Speaker 1: Text with Technology with tech Stuff from staff works dot com.
Speaker 1: Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I am your host,
Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer here at how Stuff
Speaker 1: Works and a lot of tech. So today we're gonna
Speaker 1: focus on the Phantom, which was a proposed gaming console
Speaker 1: that never made it much further than a prototype. So
Speaker 1: this is kind of a part story about what you
Speaker 1: could consider a tech failure. Some people go much further
Speaker 1: than that. They call it the an example of an
Speaker 1: entire scam or hoax, And I'll let you guys decide
Speaker 1: for yourselves, but I'll say this, there's a lot of
Speaker 1: at least evidence that seems to support that not everything
Speaker 1: was on the up and up. But draw your own conclusions. So, uh,
Speaker 1: the prototype, when it did happen, it was kind of
Speaker 1: cobbled together from standard computer parts. So what was the Phantom, Well,
Speaker 1: it is meant to be a next generation gaming rig
Speaker 1: that would bring PC gaming to the living room back
Speaker 1: in two thousand three, two thousand four, and it proposed
Speaker 1: something fairly revolutionary in the process. Now, today, if you
Speaker 1: were to unveil a gaming device that required you to
Speaker 1: download all the titles to a hard drive, you probably
Speaker 1: wouldn't raise that many eyebrows. It's not uncommon for a
Speaker 1: gaming PC to lack an optical drive, after all, most
Speaker 1: gaming rigs I've seen these days don't have an optical drive.
Speaker 1: And digital delivery of games has been growing in popularity.
Speaker 1: I mean, just take a look at steams numbers, They're incredible.
Speaker 1: There's still a market for physical copies of a game, however,
Speaker 1: particularly since you can potentially sell or trade in old
Speaker 1: games if you use physical media. But overall, I'd say
Speaker 1: the trend has been to move toward more of a
Speaker 1: digital download experience. So if I said I was going
Speaker 1: to launch a brand new console that could only stream
Speaker 1: or download games, I probably wouldn't leave very many people
Speaker 1: scratching their heads today. But the same was not true
Speaker 1: back in January two thousand three. That's the year a
Speaker 1: new company that was called Infinium Labs announced it was
Speaker 1: bringing a gaming console called the Phantom to market. Now,
Speaker 1: this was months before Steam would launch, let alone become
Speaker 1: the dominant online market for computer games. In two thousand three,
Speaker 1: it was pretty much common practice to go to game
Speaker 1: stores or big box outlets to purchase computer titles. So
Speaker 1: when Infinium Labs brazenly announced the company intended to turn
Speaker 1: the home gaming market on its head. They got a
Speaker 1: lot of attention. Now, ultimately the story would be followed
Speaker 1: by controversy, anger, and finally mockery. And it includes allegations
Speaker 1: of fraud or at the very least ineptitude. It involves
Speaker 1: the company that changed its name and switched tracks to
Speaker 1: create a totally different product than the one that was
Speaker 1: promising to consumers. So we're really going to dive into
Speaker 1: the story of the Phantom and what actually happened. Now,
Speaker 1: our story begins. You guys know me, I like to
Speaker 1: always dive further back than when the actual stuff happens.
Speaker 1: Our story really begins almost a decade before any mention
Speaker 1: of the Phantom ever hits the public. In the early
Speaker 1: nineteen nineties in St. Louis, Missouri, They're a man named
Speaker 1: Timothy Munroe Roberts was working at a computer store and
Speaker 1: he had a customer named Andrew Gladney, and the two
Speaker 1: of them began to talk about an idea for a business.
Speaker 1: This was not the business that would become in Phinium Labs, however.
