Brady’s deadline to appeal suspension is about to arrive

The time to put Tom Brady’s Hail Mary Deflategate legal defense into play is here. And the Patriots’ quarterback, facing a four-game suspension, continues to add heavyweights to his legal team.

Monday is the deadline for Brady to appeal the decision to reinstate his suspension by the US Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit, two weeks after the Second Circuit granted him a 14-day extension. While Brady and his legal team have not publicly stated whether they will appeal the 2-to-1 decision to reverse federal judge Richard Berman and reinstate the punishment, Brady has little reason not to exhaust every legal remedy available to him.

Brady’s lawyers will almost certainly file for an “en banc” rehearing, in which all 13 active judges in the Second Circuit would decide whether to hear another appeal. The other option is for Brady to file for a panel rehearing, in which the same three judges from before would rehear the case, but that option seems unlikely.

A three-judge panel of the Second Circuit ruled on April 25 that the four-game punishment handed down by NFL commissioner Roger Goodell took its essence from Article 46 of the collective bargaining agreement between the NFL and NFL Players Association, and reinstated the suspension that Berman had vacated last September.

If there were any doubts about Brady’s intentions to continue the fight, one need only look at recent additions to his lineup of lawyers. NFLPA outside counsel Jeffrey Kessler, who has fought Brady’s legal fight from the beginning, will now step aside for two of the most impressive litigators in the country.

Former US solicitor general Theodore Olson -- who in his career has worked on federal cases including Iran Contra, Bush v. Gore, and same-sex marriage in California -- joined the team on April 29, four days after the decision. Olson now works for Gibson Dunn in Washington, D.C., and represented the NFLPA in the 2011 NFL lockout.

And on Friday, Team Brady added more legal firepower: Thomas H. Dupree Jr., a partner at Gibson Dunn in the appellate and constitutional law practice group. Dupree served in the Justice Department from 2007 to 2009, reaching the position of principal deputy assistant attorney general in 2009, “responsible for managing many of the government’s most significant cases involving regulatory, commercial, constitutional, and national security matters on behalf of virtually all of the federal agencies, the White House, and senior federal officials,” according to his Gibson Dunn bio.

Dupree seems like one of the best possible options to represent Brady in a long-shot appeal. Dupree “has argued more than 70 appeals in the federal courts, including in all 13 circuits as well as the United States Supreme Court.” Dupree was Olson’s partner in Bush v. Gore, persuaded the Supreme Court to reverse a $290 million punitive damages award against a major automobile manufacturer, and successfully represented clients such as Mark Zuckerberg, Jerry and Jessica Seinfeld, and baseball agent Scott Boras.

Olson and Dupree will square off against the NFL’s own heavyweight, Paul Clement, who like Olson is a former US solicitor general. Clement was retained by the NFL for the previous appeal and successfully argued the case.

After Brady’s legal team files to request an en banc rehearing today, it would then need seven of the 13 judges to decide that further scrutiny is warranted on the decision by Second Circuit judges Barrington Parker and Denny Chin to reinstate Brady’s suspension. Brady would then need to convince 8 out of 14 judges in the actual en banc rehearing. Because Parker is a senior judge, he will be excluded from the initial decision, but he would get a seat at an en banc rehearing because he was on the original panel.

The Second Circuit is notorious for respecting the decisions of its three-judge panels, and the odds of Brady even getting a hearing appear slim. Only eight of more than 27,000 cases were granted an en banc hearing in the Second Circuit between 2000 and 2010. Parker and Chin ruled in favor of the NFL, while Robert Katzmann, the chief judge of the entire Second Circuit, ruled in favor of Brady, which could hold some sway among the other 12 judges.

In order to convince the judges that the case deserves further scrutiny, Brady’s lawyers need to convince them that this decision carries significant, wide-ranging implications and is of extraordinary circumstances.

In the court filing on April 29 asking for a two-week extension to file an appeal, Brady’s lawyers highlighted that “the Court’s opinion will affect the rights of every player in the NFL.”

They also made sure to note that “the Court’s decision raises significant labor law issues that could have far-reaching consequences for all employees subject to collective bargaining agreements. . . . These aspects of the Court’s opinion are of great importance not only to NFL players, but to all unionized employees.”

