#183. 'BlackBerry'
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Sonny, JVL, and Mike all loved BlackBerry, Matt Johnson's account of the rise and fall of the pioneering smartphone maker, with Sonny declaring it the best of the emerging "brand movie" subgenre — better than Air and Tetris — because it has the nerve to dramatize the fall as well as the rise, and because Glenn Howerton's shark-eyed turn as Jim Balsillie ("Jack Donaghy if he were evil and totally unselfaware") is awards-worthy even though the movie's tiny May release will keep it out of the conversation. JVL called it the best "brand movie" yet made, admired how it explains a genuinely world-shaping piece of tech history (BlackBerry's real innovation was cramming 500,000 devices onto one network) and tied its schadenfreude to an Upton Sinclair "behind every great fortune is a crime" reading of how disruption actually works; Mike praised the tight, novelistic script, the Big Short-style frenetic camerawork that settles down for the second half, and Jay Baruchel's transformation from scruffy engineer to slicked-back true believer, and rated the whole thing five stars. Before getting to the movie, the guys spend a long stretch on how everyone's doing: Sonny's saga of a DC hotel reservation dispute that ended with a front-desk clerk threatening to give his room to "hookers" after a mixed-up email about dates; Mike's exhausting "Maycember" (a term from his wife's mom-Instagram circles) capped by his oldest son's first holy communion, including the kid's deadpan report to classmates that he "got paid $135 to eat a blessed cracker" and a description of his parish's confession-shredder ritual for kids; and JVL recounting a brutal DC-then-New York travel stretch that included trapping himself in direct sun at a Bulwark happy hour behind his own "buffer table." They also run through the box office (Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3's surprisingly strong hold, Super Mario Bros. still dominant, Book Club: The Next Chapter debuting at three) and dig into the Wall Street Journal report on ESPN eyeing a standalone streaming service, debating what it would mean for the cable bundle and whether a la carte sports streaming would actually save consumers money.
From the show notes
Maybe the best movie of the year so far?
Full transcript
Guest00:00:00That guy is sketchy. I don't think he's sketchy. The guy's a shark. I know how to market it, and I know who we can sell it to. But I want 50% of the company, and I've got to be CEO. I don't know who you think you are, but deal. Are you joking? We are in a race to get this thing to market, and we are a year behind. I need a prototype. I'll do it perfectly, or I don't do it. Mike, are you familiar with the saying perfect is the enemy of good? Well, good enough is the enemy of humanity.
Mike00:00:44Welcome to the Sub-Beacon Podcast. I'm your co-host, Mike Warren. Joining me are my fellow co-hosts, who do it perfectly, or they don't do it, Jonathan V. Last and Sonny Bunch. Follow us at Sub-Beacon.com. Where you can become a patron, listen, comment, join the community. If you're listening to this on our free feed, welcome. We're so glad you've joined us. Just know that when you become a patron, you will not only get instant access to our main episodes like this episode, the week that we record it, but you'll also get exclusive access to our bonus episodes. So join us over there at Sub-Beacon.com. We'll be talking about Blackberry later in the episode, but first, let's hear how everyone's doing. Sonny, talk to me.
Sonny00:01:33Um, well, it's funny. You mentioned putting the shows on them. I've really got to get better about re-putting things on the, uh, you're doing it. I sometimes, but you know, it's just, uh, I don't know. I w in theory, in theory, we would be a, you know, well-oiled machine driving subscribers to the Patreon. And in, in, in practice, I'm like a 1980,
Mike00:01:58two pinto. Well, I figure if I, I figure I can manifest it. If I just mentioned it,
Sonny00:02:04I'm on a, I can't see you guys. Cause my internet's all slow right now. My, my hair is a disaster. I like been a bit a long week. Um, uh, it has been a long week. Uh, so I was in, I was in DC, uh, for, uh, a couple of things, but one of them will work all staff meeting. We all got together and, you know, uh, and, and chatted and had a, had a grand old time, but also there was the live across the movie aisle event, a couple, uh, sub beacon listeners showed up to that. Thank you for coming out. Um, uh, a bunch of bunch of listeners across movie aisle and people who just wanted to see war games. We were, we were showing war games. So it was, uh, it was fun. Uh, everyone had a good time. Um, and, uh, maybe we'll do that again. Uh, but, uh, I, I don't wanna talk about that. What I wanna talk about is, uh, is my, my adventures of finding places to sleep in DC this week. So I, I, I, uh, I was, I was coming in on a Tuesday and I was, I was coming in Tuesday morning, leaving Thursday morning. So I needed Tuesday night, Wednesday night, uh, hotel rooms. And, um, uh, but we had, we had changed the dates, uh, for, for one of the things. So I had to come in a day later than I'd been planning to. So, uh, you know, a couple months ago, I, uh, I got, I booked a hotel at the, the architect hotel, which if you know, DC at all, it's 15th and I think L um, it's right next to the post pub. Uh, it's, it's basically the heart of downtown, but it's, it's very close to everything I needed to get to. So it was perfect, perfectly located kind of a boutique
JVL00:03:34hotel. Um, which I like I'm a basically just a place where high-end prostitutes rent rooms.
