The recent past has been quite turbulent for Peloton. After the ups and downs of the pandemic economy came a rash of bad press spurred by a string of tragic product-related accidents. The resulting stock dips and executive shake-ups put the fitness tech company's future in flux. But now, Peloton is trying something new. Or at least new-ish. The Peloton Guide is a device with a camera that sits on your TV and monitors your workout. (Just don't call it a Kinect.) It's far more modest than Peloton's large, fancy stationary bikes and treadmills, and something Peloton hopes will lure in more subscribers. Still, it's another bet on our continued interest in at-home workouts—a market that may not be as robust as Peloton hoped it was.
This week on Gadget Lab, WIRED executive editor Brian Barrett joins us for a conversation about Peloton's newest product and the company's future.
Show Notes
Read Lauren’s story about the new Peloton Guide. Here’s Adrienne So’s review of the Guide.
Recommendations
Brian recommends the novel Middlemarch by George Eliot. Lauren recommends the Apple TV+ show WeCrashed. Mike recommends the memoir The History of Bones by John Lurie.
Brian Barrett can be found on Twitter @brbarrett. Lauren Goode is @LaurenGoode. Michael Calore is @snackfight. Bling the main hotline at @GadgetLab. The show is produced by Boone Ashworth (@booneashworth). Our theme music is by Solar Keys.
How to Listen
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Transcript
Michael Calore: Lauren.
Lauren Goode: Mike.
Michael Calore: Lauren, are you still Pelotoning?
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Lauren Goode: Even the way you ask that! I mean, not as much as I did last year, but yes, I am still Pelotoning.
Michael Calore: Have the cult leaders called you back in for a meeting?
Lauren Goode: Oh, the cult leaders! Well, actually I did meet with Peloton recently, but it was not about the bike.
Michael Calore: I can't wait to hear all about it.
Lauren Goode: Well, you're going to.
Brian Barrett: Me too.
[Gadget Lab intro theme music plays]
Michael Calore: Hi everyone. Welcome to Gadget Lab. I am Michael Calore. I'm a senior editor at WIRED.
Lauren Goode: And I'm Lauren Goode. I'm a senior writer at WIRED.
Michael Calore: And we are also joined in person this week by WIRED's executive editor, Brian Barrett. Brian, welcome back to the show.
Brian Barrett: Yeah. Thank you all for having me and so great to see you in person.
Lauren Goode: Yes. You came all the way from Alabama just to talk about Peloton.
Brian Barrett: Yup. I caught a plane right before this, and I'm getting on another one right after this.
Lauren Goode: So you go home to your Peloton.
Brian Barrett: Well, yeah, get back. And I got 45 minute Power Zone endurance class.
Michael Calore: Well, today we are asking you to drop your shoulders and drop your baggage. Inhale the good shit. Exhale the bullshit. Lauren, you edited this script, didn't you?
Lauren Goode: I did. I did. I had to put that in there.
Michael Calore: Well, OK. If you haven't figured it out already, we are talking about Peloton today. It has been a long year for the streaming exercise company, there have been catastrophic accidents and a product recall, as well as some depictions of Peloton in popular culture that were not exactly flattering. And after the company overestimated consumer demand for its stationary bikes during the pandemic, Peloton's longtime CEO was pushed out and a new one, a seasoned chief financial officer was appointed head of the company. But now there is a brand-new Peloton product, and it's not a bike and it's not a treadmill. It is, in fact, a camera. It looks and kind of works like an old Microsoft Kinect. Lauren, you recently went to Peloton’s labs in New York City and got a first look at this new device, which is called the Guide. Tell us what the Guide is. Is Peloton betting the farm on this new device?
Lauren Goode: Short answer is no. Peloton is not betting the farm on the Guide. But this Guide thing is part of a broader effort to hook more subscribers and also to keep up a regular product release cadence so that current subscribers stick with Peloton. And I should note that the Peloton Guide is mostly geared, at least right now, towards weightlifting and strength workouts.
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Michael Calore: OK. So what does it look like and how does it work?
