Much Ado About Nothing

Gentlemen, I have just come back from a little launch event, I say a little launch event, it felt like a big launch event for a small company, but Nothing Phone 3. I want to hear your guys' impressions of this device ahead of time because I went in completely blind. I didn't even see any leaks. So I was so head down with what I'm doing. So the back, the back is a lot. The back looks like a...

face sort of and i don't know how i feel about it i still don't looking after looking at these images especially hands-on images it just looks a bit much yeah

What do you think of getting rid of the glyph? Because that was the first thing that struck me straight away. I was surprised that they effectively said, we're getting rid of this USP and we're going for a...

I don't know. It feels like... I don't know if you guys... You know the Mi Fit bands? Do you remember those little Xiaomi bands? It's almost like they've stuck an equivalent of one of those on the back of the phone, which I know Xiaomi did a few years ago with the 10 Ultra or 11 Ultra, I think it was. So... I don't know. It feels like one foot in one camp and another foot in like, I don't know.

anywhere that they could possibly go, if that makes sense. So my primary experience with the lights is when we were at IO and Jordan had his, what, 3A? And every time he did anything... the what did the back would light up and i thought that was a bit disarming and again a bit much uh what did they replace it with exactly so let me show you so this is basically

Sadly for everybody out there, you can't see me doing this. I'm trying to put this little LED screen to the camera. Circular. Is it proper circular or is it just a square in a circle?

It's kind of circular. I mean, I don't really understand the utility of it. It's kind of cool. It's a gimmick. I mean... Carpe came out and said it's not a gimmick straight away. It's a gimmick. Gimmicks can be good. I feel like gimmick is often used as a pejorative, but it can... like a gimmick can be a good thing now i don't know if this is a good thing it's it's anytime a phone does something like this right so like obviously the glyph lights previously and and um

you know even dating back to like the the early like lg like v10 and v20 and they're like little ticker displays i'm always like these are these are neat interesting ideas that don't really go anywhere and end up not really being any more useful than just an always on display like it's it's just like a different usually smaller less powerful version of an always on display that makes me go like

Okay, well, I don't really need this, though, if the phone hasn't always on display because it's going to give me the same information, but I don't have to put the display down on a table where it might get scratched. I don't have to, like, you know. center in on this little screen on the back i can just look at you know i can glance over to the device i don't know like it screams gimmick to me you know in a way that i think obviously they don't want it to seem that way um

But I don't know how else to describe it. But what can it do? Okay, so the people who had previous nothing phones and who have now lost the Griff display if they're upgrading to this one. Does anything gain, anything loss, really? I'm going to say, yeah, you've lost a bit of utility. I mean, I was a big fan of the glyph. I was a big fan of the glyph, not even from the light up. aspect of it in terms of like you get a notification and it kind of

It kind of startles you with the brightness. I thought it was really good for a soft light for video and as a soft light for photos. I think it was the best flash in terms of like coverage. Does that make sense? Like it bloomed a little bit more if that makes sense.

sense so it made things a little bit softer so certain images look really good considering the camera hardware wasn't as up-to-date as some of the other um in air quotes flagship phones which i actually hate that term i mean i kind of like

ties into what they're trying to do they're trying to sell this as the different in air quotes flagship phone again but I'm like I think that that term is starting to lose our meaning now I think we've reached a point where You can call something, I guess it is their flagship in their own lineup, but in terms of the wider industry, where does this sit? It feels like this is the only way that you can grab the attention of the...

I don't want to say the TikTok generation, but the TikTok generation might be like, oh, wow, this looks so cool. It's going to look good on social media. But ironically, ironically, that generation would be better served by the glyph lights for the exact same reason. that you're describing, which is that they have like an actual utility to like I'm shooting on TikTok and now my phone has like a built in like light to to illuminate my face. And then also, you know, putting aside.

a little bit what I just said but it's like okay if all of these things are gimmicks then at the very least the lights were like a visually distinct gimmick that would catch people's attention in a way that like even if all it was was a cool looking thing I don't feel like the little display on the back of this is like really cool looking. I don't expect anyone to like you're not going to notice it on the subway in the same way that you might.

You know, if someone was using like a nothing phone 3A and you suddenly see it flash when they're holding it, like you will notice that. So I don't know. I also think it just kind of loses nothing's identity just but but for no real gain.

