Shades Of Brown

[00:00 - 00:15] (Music intro)
[00:16 - 00:17] Sadiq: Hi, I'm Sadiq.
[00:17 - 00:34] Cristian: And that clap didn't go through because of Crispy AI. For context, um, we when we start a podcast episode, we do a clap so there's a wave form to sync up. I just did the countdown and I don't think I heard your clap nor you heard mine because we use Discord and Discord's uh voice suppression got good enough to cut out claps.
[00:34 - 00:36] Cristian: Because I did not hear it at all on your side.
[00:36 - 00:41] Sadiq: Yeah, yeah, it's that's uh advances in uh noise suppression.
[00:42 - 01:13] Cristian: Uh, speaking about advances in noise suppression though, my name is Christian. Um, and this is this is the two years since the last episode, uh, a week removed from 10 years from the start of the show. Um, sort of what we're calling our final, final shades of brown episode, where we're bringing it back for one last go before we, before we, you know, um, wrap this bow up, ship it, sunset it, Windows phone it, groove store it, my people it, you know?
[01:13 - 01:28] Sadiq: So, so like, I I don't know how like it's we this the previous episode was three years ago. Uh, so it's been a while since we've It's just don't just this's not two years. Holy shit, 2022 is three years ago. Shut the fuck up.
[01:28 - 01:42] Sadiq: Yeah. Yeah, it was it was it was the very aptly tiled Mont Blanc sounds like a slur, which is a hilarious title. You got to say it the right way. Mont Blanc. Yeah. I'm not French enough to uh say it, I think. Uh
[01:42 - 01:44] Cristian: What do you you're closer to Quebec than I am.
[01:44 - 01:53] Sadiq: That's true. and there's I've learned a lot about people from Quebec. I'll be going on vacation in Montreal uh in September, so I'll be in Quebec uh later later this year.
[01:53 - 02:04] Cristian: I I mean I'm glad you said that for your own safety so we know where you're at, but I stay safe in Quebec. That's all I'm going to say. I don't I don't know about Quebec.
[02:04 - 02:05] Sadiq: I'm going to be fine.
[02:05 - 02:52] Sadiq: So, this is sort of like, uh, how do you call it? Like we're just sort of doing like, I guess like a retrospective at like the very first episode of Shades of Brown was like a episode where we like talked about like various tech companies, like the big tech companies. We called it like state of thedoms, which uh which which was I think like a title because since been 10 years since this in those 10 years, I think thedoms have only grown like more like uh these walled gardens, more likedoms and they've just gotten stronger, right? Like they've got like all the tech companies I imagine we talked about. I haven't listened to that first episode since it. I'm not I don't want to listen to that audio quality. It's uh
[02:52 - 03:03] Cristian: That's fine, but the companies we did talk about was five I believe. It was Apple, Google, Microsoft, Twitter. Yeah. Okay. Facebook. Okay, one of them is like kind of falling apart. Like Twitter is uh well, Twitter is uh
[03:04 - 03:06] Cristian: I I mean Twitter's already fallen apart.
[03:06 - 03:32] Cristian: The the weird thing about this is actually, you know, to to maybe stick to the more meta narrative uh of this for a moment. Outside of maybe Open AI, which uh uh that's been the same of like if we're talking about like culture setting and ification, you know, like like companies that has just been lock step for the past decade in different ways, sure, but it's been lock step in the past decade.
[03:32 - 03:54] Cristian: Whereas if we say had started this in 2005, right? and then did one in 2015, it would have been extremely different because in 2005 we would have been talking about Yahoo, exclamation mark, right? Google probably maybe Apple, I don't think so because 2005 was even iPod stuff. So been like the music company people make Macs. Microsoft for sure, but with Sun, Oracle maybe, like you know, like Flash was still a thing.
[03:54 - 04:13] Sadiq: Yeah, it's it was a different time. Yeah, 20 2005 was a very different time. Um I don't even I don't remember. Uh but 2015, uh it was around the time of iOS 9 uh to provide like a marker for what was latest in technology.
[04:13 - 04:22] Sadiq: And um we're like which company do you want to start with? I feel like we should probably talk about uh Google.
[04:22 - 04:23] Cristian: Should we just get X out of the way?
[04:23 - 04:26] Sadiq: Yeah, I don't want to let's just get this one out of the way.
[04:26 - 05:07] Cristian: Let's just get that out of the way so we don't have to spend any more of our time. And I think it's really a few sentences. One, um the working title I had for this episode is the state of the oligarchy, X Elon Musk, there you go. Uh it's a platform basically it's buying social capital, right? It's it's it's kind of it's not the opposite of of Masterdon, but it's like the opposite of the ideals of the verse, right? Where instead of distributing power, consolidate it, purchase it, back it with money, turn it into a gross AI startup because you can basically train off of real-time data that people are making to make anime wifus in the Groc X app which is a sentence I which I I never wish I could say again. But yeah, it is just like a consolidation of power to help feed fascism.
[05:07 - 05:31] Sadiq: Yeah, it's it is just like the right-wing playbook. Uh it's just like the libertarian right-wing playbook which is control the media, control narratives, control like, you know, social spaces, you know, that's what the that's what it is. Like that's what happened to Twitter. That's what Twitter became. Uh it's called X now and I refuse to call it X because it's a stupid name. Uh like it's not a good name. I I just think it's a bad name. Anyways,
[05:32 - 06:15] Sadiq: that that aside, I think it's worth talking about uh what happened not just of these companies but us because in the intervening 10 years, a lot has happened personally, like the way we look at tech, right? Like we stopped doing this podcast in 2022 and even back then we were we were like, you know, sort of uh cynical like sort of disenchanted with like all the tech companies. Like we we weren't really watching like the keynotes. I haven't watched a Google IO in probably like five, seven years. Like I don't like I don't I don't remember. I once spent 20 minutes ranting about how gaming phones is a fake concept invented by companies for a market that does not exist.
[06:16 - 06:21] Sadiq: Yeah, yeah, we yeah, yeah, we talked about, you know, gaming phones, we talked about, uh,
[06:22 - 07:12] Sadiq: Yeah, like it's it's just like we were we just became more way more cynical is perhaps not that we were just we just became aware of like all the patterns um and like we weren't like buying the hype as much as we used to and like and it's all about hype now. Like it's all tech is all hype. Like it's like it's in the current era of of tech discourse. It's like a hype machine continuously, right? Like even it feels like even more than he used to be. Like it's like right now it's the age of the quoteunquote AI hype, right? Which means that along with Google, Apple, Facebook, Netflix, and all the usual fan companies, you also have Nvidia, right? Like Nvidia has become like one of the like quite literally like the biggest corporation by market cap, right? Like it exceeds Apple's market cap right now.
