CES 2026: Part Seven (Thursday)

Summary

Better Offline: CES 2026 - Part Seven (Thursday)

Podcast: Better Offline
Host(s): Ed Zitron & Guests (Chloe Radcliffe, Garrison Davis, Rob Pegoraro, Robert Evans, Edward Ongweso Jr., Weston Lee, others)
Date: January 9, 2026

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Episode Overview

This episode continues Better Offline’s on-the-ground exploration of the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2026 in Las Vegas. Ed Zitron and a rotating cast of guests offer a lively, critical, and often comedic deconstruction of the wildest, most hyped, and sometimes most pointless tech innovations (and non-innovations) on the floor. Beyond the gadgets, the conversation dives into socioeconomic undercurrents, labor, tech industry delusions, automation’s implications, and the diminishing sense of excitement at what was once the world’s most mind-blowing tech showcase.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. The State (and Weirdness) of CES 2026

• Panel agrees: CES feels “off” this year—smaller, less ambitious, and in many ways hollowed out.
• The absence of major players like Nikon, Canon, and Samsung on the physical show floor is notable (13:40).
• Big booths replaced by enterprise products, software, and sparse, uninspiring displays.
• More national pavilions from various countries have moved out of the usual basement zones, suggesting a shift in priorities and exhibitors (15:09).

Quote:
“I get this weird feeling about this show that something is up. Something is really weird to see. Doesn't feel right... There's a chunk of a casino just with nothing there, no tables open.” – Ed (14:34)

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2. Cloyd the Home Assistant Robot & The ‘Year of Robots’

• Garrison Davis describes LG's demo of “Cloyd,” their large, slow, expensive, and generally underwhelming home robot assistant.
  • “It just moves your keys somewhere else if you lose them... Which seems like a machine that just makes you lose your keys.” (04:21)
  • Fails basic tasks (taking 90 seconds to load a single shirt into a washing machine; can't finish folding a towel after two minutes) (05:16).
  • Regular jokes about how presenters claim “Cloyd knows exactly how I want my towels folded,” even if the task is done poorly (07:06).
• Robot relies on observing your habits, possibly through visual recognition, but much of its operation (and usefulness) remains nebulous (12:03).
• General skepticism: The robot is physically present but nowhere near a real consumer product (11:17).

Quote:
“I feel like it's irresponsible for anyone to report on Cloyd as if it's real. Like it’s real in the sense it's physically there, but this is not something that can be purchased or is sold or even does the very simple thing.” – Ed (11:17)

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3. Robotics, Gadgets, and the Mush of Mediocrity

• The show is saturated with unremarkable automation: “janky” robots, endless chatbot integrations, and a general lack of “whimsy” or playfulness that once characterized CES.
• Compared to previous years, there are fewer actual TVs and interesting home consumer tech, and more abstract or industrial-focused exhibitions (14:49).
• “The natural endpoint of CES: half of this shit’s never going to exist anyway. Man, fuck it. Just connect it to the magic API thing and then, product please invest.” – Ed (56:13)
• Chloe Radcliffe and other panelists long for weird, fun, wild ideas—even if half-baked.
• Humanoid robots are mostly expensive labor gimmicks, with questionable use-cases and a hard-to-shake connection to the concept of servitude (see “robots as slaves” discussion, 125:04).

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4. A Bright Spot: Assistive Exoskeletons

• The “Hypershell” exoskeleton is praised for actual utility—enhancing mobility for people with injuries or physical limitations (25:00).
• Discussion of modes (eco, hyper, experimental “fitness” resistance) and robust battery life (30:18).
• Garrison enjoys trolling a colleague by remotely switching exosuit modes (26:50).
• Panel agrees: genuine utility gadgets are rare but deeply appreciated.

Quote:
“With so much useless shit here, a way to help people walk feels almost like the platonic ideal of CES, other than a giant television.” – Ed (28:21)

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5. Panels, Tariffs, Manufacturing Realities, and Policy

• Brief detour into US manufacturing, tariffs, and their (lack of) impact: Outsourcing continues, jobs are not coming back, and most components needed for tech aren’t made in the USA (50:06).
• Politicians are out of touch; most actions are performative rather than policy-driven.
• Data centers provoke local opposition due to environmental impacts, and the panel discusses how Big Tech (and AI companies like OpenAI) externalize costs onto communities (52:01).
• “Property tax revenue for counties ... but there's no benefit for people nearby. They don't generate jobs. You don't get faster Internet because you have a data center one street away.” – Rob Pegoraro (53:23)

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6. Labor, Tech Privilege, and Economic Anxiety

• Powerful discussion about socio-economic divides in tech:
  • Story of a recently laid-off restaurant worker turned Uber driver spotlights the precarity and indignity faced by workers (61:23).
  • Panel reflects on how many in tech come from privileged backgrounds and often lack empathy for labor—the actual people who make daily life possible (65:09).
• Chloe: “A lot of people who work in tech didn’t grow up in depressed areas…or under the poverty line.”
• Ed: “If you don’t respect service workers, you’re not welcome on this fucking show.” (68:06)
• Concerns raised over Vegas’s broader economic signals (like declining tourism, restaurant layoffs), seeing them as indicative of bigger industry trends (68:07).

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7. Whimsy, Play, and Tech's Lost Heart

• Long-time CES participants mourn the loss of fun, silly, or out-there displays—like Angry Birds parties, wild E3 stunts, and “science fair for grownups” energy (75:03).
• Now, CES is “a sexless goon cave...doing stuff for the sake of doing with no level of self-effacing.”
• The “year of robots” pitch is called out as marketing hype: Most robots are pointless, slow, and not for sale (87:57).
• The only “whimsy” comes from a children’s robot that dances like Michael Jackson, then is hilariously beaten with a stick in its demo—and survives. (135:23)

Quote:
“The lack of whimsy is just very sad because the whole thing about tech is it should be kind of fun. It is kind of... Especially for something like this where it’s for consumers, but it’s like we’re trying some shit out.” – Ed (78:20)

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8. Automation, “Robot Slaves,” and Historical Resonance (w/ Edward Ongweso Jr.)

• Discussion on the deep-rooted cultural desire for “robots as servants/slaves” and how automation is historically linked to social organization and the legacy of slavery (125:33).
• The group notes the difference between a machine that simply enhances or amplifies labor, and one that replaces a person to fulfill every whim (128:23).
• “The thing that developed [the] impetus for automation is...after the abolition of slavery, [the British Empire asked] oh my fucking God, how are we going to keep...profits? So the idea was: make the factory resemble a plantation as much as possible...” – Edward Ongweso Jr. (126:09)
• Profound discomfort with “zero-labor homes” and the notion of optimizing life at the expense of meaningful labor (132:21).

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9. Grift, Tech Fads, and “Numbers You Don’t Need”

• Many CES products (especially those with AI or LLM buzzwords) are viewed as “numbers you don’t need”—solutions in search of problems, or outright grifts (138:18).
• Chloe: “So what does that do?...so who gives a shit?”
• More energy is put into extracting money from customers than delighting or serving actual needs (96:11).
• Big tech has money sloshing around, yet claims poverty in areas like entertainment—while “pouring it into the floor at CES on stuff that won’t work.” (139:53)

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Notable Quotes & Moments (w/ Timestamps)

• “It’s physically in the Las Vegas Convention Center, Central Hall, LG booth. But this is not something that can be purchased or is sold or even does the very simple thing. I feel like I’m going insane.” – Ed, on Cloyd robot (11:17)

• “The odd thing is like. And there was so much RO in LVCC this year, like north hall full, full of robotics. And it’s robotics that I. That if you’ve seen it, say yes before. But it’s always been. They’ve always been kind of janky. And you haven’t seen like big companies like LG really mess with it because it’s all kind of janky. And I was just kind of surprised that LG is actually like dipping their toes into this...” – Garrison (10:21)

• “It’s all predatory for the person driving the car. Everything the engineer wanted to talk about was…another place where it’ll try to sell you something.” – Robert Evans, on Soundhound AI demos (99:42)

• “Half of this shit’s never going to exist anyway. So they just like, man, fuck it. Just connect it to the magic API thing. And then, product, please invest.” – Ed (56:13)

• “With so much useless shit here, a way to help people walk feels almost like the platonic ideal of CES, other than a giant television.” – Ed, on the Hypershell exosuit (28:21)

• “I have more fucking respect for anyone who works in a McDonald’s or diner or the shittiest chip shop in London or any city in the world than I will ever have for anyone who works at fucking Google.” – Ed (68:06)

• “Automation [was] designed to resemble slavery…[and] the whole heart and soul of it does link back to it.” – Edward Ongweso Jr. (126:09)

• “There is money sloshing around, hitting the sides, coming out people’s noses. Like, there is so much money. And…it’s infuriating…in entertainment, the fact that there is relatively little money, that money is tight. And…I’m like, it’s not.” – Chloe (138:50)

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Memorable Moments

• Cloyd’s Demos: Panel cracks up over just how slow and useless the LG “Cloyd” robot is—moving keys, failing to fold towels (04:21-08:24).
• “Fitness Mode” Prank: Garrison delightfully trolls a friend by switching their exosuit to “fitness mode,” making movement almost impossible (26:50).
• Market Grifts: Robert Evans exposes how modern AI agents are now mostly for up-selling and extracting money, not serving users (96:11-97:39).
• Child Companion Robot Mayhem: Amused horror as a robot Michael Jackson dances, then is attacked with a mallet and liquor bottle in a bizarre booth video (135:23-136:46).
• Elizabeth Holmes Prison Tweet: Panel reads Holmes’ jailhouse tweet and riffs on tech grifts, drawing parallels to current AI hucksterism (110:04).
• Labor Respect Rant: Ed’s heartfelt (and expletive-laden) rant about respecting service workers and labor (68:06).

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Essential Timestamps

• Robot Cloyd & Demo Analysis: 04:01–13:04
• Panelist Observations on Diminished CES: 13:34–15:37
• Exoskeleton (Hypershell) Review: 25:00–31:26, 35:36–39:45
• Discussion on Labor and Tech Privilege: 61:23–68:06
• Robots as “Slaves” (philosophy, history): 125:04–128:23
• Lost Whimsy at CES: 75:03–78:08
• AI Grift / Pointless Products: 96:11–99:56
• Child Companion Robot Madness: 135:23–136:46
• Panel’s Final Reflections: 138:18–140:57

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Conclusion

CES 2026, as portrayed in this episode, is a microcosm of a tech industry infatuated with hype, automation, and profit extraction—but struggling with creativity, utility, and actual progress. The Better Offline team brings humor and passionate critique to issues ranging from exploitative business models and historical labor analogies, to the lack of socioeconomic empathy within Big Tech. It’s an episode rich with wit, insight, and a longing for the days when tech still dared to be fun—and perhaps, just a bit more honest.

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Further Listening/Reading

• Chloe Radcliffe: @ChloeBadcliffe; Tour dates in Cincinnati, D.C., Philly
• Ed Zitron: [Newsletter link in show notes]
• Rob Pegoraro: Tech journalism archives, Twitter
• Better Offline Discord & Reddit: see podcast notes

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(Summary by Better Offline Podcast Summarizer in the spirit and tone of the show)

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[E]

Damn, they got me feeling like white Michael Clayton I'm Ed Zitron and this is Better Offline's coverage of the Consumer Electronics Show. We are as we have been all week here in the beautiful Palazzo Hotel in beautiful Las Vegas, Nevada, bringing you yet another episode covering CES with a crazy assortment of guests from the tech industry. We've got an open bar, tacos and places to sit down for the members of the media, whether they join us on the microphone or not. This is our second episode of the day. It's Thursday, and we've got two more on Friday and an epilogue on Saturday. Then they're going to roll me into one of the aqueducts here and flush me into the sewer. But before they do that, it's time to introduce the latest contestants on the CES Challenge. Joining me, as ever, is stand up comedian and star of it is this thing on Chloe Radcliffe. No, not anymore.

[A]

Unfortunately.

[E]

No, not unfortunately.

[A]

They love you. No, very fortunately, I'm still here. You can't get rid of me and.

[E]

We will not be. And of course, it could happen. Here's Garrison Davis.

[B]

Hello, good morning.

[E]

And tech writer Rob Pegaro joining us once again.

[D]

It's good to be back.

[E]

It sure is good to have you. Lovely to see you. So, g, what have you been up to? What are you seeing today?

[B]

I've been at LVCC all day.

[E]

What did you. Lvcc?

[B]

Oh, my goodness. I realized I said good morning because the CES time distortion starting to kick in.

[E]

Oh, absolutely. Well, you were in, like, Tokyo a week ago, so your time is the best.

[B]

Best is an interesting word. The most interesting thing I saw today is I happened to arrive at the LG booth right as their home assistant robot demo started for the first time. Cloyd.

[E]

Cloyd Cloydrage.

[B]

So I got to see that in action for their first demo.

[E]

Walk me through the action part of this action. Like, how was the action?

[A]

Maybe it's maybe more proper to say I got to see Cloyd in.

[B]

Oh, it was, it was. It was.

[A]

Action is generous.

[B]

It was breathtaking because it's gonna change so many people's lives.

[E]

How so?

[B]

So they gave us three different scenarios. One is you have this clumsy dad who always forgets his keys. And the robot is able to find the keys, then put them somewhere else. Which is an interesting solution to the problem of losing your keys, because it was frame them. So this, this, this, this clumsy father of two put it, left his keys on the couch. Then the robot walks over to the couch and grabs him from the couch and moves them to a different location in the house, which seems like a machine that just makes you lose your keys.

[E]

The Jester AI. I am here to add chaos to your life.

[B]

So it was framed as losing your keys, but it's just the robot moving keys around, right?

[E]

At what speed did it do this? Would you say?

[B]

Glacial?

[E]

Just like real slight.

[B]

It's very slow. Its second segment was like A rich single guy who doesn't have anyone living with him.

[F]

Nice.

[B]

Who has this robot as a quote unquote roommate. And the roommate mostly does laundry. And I watched this robot spend, I kid you not, 90 seconds putting a single shirt in the washing machine and then also spent, I would say about two minutes attempting to fold a towel. How'd it do again? I used the word attempting. Yeah, it got about half the towel folded after two minutes and then was directed towards the next part of the demo. So it could not finish the folding a single towel task. I'm sure if you give it five minutes it could fold a towel.

[A]

That's actually a high amount of confidence based on everything you've described.

[E]

Yeah, we trained it entirely on stoner data.

[B]

It moves like someone who's had way too much weed.

[E]

Just forget what you're doing.

[B]

By the time, the time the third demo started, I had, I had to go, I had enough.

[E]

But you've been there seven hours watching it fold one.

[B]

It was like a middle aged woman whose, whose robot was like trying to get her to like work out more.

[E]

I saw that one and I mentioned it earlier. It was like, here you go. And it's got like 1 pound weights. And she goes, thanks, Cloyd. If you didn't give me this, I wouldn't even move.

[B]

The most, the most interesting part of the demo was and like I got to see like the robot, you know, try to do a lot of these things that it wasn't just on the screen, but it was. The presenter kept reiterating that Claude knows what you want before you even have to say anything.

[D]

Oh, that's not creepy at all.

[B]

And that was the thing because the Claude gets to observe you and learn your patterns and learn your habits what you like. And you can also input this data. And it was during the towel folding segment, he even made a joke because it was taking too long. It was like, ah, yes, Claude was able to fold the towel exactly, exactly like I like it.

[D]

Is this Cloyd the robot or Claude the AI?

[B]

Yes.

[D]

Does Cloyd run, Claude?

[E]

I mean, I. Probably not. I mean it's slow and expensive.

[D]

So I guess.

[E]

And also just from my understanding, this thing is fucking huge. Oh, it's big. It's giant.

[B]

It's big. Yeah.

[E]

You just have this offensively large.

[B]

It's like, it's like, it's like me sized. Yeah, yeah.

[E]

It's also super wide, like a, like a big scooter. Like the kind of scooter you see.

[D]

It's like a Sort of stormtrooper turned butler, I guess.

[A]

Yeah.

[E]

But it learns what you need other.

[B]

Than like, like C3, C3PO.

[A]

Any rapidity.

[E]

Yeah. Like a towel folded faster than seven minutes or correctly.

[A]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

And if it's in. The presenter made a joke. Is that because. Because Cloyd wasn't able to fully fold the towel. He made a joke about how that's how he actually prefers his towels being folded. Because this was. This was like an ongoing statement he kept making. He was like, you know, Cloyd knows how long I want my croissants cooked so he can bake my croissants. Left undercooked so he can bake my croissants exactly how long I want to. He also Cloy prepared a snack during the demo and the snack was taking milk out of the fridge and putting the milk carton down on the counter. Because I do not know if the robot fingers were able to unscrew the milk.

[E]

He loves my snack of milkies.

[B]

Like the milk carton, actually. So it was just taking the milk, putting it on the counter. But for the wife and father of two. Wife and father, for the couple and their kid demo, the robot was like, you know, if you're too busy, the robot can make breakfast for your family in the morning. Well, the robot can put a tray of croissant dough that's pre prepared in the oven.

[A]

So you have to put the croissant.