So my first thought straight after the event, speaking to a few people who do YouTube and stuff like that and kind of like people in the media. And the first thing I thought was. when they showed there's an option basically there's a capacitive button here which is the extra you tool for this so you press this capacitive button you tap it a few times and you can switch between i think they're called

I want to call them glyph toys. I may be wrong. I just call it the glyph LED. I don't think it's actually called that. And there is one where you can see effectively like a pixel. image of the viewfinder yeah and my first thought was in the in the briefing or sorry in the the the branding for this they've been shown so this is currently just so you guys can see basically you can kind of see what

it looks like in your surroundings. My first initial thought was Game Boy Color Camera. They were showing that in the pre-release and post-release. We're trying to make tech fun. And I'm like, yeah, but you... That was fun because at the time we didn't have technology that surpassed it quite drastically. So it's almost like we're going to make it fun by dragging you back in time, which is probably like 25 years since the Game by Color Camera came out, maybe.

27 years maybe. God, I'm sure my age as well. It's like fun for the sake of fun is great, but the time frame that something stays fun is therefore becomes a gimmick, right? I'm trying to quantify everything, right? But it just makes no sense. It's really challenging to, like, just recreate that sense, right? Like, you can allow old technology to come back, you know, into style.

on its own right like we've seen this a lot like i uh last year went to uh uh weezer's blue album tour right and uh there was a person like three there was like a you know 20 young 20 something guy like three rows in front of us that was taking photos on a 3DS. Right. Which was a trend for a bit like a TikTok trend. But like if if like.

tomorrow someone tried to essentially just take the game out of the game console out of the 3ds and make like a 3d camera uh it would be it wouldn't sell no one would buy it right those retro trends have to come into vogue on their own. And so for it doesn't totally work with the nothing phone where I'm like, OK, but like nobody's actually going to like want.

anything yeah and like the commitment to buying a phone just for that that's not a thing people do exactly it's the fact that you it feels like they're cramming that button uh that capacitor button where you cycle through the various functions that just seems overkill that I don't know that just you it's it These secondary displays, these AODs, the best ones, just show information without you thinking about it. Having to cycle to various functions, like a smartwatch.

that's wild and not in a good way it's it's i mean to the credit i guess to nothing's credit we are that's the first thing we talk about but it's i don't think it serves you throughout the life of a phone if you're but if you're actually buying this for over and using it for over a year yeah um okay so that's that's the back that's designed i think

Well, yeah, let's talk about the back design a little bit more because I think we've, in the interest of fairness, I think there is a lot of things I really do think that nothing has doubled down on in terms of their design. And they've done something that... I think in the media and especially influencer circles and things like that, people will be highly critical that all phones look the same. And when something different comes along...

The first thing everybody wants to try and do is try to tear it down, which is rightfully so. I think if you put something out there, you want people to buy it, you want it to be critiqued. That's how you improve a product. And let's not make a mistake. Nothing has been making products.

for a couple of years now at least five years now the identity of what nothing we're doing before with the glyph lighting i think it did stand out apart from a stand apart sorry from the crowd because they had something that

Yes, a lot of people will look at it. Oh, it's a gimmick. It's stupid. But a lot of people genuinely shock and awe. It's literally shock and awe. Kind of. But I feel like this time around, like, I mean, I'm... kind of showing you again, but everything, everything feels almost remixed and there is, I will give them credit for trying it.

I don't know how I feel about the design. I do like that there's certain little touches. It genuinely feels a little bit more generic in a weird way than the previous versions. I think Nottingham Phone 1 really did look very different to anything else that's out at the time. We've seen a few other...

I think it was, I don't want to name, put any other brand under the bus, but I'm pretty sure a couple of years ago at MWC, somebody tried to make their own version of the phone one with the glyph lighting and it... kind of didn't quite work the same way. But to ditch that so quickly, I don't know if that's a good sign. I know they're going for this really like industrial style design mixed with, I guess, it feels a little bit Starfield. like the game in a weird way. Um, I think.

