S03.E02: Two in the Box

[ElectricBoogaloo]

The new and improved Pied Piper impresses Dinesh and Gilfoyle, but worries Richard; Jared and Erlich both face housing issues; Gavin suggests a controversial move.

 

Promo:

[Should Be Working]

"And do you know the name of that company?" Hiring catalog cover models to pretend to be data compression engineers? Looks like Jack is exhibiting symptoms of early onset Alzheimer's. Better call Laurie Bream. 

[chocolatine]

On April 26, 2016 at 8:21 PM, Should Be Working said:

Hiring catalog cover models to pretend to be data compression engineers? Looks like Jack is exhibiting symptoms of early onset Alzheimer's. Better call Laurie Bream. 

Those are probably sales/biz dev people.

ETA: I've seen the episode now.

I liked it much better than the first, thankfully. Of course Jared was going to end up the victim of an AirBnB squatter. Loved Jian Yang being quick on his feet and deciding to do the same to Erlich. His startup idea was bad, his English is terrible, and he doesn't know how to sort trash, but he's not an idiot. Speaking of idiot, I kinda miss Big Head.

The horse sex scene fell flat for me. It wasn't as funny as the monkey masturbating and flinging feces scene last season.

Now to the main PP business: I get where Jack is coming from with needing to validate the product while they're building it, but I thought he hired way too many sales people. There shouldn't be more sales people than engineers, and certainly not more than one per region, like that guy who was "shadowing" the North East sales manager.

I didn't understand Richard's hissy fit about selling to businesses. They worked with several business last season: the porn company, the company that had the skating experiment that almost went deadly wrong, and the one who filmed the condor hatching/guy stuck in the ravine. And surely Peter Gregory and Monica must have brought up B2B when they first funded PP.

I also don't understand why Richard was suddenly so hung up on deep learning/neural networks. First, he never mentioned it before, so the original algorithm - which already far outperforms every other of its kind - must have been built without it. Secondly, it's absolutely still possible to use neural networks without using data from multiple companies - you can just train a different NN for each company; most companies have enough data to train a high-performing network. I've even trained some decent ones with only 5,000 examples, which is tiny in the big data/deep learning scheme of things.

Edited May 2, 2016 by chocolatine

[scrb]

I guess Nucleus had to have an a-ha moment and come up with a breakthrough to keep Gavin in the plot.

So no more VCs now?  Instead of Monica, it's Chef Amy?

Chef Amy is part of lampooning all the perks at startup and tech companies.  Monica is suppose to be a real character but attractive young women are probably a type in the VC community.

Maybe the horse insemination is suppose to be Richard getting done to him what the stallion was doing to the mare.

[riverheightsnancy]

The horse scene was just bizarre to me. Not funny and how they kept showing it, over and over in such a graphic way, made me think that someone on the production staff REALLY liked it and got off on it too. I certainly didn't. One of the most unfunny episodes of the entire run and I really like this show. 

[qtpye]

I agree the horse scene was totally unnecessary.  It was like they remembered they were on HBO and have a quota of shocking scenes per season they have to meet.  Otherwise it was a solid episode, but I could not believe how stupid Erlich was being, when he explained how a tenant can squat for almost a year, before getting kicked out.

Quote

Loved Jian Yang being quick on his feet and deciding to do the same to Erlich. His startup idea was bad, his English is terrible, and he doesn't know how to sort trash, but he's not an idiot. Speaking of idiot, I kinda miss Big Head.

Jian Yang might be awkward and obviously there are some cultural cues he sometimes misunderstands, but he is definitely not stupid.  Also, there probably is a California law that you have to give a tenant more then one week notice to vacate.

Quote

Maybe the horse insemination is suppose to be Richard getting done to him what the stallion was doing to the mare.

If it was, it went way over my head.  I guess the scene with the doctor joking about seeing if Richard still has balls was not enough.

[Should Be Working]

After so many episodes where what little that happened had been signaled well in advance, the creators suddenly decided  to cram a lot of unexpected and unrelated information into this episode's 30 minutes, so much so that it felt manic and rushed. 

Jack is making all these key decisions about the focus and direction that PP will take without once consulting CTO Richard in advance, then responds to Richard's frantic queries in a breezy, patronizing, and dismissive manner as he hurriedly rushes out for yet another of his many midday non-PP activities. It's a frustrating pattern.

Of course they need a good and knowledgeable sales team to generate revenue and market presence. But first PP needs to build a larger and very talented engineering team that can design kick-ass PP products that serve both enterprise and consumer markets. It's not a "one or neither" choice.

And it looks like the former Nucleus team will soon be nipping at their heels, so they really need to get their act together. Inspired by a Nordic track machine instead of a tip-to-tip effficiency all nighter.