[07:19 - 07:29] Sadiq: So it's like ridiculous. Like we're in an age of hype. Nothing is real. Uh it's all uh all AI everywhere.
[07:29 - 07:30] Sadiq: Uh even Apple is
[07:30 - 08:37] Cristian: It's all speculation markets, right? Like like so if we subtract it out more, so like crypto started as this thing that like when me and you were in IRC, you could buy like alpaca wool socks. I remember that, right? with Bitcoin. Like it was this neat thing, the energy concerns were whatever because it was just a thing that people who ran home labs were doing, right? Like the guy on IRC with the with the thinkpad Dell Optiplex collection would give you a few Bitcoin because why not? Like, you know, cool, cool. Like that was fine. But what it is turned into, which is really like a more microcosm of the entire industry is you now have businesses, right? that are like turning art, you know, say you buy someone draws an artwork, right? These are like real companies that you go ahead and they convert the value of that into some cryptocurrency, Bitcoin, whatever doesn't matter. And instead of you buying the art, you buy a percentage of the artwork's perceived value in that cryptocurrency with the idea of it being an investment, you're buying shares in, right? And that's kind of like what the whole industry has turned into because that's like it's not real tangible things that are really being made. It's just fake things with fake valuations that are it's it's a it's a cycle to end to making number go up endlessly.
[08:37 - 09:34] Sadiq: Yeah, it is like a like speculation all the way down. like everything is a speculative market. like it doesn't matter what it is. It doesn't matter like what if it's a physical good, uh a digital good, like everything can be turned into and has been turned into sort of like a a sort of a something that can be traded upon and and you know, like you have speculative markets. And like this is like the end goal of of like like what I think the folding ideas video uh aboutTs, right? The line goes up video, right? which in which like that Olsen talks about like this is like what they want is like every every single thing like even every like piece of art uh is going to turn into something like that's has speculative value, right? Uh it's just like the end state of capitalism basically is like everything is a market, right? Like every everything gets turned into something that has value on a in a in a capital market, right? So, uh,
[09:35 - 10:25] Sadiq: and it has been weird to watch this happen, right? Like over the last 10 years of technology is that I've gotten way more and more like I don't listen to any real a lot of tech podcasts, right? Like I like it's like if we're talking about meta stuff like I stopped to listen listening to a lot of tech podcasts like the only ostensibly technology related podcasts I listen to is like the 404 media podcast, right? which is not really about technology. It's like kind of like adjacent to technology. and I and I just can't listen to like it's like a human impact, right? Like the more human. Yeah, I just can't listen to like pure pure technology podcasts anymore. I just feel like I can't even like get excited about any of this, right? Like I can't get excited about new releases of operating systems because it's like some new bullshit every time.
[10:25 - 10:35] Sadiq: Uh I can't get excited about new hardware because half of the time it's like you know, it's it's not good. like it's not worth getting excited about. It's like very iterative, right? Like it's the market has especially, you know, smartphones have sort of
[10:39 - 10:47] Sadiq: become so saturated and so uh, like it's like iterative of a bit of iterative objects. It is like nothing to get excited about. Like I I feel like I haven't gotten excited about a
[10:52 - 10:58] Sadiq: technology like a computer technology product in like uh ages. Um it just just feel
[10:59 - 11:20] Cristian: and here's the problem with that, right? Because if assuming that things stabilize and like you know, a process node becomes commonplace, the assumption is at that point, it becomes boring, so it becomes cheap. So like that that's the cycle of the or the the spinning wheel that we were kind of on prior maybe around the start of this podcast where, you know, super high-end thing, LCD displays right, OLED displays.
[11:23 - 11:36] Cristian: They were new, kind of weird, but they're super cool. high refresh rate monitors, right? That kind of stuff. It then becomes boring because it's commonplace and it's cheap enough for more people to have access to it. And because of that, more cool things can be built on top of it because it's ubiquitous.
[11:36 - 11:41] Cristian: That cycle has broken now though because there's such a high price floor for a lot of things.
[11:41 - 11:50] Cristian: Like if we game consoles is the example, right? Game consoles are getting more expensive without getting more powerful. And the price floor is not going down.
[11:50 - 12:06] Cristian: Like right now the cheapest way to get into games is like GeForce now and you're stuck on, you know, being locked into Nvidia. And and basically what like the whole the whole like femes oligarchy kind of idea that we're going to wrap this episode is is is like they figured out how to break the wheel and
[12:07 - 12:20] Cristian: instead of like it being a full circle, you go like 75% of the way through and then it's like a monopoly stop, you know, go to jail and you just kind of get shoved back to the beginning of the cycle again without it without that last 25% of it becoming ubiquitous and cheaper.
[12:20 - 12:46] Sadiq: Yeah, they they consolidated the market, right? They consolidated power, consolidated like access, right? They consolidated everything so that it once you have a monopoly, you can raise the prices, right? Like that's the that's like that's why monopolies are bad is that they like once you have uh eliminated the competition, uh, you can do anything you want because there is no competition. So where are people going to go?
[12:46 - 13:00] Sadiq: So like, for example, I guess like to talk about this, uh bringing it back to like the companies like uh I remember when we started Shades of Brown, we were both using Android phones, right? Were we?
[13:01 - 13:01] Sadiq: I I
[13:01 - 13:06] Cristian: No, no, no. 2015, I was in my I had the Surface 3, so I was using Windows Phone.
[13:06 - 13:07] Sadiq: Okay, so you had a Windows phone.
[13:07 - 13:22] Cristian: Cuz I had the Surface 3 cuz I bought the Windows phone first. I had this LG shitty phone that was running a custom ROM on Android 2.3 for Froyo which is on it, right? I never I never got 4.0. I never got to lollipop because I got a Lumia like 521 because it was super cheap off contract, which is still a good phone. That was a really great phone.
[13:23 - 13:28] Cristian: genuinely. Like that was actually talk about cheap you bit with us at fast. But then you were on Android and then you went to iOS.
[13:28 - 13:38] Sadiq: Yeah. I I was uh using a Samsung Galaxy S like the first captivate. No, you're on the Nexus 5, 2015. You're on the Nexus 5. Okay, so in 2015 I was off like I bought a Nexus 5, that was like the first phone
[13:42 - 13:58] Sadiq: I bought for myself. Uh and it was Nexus 5. Uh had a piece of shit camera. Uh it was an LG device. So eventually it died because the flash died. Uh like the flash storage just died one day. like it just became like it it became a brick. Yeah.
[13:58 - 14:02] Cristian: People mourn LG in the phone market but I don't because those phones are shit.
