the best of xbox and windows together and we thought this was going to be years down

00:05:02the road and maybe it unfortunately still is but we thought we thought it was going to be years down

00:05:06the road that there was going to be a playstation handheld and an xbox handheld the executives of

00:05:11both companies both sony and microsoft had come out and said you know we're going to do this whole

00:05:16thing but it's going to take us a few years and then here i am talking to this executive he's like

00:05:21well we're going to fix some of this a lot sooner he told me we're just going to fix it in windows

00:05:25we're going to make windows better and here is an xbox guy telling me he's going to make windows

00:05:33better and this is all i've been asking for for several years as i've watched this steam deck kind

00:05:39of dominate this nascent space please fix it so make it so that this handheld actually stays asleep

00:05:46when i put it to sleep make it so that i can press a button start playing press the button again stop

00:05:50playing and my game is there ready for me to pick it up when i come back that's that's what i need

00:05:57that's what i want maybe it's finally happening and maybe not we'll get so let's get to it now so i

00:06:03think you you've given it away a little bit but the the the tldr of these things is they're they're

00:06:08really not very good uh walk me through kind of the the pros and cons of the the xbox ally and the

00:06:14xbox ally x yeah so it's built on a great both of them there's two of them one of them is six

00:06:20hundred dollars one of them is a thousand dollars they're the most expensive xboxes ever made but as

00:06:27pc gaming handhelds they kind of come from good components they come from a good base it's based

00:06:34on the rog ally x which is very similar looking except that one of them has these big honking prongs

00:06:41these big grips and the other one does not you love prongs you are on the record loving prongs

00:06:46prongs rock prongs rock that's my headline on a story on the verge is prongs rock it makes this

00:06:52thing more comfortable to hold it's still got a giant honking 80 watt hour battery in here it's got

00:06:59a proven screen not the best screen in the world but it's a vrr screen that makes games seem pretty

00:07:04smooth at 1080p only seven inches but we can get past that um it's got a maybe a slightly better chip

00:07:11in the z2 extreme on this one uh more memory it's it's it's a good base for a handheld and we liked

00:07:19the rog ally x with windows on it with the exception that it had windows on it so you know we're coming

00:07:26from somewhere good meanwhile the other one the white one the six hundred dollar model has a chip

00:07:31which is effectively the same the same chip effectively as the one in the steam deck which

00:07:37has been lauded for good efficiency it's a great one you know you're not playing all the latest games

00:07:42on at high resolution but if you're playing you know more lightweight games you can take that chip

00:07:47and you can get many hours of battery life on it they stick some more battery life on here but the first

00:07:52the first sign we get that maybe something a little weird is going on here is they release a promo video

00:08:00microsoft really and asus released this promo video where they are kind of promising the world

00:08:06from these two new handhelds they make them sound like the best thing since sliced bread that they

00:08:12are going to be your xbox console experience finally anywhere you want to take it with you

00:08:19we're working in close partnership with asus on a brand new handle called the xbox ally and the xbox

00:08:26the best game library on the go basically changes everything

00:08:31the whole this is an xbox campaign where they're like oh yeah xbox is your phone xbox is your tv xbox

00:08:39that amped up to 11 and so which to be clear is like the dream right like you and i are still on

00:08:47the same page that that is a thing that i want right yes please please give us the xbox games let

00:08:52them play on the handheld yeah let me press the power button have it go to the nintendo switch but

00:08:57it's an xbox is like very straightforwardly a thing that i think you and i and lots of people

00:09:01want a hundred percent a hundred percent and one of the reasons they want it is because the steam deck

00:09:07the steam os is not perfect it does the nintendo switch thing of you press the button it goes to

00:09:14sleep you press it wakes up you play the games you just select the games and they work most of the

00:09:18time pretty well not quite as well as a switch but pretty dang well but that is for games on steam

00:09:25and games that you sideload from other stores like epic game store battle.net and so on takes a little

00:09:32bit effort to get the other games on there they won't always work the same way there's a lot of

00:09:35games with anti-cheat that do not work on linux that have refused to figure out how to make it work

00:09:40on linux because they're worried about not only cheaters they're worried about people figuring out

00:09:44how their anti-cheat system works by using linux to reverse engineer it and then ruining the game

00:09:50for everyone so that is not a hurdle that everyone is willing to surmount it's a sideloading and then

00:09:57missing your games that require anti-cheat so some people say they want windows because it has all the

00:10:02stores they're right there they don't need to worry about whether a game will run or not because of

00:10:06anti-cheat so if they if if microsoft can bridge the gap and give you the pickup and play experience

00:10:13plus all the stories experience plus anti-cheat they'd really be onto something it's so like

00:10:19this is the thing that drives me so crazy about this space is it is everything you just said

00:10:24just makes me nod along and i'm like yes this seems like it's good and the thing i found so

00:10:29interesting about your review and your experience with the ally and ally x is like you said it's it's

00:10:37built on pretty good hardware like in a certain sense i would be less annoyed at what you found

00:10:41if there was something like fatally wrong with the chip that they picked or it's like oh man the

00:10:47screen sucks or whatever but it's like no actually the the list of hardware choices is more or less

00:10:54a good one and yet uh i would say my first experience with these things was a series of

00:11:00screenshots from you trying desperately to get this thing to start running properly in order to play

00:11:06games which just to me felt like a perfect microcosm of the entire windows handheld gaming experience

00:11:12all in one go it really was and we should we should describe what those are but let me preface it with

00:11:18this i did not think that that series of screenshots i sent you david of me trying for

00:11:26hours to get this thing even to just be ready to go i did not think that was going to be the experience

00:11:32that anyone else other than a reviewer would have sure i it says in the reviewer's guide for these

00:11:38handouts that it's like it's going to be a different experience at launch we're going to like let people

00:11:42do this we're going to let people do that um which is to be fair a sometimes true and be more often

00:11:47a story we hear a lot as reviewers that turns out to be actually it's pretty close to what most

00:11:52people are going to get they've already shipped these out to best buy there are pictures of them

00:11:56behind glass at best buys around the country people waiting to just pull them out and so what

00:12:01happens is you'll open this handheld up you'll turn it on you'll connect it to your wi-fi and then it

00:12:08will spend the next depending on your internet depending on which handled you buy maybe the next

00:12:13hour maybe the next 40 minutes maybe the next hour and a half installing windows updates on top of

00:12:21windows without you having any control over the interface it'll just be like here let it sit here

00:12:26in charge and do this thing for a while and then once you've done that you'll go to asus's app and

00:12:32you'll download more updates and maybe you'll go to windows update and you'll download more updates

00:12:37if microsoft doesn't manage to get those ones at least into the initial 40 to an hour install package

00:12:42and and after that then then it's install your game stores and then it's install your games and

00:12:47it's kind of like a half of a day to get this thing fully up and running which play your game

00:12:54immediately kind of fairly neatly undoes the thing that you were saying has a chance to be an

00:12:59advantage over something like the steam deck which is there is there is just enough complication in

00:13:04the steam deck that it's like wouldn't it be great if there was just a thing you could log into log into

00:13:08that would play all your games and this is so immediately not that thing it's not it's not but

00:13:15i think even even once you get through all of that and even once the thing is sort of in its its final

00:13:21form i think we were hoping there was going to be some big new idea about how this thing works and and

00:13:28what the ui of it should be like and what the actual and like what it always seemed to me is is that it

00:13:34should be like do you remember in old android phones you would see the skin atop android phones but

00:13:40if you went down like three or four levels you could find like a menu in settings that was still