The bogly cameras, I don't know the justification for that because the periscope's up in the top left and then I think the main one's just beneath it. And it means when you're using the camera, there is a... definite shift you can see when you switch to that um three times zoom i think it's a three times zoom i could be wrong um as soon as you switch that you can see there's a shift like in uh almost to the right of the main image

And that's quite jarring. And I wonder why that was the case. And I'm sure Calpe will have a YouTube video discussing that with his team and gaining millions of views on that. But we don't get a... a clear answer until they're ready to give us a clear answer yeah but um i just want to ask you about what you what you guys think of this layout i know you said it looks a little bit like a face yeah i see the camera's eyes that

red square in between is the nose um i don't know what to make about the the other the top camera and the display at the right it's just It just seems like a lot. It's like a face made to look like a Picasso painting. It's what it looks like. It's very segmented, you know what I mean? It's... It's interesting. I actually I hadn't clicked on this until listening to you explain your way through it, Damien. But I wonder if the reason that this phone in general has seen such a larger.

amount of backlash compared to like the the 2a and the 3a series um designs which which is the 3a specifically also had some criticism but i think far less i think it's because the lights kind of justified the odd layout that that nothing would often use for the back of its phone right like you could kind of if the camera was in a weird spot you could kind of explain it away by being like oh well like You know, it's so that the lights can circle and go around all of these components.

And without the lights, it ends up just kind of looking like it's designed this way to look different, but for no other reason. And I think because you can't like assign meaning to it. You end up just I think I think everybody's knee jerk reaction, even if you come around on the design. And I have come around a little bit on the design since it first leaked. But I think your knee jerk reaction and part of it is also just that.

different the change of it all but like is no this looks bad it doesn't look i don't understand why it looks like this therefore it looks bad yeah and i think as well though look just when we talk about this little uh glyph led section in the top like you would ordinarily expect a camera to be there or something of that of that type yeah i wonder how much r d has gone into this little extra display at the cost of everything else like yeah

shoving shoehorn this shoehorning this in and i'm looking at the top of the section and anyone out there if you get the opportunity we'll leave some links in the show notes to the to our coverage there is basically three

well what looks like room for three circular areas at the top of the of the phone they're like almost sectioned off and then all of a sudden the periscope camera's like slightly justified down a little bit and it's almost at the very very edge of the bezel and i wonder if they wanted to put

all of the camera in one area and couldn't do it. And then they're like, okay, well, we're going to have to have another, we're going to have to try and find a way to make this fit. I'm not going to, I'm only speculating. We'll probably get a better answer from some, hopefully.

from nothing themselves as to why it looks like that. There is, yeah, there's enough loss of identity, but I do think this stands out ridiculous compared to anything else. Like if I've showed my partner this.

already and she was like what the hell is wrong with this like what is wrong with your phone which is a weird reaction to have but um like i guess reactions like that are gonna create the the buzz or the lack of like the kind of things that other brands would be desperate for in some ways like yeah but Motorola releases a phone right you get that reaction and you ask somebody who has it why this like that and

you don't have an answer it's just but do you need to give an answer right do you need to have an answer for it i guess motorola can release a regular phone and most people just won't bat an eyelid it's like oh how much is it like yeah I guess there's going to be a lot of, in air quotes, column inches for this phone because the design is so striking. Rightly or wrongly, people will find it good, bad. They're indifferent to it.

Yeah, I just want to give them credit for even trying something different because we can be highly critical that all firms look the same. I think... Yeah, it would be very, very interesting to see why they've gone down this route and not put the money, the other R&D money into somewhere else in the device, because at the front, it's pretty by the numbers from the front. So at least the back's a bit different, I guess.

I'm curious if this is going to kind of shoot themselves in the foot, too, because we've spent, you know, the first 15 minutes of this podcast being, you know, fairly mixed to negative on the overall design of this phone, yet reading through.

you know, Ben's hands on on the on the site, like it's very it sounds like a pretty good phone, all things considered. Like we've gotten some caught up on the design, but then it's like. But yeah, the rest of the device is actually seems pretty good. I mean.

The sum of its parts are great. Like you look at it and you think, I mean, I do think maybe the price could come down a little bit, but in terms of like the actual, what you get on offer here, it's pretty darn solid in a lot of ways. And it's almost like... Just a tiny, pulling back a little bit from the ridiculous changes they've tried to make at the back and sticking with Glyph and maybe doing something slightly different with it.

and reducing their own costs as well because they've done the R&D on it. They could have put a little bit more money into it and made this that, in air quotes, out and out flagship that they really, really want it to be. But it's almost like they... nothing a little bit kind of, how would I describe it? They inhibit themselves to try and be like, oh no, no, you don't need the latest and greatest. But it's like...

