It's Tuesday June 10, 2014 and I'm Ariel Nunez and from our CBS studios in New York City, welcome to the 404.
[MUSIC]
Hey, everyone, thanks for tuning in to The 404 Show on CNET, I'm Justin Yu.
And I'm Bridget Carey, now in color.
[LAUGH] we're in color, what happened to you, Ariel?
I'm controlling from back in time today.
[LAUGH].
Before there was color TV.
You have to talk like an old timey TV news broadcaster.
Yeah, from back in time, see.
[INAUDIBLE] [LAUGH].
You just did.
Yeah.
I don't know how you did that, but I might wanna put an Instagram picture on the video.
[LAUGH].
You're looking pretty good.
Why don't you keep that this episode?
For this episode, I'm staying back in time.
Yeah, that's good.
[LAUGH] So Bridgette, you're back on the show today and I, I do appreciate that cuz I know you're super busy all week writing up stories about E3.
Which is interesting cuz neither of us are huge video game fans?
I'm like a casual gamer, I would classify myself.
But I don't have the new systems, yeah.
Right, but the news that's been coming out of E3 this year has been really interesting for non gamers and gamers alike.
Yeah.
So tell us what's been going on with Sony press conference, and why Microsoft has kind of phoned this one in.
Okay, so.
I have a perspective from someone who doesn't have the, the new systems, you have Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo all just made their announcements already by the time we're doing this.
And so you have Microsoft not saying a word about the Xbox One features, what the Xbox One can do, what the Kinect is, they didn't even utter the word Kinect.
Mm-hm.
It was simply.
We're just gonna talk about games right now.
Okay.
Now, now as someone who is indecisive between you know, am I gonna get an X-box or a play station, they didn't even mention why I was working in X-box.
Mm-hm.
Just that they have a lot of good games coming out.
They announced games that are gonna be on both systems.
So you sat back and went oh, okay, I guess some last year.
They were hit with so much backlash and criticism over some of those Xbox features.
Mm-hm.
The Xbox One features that they clearly were just playing it safe and saying, you know what, let's just talk about the games.
Hm.
So Sony a couple hours later comes out and they, Microsoft made it easy for Sony to shine.
Sony comes out has, some new hardware, really amps things up with, with exciting game play not just like fancy looking trailers for games.
Mm-hm.
And, and new features, like the Playstation, I believe it's called Playstation Now.
Right.
Where, you're able to, stream the games for a limited time.
It's kinda like modern day renting.
Mm-hm.
You know, I used to go to the Blockbuster and rent games.
Now just stream them, kind of thing and they haven't worked out the pricing yet, but that's gonna be starting to roll out in the summer.
So if you are an indecisive gamer-
Mm-hm.
And you wanted one of the top systems, you clearly were sold better by Sony.
It just, I mean the Playstation TV is kind of an interesting new gadget they're coming out with.
It's a set top box.
Mm-hm.
That you would put on a secondary TV in the house.
And, it'll stream games that were from your main Playstation 4. So if you wanna just play a game from your Vita or your Playstation 4, say in the bedroom instead of the living room, where it's hooked up-
Uh-huh.
You would just buy this $99 box.
It'll stream it to another TV.
It'll probably also have video streaming like Netflix on there, too.
Right.
But they're little laid on the details right now, but that kind of thing is $99 and you kinda go, well, there's another perk-
Mm-hm.
To having a PlayStation if you have a family and you wanna play different games.
It looks pretty cool too, especially from, I guess an old school point of view too if you were into PlayStation 2 or 3 games.
You'll be able to play those here, as well.
Yeah.
Do you think you'll be able to buy this separately, or does it require a PS4 already as an accessory or standalone?
That's what I was confused about.
No, I feel like, I feel like they were implying it was an accessory but at least when it comes to being able to stream a game from your Vita that you played, that you paid for already.
Mm-hm.
Or a game that you paid for on a PlayStation 4.
But you would think that if it was connected to the internet it could do its own streaming regardless of the-.
Right.
Systems.
It should stand alone.
But it'll be interesting how, you know, that works out with more details.
And, they have like 100 games right now with some big titles.
But yeah, imagine, you can have all these older games.
Right.
You know, plan that.
And the Nintendo, they're always the more family friendly one, you know, the more, I guess you would say serious gamers, like-.
Has that press conference happened already?
Yes, yeah, it has.
