way. Welcome back to the hustle this season. Two.

Here we are again. Do we've had a few months off? Yeah. What going on?

Yeah, I've mostly been watching the show, Fargo, and I think Nathan for you, that's pretty much what I've been doing since the last time I said Vikings came back on, like that show. Oh, you're into that. It's not an episode of that When we're on our way to Finland last year, that was kind of creepy thing to watch on the way over there, but, um, so in season two, we've been talking about this for a while. This is the first episode. We were just really thinking that we'd totally reworked the framework to be a little bit more, Um, shoot from the hip reason being that we're spending a lot of time planning and kind of realized that we'd like to produce more episodes like quicker and perhaps shorter, too. So

we got a lot of good feedback from you guys. Our listeners about I love the show. So, you know, we wantto try to find a wayto release more regularly than once. Yeah, once

every two months, everyone ever we're doing Yeah. Ah, and in the interest of what we've been doing in the off time, Anthony, I know you went to Epicure in ce maybe be cool to hear from, you know, what about like I'm sure it's a mouthful, but it's one

of those things. I mean, I could probably write a big, long block post about it. In fact, there are some pretty long block post about it, but in summary, it was

for those that don't know parents

ever occurrences. Ah, new design conference founded by Dan Petty, who is a really awesome, talented designer and really just cool down Earth. Dude, I think you'd have occurrence one, so I don't know what to expect, but And when going into when we went to which was in Hawaii yeah, we didn't know what to expect. First of all, Dan somehow convinced the spot sponsors to basically pay for everything. So they paid for the flights. That's crazy. They flights. They paid for the lodging. They had the most awesome like high demand houses booked on the pipeline on the north shore like the Volcom house. And

I'm like, damn petty. Seems thio a lot of his social media and everything kind of talks about surfing and, like, getting out and getting things outdoors and stuff. So that was sort of

it was all it was all about. Like, the basic theme my ticket was. It was about getting a bunch of really talented people in one place and started instead of talking about designer business, like experiencing life. So it was all about surfing and getting out of your comfort zone and trying new crazy things. And there was a lot. I mean, did you serve? I was not going to do it, But then I was like, You know what? Like I'm like, I'm in that one area of the world that is like the surface of the world. There were pro surfers teaching people how to serve. Another thing the sponsors paid for and whoa served. It was one of those things I never thought I would enjoy, but actually left Hawaii with a desire to wanna pursuit. Maybe pursue that as a as a hobby. And I never thought I would run a sport that I would get into.

So did you hang 10? I don't even know what that means. Actually,

yeah, I don't really know. Arena riding in helicopter rides and hiking the waterfalls.

And it was terrible. It was really sounds to hear. Actually, while you guys were an epicure and says that Adobe Max, that was pretty cool. Really. Cow. They had a lot of stuff to reveal, Just like new technologies. Um, coming out. They had Nick Offerman there and they three d printed his face, like on stage. That was weird. Like you could do. Like they had, like, some three D printing, like extension. Yeah, it was ridiculous.

They also know Is that where they announced that new prototyping tool? I can't

remember the name. Yeah, we should totally know this, but I'm totally blanking on the name. It was to comment. Comment? Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's where they reveal that. I actually, like was working at the hotel working on my talk and missed that announcement. And I got there and then step, you know, from photo shop he was on last season. Uh, he,

uh he's like, Did you hear about comment? And I could tell that he, like I've known about this forever and wanted to tell you, but yeah, no, that's that's really It's this really interesting thing that is hopefully going to Really? In my opinion, it looks like it sort of merges something like Envision with what? Photo shop, slash sketch. Maybe is right now, which is pretty exciting. And then I think maybe even has some, like, level of micro interaction capability. Like what? Like animation. Like what? Principle or picks a does

again, but it looks like it could actually give some of these products are on run for

the money. Yeah, I think I'm, like, not sure whether I'm really holding my breath for it or not. But I d I am excited for what it's just gonna do to the overall landscape. Like it's gonna push the other tools to

two for sure. Well, what The dhobi, Max. I mean, what was it like giving your first presentation to hundreds of people? And then not only did you do that once, you did it twice?

Yeah, Yeah, I did it twice because they were just like we have extra time on Wednesday. You want to come back? I was like, Yeah, sure. Like the inertia that it took to get Thio adobe Max like, and do the talk was like months of preparation and tons of stress, like me Just not being sure if I'm like, is it what I want to say, You know, and then to just be able to just do it again, I was like, Yeah, I'll just knock out to these But it was cool, you know?