00:13:46stock android yeah and that would be you'd be like oh now i know this is gingerbread right and it's like

00:13:50that's what i want out of this like i'm fine with it being windows underneath i just don't i don't want

00:13:55to see windows unless i really deliberately intentionally want to see windows and i am i am uh truly bummed by the

00:14:07fact that it seems like this is just still fundamentally a windows pc that that like the

00:14:12the xbox of it all is just not nearly as much as it seems like it ought to be even on the most xboxy

00:14:18version of this thing so far they could get there like there is a road from here to there if they want

00:14:24to say xbox is the skin atop windows and and they're kind they're certainly moving down that road xbox

00:14:32skin atop windows we're going to make everything else disappear they're like halfway there okay

00:14:39they could they could like they could properly add the microsoft store and a browser and a whole bunch

00:14:45of other creature comforts into the xboxy interface they could maybe they'll get rid of the online

00:14:51account requirement so you can just you know log in with steam if you want to do that instead

00:14:56maybe they'll integrate the accounts better um they they can make things more streamlined and

00:15:03seamless and xboxy on top of windows but the on top of windows part is part of the problem

00:15:10it means that this operating system doesn't know how to make a chip that's like an enhanced version of

00:15:18the steam deck chip as good or better than the steam deck experience it's it's weaker it's less

00:15:24powerful than it should be even though it should be more powerful i can plug in this this steam deck

00:15:29version to the wall with a power outlet and it should have more performance but instead it has less

00:15:34um it would not solve and it would not solve critical things like expecting the system to save

00:15:42your game and sleep when you press the power button the the overall story of these i think is that they

00:15:48are not they don't represent the kind of leap forward we were hoping that they would right which is like

00:15:53we've been waiting for sort of the microsoft like the surfacy version of this that is like the

00:15:58both the high-end one but also the one that is like hey other manufacturers here's how you do this

00:16:03right it is it is the thing that should be the sort of tip of the spear for all of these these are

00:16:08clearly not that how do they measure up to the other windows handhelds out there there's now a bunch

00:16:14of them i would say like you were saying earlier they're all built on relatively similar

00:16:17foundations like even for those people even knowing all the problems that they have even knowing

00:16:22windows is still not the correct platform to be doing this the way that you would like it to be

00:16:26are these compelling in comparison to the other devices out there in order to compete with all

00:16:32the rest of the handhelds it really and it's to surpass every other windows handheld out there

00:16:37all it needed to do was sleep reliably have slightly better performance than with stock windows

00:16:47and um and and and let me easily access my steam games and instead what we've got is something that

00:16:57it's not sleep reliably um maybe maybe that almost the way there with the black one but not quite

00:17:03um obfuscate steam and tries to thrust all this xbox stuff front and center which which tom and tom

00:17:11says it works a little better if you're deep into the xbox community just not the way it was and does

00:17:16not feel like a console they they're they're propping it up as this console thing it is not an xbox

00:17:22console it does not play xbox console games if you back away from all this and you're like okay let's let's

00:17:30take other handhelds that should cost around a thousand dollars and compare it to the xbox ally x

00:17:36at a thousand dollars this thing has better grips it feels more comfortable to hold than them

00:17:42but it's now maybe a little bit harder to do the things that i want to do with it if i'm not buying

00:17:49it for an xbox experience and it doesn't have a flagship screen for example this screen is the same

00:17:59screen they shipped in a six hundred dollar handheld a few years ago it's the same one they

00:18:04shipped in an eight hundred dollar handheld last year now you're paying a thousand dollars for that

00:18:09screen whereas we now have eight inch devices we have eight we have eight inch devices like this

00:18:15like this msi claw and this uh and this amazing legion go to hold that thing up with beautiful

00:18:24screens very little bezel on these things uh they look way the heck better at around that thousand

00:18:30dollar mark i'm now starting to wonder and this is the the sort of size of the universe thing that

00:18:36i'm thinking about reading this review that you did is is are we even sure this is possible like i

00:18:43think you and i agree that the the thesis for microsoft here that actually what we should do is

00:18:49divorce the hardware from the software and that actually what people want is ways to play games

00:18:54lots of places that is not a giant box in their living room maybe they have the giant box in the

00:18:59living room but what i want is to be able to play my games everywhere and i want games that scale up

00:19:03and down based on where i am i want games that work different ways on different devices like i want

00:19:08i want games that exist everywhere that feels like the right idea lots of folks are moving towards

00:19:14that i'm starting to wonder if it's possible even for microsoft to get there or if this they have

00:19:21just gone down some completely wrong path and the idea of the correct windows-based gaming handheld

00:19:29should just die i feel like one of the persistent problems with microsoft's gaming strategy outside of

00:19:41the xbox console itself is they're not really trying to sell a handheld they're trying to sell

00:19:48an operating system to a bunch of partners that want to control the experience and make the best

00:19:55experience they can for their for you know their for their customers so wait okay so you just said

00:20:01something i think is interesting can i let me let me just pause you on that because what i thought you

00:20:04were going to say is microsoft's not trying to sell you a gaming handheld they're trying to sell you

00:20:08games and i think the the shift that we have been seeing is these companies are increasingly seeing

00:20:15hardware as if not quite a loss leader like not the relevant piece of the puzzle right like i can make

00:20:20more money by putting fortnite on every device that you own than i can selling you a fortnite gadget

00:20:26and that to me is where it's like that's clearly where this business is going like it or not that is

00:20:32clearly where this business is going and and and yet you said windows and so i'm like does microsoft

00:20:39just not get it they spent how many tens of billions of dollars to become a game company like

00:20:43sell me games be in the business of selling they have an xbox team and they have a windows team and

00:20:49maybe they can build a hybrid team and and create an operating system that makes sense to just sell you

00:20:56the games but there are the conflicting priorities here of they they also want to sell an os to these

00:21:03handheld makers what we expect to happen what tom and i expect to happen is yes the future of xbox is

00:21:12not going to be just about the box yes the games are the most important piece of the puzzle and they

00:21:19probably are going to start to build those games on top of windows on top of these kinds of pc chips

00:21:27designed for the pc ecosystem which includes xbox instead of designing them specifically for an xbox

00:21:35console so the problem we have today of or i should say next may the problem we have next may

00:21:40when grand theft auto 6 comes out and you can play it on xbox but you can't play it on xbox ally because

00:21:47there's no pc port that kind of thing maybe goes away if microsoft uses all of its studios all of its

00:21:56muscle to push the industry in the pc development first direction and the pc ecosystem now does kind

00:22:04of include all of these consoles right like architecturally the xbox the playstation the pc all

00:22:10of these things are very close to each other now right going on over a decade for over a decade now

00:22:16since since the xbox one these systems have all been using amd x86 chips that are quite similar

00:22:25to one another that have similar levels of performance between the xbox and the playstation

00:22:30others wrinkles everywhere um and so when it allowed a device like the steam deck to come out and be the

00:22:37success it was four million or whatever it's not a huge success but it allowed it to be the success it

00:22:43was because it's the same architecture the same kind of games are being made for these consoles

00:22:48at a console level of performance that the steam deck just targets that some folks at valve can say

00:22:53oh it looks like amd has a chip coming up two years from now that's going to give me a 720p resolution

00:23:00experience at 30 frames per second of the same thing i can see at consoles at 1080p60 right now

00:23:06would people buy a 720p 30 experience of the same kinds of games seems like they might let's go ahead

00:23:13and do that that chip didn't exist before the architecture wasn't all aligned before now it is

00:23:19now it's way easier to make those things line up but when when the game development efforts do align in the

