Sidephone's SideOS vs Android, what's different?

Summary

Returning Retro's host Jake interviews Sebastian, the lead software developer at Sidephone, about their new operating system, SideOS, and its launch. During the engaging discussion, they tackle missed recording dilemmas, the community's enthusiastic response, the difference between SideOS and Android, and the design philosophy behind leaving Google services out. Furthermore, Sebastian explains the development inspirations, anticipated features like app stores and customizable interfaces, and outlines the challenges and milestones ahead. They aim to provide a unique user experience while keeping options open for future updates and enhancements.

Highlights

• The community's response to Sidephone's reveal was overwhelmingly positive, surpassing even the creators' expectations. 🎉
• Sebastian, the software development lead, talks about the transparency and control SideOS provides by not incorporating Google services. 🤔
• Technical aspects such as app repositories, modular design, and freedom from Google's ecosystem are discussed in-depth. ⚙️
• The interview navigates the practical aspects of living with a dumb phone powered by customizable, modular software. 🌟
• The potential for future growth and updates makes SideOS an exciting prospect for tech enthusiasts. 🚀

Key Takeaways

• SideOS introduces a refreshing alternative to Android by excluding Google services, focusing on user privacy and battery efficiency. ⛔
• The project was inspired by the lead developer's past experience with creating custom operating systems, leading to a passion project that is now SideOS. 💻
• SideOS will allow a customizable app market which lets users select specific applications and services they desire, maintaining the phone's dumb phone nature. 📱
• Despite a small form factor, SideOS promises a satisfying user experience with its emphasis on minimalism and efficiency. 📏
• Community feedback and collaboration play a pivotal role in shaping the SideOS experience and its roadmap for future updates. 🤝

Overview

Returning Retro's exciting conversation with Sebastian delves into the nitty-gritty of SideOS, Sidephone's unique operating system. The interview reveals why the decision to exclude Google services is central to the project, emphasizing user privacy and extended battery life. Sebastian offers insights into the development process, including the inspiration from past custom OS projects and how these experiences are leveraged into building a robust SideOS experience.

With SideOS, users will encounter a world where app selection is intentional and minimalistic principles are embraced. Unlike traditional app stores, SideOS proposes an app market with user-selectable repositories, ensuring each application is handpicked to enrich the phone's core dumb phone experience. This flexibility is intended to accommodate various user needs while maintaining the philosophy of simplicity.

As the interview progresses, Sebastian addresses potential user questions about functionality, highlighting SideOS's commitment to continuous improvements and future updates. Enthusiastic about the journey ahead, the Sidephone team assures early adopters of an experience grounded in thoughtful design and community collaboration, aiming to offer both a unique device and a continuously evolving ecosystem.

Chapters

• 00:00 - 00:30: Introduction and Welcome The chapter serves as an introduction and welcome to the show 'Returning Retro,' hosted by Jake, who is described as a 'hyper credulous interviewer.' The host discusses the excitement surrounding new retro tech devices and expresses enthusiasm for the subject. Jake introduces the episode's guest, Sebastian, who is the software development lead and was previously featured in a world reveal video with the Sidephone team.
• 00:30 - 05:30: Sebastian's Experience and SideOS The chapter titled 'Sebastian's Experience and SideOS' discusses an interview focused on SideOS, the operating system that Side plans to launch with. Despite technical issues that resulted in only half of the recording being captured, the guest kindly agreed to a follow-up interview. The video includes timestamps for major questions and discussion points, allowing viewers to navigate to specific sections of interest easily.
• 05:30 - 10:30: Differences Between SideOS and Android The chapter discusses the differences between SideOS and Android, following an acknowledgment of recording issues and appreciation for viewers and supporters. The timing of the discussion is considered beneficial, as it occurs post-release, indicating potential enhancements or updates available for analysis.
• 10:30 - 17:00: Apps and Functionality The chapter "Apps and Functionality" includes a discussion about feedback and reactions from a community following a significant reveal of an application or feature. The speaker shares an anecdote about a humorous comment on a video, where someone questioned his presence and lack of commentary. He clarifies that he did speak, but his comments were not included in the final cut. The focus shifts to gathering insights from one of the founders about the community's response to the reveal. The chapter hints at an exploration of public reception and interactions related to new developments in apps and their functionalities.
• 17:00 - 23:00: Hardware and Integration The chapter titled 'Hardware and Integration' discusses the overwhelmingly positive reception and excitement surrounding a newly released design or product. The speaker expresses their surprise and satisfaction at how the final release exceeded their expectations and those of others, even surpassing initial enthusiasm when the concept was first introduced. Despite some stress leading up to the release, the outcome is better than anticipated.
• 23:00 - 31:00: Software Updates and Future Assurance The chapter focuses on the continuous effort in designing software that meets and exceeds consumer expectations, ensuring that users are excited about and proud of the products they use. The speaker mentions the overwhelmingly positive reception from the majority, describing it as a unique and awesome experience. The project described involves innovative and custom work, marking a significant achievement in their creative endeavors.
• 31:00 - 34:30: Conclusion and Final Thoughts The chapter wraps up with an optimistic tone, emphasizing the excitement and motivation surrounding the project, particularly in improving the software side. There is a strong belief in making the software as good as the hardware, which already has enthusiastic support. The conversation highlights the eagerness to explore the background and insights of the speaker, especially in the post-reveal phase, indicating an interest in deeper discussions going forward.