[E]

Yeah, you have to put the croissants on there.

[B]

Unclear. No, the robot can take as long as the dough magically exists.

[A]

Sure.

[B]

Claude Cloyd can walk towards the oven. The oven will automatically open with the new LG Smart oven and then put the tray in. But as in take the tray out.

[A]

You still have to line the croissants.

[B]

Yeah.

[E]

And you also have to unroll those tubes.

[A]

It can do the easiest part to.

[D]

Afford drone delivery of croissants from a really good.

[B]

The part that we saw was moving tray into oven. How the croissant dough got on the tray, complete mystery. How the milk got from the carton into the glass also, we'll never know.

[A]

My question is, did the nice actor who they hired to lie seem.

[B]

Well, acting is lying.

[A]

Exactly. And he is good at his job. Seem like self aware at all?

[F]

Yes, A little bit.

[A]

Like he seemed a little embarrassed.

[B]

He did a good job. Yeah.

[E]

This is also Vegas. People humiliate themselves.

[D]

Just think about the paycheck.

[F]

Yeah.

[B]

When he.

[E]

Yes.

[B]

When the robot spent 90 seconds putting a shirt in the washing machine. It was framed as Claude being extremely thorough. Look, look, look how thorough.

[E]

Yeah, it knows my specifications. I like shit done wrong and slow. I like my stuff done poorly. It's like if I needed someone to do something slowly and poorly, as I said, I would do it myself.

[B]

The odd thing is like. And there was so much RO in LVCC this year, like north hall full, full of robotics. And it's robotics that I. That if you've seen it, say yes before. But it's always been. They've always been kind of janky. And you haven't seen like big companies like LG really mess with it because it's all kind of janky. And I was just kind of surprised that LG is actually like dipping their toes into this because it's not, it's not necessarily new technology, but it's at the same level of jank as it was like a year and a half ago. But for some reason they decided to like go for it.

[E]

They got nothing else. I genuinely. It's just headline grabs. It's just. I fucking read Wall Street Journal story today. I'm not even named the reporter because he should know better. But it's like, yeah, this is the year of the robots. And one of the. I swear to God, most of the robots they mentioned didn't exist. It was like Cloyd. I think they mentioned Cloyde. I feel like it's irresponsible for anyone to report on Cloyd as if it's real. Like it's real in the sense it's physically there.

[B]

It's physically in the Las Vegas Convention Center, Central Hall, LG booth.

[E]

But it's like this is not something that can be purchased or is sold or even does.

[A]

Like it does anything.

[E]

The very simple thing. I mean, I feel like I'm going insane.

[A]

I made this point last time we were talking about, we were talking about Cloyd on some other episode I can't.

[E]

Remember, several years ago.

[A]

Yeah, truly. But so I know that this is a repeat point for anybody for, for.

[B]

The real out there.

[A]

But the keys finding thing for the robot to be able to find the keys, that means that the keys must have some kind of airtag chip on them. Like that's how the robot maybe it's possibly. In which case you go, how about you just put an airtag on your keys?

[B]

Sure. I, I think Cloyd might be able to find the keys via just visual recognition. Like Cloyd was like sorting laundry by color. Cloyd Washing certain items but not washing others.

[A]

It just Feels like if I can't visually see my keys.

[B]

Well, you know, you're. You're a busy dad. You don't have time.

[A]

I am a busy dad.

[B]

You don't have time.

[E]

Dad and wife are busy with AI but doing productivity.

[B]

Woman.

[F]

Oh, no.

[E]

Woman is. Because at CES 2026, she was given pink battery pack.

[A]

I was, I was, I was walked around a little. A little power bank thing. And he pointed to the pastel colors and was like, this is it. It looks like a foundation. It looks like a makeup. And I was like, ah, yes, that's for girls. And I. And I pointed at a black one and I was like, that make me go, no. Bad. But this make me go, yes. And he was like, could not see. Actually, he just kept it and kept telling me. Power banks for girls.

[E]

It's woke.

[B]

Woke is truly, truly dead. Yeah.

[E]

No, but Woke 2 in CES 2027 is gonna be.

[B]

It's gonna be intense.

[E]

They're gonna be the gender forcing machine.

[B]

I mean, yeah, they already have like the, the like accessibility stage this year. It's Woke 2 is going to be bigger.

[E]

Yeah, it's going to be like the. The caliphate section and the gender section, the forced transgender section. That's going to be fucking great. Sure, we're all changing genders next year. It's happening, folks.

[A]

But that means you get a power bank. That's whatever color you want.

[E]

I can get a pink power bank. That sounds fucking great. We're all changing our genders next year. No, it's. What else do you see?

[D]

Gas?

[A]

I mean, it's.

[B]

Honestly, what was more interesting to me at Central hall was what I didn't. Didn't see.

[E]

What was that?

[B]

I didn't see Nikon. I didn't see Canon.

[D]

Really.

[B]

I didn't see Samsung.

[D]

They were not there.

[B]

They don't have booths this year. Holy shit. The Panasonic booth. Very bare. Not really any product. There's like enterprise products. There's like, you know, energy efficiency products. There's like software, there's chips, but there's not many physical products. There's no, like, Panasonic cameras. That's the Sony booth.

[E]

Samsung, isn't that. No, I'm sorry.

[B]

The Sony booth just has cars in partnership with Honda.

[D]

Well, they've been weird the last several years.

[E]

Like, but Samsung.

[B]

But Sony.

[D]

Well, they do have. Samsung has that exhibit somewhere in the Wynn.

[E]

Usually they have like the Samsung Megalopolis.

[B]

Like a giant booth.

[D]

Yeah.

[B]

Not there. And Sony's exhibits is very small this year. It's Just cars and no Nikon. Well, Nikon. No Nikon. Which has had huge boosts at CES the past, like three, four years.

[D]

Yes.

[E]

I get this weird feeling about this show that something is up.

[B]

Something is really weird to see.

[E]

Doesn't feel right because I saw like a chunk of a casino just with nothing there, no tables open. I think it was even at the Palazzo, which is just fucking strange. But something feels missing. It doesn't feel like there are less televisions like last year.

[B]

There is less television.

[D]

Yeah.

[E]

There's like a television variety. You could stride around like, looking at all the various giant TVs that all look and sound the same. And that was fun. This year it's smaller, weirder. And I mentioned this in another episode, usually they keep the country based stuff in the basement in Eureka Park. Yeah, it was top secret.

[B]

Topside, it's top.

[E]

Okay, so I'm not going insane.

[B]

There was some top side stuff last year, but it was much smaller. But there's, there's, there's way, way bigger topside pavilions. Very strange Above, Above Eureka this year.

[E]

This is a bad sign.

[B]

There's a lot of, a lot of shifts. No, this, this CS definitely feels, feel, feels very different. And I, I don't want to be just like, cynical for the sake of being cynical. Like, I, I want to have a fun time at ces.

[E]

I actually am serious. I would love that. I would love to see some shit that makes me go cool. I would love that.

[B]

And, yeah, I don't know, like, I tried on some new, new, New to me auto translating earbuds today. I know, I know. I've done a lot of auto translation stuff so far, but these ones were really good. These ones were fast.

[E]

Do you know who they were by?

[B]

Let me, let me.

[E]

Okay.

[B]

Let me look through my notes.

[E]

It's.

[D]

No.

[E]

I must say, though, I'm not.

[B]

They were, they were in, they were in North Hall. Okay. I'm trying to find them.

[E]

Yeah, I don't think any of us are trying to be reflexively single. Why are you looking up, Rob? What have you seen? Let's bring you in.

[D]

So, yeah, I've, I've now sort of completed my inspection. I'm flying home this evening. And. Yeah, so west hall is the usual weird exhibit of things with wheels and sometimes tank treads. It's all the mobility stuff, which was Never part of CES first year ever came here. God help me. 1998. Yeah, yeah. No, there's lots of interesting stuff being done with, you know, portable solar power okay. Like, if we had balcony solar legalized in the U.S. that's where you'd see it in the north hall.

[B]

Right.

[D]

Central hall is. You know, that's still some exhibits with TV vendors. Companies like Hisense and TCL were sort of devoting more space to that. And Samsung has sort of moved off site. And, yeah, Panasonic, half of their stuff was like, here's what we do for data centers.

[B]

Yep.

[D]

Which are. Speaking as a Virginian, they're not that popular. People do not like these.

[H]

Yeah.

[E]

I imagine you've seen quite a few of those recently.

[D]

Every time I fly at a Dulles airport. Can't miss them. And today I finally got over to the Venetian to look at the sort of smart home exhibits upstairs. Downstairs is Eureka park, which is all the real sort of cats and dogs. Random international.

[E]

Just the random. The stray dogs that walk around Eureka Park.

[D]

That's where you have the weirdest stuff. Definitely.

[E]

I think they need to lean into that with Eureka Park. They need to make it dirtier. They need to have, like, a dive bar in the corner. Let a few straight rocks. Like the It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia episode where they go to Atlantic City and there's just, like, dogs walking around. I think, like, they need to make it weird and gross, because I think that's the only thing that will make it interesting.

[A]

I had the unfortunate order of going to Eureka park. First. I went. I. The first day that I got here, I just had an hour before the show floor closed. And so all I could do was be in the Venetian. Venetian. And Ed had been like, oh, the downstairs is the weirdest. And so I, like, wandered around the upstairs of Venetian a little bit. And then I was like, I gotta hit the downstairs. Whatever. So basically, that was my intro, and I was like, this stuff fucking rocks. Yeah. I mean, it's insane. It's batshit. It's 99% unnecessary.

[E]

Yes.

[A]

But it's so funny. And I was just having a ball, having the time of my life. Even. Even the upstairs at Venetian has been great. And then the last two days at the. At the convention center, I've been like, the fuck is this. Is this useful shit that you think I'm gonna actually incorporate into my life? Get the fuck away from me. I want the weird shit that I can make fun of.

[E]

Yeah, I. I'm sorry for that. I wish the show was more dopey, but it's kind of. It's sad.

[A]

I want.

[E]

I want. I like the novelty stuff or I want, like, big and stupid. I Hear, there's a giant tractor I somehow miss. That's very me.

[B]

I saw the tractor today. What?

[D]

Wait, the.

[E]

What was just the John Deere combine.

[D]

Or was there another one?

[B]

No, the combine.

[D]

Yeah, that's.

[E]

It could be fun if there were.

[D]

Two big green machine actually imported some. Some corn from some farm in Iowa to plant in front of it to show you what it actually does.

[E]

Interesting.

[D]

Yeah.

[E]

Yeah. I wonder why. Like, I feel like if you have a farm, you probably know about tractors.

[A]

Yeah. But I don't know that the people here looking at that tractor are people who have farms.

[E]

Right. But my point is, then why did you put the tractor there?

[A]

It sounds like.

[D]

Because you can. It's a giant green machine with.

[E]

The thing is, if their reason was just like, we can.

[F]

Fine. I love that.

[E]

That's great. But yeah, so these, these headbutts. Head.

[B]

Time kettle.

[E]

Wow.

[B]

Time kettle.

[E]

You could. You could have given me 7 million years that wouldn't have come up with that name.

[B]

Yeah, they were very fast. Like nearly leg. Free conversational translations.

[E]

That's awesome. Do you know how much they cost or anything like that? Did they tell you? Because so many of these places just don't. It's like, when can I get it? Oh, no, no, not. We don't do that here. We don't sell things or put prices on things. We are simply. We are simply showing you something so we can raise money and then run away. Oh, no.

[B]

Yeah. They definitely, definitely have been selling them the past few months. And I will. I will also go through my notes.

[E]

No, it's okay.

[B]

It's.

[A]

Rob, can I ask. Solar balcony. Solar, Yeah.

[E]

I was actually. This was in the back of my mind, too.

[A]

Is that where somebody. Is that where you have, you know, tiny little baby solar panels on your porch and you can sell the electricity back to the electric company?

[D]

The whole idea is you don't. So this is something that's very popular in Germany. I was in IFA in September in Berlin. Right. And if you walk around the city, you'll see solar panels on balconies next to flags and flowers and everything all over the place. And the whole idea is it's very cheap. It's not enough to like, power your whole flat, but it will. It's enough. You put two, maybe three solar panels outside, you plug them into an outlet, and that's it. And they sort of found some way to legalize it and they flow back. So the whole term outlet is apparently wrong because it is bi. Directional.

[A]

An inflow.

[E]

Yeah. Also an inlet.

[A]

Oh, Wait, you mean what I think of as an outlet, that thing we've.

[D]

Been lied to our entire lives are also inlets. Yep.

[E]

And Phil just stepped in. Which is to say they're lying to you about those plugs that have two spikes.

[D]

They're very big on the electrical system.

[E]

You can take Phil, you agree with this?

[F]

Of course I do.

[A]

Yeah.

[E]

The ones with the two plugs on the end, you plug them in, they're legal, right?

[B]

Mail to mail.

[E]

Yeah.

[B]

Yeah. Mail to mail is illegal in most. In most states, mail to mail is.

[E]

Legal due to woke electricity. People who don't want you. Maybe not Alabama, they're trying to overturn. In Texas, they are actually. It's the state flag.

[D]

It's.

[E]

It's a.50 cal rifle just wrapped in. Mail to mail. Yes.

[B]

So that $400.

[E]

$400 for the. I can see. I can.

[B]

Do they need to be WI FI connected phone conducting? No. I mean, I think no. The Bluetooth to the phone. So, like, your phone will need. But I feel like they're running the computer through the phone.

[A]

But. But I'm asking, does the phone need a WI fi. Can need.

[B]

It's probably need cell.

[A]

It's not an on device. LLM. Listen to me.

[D]

There we go. Buzzwords.

[B]

No, it is. It is. It is not on device.

[E]

I will say with that one.

[B]

Uses other LLMs.

[E]

I will say with that one, if it's immediate, then the situation you'd be using that is like international business. So I can kind of get it.

[B]

Yeah, it was fine.

[E]

But I'm kind of getting worried about, like, LLM translation, though. Sure. Because it's like, how would I possibly know? It's like it gets things wrong in the language. I understand. Imagine the one I don't.

[B]

Yeah.

[F]

And.

[E]

But at the same time, I like this text. So, you know, who knows if that will exist. I want. I want that to work. But it's like. Because the pebble watch we're talking. The pebble ring we were talking about earlier, that's on device somehow.

[D]

Right.

[E]

And that's cool. It's just like. But the thing is, on device is very difficult. It's not. I can understand why people are doing it. It's just what happens if this becomes more expensive, which it most certainly will. I don't know. But, Rob, you've been going to CES since 1998, as we've just established.

[D]

I think a lot about the life choices that put me in.

[A]

What do you think about those?

[E]

No, seriously, how do you feel about this ces? How does it compare to even last or the year before?

[D]

So honestly, I would say.

[A]

And how does it compare to 1998?

[D]

Well, in 1998, this was a show about TVs and stereos, and it was the dawn of digital TV.

[E]

Look what they took from us.

[D]

People were very excited about the prospect of being able to spend like $4,000 on some 30 inch CRT that would weigh 400 pounds, but it would display 1080i resolution. Whoa. Yeah. Whoa.

[E]

Yeah.

[D]

And along the way, it's become this show about all these different parts of technology. So there's all these, you know, electric cars, solar panels, AI household robots. So I mean, like, I complain a lot about the logistics because it is such a pain in the ass to get around, but yesterday, in the span of like 4 hours Walking around LVCC North, I talked to a company developing, building a test fusion power plant in Massachusetts. Who else? Let me take a look at my notes. It was a bizarre sequence of events.

[A]

All right, let's wait. Sorry. Say that as in a new nuclear.

[D]

Power plant in nuclear fusion power plant.

[B]

Oh, wow.

[E]

Oh, this is non existent.

[D]

It's been 20 years away my entire life.

[E]

You know, it's. That's my favorite thing about all the nuclear stuff. It's like nuclear power is real, but it's like fission.

[A]

Yep.

[E]

We are just. We are mere decades away from this 20. Like fusion.

[A]

Fusion. Yeah.

[E]

There's the whole fission fusion thing. I don't want to get Phil on. He actually knows what he's talking about. We don't do that on this show.

[A]

The only reason I know is because Phil told last night. Phil spent an hour explaining this and.

[E]

I was suffering a podcaster's concussion, so I was.

[D]

Which I know the other. So other random conversations I had during this little tour, just LVCC north guy with a battery company in Singapore where they're building much of the battery out of paper.

[B]

Oh, yeah, yeah.

[E]

Robert was launching this. Yeah.

[F]

So there.

[D]

So that's really neat. Yeah. I tried on an exoskeleton to my legs.

[E]

We've heard a few people.

[B]

Which one?

[E]

Yeah, which one?

[B]

How was it?

[D]

Hypershell.

[B]

I was wearing Hyper Shell today as well.

[D]

Yeah. And so it. It's sort of like, you know, when you get on an E bike and it's. It's almost like the hand of God is pushing you down the street. Same sort of weird thing. Except your legs.

[F]

How's it feel?

[D]

Honestly?

[E]

You've both used them. Yeah, it feels good.

[D]

I mean, anything to make my feet hurt less. At the show. So maybe I should roll up wearing that thing next time.