Lauren Goode: Yeah. So this is a good question. When I first heard about the Guide, and this was months ago, I thought maybe it had infrared sensors like the Microsoft Kinect and that it was just sort of inferring your body movements. But it's an actual camera. It's like a set-top box, although one Peloton cofounder told me that is the worst word to use. He thinks it's a lot more than a set-top box, but it is this streaming media box that plugs into the back of your TV via HTMI cable, and it's got its own code base, it's running its own OS. It's running an instance of the Peloton app that's different from the Peloton app on the bike or on the tread. And then it's got this full camera that captures what you're doing as you’re weightlifting or doing strength training and it places you along the instructor, on the screen.
Michael Calore: OK. So is it like tracking your arm movements and tracking your weight lifting movements and things like that?
Lauren Goode: Yes. There is something, it's a new feature to the Peloton app, it's called the movement tracker. It looks like a little bit of sweat. I don't know. That's probably not the best way to … That's what it looks like. It looks like a droplet of sweat, that appears on the screen and as you are doing your reps, whether it's bicep curls or lunges or squats, the sweat tracker, the movement tracker is sort of being filled in because Peloton is recording how many reps you're doing. There is obviously some machine learning and artificial intelligence involved in making this happen. Peloton says, this is all happening on device, that it is not storing this information and sending it to the cloud.
It's also, I think, maybe a little bit limited at this point in terms of what it is telling you to do. It's not telling you like, "Straighten your back" or "Turn your arm at a 90." “Just your shoulders just went back, that was very good” or saying, like, "Hold your arm in a 90-degree angle." It's not quite that granular yet, but it can tell that you're doing some sort of movement. And so it's recording that.
Brian Barrett: When you say yet, is the intention that it will give tips on technique and things, because I can see the real utility here being, especially for now, so it's like, don't do this in a way that's going to hurt yourself. Is that the plan that they're going to build that in eventually or?
Lauren Goode: I tried asking that a few different ways and I didn't get a clear answer on that. I mean, I think ultimately, yes, I think this is Peloton’s first step into really better understanding your body as you're using this exercise equipment. And so part of that is probably going to be giving you more helpful or insightful feedback over time. But for now, one of the primary benefits you'll get from this is just, it knows which body parts you have worked out based on the strength workouts that you've chosen to do. It knows approximately how many reps you have done and is scoring you on that accordingly. And then next time you go to log in to this app on your television, through this set-top box, you will see sort of this heat map of your body that shows the areas where you have been concentrating your workouts on and it'll suggest to you, it'll say, like, "Your next workout should be X."
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So for example, I will do squats all day long. I mean, not literally, but I prefer to do like lower body exercises and lunges and that sort of thing. And so I gravitate towards those, and now when I fire up the Guide, there's a recommendation that I take, Jess Sims' 20-minute upper-body class, which will inevitably involve a lot of pushups, which I will hate but I should probably be doing. And so it's starting to make personalized recommendations over time.
Michael Calore: So this is a whole new realm for the company. It's not like it's putting you in front of a touchscreen tablet on a treadmill or on a bike. It's not asking you to put on a pair of earbuds and go walking or running out in the woods. It's plugging into your television and taking over like a different part of your home.
Lauren Goode: Right. And you could argue that the company has already done that because the mobile app is popular. I see Brian nodding here.
Brian Barrett: I use, at some point, the app on Roku, but I guess it's also interesting because it's like it feels like a similar thing to a Tonal or a Mirror, but without extra equipment. It's just sort of using what you have in your house already.
Lauren Goode: Yeah. That's a reasonable comparison to make, certainly. Because those are also focused on either giving you that instant feedback of looking at yourself and seeing if you're doing the exercise properly, and supposedly giving you motivation based on that, or strength training in the case of Tonal. Their form factors are different. Tonal requires you to install it into the wall. There are these digital strength cables that you're supposed to use or that they're physical cables, but they provide some kind of digital resistance. Mirror, which sold to Lululemon, I mean I used it very briefly. I did not think it was all that great. It didn't really offer the same kind of … I don't know, it didn't have the same kind of PZA as Peloton. I think the same kind of personalities and draw and stickiness of Peloton. But yes, similar idea, but in this case, Peloton's sort of execution of it was, why don't we just make it this tiny box that you plug into your TV and just put a camera in it.
Brian Barrett: I have another question. As a Peloton user, and I take the strength classes too, sometimes. Is this a whole new set of classes that are Guide-specific or can you use any strength class with this? Because if they're showing you alongside the instructor, I would imagine that lends itself to some moves rather than others.