00:23:29microsoft camp and the sony camp and everybody's hopefully in all the developers camps and everybody's

00:23:34just publishing a game and selling it to all the places microsoft does want to have a handheld

00:23:40that encourages people to buy them take them everywhere do that thing that the steam deck users

00:23:46talk about where it's like well there's a sale coming up on games might as well have some more

00:23:51now that i can play them in the bathroom now that i can play them in the bus now that i can play them

00:23:55the train and not worry about buying specific cartridges that only fit this this handheld i start to worry

00:24:01again reading reviews like yours of the the xbox ally that it's like well if if microsoft putting

00:24:07the xbox name on something can't pull all of these pieces the games the hardware the software together

00:24:13in a way that works and feels coherent maybe nobody can but but you sound like you're thinking you're if

00:24:19we're not there yet we're at least maybe on a path towards that over time you seem optimistic

00:24:24i think it's a wake-up call uh for one thing i think it's i think it's a big wake-up call this

00:24:29the way this launch was handled i'm sure they knew weeks or months ago after they realized that

00:24:36things were not all together the way they should be that they were going to get some

00:24:41less than enthusiastic reviews of these handouts and they have sure been less than enthusiastic

00:24:47sure uh poly polygons also also an excellent one um uh if you want to read some some more

00:24:55some more people trotting on this thing um but uh because there's been this wake-up call

00:25:03not today but maybe months ago for microsoft uh they're going to have to shift their strategy again

00:25:09they're either going to have to really put the right teams on this to make the skin bulletproof on

00:25:16top of windows and really amp up reducing how much windows there is under the hood so that you

00:25:21don't that doesn't get in your way or they're going to say screw it we need the next xbox the

00:25:30next family of xbox consoles which will include a handheld to have a purpose-built architecture of

00:25:37purpose-built software architecture i should say that actually feels like a game console we'll put

00:25:43that on our next xbox we'll put that our next handheld to this xbox ally was a test balloon but it

00:25:49wasn't the real xbox handheld we'll bring that to you later that's what i expect will happen

00:25:55i hope you're right uh but you only get so many swings at that you know and i i think that the

00:26:03the size and confidence of this marketing effort from microsoft that you know everything is an xbox

00:26:10is again i look at that i'm like this is a great idea what if you shipped it like that'd be fun maybe

00:26:15maybe do it successfully and then this will all be fine i hope you're right i really do i i continue

00:26:21to believe that this is the right idea and that microsoft's like what is written on microsoft's

00:26:27whiteboard is like this is the future of gaming i think is the future of gaming and i worry that

00:26:33microsoft is screwing it up so badly that no one else is going to try and we're all going to go back

00:26:37to like console exclusives that run on a box in my living room i don't want that don't love it

00:26:44wouldn't be the worst thing ever if they also subsidize the consoles again okay before we go

00:26:49people could afford them before we go uh i have a question and a complaint which would you like to

00:26:54hear first hmm can i ask a question first sure okay we talked a long time ago on this verge cast i

00:27:03feel like about you deciding whether you were going to buy a steam deck or not did you welcome

00:27:09to my question and my complaint sean uh i'm going to give you my complaint first because my complaint

00:27:14leads to my question uh my complaint is about the nintendo switch 2 which i own and enjoy very much

00:27:20um four games that were built for the switch to donkey kong bonanza fabulous mario kart world

00:27:26fabulous every other game made by a company not nintendo seems like they just they shipped it

00:27:33to other devices and then they found a knob that said make it 35 percent worse turned it and shipped

00:27:40it for the switch to hate it like i the thing i said i play fifa a lot it's called eafc for all the

00:27:48people who can email me i'm aware of this it's called fifa leave me alone um the solution for the new

00:27:54game on the switch 2 was just to to limit it to 30 frames per second you just can't run it any faster

00:27:59than that on the switch 2 and so now i have this like blocky jittery soccer game all the time turns

00:28:05out that sucks and the last game played better so everybody is like making these incredible new games

00:28:11and then they just make it make it shitty and ship it for the switch 2 and that is awful and one of

00:28:17the things i was excited about about switch 2 is that there has been more developer interest and

00:28:21there are more third-party games they're bad and it's welcome to nintendo welcome to nintendo

00:28:27uh i wish i had known so this is which brings me to my question uh which is sean should i buy a steam

00:28:33deck we've been doing this for so long and now there's rumors that there's going to be some new

00:28:38hardware like the there's some smoke that valve is up to some stuff like sean should i buy a steam deck

00:28:44i don't think we're getting a new steam i don't think a steam deck 2 is imminent i think it's safe

00:28:51to wait i may have bought somebody in my life a steam deck recently having told myself totally fine

00:28:59to get them one okay it's good stuff um do do you want to play the latest games at like acceptable

00:29:06settings you're talking about how stuff on how stuff on switch 2 is is is these these shovel this

00:29:12shovelware that's what people call it the shovelware that happens on the nintendo platforms

00:29:17it looks like they just shoveled it on there and turned the dial and spun down the graphics they're

00:29:22shoveling better games now which is something no like i just sincerely that is something

00:29:27instead of instead of yeah crappy old games it's pretty good newer games but it's still shovelware

00:29:35developers have figured out now how to take advantage of everything the steam deck has

00:29:41and the stuff that's that runs there you can play a lot of great shit there if you want it to run

00:29:48every new hot game that comes out it's going to look like trash there i'm sorry there's just no way

00:29:54around it so don't expect it to play indiana jones or whatever you know grand theft auto 6 when it

00:30:01comes out it will not run that at good settings if at all um probably won't run that at all because

00:30:06there'll be some kind of anti-chate that rockstar throws in there some kind of terrible launch or

00:30:10whatever um and that'll be even further down the road to the pc version of that isn't going to come

00:30:16right away we may need to have like a real a real conversation in like may where i just sit down

00:30:23in front of my microphone with a thousand dollars in cash and you just tell me what to buy so i can play

00:30:28gta 6 because most of the stuff you're talking about i'm like a i'm i'm not a good enough gamer

00:30:33to like need the stuff at super high settings anyway and b most of the stuff that i play most

00:30:38of the time is not like you know day one release stuff i'm happy to wait it out and play the old

00:30:44games and like that's all fine i do want to play a lot of gta 6 next year and it is it's increasingly

00:30:51clear to me that i'm going to need to spend a lot of money on a device i do not currently have

00:30:54and at some point you and i are going to have to talk that out yeah and then the end of that

00:31:00segment will just be me throwing money at my microphone and running away can you throw it

00:31:05through the camera i'll just i'll just take it can i just have like three or four of the handhelds

00:31:10that you have that'll solve all of my problems daisy chain them together and i'll have one kick-ass

00:31:14windows pc yeah this'll be great all right we gotta take a break but sean will you come back at the end

00:31:19of the show to do a hotline question i got a hotline question that i think you and i should really

00:31:22talk about i think it'll be fun i'm ready to be ambushed all right cool we need to take a break

00:31:27and then we're going to come back and we're going to talk about what ai is doing to our brands

00:31:30be right back support for this show comes from shopify starting a business is exciting but once the

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00:34:03all right we're back hayden field is here hi hayden hi happy lots of you on the verge cast recently

00:34:13this makes me very happy it's been a blast i'll come on anytime it's just ai shenanigans

00:34:17everywhere you look this is what we do here now every single day so the the sort of big heady

00:34:26question i want to spend some time talking about and i think this is a thing we're like as a society

00:34:30going to spend a lot of time talking about is essentially what ai is doing to our brains and