Sonny00:03:42No, no, it's not, it's not, it's not the Mayflower. It's not the architect, not the Mayflower. It's not, uh, I don't know. I don't, I don't know where you stay
JVL00:03:51when you were in. No, I had heard that that's what the architect basically was. Maybe
Sonny00:03:55it is. I don't know. It would explain some things. It would explain some things. Um, but the, uh, so I, I was staying at the architect and, um, it's a, it, I, I like staying in like small boutique hotels. When I go to DC, I like, I like going to the little ones that are kind of dotted around the city, not the hostels, not rouge. Yeah. Like exactly. Yes. Like, or the old Tabard Inn is another one I like a lot. Um, and I like these cause they have, they got a little more character, you know, and, and they're often cheaper. They're just often cheaper than the, than the regular options, you know, your Hyatt's your Mayflowers, your Renaissance's, et cetera. So, uh, anyway, I like, I like staying at these places and the architect, uh, happened to have rooms available and they were relatively cheap. Uh, so I was like, all right, that's where, that's where I'm staying this time. So they, they have a very, they have a very 2009 quality, uh, uh, reservation system. Like you, you go there and you do it. You can't go back in and like change your reservations or anything. And this is important. We'll see. We'll see why in a moment. Um, but I went and I signed up and, uh, they went after I, you know, bought the rooms. They were, they were like, great. You'll get an email from us in a moment with your reservation number and all that. Never got the email. The email never came. That's not a great sign. Not a great sign. So I like waited a couple of days. Uh, and then, uh, after, after a couple of days, we actually got word that we had to change the dates of, of the, the board meeting. So I like, uh, I needed to change the dates on my hotel anyway. So I tried calling, I tried calling no answer at the phone. When I called they don't have a front desk. I don't think they do have a front desk. I'll get, don't worry. I'll get into that. Uh, so I call, I called and no answer. So I sent an email. I was like, Hey, I booked a couple of days ago, uh, this hotel room. I'm supposed to be here. The I'm supposed to be here the night of the 15th and the 16th, but I I'm staying, I'm coming in a day later, leaving a day later. So it needs to be the 16th and the 17th. Now, um, can we change the reservation? What are the, what are the rates if we can't change it? Can I just cancel it? You know, they're, they have a 72 hour cancellation policy. So in theory it should have been fine. So I got an email back almost immediately, like 20 minutes later that was like, yep, no problem. We've got you for, uh, the 16th and 17th. Now here's your receipt. Uh, we'll see you then. I was like, oh, I was like, okay. I was like, okay. I get all of my, I, you know, people like interacting on email. They don't like interacting on phone. So this actually works out for me. I don't want to fucking talk to anybody on the phone. I want to, I want to send an email, uh, on my Blackberry and I want to connect with people that way. So I think everything's set and I go in and I check in, uh, on the 16th. Uh, I'm like, I'm in kind of a rush cause I got to check in and I got to get down to crystal city for the, across the movie aisle thing. Um, but I like, I go to check in and I check in and the lady's like, all right, Mr. Bunch got you here for one night. And, uh, I'm like, oh, hold on. We got you two nights, two nights, 16th and the 17th. Um, and she's like, no, no, it's just one night here. So I like pulled up the email. I was like, look, see on the email that, you know, you guys responded to a 15th and 16th instead of 15th and 16th, I want 16th and 17th. And she says, no, sir, that's 16th through 17th. And I said, no, it is not. If I had, I, if I had met 16th through 17th, I would have written 16th through 17th. I wrote 16th and 17th because I need two nights. And she's like, if you don't want to stay here, we could just cancel your whole room right now. I'm like, fucking bitch. She went, she went from like zero to nuclear in a second. So I, uh, anyway, long story, we can fill these rooms with hookers, Mr. Bunch. That was the real implication here. Like, you know, there are, there are other more profitable customers. We can get in. So anyway, uh, I, I, uh, I, I was like, all right, whatever. I'll stay here tonight. I'll figure something else out for tomorrow. I mean, it's, the internet, I was, I pulled up Expedia. I got a room at a different hotel, like two blocks away.
JVL00:07:54You didn't just out of spite, walk out and say, good luck renting the room on two hours notice.
Sonny00:07:59No, I, no, I didn't do that because I, I, cause I had, if, if I did not have another thing I had to be at immediately, if I didn't have to like drop my bags off, I might have done that. And just like stayed at the Bulwark offices overnight. I might've just slept there, trashed the room. No, I didn't. Cause I'm not, I like, I'm not, I'm not, uh, I'm not a rock star. What am I going to smash up the TV? And throw, uh, you know, things out of your, you're a rock star semi let's let's I'm a, I'm yeah, but I'm like a, I'm like a rock star for the national or something.
JVL00:08:28Don't you know who I am? I'm hosting a screening of war games.
Sonny00:08:33I, there will be 100 podcasts. There will be 100 people. 100 people are here to see me, me. Damn it. Um, so anyway, I, uh, so anyway, I like it all, it all worked out the, the lesson here, the lesson here for, for everyone who was listening to me, ramble about this, the lesson here is make sure you're very clear with people when you're on, uh, email that they, that they, they understand what you're doing. And really you should talk to somebody on the phone. Like I tried to do in the first place. Cause I feel like if I had talked to somebody on the phone and been like, instead of the night of the 15th and the 16th, I want to be here the night of the 16th and the 17th, all of this could have
Mike00:09:10been avoided. All of this could have been, all of this could have been avoided if you had not violated your own rules, Sonny, and stayed at a brand name hotel. I'm just throwing that out there. I'm just throwing that out there. I'm just throwing that out there.
Sonny00:09:19I didn't violate my. Oh, you're saying if I had violated my rule and stayed at a brand name
Mike00:09:25hotel, none of that. No, no, no. You're but you know, I'm talking about your rule that brands are brand names are the best.
Sonny00:09:31No, that's true. Well, I mean, this is true. If I had stayed, if I had just stayed at like a Regency or something or a Hyatt, uh, none, I wouldn't have had none of these problems would have happened by state at a Renaissance. I would have been able to do all this online via the
JVL00:09:44computer and it would have been fine by the bunch principle. The best hotel is the hotel with the most
Sonny00:09:49number. I know I should have been at a Days Inn. I should have been at a Holiday Inn Express or a
JVL00:09:55Red Roof Inn. I don't know. I don't even know what super eight super eight at the Ramada.
Sonny00:10:03Uh, Howard Johnson's. I don't even know what the biggest hotel in the country. There's no Hojo's anymore. Are they gone? Um, anyway, so, uh, anyway, long story short, make sure that people you're talking to understand preposition when you're sending emails. That's that's
Mike00:10:19just what it comes down. All right. All right. Michael, what's up with you, buddy? Oh, with me.