They have, like, sort of these breakout sessions that were like, you know, the main theaters, like 5000 people or something like That's ridiculous and some great talks in there. But then they have these breakout sessions that are, you know, probably more what the bulk of the conference was, but just people talking about really specific stuff. And so I did one on mobile design, and Sophie Shepherd did. Did one on, like, some responsive design stuff and sort of like designing a system which was pretty interesting as well. It was pretty cool.

It was really nerve wracking. I felt great after I finished, but it was pretty much like Ben's and needles all time up until then. But yeah, that was sort of my first time doing anything like that. Exactly. You did a creative South Thing earlier this year, but that was like a workshop. This was like an actually talk talk. So yeah, it was good. I'm excited to have done it.

Maybe we should share your experience on how long it took to, like, put it together. I think

most people know how hard it is. I tweeted about this. I was like, I would rather have done this with one hour's notice than six. I had, like, six months notice because I rewrote that mother fucking thing like that 74 times because I was just continually, like, second guessing like, Oh, maybe I want to say this and then, like, new tools came out. And so I want to talk about the new tools, you know, And I would have much rather have been, like a little bit more improv,

But it's kind of torture, just like all of the waiting, you know? But Adobe Max itself, dude, huge, just big, like everything in L. A was just big, like it took me like I I looked on the map and I'm like, Oh, it's only eight blocks. I'll just walk from the hotel and dude, eight blocks in Los Angeles is like is like 40 blocks in Austin. It was It took forever, and everything was just huge.

Like it was It was really overwhelming and cool to like every a lot of cool people there. Um, at anyway, something else happened recently, which was some bad news from ah beloved product that I think you were. You were into cardio too, right?

I was early

on earlier. Yeah. Yeah. So already is kind of, I guess, been been parted out to was a Pandora that bottom up or what? Yeah. So I think maybe in the waves of what happened with Apple music Rto was, I guess, the 1st 1 to go, which is the Bombers II. I think it was more niche for niche group of people than maybe a Spotify or Pandora

are also really, you know, originally elected because it was a US made product versus Spotify, which is, you know, european. And so I was like, Well, I'm gonna spend the money and I would rather spend that with American company.

But, you know, I didn't know that. Actually, that's pretty cool. The thing that I liked about cardio Spotify when I first started in cardio um I guess for those we don't know our Dios, just like a music streaming service You pay like, uh, there's like a free version with ads. Or you could pay, like, 10 bucks a month and just get unlimited streaming in like downloads on your on your phone or your computer or whatever. Just it's a lot like Spotify. But when the Rto first came out, man, both both cardio and Spotify were really different products than they are today. Um, Morse a Spotify is really

different this But if I felt very develop ary unfinished and cardio felt very thoughtfully polished

I've not said to you I mean, like, not maybe not even just from a design standpoint, but almost also like just a product of the whole standpoint, right? Yeah. Um but the thing that I think the thing that hooked me on Rto was the feature where first of all, I like that they had a social graph, and I know Spotify does not, too. Although I see I think it's largely based on Facebook like who you're friends with on Facebook. But Rto had this feature where you're like, Yeah, I love this artist, you know, and like whenever that artists would come out with a new album like it would. It would like update you like that artist that you know,

has a new album. You get to listen to that like first. Like I've never been able to keep keep tabs on that many artists. So that was awesome feature for for me. Um, so that kind of got me really excited. And I actually had some, like, talks with a friend of mine, Adam Hole. He he was really excited about cardio, too. But then he split off and went to Spotify, and he and I kind of had, like, back and forth.

I made fun of him for listening to Spotify. You made fun of me for listening cardio because he felt like it was, like, unusable for some reason. I think he said, like the buttons were too small or something. But, uh, I kind of got tired of rd towards it in because it seemed like there was just no follow through with, like, new features and stuff rolling out seem like they're running out of steam. And, you know, apparently I guess that's true. So many

players and that there's been so many players in the space. It seems like it's about time for that to kind of be whittled down. I don't know about you, but I've spent just almost like to do lists. I've got so much time trying to figure out, you know, whether I would use Apple music or Rto are spotted fire Google music or, you know, and when to use Pandora. And like, my biggest frustration with these products is that there is a lot of innovation. But, you know, I'm you know, I'm not Ah, you know, I'm not a spring chicken,

you know, like my mental models and dealing with music are more align with traditional ways of organizing things. You know, here on my albums, these air, my favorite songs. And this is how I like things organized. You know, I I organize my genre and things like that. My biggest frustration with all these service is from a design perspective is that they all do a really poor job and helping onboard a user to their unique paradigms of mental models like what does it mean when you thumb up a track on our d'oh or spot of fire? Google music each one of those platform sandals are completely different. Different? What? What is adding it to your library? Mean, Does that mean you like it? Or does

that mean it's in your library or in like Okay, Yeah. I mean, I I had a sort of, like an exchange with, uh, both Spotify support. And, um, a guy named Brian Griffin who was he was on that upside last less than season two. But e I had this issue because Spotify, you know, has like, a shuffle button for, like, the play. Like when you open up in an album.