Speaker 1: It was instead to create a data hosting service and
Speaker 1: an early internet data hosting company. They called it the
Speaker 1: Savaths Communications Corporation s A v v I. S now
Speaker 1: Gladwell put up the majority of the starting capital. He
Speaker 1: had a pretty healthy trust fund to draw from. It
Speaker 1: was left to him by his grandfather, who has a
Speaker 1: founder of a company that made a little soft drink
Speaker 1: called seven Up. Together they got the business up and running,
Speaker 1: and the company saw some early success with Robert's landing
Speaker 1: a big deal with Apple Computer Incorporated. And landing Apple
Speaker 1: meant Sabbaths had some serious market buzz behind it, and
Speaker 1: they soon secured several other big contracts. Roberts, however, had
Speaker 1: decided that he wanted to try and do something else,
Speaker 1: so he left Sabbaths in n and went out to
Speaker 1: start a new business. Now. This time, this was a
Speaker 1: web hosting company called in tira I n t I
Speaker 1: r A, also based out of St. Louis, Missouri. Some
Speaker 1: of the concepts the company pushed were predictive of the
Speaker 1: cloud computing craze that would follow a few years later,
Speaker 1: but perhaps it was a touch too early for the company,
Speaker 1: and coupled with the dot com bubble bursting in the
Speaker 1: early two thousand's, it ended up not surviving, it filed
Speaker 1: for bankruptcy protection in two thousand one. Oddly enough, Roberts
Speaker 1: had already extricated himself from the company at that point,
Speaker 1: selling off most of his stock, which in hindsight might
Speaker 1: seem like it was a bit of a tip off.
Speaker 1: Roberts had left in Tira around nt SO a couple
Speaker 1: of years before the company went under, and he went
Speaker 1: on to found another company, this time called Broadband Infrastructure
Speaker 1: Group Corporation, also known as Big b a G. The
Speaker 1: company's mission was to act as a sort of incubator
Speaker 1: for tech companies and developed communications businesses, according to the St.
Speaker 1: Louis Business Journals, So this is still happening in St. Louis,
Speaker 1: Missouri now. According to the St. Louis Post Dispatch, Big
Speaker 1: raised about eighteen million dollars from investors in two thousand
Speaker 1: and it even sponsored a race car during the Indianapolis
Speaker 1: five hundred that year. There are also stories of lavish parties,
Speaker 1: expensive wines. In fact, part of the bankruptcy proceedings, because
Speaker 1: spoiler alert, Big went out of business to part of
Speaker 1: the bankruptcy proceeding has included the auction of twenty four
Speaker 1: models of Chateau Lafitte Rothschild, which was a worth about
Speaker 1: twenty four thousand dollars. Within nine months of raising those
Speaker 1: millions of dollars, b I G closed. Now that led
Speaker 1: to Roberts getting some heat in St. Louis See. I
Speaker 1: changed it to Sant Louis for this part, and soon
Speaker 1: he had folks at the state and federal and city
Speaker 1: levels all asking some really tough questions about his entrepreneurial efforts,
Speaker 1: and undaunted, he picked up stakes and he moved to Florida,
Speaker 1: near Tampa. He started a new company called Infinium Labs,
Speaker 1: and on January twenty, two thousand three, he started the
Speaker 1: company two thousand two, by the way, but in two
Speaker 1: thousand three, on January twenty, company issued a press release
Speaker 1: about their plans. It's a short one, so I'm going
Speaker 1: to actually read the press release. A Tampa Bay area
Speaker 1: technology company in Phinium Labs Corporation, will develop and market
Speaker 1: a new game console that will outperform the Xbox Sony
Speaker 1: PlayStation two GameCube. The company plans to market a high
Speaker 1: performance gaming console and delivery system to provide consumers with
Speaker 1: options and capabilities that are not available in today's marketplace.
Speaker 1: The console will appeal to the hardcore gamer and the
Speaker 1: high end consumer electronic purchaser. The next generation game console
Speaker 1: provides a robust, fault tolerant delivery system that supports games
Speaker 1: on demand, game rentals, game demos, seamless upgrades, and patch management.