[scrb]

Is it sales which meddles in product development or marketing?

[locomoco]

1 hour ago, scrb said:

Is it sales which meddles in product development or marketing?

EVERYTHING meddles in product development.

[Traveller519]

I wasn't expecting Jack's rise to villain to happen so quickly, no matter how truthful so much of what he was saying was. It really calls back to how much Richard has to miss Peter Gregory, the one person who likely shared his vision for product over business. Now he has to deal with the meddling of people like Laurie, Russ, and now Jack.

Oh Guilfoyle and Dinesh. Never change.

Erlich's silent "Motherfuck" when Jin Yang poured out the water bottle on the floor was fantastic.

[Should Be Working]

Has Mike Judge stopped consulting with bonafide tech experts before he develops and airs an episode like this one? Yeah, cyber security is a huge issue these days, but it hasn't stopped the Internet from sending critical data back and forth between cloud-based servers and their clients 24x365. How exactly Is this silly metal box with no network connectivity whatsoever supposed to make PP stock climb? 

Season 1 started out by brilliantly lampooning the absurdities that really do abound in Silicon Valley. Now the focus seems to be on creating the show's own absurd scenarios that might generate a few laughs (very few) but have no foundation in computer tech.

Edited May 2, 2016 by Should Be Working

[candall]

The very few wins--and the only thing sustaining Richard other than his integrity--came from this one nugget of compression genius that no one else could crack.  Are they planning to blow one or both of those?

Comedy from horse sex and enormous horse penis seems a little bit insulting for this show.

Oh, and Richard, get a new doctor.  There's not even any backstory about why your continued commitment to that asshole is remotely justified, other than you're a loser with no self-esteem.  Surely we're past that.

This whole episode just left me vaguely depressed.

[Accidental Martyr]

I agree about the horse scene. Pretty unnecessary.

They need to bring Big Head back in somehow.

[hincandenza]

10 hours ago, Should Be Working said:

Has Mike Judge stopped consulting with bonafide tech experts before he develops and airs an episode like this one? Yeah, cyber security is a huge issue these days, but it hasn't stopped the Internet from sending critical data back and forth between cloud-based servers and their clients 24x365. How exactly Is this silly metal box with no network connectivity whatsoever supposed to make PP stock climb? 

Season 1 started out by brilliantly lampooning the absurdities that really do abound in Silicon Valley. Now the focus seems to be on creating the show's own absurd scenarios that might generate a few laughs (very few) but have no foundation in computer tech.

My god, this a thousand times.  What the hell happened to this show, and why does Mike Judge apparently talk to no one in the tech world anymore?!?  He seems to be stuck in the same late-90's tech world that the admittedly brilliant "Office Space" hails from, but the tech world has changed a lot since then and Judge and the writing stuff have not kept up.  We're quicksanding in non-existent or archaic problems!

While Jack is apparently our new "villain", he's not wrong.  You want to change the world, Richard?  Then you should have released PP as open source and let the world run with it.  Since you didn't, and since you allegedly want to make money... why are you fighting so hard on the making money part?  As I've labored at mind-numbing length here in the past, big businesses- streaming companies like Netflix, Hulu, even Spotify, cloud providers like Microsoft, Amazon, and Google- would pay good coin, today, to leverage that amazing compression.  chocolatine is right; anyone who'd be an early player in using the PP compression would have plenty of their own data to hook up to a neural net and reap whatever additional benefits (although 2x-5x compression of video isn't exactly begging for an additional boost). License the tech, then go swim in the piles of money while building your neural net and awesome customer platform that can change the world four years down the road.

I mean, what does it say about how dumb the PP gang are after 2+ seasons that the one brogrammer proclaimed immediately that he wouldn't give it to Gavin: "Do you realize how much money we could make selling this to someone?!"  Huh... imagine that, selling your product to interested businesses!  Seems that guy, not Richard, is the real genius of this show (oddly, of course, Gavin now has a legitimate lawsuit against those Hooli guys, since they developed the entire thing at the office; if we're lucky, we'll have a whole new season about legal battles, whoohoo!).  Not to mention we're no doubt in for some more "oh no, the funding is running dry" story lines, based on that line of dialogue when they first walked into the offices and Richard asked how they could afford it.  As if a genuinely valuable idea wouldn't get more funding if need be, when dumb ideas can be funded through several rounds before collapsing.

Also, are we now in season 3 and still haven't seen a mention of patenting the freakin' algorithm- even after the protracted lawsuit with Hooli?  Wouldn't this be job #1 for Jack, given the history of PP?  While software patents get a bad rap for things like patent trolls and frivolous patents, people can and do patent compression algorithms; things like gif files, mp3 files, video files, and general data compression.  That's why you get a patent: so that if eventually someone literally jerking off at their desk stumbles on the same idea, you're protected from a bigger company with deeper pockets simply shoving you out of the market place.