I think I can identify with you a little bit because you said, like, I like to organize the way I like to organize it. You know, like when I go to pull up an album, I just want to listen to the album like ST. And the only option, even with even with a paid account, is shuffle. This is ridiculous. And like they said, Okay, well, you can just play one song, and then it'll just play the whole album. So I was like,

Oh, but then apparently I had something in my queue which a lot of people don't even know that you can have a cue. That means just like What's next? If you have something in your cue, you play one song on the album, then it's gonna play whatever's in your cue. So you have to clear it. You out. Um, I hope this isn't too. Yeah, People are probably tired of hearing this, but if you try to clear cue up the delete it from your library, it's like, Yes,

it's frustrating. And so I just haven't I don't know. I don't know if we'll ever land

on. I think they're just so based on discovery and pushing new music, which is a positive thing. But if you just want to go on like you know you want to listen to, maybe they're just like, in their minds thinking, Yeah, that's what iTunes is for. You know, you have your music already, so you don't need to find new music. I don't know. Maybe that's

what it is, you know, maybe the you know, like like you said, Maybe they're designing for themselves like, yeah, the lead designer is designing it the way that he would do it, but yeah, I don't know. You know, like maybe, you know, kind of related to, you know, some other products recently. Maybe they're designing it for a younger audience that thinks differently about I've I've never owned, like, physical music and isn't

designing it for the Snapchat crowd. Snapchat What a yeah, he's a ship that it took me, like either the harder learning curve with snapshot than I had with any thing any sudden. Like I felt like it was the first day of school. Like when I tryto figure that out. But I actually finally figured it out like Edgar and Fi helped me. Like, I feel like I felt so dumb, like using this app.

Me to like I mean, I mean some of the gestures of stuff for cool. But what What does that mean For, like, the way younger audiences are gonna grow into and with their expectations of products are I mean, I don't know. Is that younger people like

I think they dio I think, like I have this theory completely unfounded theory. But I think that kids like younger people, liked Snapchat because their parents couldn't figure out how it worked and like they could just like you know, texted on video, do all sorts of video chat stuff and everything and like, there's no you can't track it like you're Mom or Dad can't let go through and see your history because it just disappears after 30 seconds or whatever, anyway, so in 24 hours, but yeah, yeah, I didn't mean to go off on a snapshot, but you have really been messing around with it a lot lately and it's actually really fun, but it just goes to more of that temporary. I think that's a good segue way, you know, from the Spotify argument,

because it's more about, like, What am I gonna experience right now and then I don't care. After that experience, you know what I mean? Um, and I don't My brain doesn't work that way, although it's I find it like as a designer, I find it interesting that is going that way. But as a user, I'm frustrated.

I think I'll probably have to change careers if I need

to design. What did you end up going? Going with a za replacement of cardio? Uh, what do you change to

you? Well, I use Google music, but I mean I have equal frustrations with it, you

know? What don't you like about Google Music? That's what I actually ultimately went. Thio

Love. I love the product. I mean, I think it's got course set of features, but after coming from other products like Pandora and maybe our d'oh all this time for last year to have been using Google and I would come up songs and really list And then I realized, Oh, when I thumb that up, it's adding it to a playlist of things. It assumes I like that song. And when I found something down, it never plays it anymore. But I was doing thumbs up, thumbs down and contextual to the playlist. So, you know, fuzz listening to heavy metal playlist and some punk rock song came in. I was dumb

it down, even though you like that for I thought

I was tuning a station. Uh, but what Google was actually doing is saying, Oh, you don't

like that song Really? Never played a song

for you. Yeah, so I don't know. I just I

you know, I found that that that rating a song thing to be highly unreported, you know, like all something's down and then hear them later. You know what else I wish? I wish that these on my music streaming service is had like, Hey, maybe I like this ban, you know, maybe like me or whatever. But that doesn't mean that I also want to hear every live version every like, techno remix, you know, like to me, that's not like discovering music. That's like discovering the stuff that I don't want to hear that kind of thing as a little side side trail. But it's annoying as well.