Lauren Goode: Good question. There is a specific set of classes that are designated for the Guide, they're called, I don't know, strength. They're just in the category of strength classes, but then you have to look for that movement tracker symbol, but eventually they're probably going to move this into another quote unquote modality. So you can picture like doing yoga classes or something with the Guide. And I also think too, the camera, maybe there's potential for it to be more social because like Peloton right now on the treadmill and on the bike, they have cameras. And no, have you ever used yours?
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Brian Barrett: No, I have tape over mine.
Lauren Goode: Like a good former cybersecurity reporter. Respect. Yeah. I think I've used mine once or twice, and every time we've done it, my friends and I have said this is bad. Let's just Facetime.
Brian Barrett: Why are we doing this?
Lauren Goode: And why are we doing this? And if someone ever just kind of dropped in while I was in a class, I would be like, "What are you doing?" So I think when Peloton first put those cameras on the bikes, there was this idea that maybe they would be used for social purposes as you were on the bike and I really don't know anyone who uses it. So maybe part of the goal here is that eventually you will be able to live stream with your friends and then an instructor and take a live class and have a more communal experience.
I mean, this is all very ironic because this is happening as we are slowly emerging from pandemic life, from quarantine and this product has actually been in the works since 2019. So it was a pre pandemic vision that they had. And now it's finally shipping. So people are starting to go back to gyms. Data show that people are returning to boutique fitness studios and that kind of thing. And Peloton is still just like, "Nope, you should use this in your home because this is going to be what you need for strength training and maybe yoga and some other stuff too."
Brian Barrett: Do you get a sense that Peloton sees this as on the same tier as the bike and the tread? Is this the third leg of their pillow stool or is this just sort of a, we'll give it a try? Yeah. I said it, third leg of their pillow stool. Do you guys do T-shirts? Do you guys do merch? We can make a T-shirt. We should do a pillow stool. We should. That's probably a licensing question.
Lauren Goode: We better be careful because they're going to look to hire Brian for their marketing department after that one.
Brian Barrett: Yeah. Seriously?
Lauren Goode: Yes and no. I mean, I don't think … Look, it's a nicely designed little piece of hardware. So far I've been impressed with the software. It's not as heavy duty as a biker, a treadmill, for obvious reasons. They're also pricing it a little bit differently. So the Guide itself will cost $295 in the US. They're even introducing kind of a new subscription tier with this, at least temporarily. And no, I don't mean I would be surprised if as many of these sold as they've sold of the bikes. Then again, it's a lot easier to ship.
Brian Barrett: Well, no, I guess I ask because it does seem like a pretty narrow market. I feel like the actual need it's addressing, just having a hard time thinking of how many people would pay for that. You already get those strength classes if you already got the equipment at home and you've got the app at home, the idea of something that for now basically counts your reps for you and reminds you that you worked tri's yesterday, in case you forgot.
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Lauren Goode: In case you forgot.
Brian Barrett: It just seems like a tough … I guess what I'm saying, I'm eager to see how it grows and how it can apply its AI more smartly and work on form and give that more added value than what it seems to be doing now.
Lauren Goode: Your skepticism is well-founded.
Brian Barrett: Yes.
Lauren Goode: And I would say, I would love for you to try this, given that we have compared many notes on Peloton over the years. It's funny, there are times when Brian DMs me and he's like, “LAUREN” in all caps, and I'm thinking, oh God, what news is breaking? And he's like, "Have you tried Dennis Mo's new class?" And I'm like, oh, OK. All right, good. It was just that. And yes, I will. I'll get right on the bike. But yeah, I would love for you to try it and see if you feel any more motivated to do the strength-training classes just by using this thingy, this set-top box slash camera. Because on the one hand, yes, why would you spend $300 for that when you can just use the mobile app and not have any kind of instant feedback and just do the same strength-training workouts?
On the other hand, when Peloton first came out with the spin bike, the exercise bike, a lot of people said, "Why do I need a $2,000 spin bike with this giant tablet on it?" And then it cultivated this whole community. So maybe they manage to do that with this. What's the phrase way we say at the end of the stories we don't know how to finish?
Brian Barrett: Time will tell.
Lauren Goode: Time will tell.