Even talked about it, it was all about Sony and Microsoft.
Well it, it was a video stream that they pre recorded.
And so, you got to watch it live, and it just wrapped up.
And they're still announcing some things.
I think, as someone who gets kind of nostalgic for old classic characters and.
Mm-hm.
And, they are.
Nintendo does things really cute.
I couldn't help but smile when I saw some of the things you could do with the new WiiU.
I don't have a WiiU yet.
But, you can play Super Smash Brothers as your little character, personification, Mii character.
So, you and I could fight together.
And you would be Justin.
And I would be Bridget.
And that's kind of a cute idea to play in a video game.
Cuz I always wondered why can't you play more fighting games with like, your little Mii's.
And they also have those new toys that are kinda like Skylanders.
Oh, right.
Where they call them.
Amiibos.
Cuz M-I-I.
Me.
You know.
Amiibos.
And I'm always gonna say it that way, too.
[LAUGH].
But you can buy them and put them on your gamepad and it'll awaken that character save data-
Uh-huh.
In whatever game your in.
And it'll be multiple games, not just Skylanders for Skylanders.
But, if you like four, Mario Kart, or for Super Smash Brothers, you would take that same character with you a different place.
Mm-hm.
So, interesting stuff that is on the adorable side, and Star Fox is coming back.
For Nintendo.
Yeah, like they're making a new Star Fox game.
That's what's out on the Internet now.
Mm-hm.
So I'm interested in learning more about that, because I never had a N64.
Right.
But every time I go to the store, I always learned how to do a barrel roll.
[LAUGH]
It was so adorable.
I wanted to play-.
For the five minutes you were allowed to play-.
Yeah, for the five minute demo until someone at Toys R Us kicks you out, you know.
Right, so it sounds like you have the Nintendo, the Wii U console for maybe legacy gamers or kids that wanna get into gaming.
And then Sony, I mean, there's something for everybody here.
Mm-hm.
I mean, they're even gonna let you stream your.
TV shows and original content shows.
Yeah, yeah they're gonna have some original shows of, of, I think one of them was called, what was it called?
Powers.
Right, Powers.
Yeah.
Based on a comic strip or something?
Right, right, a very popular, comic strip.
So, you know, they're, they're pumping out more reasons for you to invest if you wanted to choose, you know -.
Right.
You have more reason suddenly.
I mean, Microsoft has perks, but they just can't talk about it.
They're taking things away.
Meanwhile, Sony is introducing all types of new things.
There's a new Ivory, Playstation 4. But Microsoft has taken stuff away.
They didn't even talk about the Kinect.
Like you said, it wasn't mentioned at all.
It's kinda like a lack of confidence.
Right.
It came off although, when I gave my update report yesterday and said, oh Microsoft is clearly, you know, not saying a word about this, making it easy for someone to outshine them.
Mm-hm.
Oh, I got hit with so many gamers who were on Twitter going.
Oh, this is what we wanted.
Right.
We didn't care about the other features, we just want them to talk about games.
Yeah.
But I mean, from, from a reporter perspective who's looking for like, you know, who's got more to offer this year.
Mm-hm.
Sony clearly wins.
It seems like the big issue is marketing, messaging problem.
It just seems that, you know, they pulled back the bundle so now it doesn't include the Kinect.
Over the weekend, they introduced Kinect 2 for developers and.
Hm.
They were encouraging developers, at least on the PC side.
To make games and apps for the Connect, but now it's starting to seem like Microsoft just wants Connect to be disconnected entirely from the gaming industry.
[CROSSTALK].
More exciting apps have been outside of gaming entirely in the healthcare area, they should just market it as a camera and not necessarily a game.
It's that 3.
Yeah.
They didn't even talk about, like, maybe what the were working on in the future.
It was just kinda like, focus on the games kids.
We're gonna be back here.
Forget about all that drama last year.
Right.
And, we'll let that blow over.
And, maybe it will come back stronger next year, with, More, like, guess what we're trying out, you know?
Right.
And, you've gotta assume that Microsoft already knew what Sony was going to announce, before the press conference?
Pretty much.
You could.
I wanna go back and re-watch that conference and just kinda see how they struggle.
Yeah.
But, what, did they, did Sony mention anything about Project Morpheus cuz that's really what I was the most excited about.
Oh, the whole [CROSSTALK].
Yeah, it was more of a tease, like we're working on more things but there wasn't any like solid news like you're gonna buy it on a holiday.