Sidephone's SideOS vs Android, what's different? Transcription

• 00:00 - 00:30 welcome back everybody this is Returning Retro my name is Jake the hyper credulous interviewer as one Reddit user observed and yeah I got to be honest with these new production retro tech devices i am very credulous i am super hopeful and excited about it as I'm sure you can probably already tell today we sit down with Sebastian as those of you may have noticed with the world reveal video I had done with the sidephone team Sebastian the software development lead
• 00:30 - 01:00 was on the call for about half of it and then just disappeared that was on me my recording software had some glitches and only about half of his stuff made it on so he was gracious enough to offer to come and do a separate interview so in this video we are going to talk all about SideOS the operating system that Side is going to launch with and I've put timestamps down you should be able to see i tried to get all of the major questions that I asked and the discussion points that we go over into those timestamps so if you need to jump
• 01:00 - 01:30 around a little bit I understand it's almost an hourong video but lot of great content and yeah thanks to Sebastian thanks all of you wonderful viewers and supporters of both returning retro as well as the sidephone project so let's jump into it here's Sebastian i am so sorry that everything went haywire with the the recording i think I think this works out like I think this works out for the best because now we're we're postrelease there's a lot more I
• 01:30 - 02:00 think clarity on some of the questions um and uh I got a good laugh out of the one comment on the video about who was that guy who My wife thought it was the funniest thing ever who is that guy who didn't say anything and then disappeared they just left they just left it's like well that was me i I did say things they just weren't they just didn't make it but I'll say things now i want to know from you one of the founders what has your impression been of the response the community response to the big reveal it's been it's been
• 02:00 - 02:30 fantastic i mean it's been absolutely fantastic people are super excited for it people love the design i mean like it was so nice even before we had a design how excited people were about the general concept of it but it's been awesome now that it has been released it is even better than what a lot of people were hoping for like it came out better than even I was expecting you know at the beginning of this year yeah it's like oh wow like this is really something it's always a little bit it it was not stress i guess stressful is the right word leading up to it as we were
• 02:30 - 03:00 still working on the design where it's like man is this is this going to meet people's expectations is this something people are going to like is this something they're going to be excited by is this something they're going to be you know they're going to enjoy they're going to be proud to carry around you know and it it seems like to the vast majority of people it is and that's I mean that's awesome that's incredible to have something that we've been working on like this uh be so wellreceived like I've never had an experience like that i've released things nothing that was completely just completely custom in the way that this is uh it's it's been it's
• 03:00 - 03:30 been awesome it's been it's been really encouraging too to like oh man people are really excited for this we're going to make it you know especially on the software side you know the hardware people love that now the software we're going to make that as good as it could be too we're going to make it we're going to make it that good and that is and that is one reason I'm really excited to be able to talk to you especially in in this setting as well like you said post uh reveal so that we can dive into some of that a little bit more because you bring a very interesting background to the project i know that we I think barely touched on
• 03:30 - 04:00 it a little bit in the the first chat that you and I and uh Chris had but tell me a little bit more about how Ghost Phone came to be and how that has prepared you for and also how you're leveraging that in Side yeah yeah yeah so Ghost Phone came out uh or came to be I think around three years ago now where I had been using a a flip phone for a while i had I had been inspired my uncle you know really helped me out with that he got me into dumb phones you know it
• 04:00 - 04:30 was a New Year's resolution he was like "I'm going to use my phone less." And I was like "Oh man it's a good one i'm going to make that one too." And then he ended up getting I got a different one um and it was great up until it broke i dropped it it broke and I was like "Man I've I've always been software heavy specifically Android heavy um I didn't have I didn't have a smartphone until I was like 16 or 17 um just like house rules." and I was fine with it but my oldest sister had a bunch of olds this is like when I was like 14 15 she had a bunch of She always got Androids always cheap ones and they was broke so I got into modifying them i got an XDA forums
• 04:30 - 05:00 you know Lineage OS all various kinds of ROMs and modifying that i've been doing that since my teenage years so when my flip phone broke I was like "Oh man I bet you I can make like an operating system for me." You know put it on a Pixel see how it goes and I had it and I showed you know my uncle who got me into into dump phones in general he's like "Oh hey man can you make one of those for me too?" And I was like "Sure." And I spent I spent some time on it um and I sent him one and he was like "Hey this is really good you could look into selling these." And I was like "Oh all
• 05:00 - 05:30 right." And then obviously it took more time because like okay well now it needs an update server now it needs all this stuff um which I already had some experience in and yeah and so then you know everything sort of started to come together you know started using you know got newer generations of pixels got the supply chain set up for all that um and yeah um for most of it for most of Ghost I've been the sole developer um and that's been all oper you know all kinds of operating system work app development and it's been a few years at this point so yeah yeah and so coming to Side you
• 05:30 - 06:00 know when Chris approached me all that I was like "Oh yeah this is this is awesome this is this is the level of freedom that I've wanted building operating systems where now it's our own hardware now it's our own device i don't have to with this um you know be limited to what Google had designed it with in mind there's there's a bit more that we can do with that especially being in software but also on the ground floor of the hardware development right has been which I imagine makes a big difference yes oh absolutely it's like instead of like trying to find ways to do things being able to go to the manufacturer and
• 06:00 - 06:30 be like hey like how can we do this how is this going to work is this possible that being able to have that level of connection just makes everything go a lot smoother uh and the manufacturer having in mind what's going to happen uh what the plans are for it software-wise has just been super helpful and I'm just super grateful to be uh to be working on this awesome well I figured we could kind of do this sort of a rapid fire Q&A anything that you want to interject or say "Oh by the way I don't want this just to be all about the questions that
• 06:30 - 07:00 I have compiled." A lot of them are from me a lot of them are from the community places in uh Discord Reddit as well as just some people that I've reached out to uh via the old SMS because I know that they've been kind of following the project um but the big thing I I want to know is right off the top what is going to set apart OS or side OS or I'm not really sure even what what it's going to be called from from Android what's what are going to be maybe the top you know few big
• 07:00 - 07:30 differences between run-of-the-mill Android whether that's the Pixel version the Galaxy version you know you name it and and Side Phone OS yeah yeah yeah yeah we'll call it side OS tentatively Side OS doesn't matter it'll end up being one of those two probably Side OS sure side OS i like I like Side OS first i like Side OS too plus it's you know we have a smaller screen so we got to fit the boot logo on you know so side OS gets a little trickier side OS that's a good point that'll fit um but yes I mean there's obviously
• 07:30 - 08:00 a lot of differences that are going on especially from um any of the smartphones you would buy more advanced people are going to be you know adv especially people using dumb phones or anything custom for a long time are going to be more familiar with custom ROMs like Lineage OS or um I mean graphine OS which is a bit different you know allows more Google stuff going on but so one of the big differences between side OS and the operating system running on a phone that you could buy from store um is there going to be no Google services no Google apps no Google services okay so no Play Store and we'll
• 08:00 - 08:30 get into what kind of what kind of app store it's going to have um at some point I'm sure um but so yeah which is good for a lot of things there are some downsides um one of the big ones is I know people have been asking a lot about RCS is it going to have RCS is RCS going to be think I'm sure that's one of the questions coming up it is and the the short answer Yeah yeah and the short answer and it's related to this um is probably not at least not at release just because RCS unlike SMS MMS it's not