Yeah, but if you spent less on the R&D for this ridiculous little LED that probably some people are going to use twice, you could have maybe had a little bit extra left over to put that Snapdragon 8 Elite chip in there. I don't know. Again, I'm...

speculating wildly there um what what do you what do you guys think of the specifications though because for this for a phone of this kind of price point feels on par maybe you might get a little bit more money if you went with someone else like oneplus or yeah or even maybe some of the base model samsung phones i don't know if you're playing it conservatively i i think it's probably a touch it's it's not really overpriced but i do think it's at the absolute like

top of its budget i think if this had been even like 50 more we'd be like why why is anybody spending 850 on this i do think it's gonna you know obviously i i uh i think it's fascinating and i wrote an editorial about this yesterday but i think it's fascinating that this is kind of the this is not their first u.s

launched phone but it's it feels like the one they're like really pushing to be a success in the us like more so than the nothing phone too and i think that's really interesting in like kind of a wrong-headed way where i don't expect this to really connect with users who have never heard of this company and i would i would hazard to guess that most

US consumers have not heard of nothing. Like, I don't think they have a particularly large amount of brand awareness here, which is another reason I think sticking with the glyph lights would have helped because they could have. built that to be their brand identity in the way that like the camera bar is the pixels identity or the camera in general is the pixels identity. I feel like you could have had this core design that reaches across every single one of their products.

So you could point to it and be like, this is what a nothing phone is. But instead, it's this new thing that doesn't really build on anything that came before. So as much as $800 is like a pretty OK price for what's on offer, I also don't. expect it, at least in the US, to move a particularly large amount of numbers. It's a lot of money to drop on a device that you're not going to be able to buy on discount through a carrier store or something.

I feel like they could have gave away a pair of in-ear earbuds and that would have been perfect. And I feel like that might be the way to do it. Yeah, just even if only for like a month or two, like even for like an early... early pre-order early order type thing like like you know we'll give you this bonus and you know it convinces you to maybe think a little bit more about nothing as an ecosystem as opposed to this just being like a slightly different looking phone

Yeah, I think you made a really, really good point. I kind of wanted to touch on it a little bit. It's that in the shadow of what Google are doing with Pixel, I think this is one of those phones that, I mean... let's be completely honest, the Venn diagram of people who liked OnePlus, the old OnePlus and Pixel, nothing is kind of like in that middle, right? Exactly. Of that Venn diagram. I think this could push people the potential...

buy a pool away who were interested, especially those in the US that maybe aren't willing to kind of... I'm not going to say compromise because I really like OxygenOS now. They don't want to compromise with OxygenOS. They maybe don't want to spend as much money on the Pixel because...

Let's be completely honest, Tensor isn't probably where it should be at this point in time. And we're hoping for that big quantum leap. If you're a spec head, this probably did hit a lot of the beats. And that price, like I say... maybe puts people off a tiny, tiny bit. And again, tying into what you said about the iconic, I say iconic, is the camera bar iconic? Are we fair in saying that? I think it's iconic. Do you think it's iconic? People...

I think people recognize like even outside of the tech world, I think general consumers can see that camera bar and like identify it as at least like a Google phone. Like they might not know Pixel. They might not know the specific Pixel model, but they will see that the camera bar has been around. long enough that i think it has become you know that is the thing that's the thing google makes i think that's pretty widespread yeah but this is why i feel like

they're not going to get that with this. And I've just looked it up. It's called the Glyph Matrix. Nobody's going to be looking and saying, oh, that's the Glyph Matrix. I mean, you were at the launch event and you had to look at what it was called. I can't remember what it's called, no. I can't remember what it's called. I know Glyph is in there. They want to keep...

glyph name around but they don't want to keep it doing what it does best but I don't know I think yeah there's some strange things here as well obviously they're a smaller company as well so they don't It's launching with Android 15. We're expected to get a version of nothing unless of Android 16 in September. We then have Pixel 10 to contend with coming up in, what, maybe six weeks' time, eight weeks' time.

It's a very confusing launch because there's a lot of other factors I think that nothing doesn't have a hand in. And yeah, the price has probably got to come down pretty down quickly, especially in the US when there are more people buying Pixel phones, right? Like, yeah, the A series is flying. Yeah. Yeah. So I don't know. With those optics, it does become a tougher sell. But I think.