Right.
It wasn't anything solid like that.
It was just another little wink, wink nudge, nudge.
We're working on some stuff and maybe involve the camera, you know?
Right.
It's gonna be cool.
Okay.
You wait and see.
You know I felt like they moved on quickly to other more substantial concrete news, you know.
Mm-hm, mm-hm.
All right, so what else do we got here?
I mean, we already talked about, you know, the competitor to Amazon Instant and Netflix watch instantly as well, that's on the Sony side.
Anything that Microsoft announced besides some of the upcoming titles?
I know a lot people online, I was reading responses to the, the presser.
People were saying that Microsoft only showed, movie footage, trailer footage.
There was not a lot of in-game play.
There was, that's another thing about, about teasers.
That's got to be very frustrating.
It's like, here's the movie and what does the game play really look like?
That's right.
And Sony did more of that.
I mean maybe, Sony just, just spent more, more time, you know, really hyping up their, their promotions.
Mm-hm.
But yeah, Microsoft was heavy on the halo.
And, I know people love their Halo.
Yeah.
I know they do.
But, I think it, there's a, there's an issue when the biggest news about Halo is, hey everyone, we just wrapped up the past four Halo's and repackaged it so you can pay for it again.
Right [LAUGH].
In a new collector's edition.
And you want that new Halo wait til next year, next holiday in 2015.
Right.
And so you kinda go, I know, I know Halo friends, you know, are actually pre-ordering it.
It's actually hot on Amazon right now.
But if this is the big wooptie do, it's old stuff that you're paying for again.
Mm-hm.
I don't know, unless you were like young and you never played the other ones.
Right.
Which, I think you are included in that list.
I got enough things to do with my time.
I don't wanna replay a game I played already.
I like to play some new stuff.
And you know what, though is most interesting maybe.
From someone who's this casual gamer like, like me, a lot of indie games that are so creative and beautiful to look at on both sides-
Mm-hm.
On both Microsoft and the PlayStation.
They both have these titles that aren't your traditional, Metal Gear Solid-
Right.
Racing Game, and Fighting Army seems, everything's the same.
[LAUGH]
and, and, and you see these really creative approaches to almost like the style that you see in artistic, app games.
Mm-hm.
But they're coming to consoles and kinda bringing that creativity along with the power of a console.
So, I don't have the names off the top of my head, but some of them were just so, so stunning, that I'm like oh I would, I would buy them.
And they're cheaper than, than full fledged, you know, $60 halo Games.
Right.
Yeah, I was also very surprised to see that a lot of those indy games were downloadable content?
That's what I mean.
Yeah, yeah.
I think that's great.
It's like ten bucks for some games.
Yeah, you don't have to wait for a release date.
You don't have to worry about things being clogged.
Mm-hm.
And the, the timeline getting moved back.
Play it right now.
Mm-hm.
And that's really cool stuff.
Probably hear more about it when Jeff comes back.
In terms of.
Oh yeah.
The specific titles that are coming out.
But it already sounds like Xbox has it in the bag.
I'm sorry, PlayStation has it in the bag.
At least, at least for yeah, I mean, families probably, you know.
Mm-hm.
Might, might finally be, oh, maybe I'll finally buy a Wii U now, now that there's.
Mario Kart and Super Smash Brothers and the popular titles like that.
Yeah.
And you can make your own Mario game now.
There's Mario Maker.
You can build, your own level and then play that level.
Like the classical Mario.
Yeah!
Yeah.
So I'm like, oh I could see people, you know, having fun with that.
But.
But yeah, for the more traditional gamer maybe, Sony.
Sony.
It sounds like it's gonna be an uphill battle for Microsoft.
Yeah.
I read in this CNet article actually that even before E3 arrived, Sony had pre-announced record breaking sales of the console.
So, mainly, the PS4.
Well, let's keep in mind.
A million units sold.
Let's keep in mind, Sony Playstation is sold in more countries.
Well, that's true.
So, when people talk about those sales numbers, I'm like, Until we get, like, U.S. specific, or, at least, being able to compare with the same places that Microsoft sells-
Mm-hm.
Then it's more.
A comparable argument.
But, yeah, somebody who is gonna sell more, they have more countries, you know?
You know what's weird is that Microsoft hasn't fessed up to how many units they've sold at all yet.
The last figures we got, hard figures were April 2013.