• 08:30 - 09:00 really an open standard i mean I I think technically it might be considered one but there's no like libraries we can go to you know software libraries notbook libraries that we can go to and oh okay this is how you implement RCS there's a whole thing going on with servers that needs to happen there are sometimes security concerns with that as well we would have to we wanted to run our own servers for that we'd have to get a certification from the GSM association and they don't really hand those out like Google has one Verizon has one like
• 09:00 - 09:30 we have to be a really big player to get that and run our own servers which is unlikely there are other ways to do it like Beeper does it but even Beeper does it through um uh uh Google messages like it is it requires it goes through Google messages yeah it's RCS is super cool but it is very Google centric right now and there's just not the frameworks in place to really it's top priority for us it is something we really really want to have and will be continually looking um and and trying to implement uh but it's it's
• 09:30 - 10:00 it's really tied to Google at the moment and so not having Google services means we're not going to have Google messages by default and and and Sebastian I'm curious i I kind of know but for people that maybe aren't familiar but but why why no Google services what why why is why are we doing a deled OS here what's the deal so and so there's a couple reasons one it's a little bit harder to get a Google certification for a smaller device depending on the version of Android so there was there was always a chance that like Google would just be like ah hey we're actually not going to
• 10:00 - 10:30 let you do that but the reason why we didn't want it from the get-go regardless of that um there's is privacy largely because Google services they're always running in the background they're always looking at the stuff you do it's just it's unfortunately just a fact um and also uh extended battery life and so oh people yeah so without Google services running in the background and you could find in the dumb phone subreddit and a lot of other places people talking about it like especially with uh any sort of dumb phone or flip phone like cat22 is a great example that runs Google some form of Google Android
• 10:30 - 11:00 uh once all that stuff is disabled there's greatly increased battery life which is super big for us uh yes so it's largely privacy battery just being more in control of the software and with Google services uh they they require certain apps to be installed along with it again the Play Store which especially with our device would kind of negate a lot of the dumb phoness of it you know now it's oh it's a small phone a small phone running all that and it's not like we have an e- in screen we have a small screen um
• 11:00 - 11:30 which provides some friction but at that point is it just a smartphone and we personally think yeah at that point it kind of is if it's full-blown Google with the Play Store the Chrome kind of going against the philosophy the side phone yeah philosophy oftentimes too they require YouTube to be installed if you get you know a pixel or anything like that YouTube will be there and that again is like ah you know if there is a browser you can access YouTube maybe that's fine but probably having YouTube pre-installed there's a lot more um uh what's the word not qualifications but
• 11:30 - 12:00 there's a lot more um rules as to what you can do with the operating system once Google Play Services are installed and they're all to benefit frankly Google which makes sense i mean they've you know they they kind of run the show on that side of things if we're going to use their stuff we have to we have to include what they want us to include but we don't want to include all that stuff uh it's not the idea behind it so yeah the the level of control over what we do and don't have on the operating system is a big one uh maybe the biggest one and that actually
• 12:00 - 12:30 uh while we're talking about Google services I I I wish I should have I I want to give credit to the people that have asked these questions this was one that I just remember a couple people asked about so I apologize folks but does that mean that this will not be compatible with Android Auto at this time it won't now there is a way to do it uh the developers working on graphine OS have have have an implementation in place that we can look
• 12:30 - 13:00 at and that we can look into providing um they also have a way of incorporating Google services kind of in a separate layer from the Android so we'd have to find a way to do that it would be a big it would kind of negate a lot of the pros I just mentioned of not having but I know it is a feature that a lot of people want um so it is up there with things that we will be actively looking into but yes Android Auto does require a lot of Google stuff that's not impossible for us to do again Graphino
• 13:00 - 13:30 OS have done it those developers they're absolutely brilliant but they have found a way to do it um and so we could we could mirror their implementation possibly it's going to require a lot more on the OS side but it's something we can do but by release time I wouldn't count on having it there unfortunately gotcha so similar to RCS would it be would it be fair to say not at launch but definitely something you guys are going to be actively looking into going forward yes absolutely it's like
• 13:30 - 14:00 especially RCS like top and Android Auto they're both they're both really high up there on things we want to do but at this moment in time I I wouldn't count on it for launch yeah okay it's it's it's it's unlikely it's possible but it's it's unlikely and I don't want to mislead anybody as to as to what will be there gotcha okay well and that actually segus into another question that is similar to those being having talked a little bit about some of the for lack of a better term baggage that that Side OS
• 14:00 - 14:30 is going to get rid of in terms of comparing it to a regular Android operating system what are some of the things that it will have that will be unique to I mean some of this may be secret i don't I don't know what you could talk about right now but I am kind of So for example I'm assuming it will be heavily optimized for the 2.8 in screen are are there other either UI or UX things or even just apps themselves that that you guys are working on that will be unique to Side OS yeah
• 14:30 - 15:00 especially in like in a dumb phone context so obviously yes all the apps will be optimized for the small screen and there'll be a heavy emphasis on making everything run as smoothly as possible we have 4 GB of RAM 64 GB of storage it should be able to run everything just fine we're going to make sure it does especially any system app anything that we have complete control over will be designed specifically for iPhone and I've already uh you know started on that through through you know various various development methods of Yeah uh but so yeah so all that's going
• 15:00 - 15:30 to be optimized working well working seamlessly we have a lot of things that that Chris and I are still in discussion with as to exactly what it's going to have like in regards to call blocking number blocking some stuff like that which Chris Chris and I have talked about like oh will there be a distraction-free mode that only allows certain contacts to to call and stuff like that um that's a little bit still more nebulous but one of the big things and I think this is going to be very nice for um for dumb phone users i think they'll appreciate it in particular people who have used other ones um is the app market that I know I've talked
• 15:30 - 16:00 about i mean it's an app app store app market i I say app market and this not going to be you know apps for purchase so it's not really a store you know everything's going to be free to download at least but I know there's been a lot of talk about like oh some people are like oh I want I want a browser and some people are like man I really don't want a browser and it's the same with email it's the same with a whole bunch of things and I you know I've been in the dumb phone subreddit for I guess a few years at this point and it seems like that's sort of the main conflict between people is different people living different lives and so they just have straight up
• 16:00 - 16:30 different legitimate needs to as to what they want on their phone and there ends up being a lot of sometimes funny sometimes like way too aggravated I think conflict over like oh no dumb phone should not have this one should have that with the app market it's going to have a selection of apps um to to install a lot of them are going to be just a lot of them are going to be utilities and all that but it will and this is a this is a recent implementation i haven't fully explained how this is going to work to Chris but we do have this um this will be there um
• 16:30 - 17:00 you will be a because it's based off of uh after people are familiar with that their client software it's not pulling from the repos but there's some there's some software um being used from there um but it will allow different repositories it'll allow users to select what repositories they want to get apps from and we'll be running all of that on our servers so you have the app market you can decide there'll be a default one but on the website there'll be QR codes at least