JVL00:10:25Yeah. I was talking about it. I'm I'm I'm out of it. I'm it's been a long week. I've been traveling. Uh, I have nothing to say. Uh, what, what is going on with you? Do you have any baseball updates for
Mike00:10:34me? I don't have looking forward to these. I, I don't have any great baseball updates for you, but can I just say as a general baseball update that, um, I learned a term this week that I have never heard before, but I am embracing it completely. Which is steamer. I'd heard that one before. Oh, thank you very much. He's not a, not ignorant. I'm not a nafe. I'm not a nafe here. Uh, no, it's called Maycember. Have you guys heard of Maycember? No. Okay. What is that? Maycember is essentially the concept that may the month of may is as crazy and busy and sort of like filled to the brim with stuff because it's the, you're in the middle of the sports season. Uh, the youth sports seasons you're in, uh, the, the, uh, final weeks of the school year, all of the stuff that like, you know, the teacher appreciation week and the field day stuff and, uh, you know, graduation from spring concerts, all of this stuff is like hitting, uh, all at the same time. Uh, my wife shared with me that the moms, the moms are referring to this as Maycember. So, uh, I'm fully embracing it. It's in the middle of it. It's, um, it's just a lot and like, I don't really understand the etymology
JVL00:11:56of it. It's like, is it like September or like December, like December, the way that, the way
Mike00:12:01that like the Christmas holiday and all of the end of, you know, sort of like dominates and everybody's busy in December. So now we're busy in May. So now it's Maycember. Um, so anyway, that, that is like the, that is the life I feel like I'm living and it doesn't end either with a weekend. It's going to be relaxing. Like I'm going to, you know, head off to the beach or the lake or whatever, because we've got to go to a family wedding in Philadelphia and we've got to like leave our bigger kids with, uh, with their godparents. We've got to take the baby. We're staying in my cousin's apartment and it's like a whole, it's like, it's all just stress. But I will say one little update. That's, that's very nice. Uh, a very wonderful thing happened this past time. My oldest had his first holy communion. Hey, congratulations. Yeah. So it was, thank you. It was a, uh, you know, again, one of these like, go, go, go. I like, I can't believe, you know, it's like Saturday afternoon. I'm like, uh, you know, channeling Liz Lemon. I'm like, oh man, what a weekend. And my wife's like, it's just Saturday. Like it's, we're not even through
JVL00:13:13all of this. Um, so do you know what a first communion is? Have you ever attended one of these
Sonny00:13:19uh, I have, I have, but my understanding is that that's when you take care of all family business.
JVL00:13:26That's a baptism, a baptism, not, not a first communion. Nevermind. I take it back. Well, it's going to be great. It's what you'll, when we start the RCIA stuff, but the that's,
Mike00:13:38that's when you'll really get deep into all this. Exactly. Um, so the, you know, it was, I do think my, my oldest had a sort of like took it very seriously. Um, he hated going to CCD every Sunday afternoon and all of this stuff. Um, but he did have a kind of solemn approach to it when on, on that Saturday afternoon or Saturday morning when he was doing this, um, which I was very proud of him for. Um, and then we went out to lunch, you know, with his godparents and his grandmother was in town and it had this kind of special feeling to it. So that was all, all wonderful. And, uh, it was very nice. And then he told me on Monday, he, you know, there were a couple of kids in his, uh, in his class at school who had also gotten their, their first communion. So they were all talking about it and sharing it with the, with the non-Catholic kids in the, in the public school
JVL00:14:29class. And I said, so what did you tell them? I ate the body of my Lord. No. And the non-Catholic
Mike00:14:36kids were like, what? No, no, no. That, that would have been nice if he had said that. Apparently, apparently his line was, um, I got paid $135 to eat a blessed cracker.
Sonny00:14:49That's an awesome formation. I was like, okay.
JVL00:14:54Father Harrison and father Anthony are having, uh, coronaries right now.
Sonny00:14:59I know. What is the, what is the, wait, where did the $135 come from?
JVL00:15:02Those were the presents from, from, you know, uh, family members and, and, and, and us. So yeah. How did his first confession go? Cause that's before you get to do that. Right. So he must've done his first confession, like what, three months ago?
Mike00:15:14Uh, yeah, like two, two and a half months ago. So yeah, it was, um, it was, uh, it was five months ago. Yeah. I took him to that. We had it in, we had, so our parish has been, um, renovating and has just opened a new, beautiful, actually new Northex and, uh, with like a new parish hall and all this stuff onto the existing parish. Um, but it, which was very nice. Um, our, our, our infant son had his baptism. He was like the fifth baptism at the new baptismal font. Um, in this thing, it wasn't even technically open, but he got to have it. But during the first confession. It wasn't open. It was, there was some construction stuff. So we had to do in the school. So it was not very, you know, it didn't have the special feel to it. It was just like in a couple of meeting rooms, uh, classrooms in the school. Um, and I went with him and I, they encouraged us to go to confession as well, like with our kids, I mean, with them, but you know, at the same time. Uh, and so he walked in, uh, and like three and a half minutes later, like walked out with like a skip and a step. And I was like, yeah. That's about right. Right. Yeah. It was a, it was a good one. It was a good, he said he felt good about it. I kept thinking, should you have been in there a little bit longer?
JVL00:16:29So our church up here does a thing for kids. First communion, first confessions that is with G money where we first confession, they have you like fill out a confession sheet to write down all the stuff that you want to talk about. Yes. And then they have a shredder, they bring a shredder to the, to the confessional. And as a sort of like to help them understand that, like, you know, once you can, once you confess your sins, like that shit is gone, right? And they're like, all right, you take that paper, you put it in the shredder and just like, they're like, see, look, totally, totally erased state of grace. You're in a state of grace from the island. And the kids could see my, it'd be sort of funny if a kid lost a finger in the shredder and their confession, but, uh, it meant they weren't really truly sorry. Jesus is exacting retribution on you for your sins. So your penance is a half a pinky. The first knuckle of your pinky is your penance.
Sonny00:17:26So basically the Catholic church is like the Yakuza.
Mike00:17:29Uh, yeah, it, it was, they, they learned a lot from each other, I would say. Um, so anyway, so that's, so that's, what's going on. So yes, a Maycember to remember, but
Sonny00:17:40I, can we just bring, come back to this Maycember thing here for a second? Because when you say Maycember, what it sounds to me is like, you're talking about a May, December romance. We're talking about a, we're talking about like a, you know, tell me more. Well, I mean, like, you know, you know what a May, December romance is. Oh yeah, I do. So I'm just saying it. That's what it feels like. Uh, it feels like your age had seven. It feels like a combination. It feels like a neologism of those two words. I don't know. I don't know if I like this Maycember thing. The TikTok moms need to work on this. They need the Instagram moms with their reels, which is how, how information propagates at this point, as far as I can
Mike00:18:19I guarantee you, my wife learned it from some, some mommy reeler on Instagram, but I, I didn't make it up, but I'm embracing the concept. If you have a better name, Sonny, for what's going on in May, um, why may is so hectic. Um, I'm all ears.
Sonny00:18:35You can remind me of that kid bullshit month, but when we get to outtakes, remind me of
JVL00:18:42the half your age at seven. Cause I got something for you guys on the outtakes of that, that you guys will go crazy for.