[14:02 - 14:18] Sadiq: No the LG phones were bad. Like all of the LG phones were garbage because uh because of the bad flash storage problem that LG had like all these phones like they'll be fine at first but like after a couple years like, you know, it would end up you find like they just die. And that's what happened to my Nexus 5.
[14:19 - 14:27] Sadiq: And back then, I just switched to iOS and and I stayed on iOS. And at this point, you
[14:27 - 14:35] Cristian: passionately like for like I honestly like surprisingly you went back to Android.
[14:36 - 14:43] Cristian: Uh you went back to like a bunch of Google shit, right? Like you went back to Android, you bought a pixel, right?
[14:43 - 14:48] Cristian: Um and you have like Yeah, I sold I sold all my Apple stuff and and made a profit on it.
[14:49 - 15:08] Cristian: Um and I mean the real reason why is speaking about like oligarchy and them and all that. It's a it's not necessarily that AirPods are like a weird market that are only upheld due to market forces and like consolidation and not necessarily always the quality of the product.
[15:09 - 15:27] Cristian: But I and the Linux users in the crowd will will understand me. It was just a mind numblingly frustrating that I could buy a pair of earbuds or headphones that like are more comfortable for me and because I did not buy the option that does not fit me like physically, I got locked out of features.
[15:28 - 15:33] Cristian: It was just like disillusioning to the point where it's like, I I don't know. Why why am I even here?
[15:34 - 16:02] Cristian: Like it's just weird. It's like you get and and sometimes people on the um on like the PC or this is not really sides, but people who people who are not necessarily fully in the Apple ecosystem, I should say, it's kind of the the the the the adage is, you know, you have to be the right the best Apple customer, right? Like the right kind of user to make to have everything work for you because if you have a product or if you have a need that doesn't fit in between the or in in the boxes that are well defined, you have a really bad experience.
[16:02 - 16:08] Cristian: Um example being if you use uh Xcloud Xbox Cloud gaming or GeForce Now on anything but a Mac.
[16:08 - 16:16] Cristian: It is just absolutely terrible for reasons that are not technical. No, it's it's it's not. because of that, I was like, I was just going to switch back to to Android. I was like, you know what?
[16:17 - 16:26] Cristian: I I these operating systems are basically the same at this point. switching one big tech company to another really doesn't matter and I can get all of this for cheaper. and the best part is even though it's less coherent,
[16:29 - 16:34] Cristian: um there are third-party solutions that fill in the gaps, right?
[16:35 - 16:55] Cristian: Um so like if we like messaging, right? iMessage ubiquitous in the US, Canada, y'all a little more for you, not really because they just replace it with WhatsApp instead. And on Android, you have apps like Beeper that can kind of weave together all of the different chat apps, right? and make it one cohesive experience for you. You also have the ability to use things like
[16:57 - 16:59] Cristian: Oh crap, what's the other one?
[16:59 - 17:02] Cristian: I mean, I don't really use the Google. I'm going to look at my phone right now. RCS.
[17:02 - 17:08] Cristian: So you can Well, yeah, RCS messaging also made it functional because I can message people and it's not it's not that bad.
[17:09 - 17:46] Cristian: But, um, outside of it, I mean, like you you have the stock Google apps were basically the same as the as the Apple ones, but like the third-party solutions like Pocketcast and stuff have gotten good enough now that it's not necessarily a place where I would need the same integration, um, as as the Apple ecosystem. And local send, that's what I was thinking of. Local send is basically air drop but for any device and it runs locally from device to device over a peer-to-peer Wi-Fi, so it is encrypted. Um, so like you you sure you have to install an extra app, but it is not significantly worse than um using the Apple equivalents like it was back when we started the podcast.
[17:46 - 18:03] Sadiq: It is it is not. and also but at the same time, like I can't even think well, I can think about switching. Like I can think about the process, what it would look like and it is going to be uh painful. It's going to be expensive. It's going to be painful. And that's the problem, right? Like that's the whole problem with
[18:05 - 18:41] Sadiq: lock in is that it's the switching costs. that's the uh big problem is that for now like I have like a iPhone, like I have a watch, like there's like a homePod Mini, um and like there's the AirPods, right? Uh so it's like I'm locked in pretty deep, right? Like I don't I I have a Mac, right? But the Mac is like less of a point of locking than the other stuff, right? Like so it's like to exit at this point would mean spending like, you know, a bunch of money to buy new hardware and also possibly new software and it's just like at this point I'm stuck, right?
[18:42 - 19:12] Sadiq: Like in a way I'm kind of just stuck. Yeah, so it's like that's the problem with the lock. Like and I don't like I don't like it. Like I'm not like like sure a lot of the Apple products work well enough for me, you know, like I like the AirPods, like the AirPods do work for me, you know, the Macs surprisingly work really well for me. Uh and like stuff like that. There there's aspects of iOS that I like using, you know, but it's like, you know, I can recognize that it's like I'm locked in. Um and
[19:12 - 19:43] Sadiq: it's like very apparent like when I know like I have to like I have a Windows desktop PC like the gaming PC, right? And that hasn't changed in like the 10 years since we did like the first episode. So I still have that. so like I'm like using Windows and I'm like, you know, like using iOS. it's it's not seamless. Like there's there's a bunch of this weird disconnect that doesn't it's not technical. There's no nothing technical preventing me preventing deeper integration. It's just, you know, Microsoft and Apple wouldn't like not do that.
[19:44 - 19:47] Cristian: Oh, I mean Microsoft also is just Microsoft.
[19:47 - 19:49] Sadiq: It's yeah, Microsoft. Yeah, they probably. Yeah. Microsoft.
[19:50 - 19:51] Cristian: They're also shooting themselves in their own foot.
[19:52 - 20:02] Cristian: But the other side of it too, which is one that we never really touched upon I think in the entire run of the show is repairability. I with a Pixel can just go to a repair shop, any local one, right?
[20:02 - 20:17] Cristian: And they will they can source parts from Google and there's an official tool to flash it. There's a repair mode I can put my phone in, right? So it's completely separate, different passcode, the and it like several partition on the phone, right? that that walls off my data from a repair shop.
[20:17 - 20:30] Cristian: And those are nice things. And I value having having the ability. I mean, I'm not I could open my own phone. I don't want to. But going to any repair shop, right? I can buy the screen myself, bring it there and I and I tell them to install it, right? And, you know, risk of repair shops, people been dealing with this with cars for decades.
[20:32 - 20:36] Cristian: It's fine. Like it's fine. People people know how to get their own things serviced.
[20:36 - 20:47] Cristian: And and I appreciate that significantly because I did crack the screen when I was at the beach was as my own fault. Um don't put your phone in a ice cooler when it's 90 plus Fahrenheit outside.
[20:47 - 20:49] Sadiq: Oh, that's a bad. Oh no, yeah.