Speaker 1: The game console is an always on broadband device. It
Speaker 1: is easy enough for children to use independently, yet so
Speaker 1: advanced it exceeds the needs of hardcore gamers. In Phinium
Speaker 1: Labs was formed by veteran entrepreneurs who have a successful
Speaker 1: track record in building large scale companies and advanced architectures
Speaker 1: for supporting massive e commerce and enterprise applications. Combining skills
Speaker 1: from telco data communications, digital rights management, software development, and security,
Speaker 1: the management team brings together a unique array of skills
Speaker 1: to develop the most robust next ration gaming console and
Speaker 1: delivery network on the market. The Infinium Labs game console
Speaker 1: features a high tech design and offers ease of use
Speaker 1: for the variety of game players worldwide. The on demand
Speaker 1: delivery system will appeal to hardcore gamers as well as
Speaker 1: casual users. The unique design architecture allows for delivery of
Speaker 1: a large number of games and the ability to participate
Speaker 1: in online massive multiplayer gaming. Key features include fastest console
Speaker 1: on the market, broadest selection of preloaded games, cross platform capabilities,
Speaker 1: state of the art design and architecture, advanced accessories and
Speaker 1: wireless capabilities, online connectivity for multiplayer gaming, seamless upgrades and
Speaker 1: patch management. A multi tiered subscription service that meets the
Speaker 1: needs of casual, moderate and hardcore game players, demo games
Speaker 1: before purchasing or subscribing, games on demand, and game rentals.
Speaker 1: The advanced system provides game developers and publishers a secure
Speaker 1: and efficient software distribution system. In Phinium Labs intends for
Speaker 1: game developers and publishers to reap greater profits using this
Speaker 1: new game delivery system. And Phendium Labs has engineered its
Speaker 1: prototypes and it expects to unveil the new gaming console
Speaker 1: in March of two thousand three. The company intends to
Speaker 1: launch the game console to the US consumer market by
Speaker 1: November two thousand three. Remember that date. And Phenium Labs
Speaker 1: has chosen Florida as its corporate headquarters. Florida has emerged
Speaker 1: as a leader in support of technology companies with its
Speaker 1: e Florida initiative. Offices will soon will open soon in
Speaker 1: Silicon Valley and St. Louis, Missouri. About in Phenium Labs
Speaker 1: and Phenium Labs Corporation was formed in October two thousand
Speaker 1: two as a global entertainment gaming company and Phenium Labs
Speaker 1: mission is to market a gaming console and delivery system
Speaker 1: that will be the performance leader in the game playing
Speaker 1: entertainment industry. The company will market a robust game console
Speaker 1: that will appeal to a wide audience with its ease
Speaker 1: of use, quality assurance, and robust delivery systems. Now, we
Speaker 1: could probably say today that those promises we're a little
Speaker 1: astounding for their time time and perhaps even a bit boastful.
Speaker 1: I mean, you're talking about the fastest game console on
Speaker 1: the market. Back in two thousand three, this was a
Speaker 1: new company, untested in this space, setting out to challenge
Speaker 1: entrenched companies like Sony and Nintendo. And then you had Microsoft,
Speaker 1: which was relatively new to the video game console market
Speaker 1: at this point but had already established itself as a
Speaker 1: powerful presence in the industry. And the features the press
Speaker 1: release listed were extremely innovative at the time. I'm sure
Speaker 1: the gamers out there recognize that many of those features
Speaker 1: are now standard on several consoles. For example, both on
Speaker 1: the Xbox One and on the PS four you can
Speaker 1: sample some games and even get some titles as part
Speaker 1: of a monthly subscription service. So that kind of stuff
Speaker 1: today isn't innovative, but at the time it was a
Speaker 1: totally different way of doing business. So the promises being made,
Speaker 1: while advanced, we're all features that would later on become
Speaker 1: standard in video game consoles. It's just that in two
Speaker 1: thousand three, this was a really wild idea, and it
Speaker 1: raised questions was the world ready for an always on
Speaker 1: internet connected console? Now? Judging by the resistance gamers put
Speaker 1: up when Microsoft first said the Xbox One was going
Speaker 1: to follow that same model and being always on broadcast service,
Speaker 1: I think it's safe to say that if pack in
Speaker 1: two thousand three, the world was not ready at that point,
Speaker 1: because it wasn't ready when the Xbox One came out.
