Hotline: E Ink, the fediverse, and smart Puka shells

Summary

The Vergecast Hotline: E Ink, the Fediverse, and Smart Puka Shells

Date: August 5, 2026
Host: David Pierce
Producer/Co-host: Travis Larchuk
Episode Theme:
In this listener-driven “hotline” episode, The Vergecast dives into community questions covering the philosophy of minimalist smartphones, the nuanced debate around E Ink vs. LCD screens, the challenges and promise of federated messaging, the retro-futurist dream of modular wearable tech, and a lively discussion about foldable phone form factors (with a side of existential movie references). David Pierce leads with his signature cheeky, thoughtful analysis, ably volleying ideas with Travis Larchuk and a parade of savvy listeners.

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Main Discussion Points & Insights

1. Minimalist Phones: Community, Control, and the Philosophy of Restriction

Timestamps: 03:46–08:42

• Listener Question: Wiley calls in about how minimalist phones (like the Light Phone Flip) can succeed, suggesting open development and community-driven improvements.
• David’s Take:
  • There's a tension between device creators enforcing philosophy (restricting functions for simplicity) vs. empowering users to do as they please after purchase.
    • Quote (05:28, David): “Either I, David Pierce, the CEO of Flipphone Incorporated, am now the single arbiter of what belongs on this device… Or you, the user, can do whatever you want.”
  • Current approaches:
    • Commodore (retro brand reboot) curates its app store based on company values, positioning its CEO as “the Lord and savior of flip phones” (06:54).
    • Light's approach is more open—users can install whatever they like, even if it “destroys the whole value system… knock yourself out.” (07:35)
• Key Insight: The core ongoing debate is “Who decides?”—manufacturer or end user? This question will define the next era of minimalist devices.

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2. E Ink vs. LCD: The Tech, the Trade-offs, and Why Cameras Ruin Everything

Timestamps: 08:42–14:05

• Listener Question: Eddie asks about screen technology choices for minimalist phones—why not E Ink for true distraction-free experiences?
• David’s Deep Dive:
  • E Ink Pros:
    • Battery efficient, easier on eyes, actively unpleasant for addictive scrolling (which is a feature, not a bug). “It sucks. And, and I mean sucks as a compliment in this sense.” (10:20)
  • E Ink Cons:
    • Terrible for camera usage; slow refresh, low fidelity, can’t preview images effectively (“You can’t use a camera properly with an E Ink screen.” 11:33)
  • Light Phone switched to LCD to enable camera features, which rank above even calling for many consumers (12:04).
  • Manufacturers are experimenting with making LCD/OLED displays more “E Ink-like,” e.g. TCL’s nextpaper, Daylight LCDs (12:46).
• Key Quote (13:02, David):
  • “E Ink solves kind of all your problems, but one. But the one turns out to be maybe the single most important feature of most of these devices.”
• Conclusion: Until E Ink innovates, most minimalist phones will adopt “E Inkified” LCDs to support must-have features like cameras.

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3. The Fediverse for Messaging: Is ‘Matrix’ the Future?

Timestamps: 17:16–21:12

• Listener Question: Travis (not the co-host) wonders why the “Fediverse” only addresses social media fragmentation, when messaging is equally fragmented, and asks if there’s a protocol to federate messaging.
• David’s Analysis:
  • Matrix.org: An open, encrypted protocol for federated messaging— “the Fediverse for messaging.” (18:02)
  • Challenge:
    • Messaging requires strong privacy, which is technically hard to guarantee across federated servers.
    • Adoption problem: “They just can’t convince regular people to use it… If it had come along before everyone got entrenched in these worse platforms… Matrix would be essentially ubiquitous.” (20:36)
• Key Quote (19:51, David):
  • “We could do better messaging, except that everybody already uses iMessage and WhatsApp. They’re not good. They’re just the ones that we use.”
• Conclusion: Matrix excels in government and enterprise, but faces steep consumer inertia. Still, something like it may yet “make that mainstream turn.”

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4. Smart Puka Shells: Modular Wearables, Retro Style, and Why Physics Says No (For Now)

Timestamps: 21:21–25:20

• Listener Idea: Ben from Virginia suggests embedding wearable tech into a modular, puka shell-style necklace for both fashion and function.
• David’s (Comedic) Support and Reality Check:
  • Modular gadgets = “David bait.” “Modular gadgets are my jam and have been for forever. But they don't work. That’s... just the problem. They don’t work.” (22:47)
  • Key obstacles:
    • User experience (awkward interfaces)
    • Battery and heat management in ultra-small modules
    • “Several physics miracles away from being actually possible." (24:20)
  • Vision: Once possible, “everyone will do it because it is so transparently the right idea… charm bracelets of technology.” (24:29)
• Notable Moment: High school David = two popped collars, braces, a ring, and a puka shell necklace (22:03–22:30).