The sum of its parts are pretty darn good. Again, I've only used it for a little while and I don't have too many strong feelings at this point in time, but NothingOS is nice if you're a person who likes the Pixel version of Android. Something... that has a little bit of extra kind of visual flair. I really like the touches that they've made here and there. You can still customize the quick settings like you can in Android 16 QPR One, which is interesting in Android 15. Yeah, nothing OS is...

it's pretty darn solid. It does sometimes vary into, I don't want to say uncanny valley, but I guess that's kind of what it is. It's like homage to what Pixel are doing, but with a few... like dot matrix leds thrown in for good measure yeah but um yeah it's pretty it's pretty nice the phone feels it about what i expected their their um industrial design is very very good and that's something that i guess

I want to give some credit to as well because most phones come out, they're kind of cheap on some areas and then it feels terrible. Like you have a terrible screen, you have a terrible battery. Everything looks pretty solid in that respect. So hopefully the phone itself can perform well. That's the main thing. But I don't know. I want to get your thoughts, Sam, because you are a staunch Pixel 9a person. Is this the kind of device you'd be looking at and thinking?

I would potentially switch. Or are you so solely focused on Pixel 10 that this is not even in the rear view mirror, let alone in your periphery? I was considering a Nothing Phone 2 last year, but the bigger... the screen sizes put me off um what's this six point what six seven i think it is yeah it's too big yeah uh that's what also put me off the s25 edge but the the software would be

a non-issue to me in that it's probably honestly a plus um the widgets are honestly interesting to me that that industrial design that design the visual design they have of the widgets that kind of stuff interests me but

How's early days, but what's the camera looking like? Have they addressed that from previous generations? Well, I have to say the camera seems okay so far. I would definitely say that Pixel still... veers into more normal not normal like natural like a natural image i do think the the triple camera setup so what i've played with so far has been pretty pretty impressive the zoom is better than i expected um especially for

I guess it's the second Periscope Zoom. I know they did that with the 3A, so they've had time to play around with it. Do I think it will replace S25?

ultra or pixel 9 pro in my pocket probably not in terms of the camera but i'm taking less photos as i'm getting older most of it's just food so as long as it can take decent pictures of food then then i'll be happy so i'll have to test that over the next couple days um and then see how it stacks up but so far I've been a little bit impressed because the last time I used a nothing phone was a nothing phone 2 and it almost felt like that was a step in the right direction but not quite far enough

This feels like another half step again, but then we'll chop, we'll kind of throw some things away for no good reason. But it looks like a pretty solid foundations. I just hope that this isn't... a blip that causes people to turn away fully. I think a lot of people I can see already, the discourse is that they should have never stayed clear of the mid-range, but it's clear from...

what people want to buy. They want a top-end phone that competes with the likes of Samsung and Google and OnePlus. So yeah, it's a strange one. It's a strange time to release a phone as well. Well, I'm just frustrated. I feel like this is like... Design aside, like kind of a home run if this is either same exact spec sheet, $700 or $800 and you just bump it up to an 8 Elite.

Like, I think it had to it should pick one of those lanes. I don't think it's like going to make or break the phone, but I do think you have people who are either a little more forgiving. You know, like like nothing. People are already nothing fans or who are Android enthusiasts looking to try something new. I think are a little more forgiving of the 8S Gen 4 at 700 or.

are more forgiving of the design. If it's got that in the $800 price, if it's got the full eight leaps, this thing's still going to run, you know, particularly with gaming run circles around like Tensor probably. But You know, it's just, it feels, for nothing to have spent months hyping this as like a full flagship, like their first full flagship, it's just a little disappointing. I do think they...

They'll get it down eventually. I do think it's a very, very slow march towards $1,000 plus phone with all of the bells and whistles. And obviously... The playbook is very, very similar to that of the original OnePlus, right? Even going down to the launch event, being at the same event where... Carl Pei and Pete Lau launched the 7T and 7T Pro.

at Magazine London, which I found very interesting because his second, his last launch after that was the Nord. So yeah, it's a very interesting playbook that they're kind of be following, but I'm... I'm excited to see what the fallout is. I want to hear and see other opinions because I think...

Maybe I will be a little bit more forgiving in that they've tried to do something different. But yeah, it is out there. It's completely out there. And I guess I kind of like that. Maybe we'll get something... I would love to see what nothing would do with a ridiculous foldable and probably put a full LED display on the front like a...

a pixel LED display and do something stupid like that. That would be hilarious. Or maybe even just make a 3DS. That would be hilarious as well. But I wouldn't put it past Carl to have a prototype there because I know he's a big Game Boy and Pokemon fan. poor like myself, so we're kindred spirits in that regard. So in terms of what else they watched outside of the phone, the headphones, any thoughts on those, Damien? I haven't tried them, but I feel like they...