I didn't even know that until reading and doing some research this morning.
It had a marketing problem.
It had a message marketing problem, where like they were really focusing on like, oh look how, what it can do besides games.
And because they were criticized on that, that's why you only heard about games this time.
Right.
Because I think people were going well I don't.
What, why do I buy that?
I, I don't need a new thing to watch TV if I already got my TV.
[LAUGH] Yeah.
And so then you gonna go I'll wait a year until the price goes down.
Right.
Now the price is going down, so.
Vita's got a, Playstation now seems really cool but there's so many options for you to get that extra content off your, off your TV now.
Mm-hm.
Aren't those like the Chrome cast, there's a million different [UNKNOWN].
For someone who's just entering the streamline market, I feel really bad for them cuz they have so many choices.
Yeah, there's a lot out there, if, if you've never had [UNKNOWN] yet and who at this point-
Yeah, right.
You know, hasn't and then like I guess you can have really cheap ways to get it.
Right.
And you don't need to, you know, be invested system for that.
I'm kind of, I have an XBox 360.
I'm kind of invested in my XBox avatar and all the little things.
[LAUGH]
In my achievements.
And, as I'm thinking about what do I upgrade to.
Uh-huh.
I think, I think I'm actually going, oh, heck with it.
I think I'm gonna go Wii-U.
Oh, really?
Just because of the casual like, quick nature of the games.
And being able to have friends over.
But, but then I'm like oh, to, like finally, after seeing this presentation, I'm like maybe it's, maybe it's the Playstation 4.
Yeah.
You know.
Maybe it's time to do a little bit of an upgrade.
Yeah.
Change camps.
I'll let you know when I do.
[LAUGH] All right, so speaking of games, I wanted to talk about this.
You know, for someone like you and I who haven't really played games in the past, I feel like we both sort of missed out on a big chunk of game skills.
[LAUGH].
And you know, like that.
That is pretty tough to recover from, if you missed out on what five, ten year, maybe, chunk of video game consoles that have come out.
[CROSSTALK] You have an Xbox 360?
Yeah, and I also have, [CROSSTALK] before that, I had a Playstation.
I wasn't a multi console person.
I do have an old Wii.
Yeah.
As well.
But when I grew up, when I grew up, it was the Genesis.
Right [LAUGH].
It was all Genesis.
It was, I'm a huge Sonic fan.
I never had a Nintendo growing up, but my neighbors or friends did and I might-.
Right.
Play a little duck hunt, when I went to their house.
But really, I'm just hardcore when it comes to, my, my Sonic fan-ness, and and loyalty to Sega.
Hell yeah.
Genesis.
I'm the same way.
I'm literally into these, like, nostalgic consoles, too.
Cuz the, the last thing I owned was a PlayStation 1.
Mm-hm.
Four generations already of consoles.
But, to get yourself sort of updated, I think the best way to do that is to find someone who's super obsessed with video games and just buy out their entire collection.
Sort of just, to learn.
Get a good history of it.
And I think that would be kind of expensive.
It will definitely be expensive, but, finding a collection might be even more difficult.
Luckily, someone's out there, that's selling their official Guinness Book recognized.
World's biggest collection of video games.
How big?
Check this out.
So we're talking about over $100,000 worth of video games.
11,000 units this auction's up for sale currently right now on gamegabble.com.
I'll cycle through some of these photos while I talk about it but this is all owned by one guy named Michael Thomason.
And he's local, too.
He's out of upstate New York.
He's been collecting video games for over 20 years.
Wow.
And, back in the 90s, I guess, he said he operated about seven, independent gaming stores?
And so because of that, he got discounts on the games, and now he's opting his entire collection, which is, like I said, over 11,000 units.
Really crazy.
Look at all this stuff.
I mean, if you're into collecting or I guess in this case you could call it [UNKNOWN].
You can't own every game [UNKNOWN] What's your hobby?
I own every game ever.
This is insane.
And this is for, oh man looks like he hasn't been out since the '90s too.
This is for every single console too, even the smaller ones like Sega CD, or what were some of the other ones?
The ones that quickly faded into.
The Jaguar, yeah things like that.
Oh my gosh.
There's crazy stuff here, so you can go and check it out at at the time that we're talking about it.
It's about $101,000.
But it keeps climbing, so you probably have to invest a little bit more.
I'm really into big collections like this and just buying them off.