Mike00:18:49Ooh. Um, wait, where are we going with that? Uh, well, okay. So JVL you're, you're done though. You, you don't have anything to say to us barely here. I got nothing. I, you know,
JVL00:19:02I was, uh, I was in DC. I got home at 1:00 AM on Thursday morning. Then I was in New York. I get home at midnight last night. Uh, I just been like around people and glad handing
Sonny00:19:14and taking pictures. Have you died yet? Have you, have you died from disease that you caused? Not at one of these various events? Not yet. Can I say it was, I wanted, I will, I will say one thing about, uh, hanging out with JBL in a group setting. It's very funny. So I, we went, we had like a, um, a bulwark, uh, happy hour. Uh, we invited some folks and it was fine and fun. And I was like, is J I I'd been there for like 30 minutes. I was like, man, it's like JBL here. So it was like, yeah, he's out in, he's out on the, on the patio in the corner. I was like, oh, well that makes sense. But it wasn't, it wasn't just that, that JBL was in the corner of the patio. He was in the corner in the sun. Like there were a bunch of umbrellas around that provided shade for people, but he had chosen a space that was very explicitly in the sun, which made it like just that little more annoying and uncomfortable.
JVL00:20:05So that anybody who wanted to talk to me, it would have to be staring into the sun setting behind me. And I had a, you know, it was all very well thought out. And I had a, a, um, bar top table there sort of as another. A level of physical buffer between me and anybody who wanted to interact with me. And I had thought that this would be sufficient to keep everybody away. But as it happened, people came over and then the, my buffer table became a prison. Well, you couldn't get out. I couldn't get out. I was trapped behind it in the sun with people who, and I just kept saying like, oh, I'm sorry, this must be so uncomfortable for you here. Why don't we go inside? Like, you know, with the idea of being that I was gonna start them in and then not follow, but it didn't work out that way.
Mike00:20:49Out there JVL. You can't, you can't deny that. Yeah. You can't deny that. All right. Well, let's move on here and very quickly. Uh, now that we're done with dudes chat, let's look at the box office for this past weekend. Guardians of the galaxy volume three still at the top was something like a 47% drop from its opening week. Yeah. Uh, let's talk about that in a second, but real quick, super Mario brothers still going strong at number two, no doubt the biggest movie of the year, very likely, uh, and new this week at number three book club, the next chapter. Uh, I know that sounds like a horror movie, but it's apparently one of these like boomer lady picks like Haiti for Brady. Um, it's I guess a sequel to another book called another movie called book club. Never heard of it. Yeah. It's an old lady movie. Okay. Uh, and then dropping down a spot, each are evil led rise and are you there? God, it's me, Margaret. So any quick box office thoughts,
Sonny00:21:43Sonny? Um, I I'm trying to, I'm trying to look at it up right now. There was, um, I don't know. But if you, if you look at the, uh, the, the decline on, so for guardians of the galaxy volume two, I had, I had assumed that this would probably drop kind of like Marvel movies have been dropping recently. Totally ir irrespective of the good word of mouth. This movie has gotten and the good reviews. I figured this movie would do probably a solid, you know, 65% drop because that is my, my working theory on Marvel. And like kind of superhero stuff in general is that there is a base of customers who are showing up for all of these things first weekend, no matter what. And that base is 100 to $120 million or so. And then, uh, the declines after that are going to be pretty steep because people are just going to wait for it to show up on Disney plus, or they just don't want to see it. They're just tired of it, whatever. And that was proven totally wrong this, this, you know, the, the hold on guardians of the galaxy volume two is I think either the best Marvel hold in history or like the second best second weekend Marvel hold in history. The best is like, it's actually crazy to look back at this. The best is black Panther Wakanda forever. And it's crazy because it not only did it have the best second weekend hold of all time for a Marvel movie at a, with just a 44% drop, but it had also, it also had one of the biggest opening weekends of all time to open to $200 million. And like a lot of the times with these movies, you see. Um, a huge opening weekend and then a big second weekend drop. Like, uh, I think Spider-Man no way home open to 250 or $60 million, something like that. And it dropped 67%. And that's,
Mike00:23:30and that's because of like the, the boys, right? Well, it's just, it's just because
Sonny00:23:34it's, it's just because they're a little more front loaded, but also like, you're just having, you just have such a big number to start from that even as you know, even if it drops two thirds, you still have a movie that's grossing like $90 million and it's second weekend. It's still, you know, making a lot of money. So, uh, anyway, I, I w I was totally wrong on guardians of the galaxy volume two or volume volume three, volume three. Um, the, the hold has been much better than I expected and uh, it will, it should have no trouble getting to 300 million. It may get 400 million. It'll probably do 850 to 900 million worldwide. So the movie, the movie is, uh, is a big hit and uh, it just goes to show that Marvel, if they want to make money, they need to do the things that they had been doing for the last 10 years. Instead of, instead of starting to try new franchises. Um, so we'll see, we'll see what happens. I don't know. All right. Any other thoughts? My big thought. I don't, I don't know. I mean, I, I'm curious, I'm kind of curious to see what happens with fast and furious this weekend because those movies have all been trending down, uh, in terms of box office. And I think, I think audiences have finally realized that these movies are bad and dumb. Sorry. Sorry. Okay. I say, but these movies are bad and dumb and I, I do not like them and I've never liked them. And, um, I've always been like vaguely put off by the box office success of them. So you saw it last night, right? I've not seen it. I've not seen it. No, I'm going to, I'm going to try and see. So we're taping
JVL00:24:57this. John Pataritz texted us last night and said that, uh, Jason Momoa basically plays his character as gay. Yeah. As Rip, Rip Taylor, which I, I'm sorry. I'm there for that. Is he throwing confetti and Jason, Jason Momoa playing a villain as Riptide? I mean, what's
Sonny00:25:14not to love? That sounds great. I like Jason Momoa a lot. I love him. He's, uh, he's, he's a delightful presence, but I also just do not care for these movies. I don't care for them. I don't care for their dumb anime structures where like the villain from the previous one becomes the hero or like the sidekick in the next one. I like, I hate everything about them kind of. Um, and it would be pleasing to me if they went away
Mike00:25:36just because they haven't made a fast and furious anime that, that it seems like there
Sonny00:25:41was a, there was a fast and furious animated series. It was on Netflix. Oh, well, yeah, you didn't know about it. You know why? Because there's so much shit on streaming that nobody knows about anything. And this, I also, I also haven't
Mike00:25:53watched anything fast and furious since Tokyo drift. So this is also my, well, you're going
Sonny00:25:57to have to watch this for next week's show. So get strapping on. I quit. I quit. We've had that. We've had that happen on this show before. So it wouldn't shock me. Um, I, uh, I, the, the, the one, the one big piece of, uh, Hollywood business news that is pretty interesting. And I, I, you know, it got some play yesterday, uh, or the day before. And um, but that is ESP, the wall street journal had a story out about ESPN looking at like making the jump to becoming a streaming channel. And it's going to be very funny when this happens because ESPN is going to have to charge people like 25 or 30 bucks a month for ESPN. And I think it's going to cause a lot of sticker shock on folks when they realize just how much money, um, you know, but when, once they start to understand that the decline of the way's sports in particular, it's going to be, it's going to be a real problem for folks.