[20:49 - 20:55] Cristian: Yeah, yeah, I put an ice cooler because I was like, I need to put it somewhere and I cracked the screen because of the temperature. Yeah, that that's solely on me.
[20:55 - 21:07] Cristian: But it was just nice to go to a shop, they had a screen in stock, it was an official Google screen, um, they ran the the the tool afterwards, I put in repair mode, way better than having to only go to a preferred partner for for repair.
[21:07 - 21:12] Cristian: And that's something that I think I'm more appreciating um, because I don't know, Apple's door for crazy.
[21:12 - 21:36] Sadiq: Yeah, Apple stores are I it's Yeah, it's like having to deal with Apple stores, like having to go to an Apple store to deal with thankfully like hardware issues are few and between like, you know, for me at least, like I haven't, you know, uh been to an Apple store to do a hardware swap or whatever hardware repair in in in long time years. Uh, and thankfully that's been the case, but you know, like it's it's a thing.
[21:37 - 21:48] Sadiq: Like you have to worry about you know having to go to an Apple and there's like only a few of them in Toronto, right? Like it's like paying in the ass to get to. Uh and all that. Uh, yeah, I don't I don't I don't know what else to say about that. It's just like Apple has
[21:53 - 22:20] Sadiq: continued to like, you know, as as we speak, like, you know, the sort of the lawsuit situation or either the the the Apple's uh legal woes in the in the European Union, right? Uh like the DMA and things like that are happening, right? Like so things are moving I'll be it slowly, but like Apple is like not going to let go of that like they're kicking and screaming out of it, right? Like they they they they are refusing to give any ground.
[22:24 - 22:45] Sadiq: Like they they give the least amount of ground. They're they're like throwing a tantrum in the EU. Uh and like you know, browser choice, you know, things like being able to use a different browser engine, right? Remember like, you know, like stuff like that, being able to, you know, use a different App store. Uh so like that kind of shit is like slowly
[22:48 - 23:14] Sadiq: happening but like I feel like it's it's going to take like a decade plus for any of this to like not be just the European Union having this shit, right? Like and it's like Apple's regulatory woes are like for now, they're relegated to the European Union, but like, you know, uh I don't know if the United States is in a market that's going to regulate Apple anytime soon. So, it's like it's not looking.
[23:14 - 23:20] Cristian: I mean, the problem is like they will they'll do a threat over here and then you just kiss the ring and you're trying to make it go away, right?
[23:21 - 23:46] Cristian: Like it it we're seeing it right now where uh CBS is uh cancelled the Colbear show after like a 10-year run, the late night show. And everyone's pretty sure it's just because it's sometimes critical of the current administration and they're trying to get a merger with Paramount to go through or something like that. So they is a lot of that's going on right now. I mean, you have what all the tech CEOs at the inauguration, all of that fun stuff. So yeah, I I have a high I highly doubt that'll that'll happen in this country.
[23:51 - 24:09] Cristian: Um, but yeah, it is it things have gotten worse not for technical reasons. Like technically things have gotten better, you know, if we started to take the low end, like you take the low end of something, like a shit PC 10 years ago is way like the shit PCs now are way better. Absolutely they are. But the price has just been artificially inflated.
[24:10 - 24:32] Sadiq: And it's like it's not even like the uh it's it's like prices are artificially inflated, you know, like what it's called like, you know, in the GPU market, like it's shrinkflation, right? It's everywhere shrinkflation is happening. Like the for for $500, you don't get the same GPU class that you used to like you know, like 10 years ago. Right, like stuff like that is happening. Uh,
[24:33 - 24:39] Sadiq: you know, uh prices of hardware across the board, uh is getting more expensive.
[24:39 - 24:47] Sadiq: Uh it's it's like big but the hardware is incredible. Like it's the hardware is not the problem. software is getting worse, you know, everything has AI in it.
[24:49 - 24:54] Sadiq: Uh and every company's trying to put AI shit in their software. Uh so
[24:55 - 25:06] Sadiq: I like what like Google, like I you you use I you have experience here. So you use Google shit. How much is like Gemini and all that stuff present in the Can you avoid it?
[25:07 - 25:14] Sadiq: Like is it possible to not is it possible to use an Android phone and like avoid Gemini?
[25:15 - 25:21] Sadiq: Like is that is that possible or like is that like entirely like baked into the OS now?
[25:22 - 25:26] Sadiq: I mean, if it's a third-party Android phone, I imagine it's a different skin, right? It's probably just relegated to an app.
[25:27 - 25:42] Cristian: But so using a Pixel and have a have a have a caveat here that most AI is stolen off of just or is built off of stolen, you know, copyrighted works, generative art is never a great thing. Um, with that being said,
[25:43 - 25:54] Cristian: there are some parts of because everything Google does gets branded in Gemini that are actually useful, right? So like on device search runs using a local LLM model, which actually is not is not not bad.
[25:55 - 26:14] Cristian: Autocorrect runs off of some of that stuff too. So there are a few things that are genuinely okay. photo search right, like on iOS, you know, they scan photos on the device, build an index with it, right? that you can technically put behind that quote unquote AI thing. So those uses, I'm not, I'm fine with and it does make the the experience better because nothing is as bad as Windows search.
[26:17 - 26:20] Cristian: I don't think Windows search uses any of that crap.
[26:20 - 26:31] Cristian: Um, but the parts where it gets a little bit annoying is in most apps is the Gemini button. So accidentally tapping it, you're going to get thrown into a chat interface, right? Or like an email summary.
[26:32 - 26:42] Cristian: But it is not something you have to interact with if you just don't tap the button, right? It's not as if you're you're doing something on the device and it just pops up without your consent.
[26:43 - 26:56] Cristian: Um and using it as a Siri, you know, voice assistant replacement is fine because I normally use it for tasks like, you know, set a timer, right? So it doesn't necessarily go into the hallucination bit of it. It just does an on device thing that's at a timer.
[26:57 - 27:14] Cristian: Um I don't necessarily talk to it. Um I have tried once the the the live feature where I was at I was on vacation recently and I was at a at a uh at a museum and they didn't have a description of the art piece. So I'm like, what's this thing?
[27:14 - 27:35] Cristian: Um but the latency was just bad. It was like it told me it and I Google it afterwards to verify it, right? So I checked a different web page Wikipedia page for it and it was accurate. So it wasn't like making it up, but it's like this took like 20 seconds where I could just like, you know, tap the photo and put it into a Google result or, you know, Wikipedia or some other like art index database there. So it
[27:36 - 28:00] Cristian: you you can interact with it as you for for to Google's credit, you only have to interact with it as much as you want to interact with it. It is not while turned on by default, it is not like in your face, right? It's not like I'm accidentally going to send someone a text message and oh no, now there's Gemini, right? So because he's like beeper is my messaging app for example. There's no AI in that app.