Michael Calore: Remains to be seen.
Lauren Goode: Remains to be seen. We're going to have to ship you one of these Guides, Brian. I'm very curious.
Brian Barrett: I am too. You know how I can tell what muscle groups I worked at last time?
Lauren Goode: Because you're sore.
Brian Barrett: Yeah. Whatever hurts.
Lauren Goode: That means you're doing something, right?
Brian Barrett: Yeah. It's because I do it so infrequently that every time I jump back in it's like, "Oh, OK. Well, that part hurts." So I'll wait until it doesn't hurt and then I'll do it again.
Lauren Goode: Yes.
Michael Calore: All right. Let's take a quick break and when we come back, we will have some more Pelo talk.
[Break]
Michael Calore: So Peloton has not had a great last 12 months. It's streaming workouts surged in popularity during quarantine. But as a result, the company wildly overestimated demand for its bikes and built more of them than the people out there were willing to buy. And so in February of this year, the company got a new CEO, fired a fifth of its workforce and took a massive stock. But that doesn't mean that Peloton is exactly failing. It's still got one of the highest user retention rates in the industry and it's still selling a bunch of products. Now, Brian, we brought you on because you understand all of the subtle forces of the stock market.
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Brian Barrett: Every single one of them.
Michael Calore: Please tell us, is Peloton going to fail?
Brian Barrett: Well, thank you for recognizing my stock genius. It's what I'm known for here and elsewhere. No, I think though it is healthy to separate that out the stock price from will Peloton succeed in the long run. Because the stock price was very, very, very high, but because Peloton had sort of anticipated that the pandemic boom would never bust for itself. And clearly it did. But now with the new CEO, it still has a good user base, a loyal user base. It still sells a lot of bikes. The supply chain issues seem to be largely resolved. The stock is crawling back up slowly as of when we recorded this, when this comes out, who knows? Greater at it again. But I think Peloton is succeeding in that it still has a product. You would think that by now there would be a competitive exercise bike product or a competitive tread product that really ate significantly into what it was doing.
I don't know that's the case. There's Echelon, which is a lower price point competitor based out of Chattanooga, Tennessee.
Michael Calore: They make excellent devices. We've reviewed some of them, high marks.
Brian Barrett: Nordic Track has some devices like that. But I think Peloton is still holding a steady market share. They're competing with gyms and people going back to work. I have all always worked from home, so I'm a bad use case. I still use my Peloton a lot. I'm a loyalist. Sometimes when I Slack Lauren in all caps, I think I literally, at one point said, "I hope Peloton is OK." Like have a parasocial relationship with the company and its employees. So I think what we can look at Peloton in the future is a company that is not as world beating is the one it had presented itself as, but still can be healthy and enduring based on a really strong and loyal user base.
I do think they need to grow into other markets. I don't know that the Guide is what's going to do it, who knows? But I start to think there have been rumors for a long time about, will they have a ROI machine? Basically just that. But I'm curious to see how they grow and continue to attract new people because I do think, and especially when it gets more competitive in terms of when do people start poaching Peloton instructors? When does Apple start snapping up some of their marque talent? How does that affect thing? So I don't know, it's curious, see how it goes. But again, I think they have a really intense loyal fan base and it's also a product that just works the way that you want it to and expect it to. And I think there's only a handful of those that really feel worth it these days.
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I think Peloton, Roku, an iPhoners are the three pieces of hardware that I am consistently not annoyed at, which is my bar. It's stuff that just works the way you want it to and you feel like you got what you paid for. I had a Sonos device-
Lauren Goode: Oh yeah, Sonos. Have you tried Apple Fitness Plus?
Brian Barrett: I have not. I have a trial subscription available to me, because I recently took the plunge and got an Apple watch, but I have not activated it yet. I don't think I'm going to.
Michael Calore: The subscription?
Brian Barrett: The subscription.
Michael Calore: You activated the watch.
Brian Barrett: Well, yeah, I did. No, I don't think I'm going to. Because again, I think part of the Peloton, they have structured classes and instructors that I know that I like and that I respond to and I know what I'm getting and I'm not. I don't really feel the need to look elsewhere, which is saying a lot, I think. I don't really feel the need to compare it. I think also in terms of the bike, having everything integrated into the bike just feels like a much better experience than the tablet. The thing I would potentially try it is for outdoor runs. Would potentially try apple fitness but again, I think Peloton has a really good offering there too. And I'm really happy with what I got. So yeah. I have not tried it yet.