• 17:00 - 17:30 this is the current implementation uh I have working there'll be QR codes you can scan to add an additional repository and then you can remove the repository if you want um from from the app market itself so maybe you don't want so maybe there's a there's one repository you can add and that has your browser that has your email that has all the things like that right so you can add that you scan the code on the website from the phone boom you now have access to all those apps and you can install them if you want if you don't want them you simply remove the repository and then you can
• 17:30 - 18:00 bring it back any other time you want and so you can and so you can you can imagine packages will be available be a very minimalist utilities driven one you know oh that's your voice recorder your two-factor authentication all of that and they'll be you one for people who do want the browser who do maybe want calendar sync and things like that that would require a browser and so users will I I I think this is super cool users will be able to select with some degree uh with some degree of granularity what apps they want to be able to install now obviously I know it's still not a perfect
• 18:00 - 18:30 implementation for everyone i know there's some people who absolutely you know don't want any sort of way to install a browser or things like that but we're hoping that adds enough friction for people who don't want certain apps while also allowing people who do want those apps access to them because if you you know if you if you have to go to the website scan the code to install them you're already on a device with a browser so you know there there's something there's something I think in there but yeah I think that's going to be one of the one of the coolest features or maybe it's just the one I'm most proud of i don't know well
• 18:30 - 19:00 and I think that's I think that's really cool and this whole concept of friction you know for for viewers or listeners that aren't familiar it's this idea of adding either extra steps or or extra requirements in interfacing with your your hardware or your software in an effort to make your use more deliberate and less distracting and so I think as you're describing that like that is so genius to in order to add those repositories or those app sources I guess you could call them yeah you can't just go in and and start typing like
• 19:00 - 19:30 you'd have to oh nope got to go get on a browser on you know a desktop or laptop or whatever scan the QR code now have access like it just makes it so much more of a uh an effort required to do it i I think I think that's really really neat um yeah so yeah I'm I'm excited is um so that's another one and and we had kind of discussed this a little bit on the the footage that disappeared of yours um lost footage sideloading this has been something a lot of people have so people oh I'll just put on Aurora
• 19:30 - 20:00 store and be able to put whatever I want and I'm like ah but will you be able to so can you talk to that a little bit are there going to be some things that you you can sideloadad some things that will be restricted or is it just going to kind of be wild west if you know how to sideloadad you'll be able to do whatever you want yeah that's still that's one of the things that's a little bit up in the air uh we have the ability to uh prevent again that's something I've also uh worked on in the ghost phone uh for a while now is having stuff built into the package manager of the device that
• 20:00 - 20:30 prevents certain packages from being installed we can do that um it's it's still that's one of the things that's still up for discussion it's it's unclear it's unclear if there's there's always that there's that fine line that we have to walk that kind of go kind of leads into the app store and all of that where like it is we want we want people to have a distraction-free experience but we do want people to have the freedom as well so really it's like ah if you're sideloading anyway does it matter then because then
• 20:30 - 21:00 what we run into and this is a concern this might be I think right now where we're at you will probably be allowed to sideloadad almost anything just to sort of leave it open only because and again this could change this is one of the things that could change um we haven't fully set this in but as soon as we start to lock in um oh it there's no way to do this there's no way to do that and somebody finds a way people will be upset people will be mad at us it's just
• 21:00 - 21:30 it's just what's going to happen because people buy a device with expectations and they find a way around it and I mean that is I think true of almost almost any dumb phone like I know in a lot of them that don't have brows or anything like that you can access the Android layer and you can technically do it it's a lot of work there's a lot of friction there but it can be done and so as soon as we go into the territory of oh you can't do this we better make sure that you really can't or or then it's not then not that not that that would be a
• 21:30 - 22:00 lie from us because we really tried and we really thought that you couldn't but it gets us into some some murkier waters where where we maybe don't want to be as as a company with advice where it's like oh we made this promise that there was no way to do this oh but you could do it from the terminal of your computer if you know how to do it with ADB because it's actually fairly difficult to to block that on a device while still because of the way software upload process works when it's being flashed whole all kinds of very technical things get involved and especially for me as a
• 22:00 - 22:30 developer I usually know the ways around it and I wouldn't want to be caught in a situation where it's like oh shoot we actually can't fully stop somebody from doing this but we're telling them that they can't um and so yeah it will probably be a little bit more open actually quite a bit more open on the sideloading side especially with the app market we think there'll kind of be no need to um at some point it's ah do we just do we just let people do that yeah you know you know
• 22:30 - 23:00 what I mean i'm again you could you could you could find yourself you could find yourself between a rock and a hard place real quick especially if you you know made commitments that you fully according to the knowledge at the time expected to be able to live up to and then all of a sudden oops you know some you know 14year-old figured out how to crack the or you know whatever the case may be exactly yeah that's so that's that's just a situation we don't want to be and we think with the app market and all the things like that just won't be necessary well and I imagine with with the size of
• 23:00 - 23:30 the screen uh so many apps you wouldn't even really I mean even if you did sideloadad it getting into it you might be like "Oh this is not a great experience." Exactly the device itself is self is built with that like on the ghost phone there's no browser there's not going to be on that because it's it's a smartphone form factor you know it's based on pixel hardware um and so then then yeah there there's there's zero friction once you have it there for anything you want to do with that but with the side phone it is it's built into the hardware of oh okay this isn't
• 23:30 - 24:00 like woohoo I'm I'm going to do all these all these things on it it's designed purposely to limit that in some capacity and so we can we can allow more things like that like the whole browser discussion and all that is open because of the form factor gotcha so speaking of hardware this is something a question of mine i haven't someone may have asked it somewhere but I haven't seen it yet biometrics is there going to be I don't think I saw a fingerprint scanner is there going to be any kind of face unlock anything in that regard there's
• 24:00 - 24:30 going to be no biometrics um yeah with this with this particular edition and it's possible we could add them there could be a biometrics tile i think um I think that's technically possible there are some limitations i know Chris has talked about um I don't think that that falls under them i mean he can correct me i could put a comment down um if I'm wrong so it could be but at release and you know focus yeah probably no biometrics you'll be able to input like your pin from the keypad so now you have a lock screen you have a lock screen you'll have a lock screen
• 24:30 - 25:00 it'll work just like any other Android with the lock screen biometrics would be super cool um but yeah we're just we're just too restricted on on just sort of the ways to implement that unfortunately yeah well and I think honestly in in my own experience that to me is just another one of these layers of friction that we talk about where you know with a fingerprint or a face unlock it's it's boom you're there boom you're there boom you're there whereas a pattern or or a pin or whatever it just adds a little bit more inconvenience to accessing that