00:34:36our ability to use them and i think we're at this fascinating moment where like these these tools like

00:34:41chat gpt and the rest have been around long enough that we're starting to get real sort of useful

00:34:46longitudinal research on like what it means to use them and how we're using them and we're past

00:34:51some of the like you know thrilling novelty of it all and so we're starting to get like real actual

00:34:55evidence about how they are changing the way that we work and think and all this stuff but also we're

00:35:01still so early in this phase that it's like we don't know yet if this is just the same moral panic

00:35:07that happens every time something happens right like rewind to any new anything and everybody thought

00:35:13it was going to destroy our brains right like calculators were going to destroy our brains and the

00:35:16printing press was going to destroy our brains and newspapers were going to destroy our brains and the radio

00:35:19was going to destroy like pick anything you want and it was always going to ruin society and most of them

00:35:23have not um some of them have but uh we don't know yet which one ai is but i think especially over the last

00:35:30few months we've gotten a couple of really interesting studies that have tried to dig into this stuff in a

00:35:36pretty meaningful way and just before we started recording i told you one of the main ones i want to talk

00:35:40about is this big study out of mit um that basically was looking at what it what our brains are doing

00:35:48on chat gpt and how we think about tasks and how we accomplish tasks when we're given llms to use or

00:35:56not um and you just told me that literally just before we started recording this is like not a bit

00:36:02i'm doing this is like a thing that happened i'm very excited about it uh just before we started recording

00:36:06you were talking to the person who led this study is that right that's right yeah i just shot her an

00:36:11email because i figured you know let's get it straight from the horse's mouth and talk about

00:36:16you know what really happened here and how they tested people and what some media outlets might have

00:36:25gotten wrong when i was looking at the study um i saw that they had only linked to certain outlets

00:36:31because they said some had like sensationalized their findings so i just wanted to make sure

00:36:36we really got right like what they found in this study so just to really quickly let me just like

00:36:41briefly explain the study for people who have not read it's like 206 pages you should read all of them

00:36:46they're fascinating i don't know anything about eegs so most of it made no sense but it's very

00:36:51interesting and essentially as i understand it and you should correct me if i'm wrong because i think

00:36:55it sounds like a lot of people are getting this wrong and i'm sure i'm one of them

00:36:57basically they took this group of people divided them into three sections basically there was a

00:37:03group of people that were given access to a large language model there's a group of people that were

00:37:07given access to a search engine and there was a group of people that were given access to neither

00:37:11and they gave them uh an essay writing task four different times over the course of i think several

00:37:17months and basically charted uh how their brains were working as they were doing those tasks and then at the

00:37:24end on the fourth task the people who had to use only their brains were given access to an llm on

00:37:31the fourth try and vice versa the people who had had llm access the first three then had to just use

00:37:37their brains for the fourth and uh we should get to what they find but i'm curious what you what you

00:37:42learned from talking to the the person that led it yeah they did swap up the groups on the last try

00:37:48which was interesting and the thing that i thought was the most interesting is that

00:37:52when they swapped the groups at the end the same exact results which we'll talk about in a second

00:37:58happened so it wasn't like if you had been doing something one way there was a compounding effect or

00:38:05vice versa it was whenever you did one thing the same thing happened and whenever someone else did

00:38:11that thing that thing happened and there was no you know compounding problems or benefits it was just

00:38:17when you did it using xyz type of technology or no type of technology they saw a pretty similar result

00:38:24okay and i would say broad strokes my understanding of the results of this study and this has been a

00:38:29pretty controversial study it's a relatively small number of people it's a they released this pre-peer

00:38:34review which is is a like peer review is an important part of the academic process like

00:38:38this is an early thing and i think they put it out basically saying yes this is early but we think

00:38:43it's important to start getting this stuff out there but basically what i would say my understanding

00:38:48of the findings is that the people who had the most access to the llms came to rely on them almost

00:38:56completely over the course of doing the task and that the more they had access to these tools over

00:39:01and over they came back and by the third time they were doing these essays with the llms they were

00:39:06essentially just copying and pasting the output of the llms and all the people who used them this is my

00:39:11favorite detail from this basically ended up with the same essay no matter how you started no matter

00:39:18what you prompted there were they said there were people who started in a language other than english

00:39:21and then translated it back into english like a remarkably similar thing appeared at the end and the

00:39:27funniest thing about this is by all accounts they had they had human raiders and ai judges all of whom

00:39:33agreed that the essays they came up with were actually like pretty good but this that was not the point

00:39:38right the point wasn't can you use ai to write a good essay the point was what is your brain doing

00:39:42in this process and they found essentially that the people with that were doing less and relying on

00:39:47the ai models more and that was increasing as time went on but then like you said once they once they

00:39:54flipped back to having to use their brain they it wasn't like they were permanently ruined forever i think

00:40:01was the thing that i found and i i would guess not to put words in in our researchers mouths but

00:40:05that was the thing that i think a lot of people picked up on incorrectly and and i think that the

00:40:11narrative of this study has been that like if you use it your brain will go to mush and you will never

00:40:15be able to use it again and i think from reading the study my understanding is like that's not the

00:40:21finding the finding is that when you have it in front of you you will you will use your brain

00:40:26differently not it will destroy your brain in perpetuity is that fair is that your read yeah the

00:40:32researchers said that they recommend like longer term longitudinal impact studies on the usage but

00:40:41this was just short term like seeing what parts of your brain lit up or which parts which brain

00:40:46networks were being more engaged um and that was it not kind of charting what's going to happen in the

00:40:53future right it's not it's not that the people came out of this like unable to spell their names because

00:40:58they'd used an llm three times it was just like when they had it it was very clear that they were

00:41:03doing less of the like critical thinking part of writing an essay and more of prompting an ai to

00:41:10basically give them the same thing that everybody else is getting um i will say this study a lot of

00:41:16people have not talked about the search engine part of this study but maybe the single most damning

00:41:20part of this study to me is the people who were given access to a search engine and basically just

00:41:24wrote the essay that google decided to give them based on how google's keywords rank for ad prices

00:41:31that it's like just overwhelmingly you search for something and google gives you whatever it feels

00:41:36like giving you whether or not that has any bearing on what is like useful and good and so the idea that

00:41:41like using ai is bad for your brain and having access to google is not disagree if anything you could

00:41:48argue that they are like equally bad for your brain um but i do wonder like is is it a fair read to come

00:41:56out of a study like this for you as a as a you know reader of this and for them as the researchers to say

00:42:02it is bad for your brain to have access to these tools i don't think they'd say it was bad for your

00:42:07brain because your whole brain was functioning the whole time no matter which group you were in it was

00:42:12just the connectivity was really different so you didn't have the same amount of engagement

00:42:16among all your brain networks and also something that she told me on the phone the lead author natalia

00:42:22was that directionality was impacted so basically this is a really simplified version um for us because

00:42:29we are not researchers on the brain but something they were tracking was where data flowed um which

00:42:38direction to which direction data flowed within the brain and they saw there was a lot less flow when

00:42:44they were when people were using llm so you know if the information is flowing from the front of your

00:42:48brain to the back of your brain the back to the front that's super oversimplified but that's what

00:42:54she told me that looking at that specifically the directionality there's a lot less flow when people

00:42:59were using llms and that's not good in the moment at least you know it's not um they they put it like

00:43:07this the cognitive cost of using an llm so basically you know the brain connectivity did systematically

00:43:13scale down when people were using search engines and even more so when people were using llm so

00:43:20i think that the main kind of takeaway is that using your brain on its own is the best for your brain