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5. Foldable Phones: The Passport Form Factor and Changing Perceptions

Timestamps: 25:23–30:54

• Listener Email: Why is the new Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 8’s passport shape being praised when the Pixel Fold had it years ago? Is this bias toward Apple’s rumored foldable?
• David’s Honesty:
  • Admits he was wrong to doubt the form factor.
  • Reasons for new enthusiasm:
    • Software finally works decently; the phone is both smaller (closed) and larger (opened), making it “pocketable.”
    • Samsung solved many pains (creases, durability, cameras). “All of a sudden the idea that you have to make a bunch of sacrifices just for the privilege of spending twice as much money … that trade is getting easier to make.” (28:48)
    • “Smaller phone that opens up into a slightly bigger phone actually is something.” (28:33)
  • Apple rumors: If they don’t nail the crease/software, “Samsung can just sit back and be like, yeah, we fixed that, you clowns.” (30:24)
• Notable Reference:
  • The new Z Fold 8 is “Theodore Twombly’s phone from ‘Her.’” (31:15)
  • David: “Everybody in tech watched that movie, somehow didn’t realize it was, like, horrible and dystopian, and started trying to make Samantha.”
• Big Takeaway: The evolution is both technical (solving past hardware/software problems) and psychological, as norms and user expectations adapt.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Flip Phones and Control:
  • “The minute you open it up to any more than that, everything gets weird and messy and complicated…” (05:19, David)
• On E Ink:
  • “E Ink screens are more complicated than you’d think. They’re all essentially run by a single company. The whole E Ink ecosystem is a strange thing.” (10:53, David)
• On Modular Gadgets:
  • “All of these things are several physics miracles away from being actually possible to do.” (24:20, David)
• On Foldables:
  • “Software’s kind of wacky. Some things fill the screen, some things don’t. Some things have weird sidebars because they don’t know what to do with the aspect ratio.” (27:16, David)
  • “The combination of it’s actually a smaller phone that opens up into a slightly bigger phone is more compelling than I realized.” (28:20, David)
• On the Movie ‘Her’ as Product Roadmap:
  • “Everybody should stop trying to make us fall in love with our AI assistants. Steal all the other ideas from that movie… Leave Samantha alone." (32:12–32:18, David)

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Minimalist Phone Philosophy: 03:46–08:42
• E Ink vs. LCD: 08:42–14:05
• Messaging Federation/Matrix: 17:16–21:12
• Modular Wearables & Puka Shells: 21:21–25:20
• Foldable Phones & 'Her' Reference: 25:23–32:18

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Tone & Style

• Language/Tone: Playful, witty, a little self-deprecating, deep tech knowledge with a conversational and accessible delivery.
• Attribution: David Pierce is the chief voice with Travis Larchuk as the energetic co-pilot; listeners’ questions and remarks are highlighted respectfully.

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Final Thoughts

This episode is a treat for both gadget nerds and anyone curious about the future of consumer tech. It’s a nuanced meditation on ownership, design compromise, technology adoption, and the strange recursive relationship between pop culture and product engineering. The Vergecast’s hotline format proves a perfect vessel: smart, irreverent, and always thinking a step (or collar-pop) ahead.

Transcript

[A]

Hello and welcome to the vergecast, the flagship podcast of Anti Reflective Display coatings. I'm your friend David Pearce and today on the show we're taking your questions about I actually don't know what. Travis Larchuk, our producer, is gonna come on and he's gonna ask me some of the questions we've been getting on the Vergecast hotline. We're gonna get into all of them. He has promised me. I'm gonna love at least one of them.

[B]

I'm very excited about it.

[A]

All that's coming in just a sec. But first, here's everything else happening on the Verge today. This is 90 seconds on the Verge

[B]

for Wednesday, August 5, 2026.

[A]

Disney is thinking about big changes to its streaming strategy. On its earnings call, Josh d', Amaro, the new CEO, said that the Disney app will soon get games, merchandise and

[B]

other experiences, whatever that means.

[A]

Basically, it seems like Disney is going to become the Disney Everything app. Disney's Even partnering with TikTok to turn

[B]

the vertical video feed into, I guess, Disney Talk, whatever that looks like.

[A]

Demaro also said that Disney is looking

[B]

into adding a free ad supported tier

[A]

to Disney and said it in such a way that it's very clear that

[B]

that is in fact coming and probably very soon.

[A]

Right now, the streaming in general are just a race to become YouTube before YouTube can swallow the entertainment industry whole.

[B]

It's wild out there.

[A]

SpaceX also just reported earnings for the

[B]

first time ever and it's doing, I don't know, fine.

[A]

SpaceX wants you to think that it's a space and AI company, but right

[B]

now it's mostly making money renting compute to other AI companies.