I mean for the purest-
I, if you cant play then-
I'm sure you wanna build it up yourself.
I'm someone who wants to collect things, but I wanna be able to play with them too.
Yeah.
I wanna have fun and show them off.
Or, or like you said, I would to speed up, can I give you.
$20 for all the Genesis games you got.
Yeah.
[LAUGH]
And you can play a new game every day and there would still be thousands of games you can be able to get through before you're old, too old to hit the controller anymore.
Oh man.
I, I have a hard enough time with like, random references to friends.
You remember that weird game like, no one knows what game I'm talking about.
Right.
But I'm sure he really has that problem [LAUGH].
Oh my god, he spent so much money on this crap.
How much money do you think all this stuff is worth?
Again, over 11,000 units.
At the time, he bought them retail so, who knows?
Well, is he, is he charging what you said, like $100,000 or something?
yeah, I think he's actually losing money on this.
He's definitely losing money on the collection.
Well, to have this collection, means he's aware.
[CROSSTALK]
You said he's spent about $3,000 a year for the last 20 years.
Yeah.
But the bulk of it, is really what makes the price go up so much.
I think this is really cool.
The, that's a lot of cartridges you gotta blow on to make them work.
[LAUGH].
Yeah, I know.
We all have to have a hobby, Bridget.
[LAUGH]
What do you collect?
I used to, well I collect stickers.
You collect those Disney VHS tapes with those big plastic cases.
Those like ones that were bigger than every VHS, stickers actually.
Stickers?
When I, when I go into any store and I see stickers I have to collect them cuz I like putting them on like on any sort of letter I send out.
Like random weird stickers.
Me, too.
I used to collect erasers, the pretty kind?
That like for, from Lisa Frank.
I had a lot of Lisa Frank things I would collect.
Yeah, I can imagine.
I never wanna erase with them.
I just keep them very precious and nice.
The ones that like smell like fruits.
Yeah, [LAUGH] I had, I had another, I was best friends with someone who collected pencils, so I guess we were like made for each other.
A very exciting group of friends, you guys are quite the party animals.
Oh yeah.
I like that.
I, I, I'll show you my sticker collection one day, I'll bring it.
I wanna see it, I wanna see the entire thing, the whole notebook full?
Nah, it's just a big stack, yeah.
Speaking of collections, I added something to my weird audio.
Accessories collection, that I kind of have over the weekend.
So, driving back down from Montreal, we stopped by this outdoor flea market that we saw off the freeway.
And I got something that's really cool, so I kinda wanted to do a show-and-tell right now.
Yeah.
Okay, okay.
If you don't mind.
Okay.
I think you'll be really into this.
Check this out.
What?
All right.
What?
What?
So see if you can take a look at this here.
What do you have there.
That looks like a radio.
I'll hold it up.
That looks green.
It says Polaroid.
Yeah.
How cool is this?
So, this is a radio.
A transistor radio.
Nice antenna there.
Mobile, that runs on batteries.
Yeah, has like the, the old antenna that telescopes up and everything, but it's made to look like an old pack of Polaroid 600 Film.
It's like, it's like a promotional give a way from Polaroid.
That's exactly what it is.
So I did a little bit of research on it when I got home.
By the way, I bought this for a dollar.
From that [INAUDIBLE] table.
Oh nice.
And.
Where's the tuner?
So it's all, yeah, so let me give you a tour of it.
Okay.
On the side you have, you know, like your tuning dials.
Uh-huh.
All mechanical, right?
So your tuning dials, so I go through radio stations.
Your FM and AM toggle switch, I guess you'd call that.
And then like a volume rocker.
And, and, how does it work?
[CROSSTALK]
You plug headphones into it.
And so, I, interesting story, I actually haven't listened to it yet.
And I think it works, but one of the coolest parts about this radio, is that it also operates on double A batteries.
But, here's the craziest thing.
When you open up the cartridge on the side here.
You can pull it open.
It is also actually powered by old Polaroid film.
What?
How, how and what, why?
Science.
Weird right.
Science I don't understand.
Does not compute.
Yeah.
So what, it, when you use Polaroid film in the camera, there's battery live that gets wasted.
So after you take those ten photos or whatever, there's a good chance that you're gonna have a lot of juice left over in the pack.
Do they still make them like that?
It comes with it.
The batteries are housed n the film.
In the modern Polaroids.
Do they still make them like that?