• 25:00 - 25:30 device and hopefully would help you be less distracted by it at least that's the way that I I kind of view it so um let's see okay got to do a little shout out to a Discord um friend will it have any Google services whatsoever being based on AOSP will there be any Google any link to Google at all no not Google no no Google whatsoever the browser will not be a Google browser it'll probably search engine will probably be duck.go
• 25:30 - 26:00 by default I think um um for for the browser but yeah nothing nothing Google won't be anywhere on the device there will be no uh telemetry between the device and us either this is going to be just none of that and yeah no Google because if we have one Google thing we have to have them all and we're not going to do that um so yeah there'll be nothing there'll really be no weird things running in the background it's at this moment there isn't going to be any sort of signin required on the device
• 26:00 - 26:30 again you'll have your lock screen and all that but there is no like oh you need an account to log into this or do that it'll be very similar to the flip phones of your uh which is oh it is a phone like you take this and it is a phone and again you can lock it you can do all sorts of things like that but it's not linked to any account now apps can be linked to your account and so you could have like a cloud backup that's linked to you you know that you sign into you know proton drive or anything like that that you can do like you'll be able to do that but the device itself will not have any sort of overarching sign in um or and does that include does
• 26:30 - 27:00 that include the app market so for example downloading apps updating apps apps that type of thing i know you know on the Apple and the Google you have to be signed in but yeah no you won't have to be you will not have to be signed in and you won't be able to sign in they'll be there'll be no account it's a very it's very u I would say bare bones i don't want people to think that it's like it's going to look terrible or anything like that but it's very I guess I guess pure it's it's going to be very open and honest it's like these are apps and then when you get an update it's like okay these are the apps that have updates very simple very very clean I
• 27:00 - 27:30 think i love it but yeah so none of that required none of that will be required um again it's it's maybe something that we could look into at some point there might be a version this is probably like a a phone v2 you know or something like that where there is i know I know light has it i know there's some other companies where they do have something and that allows you to manage online on your dashboard and all that and all that there's trade there's convenience about that but we won't have that um at at this at this time and most likely not uh
• 27:30 - 28:00 for this device um just especially given if it's sold without that we don't want to add that to people add that to the device it's like I need an account all that we would like to just avoid that entirely cool um okay another one a user submitted this is from uh Reddit Retro Re-Imagined had asked "Can you give any specifics about the querty keyboard teased in the recent graphic and will the phone launch with it also what kind
• 28:00 - 28:30 of battery life can we expect all good questions uh Querty we would like to launch with the Querty so right now the one tile that we do have that will be launching it and we want to be very clear on this um is the T9 that is the tile that is actively being worked on by the manufacturer and we are we want to launch with more than one tile but that is the guaranteed one that is the one that is guaranteed at this moment in time is the T9 tile and there will 100% be others but at launch that is the guaranteed one we're gonna we're gonna
• 28:30 - 29:00 absolutely we already are I guess is the way to say it working on more tiles but that's the guaranteed one for right now um the certy one uh I don't I can't really give more information on it since it's not at the same level of development as the T9 one is sure um so it's Yeah it'll it'll look like I I'm with you on the shirt type Jake i want the shirt type Jake i want that gets a little bit trickier um just because of the way Android works and the way it handles keyboards that's going to have to be some custom some custom software
• 29:00 - 29:30 because you know Android super easy to be like hey here's um here's here's a keyboard because it recognizes the tiles as keyboards the one the ones we've suggested it recognizes them as keyboards um here's a keyboard and this is its layout and then it's like oh cool yeah I know what to do with this and Android knows what to do with cert you know regular certy or certy style keyboards um you know single button single input keyboards and it knows what to do with T9 and a few others um out of the box you know within the operating system with sure type since it's like two characters per that's kind of in
• 29:30 - 30:00 between both and it would probably end up being me write custom code to handle that which I'm into I'm into if I have the resources I have the time I would like that it would work very well with the form factor it's going to be a little bit of a tossup like that is something that we can totally do um it's going to be a tossup between that or awerty because we do want a text input in some form that isn't a T9 um and sure type would be super cool and would work perfectly in that form factor it's just
• 30:00 - 30:30 writing the software to be able to do that it's not handled natively by Android right well and that's something that I I've you know as I've engaged with people I've actually kind of been surprised i I thought that I was the only person left alive that likes the shore type but in in in YouTube and Reddit I've said "Yeah the shore type sure type." Um one thing that I personally worry about is you know someone I even responded to their comment like "I'm I'm 6 foot 215 lbs i grew up on a cattle ranch like my fingers are huge Sebastian." And I think
• 30:30 - 31:00 of like the the width of side with a full querty i mean some people would probably be able to do it and love it but I and I would try to if that's you know what what is what is available but I'm just like remembering those dude I could get smoking with a short type i have to look anyway so I'm I'm glad no no I get it i don't think my hands are as big as yours i never worked on a cattle ranch but I'm 6'1 if that means anything i have I have uh this little guy here that my neighbors gave me when I helped them move in they was like "You
• 31:00 - 31:30 do stuff with bones." They gave me this i was like "All right awesome perfect." But I was just messing around with it um and yeah these are a little small these are a little small i like I was trying with it i'm like I could get there these are a little small and I don't know exactly what sizes we'd be looking at that is the thing with the querty and why um I don't want to say we'll have it at launch we're going to we would love to um again that's one of those things top priority a lot of the stuff's going to get more clear um in May as we get into May as we actually especially once I get sort of the uh the early
• 31:30 - 32:00 prototypes and stuff to start doing with the software and the sizing and all that a lot of stuff which is something I meant to preface this with like a lot of stuff is going to get a lot more clear very soon um but that's a big thing with the query is we want to make sure it's actually usable we want to make sure oh you could type on it it makes sense to with any sort of configuration we do as well because it won't be able to you know be a full wide keyboard so now it's going to be you know shorter and and we'll find a good system for it but it has to be real and I was going to ex and
• 32:00 - 32:30 I was going to show So I've got I've got my my uh Bold 9700 here and this is significantly wider than Side Phone and these I I don't I got to where I could be pretty good at typing with with this but these are very small i mean these are much smaller than what I feel like a lot of BlackBerry people even now like it's much smaller than the Key 1 or the Key2 much smaller than the Q10 or the Classic even the 9900 was a little bit bigger than this and so anyway I I I'm all for it i see why people want it but
• 32:30 - 33:00 as as someone that has kind of lived on both sides of the the big shift to these huge phones I'm like guys a full cordy quarterty on something that's Anyway um sorry so the other thing um just just to kind of keep moving it along um but I'm glad you're with me on the short time um yes battery life uh so we talked about this a little bit do you know what have you guys done any I don't as as much as you can I know you don't have prototypes yet it's fairly difficult yeah without without a prototype um and without
• 33:00 - 33:30 really a a clear analog uh that exists without any sort of real comparison to there are some phones that have a battery around that size but they are also running Google services which is a pretty massive drain on battery on most devices so not it'll definitely last through a full day we're like that that's a guarantee that I can make outside of that it's really going to be testing we would like to see and we can make some optimizations on the OS side we'd like to see a couple days obviously