They complement this device and the lineup really well. It does feel like every single company has to follow the Apple Playbook in that they have to have one product in every part of it. Apple's portfolio, if that makes sense. We have to have headphones. I don't think it was necessary, to be completely honest with you. Their earbuds are fantastic. Just make the best earbuds. I know that they're probably making a lot of money from them as well. They definitely stand out.

um the sound is great the work they've done with teenage engineering there is means that they kind of have a sound profile down and a design that works i just kind of don't understand why they had to make this move into over ears because At $300, they're probably way better options out there for most people. I think you're probably better off with two pairs of in-ear headphones that you can kind of like switch between when the battery runs out.

They look okay. They're quite comfortable, I will say that. But yeah, sound profile, I don't really have any thoughts because I listen to them at a ridiculously busy hands-on event, which is never a good place to kind of give you thoughts on many things. Yeah.

yeah they're i don't know they're they're they're fine they seem a little uh you know reading through reviews and obviously our review is forthcoming but reading through other reviews like they seem a little i feel like i was expecting a little bit more in terms of sound quality for $300. I feel like everybody has kind of went like, they're not terrible. But, you know, it just feels so weird to be at a point where we're calling like $300 headphones like mid-range.

bluetooth headphones which i've seen people say a lot and i get why they're saying that because of like sony's latest you know release and and of course the airpods max which these are pulling from um at least a little bit in terms of their

their design uh it's very nothing design but there is a little bit of airpods max uh visual language in there and um yeah i don't i don't know i i feel like if these were two hundred dollars i might just impulse buy them one day, but I don't think that's going to happen for $300.

It definitely feels like they're at odds with the phone, if that makes sense. Like, oh, we're a slightly cheaper phone, but we have all of these compromises. But these are really high-end headphones, and they're not compromised, and you're going to get all of this for $300. It feels like, again, it just feels a little bit at odds with what they were like. Maybe they should have launched that separately, but I guess they want this kind of portfolio of products to launch at the same time.

They look cool, I think. They look like cassettes on the side of your ears, so that's kind of interesting. Definitely a lot cooler than the phone, I will say, from first glance. But all of the designs have grown on me more as time has passed. Hopefully that's the litmus test that we have.

We have a pair of headphones and a phone that in a few months time, like, oh, great design, really well played. Like the guys at the former Dyson team and the teenage engineering people have worked with nothing, did a great job. They're making great products, but.

Yeah, I just think place their strengths. They should place their strengths a little bit more, which is just making fairly affordable products that look good. Stand out, yeah. Yeah, yeah, stand out and look good. Yeah, the transparent thing's cool. I wonder how long that'll stay.

Relevant to nothing. I hope they don't go down that route because I think everybody eventually falls down that kind of, we need to go a little bit more professional business-like. And they should go the other way. They should do...

like colored transparent shells like i want like n64 you know like old imac style like blue like blue and purple and like they should do that like those frosted transparent uh uh finishes uh that you'll still see on like retro gaming handhelds or whatever like they should

They should lean into that more. It doesn't totally fit with the aesthetic they they launched the company with. And obviously that's the aesthetic they're still doing. But it does fit with the aesthetic of the user base. I think they're trying to chase.

right like i think there's a lot of nostalgia uh among among you know gen z obviously gen z was not like growing up in the early 2000s but i think they have like come around to a lot of like the fashion choices of the early 2000s and that sort of stuff would fit right in um so sticking to the the black and white sometimes can be you know a little disappointing i think there's like a lot of but it also costs it costs a lot of money to uh

to launch all those colors. So I get why they stick to some more basic shades. But I would love to see them kind of lean into that early 2000s, late 90s type visual language. You're probably right, actually. It probably taps into something different. This could be a full podcast on its own, but I do wonder if that Gen Z and even Gen Alpha, to an extent, have only ever seen devices of one shape, one size, maybe a few colors.

this is brand new to them. So yeah, definitely think they should lean into it more and hopefully they'll continue to do it. Maybe, maybe, maybe, and this is one for anyone out there from nothing who's listening. Why don't you release a... uh something a little bit like the analog pocket of your own that would be pretty cool i'd like to see that nothing branded game boy emulator maybe you should just go whole hog and go for it um

I don't know if you need tons and tons of resources for that, but hey, even limited edition, I would probably be first in line for that. But yeah, that's nothing from three.