00:43:27probably at least in the moment because you know uh those people that group exhibited the strongest

00:43:33widest ranging brain network activity so clearly you know their brains were just lighting up it was a

00:43:40party in there there were a ton of thoughts happening um other people less so but also i think it's

00:43:45important to note this isn't just happening with ai like you said david it's like you know i remember

00:43:50when we got gps systems in our cars for the first time and i forgot how to drive to like you know the

00:43:55grocery store or to one of my friends houses i didn't remember how to do things that i used to do

00:44:01if i didn't practice so it's kind of like that i mean i think it does happen with every technology

00:44:05you know obviously brain connectivity also scaled down in this study with search engines so i think

00:44:11it's just about you know i used to kind of roll my eyes when my friends would put their phone down

00:44:17and say oh like i'm going to try to remember the name of this person instead of looking it up in my

00:44:21phone or i think i'm going to try to remember the name of this movie instead of googling it but now

00:44:25i'm like you know maybe we should all be doing that because i mean it does use a different muscle

00:44:31or whatever part of the brain that you and i don't know how to refer to it uses that in a

00:44:36different way um and you know under engagement is something they saw in um and weaker neural

00:44:43connectivity was something they saw in the group using llms which i just don't love the sound of

00:44:47yeah that's fair i just want everyone listening to and watching this by the way to just imagine that

00:44:52every two minutes like a little asterisk appears above our heads that just says disclaimer not a brain

00:44:57scientist yes that's important but i think like the way you described that makes me think of

00:45:01actually i was just reading um another study that microsoft researchers did earlier this year

00:45:07um basically looking at how people doing knowledge work tasks engage in critical thinking and they

00:45:15define critical thinking in some really interesting ways but i think like however you imagine that in

00:45:18your head is a useful enough heuristic for what we're talking about here and essentially what they

00:45:22found is that if you trust yourself to do something like if you if you think you are an expert in a

00:45:30task ai is actually like productive and useful and helpful in that task and it will allow you to do it

00:45:37better that it's like a it is a way of taking something you do well and and magnifying it even

00:45:41further but ai is a as a replacement like as a way to fill in something you don't know how to do or

00:45:48don't have confidence in is a huge problem because it a it makes you more confident in this deeply

00:45:55imperfect technology and you just kind of plug in a prompt and let it do its thing and trust whatever

00:46:00it comes out with because you don't know any better and so over and over they're coming in this study

00:46:06basically being like what we need to figure out how to do is a help people gain competence themselves

00:46:11and b plug in ai in a way that is like additive and productive not a solution so that you don't

00:46:20have to use your own brain and i think like the way you describe i was it's so funny you mentioned

00:46:24the like trying to remember a person's name because this is a thing i go through all the time now and

00:46:28there's like people have been talking about this for forever right that google like ruined the the bar

00:46:32debate about who was you know who who was in that movie or like which one of those made more money or

00:46:38whatever like all of these things that just have answers but are fun to talk about anyway

00:46:42doing that on purpose is like stupid but kind of fun and productive anyway that it's like i'm just

00:46:48gonna sit here and try to remember the name of that song even though i could google it and it would

00:46:53simplify everything because like i should probably work on my brain like feels ridiculous but i think

00:46:58is actually borne out in a lot of this stuff that like using your brain on purpose is good

00:47:03shocking shocking but true yeah and what you said about um ai making some things better is true

00:47:11because even in that mit media lab study they found that it does help with speed and execution and grunt

00:47:17work and organization of thoughts and the other thing about that study is that a lot of neuroscientists

00:47:23apparently say eegs which they use to test the brain activity are kind of a flawed method because

00:47:31they're outside the brain so it's kind of like they liken it to standing outside a stadium and

00:47:37listening to the crowd's reaction so you can hear when the crowd roars and you know the vibes that are

00:47:42going on but you can't really you know figure out exactly what's going on and uh you know exactly

00:47:49what people are feeling and when and which areas so you know it's a flawed approach but you know it does

00:47:55tell us something so i think that's important but what you said about um you know feeling

00:48:00confident i think is so important because it reminds me of learning languages like if you are

00:48:05super you know playing it safe and taking it easy with learning a language i feel like you never really

00:48:11and i think studies back this up but don't quote me on this but you never really get fluent because

00:48:16the way that the brain learns a lot of times is when you do feel uncomfortable or frustrated or

00:48:24not like safe in terms of you know saying what you want to say and then it causes you to build new

00:48:32neural pathways and remember um you know connections and things you might not have gotten before that's

00:48:37why immersion programs are so good for building language fluency it's because you're forced to

00:48:42just figure out how to say something even if you have to be creative and kind of talk your way around

00:48:47something or you know build new connections you just have to figure it out and that's why people that

00:48:52get fluent in a language do that stuff and i think it's kind of important to note here too

00:48:56totally so what what do you think the reaction has been in the ai industry to some of this research i

00:49:03mean this mit study uh we we talked about on purpose because this like it caused some real like

00:49:10debate and kerfuffle in the ai industry there were a lot of people who just reflexively like

00:49:15didn't like the study didn't like the way that it was done didn't like the product like whatever

00:49:20but this question of like is i is ai making a stupid is very much like in the ether of the ai

00:49:26industry right now uh what are you hearing from folks who are starting to reckon with this question

00:49:31of like what what is ai doing to people's brands are they even reckoning with it at all i think a lot

00:49:37of times they're not reckoning with it like when i reached out to anthropic and open ai before this

00:49:42recording like a few days ago um i just wanted to see what they would say and they did not respond at

00:49:47all so zero response and i think you know a lot of people just don't want to acknowledge it i do

00:49:53think there's a lot of controversy over the study itself and the results and the small sample size

00:49:57and the eegs but i also think that you know there's a question why we're not seeing more research

00:50:06starting right now about the long-term effects of using these systems and you know there's a lot of

00:50:11questions out there right now about how it does affect your brain or even if it doesn't affect your

00:50:15brain in a certain way how it affects how you think or how you act you know we saw a bunch of um

00:50:23hugely problematic uh situations with teens and young people recently you know committing suicide

00:50:32after months of confiding in a chatbot or um you know going through a lot of mental health struggles

00:50:40and having to be hospitalized so it's like interesting and just you know we need more

00:50:45research on this stuff and we need to be looking really hard at it and a lot of companies don't want

00:50:50to reckon deeply with it because companies want people to use their services and rely on them i mean

00:50:55that's how you make money as a tech company so you know up engagement um up the number the amount of

00:51:02time that someone spends on a platform um figure out how to kind of insert it into every part of their

00:51:07life you know we just saw open ai launch pulse which is supposed to be like you know the way

00:51:12that you start your day every day and a routine with chat gpt so i think these companies want their

00:51:18products to be embedded in every part of your life and you know that is how they're going to make money

00:51:22yeah i mean i'm so torn on this because i think like your your google maps example from a few minutes

00:51:27ago is such an interesting one because i spent a lot of time over the years wondering whether it's bad

00:51:33that i don't know how to get anywhere anymore and like it's sort of seriously like i don't know how

00:51:40to get nearly as many places as i used to that's certainly true and the number of places like my wife

00:51:45will make fun of me because i will google maps the three miles to the airport uh despite the fact that

00:51:50i've done that drive 650 000 times like i i should be able to do that drive in my sleep and i put on

00:51:57google maps every single time and i say like oh i'm checking for traffic but i'm just like i'm just not

00:52:00100 sure how to do any of that anymore and i don't i don't know if that's bad and i think in a lot of