Lauren Goode: So Brian, let's say Peloton was not OK and bigger tech companies were kicking the tires and they ended up getting acquired. Who do you think makes the most sense there?
Brian Barrett: And I know this is one of the main rumor that I saw and I think it does make sense. I think Amazon makes sense because they can just fold it into Prime potentially. They've got the distribution channels, which Peloton desperately needs help with. They've got the subscription model, which Peloton plays into. I would be sad if that happened, partly because was also an Ero customer. I was annoyed that all of a sudden my router was controlled by Amazon when I had not intended for that to happen. I think I'd feel similarly about Peloton. I don't know. I mean, you could see, it's an Apple quality hardware, I don't know that apple would acquire a third party hardware company though. I don't know.
Michael Calore: Know. And, I mean, if you buy Peloton, you're buying the platform. You're buying the instructors, the user base, the experience. It would have to be something that slotted neatly into the way that Apple likes to present those things.
Lauren Goode: Right. And Apple also likes to keep things tightly controlled and mostly behind a wall and Peloton is pretty accessible, I mean, price point aside, but it's available to anyone really. It's actually running on a giant Android tablet and you don't need an Apple watch to use it. It's a nice little addition, but it's not limited in those ways and apples a much more closed ecosystem. What about, what was the other one that was floated? Oh, Nike was I think one of the-
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Brian Barrett: Yeah. I mean, Nike makes sense on a few levels I guess, but it also gets away from their core competence like the idea of … Because again, it's the platform. And Nike has some experience partnering with Apple and others on the software bit. But it just seems like a leap to, all of a sudden you own this giant platform and all the hardware. It feels like it would be a lot for them to take on outside of their areas of expertise potentially. Like there's a fitness alignment, it's hard to see a lot of other alignments on it. The other tech giants maybe. You could see Google doing it because Google has had interest there before with Fitbit, in the health space. They don't have anything like this while Apple is moving into it. Microsoft buys random things all the time. So this could be a random thing for Microsoft to buy.
Lauren Goode: You can check your LinkedIn from Peloton. Microsoft buys it.
Brian Barrett: I mean, it kind of makes it weird. I think Microsoft to me is-
Lauren Goode: Maybe going to GitHub for a bit.
Michael Calore: Cortana, let's do some yoga.
Lauren Goode: Oh God.
Brian Barrett: Wow. Well and honestly, I mean, if they brought you the Kinect, they know what to do with the Guide. And Microsoft also tends to enjoy owning random social networks, LinkedIn, Minecraft.
Lauren Goode: Yammer.
Brian Barrett: Skype, Yammer.
Lauren Goode: Wow. We're dating ourselves.
Brian Barrett: So yeah, I don't know. But I hope that doesn't happen. Not just for my own personal interest in the ways I think it would change. Plus, I think it's important that independent hardware companies can make it on their own. I think that we have seen so much consolidation and there's really just a handful of companies that make really good hardware that don't get either bought up or can't go the distance, because they run out of money, ran out of runway. And Lauren, I know you've written about this recently, but I think Peloton is a good example that you can make something great outside of those closed systems or those established giants, and that's so rare. So I'd like to see them make it.
It is. It's becoming increasingly rare. There's too much consolidation happening, I think. And that's not good. It's not good for customers. It's not good for people who are trying to innovate. And I would be sad if Peloton got acquired by one of the big tech giants. I'm not quite sure why, I'm sure I could go down the list of all the companies we just talked about and find some reason why that would maybe affect the user experience or be disappointing in some way. But I'd prefer for it to stay independent. Now here's an idea, what if Peloton, just like pie in the sky, what if they bought a company like Strava? Because Strava is also one of the few subscription based fitness companies that has remained independent, lots of venture funding there and not a publicly traded company like Peloton but independent regardless. And they're focused on the outdoor space.