[28:00 - 28:12] Cristian: you know, they have an optional feature you can use like whisper to do voice transcriptions for um for voice messages, but it's not shoved in the third-party apps or it's not built in a way where it's super annoying.
[28:12 - 28:17] Cristian: It's not like on say, Oh, what's the It's not like Google search where there's AI overviews, right?
[28:21 - 28:27] Cristian: It's not as if I'm going to open my calendar and there's an AI box that I have to go past before I can make a calendar event.
[28:27 - 28:31] Cristian: At least thankfully for the actual productivity software, they have not gotten that far yet.
[28:32 - 29:09] Sadiq: Yeah. Yeah, I mean for Apple intelligence it's basically non-existent for me because I have my local set to like English, Canada or language set to English, Canada and Apple just doesn't work with if you have or it doesn't it doesn't it doesn't work if you have that set. Like if you if you haven't set to anything other than English US, I think it just doesn't work. Uh which means that uh that there's no really no really any Apple intelligence features active on my phone right now other than I suppose the uh stuff that was already there like the photo organizing and stuff like that, but that was that was a pre Apple intelligence thing.
[29:09 - 29:17] Sadiq: And the notification summaries are also turned off because those were just bad. those those are just bad. like those did not work.
[29:19 - 29:24] Cristian: You know it's you know it's wild when like Google doesn't have the feature that Apple does for an AI thing that like it's bad.
[29:25 - 29:32] Cristian: Like there is no notification summaries in Android. Yeah, no, it's it's it's 100% like a really bad feature.
[29:33 - 30:20] Sadiq: Uh it was not good. Uh but yeah, like I I feel like I'm missing like I feel like I'm I mean on the well we got I mean Google and Apple are like what just like it's just platform holders. It's uh just not growth in some areas, stagnation in others that probably won't take regulatory things so there's no competition. and that's why everyone's trying to fight over VR and and and and mixed reality as like the quoteunquote next frontier because that is something where the those two are Microsoft doesn't have a dominant foot in.
[30:20 - 30:52] Cristian: But and I I think what's what's probably going to happen if I had to take a uh a make a hot take is I think at this point, we are going to see a split. I don't know where, right? But we're going to see a split. I think I think Canada, I'm so sorry, is probably going to be aligned with the US. Like Canada, North and South America and some parts of like Japan and that, right? But I think for Europe, um with the amount of regulatory stuff coming in and plus the amount of tariffs and also just general anti-US sentiment going on in the world right now, I really do think that we're going to see a huge increase in some countries of just like Chinese led manufacturers, right?
[30:52 - 31:00] Cristian: Um Harmony OS from Huawei, that kind of stuff. I I think there's going to be more of a split. Um I think Splinternet is the terrible term people are trying to use for that where because of all the fuck ups and dumb stuff going on right now and other countries getting sick.
[31:01 - 31:08] Cristian: of the um ecosystem lock in, they'll pass laws that will give that will force other companies to come in and have a chance, right? think get propped up by the government.
[31:08 - 31:15] Cristian: I I don't know, I don't know if Europe is has a has like an engineering culture that will start its own like OS, right?
[31:15 - 31:22] Cristian: Like I don't know if there's even like a a huge European phone maker that will have its own like OS and stuff. Probably it's going to be more likely is that like a Chinese manufacturer will come in.
[31:22 - 31:25] Cristian: So I I think things are probably going to get splinter like that. Um just for the incompetency over here.
[31:25 - 31:28] Cristian: But I think for North and South America, it's probably still going to be Apple, Google, all that stuff.
[31:29 - 31:33] Cristian: uh which is terrible because those those Chinese phones are cool.
[31:35 - 31:37] Cristian: Like they have silicon carbide batteries. Have you heard of silicon carbide?
[31:37 - 31:42] Cristian: So it's basically it's a new material where you can get like 6,000 milliamp hours in a battery cell that's significantly smaller than lithium ion.
[31:43 - 31:48] Cristian: And only phones out of China right now are shipping with it. There are no like uh Korean or or US or Japanese manufacturers that are making phones with those kinds of batteries right now.
[31:48 - 31:51] Cristian: Uh for example, the OnePlus, never settle. Like the OnePlus Open fold is thinner than any other foldable but has the longest battery life compared to any of the foldable because he uses this new type of battery technology.
[31:51 - 32:02] Sadiq: Okay. Uh yeah, battery technology is one of those things that is like, you know, a thing that is important because uh you know, a lot of things rely on on uh batteries because not just phones, but also obviously laptops but also cars.
[32:02 - 32:21] Sadiq: Uh like batteries are going to be like batteries are the like batteries are like the big where big advances are going to happen I feel like in technology, like actual hardware advances because that's where hardware needs to improve to, you know, uh on the needs of a changing world where you know, we need uh electric cars, you know, battery, power storage and like all that kind of shit.
[32:21 - 32:47] Sadiq: Like battery tech is, you know, still where things are going to change, I think. uh because I feel like we have stagnated on hardware where it comes to like CPUs and like RAM and like screens and like, you know, high resolution displays. Like I feel like we've reached a point where like how how much higher of a refresh rate do we really need? How much higher of a resolution do we really need? you know, like you know TVs and like screens have kind of like 4K is good enough, right? Like and we should try to
[32:47 - 32:51] Sadiq: improve on 4K and like make better quality displays. um like OLED
[32:51 - 32:53] Cristian: right. Like bandwidth has increased but for what, right?
[32:53 - 32:57] Sadiq: Yeah, yeah, like what's what's the point of increasing refresh rate or or resolution?
[32:57 - 33:02] Cristian: Speaking about that, I think, I think leaning into Microsoft, we need to we need to talk about gaming for a minute. Specifically how the past decade has been, um,
[33:04 - 33:14] Cristian: only market forces are the reason that Windows is is still used for gaming. There's no technical reason at this point. I think it's literally just like lock in and market reasons because, um, I'm unsure of what benefits genuinely, outside of an existing library and people make games for it.
[33:14 - 33:19] Cristian: Does Windows have in 2025 for gaming over just like any version of Linux with a good AMD driver, right?
[33:19 - 33:28] Cristian: Uh like you see the you have handhelds like the Steam deck, which are a new category because of um you know advantages of chips and efficiency and all of that. But you have the like Lenovo Legion Go, that one can run Steam OS officially or it can run Windows.
[33:28 - 33:34] Cristian: And just by installing Steam OS, even though it's running through a compatibility layer in Proton, you get better battery life and better performance in games, which is hilarious to me.