[A]

But the big news was Gwynne Shotwell, the company's president and actual leader, saying SpaceX is planning to build a terrestrial

[B]

mobile network in addition to its satellite systems.

[A]

In part, the plan seems to be

[B]

to connect all of its existing Starlink antenn and build a network that way.

[A]

Starlink evidently has its sights set on taking, quote, quite a few customers from

[B]

T Mobile, ATT and Verizon. We'll see.

[A]

And finally, a preemptive rip to Google

[B]

Assistant, which is officially being removed from Android devices starting on September 4th.

[A]

This isn't at all surprising.

[B]

Google has been all in on Gemini for a while now, but I think

[A]

Assistant is actually still the best way

[B]

to do some simple phone tasks. And now it is all LLMs all the time. Apparently forever.

[A]

You can read more about all [e-mail] that is 90 seconds on the verge

[B]

for Wednesday August 5th.

[C]

Support for this show comes from Odoo. Running a business is hard enough, so why make it harder with a dozen different apps that don't talk to each other? Introducing Odoo. It's the only business software you'll ever need. It's an all in one fully integrated platform that makes your work easier. CRM, accounting, inventory, E commerce, and more. And the best part, Odoo replaces multiple expensive platforms for a fraction of the cost. That's why over thousands of businesses have made the switch. So why not you try Odoo for [e-mail] that's o d o o.com.

[D]

This episode is brought to you by Google Chrome. You think you know a browser, but Gemini and Chrome? That's new. It can help you with practically anything on the web, like restoring a vintage motorcycle from a 50 page restoration block. Or finally break down that long article you've had open for weeks. Gemini and Chrome is here for it, ready to make anything online make sense. There's no place like Chrome. Check responses set up required compatibility and availability various 18/.

[A]

All right, let's get to some of your questions. As a reminder, the best way to ask us questions about anything and everything. We love all of your weirdest possible questions. You can email vergecastheverge.com, you can call the hotline 866 verge11. We're going to do more and more of these all the time. Travis Lar, our producer who is here, just wants to do the hotline all the time.

[E]

All the time, every show.

[B]

I love this.

[A]

You have a bunch of questions. I am going to do my best to answer them.

[B]

Let's get into it.

[E]

All right. Our audience is very interested in that sick light phone that you talked about.

[A]

Everyone is interested in this. It is. It is extremely sick.

[E]

Our first voicemail is from Wiley and he has some thoughts on how phones like this could be successful in the long run.

[F]

Hey David, this is Riley. I just listened to the podcast with the light phone flip and I've had a light phone and Nokias and every other flip phone that's basically new. And you asked what is the thing that needs to happen in order for these things to work? Basically, and in my opinion the thing that needs to happen is open development and leverage the power of the very passionate community that is willing to do development for them and approve and don't approve based on purely philosophical lines. I think in my opinion that would be the game changer that allows these things to take off.

[A]

Okay, Wiley, I Say this with love. I can hear from your voicemail that you are reckoning with the exact same thing that everyone does in this space,

[B]

which is who decides?

[A]

This is the problem with all of this, right? Like, you can make a phone that does a certain number of things, and if you, the developer, limit that phone to a certain number of things, that is at least a very clear principle, right? You say, here is the phone. It does the things that it does. It does not do other things.

[B]

The end.

[A]

You can either like it or you cannot. The minute you open it up to any more than that, everything gets weird

[B]

and messy and complicated because you say,

[A]

either I, David Pierce, the CEO of flipphone Incorporated, am now the single arbiter of what belongs on this device that you've actually already paid a bunch of money for, and in theory could make a very compelling case that is yours to do with as you please. Like Travis, do you remember that thing going around with the Light Phone 3 where a bunch of people started putting full Android on it? Like, The Light Phone 3 is running on Android, so people were just hacking it to run Apple actual, honest to God, Android.

[E]

It seems like it defeats the purpose a little bit, but okay, a lot

[A]

of people would agree with you. So this, this became a whole thing because there were a bunch of people who were like, you are. You are destroying the thing that this is supposed to be. Why on earth would you buy this phone to run all of this stuff? And then there were a bunch of people who were just like, screw you. I paid $700 for this phone. It is mine to do with as I please. Both of those things are. Are good and true things. And I've been talking to a bunch of people about this, and the two different courses of action that I've really found are Commodore, which is making a flip phone.

[G]

They.

[A]

They sort of bought and rebooted the brand.

[B]

There's a really fascinating Commodore thing happening with, like, Retro Tech.

[A]

They're making a flip phone. And their idea is actually almost exactly

[B]

what Wiley said, is that anybody's going

[A]

to be able to make apps, but they're only going to be able to be listed on the App Store if they are approved by Commodore. And, and that sets up the CEO of Commodore, this guy, Christian, as like the Lord and savior of flip phones.