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Lauren Goode: Strava's just not the same. You can share your Peloton ride to Strava or your yoga class to Strava, but really they're focused on utilizing GPS either on your bike, outdoors, or your smartphone, or your garment watch. And Peloton doesn't really have an outdoor strategy. Those outdoor runs we talked about, but …
Michael Calore: Which is why I tend to think of possible companies that they could partner with or they could be purchased by and I think of Under Armor. They have done the MapMyRide, MapMyRun acquisitions, and really folded that into the experience. They have experience with hardware, they have experience with social networks. That's a partnership that could work.
Lauren Goode: Didn't they buy MyFitnessPal, Under Armor?
Brian Barrett: Yeah.
Michael Calore: Something that has shocked me is that Netflix has not gotten into fitness in the last two years. It's this giant streaming service that is already piped into everybody's homes. And they had that partnership with Head Space where you could watch the videos the taught you meditation.
Lauren Goode: They did that with Vox Media, right?
Michael Calore: Yeah. As soon as I saw that, I was like, "OK, well here come the Netflix yoga hour and the Netflix 20 minute workout and the Netflix 40 minute workout." But it just never happened.
Brian Barrett: They're doing video games, they went the other direction with it.
Lauren Goode: That's right. They're going to be doing interactive stuff. So I did actually ask one of the Peloton cofounders, Tom Cortesi, about the Guide specifically. When I referred to it as a set-top box and he was like, "That's the worst thing you can call it." And I said, "Yeah, but it is. It plug into your TV and it gives you this experience in your TV." And I kind of wondered, is it a crazy idea to think that maybe this could eventually power, be part of a bundle where you get like HBO max and Peloton, as part of a bundle or Netflix and Peloton is part of a bundle. And this box actually becomes like your TV box, it's what serves up all this stuff and it's a optimized for Peloton. I'm paraphrasing, but he says something along the lines of like, "Our goal is really not to optimize your HBO max watch time. We want you to be using Peloton."
Brian Barrett: To circle back to another thing. In addition to the Guide, they also introduced Lanebreak, which is sort of a gamified bike experience. And I guess Lauren, when you look at those two as sort of the latest innovations for Peloton. Is that encouraging to you or does that feel like a company that doesn't quite know how to keep growing?
Lauren Goode: That's an excellent question because with something like Lanebreak, it definitely feels like an experiment or like it's a little bit supplemental to the core riding experience in the bike. Have you tried it yet?
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Brian Barrett: I tried it one time.
Lauren Goode: And that was it? One and done.
Brian Barrett: One and done.
Lauren Goode: You're not compelled to go back?
Brian Barrett: Not really. I've got sort of my set. I like doing my power zone classes, I don't stray.
Lauren Goode: You like Dennis and Matt, I get it. Yeah. You guys have to bro out.
Brian Barrett: And Ben. Yeah.
Lauren Goode: I've done Lanebreak three times, I think. And I do like it. I would go back to it. And mostly because I was not distracted. Other classes I might like be like, "I should check my phone." With Lane Break, you have to actually be engaged. Yeah. I mean, the way I think about these new product launches is that these are holdovers from an earlier era. Like Guide we know has been in the work since 2019. Lanebreak has been in the works for at least a little while. And so these were part of a strategy from a year or three ago and now they're just rolling out. And so I think the big question is going to be, under this new leadership at Peloton, now with Barry McCarthy as CEO, they just hired a new operations lead, they're just kind of moving things around in the executive ranks, whether or not truly innovative stuff comes out of Peloton in the coming six to 12 months. I think that's the bigger question.
Michael Calore: All right. Well, let's wrap it right there. We'll take a break and when we come back, we'll do our recommendations.
[Break]
Michael Calore: All right, welcome back. We are now at that portion of our show where we have the guest and then the hosts, recommend something to our listeners that they might enjoy. Brian, you are our guest, you get to go first. What is your recommendation?
Brian Barrett: My recommendation is Middlemarch by George Elliot,
Michael Calore: Middlemarch by George Elliot.
Brian Barrett: The novel Middlemarch by George Elliot, a pen name. I was an English major. Both my parents are English teachers. I had never read Middlemarch. So until …
Michael Calore: We're laughing because one of our listeners was annoyed at our show and decided to unsubscribe and does not listen anymore because we are a bunch of, in their words, millennial English majors.
Brian Barrett: Well, I'm a grand millennial. First of all, I'm right on the cusp. I'm generation Y, also known as the zillennials.