[B]

I got really into the settings.

[E]

Tell me more.

[B]

They. They have an app and they have three different modes. I'm not sure if Robert's already talked about hypershell.

[E]

He talked about it a little bit, but he hadn't.

[B]

Me and someone else have been trading off wearing it all day. And so there's this, like, eco mode, which is like the regular mode that you can operate and you can change the percentage of how much power is getting directed to it. That changes how much it assists you. There's hyper mode, which, if you have hyper mode on and all the way you are, like, bounding. It is really pushing you forward. It is fun. It's uncomfortable. If you are walking slowly, you have to be walking fast. But if you're walking fast with it, it's really good.

[E]

I grew up in London. I live in New York. As that's amazing for a fast walker.

[B]

It's great. And you can. You can change the intensity of it, but you can. You can change, like the torque from, like, one leg to another to make. To make a different.

[E]

Is that if you have, like an injury in one leg or something? Yeah, that's really. That's actually great.

[B]

You can change, like, how much, like, input delay there is, how much it's going to, like, like, like how fast the acceleration is for when it starts moving. But something that I was using to, like, mess with the person who I was walking around with today is they have on their. For their experimental feature, they have something called fitness mode, which does the opposite.

[E]

Of the main features. Oh, it's like resistance.

[B]

It restricts movement. And this was really fun because I could have them. I could see them, like, running around on hyper mode and via my phone, I can change it to fitness mode to completely stop their bodies from moving.

[E]

Like the wrong trousers with Wallace and Grommet.

[B]

So I can just completely like, like force forced them to a standstill and it worked great. And I could. I could do it from, like. I could do it from like 30ft away on the app. And it was fantastic. It was really fun.

[E]

I've. I've been looking for more bits. That's really.

[B]

I. I've been doing this for like 8 hours. I've been so annoying with this.

[E]

I love that they got wrong trousers mode. That's so good. And honestly, I'm not cynical. I love these things. I fucking. I fucking love these. I know so many people with mob issues. I myself have a up ankle. I love this. I Love that. This feels like future tech.

[B]

And it's small. It doesn't. It doesn't get like. I've tried on many, many an exos. An exoskeleton at the cess I've been to. This one was very compact, but still so functional.

[D]

It's only wraps around your waist and your legs, so it's not really an exoskeleton. I'm like, what do you call it?

[B]

Mobility suit.

[E]

I don't know.

[D]

Add on.

[B]

But like, it's basically just like an extra set of hips kind of. Right. Could you. And hips that help. That help and that help push your knee up.

[D]

Well, they're artificially assisted hips, so they do it.

[E]

They do the hips. Finally, we've found hips that lie. Yeah, it's. I love that. I love that they've got these. Especially with like so much useless shit here. A way to, like, help people walk. Feels almost like the platonic ideal of ces, other than a giant television. A television so large you can't see all of it.

[D]

163 inches.

[E]

They got.

[B]

Yeah, I saw that too. Way too big.

[E]

They just got a big ass. Big ass tv. Hell, yeah.

[B]

Yeah.

[E]

Do you know what the price was?

[B]

It wasn't transparent.

[E]

Yeah, fuck it then.

[D]

No, I. Yeah, LG had the transparent TV.

[E]

Here's the thing. They're the useful TVs, but every year I think they should try and make a bigger one. Like just every year they're like egos. 200 inches now. Now we've got one where we have to buy part the wall. Like, yeah, just escalate constantly. And I saw on the very first day a wireless TV situation where they were like, yeah, it's for trade shows. You can get four of them and clip them into one thing. I'm like, or you could be a sports freak. And they just fucking look to me. They just look. I'm like, what? I mean, like, when I was getting my place here in Vegas, I went to look at a house where the guy had just 4 crts, all just playing different NFL games. And I also. What during that tour house didn't actually get in the end. I was just enamored with that. And honestly, it was all I could think about.

[A]

Like.

[E]

Like you could just pop up one of those sports TV things. Like Back to the Future too. You get fired by a guy from Japan. Be great. I'm not Marty McFly's dad in the future anyways. Yeah, it's. I like the ex.

[B]

Hypershell's good.

[E]

I need them to reach out to. They reached out to you. They reached out to Robert.

[F]

They.

[E]

They don't like me there. People at hypershell don't like me very much.

[A]

Yeah, they're afraid that you're going to get on your podcast and talk about them positively.

[E]

Yeah. You know what? Actually, based on the last last 12 hours, I don't blame them.

[A]

If I was hyper Shell, I'd be like, I don't know.

[F]

I don't think I.

[D]

In any way. So you're probably. They should be safe. Yeah.

[B]

You do have stats. You can see how many miles you walked, how many steps you've walked. The battery was great. Like, we. I've. Yeah, we've had this thing on since, like, since like 8am I got back to my hotel to drop it off about an hour ago, and we still had 50% of the battery left.

[D]

That's better than my phone's been doing.

[B]

And. No, it was. It has. It is. It is better than the phone. And like, we're walking at a convention center. Like, that's a lot of walking.

[A]

The fitness mode. Who are there. Is it the same 10,000 steps?

[E]

That's not bad.

[A]

Yeah. It's funny because so much of our podcasting has been looking at products that are unnecessary and pointing out the unnecessary parts of them and rightfully laughing at those. And this is a product that clearly, like, can help a ton of. Of people and is. Is wonderful technology and very worthwhile. And so I don't mean to apply the same logic, but is the person who's buying hypershell going to use the fitness mode? Those feel to me like two different use cases.

[E]

It feels like something that's probably not difficult to add.

[B]

It's an extra add on. That's the thing. It is. It is an experimental feature. It is not. They are not. I do not think they're selling them with fitness mode enabled right now.

[E]

Yeah, that makes sense.

[B]

It is. It is an experimental feature that you have to like, like click, like, agree and okay too.

[E]

All right, we're going to rotate, of course. Now, this following ad is not for hypershell. It's for something else that you should buy without reservation. Just credit cards out, please, everyone. If it's a podcast, you must listen to. I'm back to talk to you about quints again. I love their stuff. I wear the cashmere sweaters and T shirts basically every day. And I'm striding around CES 2026 wearing the cafe racer jacket. I'm eyeballing some gloves and maybe some more shirts too, as well. Maybe even that winter coat because it's still going to be cold in New York. So Quince brings together premium materials, thoughtful design and enduring quality so you stay warm, look sharp and feel your best all season. Each piece is made from premium materials by trusted factories that meet rigorous standards for craftsmanship and ethical production. And by cutting out the middleman and traditional markups, Quince delivers the same quality as luxury brand a fraction of the price. I love their stuff and I was buying it before they even did ads on the show, and I'll continue to do so. Refresh your winter wardrobe with quince. Go to quince.com beta for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's Q-U-I-N-C-E.com better free shipping and 365 day returns. Quince.com betta this is Jacob Goldstein from what's yous Problem?

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[E]

Superstition, fear and jealousy. Welcome back to Better Offline, the literal best podcast ever made. I'm Rob Zombie slamming things in the back of my Dragula is stand up comedian, comedian and star of Is this thing on Chloe Rat.

[A]

Where is she? I'll kill her.

[E]

There she is. It could happen. Here's Garrison Davis. Good evening and take right to Rob Pegaro. I, I like the fitness mode. I, I heard the moment you said that. I'm like, I want to go for it. Like, I've been really. I've been getting into more cardio stuff. I'm like, I kind of want to, I want to see how this me up.

[B]

It's really cool.

[E]

So how does, did you try the fitness mode yourself?

[B]

Yeah.

[E]

How does, how does it exert the pressure? Like, is it the. Is walking more difficult?

[B]

Yeah, it's more difficult. You can't. You, you have to really strain to like step more than like maybe like half a foot.

[A]

Is it just that it sort of like binds up the mechanism? I think so.

[B]

I think it's, I think it's like, it's, it's like locking the motor or applying, applying resistance to them.

[A]

So you have to then push forward.

[B]

Takes. It takes way more effort because I.

[E]

Mean you've already got like weighted pants and stuff. I know this sounds like I'm doing it. You do. You actually do have these things. You have like sweatsuits.

[A]

Well, that's sort of what I, that's where I wind up coming to is like this feels.

[B]

You can change the.

[F]

You can.

[B]

You, you have like, you have like, like, like a slider. Like you can change the settings for it.

[A]

I, I totally follow. I totally follow. And the. If, if we were not so positive on the rest of the product, you.

[E]

Can trash it either.

[A]

I just am like this. I'm thinking of Conover, of Adam Conover saying this is a solved problem. You know where I'm like, we have weighted vests or we have.

[E]

My thing is with fear vest.

[A]

You know how people bought the like Nordic tracks? Do you remember those, the cross, the Intern three ski machines. And that there was like a year where everybody's like, everybody's got to get a Nordic track.

[E]

Yeah.

[A]

And then now and then a bunch of people just have a Nordic track sitting in their basement that they don't need.

[E]

I think the difference with this is not only is an experimental feature, it's not trying to be a one size fits all thing because as you can.

[B]

Use it while hiking.

[E]

Yeah.

[B]

So if you, if you want to have a more of a workout while hiking and there's settings for going uphill, downhill and it changes the way that like how, how the motors like function. So it does have a lot of.

[E]

It's not being sold on this.

[B]

Pardon?

[E]

It's not being sold on this idea. This is an experimental idea.

[D]

They even told me about the fitness mode. I tried eco mode and they took.

[A]

One look at you.

[D]

Hyper mode, 55 year old kite. I have enough trouble getting around already.

[E]

We don't need to do this walking.

[B]

Race, walking uphill, downhill, upstairs, downstairs, gravel cycling, running, mountain packing and sand dunes are the adaptive motion.

[E]

Like I can't. I would love to because my ankle gets up if I walk more than a mile. I would love this.

[B]

Yeah.

[E]

Diaper shell reach. Hyper shell reach out to me. Like, I swear to God, they're never.

[D]

Going to know that you called them diaper shell.

[F]

They're not gonna.

[E]

I'm not gonna call them diaper shell again. It'll be fine. That was the last time.

[B]

As soon as you're like, you can't take it off when you're, when you need to use the bathroom. Diaper shell.

[E]

Yeah. Oh God. Yeah. So okay, Rob, back to you.

[D]

Yes.

[E]

Anything else you. Well, actually was there anything you really loved during this? Was anything you saw? You're like, yeah.

[D]

The story of. There's a company called Donut Lab that does not actually make. It's not a donut making robot. They introduced a solid state battery for electric vehicles.

[E]

So we had a very brief conversation about this and then someone emailed me and said they want more. So guess fucking what. One listener. It's your lucky day.

[D]

Reader service. So it is kind of mystery how they've done it because this has traditionally been the holy grail. Supposedly if you can get the battery chemistry, everything in the physics to work, you have a much lighter battery that's cheaper, that charges faster, that is far more cycle. And they, they say they've done all these things, but they're being very cagey about them. And they also say the. The minerals are globally available, widely so.

[E]

But they won't say which one.

[D]

Like, what's the catch? Is one of the other ingredients. Kittens, what are we. What's going on here? And so we'll have to see. Like, they. They showing off a motorcycle, which includes the battery.

[E]

Did you use it? Was it.

[D]

No, they just had it parked there. It's a $30,000 and up electric motorcycle. Looks great. But if they've cracked the code for that, and there's lots of other people working on solid state batteries, and given that EVs are already good, like, you know, you have this thing, you can charge it at home, you know, a fast charger. It's enough time for me to take a nap, which I like doing.

[E]

Right.

[D]

So address the other concerns people have.

[A]

Is it big enough to power a vehicle that's bigger than a motorcycle?

[D]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, definitely. Though, like, they showed off. There's some company that makes like an electric car chassis with the sort of skateboard thing where the batteries are right underneath the center. That's how most EVs are designed. So, yeah, their whole aim is to have us in a lot of different cars. Like, they say they'll have news soon about car partnerships, so big deal.

[E]

But if this is true, it's like a revolution in all carbon vortex.

[D]

Yeah, and. And not just that. I mean, like drones, trains for that matter, because we don't know how to build transportation infrastructure affordably in America. Lots of railroad operators who'd rather put the battery on the train than put the wires above the tracks.

[E]

I just want to be clear. If this is true, I will be the most excited about this ever. If Donut Labs ends up being fake, I'm going to spend multiple episodes destroying this fucking company.

[D]

So dirty.

[E]

No, no, no, you won't. Because it's an exciting and cool thing. And if this is real, it's fucking amazing. If it's not, I will learn everything about this company and publish it on this fucking podcast.

[D]

They're on notice.

[E]

No, they genuinely are.

[A]

But it also sounds like somebody is going to cr.

[D]

Well, yeah, like there are enough other. There's enough money being put at solve. Directed at solving the problem. Yeah, and what's.

[A]

What's. It going to do? I mean, is the. Is the oil industry going to have an even bigger paroxysm than we've.

[E]

The thing is with the oil industry. Yeah, but they're also well invested in this stuff too, and they will find ways to make money off of this. They will not like it, but it's kind of hard to to deny electricity.

[F]

Right.

[E]

But nevertheless, they don't love it.

[A]

Probably.

[D]

Yeah. I mean, the. The whole trend. The trend has been going on for years and years, and it's just right now in the US we have this president who has just some deranged notions of energy and affordability, and I think his head is stuck in 1986, which is why he thinks it's a good idea to, you know, hijack Venezuela. As if. It's like sticking up a gas station.

[E]

Yeah, it's. I love living in. And I want to live. You know what I would love? I'd love to live in precedented times. I'd love to live in boring times. I. I'm. I've had too many interesting events happen. I'd like to go back to boredom, but sadly, they're not going to allow me. It's. It's frustrating because I've been asking people genuinely, seriously, bring me stuff you're excited about. And everyone keeps coming back with, like, you know, it was kind of. Honestly, the exoskeletons are the one unilaterally thing other than big tractor. And again, I must be clear. Big thing. Big, huge thing. That's just big tv. I know. I fucking love it. I'm an ape.

[B]

One of the best CES moments I've ever had is when we saw, maybe two years ago, we saw the USPS's first one of those.

[E]

The Duck Face truck.

[D]

Yes.

[B]

Electric Duck vehicles. And I was like, this is rad. This thing looks great. And like, two years later, I saw them rolling around the same city, and that rocks.

[E]

I. I love that.

[D]

So I. I. Oshkosh, the company that makes it, they had a media day at their facility in Wisconsin. Flew me out there. I got to drive it.

[F]

Whoa.

[A]

Yeah.

[E]

Tell me more about that.

[D]

So, I mean, so, first of all, it looks the way it does because you want something where people can stand up in the back.

[A]

Right.

[D]

And so which you can't do right now in these 1980s vintage trucks, the postal service is rolling around. It's got air conditioning, it has cup holders, all the modern convenience. And, yeah, Oshkosh took a long time to sort of get production ramped up. It seems like they're doing that now. And, yeah, it was neat. They also showed off, like, a battery electric garbage truck, which I got to drive.

[B]

Nice.

[D]

It was the quietest garbage truck I've ever driven. Also the only one. But whatever.

[E]

I mean, I'm really. I just love the idea of driving a truck around. Yay, garbage truck.

[A]

Here's A. Okay, here's a question that I had the thought of in an earlier episode and didn't wind up asking. Asking Oshkosh, the company that makes those trucks, is a huge defense contractor. Makes a ton of military vehicles.

[D]

They do indeed.

[A]

I was reading on X the Everything app that ICE and cpb, CBP was. Has been seen using smart glasses to, like, record protesters and stuff.

[D]

Yep.

[A]

How much of the tech that we see at CES winds up getting filtered into what I would consider nefarious action?

[D]

Probably a lot. I mean, the fact that ISIS apparently using some sort of facial recognition system against some database that I didn't know the government entirely, had to see if someone is an American citizen, which, yeah, I have a lot of problems. Well, where do we start? I mean, maybe, like, perhaps they could not murder American citizens.

[E]

Yeah, that would be fantastic.

[D]

And then try to cover it up.

[E]

Oh, God, I'm gonna be shot.

[B]

Two more people.

[F]

Yeah.

[E]

Cbp.

[B]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[E]

I'm gonna be. I'm gonna say something completely honest. People do email me and ask, why don't I ever say anything? Because I'm a fucking immigrant and I'm terrified of saying anything about it at all. And if you're ever wondering if I have opinions on this, I do, but I'm terrified to say anything. Do not think that I don't have thoughts or feelings about someone being shot to fucking death and mother. Which is disgraceful and disgusting. But I have to, like, I am very guarded about it. It's not that I don't care. It's that as an immigrant with a child in America, I die here. So, yeah, very fun fucking week for everyone.

[D]

Yeah.

[B]

But this thing you're talking about, we see a lot of this with, like, the drone tech and, like, one of the. One of the first CS's I went to, and you still see this now in the show is like. Like, it was on, like, you know, advancing drone technology, and it was, like, half put on by Walmart and half put on by this police department in Southern California who launched, like, the. The first, like, big drone program, which has now been copied around the country. And this was, like, a panel with, like, both of them talking about how Walmart's doing drone deliveries and how the police are sending or sending these drones to, like, surveil neighborhoods and go to. And go to crime scenes before officers and, like, secure the area to, like, you know, see. See what's going on. And, yeah, you see this a lot with, like, the drone stuff here in ces. There's across from the, across from the creator stage, which is in central Hall.