[B]

He is.

[A]

He is the arbiter of truth and whether that gets to be good. And I think to some extent that is a perfectly good and valid opinion, right? He's like, we're selling this phone. We're selling a belief system and value

[B]

system with this phone.

[A]

And I will be the one in

[B]

control of that value system.

[A]

Light Phone has gone very much the other way. They, they opened up the development kit. They're going to have some curation and things in their own store as you like go to the website to download stuff to do on your phone.

[B]

If, if somebody wants to make a Facebook app, Light is not going to promote the Facebook app, but if you

[A]

want to make a Facebook app and run it on your lite flip, Kai Tang would tell you that that is

[B]

your right and it is your phone.

[A]

And if you want to completely destroy the whole value system and belief system behind this phone in the name of

[B]

getting Facebook and Instagram on your phone, knock yourself out.

[A]

So I think in line with the thing that all these flip phones have

[B]

been dealing with for forever, which is

[A]

what can these do before they become a problem? Like, everybody agrees you shouldn't be able

[B]

Instagram on a minimalist phone. That, that is simple. Should you be able to have WhatsApp? Should you be able to have Snapchat,

[A]

which is both a social media platform

[B]

and like straightforwardly a text messaging replacement?

[A]

Nobody knows exactly where that line is. And now the question is, who gets

[B]

to be the one to be the keeper of that line?

[A]

And I think I probably err on the side of you should be able

[B]

to do whatever you want if you,

[A]

if you want to get a phone and then use Claude to build some

[B]

weird apps that run and violate the

[A]

whole premise and Light would hate you for it. I, I earnestly believe that is your

[B]

right as the person who just spent a bunch of money on this phone.

[A]

Um, but different people will land in

[B]

different places on this and I, I

[A]

think it, it's going to be one

[B]

of the big questions in this, in this era going forward with these devices.

[E]

All right, and then our next one. This question, I believe is David Pierce bait. This is, this is right up your alley. This is going straight for your heart.

[A]

David, wait, can I guess?

[E]

Sure.

[A]

It's about, it's going to be about

[B]

one of two things.

[A]

It's either going to be about which note taking slash to do list app this person should use, or it's going

[B]

to be about E Ink screens.

[F]

Hey, David, this is Eddie. I just listened to the episode with Kai from the Light phone slip. I was just curious how, how do these minimalist phone designers, how do they decide between like E Ink, lcd, oled, E in screens? To me it seems like you would want E Ink for just terrible screen and screen time restrictions. Basically. But I don't know. I think this new one has an lcd. I might be wrong, but. Yeah. How do they make those decisions? What are the pros and cons?

[A]

My personal brand is immaculate. Travis?

[E]

Yeah. Before you answer, I had this moment when you were like, I'm going to guess where I felt like I was on the Newlywed Game and I was like, oh, do I know David as well as I think I do? Yeah. I'm glad that worked out.

[A]

You and everyone else pretty much have

[B]

me pegged at this point.

[A]

Um, okay. This is a really good one. And as America's foremost expert in the books, Palma, I feel very qualified to answer this. So the, the trade off here is

[B]

actually relatively straightforward, which is that E

[A]

Ink lasts a lot longer, it's much easier on the eyes, and it sucks. And, and I mean sucks as a

[B]

compliment in this sense.

[A]

Right?

[B]

It is.

[A]

It is actively unpleasant to do things

[B]

like scroll TikTok on any ink screen.

[A]

So even something like the books Palma, or all of these other devices that are more full fledged Android devices, they do the thing they intend to do. Not by making it impossible, but just

[B]

by making it terrible.

[A]

Like, if you want to put TikTok on your books, Palma, you can. And, and as, as I said before, I believe that is, that is your right. If you knock yourself out. That's weird. But. But go get it. Um, but no one does. And that. Because it doesn't work and you wouldn't

[B]

like it and you would have a bad time.

[A]

Um, E Ink screens are more complicated than you'd think.

[H]

They're.

[A]

They're all essentially run by a single company. The, the whole E Ink ecosystem is a strange thing that we should probably

[B]

get into at some point on the

[A]

show, but it's, it's actually probably in many ways easier to get your hands on an LCD or an OLED screen

[B]

than it is an E Ink screen.

[A]

But that, that is neither here nor there. So the, the pros for E Ink are, are, I think, fairly straightforward in,

[B]

in how you use the product. Right.

[A]

The customer cons are that sometimes you

[B]

want things that suck on an E Ink screen.

[A]

And I think the one that comes up over and over with these companies is the camera. You can't use a camera properly with

[B]

an E Ink screen.

[A]

It doesn't refresh fast enough, it doesn't show enough fidelity, it won't properly show you what's in focus. Even books which ships a camera, they're

[B]

like, this is a document scanner.