Michael Calore: Zillennials. Yeah.
Brian Barrett: Well, you can edit that out if you want, but I am who I am.
Michael Calore: Yeah, no, please.
Brian Barrett: And I'm reading Middlemarch. And you all can send me as many emails as you want about it, but it's great literature, which sounds like you could use, ya heathens. Middlemarch. I was just going to recommend it because I'm enjoying it, but now I'm recommending it because you need it.
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Michael Calore: So what is the thing about Middlemarch that makes you urge other people to read it?
Brian Barrett: It's a very long novel, but basically, as I read it, almost every page is something that's really revelatory about humans and how they work and how they think. It goes on some really fun tangents and diversions into scientific philosophy, so there's something for the science people in there. And it's really the kind of thing where you read it and you think, wow, it's impressive that other people kept trying to write novels after this, because this one kind of did it. Kind of did the thing that novels are supposed to do about as well as you're going to do it. I highly recommend it. It's very worth it.
Lauren Goode: When was it written?
Brian Barrett: It was written a long time ago.
Michael Calore: In the 1800s?
Brian Barrett: It was written in the late 1800s and it takes place in the mid 1800s, which is an important distinction.
Lauren Goode: And George Elliot was Maryanne Evans.
Brian Barrett: Correct, she wrote other—
Lauren Goode: Also an English major.
Brian Barrett: There you go.
Lauren Goode: I don't know, I'm guessing.
Brian Barrett: And she wrote under a pen name because she was worried she would not be taken as seriously, unless she had a man's name, which is terrible.
Michael Calore: Sign of the times, I guess.
Brian Barrett: Sign of the late 1800s.
Lauren Goode: So you're enjoying it so much that though you are not finished with the book, you're giving it a wholehearted recommendation?
Brian Barrett: True. So I'm a little over halfway through. Unless Sonic the hedgehog shows up or something, unless it goes terribly awry, I think it's going to keep—
Lauren Goode: In the book?
Brian Barrett: Yeah. I'm trying to think of a twist-
Lauren Goode: When new Sonic game drops, I'm done.
Brian Barrett: Yeah. Well, that too. No, I'm about halfway through. Even just the first half alone, I would recommend reading that much. And anything else I think would be gravy.
Lauren Goode: Sonic the Hedgehog.
Michael Calore: I've read the book and I can confirm, spoiler alert, Sonic the Hedgehog does not show.
Lauren Goode: Did you guys have an agreement before the show to drop Sonic the Hedgehog in at some point?
Michael Calore: No.
Lauren Goode: Because that was perfect.
Michael Calore: All right. So Middlemarch. You can buy it pretty much anywhere.
Brian Barrett: You don't even have to buy it, probably.
Michael Calore: It's probably available for free through the library or for like a dollar on the Kindle. All right, Lauren, what is your recommendation?
Lauren Goode: Mike.
Brian Barrett: I also recommend Mike. Mike is great.
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Michael Calore: Thanks.
Lauren Goode: So normally I don't like to recommend things that I haven't finished, we've talked about this a lot. That's why I haven't recommended Empire of Pain yet. Although I'm almost done with that book and really I do recommend it, everyone should read it. But I have to recommend, WeCrashed. Our colleague Ariel wrote about this WIRED.com. Well, she wrote about all of the shows that are coming out right now that are about these megalomaniacs and Silicon Valley. These founders who ended up either, I don't know, crashing and burning or defrauding people in the case of Elizabeth Holmes. And Ariel said, of the few shows that she's watching right now, she thought WeCrashed was the best. I saw a lot of people talking about it on Twitter. And so I finally gave it a try and it is very, very good. I'm two episodes in. I'm already hooked. I plan on finishing it.
Michael Calore: Great. It's Apple TV+?
Lauren Goode: Apple TV+.
Michael Calore: So is it like three episodes at once and then one a week or all at once?
Lauren Goode: I think it's one a week. I'm a little behind the curve. So there are a few available for me to watch now. So I should be able to binge-watch it appropriately.
Michael Calore: Do you find yourself waiting until all the episodes are out before you get into a show that you want to watch?
Lauren Goode: No. With a couple of other shows, I'll do the week-by-week thing, if I'm really into them. I've been really busy lately. I know that sounds like such a cliché, but I have been, so I haven't been watching a lot of shows. So now I have some catching up to do.