Speaker 1: More importantly, was the technology ready or did the company
Speaker 1: make promises that would have been impossible to deliver upon
Speaker 1: even if it had been established as a big player
Speaker 1: in the space up at that point. In other words,
Speaker 1: if this had been Sony or Microsoft, would they have
Speaker 1: been able to pull it off? Or was this just
Speaker 1: a promise that no one at the time could deliver
Speaker 1: upon we'll take a look at more details about the
Speaker 1: unveiling of the Phantom and what happened in the wake
Speaker 1: of that, but first let's take a quick break to
Speaker 1: thank our sponsor. Now, before I get into all the
Speaker 1: controversy that surrounds the Phantom, I thought it would be
Speaker 1: a good idea to talk about what it was supposed
Speaker 1: to have inside of it, what kind of connectors it
Speaker 1: was supposed to have, you know, how it was going
Speaker 1: to connect to your television, and talk a little bit
Speaker 1: more about the subscription service and the online element to this,
Speaker 1: to kind of get an idea of what exactly was
Speaker 1: supposed to come out. Now, keep in mind that not
Speaker 1: all of this ever materialized. Also, this is dependent upon
Speaker 1: technology of the early two thousand's, even the TV technology
Speaker 1: at the time. So there's some things that you would
Speaker 1: have considered would have needed to be standard that we're
Speaker 1: not included, like h d m I is not a
Speaker 1: component on the Phantom spec list, and that's largely because
Speaker 1: back in two thousand three not such a big thing.
Speaker 1: But other things that you don't see as much anymore,
Speaker 1: like composite or component video that definitely was part of it.
Speaker 1: So for the standard components of the Phantom, because you
Speaker 1: could also get optional components added on, or at least
Speaker 1: in three you could. In reality you couldn't get anything.
Speaker 1: The standard components were supposed to include a custom operating
Speaker 1: system on a Windows XPE kernel, so that custom operating
Speaker 1: system was to make it proprietary, kind of like the
Speaker 1: operating systems you would encounter on other video game consoles,
Speaker 1: and it would end up locking you into the Phantom's ecosystem.
Speaker 1: It was supposed to have an a m d Athalon
Speaker 1: XP plus central processing unit which would have approximately one
Speaker 1: point eight giga hurts of CPU power, and it was
Speaker 1: supposed to have an Nvidia g Force f x fred
Speaker 1: Ultra graphics processing unit. Was also supposed to have an
Speaker 1: Nvidia enforced to Ultra four hundred motherboard, two hundred fifty
Speaker 1: six megabytes main memory, forty gigabyte hard drive. Don't be
Speaker 1: digital five point one surround sound onboard, radio frequency wireless
Speaker 1: modules that would allow you to connect things like UM
Speaker 1: wireless mouse or wireless controllers or wireless keyboards to this
Speaker 1: and S video r c A or component video connections
Speaker 1: also composite, as it would turn out uh a Ethernet
Speaker 1: port so that you could actually plug that into your
Speaker 1: Internet connection. That was supposed to always be connected to
Speaker 1: the Internet, so you need to have something a wireless controller,
Speaker 1: a wireless keyboard and mouse, to USB ports, and four
Speaker 1: controller ports. Then there were some optional components you could
Speaker 1: add on to that, which would include extra controllers, either
Speaker 1: wireless or accorded ones, a keyboard and mouse with charging,
Speaker 1: base station storage expansion for additional game storage so you
Speaker 1: could double the amount of storage space on there in theory,
Speaker 1: a DSL modem, a cable modem, a wireless WiFi card,
Speaker 1: memory upgrades, speaker set, and flat screen displays. So in
Speaker 1: other words, you could go from something that you were
Speaker 1: supposed to just hook up to your TV to something
Speaker 1: that would have potentially multiple screens, although as far as
Speaker 1: I can tell, they the graphics card wasn't necessarily set
Speaker 1: up to support multiple displays, but that doesn't mean that
Speaker 1: it couldn't happen. One thing the Phantom did not have
Speaker 1: was any sort of portable storage drive, so there were
Speaker 1: no CD drives, no DVD drives, no cartridges, no floppy disks,
Speaker 1: nothing like that was ever supposed to go into the Phantom.
Speaker 1: All material was meant to be downloaded or streamed directly
Speaker 1: to the console. Now you may hear some of those
Speaker 1: specs and say, well, that just sounds like it's a PC,
Speaker 1: and really, when you get down to it, that's what
Speaker 1: the phantom was. But then, to be fair, all video
Speaker 1: game consoles ultimately end up becoming variations on the concept
Speaker 1: of a personal computer. The big differences you've got some
Speaker 1: changes in architecture. Something like the PlayStation four has an
Speaker 1: architecture that's different than most PCs. Uh And with a console,
Speaker 1: you typically are stuck with the hardware that the system
Speaker 1: came with when it first launched or whenever you bought it.