[A]

Like, don't even try to take pictures with this thing, it will roughly capture the thing you are trying to do,

[B]

and that will solve your problem relatively fine.

[A]

Uh, the reason light started using non E ink screens.

[B]

Light started making E ink phones way back in the day for all of

[A]

the reasons I just described. But they realized, okay, the number one

[B]

thing people require on their primary device is a camera.

[A]

Like, if you. If you were to make a list of features people want on their phone, I think you'd get to camera before

[B]

you'd get to phone.

[A]

You know what I mean?

[E]

Yeah.

[A]

So, like, you just have to have a camera, and then the minute you have a camera and you want to use it for anything at all, you

[B]

need a better display than what you get on an E ink screen.

[A]

You just, you just can't do the

[B]

thing on E ink that you need to do the camera.

[A]

So now you're stuck with like, okay, do we do a bunch of weird tricks to an OLED screen to make it look more E inky? And we're starting to see this from a lot of companies. Like TCL is doing some really interesting

[B]

stuff in this space with nextpaper.

[A]

There are a lot of ideas about

[B]

how you can change the color of the backlight.

[A]

There's this really interesting company called Daylight that basically just like took all the blue out of an LCD and made

[B]

it feel much warmer and a little different and changed the reflectivity.

[A]

So there's a lot of stuff you

[B]

can do on an LCD to make

[A]

it more E inky, which is where

[B]

most of these companies are landing. Right.

[A]

Like, even on the light phone, it is a black and white experience until you open up the camera and then

[B]

all of a sudden it's a full color camera because a black and white camera would suck, and no one wants that.

[A]

So I think the trade here is basically E ink solves kind of all of your problems, but one. But the one turns out to be maybe the single most important feature of

[B]

most of these devices.

[A]

So I think anyone who's going to use a phone or try to make

[B]

something that you can use as a

[A]

phone is going to ultimately land on

[B]

the side of how can we minimalize

[A]

an EE Inkify an LCD or an

[B]

OLED rather than just go pure E

[A]

ink until there maybe there's some magical E ink revolution, new technology to come. Travis, you're shaking your head. And that is also how I feel.

[E]

I don't know whose priority that is right now.

[B]

No one's.

[E]

Yeah.

[A]

But, yeah, I think, I think that the trade off is tricky. And I think most of these phone

[B]

makers are actually landing on the right side by landing on non e ink screens.

[H]

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[C]

Support for this show comes from Odoo. Running a business is hard enough, so why make it harder with a dozen different apps that don't talk to each other? Introducing Odoo. It's the only business software you'll ever need. It's an all in one fully integrated platform that makes your work easier. CRM, accounting, inventory, E commerce, and more. And the best part? Odoo replaces multiple expensive platforms for a fraction of the cost. That's why over thousands of businesses have made the switch. So why not you try Odoo for [e-mail] that's o d o o.com.

[D]

This episode is brought to you by Google Chrome. You think you know a browser, but Gemini and Chrome? That's new. It can help you with practically anything on the web. Restoring a vintage motorcycle from a 50 page restoration block, or finally break down that long article you've had open for weeks. Gemini and Chrome is here for it, ready to make anything online make sense. There's no place like Chrome. Check responses, setup required, Compatibility and Availability Various 18

[G]

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[E]

all right, David, I don't know how much longer we have you before you go on leave, so I just need to run this by you before you're out. This is some more David Pierce bait. It is not about to do lists though.

[B]

Oh, well then I'm not interested.

[E]

This is from someone named Travis, but it's not me. It's not me, I promise.

[A]

We love a Travis here on this show.

[E]

Question, friends, I've been very interested in your coverage of the Fediverse or lack thereof.

[B]

We're so back.

[E]

But I'm wondering why it's only about social media. There's such a splintering of messaging platforms, especially in the work context. What once was established norms in email has turned to client and teen conversations with important documents across email. Slack, Gchat, WhatsApp. The beauty of email is any email client can email any other. Are there efforts to federate messaging? You send it from wherever you want and I receive it however I want to receive it. Seems like a far more pressing problem. Yours an activity pub, Travis?

[B]

This is.

[A]

This is my kind of thing.

[B]

Okay.

[A]

I just want to very briefly tell

[B]

you about a company called Matrix that

[A]

I find absolutely fascinating and have done

[B]

a bunch of reporting on and think

[A]

is sort of an underrated, most important

[B]

company in tech right now.

[A]

I really earnestly believe this. So Matrix is exactly the Fediverse for messaging. Like imagine I have a Slack instance

[B]

and you have a Slack instance and

[A]

they actually have nothing to do with each other.

[B]

Right.

[A]

They are completely separated. We each run our own on, on premises. Like you can run Matrix on a,

[B]

on a network, on a Navy ship.