[33:34 - 33:43] Sadiq: Yeah, yeah, it's it's I think uh it is possible we see a shift in in PC gaming slowly. Uh not I mean it's it's going to take a while for it to shift significantly, but
[33:43 - 33:52] Sadiq: Windows is still like the majority of PC gaming, right? Because it's like, you know, it's just as you said, inertia and like market forces mean that people just use Windows still. but it's
[33:52 - 34:02] Sadiq: yeah, like Steam OS is uh you know, when when we when we did the podcast last like it was like Steam OS was like, you know I don't even remember three years ago, Steam OS was the thing like steam boxes.
[34:02 - 34:04] Cristian: Steam boxes were the original Steam OS. Remember?
[34:04 - 34:11] Sadiq: Yeah. Valve tried shipping desktop PCs as like a TV thing. Yeah, then they gave up on that project like pretty pretty soon after like sort of got announced.
[34:11 - 34:12] Cristian: Where's your steam controller actually?
[34:12 - 34:17] Sadiq: I don't know where my steam controller is. I think I don't I don't even know if I have it anymore.
[34:17 - 34:25] Sadiq: Um that's a that's another piece of uh like the steam link, the steam uh controller. I don't have it anymore. Uh the Valve index. uh you know, valve is, you know,
[34:25 - 34:39] Sadiq: and the steam deck has been valve's most uh promising hardware but also most promising software project. like it's handheld gaming is like, you know, when in 2015 there was no uh Nintendo Switch.
[34:40 - 34:57] Sadiq: And uh now we have uh Nintendo Switch 2 and we have the Steam deck. We have this market of uh PC uh Steam OS running handhelds are going to come. Uh some of them run windows but they're going to start running Steam OS. Like handheld gaming is like like portable gaming seems to be like kind of like the future.
[34:57 - 35:05] Sadiq: which is weird because there was a time when portable gaming was like like the cool gimmick, like the Nintendo DS, the Game Boy,
[35:06 - 35:10] Sadiq: the PSP, Sony just, you know, kind of gave up on that. uh famously.
[35:11 - 35:16] Sadiq: Uh but it's back. uh and uh you are gaming more on
[35:16 - 35:18] Cristian: GeForce now, right?
[35:18 - 35:22] Sadiq: Like you don't really game on uh console hardware, right?
[35:22 - 35:24] Sadiq: Like you kind of just I don't own a console anymore.
[35:24 - 35:25] Cristian: Oh, yeah, my Xbox gave to my.
[35:25 - 35:34] Sadiq: Yeah, I don't own it. you don't have a console anymore, which is like a big change. Like you used to be like you used to be like deep into like Xbox. like you used to be using, you had like a, you had a 360, right?
[35:34 - 35:43] Cristian: Uh 360, Xbox One, then the Xbox Series S, Xbox One X, then the Xbox Series S.
[35:43 - 36:03] Cristian: And yeah, so I guess the real shift for me was, um, I used I used Windows 10 on a Surface 3. I used the Windows phone. Um, I I I subscribed to Groove Music. I see a sinking ship when I can. I I've been on I I've been I've been on the Titanic before multiple times. Um and I don't think that like the Xbox platform is going away per se, but I do think what's going on is
[36:08 - 36:16] Cristian: Microsoft like all these other big companies are number trying to go up, right? So they are trying to expand the ecosystem while keeping current gamers, which is not working for them, right?
[36:17 - 36:26] Cristian: They're trying to sell game pass while also putting game pass on new markets and trying to convert PC to be more like Xbox and they're fumbling the bag each time of the way, right? Because in theory, what you ideally would want is a shared platform where PC games and Xbox games are one of the same.
[36:30 - 36:40] Cristian: You use like an Xbox preset and you know, um even if like the DRM trip or whatever, right, you you can build a PC and run Xbox games on it because it's the same thing and Xbox is just like the living room version of Windows, right? You could that world could exist.
[36:42 - 36:50] Cristian: But they because it's Microsoft are stumbling over themselves every inch of the way there. So I got off that ship because what I was finding is
[36:52 - 37:10] Cristian: I personally don't want to always be paying for Game pass. and I also don't know if I can trust the future of the platform. um and also Microsoft still doesn't let you use arbitrary USB headsets. they can go fuck themselves. Uh so putting that out there just wild that you cannot use a random USB headset on a on an Xbox.
[37:12 - 37:17] Cristian: But the thing with GeForce Now, the the real reason I was like, oh, I think there's something here is
[37:17 - 37:21] Cristian: I was on vacation, right? recently and I was playing through Final Fantasy 16.
[37:21 - 37:29] Cristian: I it's you experience this with the Steam deck, right? You know, because of the Steam cloud. You're playing the game on your desktop. I'm go play it in bed on the Steam deck.
[37:29 - 37:32] Cristian: Go back and play it on your desktop, maybe you want like a more in-depth session. That multi-device hop without me having to spend like $2,000 on equipment
[37:36 - 38:00] Cristian: is is really what what I what I enjoy about GeForce Now. like after work, cool, I'll go play something on my TV. If I'm like, you know, I don't know, have a few minutes on my lunch break, I can play it on the tablet, right? Just look up an Xbox controller to it. And then if I like want to hop in the Discord with some people and have like a sweaty match of whatever game, cool, I'll play it on my on my my computer for the VRR display, right? play, you know, high frame rates, do it a Discord call. Um I think there's some I think that is something that once you experience it, it's really hard to go back to just like I game here, I have to do games here, I cannot do it anywhere else.
[38:10 - 38:16] Cristian: And Microsoft's trying to build for that, but it's it's so hamstrung when, you know, you can just do it with GeForce now or existing hardware.
[38:16 - 38:17] Cristian: Or if you're in a Sony ecosystem, you can buy like a PS portal and do it that way.
[38:17 - 38:43] Sadiq: Yeah, it's it's like Microsoft is trying to pivot into that and it's it's not going great. Like I don't I don't think it's it's it's going great. Like the Xbox brand is kind of like a it's it's not what it used to be. Xbox just doesn't command the sort of uh power, I guess or sort of market dominance that it used to have like with the uh Microsoft having lost the last uh last significant console wars, right? Like I mean that's a term that people don't use anymore, but like, you know, console wars back when that was a thing.
[38:43 - 39:27] Sadiq: Uh and 10 years ago, like it was Sony, Sony's PS4 generation just kind of destroyed whatever was left of Xbox's credibility. Like the Xbox One, the Xbox Series S and X and Xbox One X, the terrible names, the lack of good games for them, right? Like just kind of meant that Microsoft took an L and kept taking Ls, right? And they never really recovered from that series of Ls and it's looking like it's not looking good considering the state of Xbox Game Studios, the studio closures, the layoffs, the what the fuck is going on over in Microsoft right now.