Mike00:26:53So, right. But, but, but as a purely sort of descriptive, uh, uh, analysis, this is like the end of cable, right? I mean, this is like the, like ESPN getting out of it seems like that's it.
Sonny00:27:06The two big things that are holding the cable bundle together at this point are ESPN and cable news. Um, and if, if Fox moves to a, um, uh, a. I don't know, a Fox nation style streaming platform instead of just being tied to, to cable. Um, and if ESPN does the same thing, I think that is, that's basically ball game and the cable companies have basically said it's, there was a very, there's a very funny piece in the, uh, the wake up the anchors morning roundup of newsletters this morning, the cable company chiefs have all said, you did this studios. You did this by forcing us to take a bunch of channels. We didn't want them bundling them all together and Jack. Hanging up the price on people. We are going to be, uh, we're just going to get into broadband access. They're pipe. They're pipe. We're going to be the pipes and you can figure out how to make money on your own. Fuck off.
JVL00:28:01Um, you know, I, I do have a question though, Sonny, does this mean that ESPN won't be on a cable bundle? So if you are getting, if you are getting terrestrial cable, you no longer get ESPN because it is unavailable in that format.
Sonny00:28:16I don't, I don't think so. I don't think that is what. Yes, because this is the real problem for, for Disney. Disney has to figure out how to maintain the people who want to keep paying for cable and also provide the thing to, uh, people on streaming without doing so in a way that costs them, um, uh, all of their affiliate fees, which is still an enormous amount of money because there are still 80 million, 90 million cable subscribers. Right. So like, you know, the way, the way very quick business lesson on cable, which we've done before, but just. Remind folks, you know, the way, the way that cable networks make money is twofold. They make money by selling ads on their networks. Right. But they also make money by getting affiliate fees from cable companies. The reason your cable bill costs carriage fees. Right. So the reason your, your bill costs, you know, whatever it costs, $90, a hundred dollars is because $9 and 40 cents of that goes to ESPN, you know, $4 and 60 cents of that goes to Fox news. FX gets, you know, a dollar or AMC gets a dollar or two, but like these channels, all charge money. These channels all charge money. And that, that is essentially what you are paying for with, with cable. And because, because the ESPN number is so high, I mean, it's literally twice as much as the next is as the number two affiliate fee, I think the carriage fee, but the, but the, but the, the reason that ESPN, you know, is an exceptionally valuable property is because they, they have some in like basically a billion dollars in affiliation. Fee's coming in every month. I mean, just an insane amount of money. Um, so, you know, uh, but they, they spend all that. I mean, they spend it on, you know, what's expensive rights to the NBA broadcast sports,
JVL00:30:00right?
Sonny00:30:00You know, it's expensive rights to the NFL. What's expensive rights to everything. Yeah. I mean, it's just, it's just, it's, it's extremely expensive. And plus consumers don't understand this because a lot of the costs have been hidden within the cable bundle for a long time.
JVL00:30:15What we need is honestly, what we need. What we need to do is for ESPN is a bundle. This is what people don't understand, right? ESPN is bundled into your cable, but ESPN itself is a bundle of sports rights. And so you have to pay your cable not, you know, a hundred dollars because they're paying ESPN $9. Why is ESPN getting $9? Because, uh, they're paying $2 for NASCAR and $1.50 for the NBA and $1.75 for sec football. And if we could unbundle everything. If everybody was their own service, then everybody could just a la carte this shit and you would not be forced to subsidize, uh, whatever ESPN is paying for the college lacrosse division one championship.
Sonny00:31:03The worst possible way to look at this, because all you're going to end up doing is paying the same amount of money for less stuff. You're just going to end up paying the same amount of money. You're going to, you know, like a lot of it will just go away. Well, this is my question.
Mike00:31:14I want it to go away. Will, will this, will this actually, you will get less stuff. But it will be essentially a market efficiency.
Sonny00:31:21You will get less stuff and you will pay the same for it. And everyone will talk about how much happily happier they are because they're not subsidizing everything else. It's nonsense. It's like the system we have right now is actually great system we have right now is great. You get, you get a hundred channels and maybe you only watch five of them, but everybody's watching a different five. So all of these things get, we wouldn't have, I mean, I, you know, JBL hates series television. So, you know, none of this really matters to him, but. Well, you don't, you don't have the golden age of TV with, you know, uh, high quality hit shows on FX, AMC, um, et cetera, because those networks only existed because they got like a dollar each from 90 million households.
JVL00:32:06You know what I really want to do? I want to, the networks themselves are bundles if you think about it. And so you, we should all just be, if you want to watch, uh, the Sopranos, you should just buy the Sopranos, right? Why don't we do it that way? It's bundles all the way down. Having everything be Amazon. So if you would like to watch something, you purchase it. You'd like to watch Sherlock, the BBC Sherlock, you go to Amazon and you purchase Sherlock. See, this is, this is why it's not how TV works. Yeah.
Sonny00:32:33I was going to say, I want it to work that way, but it's not how it works. The TV has been great. And now it's going to be all fucked up and broken.
Mike00:32:39That explanation JVL puts me on Sonny's side because that, because that, that explains it all. All right. Well, you know, speaking of, uh,
JVL00:32:48it's literally un-American.
Mike00:32:51Well, speaking of Americans views, the world, speaking of un-American and technological paradigms being shifted, let's talk about the movie this week. Blackberry number 14 in the box office. It didn't even make a half a million dollars, but it's so fucking good. It's so great. Sonny, let's get a big boy review of IFC films is Blackberry.
Sonny00:33:14Blackberry is kind of like air or Tetris. It's a brand. It's a brand movie, right? It's a movie about a brand. And I have a theory on these movies I'm able to get into in a minute. I'll just do it right now. So I think the brand movie has essentially replaced the musical biopic. I mean, it's not like musical biopics have gone away, but I think the brand movie has basically replaced the musical biopic because a musical biopics were always just kind of movies about brands. Anyway, they're movies about either famous singers or famous bands and how they came to be. But also because the musical biopic has been completely destroyed as a source of artistic creativity by Walk Hard. The Dewey Cox story Walk Hard made made it impossible to make a a musical biopic that
Mike00:33:57does not prompt Snickers, but that didn't stop people from making them for 15 years.