[A]

It's like a real thing that they do. It is a completely distinct thing. But also I can message your matrix from my matrix like it turns into cross platform messaging right next to and integrated with like team messaging that is

[B]

incredibly well put together and encrypted and all of the things that you would want.

[A]

So Matrix started essentially as a, a completely federated encrypted messaging platform. And the reason, by the way, that this is a much harder problem for messaging than it is for social media is privacy. We just have completely different expectations about the privacy of our content when we're posting it publicly to a social network

[B]

and when we're talking to our friends

[A]

and maintaining privacy across different servers and different implementations in different companies and building a system that sort of exists in so many places but all adheres to

[B]

the same very intense privacy policy is just really hard.

[A]

And so this company, Matrix, has spent a long time working through this. And the most fascinating thing about Matrix to me is that they have really

[B]

struggled to get regular people to use it.

[A]

They make an app called Element that

[B]

is essentially just WhatsApp. It works very well, it's very fast, it's very simple.

[A]

But they're having a hard time getting

[B]

that adoption, in part because people use,

[A]

you know, WhatsApp, but they are all

[B]

over, like, secure government implementations.

[A]

Like countries around the world are using

[B]

Matrix for important secure communication.

[A]

Because the alternative is WhatsApp, which is not as secure, causes all kinds of problems, is not nearly as manageable and administrable.

[B]

It's just a worse system.

[A]

So what they've done is they've rolled this much more secure, controllable, ownable messaging

[B]

platform called Matrix that has. Has kind of percolated all over.

[A]

So matrix.org is specifically the answer to this question.

[B]

I think it's really good technology. The people who run it are really smart and interesting and up to cool stuff. They just can't convince regular people to use it.

[A]

And I think this is the most

[B]

fascinating piece of this story to me,

[A]

is like, if it had come along before everyone got entrenched in these worst

[B]

platforms like Teams and Slack, I think Matrix would be essentially ubiquitous in the world right now. It's the same thing with messaging, right?

[A]

Like, we could do better messaging, except

[B]

that Everybody already uses iMessage and WhatsApp.

[A]

They're not good. They're just the ones that we use.

[B]

And getting people off of those things is very hard.

[A]

But whether it's Matrix or something like

[B]

it, I think it's coming.

[A]

Something like this is going to make

[B]

that mainstream turn, and. And it's going to look extremely fediversey, because that idea is the right one.

[E]

All right, we have some feedback from our episode where we talked about AI wearables.

[F]

Ooh.

[B]

Okay.

[F]

Hey, what's up, y'?

[E]

All?

[F]

This is Ben from Arlington, Virginia. I was listening to the episode where you ranked the different sort of AI wearables, and it got me thinking. When you ranked the pendant and necklace so low, what if we brought back kind of like the puka shell chokers from the late 90s, early 2000s? Because then people could kind of design the batteries or the different components into each one of those different, like, balls or shelves, and then we could bring it back as a. As a fashion statement. All right, love the show. Thanks. Bye.

[A]

Before we get into this, I would like you to just. Just briefly close your eyes and imagine early high school.

[B]

David.

[A]

I had, uh, I had a ring on my right hand. Uh, it wasn't like a. Like a thumb ring or a pinky ring. It was just like. It was just a ring. Just wore a ring. Not really sure why in retrospect. Uh, I had not one, but two popped collars on my polo shirts.

[B]

Uh, not again. It's very important.

[A]

If just one.

[B]

You're ridiculous.

[A]

Two legendary. Uh, and I did, in fact, have

[B]

a puka shell necklace.

[A]

I also had braces and had a

[B]

giant gap between my two front teeth. And I was styling. So this.

[A]

This is. This is the David we're bringing back with this idea. First of all, shout out to Northern Virginia, Go Nova. This is a good idea. And Travis, I think you don't understand

[B]

the extent to which this is also David bait, because modular gadgets are my jam and have been for forever. But they don't work. That's.

[A]

It's just the problem. They don't work. We have been trying to do modular gadgets for a very long time, designing them in such a way that each one of them works individually, but also in concert with any number of other things just turns out to be essentially impossible. We just can't do it. We can't make it work with phones without them being like hideous puzzle piece blocks that don't fit together well. There's so many awkward things with making

[B]

that work just from a user perspective that they haven't really worked.

[A]

And then you throw in the fact

[B]

that there are all kinds of battery

[A]

problems to solve with this. Like, the idea that you could just stick a bunch of parts into a little puka and string a bunch of

[B]

them together and make.

[A]

Is such a lovely idea that I. And I desperately want it to work.

[B]

And in case you're wondering, Travis, the

[A]

singular is Puka1.1 Puka Many Pukas.

[B]

And that's. That's your necklace. Just doesn't work.