[E]

What is the creator stage?

[B]

It's where. It's where if you're a content. It's all things content creator in creator economy. Ed, you would love the creator stage.

[E]

I'm going there tomorrow.

[B]

I. I stood next to a panel where they talked about the changing, Changing habits of gens of digital Gen Z.

[E]

Life, a presentation created by people over the age of 40.

[B]

All of them were. Yes.

[A]

What did I say? What habits were changing?

[E]

Yeah, yeah.

[B]

Again, I stood next to this panel because I just heard too many, like, things. I, I sometimes in panels, you know, like five minutes in, you're like, this is not going to be worth my time.

[E]

You just start hearing the Charlie Brown.

[B]

Parrot noise and then, and then, and then you have to. But it turns out they use TikTok to make purchasing decisions.

[D]

Hell is that. But wow, that's so skibidy of them. Did I say that right?

[A]

That rocks.

[B]

But across from the creator's tape, I've.

[A]

Been podcasting for approximately 14 hours over the last three days. That's a tough three moment.

[B]

Across from the creator stage, there's a Chinese drone company that has these. They're called drone in the box system, where basically you put it in the back of like a pickup truck and you can launch. You can launch a drone and it'll. You can like, you can launch an autonomous drone and it'll pilot. Pilot around and then go back back into the box. This. This already exists in this. We have, we have. We police departments in the States already have this, but this was like a Chinese company that, that was making. Making a lot of these. And I can pull up the.

[E]

I've noticed less consumer drones here, though. I feel like last year there was like various. There were more fun things. There was like a baseball thing. That was what.

[D]

There was a drone soccer thing last year.

[B]

One thing is GDU was the company with aerial surveillance and public safety. Were there two?

[E]

But like, I haven't seen many consumer drone companies.

[A]

No.

[D]

How many of them are now sort of banned by this order that has come out, which they're targeting dji, which. Which without them, like, where are Americans going to buy drones?

[E]

Yeah, they're targeting the horse when the barn door's been open for a few years.

[D]

Thought this through entirely.

[E]

It's just that whole thing, the whole. All of that shit's so bizarre to me. It's just like, oh, what if the. What if we fill American full of Chinese products that could be used as a. Oh, Wait, we did that? We've done that for 10 straight years. We've just. Amazon has, with various letters, put in random orders, shifted security cameras into every home for the on the cheap. Oh no. How would we stop this? Well, it doesn't start with the stores. It starts with China. The sneaky Chinese who are, I don't know, selling to America constantly. We don't stop that.

[A]

You heard it here, folks.

[E]

No, it's just very confused. I don't really understand. I don't think anyone really understands what we're doing against China at this point. It's just like we, we might let them buy stuff. Actually, that was an interesting story I saw today. Nvidia with China with these GPUs, they're saying they have to be paid completely upfront whether or not they can actually sell them. They're saying that regardless of how the sanctions work out, if you buy them, you must pay completely fucking upfront whether or not you can. You can't change your order, you can't get a refund, you can't cancel, you can't reallocate. Fuck yeah. Nvidia doing great. That's the kind of shit you do when you're like not doing well financially.

[A]

Fuck yeah.

[G]

We live in the future.

[E]

Huge.

[D]

Such a weird. Like why even.

[E]

It's just because you must think you.

[D]

Have exceedingly captive customers.

[E]

No, that's. Yeah, it's like the kind of you do when you think that you can't die and.

[A]

But you also are a little worried about.

[E]

Yes, exactly. You're like trying to pretend you're strong. And I say this in a town full of people that act like they can't die. This is the person who gets washed out first. Like this is the person who. They have all the money until they get seven down the craps take. Yeah, little craps, little craps for everyone. Anyone play craps? You listen. Email me easier. Better offline.com with Mike your craps tips if you send me toilet related stuff and be really upset. It's different kind of craps. Anyway, moving on. What else, Rob? What else do you see?

[D]

Let's see. So I've been trying to follow some of the. The political discussions. Like every washingtonian, I fly 2,000 miles to hang out with people from DC.

[E]

Yeah, exactly.

[D]

And so there's really interesting panel about tariffs Tuesday morning morning where everyone was saying this is such a dumb idea. Like this is not helping. They are a tax paid by Americans, not the Chinese. They're not helping people build factories. The CEO of This kitchen robot company suv, Robin Lisbon saying, we've created a lot of jobs. Not in the United States. They had a factory built in Mexico, one in Vietnam. None of this stuff works. None of it makes any sense.

[E]

Well, stupid question. Question, why would the tariffs make them put jobs in Mexico? And I say this genuinely not.

[D]

So her answer was basically the first of all, a lot of the components to the stuff she makes is not made in the US and will not be made in the US at any time soon.

[E]

And you can't make them here.

[D]

And. And therefore you need to import those things. And so why eat the tariffs on the stuff you need to bring to the US when you can just have them shipped to Mexico? Go pay a lesser tariff once that way.

[E]

Oh, so it doesn't change the incentives at all.

[D]

Yeah, like, we haven't suddenly magically made it reasonable for people to, you know, do all this factory work that was, you know, profitable 30 years ago.

[E]

Yeah, we're not going to pay people like nafta, was it. NAFTA is probably what caused the problem. Not like. Yeah, not like the tariffs people were paying nafta.

[D]

Now it's usmca, which now Trump thinks is terrible. It's just not. It's not policy making by grownups.

[E]

And so the rest of the panel, I'm guessing everyone kind of agreed.

[D]

Yeah, Yeah. I mean, it was. I don't imagine the fun thing is, of course, a lot of people in the electronics industry seem to think that, oh, it's great that we're pushing ahead on AI. We're getting rid of the regulatory shackles. But the problem is the person who's doing that is also the one who's imposing the tariffs. It's the same guy.

[E]

Also, we don't have regulatory shackles. You live in Virginia. You know that.

[F]

Yeah.

[E]

There's nothing.

[D]

Data center capital of the world.

[E]

All you hear in Virginia is the screaming of the computer because the computer is in pain. The GPU is hurting the computer.

[D]

We have a new governor getting sworn in in less than two weeks. Abigail Spamberger. And I think we will be seeing some things done about data centers that were not.

[E]

She's going to save the. She's going to save the computer from the GPUs.

[A]

What do you have a suspicion of what those things will be?

[D]

Well, I mean, a lot of it is.

[E]

She ran on that, didn't she?

[A]

She.

[D]

Said, we need to make sure that, like, large utility users pay their fair share, which the previous governor, Glenn Youngkin, who is, I think most people Would say he is the most mediocre governor of Virginia in the 21st century.

[E]

We have a word for me. Twat.

[D]

So, yeah, like Youngkin, he vetoed, like, really small board legislation saying, like, you know, we need to have some standards for environmental review of data. So centers, because these things are all over the place. If you take off from Dulles Airport, look to your left and right, you'll see these huge boxes with stuff on the roof, no parking lots around, nobody works in them. And they do provide a lot of property tax revenue for counties. So, like, it's a huge chunk of the revenue of, like, Loudoun County, Prince William county, western exerbs of dc. But there's no benefit for people nearby. They don't generate jobs. You don't get faster Internet because you have a data center one street away.

[A]

In fact, you get more expensive electricity.

[E]

In America, we feed those taxes into.

[D]

Something once a month. They've got to turn on the backup generators to make sure they work. So that's a lot of noise and pollution. Everyone hates them. They're really unpopular. And the whole idea that we need to do this because guys like Mark Zuckerberg and Sam Altman think that we're going to get super intelligence or AGI, so we have to sort of suck it up.

[E]

We need those GPUs to lure. This is a true story. Jeff Horowitz from Reuters. Lure a man with dementia to New York using a Kylie Jenner branded chat bot, and then he fell over and died.

[D]

Yes, true story. Yeah, yeah, that grandpa marks like a.

[E]

Bug should be in prison and everyone who worked on it should be in there with him. I'm deadly fucking serious. Everyone who worked on that. Every single fucking person. Fucking put Jenner in there as well. Her fucking face on it. Sorry. I have some, like, slightly aggressive views on this.

[D]

You do have views?

[E]

No, no, it's just. I don't know, I think it's just exploitative. But no, it's interesting hearing the data center conversation here as well, because we're have some core weave. I should go and have a look. Go and have a look at them. Oh, of all the companies to be here in Vegas. Core wave. But did you see any other panels that are of interest? So I don't just talk about.

[D]

So there's a bunch. Honestly, I'm going to have to sort of catch up via VOD when I get back home. Like every year I walk miles and miles through these exhibits. Think I've covered it all, come home, read other people, CES recaps. See all the stuff I missed.

[F]

I'm like, totally.

[D]

Did I go to the same show?

[E]

Yeah. No. Absolutely no. I walked through. I've been here for days, and there was like, yesterday when I walked through stuff, nothing was affixing to my brain. It was all just this slop of my brain just going, won't exist, won't exist. GPT wrapper.

[A]

Don't need to remember.

[D]

Laundering.

[E]

Photonics panel. Solar panel. And it was strange because usually there is, like, a good amount. And I should also be clear, cynic aside, there is a use for this. There are people who go here, buyers who are like, oh, I'm gonna. I'm building something, what have you. But it feels like it's either that or the, like, the sloppy fication of CES.

[B]

Yeah. It reminds me of, like, when 3D printers just started.

[D]

Yeah.

[B]

And then. And then you see 3D printed slop everywhere. And that is. This is interesting, like, the way that, you know, if you go to like a. Like a. Like, like a comic con or like a Ren Fair, things that used to be, you know, like handmade, cool, like, novelty goods, now it's just all these 3D printed dragons. Because we can use these. We can use these devices just to, like, print out this, like, you know, plastic bullshit. And there's a similar thing happening with these GTP wrappers.

[F]

Yeah.

[B]

Where instead of. They are kind of new products, but it's all. It's all building some physical mechanism around this. The same. The same, like the same software service.

[E]

It's the natural endpoint of ces. It's just like, half of this shit's never going to exist anyway. So they just like, man, fuck it. Just connect it to the magic API thing. And then, product, please invest. I genuine there is partly because of where I am in my life. I can't do this this year, but maybe next. I think I'm just. If they're not going to be here next year, but if there are still LLM companies next year, all I'm going to do is walk up to them and do the Radcliffe, as we call it. It's like, what. What's the point of this?

[D]

Why do I.

[A]

And who gives a shit about that?

[E]

Yeah, who cares? Who cares?

[A]

Why does that.

[E]

Who cares? Who cares? Because honestly, I don't think 90% of this show can answer that question. Last year, when I saw my favorite booth, which was the Korean baseball one, where it's just. It was like a golf tee thing, but for baseball, and the guys were like, no, you need to Step up and hit the ball. I'm like, I cannot do it. I will be shit. And then when I finally did, they were like, oh, right, you can't hit it. I'm like, I fucking told you. But when I asked him, I was like, it's for people that can hit baseballs. I'm like, yeah, I know. And, like, professional baseball players who have their own, like, mansions. And I'm like, that makes sense. I get the people who play baseball. And you want to hit the ball at home. And also just. It's fun to go to a batting cage.

[B]

Totally.

[E]

This year, it's like, I went looking for stuff like that. I really wanted, like, a baseball cage, something like that. I want. I wanted something fun.

[B]

There's a. There's a golfing. Golfing simulator.

[E]

Okay.

[F]

Okay.

[H]

Okay.

[E]

What happened? It's just golf.

[F]

It.

[B]

It pretty much. I think it's at the. You said it.

[E]

He. Heisen.

[B]

I want to say Hysense. I think it's at the Heisense booth.

[E]

That's nice.

[D]

So there. There is some. It's like a projected tennis setup in. In the Venetian Expo.

[E]

The tennis thing out the middle of it.

[B]

Yeah.

[D]

You know, the idea is, like, you're sort of like, tennis coach. It will, like, you know, serve right at you.

[B]

Try that tomorrow. Yeah.

[E]

I'm actually curious about the 10.

[H]

See, that's.

[E]

That's fun. We like that. That's good. We like tennis. We love tennis.

[A]

I had a little bit of human connection.

[E]

That's great. Tell me, please, God.

[A]

I had called a cab. So I'm staying at Harrah's. And I had called a cab from Harrah's to the convention center, and everybody just goes down to the little Uber waiting zone. And there were a handful of people, and I just kept watching car after car drive up. One person get in. The rest of us are waiting there. And it just felt insane.

[D]

Yeah.

[A]

And I think it would have felt insane even if I didn't live in New York, but living in New York and.

[E]

Yeah.

[A]

And, you know, feeling so passionately about public transit. I'm like, this really is insulting. And I. My guy pulled up, and I just turned to. There were two women who were next to me, and I was like, do you two want to get in the car with me? We don't have to talk.

[F]

Talk.

[A]

And one of them gratefully accepted, and she was like, my Uber kept canceling. I kept not being able to get a car. Thank you so much. And the other woman didn't just looked up, didn't say anything. Looked back down at her phone and I just copy that.

[E]

Now there's a New Yorker.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, truly. And she. I'm not 100% sure that she understood.

[E]

What I. Yeah, I was.

[A]

That's probably more likely, but this woman and I got in the car and we wound up riding the whole way. I mean, or, you know, or two, talking the whole way on the ride. And I asked what she did. I saw that her badge said Apple. And she was saying that she's a buyer for stores. And she said, I didn't used to work in tech. And I said, what did you used to do? And she said, well, I used to be in supply chain management. And I went, oh, that's cool. I used to be in supply chain management. And she said, oh, yeah, I used to work at Target. And I was like, oh, I used to work at Target. She said, oh, I was a business analyst. And I was like, oh, I was a business analyst at Target headquarters in Minneapolis. Were you? And yeah, yeah, yeah, for. Yeah, for two years. For two years. All soda, Coke, Pepsi, Dr. Pepper, all subsidiary brands that pass through all of the 1800 Target stores in the country pass through me. Which is insane that they let me, a nice 21 year old.

[D]

Queen of soda.

[A]

Queen of soda. I used to say pop until I worked Midwesterner. Yeah, yeah, pop, pop. Oh, yeah, I have some Pat. And she, you know what's even wilder? She worked on the snacks desk. And I trained in the snacks department. And I trained on the cookie cracker desk.

[E]

That's good.

[A]

In the snacks department. It just was like this very weird small world.

[E]

Did you learn anything about Apple or anything?

[A]

Absolutely nothing. No, I was like trying to have. I was trying. I was like trying to get in a little bit more. And I just was like, this is not. It's not. We're really sucking.

[E]

You could have done a bit. You could have been like.

[F]

Like what?

[E]

Like fruit? Just like stared at her with your mouth. Slight.

[F]

That's gold.

[E]

I know, I know. The thing, the thing about having like. Because the area in West London I grew up in, I can't. I can sound. I mean, I was about to say I can sound stupid. Really obvious setup for people to go, oh, you really.

[A]

Huh? He's learning. He's learning. What Joke.

[E]

I see that one coming. No, but you go, walla fruit. You can just have your mouth.

[A]

I'll find, I'll find her.

[E]

Yeah, this is my simpleton friend on a taxi line. He's a moron. No, I oh, my God. The idea of sharing my Uber with someone anywhere but let alone Las Vegas.

[A]

What was more interesting was the driver wound up talking about the driver worked for over 30 years at a restaurant, at some restaurant.

[E]

Oh, interesting.

[A]

And just got laid off. Lost, no severance, lost all of his benefits, now is doing Uber. And he. And he was like, there are no jobs. So many people are looking for jobs. Everybody's out of work. And he said, I just got hired back at the exact same restaurant that I worked at for over 30 years, but I got hired back at the absolute lowest entry level and only for the holiday season. And so I don't have any vacation. I can't. He said, I can't even bump somebody working in the coffee shop. Shop. I like. He. It's. It's such an insult. And it was the. The most interesting thing he said. He said, I think people in tech think that they are safe from it.

[E]

Yeah.

[A]

Because she also, she was like. She was very sweet, but she was like, you know, they should repurpose the workers.

[E]

And I was like, oh, I want to.

[A]

I know. And I was like, yeah, but the whole point, literally the point of laying off these people is. Is to not have the worker. Like, the point is to not repurpose the worker.

[E]

But it seems like they are repurposing the worker as the worker they had, but then they just pay them less.

[A]

Yeah, it's a little confusing. I mean, I mean, I think. I think both are happening. And he wound up cutting in and he said, I think people in tech think that they're safe, but they are not safe. So many tech jobs are going to fold in the next. In the coming years. And he was saying, like, AI is going to take all the jobs. And, you know, who knows?

[E]

AI is going to take all the jobs because it's going to destroy all the tech companies.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, I think that there are going to be a lot of tech jobs. And he. And he was like, when. When tech people experience it, they will not. It will take until then for them to realize what other people experience.