Yeah, I ended up on Google music. Fi kind of like sold me on it. It's sort of like mine early, just her base. But the other thing that's really interesting about it is like I don't know if this is a bug or a loophole, but, um, like my son Caleb, like, goes to sleep to like certainly I kind of like slow acoustic guitar songs. So he'll be listening to that while he's sleeping in his, you know, his crib. All listen to something else on my computer and I can listen to the same time and the same time Jenny could be like driving a car somewhere my wife and listen to something else. All under one account was not the case with our d'oh.

Which was kind of a cool features, had that, like, remote mode, right where you could control like something over there. And it was weird because it wasn't controlling over WiFi or anything is controlling it over the clouds. Basically. So you can control what's what's being listened to from but anyway, Google music than the how that just lets you listen to a lot of different things at once, which is great. I

do wish they had a native Mac up, though.

Yeah, I agree with you. You have to listen to through the browser if you if you want to you. But I

wish I could work on design problems like that. Like those.

I mean, yeah, that would be fun. Did you try apple music, by the way?

No, I didn't. I mean, because I don't use the iPhone, but right, right. I mean, you know, not only was telling me the day that once the date hit wherever, where everyone's free trial went out, the day ended up losing like millions really of of users that never converted over to pro.

Yeah. Yeah, like Taylor Swift had something to do it, like the way Oh, because they had to pay the artist during the trial period. That's what it was that she took, like a stand on that, which is kind of funny. But the thing I was gonna bring up about, just like Apple music was just my favorite thing about the apple music was the on boarding experience. And then I never liked any single thing about that product ever.

I think Google, I think Google and spot ified now should probably, you know, think about that, you know, because I think they could get people to get more out of the the experience if they just simply said, like, this is how to get the most out of this,

right? Right? Yeah, I think so. It's just like taking away the power of choosing how you wanna listen to music is like, really frustrating. Google music doesn't find, like for me handles it. A couple of things I don't like about it. Like there's a lot of total lack of of the social graph on Google music. Like, I can't even like share a song like I couldn't send you a link to a song. Uh, least as far as I know, I think I've tried that. And like Artie, it was pretty cool.

So you have, like, this whole, right? You could share a tiny platform or yeah. Anyway, just comparing those things like, yeah, apple music was like, Man, I haven't talked to a lot of people about the features they had, but it was it was just totally not not my cup of tea. Yeah. Um, So, anyway,

um, yeah, I think that was that was quite a tangent. We went on on on the streaming thing. I could Honestly, I think we could have an entire episode. Just don't like the thumbs up thumbs down thing because, like, I have a lot of tangents that are, like, sort of like it seems like such a missed opportunity just the way that they sort of mis misuse that that feature, I think at least like you could have, you know, you could be forming, like your own play less based on

the thumbs up or thumbs down, you know? And then you know the same thing when you had when you when you like something, Something enough to add it to your library. Yeah. What does that mean? Right? Like in my just saving this or our future recommendations from whatever service is like gonna I assume that you that you actually like all of that. But like you're saying, like for the music collectors you may not like. It might be 12 songs on an album. You might only really love four. But if you really love the album, you wanna listen to it front of, you know, from beginning to end as it was intended to be

Yeah, yeah. I mean, you take away you take away the experience that the artist crafted, Especially when some

of the songs seamlessly transition into Yeah each other. It's not so cut and dry.

Yeah. Yeah. A lot of bands that I listen to sort of really like Leaned on that and made cool kind of experiences to Geelong. Cool journeys through through that. So, yeah, that's that's sort of lost. Um well, we wanted to talk a little bit about the apple TV, but I think we're at a time. Let's get these short, maybe a tackle, that one next time So, um, we've got some pretty exciting guests lined up. I won't say who they are yet. I don't know who's solid, and he's not, but I'm really, really looking forward to this. We're gonna try and do this a lot more often.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Being a lookout. Like Rick said, there's gonna be a lot of really cool. Guess we're gonna keep these little bit shorter. So be a good mix of, you know, talk about design and and using interviews with really cool

designers and makers of digital things. Right? And just like when we designed products, we really thrive on user feedback. So if anyone has any thoughts on the new format would love to hear it just tweet us. We're at hustle cast, right? Yeah, on Twitter. So cool. Looking forward to hearing from you guys and looking forward to seeing you next. This episode is brought to you by the Iron Yard. Thea Iron Yard in Austin is now offering a 12 week intensive program user interface design. Theon yard will teach you the tools and skills you need to become a professional interface designer and then help you find a job. If you're interested in launching a new career in tech and design, visit their website. The iron yard dot com scholarships are available for the summer semester wearing user interface design at the Iron Yard.

Life's too short for the wrong career. Hustle is brought to You by Fun Sized, a digital product design agency in Austin, Texas, at creates delightful, innovative products for mobile Web and beyond.