A decision on whether to hold an en banc rehearing should come within four to six weeks. Should Brady complete the Hail Mary and receive the rehearing, his four-game suspension will be stayed until the legal process is complete. Brady could potentially play the entire 2016 season, although the original lawsuit and appeal both operated on an expedited schedule, and there are still three and a half months until the start of the NFL regular season.

If Brady’s request is denied, he still has a few long-shot remedies to try to delay his suspension. He would probably file a petition with the Supreme Court and ask the Second Circuit to stay his suspension until the Supreme Court decides whether to hear the case.

If the Second Circuit declines, Brady could then ask the Supreme Court to stay his suspension until it decides whether or not to hear his case. Instead of asking all nine (or eight, current) justices, he would present his case to the Supreme Court justice assigned to the Second Circuit, currently Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg.

on Monday, May 23, 2016

UK's National Obesity Forum slams 'disastrous' low-fat diet advice

The UK's National Obesity Forum (NOF) has come out with a scathing report this week that condemns the common advice handed down from authorities to eat a low-fat, low-cholesterol diet. It argues that "eating fat does not make you fat" and joins a growing wave of backlash against the established dietary wisdom of the past four decades — which was initiated by the US Dietary Goals that began in 1977 and concurring UK guidelines in 1983. In response, Public Health England, the body responsible for issuing diet advice, has said that "calling for people to eat more fat, cut out carbs and ignore calories is irresponsible."

A year ago, the United States made its biggest shift in policy since the start of its national dietary guidelines by dropping the warning about cholesterol. As it turns out, the scientific underpinning for the advice to reduce dietary cholesterol intake was lacking, and so the policymakers just dropped it. Numerous studies plus a growing number of academics have also suggested that diets low in carbohydrates and high in fat are more effective at controlling weight and may even be healthier for the heart. This is the position endorsed by the NOF charity in its present critique, which has been reported by The Guardian.

The alternative proposed by the charity is for the consumption of "whole foods" that include meat, fish, dairy, nuts, and everyone's favorite high-fat fruit, the avocado. In that respect, they agree with the general UK advice to consume more unprocessed, well-sourced foods, though the discord arises in the amount of carbohydrates that each advocates. The latest Eatwell Guide from Public Health England was updated in March of this year, and it advises that roughly 80 percent of the calories we consume should come from carbohydrates, through things like beans, breads, pasta, fruits, and vegetables.

The NOF alleges that the science of food has been "corrupted by commercial influences," noting that the Eatwell Guide was prepared with the involvement of a large number of people from the food and drink industries. The report has already been criticized for expressing more opinion than scientific facts and figures, however its core contention that current dietary advice is not functioning as intended is hard to argue with. If the goal of the high-carbohydrate diet advice is to keep people healthy, the rapid rise of obesity that's coincided with it — particularly in the United States and the UK, one of Europe's fattest nations — would suggest it's been counterproductive.

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Contactless payments tripled in popularity in the UK last year

The UK is on its way to becoming a cashless society, with payments in physical currency making up less than half of all consumer purchases for the first time last year. This is according to a new study from Payments UK, and reported by The Guardian, which says that the number of contactless payments made in 2015 tripled compared to 2014. A separate study released last week by the UK Cards Association estimated that one in seven transactions in the UK are made using contactless methods, which include NFC-enabled debit cards and smartphone services like Apple Pay.

“It took almost eight years for monthly contactless spending to reach half a billion pounds — now it’s grown by the same amount in just four months," Richard Koch, head of policy at the UK Cards Association, told The Financial Times last week. "This dramatic rise shows that paying with contactless is now second nature for millions of consumers who see it as an alternative to cash.”

CONTACTLESS PAYMENT IS BOOMING, BUT OLDER METHODS LIKE CHEQUES ALSO SURVIVE

The Payments UK report found that the average adult in the UK makes 648 payments a year, or around 54 a month. On average, debit cards are used for 20 of these payments, while credit cards are used for just four. But despite the rise of contactless technology, older payment methods are still surviving. Some 546 million cheques were written in the UK in 2015, averaging about 10 cheques per adult per year. This is despite the fact that most retailers in the UK refuse to accept cheques.