Speaker 1: So if I go out and buy an Xbox One today,
Speaker 1: it's hard for me to upgrade that. I can probably
Speaker 1: upgrade the storage by adding external storage, but I'm not
Speaker 1: going to be able to upgrade the processor or graphics
Speaker 1: cards or anything like that. With a PC, you can
Speaker 1: actually upgrade components, at least until you bump up against
Speaker 1: limitations like you've got stuff that's going to be too
Speaker 1: big for the size of case that you have, or
Speaker 1: the motherboard will no longer support it, something along those lines,
Speaker 1: And technically you could keep on swapping out components. You're
Speaker 1: essentially building a new computer at that point rather than
Speaker 1: just upgrading. But it is a possibility, but consoles are different.
Speaker 1: You pretty much have to wait for the next generation
Speaker 1: to buy up and and increase your console's capabilities. The
Speaker 1: Phantom was meant to play PC games, so that was
Speaker 1: one concern a lot of people had early on was
Speaker 1: if this in fact was to be a standalone video
Speaker 1: gaming console for the living room that would allow you
Speaker 1: to play PC games in the living room, something that
Speaker 1: a lot of people have been trying to do, and
Speaker 1: in fact today are still trying to do, like steam
Speaker 1: boxes are essentially that same kind of approach. Uh. Even
Speaker 1: though you know that was the mission statement, everyone was
Speaker 1: pointing out, well, what happens when the games get too
Speaker 1: advanced to run on the hardware of the Phantom. You
Speaker 1: would have to upgrade somehow, and you could do some
Speaker 1: upgrades through firmware, but that's not going to make the
Speaker 1: process or work any faster necessarily, or make the graphics
Speaker 1: card work harder. So that was a big concern was
Speaker 1: that if in fact, this is essentially a customized personal
Speaker 1: computer running some proprietary software on top of it then
Speaker 1: what happens when the games get too advanced? Now, as
Speaker 1: it turns out, there was never a need to answer
Speaker 1: that question, but it was one of the early ones.
Speaker 1: And as I mentioned earlier in this episode, the console
Speaker 1: or hit the market, so some people would refer to
Speaker 1: it as vapor ware, but all the components existed. The
Speaker 1: stuff that they talked about really did exist. I mean,
Speaker 1: all of those different elements you could go out there
Speaker 1: and buy, so there was never a problem with that.
Speaker 1: There's just there was no consumer product that featured all
Speaker 1: of those in that configuration as a phantom console. There
Speaker 1: are a couple of prototypes or show models that Infinium
Speaker 1: Labs would trot out at various events like c E
Speaker 1: S or E three, and there's some debate in online
Speaker 1: circles as to whether those prototypes represented a real effort
Speaker 1: to create a phantom console or if they were in
Speaker 1: fact just a run of the mill PC inside a
Speaker 1: customized case. In some cases, it wasn't even that. According
Speaker 1: to one story I was reading, a games journalist went
Speaker 1: to E three and saw a demonstration of the phantom
Speaker 1: console and it sat down next to uh representative from
Speaker 1: Infinium Labs who was going to give a demo of
Speaker 1: the whole thing, and they had the console sitting in
Speaker 1: front of them. They tried to launch a game and
Speaker 1: it didn't work out properly, And as it turned out,
Speaker 1: the representative actually revealed to the games journalist that the
Speaker 1: game itself was being run on a PC behind the cabinet,
Speaker 1: that the console that was on display was in fact
Speaker 1: a dummy console. It didn't do anything. It just had
Speaker 1: some lit up letters that spelled out Phantom, but there
Speaker 1: was nothing going on inside of it. Now that's not
Speaker 1: to say that every single instance was a fake console
Speaker 1: with a real PC behind the curtain, Wizard of Oz style,
Speaker 1: but at least according to that one report, that was
Speaker 1: the case. Now, as it turns out, years after the
Speaker 1: Phantom controversy had kind of fizzled out, Ours Technica would
Speaker 1: run a piece about a reader named Eddie Schlessinger who
Speaker 1: worked at a computer repair shop in Venice, Florida. Now remember,
Speaker 1: Infinium Labs was originally located off Florida and around to
Speaker 1: the and twelve. A customer brought in this weird PC console.