[39:27 - 39:41] Sadiq: Like it's it's not looking good. Uh, and uh I don't I don't like right now like I am in a phase where I'm not really playing any video games. Like I haven't played a video game in like uh weeks, uh, which is weird for me. Um, like I just I just don't feel any games interesting to me right now. It's not a hardware problem, it's more of a software problem. Uh after I played uh
[39:41 - 39:46] Cristian: Well, no, I I blame it, I blame it on on a mix of both, right? Here hear me out.
[39:46 - 40:06] Cristian: The there's a few things going on. I think that be contributing to this for for everyone. One, hardware hasn't gotten cheaper, so people are spending more money and because of that they have less money to spend on games. So people are going to games forever games like Roblox, Minecraft, Destiny more, right? You see like single player games just go down and the problem with that is single player games are now having to be a lot more microtransaction, right? Like Assassin's Creed with their whole exploitative things.
[40:06 - 40:17] Cristian: And I think what companies are viewing, they I was on another podcast I was listening to, they believe engagement is entertainment, right? So they're tweaking for engagement numbers because they think it's more entertaining, but people are getting burnt out on it because the game is trying to make you engage with it.
[40:17 - 40:20] Cristian: It's it's like it's the same kind of mindset behind YouTube shorts or Tik Tok, right? Where you you feed things in a game to like feed them shit and then you will interface with it more, but you don't like what you're interfacing with.
[40:20 - 40:37] Sadiq: It's it's the reason like every multiplayer game uh has a battle pass, right? That's just engagement bait, right? Like and and at a certain point you do it for a little bit then you're like, what am I actually getting out of this, right? Like you're on a treadmill. Like you're just it's just work. Like you're logging in every day for those daily challenges. Like what that's just work. That's just like that's that's you log on every day to check out thing off your checklist, make progress on a battle pass that'll give you shitty rewards to do
[40:37 - 40:53] Sadiq: what? Like at a certain point if you're not enjoying the mechanics, at a certain point the mechanics of the game. I'll use Overwatch as an example because that's the one I played. was just that after a certain point I was just like I'm not having fun with this anymore. Like I'm just not really like I'm playing the game for the sake of advancing the battle pass when I should be playing the game to have uh you know some sort of fun with the mechanics, the gameplay and and all that, right?
[40:53 - 41:03] Sadiq: Like sure, uh a sense of progression is good, but like just playing a game for the sake of battle pass progression, like it's just it's just the engagement, it's just engagement for, you know, you buy the battle pass, you spend money on in-game currency and that's how these games make money.
[41:03 - 41:14] Sadiq: And that's the way engagement turns into money. And it's just all a way to increase the amount of time and money you spend in these games. And it's just like I'm just burnt out on that. Like I'm just burnt out on these games because as much as I enjoy some of the gameplay loops, it's just like I can't can't play them anymore because I just I just see like battle passes.
[41:14 - 41:18] Sadiq: like in front of me, like it's just battle pass after battle pass, man. Like you
[41:18 - 41:20] Cristian: It's just a task manager. It's a task manager with with uh particle effects.
[41:20 - 41:40] Sadiq: Yep, sure is, you know, pretty graphics and and yeah, it's not it's not enjoyable anymore. So and I and which is why I retreated to single player games but that means that I don't play as many games as I used to, which is fine, right? I have I I kind of like have become more judicious of the games I play. Like I played
[41:40 - 41:51] Sadiq: we talked about this on our other podcast, Foxels, right? We talked I talked about how Assassin's Creed was just like, you know, kind of a disappointment. Like Assassin's Creed Shadows was just I was just so kind of like bored with it. Like I was just like kind of bored and I was just like, you know, this this ain't working for me.
[41:51 - 42:01] Sadiq: So I'm just I just don't really I was just like, I'm not going to play video games. I guess I'll just read books instead because that's still entertaining and that's still fun, you know. Um so that's what I'm doing. Uh so that's that's what that's what happened with video. Like I have this gaming PC and I mean the most of the time like the GPU is doing uh jack shit because I don't like it feels like a it feels a kind of a waste of money at this point.
[42:01 - 42:05] Sadiq: Like I feel like this PC is not getting to use it was supposed to but you know, that's life. Sometimes things just uh change and you know, I don't know.
[42:05 - 42:10] Sadiq: I don't feel like playing any any of the video games out there right now. So is there anything else we want to cover before we wrap this up?
[42:10 - 42:17] Cristian: Uh, I mean, I think really uh we don't need to spend any time on meta because meta is just uh Facebook as what we'll call them. this is the same thing actually. This is what they've been doing for the past decade. At least, you know, out of all the companies that that we can say have changed for the worse.
[42:17 - 42:25] Cristian: They've stood the same amount of shittiness because they were always bad. It's not I don't think you spend more time on that. It's just like, yeah, you know, if you told me 10 years ago that Meta would be uh kissing the ring and um and and and scaling back content moderation to just have an engagement be like, yeah, that makes sense for for Facebook. Okay, cool. Yeah, yeah, cool. Yeah, makes total sense.
[42:25 - 42:33] Cristian: Um I think what's probably how we should wrap this up then is uh to steal like the the the John Oliver line after you go through an hour of shittiness of John Oliver is, what can you do about it, right? What what can one do when they live in a world of things they can't control with stagnating wages and higher inflation and really a lot of people who are cosplaying Cyberpunk 2077 because they think it's kind of sick to be a corpo in real life.
[42:33 - 42:43] Cristian: Um you can it's it's I it's the same answer that we really probably had a decade ago, use use open standards, build on the open web, don't build for reach and engagement and stuff.
[42:43 - 43:03] Sadiq: Yeah, no, I I want to I don't know, this is this is the thing. I want to pull back from even that. Like I want to move back a series like, you got to get out and get out in the streets and work with like you got to get in person to work with people. Like it's like I I don't know how else to say this, but like we got to Get off the computer. Yes, get off the computer. I mean the computer is are uh a medium. you can use them, right? Like Everything is a computer. Everything is a Jesus Christ. But
[43:03 - 43:21] Sadiq: my What's a photo? What's a photo? What's a computer? No, the point is people are more important than computers. So you got to get you got to organize, you know, organize with people, build systems, build communities, right? Build build better worlds, build the world you want to see with the technology that we have, right? Build build websites, build communities, you know, build uh
[43:21 - 43:32] Sadiq: physical spaces, hardware, build hardware. uh help people using your skills, use your technology skills to help people uh because you know, like uh as things get worse, like the the only thing that works is people helping each other. uh and that's what we got to do. We got to everybody has different skills and we got to use our skills to uh help other people.