It's difficult to contrast these figures directly with the US, but there are some broad comparison to be made. A study from 2012 found that cash accounted for 40 percent of payments in the US by volume, compared to the 45 percent figure in this recent Payments UK report. However, while almost half of UK credit and debit cards have contactless technology (and more than 90 percent of UK adults have a debit card), only 14 percent of Americans own a contactless card. These figures suggest that although the US is less dedicated to cash than the UK, new payment methods aren't as widespread.

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Why a glowing button might be more important than a touch-sensitive jacket sleeve

This year at Google I/O, its experimental ATAP division had not one, not two, but three mic drop moments. Project Jacquard, Project Soli, and Project Ara — all three are visions of how computers could work in the future. And all three seem like the sort of thing that will never really come to pass. But in two of the three cases, ATAP announced that they'reshipping, damn it, and doing it next year. And in the third (Soli), they're pushing very hard to ship as well.

Typically, when you see a wild technology idea go from the lab to store shelves, you end up with something quite a bit more pedestrian than the original idea. Concept cars at auto shows blow your hair back, but the actual production vehicles are lame by comparison. Jacquard, Google's project for touch-sensitive fabric, isn't entirely an exception. The touch-sensitive part of the jacket that Google is co-creating with Levi's is only on the left cuff. And to make it work, it requires a little flexible dongle that snaps into the cuff and pairs to your phone via Bluetooth.

That's not exactly the dream of touch-sensitive, computerized clothing that you can treat like any other piece of clothing. There's that dongle to charge (it should last two days). There's the fact that only one part of your clothing is touch sensitive. There's the fact that the jacket has "more than a modest premium" attached to the price, as Paul Dillinger, VP of global product innovation at Levi’s, puts it. Though he's quick to point out that "it's still definitely in the range" of Levi's other price points, this won't be the most expensive jacket Levi's sells.

But it is a solid first step. The work required to both create the flexible weave and then to make sure it could be mass produced is significant. It was just as hard to make it look good instead of looking like a cross-hatch tattoo of wires on your wrist. Close up, you have to know exactly what you're looking for to even see the tech: "The actual construction is a technical mistake," Dillinger. "It's called a missed pick in the weft. The structure of that mistake is actually what created this subtle, or authentic integrated sense for the patch."

While all the attention is on the magic of conductive, touch-sensitive area — for Ivan Poupyrev, technical program lead at Google’s ATAP, it might be the least interesting part right now. It's a problem he's already solved, and he is moving on to the next one and the one after that. He's paying attention to that little Bluetooth dongle that powers Jacquard. He's thinking a lot about buttons.
The button is "a central point of thinking," says Poupyrev. "That feels, to us, right. The device button on the jacket feels like the real thing." Someday, we'll continue shrinking down electronics so they can fit inside those buttons, and when that happens, companies like Levi's won't be limited to just making jackets.

"In the future, every [kind of garment can have] our technology woven in, and technologies added," Poupyrev says. "You can use it for other applications. Business wear, athletic wear ... we're looking very carefully at enterprise."

ATAP and Levi's worked together to craft the gestures that will work on the trucker jacket and the partners who can create apps that work with it. (ATAP isn't ready to just open it up to any developer yet — something of a common theme this year at Google I/O.) There will be eight or so gestures, all simple and designed to be easy to remember while you're riding a bike around the city.

And then there's that button. It lights up, sure, and that tiny little LED light looms larger in Poupyrev's mind than you might expect. That's because those lights are a signal — not that there's an incoming message, but that there's an incoming future — one where computers like the one in your pocket aren't going to be necessary anymore.

"I think in the future, it's going to come directly to the cloud, and you won't need the phone," Poupyrev says. To him, Jacquard isn't just about creating a remote control for your phone. That's a necessary half step, but it's not the final goal of creating ubiquitous computing. And so he's already working to minimize the phone's presence in your interactions with Jacquard: "We're talking about instead of using the phone, just using the phone as a connection directly to the services on the cloud services."

Dillinger puts it a little less technically: "Step one, put your phone away and get your face out of your screen. Step two, get rid of the phone. We've got time."