00:52:06ways like i don't know like you and i probably know how to do less long division than people who

00:52:14grew up before graphing calculators existed is that is that bad like or have we just learned how to use

00:52:20our brains in a different way i'm just curious for you as a person who like thinks about and writes

00:52:25about and uses ai stuff all day are you are you thinking about this stuff in sort of that big

00:52:32heady like what is this doing to my brain kind of way yet yeah to me i think about it right now

00:52:38in the way that i think about you know google maps like you just said i mean i think you know we need

00:52:44more research on the long-term effects but for now i just think of it as oh i'm i can tell i'm not using

00:52:49my brain as much right now um but i don't think there's a long-term effect happening um and i also

00:52:58do think it's really helpful for like the mit media lab study said like grunt work organization like i

00:53:04was making a wedding planning spreadsheet the other day and i was like i don't need to be you know

00:53:10looking at five other people's spreadsheets and trying to you know combine them myself i'm just gonna

00:53:15have ai do it so i did it was great and then i still critically thought as much as i could

00:53:19critically think about like you know the certain things i needed to add in there that were missing

00:53:24but yeah i mean for me right now it's more about making sure i don't over rely on these systems when

00:53:31i'm using them in my personal life i turn off memory for example because i don't really want

00:53:36a system learning more about me and tailoring its responses to me i like to treat it as a tool that i

00:53:44ask something and then i leave you know it's not i don't want to be building a relationship with

00:53:48this tool i know that's controversial a lot of people do love to do that but for me personally

00:53:52i don't want to over rely on these systems so that's what i do and i think it's a great hack

00:53:57if you are worried about that but yeah i mean for me i think that's the number one way i think about

00:54:03it it's just how i think about these systems rather than what they're doing to my brain because i think

00:54:06you know what i'm frying my brain with a bunch of different technology it's not just ai i think

00:54:11i'm watching too much netflix um i'm you know texting too much i am on instagram too much i'm

00:54:18on tiktok too much so yeah i think like everything in moderation is is as usual pretty good advice

00:54:24because i don't know i i think about this as like there's one way of thinking about this that is like

00:54:29the people who say like oh we used to be hunter gatherers and now we've lost that and what are we

00:54:35doing and like when men were men and i just listened to that and i'm like yeah but it's better now

00:54:38like i have i have video games now like that's so much better than being a hunter gatherer like

00:54:43what are we talking about this is i can fight lions or i can watch television like i pick

00:54:48television i don't understand what the problem is and then on the flip side you go all the way to the

00:54:54other end of the spectrum and you get all of these tech ceos who are like in five years there's

00:54:59going to be two types of people there's going to be the people who have made use of ai in every

00:55:03single corner of their lives and there's going to be the people who get left behind and it's like

00:55:07what was it that mark zuckerberg said just the other week like there's you're going to be at a

00:55:10cognitive disadvantage if you don't use ai like boy do i not think that's fully true and i don't

00:55:18know like part of me is like are we going to get to the point where actually there's going to be the

00:55:23the like wally world of people just like sitting in chairs staring at screens and then there's just

00:55:29going to be like you and me running around being like haha i still know how to type words with my

00:55:33fingers and that's going to be that's going to be our advantage i just don't know and it's it's a

00:55:39really tricky thing both as a person and as a reporter right now to to reason through because

00:55:44it's like this stuff is everywhere people are using it and like i have i have a nephew who just

00:55:49started college and i'm sure is just in the middle of chat gpting his way through all of his classes

00:55:55and i'm like is that a disaster or is that just the inevitable future and everybody needs to catch up

00:56:01like some of the pushback i've seen to these studies is that actually what happens when we

00:56:04get these technical advances is that we start to teach different things and we start to test

00:56:09different skills and we start to evaluate people based on new things that they need to be able to

00:56:14do in this new world where being able to quickly do long division is not important because you have

00:56:19a thing in your pocket that can do that for you we we need new tasks and we need new things to do

00:56:24and then maybe we'll get a whole bunch of that with ai or we're all just going to sit here

00:56:29slack-jawed talking to clod for the rest of our lives and that feels bad and i just i don't know

00:56:34i'm so stuck on this because i don't know how to reason through any of it because we are at just

00:56:39the very beginning of actually starting to understand this stuff definitely i think it's

00:56:44interesting because i remember being in college and using cliff's notes yes you know to summarize

00:56:49knew that's what you were gonna say yeah exactly to summarize books that i didn't really have

00:56:54done read the whole thing of um and you know i do think that teens are going to find workarounds

00:57:01for not doing a lot of work in any universe and with any tech that they have available to them and

00:57:07it's not something that's like you know suddenly happening now for the very first time um i do think

00:57:14it can be tough when these companies allow like every student to access these tools for free

00:57:21during exam period which to your point about like all they actually want is engagement and they'll

00:57:26figure out the rest later like what a perfect example yeah i kind of feel like it's you know

00:57:30they they like to pivot it as oh you know we want people to you know use learning mode and you know

00:57:39kind of be helped with some of the grunt work and the organization of their essays things like that

00:57:43but what inevitably happens is that you know people lean on it for exams and all sorts of other stuff

00:57:49and kind of get in early and they become a user leader in life um and you know it's just kind of

00:57:55cemented early on so i do think it's a little bit tough but i also think what you said about testing

00:58:01different things is so real i mean you know now i'm seeing that teachers are starting to instead of

00:58:07assign a full book sometimes they'll assign certain chapters or passages and then have everyone talk

00:58:12about them live in class so that's something i like to see i mean obviously i wish everyone was

00:58:17reading full books but you know at least we're you know having people really talk about their

00:58:23what they critically thought um live during class and you know use their brain that way so you know i

00:58:31think it's it's hard because it's not black and white but you know at least teachers who are saints

00:58:37are adapting to this new world and trying to get students to use their brains in new ways you know

00:58:42no matter what's thrown at them which is great whose responsibility do you think it is ultimately

00:58:46to start pushing on this stuff like obviously i think you talk to the the researchers who are doing

00:58:53some really interesting and important work and it's very clear that like a lot of people are paying

00:58:56attention to that work which is great like whatever natalia and that team do next a lot of people will

00:59:03pay attention to and i think that's great like putting all of the onus on like the high schoolers to

00:59:10make good responsible decisions about how they use their brain i think is like a complete fool's

00:59:14errand of an idea teachers have too much to do already like i i don't know i can't help but wonder

00:59:20like isn't isn't this partly up to the sam altmans and dario amides of the world to like if they if

00:59:28these things are going to be as big and important as they claim shouldn't don't they have some

00:59:34responsibility to figure out like what is the actual job we are supposed to put these things to and

00:59:39what does it mean if we're just mushing everybody's brains in service of giving them more access to

00:59:43chat gpt yeah this is kind of why i think it's weird that only a few people are in charge of the

00:59:52implications societally of this um it's interesting that you know a lot of the regulation is just starting

01:00:01to kind of percolate right now and a lot of the past regulation has just been reporters you know

01:00:08shining light on stuff or researchers shining light on stuff so it is interesting especially

01:00:13because we don't have as we said before a lot of information on how this looks long term and how

01:00:21it affects people you know i mean i think on the one hand you know these companies are saying hey

01:00:26we introduced learning mode we introduced these certain modes for students where um you know the

01:00:32chatbot isn't just giving them the answer it's helping them reason through um you know a line of

01:00:37thinking it's kind of using the socratic method in a way but how well can it really do that i haven't

01:00:44tried it um and you know i'm sure there's a workaround for not doing that which students

01:00:50will probably find you know on the one hand it is a student's responsibility in some ways to want to