Sonny00:34:03It has not stopped people from making them. But I do think I do think that that that is kind of coming to a close as people are just like, stop. We've seen that we know what all of these movies are. We've got. Yeah, we got the whole thing. And so the brand movie has kind of replaced this, but the brand movie is interesting because the music. The musical biopic is basically based on a four act structure, right? You've got rise and then you've got excess, then you've got fall and then you've got rebirth. OK, so those are the four the four basic moves of every musical biopic as outlined in again Walk Hard, the Dewey Cox story. Brand the brand movies that we have seen are different because it's more like it's more like a idea struggled to get idea made success. And that's it. And I. I think people people I think I think one reason artists like making this sort of thing is because they they you know, it's it is it it's a little more positive and it's a little more. And this is also why audiences like them. I think they're that that whole kind of excess and and decline and fall stuff is it's kind of a downer. Do we do we really want to downer? Blackberry is different because Blackberry is Blackberry is different because it's basically structured like a lambda almost right. You basically have rise and then fall and it's missing that. Middle bit of access. The excess is kind of wrapped into the fall part a little bit, but it's like rise and then fall and that's that's this movie and I kind of love it. I kind of love what they're doing with the story here. There's nothing extraneous. There's not like a whole bunch of family nonsense. I don't care about any of these people's personal lives. I just I like the idea of watching them make this thing and kind of violate their own principles and then get held accountable for it. So the movie is about again, the rise and fall of. Blackberry, the smartphone company that before the iPhone kind of dominated the smartphone market. Everybody remembers Blackberries. They have little keyboards on them. You're packing away and it is I know why JVL likes this movie because it's an indictment of capitalism and how it how it how it fails. But it is it is it does a really good job of kind of showing how business actually works in the sense that like having an idea is not enough. I mean, good product even is not really enough. You have to be able to sell it. To the people who sell it to things and that merging of that idea that that Jim and I'm sorry that I'm silly. Jim, all silly, Jim, all silly, who is like this kind of shark, this shark, you know, businessman character. You know, he's got his Harvard degree up on the wall, played by Glenn Howerton from Always Sunny in Philadelphia. Have more about him in a second. And Mike Lazaridis, who's played by Jay Baruchel in this, who is the tech guy who's the tech nerd and just loves making good, high quality products. There's this great moment early in the film where an intercom is buzzing and he looks at the bottom of it and it says, here's a problem. It's made in China. Everything that's made in China sucks. And we make things in China because it's cheaper and it's easier and it's more efficient. But everything that comes out of there sucks. And just because it's good enough, that doesn't mean it's actually good enough. Good enough is what's what's the line? It's like the enemy of humanity, something like that.
Mike00:37:11Is that right?
Sonny00:37:12I think that's right.
Mike00:37:13Right.
Sonny00:37:14Which has a great call back at the end of the movie, which has a great, great, really
Mike00:37:17well written. Well, really well written.
Sonny00:37:18And that's the thing about this movie is that it's really well written. Everything kind of pays off really well at the end. But but watching these two different sorts of people come together to make a thing that changes the world is really interesting and kind of fun to watch. It's deeply it is that this movie is really funny, just really, really funny, in large part because Glenn Howerton so folks who watch Always Sunny in Philadelphia will know who Glenn Howerton is. He's Dennis Reynolds. The kind of vaguely sociopathic rich kid vaguely who grows, who grows more sociopathic as the show goes along. But he over the last like 15 or 16 years has kind of perfected this this look that is both like absolute disdain, but unearned in its confidence that that translates perfectly to a guy like Ballas Balls, Balls, Balls, silly, who. Is just an absurd person who doesn't really know the technology at all, but does know how to sell it to folks. And I I don't know, Glenn Howerton is so good in this movie that if he is not, if he does not get award season consideration, we should just end awards seasons. We won't because this movie, as you mentioned, Mike, isn't really being seen by anybody. And it's coming out in in May, which are two big strikes against it for the Oscars. But he deserves every every piece of attention he's getting for this anyway. So. So. Watching the rise is fun. Watching the fall is also fun because you see how success has changed. All these people in in Paul Silly's case, it's just kind of made him more. But in in Mike Lazaridis case, Jay Baruchel plays the there's a moment about 60 percent through the movie where we cut from Lazaridis, Jay Baruchel, who was wearing, you know, like T-shirt, jeans, kind of messy hair. You cut to him and now he's like fully gray, but it's all combed back and he's wearing a, you know, a suit, black suit, black suit. And he's he is just like the iPhone. I changed this whole industry.
JVL00:39:25I invented this category.
Sonny00:39:28And I'm and I'm telling you, this iPhone thing is bullshit. Nobody's going to want this. It doesn't even have a keyboard on it. How are people going to use it? And I, I, I loved watching this as well because it really does get at. As somebody who put it this way, as somebody who has lived through a. A category shift in the political realm of the seeing the delta between what people actually want and what you think people actually want, it's very there's something that's a very
JVL00:40:01deep point.
Sonny00:40:02Sonny, there's something that gets there's something that hits very, very close to home about watching, watching them fall on their asses. And I think that's one of the reasons the movie may appeal to all three of us at a sub Rosa level. But with, you know, but I love this movie. It's very funny. It's very it's it's clever chuckle, funny, not like gut busting, laugh out loud. Ha ha. Funny, though, I will say that there was a moment in the theater where Glenn Howerton makes the face that I mentioned that kind of like that kind of like eye bugging, like jaw clenching head eyes narrowing high head turning look that he does. I laughed out loud as hard as I have laughed at anything in the theater in a long time. And people were like and then everybody else in the theater. So I started other people laughing. That's how hard I was laughing trendsetter. I like this movie a lot. I think it's very good. I wish more people would see it. And it is better. It's better than air and Tetris in in a very key way, which is that it is not just about success. I feel like you you have a hard time making a biopic movie that is only about successes. You have to have the failures in there. And this movie. Has that in a in a very it is. I mean, it is about the product JBL.
JVL00:41:20It also explains how the world around us was built, which is another important thing to you and to be like, you know, with air and with Tetris, they they aren't really talking about anything that's like fundamental about how we live, right? Yes, the way that sneakers are branded and sold is different, but who cares, right? Yes, video games, you know, the portable video game revolution change things, but not really. Um, getting the, you know, like I, I know a fair amount about tech. Uh, I did not realize that the key innovation of Blackberry was the number of devices you were able to put on the network, right? Which is, which, which is the, the innovation, the thing that made Blackberry Blackberry, the secret sauce was that they figured out how to put 500,000 devices on a single network
Sonny00:42:11without crashing the network.