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Civil War's Arrested Development Easter egg shows why the Russos are perfect Marvel directors

Look closely during Captain America: Civil War’s biggest battle — that one in the Berlin airport, arguably one of the best superhero brawls committed to film. There’s a little Easter egg hidden in the background: the staircar from Arrested Development. It’s a perfect visual gag from directors Joe and Anthony Russo. Think about it: Arrested Development, which they had a hand in directing between 2003 and 2005, already trades on the kind of subtle background humor that you need to go back and hunt for. The show’s Easter eggs reference its hundreds of tiny, but rich stories. The smallest reference could carry a surprisingly dense backstory. The staircar’s appearance, fittingly, is no different.

But that one shot also encapsulates why the Russos are so well suited for directing Marvel’s biggest epics. It’s in ensemble sitcoms like Arrested Development, after all, that the Russos mastered the art of juggling colorful characters with interlocking storylines. That’s an essential skill for making a group like the Avengers work on the big screen, and as more and weirder characters are introduced into this ongoing saga, their ability will be crucial as Marvel barrels toward Avengers: Infinity War.

It should be clear by now that the Marvel Cinematic Universe is less a string of nominally linked action movies and more a sprawling meta-narrative involving leads hopping in and out of each other’s movies. Since 2012’s The Avengers, characters like Thor and Ant-Man may have their own solo outings, but they know each other, work together, and presumably go to one another’s birthday parties. That’s not that far from episodic television. The New York Times’ AO Scott wasn’t wrong when he cheekily described the film series as "a very expensive, perpetually renewed workplace sitcom."THE MARVEL CINEMATIC UNIVERSE IS LIKE A WORKPLACE SITCOM

Enter the Russos. After cutting their teeth on smaller films in the ‘90s and early 2000s, the pair broke out (at least in the TV-directing community) with ensemble shows like Arrested Development and Community. Before coming on to direct Captain America: The Winter Soldier, they were established as, to quote Vulture’s Adam Sternbergh, "crackerjack sitcom directors" adept at weaving weird character arcs together. Compared to stories involving "Advanced" Dungeons & Dragons and strange mother-son bonding, the Marvel mythos almost seems straightforward.

Working on television on those particular shows taught them a unique skill set that, while it may not make them household names, allows them to thrive within the pressure cooker that is Hollywood’s current tentpole-obsessed studio system. They not only have experience dealing with the lengthy schedules of making episodic television, but they also have an ingrained understanding of continuity.

And the MCU would be nothing without its dense continuity. As the 13th Marvel film, Civil War draws from eight years of storytelling and treats them as vital to the text. Just look at Iron Man and Captain America, the two pillars of the Avengers. Tony Stark, painted as an egomaniac since his on-screen debut in 2008, is now grappling with his guilt over the team putting innocents in danger for years. Cap, on the other hand, has a point of view rooted firmly in World War II, when America deemed it necessary to take charge as a global force for good. After seeing a compromised SHIELD collapse in Winter Soldier, it makes sense that he’d balk at any kind of committee oversight. This kind of movie myth-making is unprecedented, and requires deft hands to ensure fans and casual viewers understand what’s happening on-screen, often with a quick visual or quip that must say more than a full scene of spoken exposition. It’s fitting that those same deft hands helped make Gob Bluth’s "I’ve made a huge mistake" not only a running gag, but a pop cultural refrain.

No other studio has proven itself as effective as Marvel at balancing continuity with effective storytelling. March’s Batman v Superman: Dawn of Justice is the object lesson in how easy it is to fail at creating the foundation for a massive movie universe, even if Warner Bros. has no choice but to forge ahead. But Disney has struggled at times. Joss Whedon is widely (and rightly) credited with making the best Marvel movie ever in The Avengers. He brought an auteur’s vision to a summer extravaganza. But by the timeAvengers: Age of Ultron was on the docket, that vision wound up being incompatible to the MCU’s endlessly expanding narrative. The Russos, on the other hand, had a far better go of it with Civil War, even though the film was equally complex.

That’s likely because origin stories (even team origin stories like The Avengers) benefit from a singular vision. It’s why Marvel hired horror stylist Scott Derrickson for Doctor Strange and up-and-comer Ryan Coogler for Black Panther. Those movies will inevitably have a distinct sensibility. Team-up movies at this late stage require directors to shepherd other people’s approaches while working within boundaries. The Russos are already proven successes at that kind of directorial challenge, so it makes sense that when Whedon stepped down after Ultron they were able to to pick up the slack.