[E]

And it's kind of what you were saying earlier with Matt Binder, kind of an offhanded comment. You meant like, oh, somebody grew up poor? No, because the scarcity mindset of like, oh, I can't use this rig enough because it will literally die on it. I drop money myself. It's like the sense that something can run out. And it is weird. These tech people, especially the AI, the fucking smugness. And that comment is probably the Most cutting. Yeah. No, it's also probably the most intelligent thought I've heard about the tech industry all week other than on this podcast because it's like tech people really do think that they're insulated from this like tech media. They know that they can be laid off. They're well aware they. Well like they are.

[D]

Yeah. If you work at Meta and you've seen so many people fired, Microsoft, Google.

[E]

But you think safe still.

[A]

I mean it really felt like the, the you know first they came for the trade unionists but I was not a trade union so I did kind of is.

[E]

It's like this condescension towards actual labor. Like I always say, like I can complain about my job but I send little emails, I talk into the microphone and I drink my little drinks. Like I'm very lucky and I, I have a good amount of listeners who don't like a manual labor jobs and working restaurants and such. It's like rocks to hear from people. But it's like if you don't speak to those people you are going to.

[B]

Get surprised the way, the way that labor is completely cut out of a convention like this. And you know there's, there's people, people talk about innovators and like ideas and like creatives and how like how like you know, like ideas and creatives. Creative innovation is what, is what drives everything. And it drives a little bit. It has, it has, it has a little bit. But you still have to, to do the physical work, you still have to actually labor and often you have to have labor to create the conditions that allow people to innovate, quote, unquote. But that perspective, no one talks about the like the, the actual like labor part of like all of these things even like in the supply chain stuff, even like the focus on like manufacturing this year the labor is, it gets, gets completely forgotten.

[A]

It made me wonder what the broad socioeconomic background trends are for most people who work in tech. Like it may be me, it sort of made me feel like I got to imagine that some huge swaths of tech, of people who work in tech and I don't know, this is me really, really, really taking up.

[E]

No, please.

[A]

This is not even necessarily an educated guess. This is just a vibe gut. But it feels like a lot of people, some high preponderance of people who work in tech didn't grow up in depressed areas in the middle of the country. Country didn't grow up under the poverty line, didn't grow up you know, with, with some that I think probably a Lot of people in tech grew up with some relative amount of privilege, even if they're not white, even if they're, you know, even if they're South Asian. But maybe perhaps they come from, from a family where there is disposable income, whatever. And it made me be like, I think like, I grew up with that without a ton of money in the Midwest and I'm like, I've. I feel like if I was working in an industry that was potentially hollowing out cities or potentially impacting, impacting people with data centers, whatever, I think I would always, always have the, in the back of my head, the people who I, Who I grew up around, the people who I came from.

[E]

I am very lucky in the. I didn't grow up with money, but my parents worked their fucking asses off. Like they, my. My mum and my dad worked their asses off. My mum, me and three other children. So imagine that. And I'm probably not the most normal child. Definitely wasn't. I grew up around the corner from prison called Wormwood Scrubs and didn't grow up in a good area. My mom put food in the table so you can ask for. And I feel like the people who are like, we need to build the biggest, most hugest data center to this never had a. They never missed a Christmas. They never had a Christmas where they got. And to be clear, my mom worked her ass and my dad worked her ass off.

[A]

Yeah.

[E]

But it's like those moments. There was one and it was like my. I think my parents felt worse about.

[D]

It than I did.

[E]

I'm sorry if my dad's listening. Do not feel bad, dad. You watch your ass up. I love you. But it's like those moments are what teach you to actually have humility and love for others because there is more than just stuff. But the idea of being like, we can repurpose this workforce really fills me full of angry bile because it's like this whole show feels at times like a monument against that where it's just like we don't solve real problems because you don't fucking experience. The Michael and Trader of core weave doesn't know a fucking thing about that person driving Uber. Fuck Michael and Trader. Fucking pardon me, write a beep in there. But yeah, it's just. It sickens me because it's like, we're going to have Carl Chenard tomorrow. Las Vegas sun fantastic guy for the labor angle tomorrow because it's, it's something really missing from here.

[B]

Yeah.

[E]

And also I'm going to be honest Hearing a guy driving Uber here saying that restaurants are having trouble, like laying off people is actually genuinely scary.

[A]

Concerning. Yeah.

[E]

For the Vegas economy, specifically, because we usually. I've read about things, usually print money here.

[D]

I hear international tourism is down.

[E]

We figure out why.

[D]

Yeah.

[E]

Something happened. Luke Winkle from Winky. I don't remember how to say his name. Sorry, Luke who. Who wrote a piece for Slate. Like, Vegas is down. And it's like, when that's bad, it's bad. We're gonna rotate now from this somewhat grim point, but I will. I want to end this point by saying something which is important, which is, I have more fucking respect for anyone who works in a McDonald's or diner or the shittiest chip shop in London or any city in the world than I will ever have for anyone who works at fucking Google. And if you disagree with me, go and work a day in a fucking restaurant. I've never done it. I'm lucky enough to never have to, but my whole fucking family has. And if you don't respect service workers, you're not welcome on this fucking show.

[C]

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[E]

AZ Top once said, how, how, how, how. We're back at better offline CES 2026 custom coverage and we've stuffed our face with tech and our face with guests. This was not a well written one. Joining me is stand up comedian Chloe Radcliffe.

[A]

You won't let me leave.

[E]

I won't let you leave. That's right. You've got two more episodes and then you can go.

[F]

Let me leave the CES story.

[E]

Robert Evans of Behind the Bastards.

[F]

I'm also not allowed to leave.

[E]

He's not. And then we've got Weston Lee, the writer. Now, I must say, Weston Lee Lee is an inspiration. Weston is one of the only people in the world who cares about annualized revenue. And you and I sat on you. We are friends because we sat and went. We've lined up all the anthropic reporting around their annualized revenues. We put them in line and we've worked out how much we've they've made.

[C]

You know, it's amazing what you learn about somebody sharing a spreadsheet with them.

[E]

No, it's. And I brought you here straight up to just like thank you in front of hundreds of thousands of people.

[A]

How old were you the first time you had sex?

[G]

Wait, me?

[A]

Yeah. Oh, we're getting too. We're getting too dark.

[E]

19.

[A]

Okay.

[E]

I was five minutes before my 20th birthday.

[A]

Wow.

[E]

I had my first kiss when I was, like, a Halloween 2005.

[A]

I don't know how old that makes I was.

[B]

Not.

[E]

I was 19 at the time. I know, because I had sex, like, five minutes before.

[F]

Wow.

[E]

Like a real, like, kiss, then sex.

[A]

No sex, then.

[E]

Oh, no, no, sorry. No, it was months later.

[F]

Like, I.

[E]

It was in 2006 when I had sex for the first time. Yeah, see, I don't give a shit. Anyway, Weston, welcome to the show.

[A]

Hey.

[C]

Happy to be here.

[D]

A long time.

[C]

First time.

[E]

Long time. First time.

[B]

And.

[A]

Sorry, Weston, sorry to drop you in.

[E]

True OpenAI hater. 16.

[C]

Wow.

[D]

Nice.

[B]

3.

[E]

Jesus beat me comfortably.

[F]

Yeah.

[A]

That is. That is so much.

[F]

I love that when we said cool.

[A]

And cooler than I would have expected from a man who said the sentence. It's amazing what you learn about somebody from sharing a spreadsheet.

[H]

Cheat.

[E]

Weston's a dog.

[A]

Yeah. Oh, yeah.

[D]

Yeah.

[C]

That's been a long time since then.

[A]

Yeah. Only once.

[E]

No, no, it was great. I, too. And I'm lying. I've never had sex. No. Okay. So putting my lack of sex aside, we have had to delete Robert's answer due to issues of national security. So, Weston, what are you doing here at ces? What are you up to?

[C]

So, I'm a game writer and I'm a copywriter, and when I copyright, I work in, like, certain niches that are CES adjacent. Like gear that content creators use to do podcasts and videos and stuff and film production equipment. And I've narrowly avoided working CES in my lifetime, like, three, four different times. Just never been. And I had the opportunity. I was like, well, I should come scope it out. And I wanted to see all the amazing gadgets on the trade show floor.

[D]

Yeah.

[E]

And this was a bad year for that, sadly, I. Do you guys really live like this?

[C]

Like, every January, you just come here and do this.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Drag.

[F]

And they used to give out liquor on the show floor sometimes.

[A]

Is that for real?

[F]

Some of the comics would have bars, you know. What did you say?

[E]

Comdex.

[F]

Oh, my God.

[B]

This is like.

[C]

Because that's what.

[F]

Yes.

[C]

Used to be.

[A]

Right?

[E]

Yeah, that. That's a homie.

[F]

I should see the Mobile World Congress.

[E]

We were drunk.

[F]

I was there the year Angry Birds came out and the Rovio guys rented out, like, a whole beachside cabana. And every Rovio employee I saw at the party they were hosting was, like, blacked out near or past the point of violence.

[E]

No but that makes sense.

[F]

It was amazing.

[E]

No, but that makes perfect sense because for a while they were like, rovio is going public. Rovio is the neck. Angry Birds are the next Marvel. Well, I guess it would be Disney.

[F]

At the time, there were a bunch of. Of like 22 year old nerds who suddenly had like a $300 million company and they went insane.

[E]

Weren't they like German or something? Like Swedish? Like they were like a Nordic nation. Maybe they're Swedes, right?

[F]

Yeah. No, I mean, because if they were Swedish, I met a couple of Americans. But I don't know, it may just have been that their team had some. I don't. Yeah.

[E]

Peter Stormare, friend of the show. My mate Peter. That could drink me to death. I don't know. But like, if it's sweets, I'd be surprised if you could see the alcohol.

[F]

Most of what I remember from that party is that there was a box of Cuban cigars that they just like had table. And at a certain point I was like, none of these kids smoke. Yeah, I just took them.

[B]

You took the whole box?

[A]

Yeah.

[E]

You looted the Angry Birds?

[F]

I waited like two and a half hours had gone by and no one's touched these fucking.

[E]

I think that's fair.

[F]

Romeo e Julietas. And I was like, fuck it, I'm taking them.

[C]

So this is my first CES. So what you're saying is in 2009, they had apps, like just a bunch of phones in a booth and you could play.

[F]

Angry Birds were huge. Because it was a new idea.

[E]

Yeah, because apps were like relatively new.

[A]

That was.

[F]

Well, it was.

[B]

That was the.

[F]

You had your waves. You had like first like smartphones. And to an extent, the smartphone and app phone waves were at the same time where it was like every other booth is a new smartphone or like huge. Google used. Google had like this massive booth. One of the first Google had a year after Andrew came or Android came out. Yeah, it had a slide one year, it was like three acres. Cause it was like Android was like a year or two. New, old used to be so much fun. It was way better back then.

[E]

But that's kind of the thing that I think is missing as well. Like putting aside the fact that there are useful stuff, it doesn't even feel like light hearted. Like there used to be something dorky. Like E3 in its heyday used to be kind of silly and also very sexist in a way that was reprehensible and remains that way though E3 is dead. It's like there used to be A dorkiness who is like fuck it with Google whenever fucking slide. Like the big tractor is the only bit of this place is whimsy.

[F]

Less one year I went to E3, they had like 200 extras all dressed as North Korean soldiers to like.

[E]

For home front.

[F]

Yeah, I think it was for home front.

[E]

Written by the Red dawn guy.

[F]

Yeah, written by Milius.

[C]

I think John Millius had 100 or.

[F]

200 fucking North Korean soldiers marching around the fucking. It was. It was nuts.

[E]

Little North Korean whimsy. No, this place is a bereft of whimsy. It's like a sexless goon cave. It's just. There's just. It's doing stuff for the sake of doing with no level of like self effacing.

[A]

Totally. There was no sense of humor.

[E]

It is silly and you should be silly about this stuff. It would be so fun.

[F]

It's not silly. Our pen that has a chatbot on it has to succeed against the 400 other pins that have chatbots on it, on the glasses that have chatbots on it and the chatbots that are actually three different chatbots if you think about it.

[E]

But no, I think. I think the general lack of whimsy here is just very sad because the whole thing about tech is it should be kind of fun. It is kind of. Especially for something like this where it's like. It's ostensibly for consumers, but it's like we're trying some shit out. It's like a concept car. Like I saw a concept car for an autonomous vehicle which is a bit. Everyone does every. Like last year TC makes TVs had a concept car. It's like this year I saw one. It's also half hearted. It's.

[A]

Now I will say what you're describing is tech that doesn't fully work but is like taking a big swing with everybody knowing it doesn't fully work. Yeah, we all sort of forgive it. That actually describes a lot of what we've talked about. The laundry bot that doesn't fold, but.

[D]

Then you want to knit in it.

[A]

Find your keys that doesn't find your keys. But there is no. There seems to be no feeling of experimentation.

[F]

There's no like they're not big swings is I think the problem like something like a laundry folding bot is at least like that that remains a high bar for a robot to breach. And so every attempt at. Even though the most. At least that you're trying to do something that we don't really have it down. But most of by volume. The vast majority of like, new shit I saw was, you know, this product that already exists, it's got a chatbot now. You can talk to it. It can transcribe your conversations. I saw, like, a million glasses and rings and pens and, like, a bunch of different individual products that are all. It has a chatbot. It records your conversations. It has a camera translation, Right? Yeah.

[C]

The coolest thing I saw today, it sounds like, doesn't even normally exist at ces, which is an install. Like an interactive install out of Comic Con for a movie.

[F]

Oh, yeah.

[C]

Rebecca Ferguson movie. We're talking about this. But I saw the booth Mercy now, and it totally fits this. Cause it's dour as hell. Because it's a dystopian future sci fi where an AI is judge, jury, and executioner for people on trial and stuff. And Rebecca Ferguson.

[E]

So, like, Compass, the criminal justice system.

[C]

The video that they had.

[E]

So.

[C]

And the booth is blacked out. Like it's a defense booth. Like, you're at a cop show or a military show. And so I just see this video playing on the side, and it takes a second for me to register that it's Rebecca Ferguson in the video. And it's not just an ad for a real company. So, yeah, mercy coming out January 23rd.

[F]

It's very fun because you said, that's the one with Chris Pratt. When I went up to the booth, I asked like, what is it? And she said, well, look inside, and then I'll tell you. And I look inside, and it's like a guy in a chair. Well, it looks like handcuffed chairs. Where it's like, yeah, it's clearly. This is a robots are judging us kind of movie, or we have an AI judge. So I walk out and I'm like, I don't know, is it like a game? And she said, no, it's a movie trailer. And I was like, oh. She was like, haven't you heard of the movie? And I was like, no, you haven't heard of Mercy? No. And she said, well, it's got Chris Pratt in it. And I was like, well, okay, that didn't. Well, that didn't win me over. Yeah.

[A]

You're not selling. Yeah, I think Chris Pratt. I think replacement Rebecca Ferguson cancels out Chris Pratt, but she loses. All of her. All of her draw is also canceled out by Chris Pratt.

[C]

So it's just a flat line.

[G]

Yeah.

[F]

She brings the movie to a neutral.

[E]

I'm fucking done with things. Like, what if AI takes over everything? Make a movie where it's like, everyone bet on the wrong horse. Like make something where the dystopia is, like, societal failure based on stupid choices that are not just political. Or what if the AI sucks? Powerful.

[A]

Is this. Ed, are you saying one of your listeners should fund a movie that I write about this? Yeah, sure.

[E]

Fuck it. Only if I can be in it, though.

[F]

Great. The idea I've had that I was thinking about since we were doing our episodes on nuclear war is, okay, you don't have Skynet gain control of the nukes, but instead you have the military adopt, like, an AI program that it links a bunch of its radar and listening stations to. To analyze incoming signal in intelligence data, right? And that errantly says that there's an attack imminent. And so the humans decide that they're going to start by firing all of the missiles. And it's the job of our protagonist to convince all of these generals and politicians who are losing their minds over data that. Over what? The conclusions of this AI, that, like, we are not in danger and you do not need to fire all of the news.

[E]

If you made that like an ticking clock, like an Amanda Iannucci death of star install thing, right? That would be really good. Because Mission Impossible, the last one, if you watch this fucking movie, great. If you didn't, it's so long and so bad and so I don't know. But it's like the entity controls all of the nukes and it's like, who gives a fucking job? I watched that movie the whole time. I was just like, I hope they all fucking die. Like, I'm just like, oh, well, these people, I've learned. Angela Bassett, she's all right.

[A]

Speaking of Rebecca Ferguson movies where somebody has to convince somebody to not fire preemptively, right there is the movie that's on Netflix that came out a couple months ago that is pretty much exactly that. But it's not. It's not exploring AI at all. It's that they pick up a signal that there's a. That there is something incoming and they can't figure out what it is. And that. I mean. Oh, yeah, you watch that movie?

[F]

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The movie that just. Yes, yeah.

[E]

And Rebecca Ferguson was actually. I didn't remember who she was looked up. She was actually in Mission Impossible, Final Reckoning. She was very good at that.

[A]

And my fucking boyfriend has a big fucking crush on. On her.

[F]

So I. I hate her, Stuart.

[C]

I kind of like her. I think she's fine.