Yes, they still make them the same way, I guess.
And so, instead of just, you know, discarding this, throwing it away, you can recycle these old film packs by putting it into this radio, and that will then power the speaker.
I don't know how long that lasts, but.
Yeah, I have no idea how long that lasts for, but unfortunately I don't have the external battery pack that lets you run double A's with it.
So I have to find somebody who's used up photo pack and maybe borrow their film often so that I can listen to it.
Oh my gosh.
Isn't that crazy?
And on the back here, there's actually like a little slot.
I'm not sure if you can see it.
Yeah, it's like something you can slide into it.
A Polaroid film.
So, once you take a picture.
Adorable.
You use your favorite one to display on the back [LAUGH], How cool is that?
So, this is from 1982.
They used to give these, give these away with Polaroid film.
It's a commercial item.
Oh my god.
It's like 32 years old.
Crazy, right?
Oh my gosh.
And, now I own it.
Imagine the stories.
Cool.
That, that this has from behind it.
And, it has, like, a little.
This is gonna come -
Wrist straps?
Super analog.
You know, you, you, you know, it's hurricane season.
This is gonna come in handy during emergencies.
[LAUGH] Yeah.
Yeah totally.
Yeah.
You're gonna want a battery powered radio.
So yeah.
Get on that collecting of the extra film.
As like every five minutes you're probably like [LAUGH].
Replacing it.
Totally!
Yeah, it's funny I actually use one of those [UNKNOWN] analog radios.
Oh, my gosh.
During hurricane sandy.
And I never thought it would come in handy.
But it ended up being the best asset.
Yeah.
Wow.
Anyway, if anyone has ever used the Polaroid film.
Definitely shoot us an email at polaroid@cnet.com.
I'll give you the address.
Maybe you can mail it over to us, cuz I wanna see if this bad boy works.
Oh, that's so cool.
Crazy, right?
That's a good find.
A dollar.
A dollar.
I mean if nothing else, and Peony would definitely disagree if she were here but-.
It's colorful.
If nothing else it's good to keep on your shelf or something like that, right?
It's colorful and retro, I like that.
Yeah, so anyway, that's my Polaroid show and tell.
Let's, let's switch over to the mobile side.
Okay.
For, a second.
And I kinda wanted to talk about Google.
Hm.
Because, you know, we all live in a metropolitan city.
We're all here in New York.
So we take the subway every single day, right?
Yeah.
Take it every day, and it's not very often that you see someone sleeping on the train.
Unless they're homeless or something.
But it happens every once in awhile right?
You'll see a guy kinda nodding off.
You'll nod off.
People, some people are, I swear they have this internal thing where they, where they know how many, you know, nods it is until they have to wake up.
It's amazing.
[LAUGH] How do they know?
I'm like, how did you not.
I like stare the whole time, how are you not missing your stop?
[LAUGH].
Or maybe they're just playing it cool and they totally miss.
There stop.
Right.
Maybe they missed it like ages ago and this is the second time that they've revolved around.
But that's what I was wondering too like how do people know when to wake up.
And luckily for those people now, Google actually introduced a new feature for their Google Now Service.
Mm-hm.
So if you use an Android Phone that's built in already.
Google Now is available on I.O.S.
if you download the Google Ap.
Yes.
Google Search Ap.
There's like 20 Google Ap.
[LAUGH]
Little confusing.
Right?
Yeah.
Google Maps, different than, the Google Earth.
Different than Google Satellite.
Anyway.
Google Now.
If you have that on your phone.
You can now be updated and notified, when your stop is coming up on public transportation.
Why can't they just bake that into the maps directions?
I mean.
Duh [LAUGH].
I mean, I mean, I guess what they're saying is that, they want it to be seamless, so the whole point of Google now is that you don't have to do anything.
Right.
It'll just go bloop, bloop, bloop, don't forget about the such and such happening.
It.
Google now kinda gets the pattern of your commute over time.
Mm-hm.
And so it knows when your supposed to get off and I guess it'll give you a little buzz.
But if you're under ground.
[LAUGH] Yeah.
That's what I was gonna say.
How is it supposed to work?
I know.
I haven't read the story.
Does Google say that.
I know.
That, that they just guess?
Yea, I guess they're assuming either that you have an internet connection underground, or you're taking the above-ground bus.