Mike00:42:13I don't mean to interrupt you with data, I don't mean to interrupt you JBL, but as a movie, uh, and as a sort of plot device, uh, or I should say exposition, the movie does an excellent job so good of laying that out very plainly, very clearly in a way that for, for idiots like me, I just clicked into it immediately. I said, oh, got it. That's the innovation. Let's go.
Sonny00:42:35Well, there's, there's that great scene where, uh, you know, uh, ball silly goes in and they don't have the prototype cause they left it in the cab and he's just, he's just bullshitting. He's like, so, you know, we've got this great device and it's gonna. You, you're gonna be able to send email from your phone. And the guy at Verizon looks at him and he's like, yeah, everybody wants to make that. We made one of those. It destroys the network. You've been sold a magic, you know, bag of magic beans by these you're getting taken for a ride by these kids. And he panics because he realizes he has no idea how any of this works. It's the same face I would have made. It's the same. It's an absolute same face I would have made. And he's like, they say he, and so, uh, then, uh, Mike Lazaridis comes in with the phone that he's rescued from the cab. And he's like, they say this can't work. What, what, what are you, what have you done to me?
JVL00:43:18And he says, what? I don't know. Did you get like 10 phones on your network doing it that way? And they were like 11. Yep. It's. That was a great moment. Yep. So, I mean, there's so much, not only does it explain the world around you, it, uh, it is funny. So the, the key to Glenn Howerton's character, imagine Jack Donaghy from 30 rock. If Jack Donaghy was evil and totally unselfaware. Right. And Jack Don, the Jack Donaghy, there's a moment where they show up to a meeting and they're offered a drink and you know, he waves the, the way, and he turns to Mike Lazaridis and says, never take the drink. Thirst is a sign of weakness. And that is something Jack Donaghy, I, so I think Jack Donaghy probably says this to Liz Lemon at some point in the, you know, nine seasons of 30 rock, but it's done as, you know, as comedy and here it's done deadly serious. And because of that, it's deeply funny. Uh, it's, uh, it's great. And it, in addition to being funny, in addition to explaining a feature of how the world around us works, it also explains some very deep truths about business and technology, which is that being first is a tremendous advantage. But the category winners are seldom the first because everything is timing and you know, being the, they invented the category in the same way that like Friendster invented the social network, right? This is, it is, it is often the, the second mover who figures out how to take an existing category and perfect it, who winds up becoming the dominant market force and, and becoming the dominant platform. And this is the Apple story, right? You know, Apple didn't create the personal computer. Apple's found the personal computer market and then realized how important the operating system was and, and realized that what you're selling is not the hardware, but the operating system. Um, they realize that the, the key to the internet phone is to package data, right? To make your little hand computer, a, a data machine, um, and, uh, it's, I, I just, I just think it was fantastic. I had to complain about a single thing. There's too much steady cam in the first half of the movie, but by the second half, they locked the camera down a lot more. And so it's, it's less Paul Greengrass, um, but I. I couldn't, I, I still haven't stopped thinking about this movie a week later and I can't wait to see it again. I can't wait till it's streaming. I want to watch it with Shannon. I like, I want to proselytize. I did this. I was like proselytizing to people at the, our little staff meeting. I was like, hey, have you seen blackberry and they're like, what are you, I don't know. I don't care. And I'm like, no, it's so good. You should go see it.
Mike00:46:05Yeah.
JVL00:46:06I, I did Mike.
Mike00:46:07Did you love it too? Loved it. Um, so from, from, I, I agree with everything you guys have said, uh, and I think I mentioned this earlier that I thought the writing was so tight and crisp and, uh, economical, um, and there are these, I mean, I was sort of watching it almost, uh, as, as a writer and I love the, and I won't like spoil it, but I, like, I love the callback to the PR, you know, the perfection and good enough stuff at the beginning, at the end, I mean, so much of it feels heightened and novelistic, even though it probably is truer to the true story than I, I think, I mean, obviously there were some dramatizations going on of, of the story, um, and, and the sort of the relationships, but it, it felt heightened, but realistic at the same time. Like that must've been what it was like when the iPhone came out or when they, when they figured out that they had something that nobody else, you know, when Verizon all of a sudden sits up in their seats to realize, wait a second, like these guys from, uh, from Canada have something here. Um, I, I. I loved interestingly about the, about the, the, the camera work in the beginning. I, I kind of took that in the spirit, which, which, with it was intended or what I think it was intended, which was to kind of, um, it was almost like a mocking approach to those kind of movies that we've seen. I'm thinking of like the big short and these other movies that are sort of like, you know, about these intense, uh, moments in our recent history, like, uh, because it was all of that camera work. It was highlighting like, just like a bunch of nerds running around, like doing their nerd stuff. I, I, I was like in a good mood laughing at this, like everything about this from the direction to the, the, the, the, the lines. I laughed out loud several times at Glenn Howerton, just cause like every, like the moment where he's like smacking the pay phone, cuz he's so pissed off that, you know, that a bunch of Blackberries aren't working. Um, uh, just, I mean, everything about it was hilarious. In fact, JVL, you don't watch always sunny, right? No. Okay. Um, and then the character, Val silly is literally Dennis Reynolds with a Harvard degree. Like that's all he is. Um, like if, if Dennis Reynolds wasn't like, uh, uh, like all of the, the, the unearned confidence, it was great. Um, Matt Johnson is the director and also plays like the kind of Greek chorus character in, in, um, right. And Jay Bruce, Michael, like business partner, yeah. Doug Johnson directed it. Yep. I didn't realize that. He's fabulous. He's terrific as an actor and I thought he was a terrific as a director. I, I, I, I loved this, um, in terms of like what kind of movie this is and why it's different from the brand movies. Um, I really felt like I was watching a marriage of the brand movie of the air type movie with another like relatively new genre that, that has come out. Sometimes it's in, in the, uh, form of a show of a series. Rather than a movie, but the sort of, um, uh, the collapse of a big con now, now Blackberry wasn't a con, uh, but I'm thinking like, you know, the sort of bad blood type, or it wasn't bad blood. What was the, what was the, uh, the, the, the dropout, the, the Hulu series about Elizabeth Holmes. Um, and the sort of like sheer joy, like schadenfreude almost of like watching like people who think they own the world kind of have their entire world shaken. And that's what the second half, that's what the other side of the Lambda curve felt like to me. Like we were like, we all know that iPhone was going to be, I mean, there's even a line there where he says, um, you know, they're going to be talking about Blackberry as the phone that you used to have before you had an iPhone. And like, we know that's true. Like we've lived that we know that that's what it is. And there was a, there was a sort of joy and like drama in watching it collapse, because you know, it's going to happen, but the characters don't. Um, and, and you could just see like time catching up with, uh, in the movie with what we know. So I loved it. I thought Jay Baruchel was great. I love the little detail, by the way, on this last thing, I'll say the little detail of like the, the engineer pulling the, the tiny little screwdriver out, uh, you know, of his pocket or wherever, like always having that on and being able to fix things or, or tinker with things that just felt so true to the way like engineers are. So loved it. Five stars. Whatever.