[E]

Stuart, come on the show. You're very funny. You're invited.

[C]

What if in your Nuke movie. The Nukes also had chatbots.

[F]

Well, yeah, I mean you gotta put. Because the Nuke needs to be able to tell you like how it needs to have a personality.

[C]

It's like, like a Dr. Strangelove thing where like every Peter Sellers character is a chatbot.

[F]

Yeah. It needs.

[E]

Each agent is like, you got this, you got this. It's gonna be okay.

[F]

Yeah. It needs to be able to text the like bombardier who drops it. Like, hey, I just want you to let you know that like I think you did a really good job.

[A]

You look fly today.

[E]

It's not just heroic.

[F]

Yeah. People are going to be angry at you for this, but you did the right thing.

[E]

It's going to be dangerous, but it's also going to help. I just, I, I think that we're approaching an Ianuchi verse far more than anything else at this point where it's just very silly and bad. But not for like the nuclear holocaust, of course way. It's just going to be like everyone shits their pants at once economically. But that's also bad.

[F]

I mean you maybe see some looming signs of that here with just the number of things that they're like pulling back on. Like I'm still seeing a lot of the same claims made about like what's how self driving is going to take off and like what like that car you were talking about, Tinsor, the world's first robocar that the PR lady was absolutely certain is definitely coming out in the next year.

[E]

Tell me more.

[F]

And it's level four self driving. And I was like, okay, what does level four mean? Well, she said like a waymo. And I said, well waymos are only allowed to drive in a really small set of areas. What about this? Because you're kind of advertising that you can self drive it whenever you want. Is it just you can self drive it if you're in like downtown San Francisco? And she's like, well whatever we do, it's going to, to be completely compliant with the law and safe. And I was like, that's simply not an answer about where your car can go.

[E]

Where you, where you driving to today?

[A]

I don't know.

[F]

It's on the law.

[C]

Wait, was this, was this a booth person?

[F]

This was a booth person. Now to be fair, so I'm accurate, the car you can also drive, it has the first steering wheel that flips out. But I was, I was asking about like, well, the self driving stuff because you show it driving in a lot of areas.

[E]

I also feel like self driving at this Point. It's not a solved problem even remotely, but it's like, we've seen it. I'm not sure what else you can show here unless it's driving you around.

[F]

It getting better at being functional in other areas.

[E]

Right, but how would you show that in the convention floor?

[F]

They. They have a bunch of methods because a lot of the booths, they'll show you. Here's what the camera sees and here's like the big thing this year was demonstrating. Here's how much better the sensors are at cutting through fog and cutting.

[D]

Right.

[E]

Which is cool. I give them that stuff.

[F]

Right. But yeah, it's not the same as there being a bunch of new products. A lot of times you're looking at like a disembodied piece of an automobile and it's like, here's how.

[E]

And a bunch of flashing thingies. And it's like, look. Look at all the things we know. It's. Look at a cat.

[F]

Yeah. And I don't doubt that it's important, but I guess what I'm kind of gathering is that, like, we're continuing to slowly figure out this technology and maybe one day it'll get there before, you know, society collapses.

[E]

Yeah, it's like the CES trough of disillusionment show. It's just. Everyone's just kind of like, yeah, well, we're still working it out. Give me money.

[A]

And that's what I want to reiterate is when we were talking about the whimsy, the kind of stuff that is like, it doesn't work and it's not going to be ready for a long time was acceptable. When there is some kind of self awareness. Yeah, it's not going to be ready for a long time.

[E]

Yeah.

[A]

When it is tried, when, when, when a company is trying to pass it off is hoping that you don't ask the question of and when will this be available and how much money is it and can it do this? It can do when. When they seem to sort of be hoping that you just buy the ruse. That's when it's frustrating.

[E]

And that's like, that was very much. It usually was reserved for like Kickstarter and Indiegogo shit, where it's like, okay, you're kind of backing something vestigial and like, you usually wouldn't back the one that couldn't show you something because those ones will disappear with your money. But now, like, Nvidia is running things like Kickstarter because you can't get refunds or change things, which is so cool.

[C]

You apparently don't have to pay for anything now either.

[E]

We love it, folks. But it's. It's so strange as well, because you. I mean, sure, you've got hucksters at ces, but there would be a level of mad scientist to it. Like the L.G. cloyd robot. Oh, Clyde, we.

[F]

Oh, Cloyd. Oh, Cloyd is your new best friend. He's a robot that can do your dishes very slowly and also can't really do them. Not like, well. And he can fold some kinds of very simple laundry, like towels, again, very slowly.

[E]

And they said hook. He said he couldn't fold them properly.

[F]

It didn't look good at it. No. And if you're kind of old and fading, it can remind you to eat fruit.

[D]

Yeah.

[F]

Its name is Cloyd.

[E]

Like, not a natural thing to say, but the thing is, like something like Cloyd. They would be like, this is just a concept. Like you Samsung, a few years ago just had a giant, like, circle thing you could sit in, and it had giant screens. And they were very much like, it's the Samsung crazy experience. It's like just some shit to show cs. And everyone went in, went like, cool. Samsung's fucking around with screens because Samsung makes screens. But this was like, yeah, it's the year of robots. Yeah, it's the year of robots. And. Well, okay, not your home or a home anywhere, but this home we built here. It kind of doesn't work in. But what if it did? But it doesn't. Please don't. You can't buy it. When can you buy it? It doesn't exist. How much is it?

[F]

We won't sell it. Video of this robot with a woman we got whose hair is like, studiously gray, even though she. She doesn't look like she's. Watch out of her late 40s. But we clearly want you to think of her as old for the sections where it looks like it's a robot for helping an old person, but then here's some kids playing it so you know that it's good with kids because we'd love it if families bought it too. But we don't really know what people want out of a robot that looks like a cross between the robot from fucking. What's that 80s movie? Not Wall E, the one before Wait. Decades ago.

[E]

Silent Running.

[F]

No, no, no.

[E]

Fuck.

[C]

The nerdiest battery's not included.

[A]

That's definitely not it.

[B]

No.

[E]

I will say email if you remember the one. I'm just imagining my. My daily departed.

[F]

It's Not a humanoid robot is what it is.

[E]

Marion, my daily departed grandmother would have fucking hated these things. Like, just the. Also old people, their brains still fucking work. They will feel the condescension of the world's slowest machine doing something. But on top of it, if they were just like, here are some shit we're trying out. Like, we found pistons and stuff, like sensors. We're trying these new. I would be fuck. Like, fuck me up. Like, fine, show me the new things you're working on. But it's framed up as. And there are journalists writing this as the CES of robots. And you're being played, every single fucking one of you.

[F]

Well, I mean, there's the. There's industrial robots which, like, it looks like some of them are getting back. I'm not great at it, but, like, I've seen, like, big robot arms that are like folding paper with a lot more dexterity than I'm used to seeing and stuff like that. And I'm seeing even, like, there was a humanoid rub with hands that was. Could just do that. And so I'll believe that there's some, like, industrial applications. But so much of the show is set on selling the idea of a home robot. And none of those look like they can do anything useful. And they all must be expensive. And I don't know why you think people want one.

[E]

I just feel like the CEA who runs this show, how is there not like a fraudulent element to this? Because when most of the show appears to be deceptive. Because, like, I've been to a lot of these fucking. They've been coming here since 2011. I've seen a lot of weird shit that was kind of vestigial and like, okay, we're working on this. Maybe it will happen, maybe it won't, but not most of it. And it feels like the ultimate end point of just never fucking truly holding their feet to the fire and never asking. And I keep going back to this, Chloe. I know I will actually say this just on behalf of me and the listeners. You keep saying these derisive things about yourself that are incorrect. Like, oh, as a layperson. Oh, I'm stupid. You're not stupid. You're asking the questions that the journalists should ask, like, who cares? And it's like, well, who cares? But also, is this real? Will you ever make it? Does this do the thing that you should do? The fact that the ca. Them selves doesn't have this level is disgraceful.

[F]

Well, yeah, I think they made the decision a long time ago that they were in the business of, number one, providing real estate to these companies. They're working for the company selling the schlock, right? Like. Like that's their job. And it's not even. You would think. And I think maybe in the past there was a broader understanding that part of their job was to ensure that the tech industry remained healthy and didn't become what it's turned into. But it's been a while since anybody in the business world felt like they had responsibility for anything.

[E]

But even then, like, this feels like almost the beginning of the punishment. Because what happens when all of these come companies with the LLM rappers die. Who's going to pay for these fucking booths? Because if there were other companies to pay them, they would have paid. I saw a fucking chunk of the Venetian or the Palazzo Casino closed off today because there weren't enough gamblers. Our pretty gamblers aren't here during a business week. What is going on? We can't con people from other countries into gambling.

[F]

I did wonder if people from other countries are visiting as much.

[E]

Well, that's probably because there aren't good enough gadgets.

[D]

I'm joking.

[E]

I'm obviously joking. Chloe, were you going to say, I.

[A]

I did wonder if this population is a like, gambling party population?

[E]

Yes. 100 people. It used to be CS people would come get RIP. They'd see we'll stand at our beautiful craps tables. They'd be. They'd be going all the hard ways, they'd be doing big six, big eight, all the dumbest bets. These put so much money on midnight, which is 12 on the craps table. That's how you know you have a healthy Vegas when you got some dumb fucks at the craps tables. Yeah, we've got empty craps tables. This is a bad sign.

[A]

It's only me making really smart bets.

[E]

Yeah. What, you got a system? That's why I play. I haven't gambled in years and I live here, which is crazy. But. No, I'm genuinely serious. Something's off. Something is genuinely off.

[F]

Oh, sorry.

[C]

Well, I don't have the perspective with ces, but I gotta say, I don't know how many of the talks and panels you guys went to, but I spent a good amount of time, see. Oh, I went to the Aria and the. The main through line that I thought was a little odd because there's definitely execs doing, doing the lines, playing the hits. You know, use AI now or your job is in jeopardy. And, you know, I know of companies where 100% of the AI is written, 100% of the code is written, blah, blah.

[E]

Right, right.

[C]

Here's the. And I've heard that stuff for years. So it's a little bit like we're, this is the same, like we're still doing this, but there's like these little glimmers of things that make me go, huh, like the word incremental showed up in like three different talks where it's just like, what does the next year mean to you? And it's like incremental. You need to be going to your customers that are using these tools, you know, in advertising and asking for incremental gains. And I'm like, not revolutionary gains, not barn burners going from here to here. There was a talk that with the one of the guys who runs a spinoff company from Telus, which the Canadian telecommunications.

[E]

I didn't know, I think.

[C]

And he's like, yeah, we saw 100, 250 million in savings, you know, using AI tools. And I'm like, all right, what's Telus's revenue? And that's like, you know,.048.

[E]

I also. Sure you did show. You fucking, fucking Any details?

[C]

No.

[E]

I'm going to strap you to one of the fucking chairs from Saw, I'm going to fucking handcuff you to an radiator data and I'm going to have Jigsaw extract from you how you save that money. Because I bet you didn't save a fucking penny with large language models, you lying sack of shit.

[C]

It's a lack of specifics.

[F]

Incremental.

[E]

You can get real incremental with a bone saw.

[F]

And the big thing that you're seeing, the shift here I think has been because there's not like previously the thing about this was about consumer electronics and there's always been, you know, software and apps and stuff, but it's been very focused on things that people will use. Right. And that's what journalists are here to report. And I was like, here is all these companies vision of like what people want to buy and what they want to use and what will delight them and what will be useful to them. And a lot more of the emphasis since all this AI stuff has come to centralize it on is here is a product that will allow you to hurt a customer. Here is a product that will allow you to extract money from people without providing really or while that you're sneaking into a service. There was a company, I went to their booth and got a walkthrough through Soundhound AI.

[E]

Oh Fucking Soundhound.

[F]

Yeah. And their whole thing is we make agents. We make agents for companies. And one example they gave of an agent was like, they basically an AI doing the job of taking orders for Burger King, right? And, like, taking down orders. And it also controlled the menu. And so the first thing that they showed the guy demoing it showed was someone being like, tell me what burgers are good while there was a menu up in front of them. Instead of looking at the menu, asking it. And so. So it suggested a burger. And I was like, I don't think people will use it that way often. That's a weird thing for him to show. But then I understood why. Because he was talking to this group of, like, three or four people, and he was talking to them about how. And obviously, you know, Burger King feels like, okay, we have this much stock that needs to get moved right now for whatever reason, because it's, like, close to expiring. We can make sure to, like, really push that to customers. Or if we want to sell more, you know, more Whoppers with cheese, we can push the Whopper. We can recommend that to people. We can even alter the menu if things are out or if we really want to push certain items. And he said, like, for example, if Coke wants to really sell Coke vanilla, we can start pushing large Coke vanillas. You can even push specific sizes. And I was wondering why they're talking about this, because, again, people don't use it that way. And then I realized all of the gaggle of four people that the rep from Softhound was talking to, I looked at their badges. They all worked for Coca Cola. And so this was a pitch of, this is the future of ordering at fast food restaurants. And if you work with us, we will push Coca Cola on customers.

[C]

A lot of the marketing in this bubble, like, you know, like, as a writer, I've spent years watching, like, creatives in Hollywood and games and stuff just feel like they're on the back foot because they're being threatened by this marketing. The marketing is not even aimed at them. When somebody says, you have to learn this or else somebody's gonna take your job, that's not actually aimed at that person. It's aimed at the investors.

[E]

Yes, right.

[C]

And that's one of the most. It's bullying, you know, but the funny.

[E]

Thing is this Soundhound was a basically a Shazam competitor. What's really good about that is Adam brought this up yesterday, and it's like, there is a famous tweet where it's like, Every Gemini commercial is, what should.

[D]

I eat for dinner?

[E]

And he goes, sandwich. And they go. And it's literally that. It's literally what should. What burger do I get? Burger Burger. Holy fucking shit. That will be $150,000 a month.

[F]

And they showed their, like their Car AI program where you can build your own agents in your car. And he gave it these capabilities and the demo that he ran it on was, oh, my car's making this weird noise. And he described the noise and the chatbot in the car first said, that sounds like it's this kind of problem. The average cost to prepare is $700. Do you want me to find. Find a place for you to get your car repaired? Aliens. Yes. He said, I'll call the dealership. I've booked a spot at the dealership. While you're there, do you want me to schedule a test drive and a new Nissan whatever type car?

[A]

Yes.

[F]

My wife loves that car. And it was all about like, first off, nobody unless you're. I guess I'm sure there are like rich people ones who they hear, oh, problem, I'll take it to the dealership and pay whatever, whatever it costs. Most people are like, okay, well, I've got a guy who didn't rip me off too bad before. I'm gonna see if he can diagnose it. And like, can I. But straight to the dealer. $700. Okay.

[A]

Not the fastest.

[F]

I'm like, yeah, I'll take a test drive. I'm always in the market for a brand new car. Like, yeah, it's just like, it's just. It's all predatory for the person driving the car. It's all. Cause everything that got the engineer excited. The only stuff he wanted to talk about was. And here's another place where it'll try to say you something. That's. That was it for the AI.

[E]

The thing is, it's like, I think the tech industry has become guys selling stuff. The guys that will not use it. It's just companies selling things to companies.

[A]

Numbers you don't need.

[E]

Numbers you don't need to raise numbers that do money.

[F]

Yeah, well, and that, yeah, that's the. Because one of two things will be true. Either all of these AI agents being integrated into these projects will drive sales significantly. And that will be the new thing advertisers fight over. And I'm not in love with that future. That said, it'll probably work better in banner ads.

[E]

I don't think it'll work at all. I don't think it's going to.

[F]

It'll work for a while, at least until they get data on whether or not it drives open.

[E]

AI tried to integrate shopping things. We're just going to get onto that, but we're coming to the rotation points. We're going to start rotating our owls. We're going to move on to the final section. And I must say, this upcoming ad, I don't, I don't, don't know what.

[F]

We'Re doing for Blades of Glory.

[A]

I'm doing these under your. Under your.

[E]

I appreciate that it's now a flawless transition. Upcoming ad is probably for a podcast or some product or some shit, but I need you to click it or listen to whatever the you do. I've never, I've never heard the ads. I don't know what they are. If you complain about the ads, please help me.

[C]

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[E]

Diane I'm once again in front of a microphone inside the Palazzo Hotel in Las Vegas, Nevada and everybody's staring at me because I keep saying strange things into the microphone. I'm on my 18th Diet Coke and feeling more alive than I ever, ever been. Joining me is actress and stand up comedian Chloe Radcliffe for Sadly, our final episode with her.

[A]

Wow, this is it. We've come so far.

[E]

Honestly, the listeners love you and I need to bring you back because they're gonna be pissed.

[A]

I'm, I, I'll come back anytime you want.

[E]

And to your left is another person who I need. Rob Pegaro, the tech reporter who has been around for a while. 1998.

[D]

It's been a minute.

[E]

Yes, genuinely. Multiple people have emailed him being like, we love you. And then one slightly horny person. One slight. It was like Rob Pegueraro, asmr. And then to your left is Rob Robert Evans of Behind the Bastards and.

[F]

Who I have heard two r names in the, in the room right now.