But yeah, you're right, if you're in a tunnel or something, or if you're underneath the Hudson river, you're definitely not gonna be getting the service, so it won't work, but,
Yeah, the bus is good, because-.
That's still kind of a cool feature.
The bus is handy, but usually.
You know, if it's a, a new [UNKNOWN].
It's hard to see outside.
Right.
If the lights are funny.
You know.
You're unfamiliar with it.
So it's pretty dangerous to fall asleep on the subway.
I don't recommend that you do that.
I've nodded off a few times in the, in the very beginning, when I first got here.
And I never did it again cuz it, it was kind of a, like, I was up late.
I was like this is weird.
Don't wanna do that.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Like woke up with Sharpie all over your face, too.
You know.
[LAUGH]
No.
I did that once.
I woke up
You did that to someone?
No, I did that I fell asleep once on the subway.
Okay.
And woke up close to Coney Island [LAUGH] on the six train, and mind you I live in the East Village so this is like coming in from uptown maybe added a 50-.
That's a bit of a trip.
It is.
Yeah.
Added to my thing but that's, that's the Google mobile side, there's actually another app that I thought was kind of interesting that went along with it.
You probably talked about it last week on update.
So last week they rolled out a new feature for the maps app this time, that'll make note of your transit schedule.
Similar, saying, it'll learn your schedule.
And basically alert you to when the last train that you normally take, is leaving for the day.
Yes, scheduals were added.
Yeah.
And, and actually, I found use out of that.
You did?
yeah, I mean, I did, it just kinda pops up now without you haveing to do anything, it just shows it up there.
Yeah.
I'm like oh, I guess, you know, better you know, leave before this time and it's-.
Right.
It's pretty helpful.
That's helpful for places like San Francisco.
Mm-hm.
For example, where there's dead zones.
You know, like the Bard for example doesn't operate after midnight in the Bay Area.
Or there's some trains where you go far out.
Right.
You know like the, the, the large, you know, railroad systems.
Mm-hm.
Yeah, they don't run all night.
Right, so you're just basically stranded.
Mm-hm.
You know, if catch find yourself in the East Bay or something and you need to get back to San Francisco.
Have you ever taken that all night bus before?
No, I never have.
Dude, I'm sure you've heard that.
He's in color.
I like travelling back, yes, back to the future.
[LAUGH]
Time travel.
There was one bus that took you from, you know, Berkeley through like the Richmond area-
MM-hm.
Back to San Francisco.
And it was the only one that ran all night.
I think it was AC Transit that did it!
And so if you wanted to get back to SF, or, you know, vice versa back to the East Bay.
Your only option from like the hours of one to 5:00 a.m, was this one bus.
Oh, that sucks.
And it was nicknamed the crackhead bus.
Oh, wow.
That's a comforting name, you know.
Yeah.
Always sticky floors.
Just the worst people on it.
Now, I'm hoping that this service will prevent people from having to take that.
Yeah.
It's kind of like the drunk app, right?
Like if you were wasted at the end of a night, this will hopefully jog your memory.
You know, there's, there's, there's some good to having more data in your life and just having it appear, you know?
Right.
Like, like knowing when something's closed or when it's open without having to ask that separate question.
Mm-hm.
It's, it's when Google starts to assume where I live and work.
That suddenly, I don't know about you, but that's when, when that started rolling out I was like what, hey I, did, did I tell you that.
Right.
How do, how do you?
Back off.
[LAUGH].
But then you kind of go I give up and if you give up into the Google world, you know, you go just fine, take it all, take my data.
Right.
Go ahead and stalk me, whatever.
[LAUGH]
And, and now Google actually shows you, even if you do miss your last train.
It'll ask if you wanna call an uber now within the service.
Have you seen that?
Yeah.
I don't wanna pay for an uber-
Yeah.
But I guess there, I, I, guess there like yeah, you know, here's another cool feature on a third party company.
Do they wanna buy uber?
Why, why, why are they promoting uber, why and not others?
I don't-
Right.
I don't know, I, isn't, isn't it kinda weird when there promoting a whole other company and your like wait, why?
Why you like uber so much?
You know like.
I don't know.
There's something there.
Kind of incestuous, I know.
All right last story of the day.
I wanna give an update to a story we talked about last month.
Regular listeners will probably remember it.
It was about that creepy video that popped up about seven months ago.
so, for those that don't know what I'm talking about.
Last month we talked about this story where for the past seven months, a YouTube account was uploading one video, every 20 seconds.