[A]

Like, I actually think everybody would like

[B]

this to be the answer that you. You could have a smart watch band that you would stick with, a mechanical watch that you like. You would have a smart pendant that could go on any number of things.

[A]

Fitbit has been trying to do this.

[B]

Like, how do we accessorize your life with a Fitbit thing for forever? It just doesn't work. The battery doesn't work.

[A]

You can't do battery and connectivity in

[B]

a thing that's that small without causing, like, heat problems. And then you introduce a heat sink, and all of a sudden the thing is too big.

[A]

Like, all of these things are several physics miracles away from being actually possible to do. But the minute they become possible to

[B]

do, everyone will do it because it is so transparently the right idea, right?

[A]

Like charm bracelets of technology is such

[B]

a huge and cool and interesting idea that will percolate into every gadget that you have.

[A]

Everybody wants to make accessories that do more stuff. Everybody wants to make lots of different

[B]

kinds of gadgets that you can put together with all the functionality you want, nothing else. Like, everybody wants this.

[A]

It's more sustainable. It would be cheaper to make, it

[B]

would be cheaper to upgrade. Like, this is just a good idea. But in anything smaller than a laptop, like Framework has figured out how to do this in a way that I have found very impressive.

[A]

Even that is like big and expensive

[B]

and kind and a little bit clunky compared to what you'd get from another laptop. The idea of doing it at necklace size is just flatly, scientifically not possible right now.

[A]

But everybody wants this and I will

[B]

buy the Puka the minute it becomes available to me.

[E]

All right, this is the last one.

[A]

Okay, I'm ready.

[E]

We got. There is a new Galaxy Z Fold 8 and it is passport shaped. A lot of excitement about it. The reviews have been great. Dom really liked the form factor. We've been surprised by it. However, we received some feedback from people who are. Who are saying, wait a minute, I was on board this passport train a while ago and here's. Here's an email we got. This is from Al Tech Media. Hypocrisy on the Z fold 8 form factor. I was listening to today's Vergecast episode about the Samsung Z Fold 8 and it made me wonder, why is this wider form factor being praised as a game changer now? When the original Pixel Fold launched with this exact same shape years ago, it feels hypocritical. Almost as if tech reviewers and media outlets are suddenly warming up to this design now just to set a favorable precedent ahead of the upcoming foldable iPhone. Rumored asterisk. Ed Travis Right.

[A]

First of all, it's a fabulous conspiracy theory. I really, I really, really like the idea that A we would be doing that and B, that we, the tech

[B]

media would have gotten together and. And made a plan.

[E]

If I was getting secretly paid by Apple, I'd live in a much nicer apartment, I'll tell you that right now.

[A]

So I will say I was wrong

[B]

about the passport size and I think

[A]

I was wrong for a couple of reasons. One is that it just took a while for the software to make any sense. Right? Like, even everybody's experience so far with

[B]

the Fold 8 has been, in a

[A]

lot of ways, this is the best of both worlds, right?

[B]

Like, it is a.

[A]

It's a pretty small screen that turns

[B]

into a pretty big screen in a way that is kind of pocketable. Like, that's a huge victory.

[A]

Software's kind of wacky. Some things fill the screen, some things don't. Some things have weird sidebars because they

[B]

don't know what to do with the aspect ratio.

[A]

There's a lot to work out here, and there's a lot less to work

[B]

out than there was when the Pixel Fold shipped with this. Right?

[A]

But I think increasingly the thing that seems to be true and the thing that I got wrong and again, I

[B]

still have not held the Z fold 8, so I can't speak to this

[A]

personally, but almost every single person who has picked it up seems to have had the reaction, oh, this is smaller than I thought. And Neil and I talked about this last week, that.

[B]

That is powerful, right?

[A]

The, the idea that this becomes something

[B]

that is easier to hold in my

[A]

hand, easier to put away, easier to

[B]

fit in my pocket, easier to fit

[A]

in my purse, like, whatever, anything we can get back in terms of physical wieldability on our phones is a big deal. And I think I underrated the extent

[B]

to which the passport form factor would be really nice when it was closed. I expected it to not be nice when it was closed, and it seems to be nice when it was closed, especially now that they're starting to figure out how to make the software work.

[A]

So I think that combination of it's actually a smaller phone that opens up

[B]

into a slightly bigger phone is more compelling than I realized.

[A]

My argument against it for a long time was you've just given me a

[B]

phone that opens up into a slightly bigger phone.

[A]

Sure, right. Like that doesn't do much for me. But a smaller phone that opens up

[B]

into a slightly bigger phone actually is something.

[A]

The other thing is just that all of these phones had so many other

[B]

problems that Samsung has done a particularly good job of starting to solve, like the crease is going away, the durability problems are going away, the cameras are getting better.