 

8 hours ago, candall said:

The very few wins--and the only thing sustaining Richard other than his integrity--came from this one nugget of compression genius that no one else could crack.  Are they planning to blow one or both of those?

Comedy from horse sex and enormous horse penis seems a little bit insulting for this show.

Oh, and Richard, get a new doctor.  There's not even any backstory about why your continued commitment to that asshole is remotely justified, other than you're a loser with no self-esteem.  Surely we're past that.

This whole episode just left me vaguely depressed.

Yeah, it's sad to imagine the writers laughing themselves silly about their "subtle" callbacks to the infamous dick joke, and how that magically gave some random brogrammer the same idea that Richard had (although how he got it all from just a single hand motion, while guys like Gilfoyle and Dinesh still apparently don't understand the algorithm they actively work on...).  Actually, it's really sad that they think the only source of humor to be found in this show is by making our main characters implausibly stupid or passive.  Why is Jared going without sleep as a homeless person?  He has money from Hooli, and presumably savings since he's not exactly a big-spending baller, and is now drawing a paycheck from PP.  Go get a hotel room while you search for a new apartment, dipshit!  And yeah, while he was funny in season 1, there's no good reason Richard should still be taking abuse from this random low-rent doctor, when as CTO he probably has a better health plan.  In short: write new jokes, you uncreative hacks!

 

I think I'm like you; this show just makes me mad and depressed.  I don't laugh anymore, the plots are increasingly bizarre, and I can't begin to imagine what end game they have in mind for this show besides petering out and getting canceled.  Maybe I should just get back the 30 minutes a week and call it a day.

Edited May 3, 2016 by hincandenza

[candall]

That was so interesting, hincandenza; thanks.  If there's been a patent safeguard available all along, that flaw must be a terrible, one-handed motion, distraction to you viewers with tech background and expertise.

 

I'm only qualified to warn Jarrod that his tenant will seal the drains and leave the water running or pry out the dishwasher with a crowbar and take it with him.  in real life, 14 months of free rent is just not a win without a parting revenge gift.

Oops, sorry, tender spot.

 

Anyway, saddle up, because this show could be all horse, all the time, and still maintain as long as it's part of the GoT/Veep juggernaut.

[hincandenza]

4 hours ago, candall said:

That was so interesting, hincandenza; thanks.  If there's been a patent safeguard available all along, that flaw must be a terrible, one-handed motion, distraction to you viewers with tech background and expertise.

 

I'm only qualified to warn Jarrod that his tenant will seal the drains and leave the water running or pry out the dishwasher with a crowbar and take it with him.  in real life, 14 months of free rent is just not a win without a parting revenge gift.

Oops, sorry, tender spot.

 

Anyway, saddle up, because this show could be all horse, all the time, and still maintain as long as it's part of the GoT/Veep juggernaut.

Oh god, that mental image.  From your mouth to Satan's ears... :)

Yeah, I know I'm totally nerding about this to the umpteenth degree, like a Star Trek fan debating minute details of a particular episode or season. It's gotta be like doctors, lawyers, or cops watching their respective TV shows, and thinking "Gah, this is so unrealistic, and unneeded since there's actual, interesting stories to explore!".  Probably unhealthy for me to fret so much over what is, after all, a 30-minute sitcom.   

[athena22]

What we enjoyed about the horse scene was speculating about the production side. Did they get it all in one take? Was there a fluffer? Do they use foley effects in post-production, and if so, how did they acquire them? What did Standards and Practices not agree to, given what they allowed?

[hincandenza]

On 5/4/2016 at 6:17 AM, athena22 said:

What we enjoyed about the horse scene was speculating about the production side. Did they get it all in one take? Was there a fluffer? Do they use foley effects in post-production, and if so, how did they acquire them? What did Standards and Practices not agree to, given what they allowed?

Ewwwwwwww.... o.0

:)

[RCharter]

On 5/4/2016 at 6:17 AM, athena22 said:

What we enjoyed about the horse scene was speculating about the production side. Did they get it all in one take? Was there a fluffer? Do they use foley effects in post-production, and if so, how did they acquire them? What did Standards and Practices not agree to, given what they allowed?

I just kept thinking....wow....horse penises are really big.  I'm a city girl, so I never really knew if it was just an urban myth.  And now I don't have to risk the pop up ads by googling it.  Win and win!

[MsTree]

Granted the horse scene was a bit overdone, but anyone think it might have been symbolism for Richard & PP getting fucked over & over again?!