And the videos were all the same.
It was basically just a random 11 second shot of a series of graphics.
And the graphics were just, two rectangles, a red rectangle and a blue rectangle.
And for 11 seconds, all you would hear, were these weird electronic tones.
Okay.
And the tones changed every time.
But, the amount of videos was really the big story.
You know, every 20 seconds for the past seven months.
Every 20 seconds even over night sounds.
Even overnight.
Sounds like its a robot.
Yeah.
You'd think it was, right?
So no one knew where that was coming from.
The only clues that you had were one a little message, a little title screen, in the bottom left corner that said aqua.flb which is a flash file.
And then a slide number.
So the only other clues were the random series of of songs that played along with the video.
And so this is one of them.
11 seconds of just this.
Did you think aliens are trying to communicate with us?
That would be my first guess.
[LAUGH] Look, if aliens came down they, they, if they would spy on us and judge us by YouTube, oh heaven help us.
[LAUGH] Yeah, seriously.
And they wanted to communicate with us through YouTube, they'd probably use cats.
That's why I said read the comments.
I'm sure you'd be fine.
and, and it was all upward about this one account, by the way.
So WebDriver Torso.
Huh.
And the weirdest thing is, the majority of these you know, 20,000 videos have zero views on them.
Because there's so many.
Mm-hm.
There's no way someone would just click through all of them.
And you know, last month when we talked about it, it was a very creepy story because no one knew.
So people were sort of making up their own conspiracy theories.
Aliens, who knows?
Government testing.
[LAUGH]
You know, people had no clue, so they're bringing up their own ideas.
So, we, we know what it is now?
We do know what it is now.
And unfortunately, like with all things the real story behind it is nowhere near as fun as the conspiracy theories that came up to explain it.
So, the person behind the account finally confessed, and it's Google.
It's, it's, it's YouTube itself.
Wah wah.
Yeah, it's just Google, and it basically they came out and admitted after Wired broke the story.
They fessed up and said we use these videos in the rectangles to basically do quality control testing.
And so, they have the original and when they upload it, apparently these red and blue rectangles are the best way to compare the video quality.
Hm.
So that's it, it is a robot.
And they continue to do this, because as long as YouTube exists, they want people's videos to look great.
So, I mean that's around the conference expiring.
.
It's, it's kinda like, it's kinda like when the printer does it's test page.
Yeah.
This is the test page for YouTube.
Yeah.
Make sure that the audio and, and video looks okay?
Right.
[LAUGH].
This is the best thing that YouTube could come up with.
So, I apologize to everyone to burst your bubble like that.
Aw, or maybe that's what the aliens want you to think.
Right.
Maybe that's, maybe they are working with the aliens in this, in their story.
You hope a lot Bridgette, I like that about you.
[LAUGH].
So, that's it for today.
That's all we got.
What's going on for the rest of the week, with E3?
Well, this is really the biggest news, you know?
Was, was yesterday and today,
Okay.
I think, now, you're gonna start to hear more about the unique game experiences that people get to run around the floor and test out.
I'm, you know, when it comes to whether it's experimental, like 3D and Project Morpheus-
Mm-hm.
And what else is being done, or, just, games that are not quite ready for release, but people wanna try them out.
I think that's what's gonna start to filter out for the next following days.
All right.
Well, sounds good.
I like it when you're here, cuz you can explain video games to me in a way that I understand.
No problem, sir.
If you have time tomorrow, maybe you can come back and help us out on the show again.
We'll talk about non video gaming.
How's that?
All right.
How's that?
All right so shoot us an email the404@cnet.com.
Again, let me know if you have any expired Porlaod film.
I wanna have enough to run this thing for the rest of my life.
So we're gonna need a lot.
Yeah.
Or if you have stuff like this, audio related crap, you know, just look at our set for, for old archival stuff.
We're always in need of new set dressing materials and just for my personal collection, I'd love to take that off your hands.
Hm.
And I'll pay you a, a handsome fee of a dollar for each of it.
[LAUGH] A whole dollar.
[LAUGH] Yeah.
So, yeah, shoot us an email, let us know what you got.
the404@cet.com.
And that will wrap it up for us today.
We'll see you guys tomorrow.
I'm Justin Yu
I'm Bridgett Carrie
I'm Ariel Nunez
The 404.
It's high tech, it's lowbrow, it's felicity.