[A]

So all of a sudden the idea that you have to make a bunch of sacrifices just for the privilege of

[B]

spending twice as much money on a

[A]

slightly bigger internal screen, that trade is

[B]

getting easier to make.

[A]

I still don't think in good conscience

[B]

I could tell anyone to make it because it's still twice the price but

[A]

it still, at this point is like getting to the point where, okay, it's now as good as your other phones and it has this other thing it

[B]

can do which is get smaller and bigger at the same time.

[A]

And that, that smaller and bigger thing

[B]

is, is what I missed.

[A]

But I think the real thing that

[B]

has happened is Samsung fixed a bunch of problems, it fixed a bunch of software problems. They're starting to figure out what this thing should be usable for.

[A]

Like, for some reason, I keep going back to the moment in the launch event where she opens up the screen and on the one side is the TikTok video and on the other side is the comments. That was like the first sort of visceral, oh, this is awesome reaction I've

[B]

ever had to a foldable phone.

[A]

And I'm sure Samsung didn't invent that idea, but it was the first time that I've been like, oh, I can

[B]

now do something different by opening up my phone.

[A]

And it's not just use two apps

[B]

side by side, which I think is a tiny feature for hardly anybody.

[A]

It's I can actually meaningfully change the

[B]

experience of using my phone just by opening it up.

[A]

I think that's very cool. I think it took us a while to catch up to the idea that there is stuff you can do on either side of this equation.

[B]

I think it took the phone makers a while to get here.

[A]

I'm very curious to see if Apple has actually figured out a the form factor itself. Like, it's going to be very funny,

[B]

frankly, if there's a big messy crease in the middle of the iPhone Ultra or whatever it ends up being called, and Samsung can just sit back and be like, yeah, we fixed that, you clowns.

[A]

I sort of hope that's the case, but it'll be interesting to see. Also, if Apple has a bunch of

[B]

new ideas about how to make the software work. I wouldn't say I'm massively optimistic. I think the existence of the iPad suggests that Apple has not yet figured out what you're supposed to do with a screen that size. But we'll see.

[E]

And that's it for today's hotline show.

[A]

Wait.

[F]

No.

[B]

Wrong.

[A]

I have one more to throw you. You didn't get to this, but I just want to give a quick shout out to David, who emailed us about the same show talking about the Z Fold eight to point out that the exact device being created now is Theodore Twombly's phone in the movie Her.

[B]

The little, the little, like, makeup case

[A]

that opens up to become his phone. This is just what we're doing now. And I think that's so funny because her is the most interesting movie in tech right now in, like, a very real way, because everybody in tech watched that movie, somehow didn't realize it was, like, horrible and dystopian and started trying to make Samantha. And this is just literally what we were doing now. But if you look around that movie, I really encourage everybody to go watch

[B]

this movie again, because it's fabulous.

[A]

There's so many interesting ideas about devices

[B]

in that movie and the way that

[A]

he, like, picks up hardware and how hardware and software interact. And this device that he's talking about, the little makeup case, like, his AI

[B]

assistant will say, like, I need to show you something, and he'll pull it out and look at it.

[A]

And this is like, there's so many

[B]

good interaction ideas and hardware ideas in

[A]

that movie, including foldable phones. But everybody should stop trying to make

[B]

us fall in love with our AI assistants.

[A]

Steal all the other ideas from that movie, including, like, the.

[B]

The pants that Joaquin Phoenix wears the whole time.

[A]

Leave Samantha alone. That's all I have to say.

[E]

That did make me think that maybe this whole time, any movie with an AI plotline should have had, like, subtext subtitles where it's just, like, parentheses. This is bad.

[A]

Yeah, right?

[E]

Don't do this.

[A]

Yeah, it's like, satire needs to be like, this is satire. Just so you know.

[B]

All right, all right.

[A]

Thank you, sir.

[E]

Thank you, David.

[A]

All right, that's it for the show. Thank you again to Travis for being here, and thank you, as always, for watching and listening. Special thanks, by the way, to everybody who sends us questions all the time about everything. 866-Verge11 is the hotline. Vergecast of the verge.com is the email. We want to hear everything, especially things I'm wrong about. We love hearing things that I'm wrong about. And a secret to getting on the show is make fun of me in particular. And Travis will almost always demand that

[B]

we put it in the show.

[A]

That's just a little fun fact for all of you. If you want to support everything that we're doing, the best thing you can do is subscribe to the Verge. Theverge.com subscribe gets you all of our podcasts ad free, including this one. It gets you all of our exclusive newsletters. It gets you all of our coverage of my feelings about E ink and flip phones and everything else else. Thank you in advance. Theverge.com subscribe the Verge Cast is a Verge Production and part of the Vox Media Podcast Network. The show is produced by Josh Kahas, Eric Gomez, Brandon Kiefer and Travis Larchuk. We will see you tomorrow. Rock and roll.