01:00:56learn because we've all found workarounds when we didn't want to learn something that's just you

01:00:59know what we're gonna do but i also think the easier it is to not learn something the more

01:01:05tempting it is to not sometimes if you're like you know a student in college or high school so

01:01:10yeah not doing the work is so sick like it's so fun to not do the work and i was we were actually

01:01:17just talking about this to some folks the other day that like one of my great joys as an adult

01:01:20has been going back and reading all the books that i fake read in high school same and learning

01:01:24that actually like catcher in the rye is like awesome and and there's like a bunch of like you

01:01:28know jane air style books that i like pretended to read in high school and college that now i've

01:01:34gone back and i'm like oh these books actually like kind of ripped dude like i've been doing the

01:01:37same thing like beloved by tony morris and i've been really i've i i saved them all to put in my

01:01:42bookshelf in the living room which is my performative bookshelf and i have like a

01:01:47non-performative like kind of like dumb bookshelf in my bedroom um and all the ones on display in the

01:01:53living room i'm now working my way through i love that for you that's awesome so one last thing i

01:01:58the way you were talking about these tools makes me think about like

01:02:01i think the the like notebook lms of the world uh i wonder if things like that end up being sort

01:02:08of the right middle ground where it's like you and maybe this goes back to the the stuff that

01:02:12microsoft study was talking about that it's like these things should be additive tools for things

01:02:17that you are already gaining competence in right that like maybe the ai's job is to help you find

01:02:23information that you're looking for or pull things into study guides and flashcards and whatever but

01:02:30like it it shouldn't be able to put out a finished product for you and i think like i know the

01:02:36notebook lm team has spent a lot of time thinking about like what does it mean to help you do the

01:02:39work versus do the work for you and i i just think that kind of thing like it's really easy for me to

01:02:46come out of these things being like just shut it all off turn off the internet in high schools

01:02:50and like make good make everybody go back to writing by hand in blue books and like there's

01:02:54part of me that thinks that but most of me thinks that's just like a ignorant way of thinking about

01:03:00what the world actually is now and so it's like me what if what is the middle ground does it exist

01:03:05do you think it exists i hope so i hope it does and i think based on history you know and other

01:03:14technologies i think it does i mean and i think what you just said is the middle ground you know

01:03:19um technology can help us come to our own conclusions it can ask smart questions sometimes

01:03:27and have us think and really like you know figure out what our opinion is and then we answer so i hope

01:03:34that's the you know line we go down because you know everyone has a friend that's amazing at asking

01:03:41questions and kind of helps you really figure out how you feel about something when you didn't really

01:03:47know before and i hope that you know in schools and with students ai can become that if we do have

01:03:55to use it let's make it that instead of just you know giving you the answer all the time which i think

01:03:59you know to their credit companies are trying to figure out how to do um but i don't know if it's

01:04:05working yet i have not used them myself that would be a good thing for us to test but

01:04:10yeah i mean it's all a mess right now and i just hope it works out is all i have to say

01:04:15that's that's a hopeful message to end on yeah i just keep thinking about the the that part of the

01:04:20mit study that is basically like when we got to the end of this trial with folks the people who had

01:04:26llm access weren't doing any work anymore they were they were essentially doing the the like

01:04:32procedural work of copying and pasting stuff in an order that kind of made sense and that was the

01:04:36amount of actual cognitive interest that they were doing because they had just decided to offload all

01:04:43of it to the machines and i think anybody who has used google's ai overviews knows that we're super

01:04:49not there yet i don't know if we ever will be i don't know if it's a good thing but we're super not

01:04:52there yet and the fact that they couldn't quote um essays that they wrote minutes before so it really

01:04:59didn't sink in which sucks like that's the thing that i feel like we need to see is even if people

01:05:05use technology to accomplish whatever in schools you have to be able to explain it and talk about

01:05:11it after so that it sinks in maybe that's the answer you know because i find that for me i learn

01:05:17the best when i'm explaining how something works to someone else like out loud that's how i learn

01:05:22and that's why like oftentimes before i'm you know gonna go on you know a tv segment or something i call

01:05:28a friend and i'm like let me just explain this to you really quick that and they're like you know

01:05:32they work in like marketing or like they're uh like a hiker and they're like a full-time hiker

01:05:37and they're like i'm gonna use a different example because that sounds like i made that up but that

01:05:40was real and they work in marketing or they're like you know just retired and i'm like let me

01:05:47tell you exactly how this random thing works that you have no interest in just so that i can know

01:05:52that i fully understand it before i go and explain it to a lot of people so yeah you sound like a

01:05:57like a comedian developing like their type five to go on a late night show i love this for you

01:06:01all right we need to take a break but i just want to prepare you for this hayden at some point you

01:06:06are going to come back on this show and you are going to walk us through the technology and ai of

01:06:10your wedding planning process um so just be ready because i have a feeling it is spectacular and insane

01:06:16and i'm very very excited to talk about it i can't wait to tell you all about it it is crazy

01:06:20all right we got to take one more break and then we're going to come back and answer a

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01:09:53okay we're back sean's back we have a question from the verge cast hotline

01:10:02as always the number is 866 verge 11 the email is verge cast at the verge.com you can go like knock on sean's door

01:10:08and ask him questions if you have them we're all on signal i don't know i go outside sometimes you find me there

01:10:15uh this question sean is um like sort of a thing i've been thinking a lot about recently and i just

01:10:23want to i just want to feel you out on this but i didn't want to prepare you at all because i just

01:10:27want to get your gut reaction let's hear this question hello verge cast friends uh this is not

01:10:34so much a question as a revelation i was just listening to the episode where you were talking about

01:10:39chrome os and android and seamless experience i am a long time android user and windows user and have

01:10:49had the tablet that disconnects from the dock that's supposed to be your computer i've gone through all

01:10:56of it and i have a revelation for an android android and windows user the perfect experience is a

01:11:04two-screen laptop where the uh like the verge book duo which i have and the asus zenbook duo which i have

01:11:15and i love and the keyboard comes off and the kickstand for the two screens take all of that except the top

01:11:24screen can detach and it is your lightweight android chrome tablet think i've cracked it john detachable

01:11:33pc's this is oh my god we're here we're talking about hybrid devices i've been thinking about this

01:11:38where we're talking about touchscreen macbooks like how do you do the chrome like detachable pc's are

01:11:44the future of everything are they the future of everything i feel like i'm i'm being transported

01:11:49right back to 2012 when i was doing this again i i was i was i think i was at ces and there was there

01:11:57was a giant fountain oh no it was copy text because i was in taipei and then and there were just

01:12:02all of these all of these giant there was a giant detachable all-in-one pc sitting on like a stone

01:12:11like a stone pillar next to this giant fountain and next to that there was a detachable e pc

01:12:18from asus and like the screen would come out of the keyboard region but but the dual screen thing

01:12:23you're right the dual screen thing so i have now played with several dual screen devices or devices

01:12:29with a giant stretchy screen that decides to become two screens when you partition it virtually

01:12:33and there is really something not to having two screens that i don't care about at all but having a

01:12:41very big vertical screen in front of you that you can partition into any number of windows you want

01:12:47but reaching for those screens to touch them is kind of weird so if the top one popped off

01:12:55that would be great the thing i can't figure out is how you would create any kind of hinge and

01:13:03detachment mechanism that would make that not fall apart at the slightest touch because even some of

01:13:10the dual screen pcs i've strapped to do screen laptops like those hinges are kind of weird the only

01:13:16one i've ever had that felt really good was i think it was the surface book uh that like the very