THE RUSSOS PULLED OFF WHAT COULD HAVE BEEN AN IMPOSSIBLE JUGGLING ACT WITH 'CIVIL WAR'

Consider this: Civil War, while certainly imperfect, brings the long-brewing conflict between Captain America and Iron Man to a head, adds depth to Bucky Barnes, reintroduces General Thaddeus Ross from The Incredible Hulk, introduces Black Panther and Wakanda, essentially revitalizes Spider-Man, and manages to cram all this into a movie that grapples with higher-order political questions about superheroes on the global stage. Pulling that off should be next to impossible, but it’s no accident the Russos managed to do so with a modicum of grace — and the help the producer Kevin Feige, of course, who deserves plenty of credit in this miracle.

Of course, as Marvel’s "Phase Three" shifts into high gear, things are only going to get crazier and more complicated. As such, it’s easy to expect the next two Avengers movies to be even more challenging, and it’s an open question whether or not the Russos are up to that task. But if just one Russo could make an episode of Community about foosball and Abed dressing up like Batman both make sense and one of the best episodes the show produced, the MCU’s endgame might be in the best hands possible.

on Sunday, May 22, 2016

AudioQuest's NightHawk headphones sound as beautiful as they look

Modern life is too full of disposable things. From the simplest pen to the smartest phone, we just consume our way through a litany of gadgets, tools, and devices without ever stopping to truly appreciate them. AudioQuest's NightHawk headphones, however, demand to be treated differently. Nothing about these cans has come from some generic shelf, and they're built and presented as something that will stay with you for years. With an eye-grabbing design and an emotion-stirring sound, the NightHawks are one of the most unique sets of headphones out there.

It's impossible to tell the NightHawk story without recounting some of AudioQuest's history. This California company has been making audio cables since 1980, building a reputation among audiophiles with a penchant for extravagant over-engineering. I have my doubts about the tangible benefits of expensive cables, but I don't doubt AudioQuest's sound expertise, which manifested itself in 2012 with the critically acclaimed DragonFly digital-to-analog converter. That tiny USB accessory was the first sign of AudioQuest exploring markets beyond the fanatical audiophile community, and 2015's NightHawks are the company's arrival in the mainstream.

These $600 headphones aren't intended for sound purists. AudioQuest might claim they are, but the truth is that their sound is too smooth, mellow, and alluring to be considered neutral. Like the lacquered finish of their ear cups, the NightHawks sound pretty and polished. You won't hear any harsh treble, even when it exists in the original recording. Opinions will be split on whether that's a good or a bad thing, but I happen to think it's great and I suspect most people who just want to enjoy their music will agree.

Before I get too deep into how the NightHawks sound, I have to recount the experience of actually wearing them. It is, in a word, sublime. Okay, another few words: sumptuous, luxurious, awesome. The comfort of these headphones is beyond reproach, thanks to their self-adjusting strap and ingenious suspension design. I don't have to tinker with notches to adjust the size of the headband; it just stretched to accommodate me. The clamping force around my cranium is perfectly distributed across the full width of the headband, and because the ear cups attach via a suspension system, I can adjust each one independently with ease.

It's easy to overlook the importance of fit with something like a pair of headphones, but it's the most fundamental requirement. I loved the sound of Beyerdynamic's T5p.2s, but wearing them over long periods of time was fatiguing. Unlike the perfectly circular cups on Beyerdynamic's cans, AudioQuest uses a D-shaped cup that better adheres to the ear's natural shape. The NightHawks' synthetic leather pads just ensconce the ear in soft and velvety loveliness. I've ridden in Bentleys and Rolls-Royces and Ferraris, and not one of those experiences has been as comfortable as these headphones.

The biggest downside to AudioQuest's design is practicality. The NightHawks' size — they're very large and oh so very eye-catching — and semi-open architecture make them unsuitable for outdoor use. I mean, I would wear them outside my home, but I doubt many others would, and these cans just don't have the sound isolation to contend with street noise. One curious thing: though the NightHawks are described as semi-open, they dooffer a level of noise suppression that approaches that of a closed-back headphone. I sense no difference between them and the nominally closed-back Beyer T5p.2s. AudioQuest's secret sauce is a custom diffuser grille behind each driver, which was inspired by the diamond-cubic latticework of a butterfly's wings.