Again, we'll have some more coverage in the next few days. I'm going to be comparing it to some devices out there because I think this stacks up well, actually, to the Pixel 9 Pro XL, to be completely honest with you. Yeah. Especially because of the Snapdragon 8s Gen 4 being... probably a few steps ahead of tensor but um uh like i say stay tuned if i can get it out i'm tired but but bear with me i'm tired um but in terms of like other things i've missed this last few days

Abner, you've seen a cool thing that happened with Gemini. I need you to discuss this with me because, again, when you plugged into the Matrix and you go into these events, you miss the big talking points. So Gemini has a new icon. at the beginning uh which what however 2024 is that whenever time when gemini launched it had this this thing visual language was the departure for google this blue purple color look that was there very different it's set apart from its usual red blue green yellow

branding that everything Google has uses over years later well months later Google's finally ready to bring Gemini into its main branding by having a red blue green yellow icon um which is what in the process of rolling out on android and ios and uh the web i assume but it's The colors, it's on one end, it's more uniform. It matches all other Google products. But at the other end, it now looks like every other Google product.

have you any feel any knee-jerk reactions to it uh the first time you saw it i mean it uh i think it does a really good job at demonstrating that in google's mine collective minds uh google is gemini and gemini is google right like that feels like this is that's what i'm supposed to take away from i i

yeah maybe i would have thought that if this had been the logo from the start too but certainly yeah the fact that this is like a change that they had to sit down and decide to make and i'm sure went through like a tons of different variations and testings before they picked exactly you know where the red and the yellow and the green and the blue would show up in the sparkle like they had to really think about this and i think that demonstrates well that like these two you know

And this is this is not quite obviously to the level of meta. of facebook changing its name to meta but but it is sort of the same thing of like look like we i want we want to we want you to identify gemini with our core product which is google search like we want you to think about that and to do that like psycho on a psychological level we're going to make this logo look like that other logo my biggest

trepidation is this is going to look like every other logo on your phone like i get it i get that it's cool right but it's a problem what why did why did we settle on the sparkle as the ai what was the reasoning for that was Every company. Yeah, every single company seems to have fallen into this sparkle trap.

Who made that decision? Who was the first to do it? But I guess this is the only way that Google can do it without it blending into the crowd, if that makes sense. It definitely, how would I describe it in the best way? It feels a little bit like... The old, I say old, I think it's still on some devices, is the old Google Assistant glow bar. Reminds me a little bit of that a little bit. Like kind of wrapped around into this sort of.

star shape this new sparkle it does glow you can imagine it glow it's interesting from again when they started they thought they needed to separate the brand and i could see that being a cautionary move like in case if this gemini thing didn't work out the main brand was protected but as time has gone on

this feels like a graduation that they're ready to embrace it and bring it in line I'm not sure if you've noticed this, but when mainstream people talk about AI overviews in Google search, they just call it Gemini. so to their credit they got the market penetration out on the term gemini even though what ai overviews are powered by gemini models but it's not gemini itself but i think that's an interesting thing that google got

It's a best case scenario, I guess, even though it's not technically accurate. But yeah, this icon, it's looking like every other icon on your phone, I guess. Most people do launch it with the power button, long pressing on the power button or the corner swipe. i guess you never really see the icon um though i've come around putting the gemini app on my dock so that's something i think you you did you do that i'm the transfer yeah i'm the original i'm the og of uh gemini on my dock

I haven't put... Weirdly, I haven't put on the Nothing Phone 3 yet, but I've only been setting it up today. So, yeah, I think having... I mean, I suppose it does... signify google a little bit more i just don't know why um in some ways they didn't there's not more emphasis of the g logo somewhere somehow to kind of really make it stand out it makes sense on your phone right but i guess

to someone who's not versed and is a little bit like is that google i'm not sure like how are they gonna yeah no off the top of their head and i think that's a probably why i alluded to the sparkle why is that the the thing for ai and every single companies just said, yeah, we're going to put sparkles on it. That means AI. And I should research why. I imagine it's something to do with like, oh yeah, yeah, it makes you think of technology or something like that somehow.

yeah i don't know i'm spitballing sorry no i it's interesting i i hadn't thought about this but looking you know in my pixels app drawer the only app that separates uh gemini from just like the google app is is gmail so ignoring that it's pretty easy to compare the two and and you know this doesn't explain why every ai

application has a sparkle and I'm sure that I am overthinking this and this is not why but I do think it's funny that the Gemini sparkle is like the exact it's like if you asked me to design the opposite shape from like the almost a full circle G in Google, it's like the exact opposite shape. it folds in instead of being rounded it's filled in instead of white in the middle it is kind of an exact opposite like icon in a way that like

I don't know, like maybe that's on purpose. I have no idea. I would love to ask someone at Google if it's on purpose for that being like a very obviously the colors match now, but it's still a very distinct logo next to the Google G in a way that seems.