• 33:30 - 34:00 it's you know 1,800 milliamp hours is is is a reasonable battery size especially with the smaller screen a lot of it's going to depend on just various other factors like RF you know signal whether it's searching Wi-Fi all that so I don't want to make any promises on that end but it will be better um for sure than something like a like oh gosh what was the really small palm I think that correctly like that had like the notoriously bad battery life because that was like a 600 millah hour battery like a 27 minute battery life no I'm just kidding i'm just I was exaggerating
• 34:00 - 34:30 but it was it was I remember it being notorious like not even a full day use yeah and so we're looking for I I can at least say at a minimum standard battery life at a minimum like it's not going to be like draining while you're using it type of thing um given the screen size the battery but all we have really right now are estimates uh again that's something that we should be able to clear up next month we'll actually really get some some real world testing in and let people know but yeah given
• 34:30 - 35:00 from our talk to the manufacturer with the chipset battery all that it should be um it should be it should be good it should be acceptable i I'm not going to promise anything again at this juncture like a week it's not going to be like that um with an LCD screen and you know all the things going on it's not going to be unfortunately like the old Nokia where it just lasts forever it's just very difficult to do that with 4G it's kind of why phones haven't been able to do that because there's just so much more power required just for it to exist and for it to connect to networks because a phone you know if you're getting calls it always has to be connected to the network true um and so
• 35:00 - 35:30 yeah and so you know for just requires more power to do that um but it I I don't know what the word use then it it should be reasonable and we'll let you know gotcha well and I think I think too and and and this is something that that I've seen pop up a lot and I know it's kind of been addressed but just here in this in this setting will people be able to if they want to use this as a standalone device will it will it be able to or is it going to be something like a battery life or functionality or
• 35:30 - 36:00 whatever you would want to have a primary device to use alongside this yeah uh no it should be despite the name side it it will be daily drivable that's that's my intended use case and you know here I am the developer um again if you need all the things a smartphone has then no but that's kind of the the thing with dumb phones anyway i was going to say paradox but I guess it's not maybe it's paradox but um um if you needed to do absolutely everything what you're looking for as a smartphone but if you need two-factor authentication if you need to call people if you need to text
• 36:00 - 36:30 people if you want to listen to music all the basics I and and sort of like the the basic plus the basic premium uh things that people need again up to including things like web browser all that it'll be perfectly fine as a daily driver again if you especially if you're going in with dumb phone expectations yes absolutely and we're looking to get people who this is their first dumb phone we want it to work well for them and all that so it will absolutely be usable as your device as as as your daily driver it's always recommended with a dumb phone that you have a
• 36:30 - 37:00 computer or some other device around that's always kind of I think the the caveat with dumb phones is there's um some expectation of there being another device available even if you want to you know if you know if you need to get certain things to log into certain apps or whatever first time like logging into a you know Gmail account or whatever how often you know they require a code sent very I mean I guess you get the text code you you know what I'm saying where sometimes it is nice to have a computer with any dumb phone um I'm trying to think even like light phone you know the
• 37:00 - 37:30 dashboard on the computer You obviously can't access that from the phone all sorts of things like that but yes I guess short answer yes you can use it day-to-day it'll be fine with the caveat being slightly dependent on your use case if you're looking for a smartphone it is not a smartphone but it's going to be pretty darn good awesome well that's um you had mentioned something there that I think is relatable to two we had two users that had pretty much the same question so shout out to cats are cute 2020 and tech bees um unlockable
• 37:30 - 38:00 bootloader unlockable bootloadader is unfortunately a no it is something we really wanted but with the MediaTek chipsets um which are just what we just what we're using it's what we have to use anything else you know Qualcomm or anything that would maybe allow that is is prohibitively expensive at this moment in time uh MediaTek just doesn't really allow that gotcha i I wondered about that myself is what is it cuz I know some devices do have a very easily unlockable bootloader and some of them
• 38:00 - 38:30 don't not really having any major background in software that's what it is then it's it's it's the chipset some kind of licensing restrictions or something because in order to unlock the bootloader or really in order to be able to unlock it and do anything with it I guess is also because like um oh gosh I'm trying to think what do I have i got as I got a while back just like as a sample just to see what I could do with this was before a side phone one of the Ulophone or one of the other you know like Chinese manufacturers you know typically for use within China um it did allow me to unlock the bootloader just
• 38:30 - 39:00 didn't allow me to do anything else like oh it was like oh yeah sure unlock it what are you going to do nothing because you also have to give people if they're going to do anything meaningful with it which is which is pretty much always uh a different operating system custom operating system you really wanted the operating system to be open source that is what we wanted it's just not possible uh we have to give people uh a lot of the device firmware a lot of the vendor files and stuff like that and MediaTek licenses don't allow us to do that so even if you could unlock it if it was like something you could toggle so it's technically unlocked
• 39:00 - 39:30 there's not really going to be anything that anybody can do with that unfortunately again maybe maybe a different device into the future it's something we really want it fits with the ethos of the company right but at this juncture it's just not something that we can do gotcha okay yeah which pains me it pains me very much i want I want everybody to know so let me even while we are talking here Sebastian I've got another couple of questions coming in okay so this is this one is from Art Crimes how will
• 39:30 - 40:00 activation work what are some recommended cell phone providers if you are establishing a new phone number okay so this one is another one that's a little not up in the air um we haven't you know we're working on certifications with different carriers um it should be as simple as putting your SIM card in so we're not going to support eSIM at this time again that's kind of bound up with some Google stuff that's not quite open source so um basically yeah you're going to pop your SIM card in um and that might require some depending on the
• 40:00 - 40:30 carrier i know Verizon could be a little bit funkier um I personally have used on the Ghost Phone i've used this is not like an endorsement this is not advertiser or anything i've used US Mobile they're fine i can switch in and out as it goes again this is this is me as a US individual personal experience um but if you already have your your SIM card it should go right into the device and be fine again if if your carrier requires you to let them know that you've added a new device you know with the IMEI number or anything like that
• 40:30 - 41:00 you'll have to enter that there it's going to be per carrier again I only have US experience with carriers but I know that's typically how that works it's going to be like any other phone any other smartphone where it'll have an IMEI number that identifies it to the cellular network um and you can give that number where needed to your carrier um but it it shouldn't be anything weird it shouldn't be anything non-standard for people who are already used to who already have a phone and at some point had to put a SIM card in it I guess is the way to put it and uh we did discuss
• 41:00 - 41:30 now this is coming back to me um on the reveal video chris had mentioned that if there is enough interest from the community actually getting carrier certification for some of the you know uh AT&T I know is a is a tricky one Verizon as well um so that'll I think help with that but for the most part what you're saying if you have an active SIM just pop it in and you should be good to go in most cases yes and that's again what I know now if that changes we will let people know um but like before and a lot of the stuff is like before
• 41:30 - 42:00 pre-orders before we do anything like that before we take anybody's money we will have an answer for you right but yeah right now it's not going to be anything particularly weird gotcha um and so yeah uh carriers recommend i also I I don't know at this point in time um that's something we'll test and maybe we'll get some user feedback on like oh it works really well with this same as with that um but right now yeah it should work it should work with with pretty much any carrier um but that's going to require uh just a bit more time