EVEN THE CASE IMPARTS A SENSE OF LUXURY

AudioQuest complements the NightHawks with a handsome synthetic leather case, which also serves as the headphones' retail packaging (bonus marks for sustainability). It's got hard sides and a smooth fabric finish on the inside that really augments the whole premium, luxurious feel. Two cables are provided for the NightHawks, as you might expect from a company with expertise in cables, with the thinner one offering gold-plated plugs and a slightly warmer sound. The more sophisticated cable has silver-plated connectors and high-purity solid copper conductors, borrowing some of AudioQuest's high-end loudspeaker interconnect tech. One minor issue with both is that you'll get plenty of microphonics — hearing the cable rubbing against your chest — when wearing the headphones without having anything playing.

I've been listening to AudioQuest's NightHawks for a few months now, primarily comparing them against the aforementioned pair of Beyerdynamic T5p.2s. The remarkable thing is that the NightHawks hang in that fight, in spite of being roughly half the price of the $1,099 Beyers. For sheer purity and accuracy of sound, Beyerdynamic wins, of course. However if I'm picking a pair of headphones for a day's leisurely listening, I'd opt for the NightHawks. When I needed to lend my mother headphones to watch a movie with, I handed her the NightHawks, knowing their fuss-free fit, excellent comfort, and impressively wide soundstage will serve her well. For regular humans that seek a painless and frictionless listening experience, the NightHawks are an easy recommendation.

AUDIOQUEST TUNED THE NIGHTHAWKS TO BE PLEASURABLE AND NOT FATIGUING

As I noted above, the aesthetic smoothness and polish of the NightHawks extends into their sound as well. Treble response from these headphones is present, but deemphasized. You won't lose any meaningful detail while listening to them; it'll just be less pronounced than on headphones tuned for a more prominent high end. Remember that treble is where all the most fatiguing and screeching notes live, so less of them just makes for a happier, more pleasant sound. Is that perfectly faithful to the original recording? No. But is it more enjoyable over longer periods of time? Heck yes.

The part of the sound spectrum where the NightHawks do most of their work is the low end, where they rumble and grumble with a satisfyingly full and rich bass. It can be a little too much at times, such as when watching John Wick thrashing his 1969 Mustang around an airfield, but that's really the exception. It might not be neutral — whatever that even means — but I enjoy the NightHawks' warm presentation, which makes voices sound a little huskier and more full-bodied than other headphones. There's a pleasing balance to everything, and the best way I can describe the NightHawks is that they just sound musical. All instruments are beautifully and dynamically recreated, from strings, to percussion, to brass, to piano, and these headphones are just as adept at handling the synths and drum machines popular in electronic music.

Put on some hip hop or EDM and you'll hear the NightHawks at their best. London artist Burial's eponymous album sounds utterly enthralling through these headphones. It's more of an urban soundscape than a musical composition, meandering through a series of drawling, bleak melodies — which can sound tepid with lesser headphones, but are given the right treatment from the bass-loving NightHawks. Booka Shade's Movements is another favorite of mine, with a multi-genre diversity that tests headphones' versatility. It also sounds great on the NightHawks. Okay, some of the snares aren't as punchy as I might hear them on, say, the Noble Audio Kaiser 10s, but then I wouldn't listen to the K10s for hours on end the way I would with the NightHawks. There are some songs that I'm simply afraid of listening to on the typically tuned high-end headphones, but the more relaxed NightHawks let me blast anything and everything.

At $600, the NightHawks are clearly a premium-class set of headphones. You could probably get a matching set of his and hers Beats cans for that much. But here's the difference between a pair of Beats and a pair of NightHawks: quality. The NightHawks offer bass that is not only plentiful, but also silky smooth. Their soundstage is exemplary, their musicality unquestionable. And the way they fit is probably the best of any set of over-the-ear headphones out there. I've certainly never worn a more comfortable pair of headphones. With their unique design and thoughtful engineering, the NightHawks are the antithesis of the disposable gadget. You might like a pair of Beats, but you'd never love them the way you would the NightHawks.