too specific to be purposeful or to not be purposeful honestly like in the grand scheme i wonder if what have you just called gemini google is that so weird that's so weird you said that because I was about to ask the same thing like at what point is Gemini Gemini is because like I don't know if you guys are having this same experience with people who, anyone who brings up AI, they instantly, AI is chat GPT. Yes, yes. There is no, like, if Google can kind of court people and say, hey.

google is ai and then be like just if you google it you you're ai in it if that makes sense like doing that with overviews right it's yeah it's going to be when ai mode is eventually becomes the default experience which like they have not to my knowledge not said that's going to happen but like obviously that's what they are working towards and yeah i feel like i feel like they'll never

disable the gem like i don't think the gemini name will go the way of like bard right when when bard became gemini but i do wonder if they're going to like you know if they look at the way people talk about chat gpt and they're like okay like

we have the world's most popular like brand name or whatever like we literally have the like kleenex of the internet like we will we will just leverage that power once ai mode is there so that it turns into like when you google it you are essentially Gemini. that brings up the question that gemini is not ai mode and so far so i i know uh damon you haven't had a chance to use ai mode because it's in the u it's only launched in the us and coming soon and in testing in india

But AI mode is good, honestly. I like it.

more than ai overviews anyways i go to it as a destination um like the separation i have with gemini is it's if it's more something that i don't want in my gemini history side panel i will use ai mode for it um and yeah i think it's good and looking like from google having two competing efforts um i feel like they would say it's not a zero-sum game having search do ai and have gemini do ai the difference is that gemini is to be your assistant and i think that

that distinction will make more sense in the future when it's truly more assistive. But yeah, I feel like, I don't know if this is like five, 10 years out when.

all these things uh when we reach agi or when we uh when the intelligence is so good i wonder if the eventual future is um gemini those two products merge or ai mode and gemini merge or the gemini just becomes google or the default search experience i don't know how far we're away from that but i feel like that they'll always be in the back of our minds as people plugged in yeah yeah well maybe maybe i agree with you that i agree with you

On the whole, but I think the time frame is going to be a lot faster. I think the time frame is going to be faster because if Google can get this into, say, the regular search mode and regular search.

is monetized faster than anybody else like that's the big biggest monetization option because chat gpt and open ai can only survive so long because they're just going to burn through this investor money and also they need subscriptions they're relying on integrations with third-party companies and google can say well we can we can go whole hog like we are the highway we don't need

we don't need to like kind of build in off ramps and all that kind of stuff they're already built into our systems i think it's probably going to be a case of two to three years i could easily see google ditching Gemini well not ditching Gemini making Gemini a side product in its portfolio and then when you use AI it is Google as part of that AI mode I can

Definitely see that happening. I feel like Gemini becomes more like how it is in Chrome right now, where it like the LLM part, the actual chatbot part of Gemini becomes like. okay you're not going to gemini.google.com and like when you activate it on your phone it's pulling up more of a full search thing right whatever ai mode eventually becomes right uh But then Gemini still exists as like the little icon in Chrome that you click to like ask it to help you find things or understand things.

Yeah, I feel like, again, like this makes more sense once you think of it as having a personal assistant, when the functionality reaches a human assistant that can help and suggest in your daily life.

I think that's where the distinction, where it will be clear to people that why is there AI mode? Why is there Gemini? I think that makes sense. But like in the grand scheme, again, it goes back to merging the two as... or or google is obviously the better name than gemini um that sounds like a very long term cycle or to what you said damien sooner but yeah i think we're relating

i i feel like google is probably waiting to see how useful how how far they can push agi or how much utility they can put into gemini to see whether it stands as it's an assistant And I feel like if it's like a human assistant, I feel like you'll be willing to pay for it. And I think that's going to be the differentiator of... But again, at the same time, like... if they if they made this perfect ai why not call it google yeah i think that's probably the best way to describe it i think yeah um

We don't have probably too much longer to wait and see what that future's like because of the way AI has progressed so soon in such a short space of time. But that actually does us for time for this episode.

I definitely want to thank you guys for talking Nothing Phone 3 with me because a lot of these are just thoughts. I don't know if you can tell from my voice, but I'm very, very tired. And I'm propped up on a lot of monster energy. But yeah, thanks guys for joining me. We always appreciate talking. talking anything and everything with you guys and thank you for listening and everyone out there and we will speak to you in the next episode bye bye