• 42:00 - 42:30 and a bit more testing to figure out and figure out you know oh we'll have on the website when we're able to like oh we've tested it with these carriers and it works with these carriers if you want a good experience these carriers and then yeah you go to the carriers website you'll get your SIM card mailed to you pop it in activate it that should be fine um but yeah I can't unfortunately I can't I just can't make any re recommendations at this point because we don't have um uh any models that are already running the software checking the networks anything like that so it's like ah I can make some guesses but I'm
• 42:30 - 43:00 not going to do that i don't want I don't want to lead people astray at this moment in time no worries so this next one Sebastian I this this is awesome and I I have to thank um Fluffy_D5877 what asurances will we have that the phone/OS will be supported years into the future we will have control over the updates all that we will keep it updated and we're not going to have so I guess because people are thinking like worst case scenario they
• 43:00 - 43:30 bought the phone and then we go under and then side no longer exists and now you have a phone what can you do with it will it work um I mean there's always like a I know with Pebble like there's things going on with that where things are kept alive after um and I don't know if at that point we could release the source code i don't know that would be nice a nice gesture um there's nothing on the device there's no services at this moment in time planned that would stop if side no longer existed so you get the phone it has all
• 43:30 - 44:00 the stuff it's a 4G device it should work for a long like the hardware should be relevant for a number of years into the future and there's no services that require us to exist again at this moment in time maybe there'll be a few things like the GPS app is going to be you know we're gonna have to we're going to most likely be using here maps APIs for all that and so then if we're not doing this and we're not paying for the API use or anything like that maybe that would stop but yeah so worst case
• 44:00 - 44:30 scenario and you know I don't think this is going to happen the side phone goes out the device is still going to work there's going to be like we're not going to do there's going to be no Spotify with like the car the car thing literally called the car thing that they had where they sent out an update and pricricked them all still not because they didn't want to like keep it connected to their services and all that there's none of that on side and Oh I had I did not know that's how that went down that's how that went down i knew that it happened but I didn't know that's how it went oh they ota bricked them i'm like 90% now okay now I got to double check that but I'm pretty sure that's what they did and people still
• 44:30 - 45:00 found ways around it um and I'm sure that clever people again like Pebble is a great example now they have the the new ones coming out and all that where people were still kind of finding ways to do that but yeah I guess the biggest assurance is there's nothing on it that would stop if we stopped once you have the device and once you have the software it will still be functional there's no core functionality again there's no services in the background it's like oh man like oh man I'm keeping this any keeping this up anymore they can't do this and it goes down which I assume that's what they're asking right so let's let's and in case they're
• 45:00 - 45:30 asking kind of the flip of that what is actually the the plan going forward in terms of um you know security updates or even just OS um updates themselves how what what's the plan there assuming maybe not the worst case scenario but sort of if if Yeah the best case or even just the the ship keep sailing scenario how does that look yeah yeah so we have really no plans at this point um to to move to a separate device we have this we have this device we have this iPhone there's been a lot of work going into
• 45:30 - 46:00 this with the just just we're not going to like oh and now there's here's version two and version one we're just going to completely forget about and none of that none of that's going to go on um again this isn't official i don't want to say this is official but I know Chris has talked about this we're looking at five years looking at keeping things going for five years and the nice thing is um we are are going to be in charge of the updates in the update servers and so even if like Google were to stop supporting you know any of the security patches and stuff for Android
• 46:00 - 46:30 that they still do for our for our version of Android um which is probably going to be Android 12 um at at this that's what it's looking like full transparency Android 12 not the newest unfortunately that's what we have to do with the chipset and the manufacturer um but there are security updates for that we will have the software and we will still be able to manage that backport things to that and send out the updates ourselves we're not relying on anybody else to do that so it's like oh Google doesn't support this anymore because that's what happens with a lot of smartphone manufacturers is they're like oh man you know Google's not kind of
• 46:30 - 47:00 doing this and we're not putting the work in to keep this going but this is our product and this is what we do so we will keep that going and feature updates too are like something we can always send out we can always send out a feature update things like that it's like oh man it got left behind i guess the the assurance is we're in charge of all the updates it's our software it's our operating system that's one of the other perks of it being uh AOSP Android open source project is like we have total control over that so we're going to keep that going we're going to keep adding you know new useful things fixing
• 47:00 - 47:30 anything that we see issues with because that's this is the ball's entirely in our in our court and we want to make it the best possible i I hope I answered that well yeah I think so and and I honestly you know I I think that there's a very refreshing in fact I even I even uh messaged Chris about this kind of taking this approach of sort of a five-year versus a annual release cycle i don't it's I'm almost in there is like okay so this is like this is like a gaming console type of a thing where where you've got this period where there there are refinements
• 47:30 - 48:00 to the software there are more you know enhancements there are more you know obviously games for for gaming systems but in this whether it's the tiles which I can I am so excited about the tiles Sebastian I cannot but but but also even just refinements to the software or app availability or some of the um I don't want to say digital well-being but maybe more like mindful mindfulness or or digital intentionalism aspects to the software i know Chris has talked about that quite a bit i think when you have a five-year
• 48:00 - 48:30 cycle as opposed to an annual cycle you just have so much more room for refinement and making it such a a a fine-tuned wellsharpened experience compared to some of these other ones not to not to name any names that you know they they release and then the the software that came on it is what you have the the entire time it can turn on exactly and that's and one of I think the coolest things about the tiles too is like there could be an improvement to a tile within the core devices lifespan
• 48:30 - 49:00 so it's like oh there's a T9 possibly find a better way to do a T9 you know maybe there's a better way to do it maybe there's make it click a little bit better this or that it would still be compatible as you know same same format so the fact that there are that the tiles can be added and all that one yeah it allows for super expansion there could be so many different tiles as time goes on and so many different use cases for it again in conjunction with the app market which I think kind of has like a sort of tileness to it there's a sort of modularity throughout the whole thing like maybe we have a repository or used
• 49:00 - 49:30 a better term or they think an easier to approach term app source you know maybe maybe that has some sort of emulation apps or something like that and that goes with you know a retro gaming tile which I'm sure would be very exciting to a lot of people things like that we can keep things updated and and fresh and expand while also keeping the core device the way it is um I think it's it's just it's just a yeah just a better way to do it I think and That actually um that that does one question that I've had cuz I've kind of seen I don't know
• 49:30 - 50:00 if I would call it confusion but one thing I maybe wanted to clear up or or see if you could clear up a little bit is there isn't going to be any functionality of the phone that is going to be locked behind the requirement of purchasing additional tiles or will there I mean outside of obviously the hardware of the tile itself but in order to play music you're not going to have to buy the music tile or no yeah that kind of thing yeah no no it's not going to be like oh man you