AudioQuest's first and only pair of headphones is one of those products that make my job as a reviewer an enjoyable one. I can happily, gleefully recommend them. No, they're not a precision instrument for audio diagnostics, but we're not talking about stethoscopes here. As I wrote earlier this year, headphones are a tool of entertainment, first and foremost, and that's where the AudioQuest NightHawks succeed. They fit like earmuffs, they are built with assiduous attention to detail and no small measure of ingenuity, and they have a gorgeous case to transport and keep them safe in. What's not to love?

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Will virtual reality kill the YouTube comment?

When Google revealed that it was rebuilding YouTube for its new Daydream virtual reality initiative, I began wondering what would happen to one of the platform's notorious weak spots: the comments, often vitriolic or racist or generally incoherent, that cluster under videos. The answer, apparently, is that Google doesn't know.

"A lot of those things are still coming together, so I can't give you a concrete answer right now," Google's VR czar Clay Bavor told me. "I think we're learning a lot about what's interesting and what works in VR, and so certainly many of the familiar elements — I don't know that those all will be there." For a second opinion, I turned to YouTube product manager Kurt Wilms, whose response was just as noncommittal. "We're still working through exactly what we'll do related to comments," he said. "But we're trying to bring as much of the functionality that makes sense to interact [with] in this experience."

The first Daydream phones aren't coming out until this fall, so Google still has months to make a call on including comments. But it will be dealing with what is, at this point, a very familiar question: are comments worth saving? And if they are, what should they look like in an experience that encompasses the viewer's entire world?
YouTube comments are notoriously bad, and fixing them has never seemed high on Google's priority list. But Daydream could change that. Like many VR platforms, its creators are desperate to create a welcoming environment for users. Web services are so entrenched that there's no real incentive to make things better: if you hate YouTube, you still probably can't avoid it. But if Google can't actively draw people into things like YouTube for Daydream, then Daydream — and possibly virtual reality itself — dies. That threat has already gotten Google to lock down specs for Android phones and curate Play Store apps in a way it's never done before, and it wouldn't be surprising to see it crack down on content as well.

The simplest answer would be to just kill the comment. VR is a rich, attention-focusing medium, so the ideal method of reading comments — scrolling for a few seconds to scan the occasional sentence for something interesting — no longer works in quite the same way. At the very least, comments would need to be hidden behind a menu, and even then Google's going to have to decide whether there's enough signal in there to justify putting the noise on full blast. Do you want to pause your fully immersive virtual travel experience to see someone rant about the international Jewish conspiracy?

But while I wouldn't exactly mourn the loss of YouTube comments, just doing away with them would feel like a missed opportunity to explore what online interactions should look like in VR. Right now, social VR overwhelmingly refers to live virtual meetings, whether that's a one-on-one call or a group event. There's very little of what we think of as social networking: posting communications that people can view and respond to at their leisure. And there's even less interaction with actual content inside VR, whether that's sharing it, commenting on it, or responding to it with your own work. Facebook announced a few months ago that it would add liking and sharing to videos in the Gear VR, but that's just a first step. Right now, we've got lots of virtual chat rooms and virtual TV channels, and not a whole lot in between.

Oculus and Facebook are putting real effort into figuring out what kind of social interactions we can have in VR, and so are many independent companies. But Google is right in the middle of overhauling a massive platform that's ripe for experimentation. Nobody is in a better position to figure out how we can communicate with each other in VR, beyond mimicking face-to-face meetings. And Google's messaging service Allo, which it announced at I/O, is already leaning heavily into messages that rely on doodles and emoji — things that could translate well into VR — instead of pure text.

The catch, of course, is that virtual reality won't fix people. That requires a trial-and-error process of creating incentives for good behavior and moderating bad actors, something that online games are getting better at but social platforms either ignore or simply can't manage at a huge scale. And it's going to be a bigger deal than ever before in virtual reality, not because VR is more "realistic," but because we've still got a chance to decide what kind of spaces we want.

So far, the VR online community has mostly been small enough to patch problems when they crop up. But if Google has its way, Daydream will change that very quickly — and whoever builds the bones of the system will determine what grows out of it.

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