[43:32 - 43:40] Sadiq: and that's that's my message is it's not about technology, it's about people. That's the that's the lesson of Shades of Brown after 10 years of bullshit is that you know, uh the technology is not as important as the people. Uh so let's uh
[43:40 - 43:42] Cristian: It doesn't matter what chat up you're using as long as you're talking to humans and not.
[43:42 - 43:43] Sadiq: Exactly, 100%. Yeah, yeah.
[43:43 - 43:47] Sadiq: That's that's that's the I mean maybe maybe you don't use Facebook.
[43:47 - 43:48] Sadiq: Yeah you don't use that one.
[43:48 - 43:53] Cristian: But like maybe don't like you know some more than others, but but like you know. Look, if you have to if you have to use Facebook Messenger to help people,
[43:53 - 44:03] Sadiq: like you got to do it. Like you can't you can't be like, I can't help people because you know, like I don't I don't like if it's something you got to meet people where they are, you know, you got to you got to learn. Oh, that's a hot take. That's a hot take. People in Freddy are going to be like. You got to you got to build and instead of alienate people. Like you got to you if you want to
[44:03 - 44:11] Sadiq: help people, you got to start by understanding them. You got to you got to be there where they are, you know. you can't just be dismissive of people's uh choices or like they're off like you know, the choices the decisions they make.
[44:11 - 44:18] Sadiq: So, you know, technology people, we tend to think in terms of technology and we got to start thinking more holistically, you know, read books about uh
[44:20 - 44:28] Sadiq: building communities and building using technology to build things properly and not just uh not just make a cool website for the sake of building a cool website, you know? Like you know, like it's like think about it more than just technology. That's that's all I'm going to say. like think about people, think about the
[44:28 - 44:31] Cristian: But at the same time though, make dumb stuff just for the sake of making dumb stuff. don't try to make it contact.
[44:32 - 44:48] Cristian: Also too, also too because there is there is this this grind that people are on now where they, okay, look, I strongly dislike that we stop calling it art and we started calling it content, right? I'm on the content grind. I people refer to music as content. People refer to like photography as content. Content is slop. Like when you refer to a slop you're devaluing it. Like this is why when we don't have time for this, but just if you've been following hip hop, the new clips album came out recently and they have been consistently talking about as a finished product.
[44:51 - 45:10] Cristian: as not fast food wrap, as a finished piece of work, not content, right? And I think and I and I and I think a lot of people are are positioning the the work that they put actual like hard work and hours into it's a content treat as such as it's something to be gamefied, something that can be just hopefully viral just so they can skim another ad deal, which I understand as to why. and this is not the first time I think I've said this on on podcast, but I'll continue to say it.
[45:10 - 45:26] Cristian: You you devalue your work when you call it content, you devalue a lot of the meaning and intent behind it when you sort of build it just to be gamed by an algorithm. But I understand the reasons as to why. Um that's why no one should support loops, that weird Tik Tok clone that the guy who likes Drake is trying to build.
[45:26 - 45:32] Sadiq: Okay, I wasn't going to bring that up, but you know, that we we went there and I think this is a good time as always to wrap this up before we go more off the rails.
[45:32 - 45:41] Sadiq: Uh I I guess this well like you can find this episode on shades of brown.com. I mean this is going to be the last episode. So it's kind of a weird way to end this. Uh but yeah, you can find that on two sheets of brown.com.
[45:41 - 45:51] Sadiq: You can find uh the other podcast Vaxels.fm, which is the one that's you know more ongoing. Uh that's the ongoing one. Uh you can find it on Vaxels.fm.
[45:51 - 46:01] Sadiq: You can find me on Federverse at Packetcat at 10 forward.social. Uh my blogroute.space. go read the book reviews that I write because that's all I seem to be uh writing about is books. So if you want to read about books, go read those.
[46:01 - 46:08] Sadiq: Uh you can find uh you know, uh everything else on safe.com.
[46:08 - 46:11] Sadiq: Uh so that's that and Christian, where do people find you on the internet?
[46:11 - 46:21] Cristian: So you can find me at loficarets.link which is has all my all my links to different various services, all that good stuff. my blog loficarets.log, I believe. I like when I say domains out loud and I'm like, is it is it that? It it it is. I remember my my URLs.
[46:21 - 46:30] Cristian: Um, you know, it's been 10 years. Uh, I want a new hobby, you know? Like Vax is still happen when it happens, but I'm I'm more like, I'm more like, you know,
[46:30 - 46:39] Cristian: tipping in my hat, stepping away from the podcast game, I think. I want to I've I downloaded Blender the other day. I want to get into 3D art. I just want a different hobby that has nothing, nothing to do with writing or talking online.
[46:40 - 46:48] Cristian: You know what I mean? Like I I I actually sent a friend my the the podcast mics and stuff cuz I'm like, this is a nice bow for this chapter. Um you know, if I
[46:48 - 47:04] Cristian: my teens was a lot of blogging, 20s was a lot of podcasting and and I'm excited to work on other things. I think I think separating your life in different eras is is is healthy, picking up new hobbies, not getting stuck in the same thing. Yeah, I I feel that. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, it's been it's been fun for the past 10 years. Uh,
[47:04 - 47:08] Cristian: thank you for doing this show with me because I was literally 18 and I started. Yeah, that was a I know we we talked about before we started recording.
[47:08 - 47:11] Cristian: I was 18 and we started this. I'm about to turn 29.
[47:11 - 47:15] Sadiq: Oh yeah, I'm in my 30s now, so it's uh it's been it's been a minute.
[47:15 - 47:22] Sadiq: Yeah, when when I was when I was I was in my 20s and that was a very different uh person uh at many different ways that's we can't get into it. But yeah, uh it's been good.
[47:22 - 47:36] Sadiq: I've enjoyed podcasting. Yeah, I don't I don't really I still want to make stuff, you know, I still want to write. I know writing is my focus right now. Uh, I do want to do a podcast, but like it's like I don't really have any plans for any other podcasts right now. I have a few ideas, but you know, I'm I'm focused on writing. I kind of want to make videos, but that's that's, you know, uh stuff like that. I want to I want to make videos about books or whatever.
[47:36 - 47:43] Sadiq: Anyways, uh you can you this that's that's all from us uh for the for the last time with Shades of Brown. Uh goodbye.
[47:44 - 47:50] Cristian: T-shirts of Brown forever and um hamburger menus are still bad. I had that opinion 10 years ago.
[47:50 - 47:51] Cristian: I was right. Take care, y'all.
[47:52 - 47:52] Sadiq: Yes.
[47:52 - 47:53] Sadiq: Yes. All right, bye bye.
[47:53 - 47:54] Cristian: Bye.
[47:54 - 48:51] (Music outro)