• 50:00 - 50:30 know in order to use this I need this tile we don't want to force I'm not even to say incentivize we don't want to force people to have to buy another accessory to use the phone that they already purchased to use it in the way that they want yeah that's that's not going to be a thing and that's not going to have like oh man to use the camera you need the camera tile like no completely completely outside of Yeah the ethos anything we're working on no it's it's your phone you bought it you can do all the things you want to do on it and then if you want to do some things more conveniently or you want to do them better the tiles introduce
• 50:30 - 51:00 different ways of interacting with the device and maybe a better way to interacting with the device again like yeah maybe maybe some apps only make sense with a certain tile or are best but also it has a touchcreen so it's not like oh man there's no way to use this like that would be kind of difficult and yeah we don't want to do anything like that where it's like oh man you need this for a core feature yeah yeah oh people are going to lose it when we release the RCS tile no I'm kidding i'm kidding i'm kidding
• 51:00 - 51:30 so like and that's an example of like we wouldn't do that yeah exactly and then again if it was necessary maybe uh again if it's necessary for this after work to have this tile sure but that would also be so tied up I think into the use of the tile and would probably be niche enough it would make sense but yeah it's not oh you need this tile to do this thing where it it turns into a weird I'm trying to think of a company that does do that but it turns into this weird thing where like oh if you want to do this yet yeah not going to do that something something that the phone is
• 51:30 - 52:00 totally capable of without the tile but you restrict it to be able to be used only after purchase no and that's and that's kind of what I I was I was like guys I don't think that's how this is going to work so anyway awesome well hey Sebastian that's that's all I've got is is there anything else um you know in terms of the software or the the launch or the you know the the the pre-order deposit stuff is coming i mean anything you want to let viewers or listeners to know about now that we're you know here post world reveal yeah i guess I just
• 52:00 - 52:30 want to assure people too like we're putting all the time and effort into this like it will work and I saw like I saw a lot of questions too like will it have hotspot yes it will have hotspot we'll be able to do this if since we are basing it off uh you know regular Android again without Google services so I know some people might get a little bit confused as to okay what's an Android feature what's a Google Android feature but if regular Android has it or if something like Lineage OS has it um because it is AOSP based um we'll have it so hotspotting it's going to have
• 52:30 - 53:00 that this is that's a core entry feature some people were like oh we'll have D-pad navigation that's built into Android um so if we do have a D-pad tile you will be able to navigate with that all sorts of things like that and I don't want to make like this isn't like a broad sweeping promise but if it's like oh man can it do this basic Android thing like can I hook it up my computer and can I move files to it can I do things like that uh the answer is yes if it's like a very basic function uh the answer is is 95% yes um I can't think of anything that it wouldn't be able to do again unless there something like form factor limited um maybe I don't know
• 53:00 - 53:30 about like projecting your screen to a TV that's a thing that could do like I don't know about that one um so some of the the more niche ones or might start to get a little bit more interesting but again if it's like oh can I transfer files can I upload my can I put my music files on it can I do all can I hotspot can I do all those things the answer is yes um yeah outside of that um I know some people were a little bit upset about the lack of the headphone jack um and I I myself kind of incl I got to be honest with you Sebastian like I
• 53:30 - 54:00 understand why but it's still it's still like a dart to the heart yeah and it and it feels it feels bad it feels it feels a little bit bad not having it um because yeah it's I know some people are like "Oh man like it's so easy why not have it?" Or it's already you know it's it's already not thinnest device anybody's ever seen why isn't it just in there but a lot of that has to do with just components the way components the way components are and we don't it's it's prohibitively expensive people like "Oh it's thick isn't there room in there to put it?" There really isn't going to be uh just because we really wanted it and Chris in particular pushed for it it
• 54:00 - 54:30 just isn't going to it just doesn't work with the current design even though you could take it you could take your sidewalk you can look like I bet you they fit one right here and it'd be sticking out the way the electronics have to be the way the battery has to be um because a lot of this stuff it can't stuff like battery like to I was going to say yeah it could it could fit right here but then where are you going to move all the stuff that's already right there so that it fit right there yeah yeah and with with RF with radio frequencies and all the stuff that has to be considered it unfortunately wasn't feasible um it will work with dongles i
• 54:30 - 55:00 know people are mad about that i know people hate the word dongle but you know I I I have a dongle i didn't have this as a prop this is just on my desk uh but yeah so I wanted like we do have very legitimate reasons i know a lot of smartphone manufacturers did just kind of get rid of them it is something we really wanted to have unfortunately it's just not something we could make work with the It's one of the sacrifices we had to make right um I mean I'm I'm crossing my fingers that this is just a an insane success and
• 55:00 - 55:30 that you know 5 years from now when V2 comes out it's got the headphone jack it's got the SD card slot it's got all these wonderful things that because a lot of it you know again not to put words in you guys' mouth but I imagine a lot of it is kind of cost related you know if if you had the ability to throw you know mountains of cash at a manufacturer they could probably do things that they otherwise you know can't so and a lot of it's tied to sales volume too because that's going to determine down years down the road
• 55:30 - 56:00 that's going to determine what's viable again somebody had compared it to um they're like "Oh Apple was able to do this with an iPod and make it thinner." Yeah yeah and I I responded to that comment a little bit before this meeting i was like "Ah but I mean one's a smaller circuit board because it's not a phone it's an I it's an iPod you know it has to do fewer things doesn't have to worry about antennas you know for 4G or anything like that but also Apple they can go and they're like "Hey battery manufacturer make one exactly this size and exactly this shape." Exactly and they plop it in and it works great well that's like "Okay well who's who makes batteries?" And what do you guys have
• 56:00 - 56:30 that we can make work which is just a different conversation um and so yeah but Apple also could be like "Oh man we're going to sell you know it might actually have been a million of these I don't know a million of those." Well for us it's like okay you know we're dealing with a thousand and you know 10,000 so it's just smaller but if a lot of people buy people spread the word people get the hype going it's like oh wow we can you know e either either with this version or a future generation we know that we can sell this many we're able to have different conversations with with uh different uh component manufacturers
• 56:30 - 57:00 about because a lot of times too they're just like hey yeah we'll make that for you this is a big thing uh but we need you need to order 50,000 or sometimes up to 100,000 it's like okay so we need to sell at least that you know we need to make at least that many devices which isn't something we're looking at right now we hope to we would love to but you know thou you know we're looking at we're looking at 10,000 which we've talked about you know that that coming down the pipe um so yeah if people one if it's really good people like it and people spread the word they get other people to we can start to justify um bigger moves like that in bigger plays
• 57:00 - 57:30 and make a better product for everybody we're hoping side phone that the one coming out um is going to last people a long time that it's going to be relevant for a long time that's that's been the whole point of the design behind it that is the plan that's what we're working very hard on is that this version carries us and everybody else a very long way thank you so much for for joining me again apologies that the original recording in during the reveal cut you off halfway through and we're having these these strange uh these these strange halfway
• 57:30 - 58:00 through he disappear moments um but but I it's it's it's a pleasure having having had you on folks please visit sidephone.com sign up for the the email um newsletter for for updates uh they are very active over on Reddit it's reddit.comrssidephone as well if you enjoy the the stuff that you're finding here we'd love to have you over on Returning Retro as well go ahead and subscribe and and we have our own our
• 58:00 - 58:30 own Reddit page as well so um Sebastian it's been a pleasure we'll we'll talk to you again soon yeah Jake this has been great