[E]

So many horny things. No, I mean quite literally. I'm so sorry.

[A]

But.

[E]

And then. Okay, we'll just move on. Robert Evans, behind Bastard. My boss. What about me?

[B]

Anybody say anything horny about me? I got an olive in my mouth.

[E]

Anyway, I actually am just describing this. Chloe just has an entire like a.

[A]

Jar of olives, one big spike.

[E]

And I said to Phil, looks pretty good.

[F]

It's just there's a Greek man sitting in a room that's nothing but jars of olives going like, all right, finally. My.

[E]

Yeah, finally podcast. Do this, for me, that's more Russian.

[D]

You're Greek.

[A]

Yeah.

[E]

That was terrible. I've not met any Greeks.

[A]

Yeah. You want to try that one again?

[E]

I. I know my brain is like, I don't know.

[G]

What?

[H]

No, I can't.

[E]

I truly don't know.

[A]

Like, is Greek an accent that white people can do?

[F]

White people do Greek all the time. They're white.

[E]

They're called Greeks.

[D]

Yeah.

[E]

Okay, well, let's move on from that one.

[H]

This is a fun bit. I. One of my favorite bits. One of my first bits that got Europeans really mad at me. I read this article that was arguing that, okay, like, Greeks got inducted into whiteness at the end of World War II, and I shared it, and the person who got the. A bunch of Germans really hated me sharing this article. This was around the time they were trying to make them pay for their debt back to them.

[A]

Yeah.

[E]

That is Edward Ongueso Jr. The writer of the Tech Bubble Newsletter and classic staple of the Better Offline Experience. We were just talking about why people do ces, and I know about why.

[A]

People do racist accents.

[F]

Why white people do that.

[A]

Because they're very fun.

[E]

No, that's a joke. She is doing a bit. We are doing bants. We're bant maxing. No, we're just talking about why people do ces. And I've said earlier, it's like, okay, people do these shows because it's an excuse to get people together. That's completely true. I also think that there is something kind of magical about CES because you get, like, people. Just people happen to be here, and if you take it for what it is, which is a convention center full of balls, you get to see people you love. Like, everyone in this room, I'm really happy to see, like, everyone. Everyone is in different places. Some of them are like, Chloe, you're in. In New York, so I see a decent amount. But, Rob, you're in D.C. ed, I see you. But, like, people get busy, and Robert's in Portland, and it's, like, it's nice to get people together. And, yeah, the more you suffer, the funny it is to talk about it. And also, I don't know, this podcast rocks, and it's kind of fun to do something weird and different every year. I wish there was more on the floor to be excited about, though. Ed, what have you been up to today? We haven't heard much from you.

[H]

Well, funnily enough, I found there's this AI voice synthesizer that let you do any accent that you wanted to do, and I was on the floor doing some of the worst you possibly could. And it was really.

[F]

Was it good at anything?

[H]

Yeah. No, I wish, you know, because you're.

[A]

Like, I'm not the one doing it. Yeah. And a robot.

[H]

I'm not.

[B]

Yeah.

[H]

No, to be clear, this is not real. This is just me.

[A]

A really fun.

[E]

Yeah, this is me.

[H]

Could you imagine?

[D]

But that totally sounds like.

[F]

Yeah. The most cancelable project. Ces.

[E]

There would just be a line out the door with guys just being like. Guys with podcasts. Guys with racist podcasts.

[A]

Whoa.

[F]

Finally.

[E]

You know, take our jobs. Like. Yeah, yeah.

[H]

WOKE is not back quite yet because I'm not white.

[E]

That's right. No, Woke2CES is going to be great. We were talking about the gender reassignment section. It's going to be great. It's going to be illegal to be white for one part of the convention, so it's going to be great. I cannot wait.

[D]

Got to open every day with the land Acknowledgment.

[E]

Yeah, exactly. Oh, no. A brand acknowledgment.

[F]

But just for, like, we are on the Sony. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. In ages past, Black Bear Rim would.

[E]

Operate this booth, but at times, Theranos would have been here, but they were canceled. Eliz. I do like that Elizabeth Holmes is now doing, like, epic. Epic posting where it's just like, from jail.

[F]

What the hell?

[E]

Posting from jail and being like, does illegally. Illegally canceled for doing fraud.

[H]

Actually, you know, my. My greatest fear about going to jail was not being able to tweet. But, you know, this is.

[E]

This is now I don't have to.

[H]

Be afraid of it.

[G]

Yeah.

[E]

You got a prison where I post. That's just me at home.

[H]

Right, Exactly, Exactly.

[F]

You can launch your own version of Theranos, which is just people mailing you blood and you being like, looks good.

[C]

I'm going to be the first.

[H]

I'm going to be the first. First person in prison to have a fundraising round ongoing. Okay. They're gonna be clamoring for that. I don't know what it'll. Maybe it'll be for. I can do like, an. A Potemkin AI thing that's just like other prisoners. They're pretending to be the.

[A]

The Martin Luther King's letters from. From a Birmingham jail. Redux is like asking for VC funds.

[H]

It's just.

[E]

It's just pitching. Beware of the tech critic who tells.

[H]

You you that you can't have a VC fund in prison.

[E]

Series A from San Quentin, Chapter 2.

[F]

Begins as a chat bot.

[C]

I'm not allowed to hover and buy.

[A]

Just.

[E]

I need to read you this Elizabeth holmes tweet from 1231 25. So New Year's Eve. Prisons are meant to rehabilitate prisoners and break crime cycles. Instead, comma, they shatter families and make better criminals. It won't break me or mine, but watching it happen daily is heartbreaking. Breaking. Honestly, this fucking rocks. I'm sorry if you're gonna post some prison. Just being like, I'm not guilty of the fraud. I obviously did. Fuck you. Yeah. Fuck, yeah. Let's just go for it.

[F]

I interpreted that differently. I thought she was saying prison is meant to, like. Like, breaks people and makes them into better. And makes them into better criminals. That's not gonna happen to me. I'm gonna stay a shitty criminal.

[E]

I'm terrible at this. If you only knew. My real story is so much more interesting than the one you have been told. Coming soon in 2026. And that is seven ellipses. Nothing hidden, nothing left out. The time for the truth has come. No one can hide from the light woman. You did actual fraud.

[F]

I'm ready for this.

[E]

I want to know. Elizabeth Holmes, you are invited on Better Offline.

[A]

Here's my question. Did. Are there other people who. Are there men who have committed fraud? Fraud as harmful as the fraud that Elizabeth Holmes committed? I'm not denying her.

[F]

Yeah, well, I mean, like, Ernie Madoff, the guy, the Enron guy.

[E]

But they didn't get culturally crucified in the same way.

[A]

Right? They have been imprisoned.

[F]

They have been imprisoned. Shkreli is the closest to getting that level of, like, notoriety. But it also worked out for him a lot better than her.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[F]

He built a little bit of a weird brand on it.

[A]

Yeah, I think he's a dude DJ now. Are they really?

[F]

Well, that's. Analysts slept with him too, which was weird DJ allegations. Yeah.

[H]

There's a Bloomberg journalist who ruined her life for Charlie.

[F]

Yeah. He's had a weird post. Prison run.

[A]

Are there. Are there people who have committed fraud at an. At a harmful level, at a, like, meaningfully harmful level who have not been. Who have not gone to prison?

[D]

I mean, the web3 industry. I'm from DC. Where do I start?

[E]

Yeah, yeah.

[F]

Right.

[E]

Well, it's gonna be a long podcast.

[A]

I mean, specifically in. In startups. In startup culture.

[D]

Okay.

[E]

Clinkle. Not Clinkle.

[H]

This.

[F]

Same way. Where they are literally starting a company on completely false pretenses and raising VC money.

[E]

I actually disagree. Clinkle. Clinkle. Was this one where you could Clinkle raised maybe a little bit less, but they were just as prominent. They were also on the COVID of Forbes. They were also in a magazine for some reason. Yeah, Clinkle was a sound based payment thing. It was obviously fraudulent. I mean sound based payments.

[A]

Yeah, they use sounds like you have money in your pocket, then that means we've paid you.

[E]

He was a very damp looking white boy, so. But no, it was a company where you could transfer money with like hypersonic. It was. But that's the thing like that. That didn't go to prison. None of the web three people who never did anything, not fucking doodles. NFT which ended up backing off NFTs that Alex Sahoneian who is a fucking asshole who should be crucified for his role in the racism and sexism of Reddit, let alone the amount of web3 bullshit. He put up a fucking hill. Putting that aside, he like, nothing happened to all the web three people who did a bunch of criminal shit like all of the blatant money laundering. And the question is, what is this? CZ from Binance.

[F]

And also he was supposed to go to that part.

[A]

Yeah.

[E]

Adam Newman already got $300 million from. From Mark Andreessen because there's.

[F]

There's two differences and we can debate which of them is more relevant in her getting penalized much more than a lot of other people who did similar things. But like one is she's a woman. But the other is it was a health company. People like. It was also cancer.

[E]

Actually fraud. It was actually fraud fraud.

[F]

It was like serious medical fraud.

[E]

It also didn't do anything close we work was just a terrible business.

[A]

And that's why I'm asking like who harmed people to the same degree that wasn't.

[E]

Well, actually the question with Theranos is I actually like. I know like people that actually die. It was very bad. Just being clear.

[F]

I don't fucking Mortgage backed securities are a man like. And that hurt a lot of people.

[E]

FDX did a lot more damage specifically in tech. Yeah.

[A]

Yeah.

[E]

Although everyone involved with the great financial crisis, everyone who bet on this, and I'm going to be honest, I'm going to say this. Every single company that invested in data centers that is going to lead to the financial collapse that follows is worse than Theranos. Every single person who pushed open air up a hill is worse than Theranos for what's coming. Yeah, yeah, I'm going for it. I'm crazy, but yeah. And they will crucify Sam Altman if what I Think is happening over there is happening where they're misleading investors, which is my personal belief, and not Those of the iHeartradio Corporation. Separation. If that is true, Sam woman should go to jail. If it's true, which we do not know if it is, he probably won't because, like, if he was a white one, he absolutely would. But would he have been able to raise the money? We're doing this. It's. But Elizabeth Holmes wasn't like an actual criminal.

[B]

Like, we can't.

[E]

We're not gonna whitewash this. She was an actual criminal who, like, talk with the deep Steve Jobs voice, which I think is a funny bit.

[A]

The voice. That thing. It. Okay, I will say this.

[D]

Turtleneck. The whole. The whole bit.

[A]

I. That is where I think sexism is coloring the entire interpretation. Because truly, when I speak in a lower voice, I get treated differently. And when I speak in a. And like, you listen to women who speak in baby voices, and. And. And we don't say it's up that women speak in baby voices. And you run into these women all the time, and that's not their natural voice. That's not that voice that if they were just left, grew up in the woods that they would be speaking with. That's a performed voice that they. That's an identity that they have. Sorry, we've got.

[E]

No, I want to know everything about this.

[A]

But. But, like, how women are perceived in society is the. Our voices are a huge part of it. As. As they are with men. Think of gay men who sound gayer. Like, they get treated differently. Right. Like, all of that is. Is part of our performance of power in society or our performance of how power and gender knit together society. Chloe. And so then I do think. And like, her voice sounds insane. It sounds insane. But I also am like that one. I. I fully.

[E]

Chloe, I gotta ask.

[A]

Drives me nuts.

[E]

Can you tell me more about. Have you had, like, as a woman, have you had to lower your voice? And in what scenarios have you had.

[A]

I have a very low voice.

[H]

Right.

[A]

I just, like, speak in a very low voice naturally.

[E]

Right.

[A]

So I. It's more that. I think the inverse is a much more common experience where women. Women baby, like, talking baby voices. And that is a. That is like a relinquishing of power, and that is a submissive stance. And for me, it's like, yeah, if I talk, if I speak to somebody on the street or in public, if I'm speaking to a stranger and I'm like, yo, if I talk at that level, like, people. People Turn expecting a man.

[H]

Right.

[A]

And treat. And then get sort of shocked.

[E]

This is an actual 30 Rock joke. Joke with that. I'm a very sexy baby.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

[E]

The manipulation through. No, it's just. I mean I'm a white guy. Like what do I know? But it's like the reason I ask is like is this a commonplace thing in the workplace with woman?

[A]

I mean, like, I don't think it's a common place. I, I don't think the voice thing. I don't think speaking in a low.

[E]

Voice or like a higher voice, even.

[A]

A higher voice is all the time. Like if you start listening to it, if you. There's so many.

[E]

Once you hear it, it's like the FedEx arrow.

[F]

Yeah.

[A]

Weird phony baby voices. Um, I don't. I think that the idea that a woman like artificially lowers her voice like Elizabeth Holmes did.

[E]

That's a little low.

[A]

Is very uncommon. Totally. And her voice sounds insane. Like I, I don't dismiss that. She sounds batshit.

[E]

Yeah.

[A]

But it's also like what we. It's. It.

[E]

The fact it clearly worked.

[A]

The thing that drives me nuts is like that we. It. We will, we will find fault in however a woman presents. And that when she tries to then model after a male presentation in some way, then we're like, well that's wrong.

[E]

But it works though.

[F]

It really works. What really frustrates me is you get a lot of people who will point out laughingly she was clearly trying to imitate Steve Jobs in the way that she dressed with the turtlenellock and whatnot and point out and how the style of her presentations was aping him. And it doesn't get brought up much nearly as often in part because people don't like to think of Jobs or other. Other like heroic figures, like tech founder figures this way is one of the other ways she aped him is Jobs was very famous, not so much at the big public announcement level, but when he was talking to investors, when he was putting together ideas with vastly over promising. And part of what he did was be incredibly anal retentive about when a product was actually ready. But he had these very specific often pie in the sky demands for what this thing needed to do, how it needed to look, how it needed to fit feel that he would promise could be done before they knew that they could do it. And he hired good people. And Apple was able to square those circles. Apple was able to produce. But there is a similarity with. Because her attitude was very much similar, which is what I need to do is make the promise. And I need to aesthetically make the case of how this is going to look and feel and what it can do. And as long as we can get enough money doing that, we can brute force the having a real product thing. And it's not exactly the same thing, but it's close to enough because almost every founder at some point relies on. I don't fully know that what I can do meets what I am selling to the people who are investing money. And I don't fully know that the product that I am promising them I'm really going to be able to deliver, especially for the cost that I'm promising them. And that fundamental reality of how all this works gets obscured a lot because it's not. Not. It makes it. It makes it sound like gambling. And in a lot of ways, it very much is.

[E]

I mean, what's the difference? I mean, there is a difference in that Theranos did not exist. But what you just described is large language models. Like, it literally is.

[A]

It's.

[E]

It's. Look, this thing fucking sucks and it doesn't do what you want it to. But what if we spent more money than anything has ever been spent ever, ever forever? What if it became something completely different? And people will try and differentiate. Differentiate, because okay, the first step with Theranos is they just sent it to LabCorp. They didn't even have the beginning steps. That sucks. But Sam Altman does not have the first steps to AGI. Wario Amade doesn't have the first steps to a. In a hole in the ground. Like, they're all doing only a few steps from Theranos. And they will be colored very differently that they were just innovators risking if you end up writing the. That when this pops, you're a mark in the same way that every single person who covered Theranos was. Because it's the same.

[F]

Not everyone. There was a. There was a real good reporter at the Journal. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

[E]

Several years after all the major articles came out. John Carrey was several. 2015, I think that came out. There were Theranos articles for years.

[H]

Not.

[E]

And there was several blogs before Carrie Roo that were like, hey, hey. I looked at the science. None of this made sense.

[F]

Doesn't seem like it can work.

[A]

Yeah.

[E]

And Carrie Rue did. And typically he did incredible reporting, a really great job. But it's like there were very few people who did. And I think it's. I think when Sam Altman gets crucified, as I expect Evangelion style It's not going to be the same way and it will. I think everyone needs to pre prepare therefore, if you want to frame this as the innovator's dilemma. Oh, you know, just, he was just trying something that is not a fair way to look at it because there was never a guidance point from there to wherever AGI bullshit happens.

[F]

It's also fundamentally really bad for innovation. Like one of the big frustrations for me today was walking past probably a cumulative acre or two of different home robots. This is a robot servant, this is a humanoid robot that you can have do tasks for you, you can have it watch your kids, you can have it take watch, take your pets out. You know, here we've got one and we've got a robot dinosaur and they're trying to get past each other.

[D]

Oh, did everyone watch him? Yeah, that was cute.

[F]

And like. Yeah, there's. Some of it's cute, some of it's. There were a lot of like humanoid robots that were like, like awkwardly strung up. Like they were on a gibbet to keep them standing because like when they were on, either they couldn't, they'd broken or they wouldn't stay up on their own power. Like, I wasn't sure exactly what was happening there, but in the middle of all that, I come like after like an acre or two of this stuff, I come across a little booth where it's like two guys at a desk, maybe two desks, and they've got just like a couple of stringy looking little fabric tubes hanging and then a couple little gizmos on the table. And I go up and I ask what it is. And it's a photonic muscle is what they're calling it. And the way it works is I'm pulling up the picture right here. Ariflex is the company and yeah, it's a photonic muscle. And you have these little bundles that look kind of like this. And each of these bundles has an LED light in it and there's like a kind of fiber or something inside it. And when the light turns on, it causes that fiber to contract in a way that mimics a motor or functions the same way as a motor. And so you can put them in devices. And the example they had was there's this device that's like, I think you call it like an intake thing on like a car right where you need these little flaps to open. And the flaps open and close by the use of these. And they take up like half as much space as a motor would take because instead of a motor. You have these little like synthetic photonic muscles that are much lighter, much less space, fewer moving parts.