01:13:24first one and i don't i don't even know if they made more than one of these but it had a pretty

01:13:28solid hinge that you you like you you had a little eject button and you pulled it out and then it went

01:13:34in and really like thunked in and felt like a lot and that was the only one i've ever used that i was

01:13:38like this i could just use and not feel like it was going to break every single time i touched it

01:13:44only one the only one and i met some people who bought that and they said that over time some things

01:13:50didn't always connect up properly electronically and there was some issues discrete graphics and

01:13:54things like that but i don't think they said that the hinge failed on them the hinge is a really great

01:13:58hinge really great hinge really great detachment mechanism do you think chip wise we're ready for

01:14:06this world because is it possible that in 2012 we just didn't have the internals we needed to do this

01:14:11but now by with some combination of you know internal graphics are getting better external graphics are

01:14:18getting better and cheaper like the idea of basically i have a tablet that i dock into a

01:14:23gaming pc seems very powerful and compelling and like it might kind of be possible now like

01:14:30put a qualcomm snapdragon elite into the tablet a bit of it and it'll still sort of run like a windows

01:14:36computer sort of uh dock it and give me like full-on gaming pc stuff yeah usb 4 i mean usb 4 with the

01:14:45bandwidth especially with usb 4 uh version 2 coming out with the 80 gigabit per second bandwidth i believe

01:14:51single port you plug in your tablet as long as it's got that kind of a connection in it

01:14:57you can do the external graphics you can do the data you can do the multiple monitors you can do the

01:15:01power all at the same time all of that would work fine and the chips are efficient enough that you

01:15:08know if they're if they can fit in a handheld if they can fit in a thick tablet they can fit in

01:15:12that tablet too making the top tablet if you want that to be like the entire computer if you want

01:15:17that to be the entire community that thin and light you might need to look at arm like like david is

01:15:22saying you might need to be qualcomm and in that case i don't know how much of the usb for external

01:15:28graphics kind of goodness you get i don't think they've figured out external graphics yet on the

01:15:31qualcomm stuff so if it were amd or bet or intel plus external that would be a little bit easier

01:15:40i think that this detachable tablet if you don't care very much about how long it lasts when it's

01:15:48away from the rest of the system like you're taking the sewing off for an hour you're using it on the

01:15:53couch then you put it back in so that it can charge and connect i think you'll have a better time than

01:15:58if you're expecting the tablet to be your eight hour computer that makes sense yeah it does sort of

01:16:04sound like as you describe it i'm thinking oh what this actually is is just two computers bolted together

01:16:09because you need all the stuff in the one but then you need all the other more powerful stuff

01:16:15in the other and now we've we've just built two computers and this thing is going to cost like

01:16:19three thousand dollars and not actually solve any of your problems which i think is the thing we

01:16:23discovered in 2012 because what we need is better software for multiple devices not hardware that

01:16:29shoves them all together do not please do not give the designers ideas david

01:16:33what if they had all of the processors what if i just put all the possible chips into a device and

01:16:40we just see what happens it could work so but but i think about this from both a like productivity

01:16:48perspective where like i like the idea of you know being able to instead of like the the the ipad

01:16:55magic keyboard to me is the perfect example of this i feel like apple has gone way out of its way to

01:16:59have this funky hinge and that's all well and good but i would rather have something that looks

01:17:04like a macbook that i can just pull the two pieces apart that to me is like that's that's where

01:17:08something cool and interesting starts to happen and the same with a lot of these other devices but

01:17:14i think about this with gaming in particular that is like is there is there a reason that i might want

01:17:22something like external graphics for you know that's worth spending the money on so that i can have this

01:17:28truly like high-end pc thing that i can just rip off the top half of and take to the coffee shop

01:17:34and then a lot of companies and a lot of users are like scared about of mechanical points of failure

01:17:39like you don't want too many mechanical points of failure on anything because inevitably those will

01:17:45fail their support calls and so on you have to engineer the crap out of it like that microsoft

01:17:50service book but i wanted i want everything to be modular i love this idea of i saw this crazy thing at

01:17:56ces this last year where it was an intel uh lunar lake lunar like may panther one of those two uh

01:18:02tablet thing oh compute module you stick into the laptop frame and or you take it out and stick it

01:18:09into the tablet frame and then it's your tablet and they hinge together and there's like mechanical

01:18:14uh motorized things to turn the screen to face you while you're walking around there just a complete

01:18:18concept and i i said well there are like three good ideas in here if anybody wants to actually

01:18:24produce this hardware it would be super cool and just a small handful of nerds like me will love

01:18:29the heck out of it yeah i i both think this is the wrong idea and think i would love it absolutely to

01:18:35pieces which i think is basically where we landed in 2012 like this this thing is so fun and delightful

01:18:39and makes sense for almost no one but i'm gonna i have wanted it ever since and this is the my hill that

01:18:45i will always die on is modular gadgets which might be impossible and might be useless but they're so fun

01:18:51and i love it is it time to do the modular phone i feel like phones have finally plateau plateaued to

01:18:57the degree that manufacturers just don't know what to do with the hardware anymore the rounded

01:19:02rectangles beside ai at the time when google did project ara tried to tried to make modular phones

01:19:09a thing tried to make those cameras modular there just wasn't enough reason because there was still

01:19:14innovation happening elsewhere but now that there isn't much hardware innovation elsewhere can we bring

01:19:18it back please bring it back just just let me attach weird lenses to my phone and you will have

01:19:25my business forever this is all i ask all right sometime you're going to come back and we're going

01:19:29to talk about project ara but that's that's probably a version history episode that we'll do at some

01:19:33point and i'm very excited about that uh for now if someone is making this chrome windows thing

01:19:38that actually might seem possible to exist um i would like to hear about it and until then sean

01:19:44thank you this was delightful thank you all right that is it for the verge cast thank you to sean and

01:19:51hayden for being here and thank you as always for listening if you have thoughts or questions or

01:19:55feelings or other mean things you'd like to say about the xbox ally and xbox ally x as always you

01:20:01can call the hotline 866-VERGE-11 you can send us an email at vergecast at theverge.com uh two quick

01:20:07things before we go one hopefully you've heard on the show or on the feed by now that we have ad-free

01:20:12podcasts but if you're a subscriber to the verge you can now go to your account settings and get

01:20:16ad-free versions of all of our shows the vergecast version history and decoder uh it's awesome thank

01:20:22you to everybody who has like been excited about this this was the number one thing people were

01:20:25asking us for super excited to be able to do it i signed up for the ad-free podcasts i'm a big fan

01:20:31uh let us know if you're having trouble with it but it is it is awesome cannot recommend it enough

01:20:37thing number two uh thanks to everybody who's been reaching out about version history we're now three

01:20:41episodes deep we've got five more in this run we're already working on the next ones um we've

01:20:46gotten tons of really good feedback so please keep it coming things you want to see things you want us

01:20:50to make episodes about different ways you want us to do the show we've gotten really interesting

01:20:54feedback on like the structure and tone and pace of the show keep it all coming we're about to make a

01:20:58bunch more of these and i want to know everything you think about all of these already before we get

01:21:03into it but for now we're just going to get out of here the vergecast is verge production and part of

01:21:07the vox media podcast network this show is produced by eric gomez brandon kiefer and travis larchuk

01:21:12nila and i will be back on friday to talk about just all of the news there's more news we have apple

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01:21:22say anymore we're gonna have a lot to talk about we'll see you then rock and roll

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The Xbox Ally can't hang with the Steam Deck | The Vergecast

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