JVL00:50:44It was great. Yeah. It also, it also hints at the, you know, what's the Upton Sinclair line behind every great fortune is a crime. And that's not entirely true, but it's, it's mostly true. Like it's true enough. And the crime, you know, at the level of, you know, very high elite business, uh, it's just people who found ways to get advantages that are either illegal and they get away with them or they aren't illegal yet, but they will be, and they should be. Right. You know, it's all high, very, very rarely does some tremendous fortune come because somebody has just like done everything so much better that the world beats a path to their door. Right. That's not, that's not how capitalism actually works. Okay. Right. Because all of that stuff is rung out of the system already and in order to, to really disrupt things, you have to be breaking existing structures in ways which are not strictly legal. Right? It's like the rise of Uber. Uber went around the country basically ignoring laws and just paying the fines on them. And they were able to do that because their stock price was elevated and was that a crime? Well, you know, not really here were they, how were they able to compete with, uh, well, it's because they were hiring these other guys who they were paying $10 million to. How are they hiring? By committing securities fraud. Right.
Sonny00:52:05They were committing securities fraud in order to be able to do the thing that they were
JVL00:52:08doing. Yeah. And this is, you know, and they get slapped on the wrist and they move on and, uh, and this is, this is how that sausage is made.
?00:52:16Yeah.
Mike00:52:17Can I, can I just say also the, uh, the little turns from some character actors like Michael Ironside is like the big bruiser. Like he's great fan tastic. And then the guy that they poached from Google, I don't know the actor's name, but he's rich summer. He's fabulous.
Sonny00:52:33Where do we know him from?
Mike00:52:34Madman.
Sonny00:52:35He was a madman.
Mike00:52:36Oh yes. Yeah. He's he also has these like bit parts in, in some movies and TV and he's just, I, I, I love him. So.
JVL00:52:42I have a question. I have a question for you, Sonny, about Martin Donovan. So Martin Donovan is in this, uh, he's from the very beginning. He's Stan Seligman, I think. Is he the one who Jim Vasily winds up going to at the end again?
Sonny00:52:59Yeah. He's he's the guy who has he's fishing with at the end.
JVL00:53:03Yes. That is wild. Okay. Uh, it just, again, Carrie Elwes is great. Carrie Elwes is in. This is like a. That's right. New York. Yeah. Let's go see this movie now.
Sonny00:53:15It's great. It's, it's real. It's real good. It's real funny. It's, it's, uh, it's, it's, it's a good length to, it's like a hundred and you know, uh,
JVL00:53:24can I say that? I think this is the best of all of these things. I would count the big short as a brand movie. I mean, it's not really about a brand, but it's about an era and a way that, uh, finance worked. I mean, it's about finance and the brand of finance during a finite period of the, the 2010s. Um, or 20 of the odds. I think blackberry is better than the big short might be the best brand movie that's been made so far. Yeah.
Sonny00:53:54I like it a lot. I enjoyed it more than the big shorts. I mean, it's, uh, the big shorts, very, the big short is very good. It does. It does a very good job of explaining of, I mean, the, the, the big short, I think had a slightly higher degree of difficulty in that what they were explaining is much more complicated and like, and I, I think they do, I think they do a very good job of that. Um, and that also has some great performances and like some laugh out loud, funny stuff from, uh, Steve Carell and, and I want to say one other thing.
JVL00:54:22There's, there's a guy who plays a very small part, uh, as a Korean, uh, Korean programmer, the actor's name is someone, someone show he is so good. I think he's got seven lines in this whole movie and he is so good. It's one of these, you know, there are no small, small parts, only small actors like this guy just kills it.
Mike00:54:43And he is a guy who has been floating around for a few years in the sort of like online comedy world. So it was like a guy who was on my radar cause I'm sort of a nerd about that stuff. Uh, and so when he popped up, I was like, oh, that's great to see someone. So anyway. Uh, okay. Well, any other thoughts, uh, on Blackberry?
Sonny00:55:03No.
Mike00:55:04All right. Well, that's all we've got for this episode. Thanks for listening. Remember to check us out at some beacon.com and we'll talk to you next time.
?00:55:13Bye. Bye. Bye.
Sonny00:55:16Bye. Bye. Bye.
JVL00:55:19Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. Bye. This bonus shows me pretty good. Uh, it's high concept.
Sonny00:55:36We're gonna do a ranking of the phones and I've got a, I got a lot to say, but you have
JVL00:55:37something else to say, James.
Sonny00:55:38So I, I want to give you guys, so you made a joke, uh, half your age plus seven, right?
JVL00:55:39Yes. No, you, you meant I made that joke. I made that joke. Oh yeah. So you were in a meeting a couple of days before either of you were there. I know the story. Oh, do you know this story? Yes. Yes. It's a, it's a legend. So I, I am going to obscure the names of the participants. I will simply say that this was the old weekly standard. If you wanna go back to a mast, I had to look through and try to guess who it was and you're welcome to do that people. So we're in a meeting and somebody had just gotten divorced and remarried, uh, some high profile thing, not somebody we knew, but some high profile thing. And so we were talking about it. And what makes this funny? Is that almost nobody at the standard, uh, got divorced ever. Like I, like it's, it's uncanny. I, I don't think there are like any divorces in the, the roster of the, which is just weird. Like, you know, people just had nice marriages anyways, but they started talking about the rule of, you know, the, the, I don't even know where the rule comes from. The urban urban thing of, well, you know, a guy's second wife is always half his age plus seven. And uh, one person says. Oh, I thought the rule was you subtract your age plus 20 and then another person says, do you guys realize that a lot of our second wives haven't even been born yet?
Mike00:56:59There you go. I'm sure that was fine.
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