[D]

It's the chance to see stuff like that, which is why I keep coming back. And yet I miss this company because there's a lot to take in and.

[F]

You have to walk past again. All these companies that have put God knows how many hundreds of millions of dollars into humanoid robots, most of which never have a chance really of establishing themselves and very like, basically none that I saw outside of, like the ones meant for specific manufacturing uses seem like they had a creative or intellectually interesting reason or solved a problem. And that so vastly outnumbers in funding and attention that the like, oh, somebody made a muscle with light. That's kind of, that's kind of sweet.

[E]

Well, the problem is, is like the idea a robot that does one thing is not what people expect from a robot. Everyone wants to have one robot that is just a person, a slave. Just, let's just, let's just cut straight to it.

[D]

LG's wholesale sales pitch was the, the zero labor home, which I mean like big if true, right?

[E]

Yeah, yeah, but it's like I don't.

[F]

Live in that home from some lay. Didn't you see the cloyd.

[D]

Yeah, he's.

[A]

He's gonna find your keys.

[D]

Willing servant.

[F]

Yeah, find your keys. But it's fruit when you're demented.

[A]

You are right that it is what. What people want as a slave.

[D]

You, You.

[E]

It's a slave.

[F]

It's.

[E]

You either want a completely faceless machine and I'm sure I, I want to make sure as the. Your ear is the black guy. Like, come on, say it in the conversation.

[A]

The guy with rings as the guy.

[H]

You know, you can't see, but I got some hotep rings on. So I know something about slaves. I know something about slaves. You know, in my newsletter I wrote, there's this essay I wrote that was talking about how the roots of automation go back to slavery. Right? So part of the, part of the, the thing that developed impetus for automation is that, you know, you had the abolition of slavery and you had the British Empire being like, oh my fucking God, how are we going to keep, you know, plantations are incredibly profitable. How are we going to keep these sort of profits? Because they're also integral to our empire, like for funding our navies and fielding our armies. And so the idea was like, okay, well, you have to make the factory resemble a plantation as much as possible. And I think most people when they think of plantations, they think like, okay, you know, it's outside, it's disorganized a little bit. You have an overstatement year. But they were like very highly regimented and they developed very specific methods of extracting and terrorizing as much labor as possible and terrorizing people. And so the automation that was developed by this guy Charles Babbage was like an attempt to do early divisions of labor and create machines that would be able to, you know, self surveil workers, or workers would be able to self surveil themselves or quantify their work or divide it into pieces. Like some of the very foundational theories of how labor should be organized going into. Okay, well, how do we get a non human along a division of labor where we're separating as much work as possible into discrete, repeatable, substitutable parts which we already designed to resemble slavery? How do we get that in this embodied thing that also just happens to look like a person without a face that we want everywhere in the house? I don't know. I feel like the heart and the soul of it does link back to it and it goes back even further. Right. But I think then also the other question is like, how much do you think this is also colored by experiences maybe some of these people have where, you know, they're. They're like, yeah, why shouldn't I, you know, why shouldn't I have a person or a thing in my house? And how can I convince other people to do it if only by having a robot do it?

[E]

Right? And I think that there's. Well, there's two parts that it's. One, they might have hired help and they're like, well, I have to pay some fucking piece of shit human. Jesus Christ. But also there is a. I feel like there's a division in automation with some people where. There's some people where it's like, I see this as an. As a kind of. As like an amplification of who I am. Like. Like an extra arm. Like an arm that moves one thing to one thing, which is not a thing I command, but it's just a. A thingy that does an action that's not a sexy thing you can raise funding on. You can't be like, I got an arm that moves a thing from a thing, which is most industrial machinery. It's just like repeating one task again.

[D]

And again and again.

[E]

The reason that replaces humans is that's a repetitive action it up humans. But it's not about the subjugation of a person. It's an action. Yeah, it's not about controlling someone, it's about making a thingy happen. Then there are the people who are like, wouldn't it be awesome if every whim I had was perfectly solved and I could order someone around? To quote Adam Connor of a few years, they don't know the way I like. And it's this idea of this Aggie bot yesterday. Oh, it can do the TikTok dance. Why do you want someone to dance for you? That's a fucking peculiar instinct.

[F]

Part of what's so difficult though is that these are. It's this, it's a, it's a version of the same problem that you have with a lot of like genetics and like fertility and technology, right. Where do you want to make sure if you can find out in the womb that a child's going to be born with its lungs outside its body and you can just kind of snip that out? So the lungs are inside the body, Right. Do we want that? Everyone's pretty much like, well, yeah, it's probably good if kids have lungs. Yeah. Do you want to be able to tell if someone has autism and snip that. Whoa. Suddenly, suddenly. Or any of the other horrible eugenics questions. Right? So everyone's like, yeah, there's certain things we want to be able to do with genetics technology. But if you say this is okay, all people are gonna start immediately pushing for all. And like drawing a line is something that, like the fact that you're drawing a line means there's going to be strong lobbies of people pushing for stuff that is really bad. Right. And with automation, everyone's like, like, I saw a product today that's one of a. I've seen a couple like this where it's a big. Basically like a big cart on wheels that can go off road and can be fully autonomous and you can set. Here's where wounded guys are gonna be, here's where the hospital is. Drive up to the front line, people throw a wounded guy in, drive to the medical area. Right. And you don't necessarily like, it's better if a robot does that. Cause people can get blowed up, right? If you can. And so. And there's also like, obviously, I'm sure we all have individual pain in the ass tasks that we're like, well yeah, I'm a fine of a robot, washes my dishes. But once you're saying, well, we do want to automate some stuff you're having then a conversation, where is the line? And right now everything's on the table, including the creation of Art and beauty and the raising of children, the stuff.

[E]

We'Re meant to do when we're not working.

[F]

Basic cognition. And that's the fact. But you can't. If you're going to talk about some of it, all of it's going to be on the table at some point. And right now it is.

[E]

Yeah.

[H]

I think that's also the other thing, right. Where it's like, you know, know, to your point, there's automation that saves you labor and enhances productivity around the home, you know, and around certain workplaces that reduces the drudgery of tasks we have to do. And then there's automation that is deployed in a way to squeeze as much as possible out of people beyond what they might in of themselves want to do if they had control over or to what degree am I going to augment my workplace or myself with this stuff? Right. And I think that ends up also being the line with a lot of these technologies where it's like, you know, how if we were designing genetic technologies, if we were designing assistive automation or assistive artificial intelligences and grafting them onto our lives, I feel like the points in which we would let them and not let them look different than what your concerns and interests are. If you're like, okay, well, I'm looking to get a return or I'm looking to organize the workplace in a certain way, or I'm looking to just meet a very specific need in this or that context. Right. In a battlefield and hospital, you know, in a public space. So I think. So I think, you know, part of this is like, you know, downstream a consequence of the fact. I feel like we're almost all technical decisions have nothing to do with what anyone other than these private investors.

[A]

I mean, you know, a thought that I have had this whole last few days is what does it mean to be optimized or to have your life optimized? What is the actual outcome of that? Yeah, what are we optimizing for? And if the optimization is we're going to remove all of the annoying tasks so you can enjoy life. That sounds like an awesome answer that I could totally get behind on the ground. That's not. That doesn't seem to be what any of the products.

[E]

I was just thinking of something very simple, which is like, I'm lucky to live a really good life. And the reason I can is I have a. I have a washing machine and a dryer that works really well and I have a good dishwasher. Like, it's like, yeah, like it's like, the shit that sucks isn't, like, I can afford to use Uber. I can get around, like, a $50 dishwasher. That's really good. Feels like it would be more innovative than anything on this floor, because most people can't afford to have a good one.

[H]

Like.

[E]

Like, the things that get in the way of existing are labor, as in having to do your horrible fucking job that doesn't pay you enough, or the shitty. Like, how the fuck do you look after the children you have? There aren't really. There's not really tech. You can't buy more time unless you have actual labor help.

[A]

Yeah.

[E]

Which requires more money. And you can't really replace that with a robot, because the reason they need an everyman robot is because problems are complex. The problems of even dishes are complex.

[A]

And decision making is complex.

[E]

You know what that is exactly.

[H]

It.

[E]

It's like. It's not the problems themselves, it's the decisions around them.

[F]

I mean, and that's why the most responsible technologies at CES stick to doing the things where there's no real downside if it's not done perfectly, like raising children, which I saw a really good child companion robot today, which I. Look, every one of these. I love them.

[E]

Oh, I wasn't sure where you're going with that.

[F]

Oh, no. So there was a really good one that. It's one of my favorite CES categories where it's, like, Southeast Asian tech company marketing to Americans that doesn't fully understand our culture. And so they have, like, a whole. They have a set of bleachers erected and, like, 50 of these, like, little robot dolls sitting in them. I'll show you guys. But they're like. They're all wearing, like, sleeveless shirts.

[D]

Oh, I did walk by that yesterday.

[F]

Yeah, they're all wearing sleeveless shirts and, like, little beanie hats, basically, that have the name of the robot on it, which is Booster. Or is it Booster? Yeah, it's Booster. But then in front, they had one robot that was dressed differently. And I didn't realize at first it looked like it had, like, a suit and a black hat on. And then the video starts playing, and I realize that fucking robot is Michael Jackson and dancing to Billie Jean alongside what I believe is a kid.

[D]

I know exactly where in the north.

[F]

Hall that was, and it was.

[E]

Well, that did happen.

[F]

Could not get across them. Hey, guys, maybe Michael Jackson's not the best robot mascot for a children's toy. You might have.

[D]

Yikes.

[F]

But immediately, what I got to show you guys, and this is what I was telling you about.

[D]

We might cut this.

[E]

This in.

[F]

We might just let it fly. I want the reaction. This is what happens in that video immediately after the robots dancing.

[E]

I'm gonna put a link to this in the notes.

[F]

Yeah. So this is right after Billie Jean.

[A]

What?

[E]

That is identical to the.

[A]

Oh, wait.

[D]

What? So weird.

[F]

So what happens in that video? What? The instant that finishes doing, like, dancing to Billie Jean while Dre, like, moonwalking, there's immediately a man runs into another version of the robot and starts beating it with a wooden stick, which then switches to a guy putting cinder blocks on top of it and smashing it with a fucking mallet. And then right after that, a dude comes in with a liquor bottle and.

[B]

Shatters spiders it over the robot's head.

[E]

If you are protecting your. Your children from the homeless or from.

[F]

The robots, like, what else does that say?

[A]

And then the robot stands up after.

[F]

Yeah, it seems fine.

[E]

You can't stop it. You can't stop. I love that because it all looked almost identical to those things. I don't know if you remember the modeling experiment, like, the regularly disproved thing about how children will copy anything, and it's just children hitting a clown with a stick. And it looked identical. Yeah, it's the same fucking thing. That's ces, baby. Just like, I want to be in the room when they were recording that. It's like, hit it again. Hit it again. Get a liquor bottle.

[B]

Fuck it up.

[F]

It was unclear.

[E]

I do that for free.

[F]

What the selling point, because it goes from it can dance like Michael Jackson. You can beat the shit out of it, and it's fine. It'll walk with your little girl and help her learn, like, languages. It's like quizzing her over her homework.

[E]

Dance, spot, dance, spot dancing.

[F]

Why is that? And I kind of think maybe they just sort of incompetently realized something that is a brilliant idea, which is if you market and build a robot entirely on Terminator 2 logic, where you just show that this robot can't be killed. It's loyal to your child. It'll never get drunk and hit them. It'll never not come home after staying out late at the bar at night. The whole Sarah Connor Speech from T2.

[D]

Important to note, I did not see any robots built out of liquid metal. But, I mean, I missed some corners of the Venetian Expo, so maybe I.

[F]

Think that's the south hall.

[H]

I want the AI bubble burst. We'll get to what we really need to get to, which is building Terminators. All right.

[E]

As we approach the end of this. Chloe Radcliffe, what do you think of CEO? Guess.

[A]

Just, it's. I mean, truly. I go back to numbers you don't need.

[E]

Yeah.

[A]

I go back to. So what does that. Do? You know, what's funny?

[F]

Or.

[A]

Or. So who gives a. It's. It's so unnerving to think about how. How much of our society feels like there's no money.

[G]

Money.

[E]

Yeah.

[A]

And then to come to a place where there is all the money.

[E]

Yeah.

[A]

And it's that.

[D]

That I think is disturbing to an AI industry conference.

[A]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, totally. And. And like, I. I work in entertainment. And such a common refrain in entertainment is like, oh, we just don't have the budgets to do that anymore. We used to have those kind of budgets, and we don't anymore. And I'm like, there is money sloshing around, hitting the side, sides coming out people's noses. Like, there is so much money. And I. It's infuriating to me that, you know, I'm taking a very narrow view right now. Actually.

[E]

I will actually push back. You're not. You're taking a very reasonable.

[A]

Well, here. Here. The narrow. The narrow part of the view is like, I'm putting aside the fact that it's infuriating that people are living very difficult lives amidst all this money floating around. But. But like, even I'm just thinking about my job, you know? Know, it's like in the entertainment industry, the fact that there is relatively little money, that money is tight. And I'm like, it's not. It's also. It's. It's especially relevant. Sorry. And then one second, it's especially pertinent in entertainment because so much of entertainment is now owned by the things that own the tech.

[B]

Yeah.

[A]

Where all the money lives. And so I'm like, what the fuck do you mean there's no money in entertainment?

[E]

It's gone. A lamp.

[F]

You couldn't be more. Right. Because, like, number one, like, the other thing is that it's entertainment makes as much money as ever. It's not no longer making money. But like you said, the companies that now own all of these fucking are taking those profits and they're currently pouring them into the shit that you're seeing. The broken shit on the floor here.

[A]

Yeah. Yeah.

[E]

And when all of this is dead and bleeding on the floor, you're going to give it to Chloe Radcliffe. Yeah, that's.

[A]

That's right.

[E]

We're going to wrap here. And I just want to say, on behalf of all the listeners and myself, thank you, Chloe. Thank you for joining us.

[A]

I've had a great.

[E]

I really hope you join us next year.

[A]

God, I've had a fucking blast.

[E]

Yeah, it's been a genuine pleasure to have you. Where can people find you?

[A]

I am at Chloe Badcliffe on all platforms. Like my last name Radcliffe, but bad. And I'm in Cincinnati this weekend. I'm in D.C. next weekend. I'm in Philly the week after. Follow me, sign up for my mailing list list, yada yada.

[E]

Robara. We'll have your links in there. But thank you so much for joining us.

[D]

You are, you are welcome.

[E]

You are one of the best. I love having you here.

[D]

I try.

[E]

And you are at everything I'm at, which is genuinely a pleasure. Robert Evans, my boss behind the bastards. Thank you for joining us. And of course the other red Ela. Love you, buddy.

[H]

Thank you for having me. Love you too, bud.

[E]

And I love you all for listening. We will be back to tomorrow for. For four more hours.

[B]

Yeah, I forgot for a second.

[A]

Psychos. I can't believe you're listening to all this. Nah.

[E]

All of the men I'm radicalizing and the woman that listen as well. And the trans people and everyone on non binary and everyone who listens. I don't care who you are, but I care that you are who you are. It has been a very long day and it's a very long week. But I love you listening. We will be back four hours tomorrow. An hour epilogue on Saturday. And then they are going to shoot.

[D]

Me in the head.

[F]

Head parody.

[E]

I met Zitron. Please subscribe to my newsletter. I did not do premium this week so please use the link in the thing. I desperately need that. Thank you to Matt Osowski, my wonderful producer who has been working his ass off all week. Amazing show. More amazing stuff to come. We're also dedicating these episodes to Sean Paul Adams, who is a friend of the show in the suite. Sadly, he passed last year. Sean Paul absolutely rocked. So we're honoring him by donating to the Pediatric Epilepsy Research Consortium. Sean Paul's son is epileptic and his family and friends would deeply appreciate your donations, as would I.

[B]

Thank you.

[E]

Thank you for listening to Better Offline. The editor and composer of the Better Offline theme song is Matt Osowski. You can check out more of his music and audio [e-mail] m a t t o s o w s k-I.com you can email me at ezetteroffline.com or visit betteroffline.com to find more podcast links and of course my newsletter. I also really recommend you go to chat wheresyoured at to visit the Discord and go to R betteroffline to check out our Reddit. Thank you so much for listening. Better Offline is a production of Cool Zone Media.

[G]

For more from Cool Zone Media, Visit.

[B]

Our website coolzonemedia.com or check us out.

[E]

On the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts or.

[G]

Wherever you get your podcast.

[A]

Foreign.

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