Brian Barrett: And I got to say, I like the week-by-week thing more and more. I sort of like having something to look forward to and knowing that we're all, not just like in general, but you know. And they're all experiencing the thing at the same time. I miss linear TV, is what I'm saying, a little bit. I'm glad we're kind of nudging back toward that.
Lauren Goode: You're such a Zillenial.
Michael Calore: I don't miss it. Whenever I'm watching something and there's not another episode available, I just turn to my wife and I say, "All right, let's watch the next one." And it never fails. She always laughs. I'm a joy to live with. I'm telling you.
Lauren Goode: Sounds like it. Well, yeah, check out WeCrashed, Apple TV+. Starring Jared Leto as Adam Newman and Anne Hathaway as Rebecca Newman, they do a fantastic job.
Michael Calore: Awesome.
Lauren Goode: What's your recommendation, Mike?
Michael Calore: My recommendation is a book. It is a fairly new book. I think it came out right at the end of 2021. It's called The History of Bones, and it's a memoir written by John Lurie. Do you guys know who John Lurie is?
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Brian Barrett: I do not.
Michael Calore: Well, let me tell you. John Lurie is a musician and an actor and an artist. He is a New York downtown figure from the late '70s, early '80s. So he's a painter and he plays the saxophone in a band called the Lounge Lizards, which was a very big band in the downtown New York scene of the early 1980s. He was in a bunch of Jim Jarmusch movies. He was in some David Lynch movies. He's been in a bunch of other things. He came to prominence in American pop culture in the late '90s when he had a television show called Fishing With John, where he went out fishing with his celebrity friends and they never caught any fish. It was just sort of this existential Gazi documentary of just two people hanging out on a boat, talking about life.
And he now has a show called Painting With John on HBO, that I recommended last year, which is now in its second season. So John Lurie is enjoying this resurgence in the world because people are watching the show and everybody's talking about him. He's written a book, it's a memoir, it is a look back at his life. He was born in the mid 1950s, so he knows a lot of stuff from when he was very young in the late '60s, early '70s. He hangs out in the New York art world in the '70s and '80s. So tons of great stories about people like Jean-Michel Basquiat and Andy Warhol and Arto Lindsay and just the CBGB scene and all that. It's really a lot of fun. There's a lot sleepless nights and some adult beverages and crazy fun stories. You feel like you're hanging out with John Lurie when you read the book.
Brian Barrett: Is the title referencing anything in particular? It's an evocative title for the memoir. Is there?
Michael Calore: I think, no, not really. A lot of his works have very evocative titles. He has songs with names like "The Queen of All Ears" and "If I Sleep, the Plane will Crash." He gives his paintings very esoteric, weird titles also, so it's just sort of his shtick.
Brian Barrett: I love it.
Michael Calore: Yeah. He has a lot of fun with words.
Lauren Goode: I would definitely watch a video of the two of you hanging out.
Michael Calore: Me and John Lurie?
Lauren Goode: Yeah. Like cooking mushrooms or something. Actual mushrooms, not psychedelics.
Michael Calore: OK. Sure. I mean, I would love to do that. I doubt he would have me. He's a very private man, but I can recommend Painting With John if you want a little taste of the Lurie.
Brian Barrett: That's a double Lurie recommendation.
Michael Calore: It is. Yeah. I've already recommended that though. So now I have to recommend the book. I really love the book. I bought it when it came out, it's been sitting there. I finally cracked it open and just blew through it. It's awesome. So, highly recommended. All right. Well, that is our show for this week. Brian, thanks for being here.
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Brian Barrett: Thank you all for having me.
Michael Calore: Of course.
Lauren Goode: Ill see you on the Peloton, Brian?
Brian Barrett: No you won't; I got that tape. The tape over the camera.
Lauren Goode: Yeah, but I'll high-five you. Just kidding
Michael Calore: And thank you all for listening. You can read Lauren's story about Peloton Guide and you can read Adrienne So's review of the Peloton Guide. Both of them are on WIRED.com. Definitely check them out, and please subscribe to WIRED while you're there. If you have feedback about this show, you can find all of us on Twitter. Just check the show notes. This show is produced by Boone Ashworth. Goodbye, and we will be back next week.
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