Speaker 1: It was branded a Phantom, So apparently this customer had
Speaker 1: bought the set from someone else who had no idea
Speaker 1: what the heck this thing was. For the princely sum
Speaker 1: of two hundred dollars. Now, considering that it may be
Speaker 1: one of a kind, or at least maybe one of
Speaker 1: a dozen or so, that's not bad. Schlessenger had a
Speaker 1: chance to crack it open and look under the hood
Speaker 1: and see what was there. Now, Remember Schlessenger was telling
Speaker 1: Ours Technica about this a few years later, I think
Speaker 1: it was so about three years had passed so, according
Speaker 1: to Schlessenger. Inside the prototype was a motherboard supposedly made
Speaker 1: by a sus That's what Schlessenger thought, had the Nvidia
Speaker 1: fx F a g P video card that had been announced.
Speaker 1: It had some d DR ram um. Some of the
Speaker 1: ports on the back we're working, and others were just
Speaker 1: for show. It had video outputs for composite component and
Speaker 1: S video connector, which again these days we would probably
Speaker 1: just use hd M I instead. It also had audio
Speaker 1: output jacks for optical co acts or our c A connectors,
Speaker 1: and there were four USB ports. The system was not
Speaker 1: in working order, so he ended up making some modifications
Speaker 1: to it, and he even installed a phantom promo video.
Speaker 1: He took a video that had been circulated on the
Speaker 1: internet for a while, and he used that as sort
Speaker 1: of the load up screen for the console, so that
Speaker 1: the customer could say that he owned a working Phantom console. Now,
Speaker 1: it sounds like a lot of the stuff and Phinium
Speaker 1: was claiming the Phantom would include found its way into
Speaker 1: that prototype, which is something. At least not all those
Speaker 1: ports were working. But then if the company wanted to
Speaker 1: create a proof of concept to kind of show how
Speaker 1: the system would work, it might only focus on the
Speaker 1: necessary components to get it to perform as needed for
Speaker 1: a demo. So, in other words, if you're shopping it
Speaker 1: around trying to get some investors to give you money,
Speaker 1: you might have a mock up where it's not a
Speaker 1: fully functional unit, but you want to show off the
Speaker 1: concept so that you can get the funding to complete it.
Speaker 1: That doesn't necessarily mean that the company is shady or
Speaker 1: suspicious in any way. Presumably the finished product would have
Speaker 1: included all of the working components that were being talked
Speaker 1: about in their press releases. Now that would also mean
Speaker 1: customers would get a keyboard and mouse in what Infinium
Speaker 1: Labs was calling a lap pad, And this was an
Speaker 1: attempt to make it easier to play PC style games
Speaker 1: on a home television in your living room. Many PC
Speaker 1: games are compatible with game controllers, but some games, like
Speaker 1: first person shooters or real time strategy games tend to
Speaker 1: work best using a mouse and keyboard approach. If you
Speaker 1: use a controller and you go up against someone else
Speaker 1: who's using mouse and keyboard, you will probably find your
Speaker 1: petuity handed to you. So what about the online service
Speaker 1: part of this whole package? Will Athenium Labs plan to
Speaker 1: operate a Virtual Private Games Network or vpg in And
Speaker 1: this is a special type of virtual private network or VPN.
Speaker 1: And you may have used VPNs for work or for
Speaker 1: your own computers. For those of you who are unfamiliar
Speaker 1: with the idea, let me give you a real quick,
Speaker 1: high level rundown. So a VPN creates a private network
Speaker 1: across a public network. So take the Internet for example.
Speaker 1: That's a public network anyone can hop on or off
Speaker 1: at any time. Private networks require access to machines on
Speaker 1: the network itself, so like a physical private network is
Speaker 1: completely separate from any other network, or it only has
Speaker 1: very controlled portals to other networks. And the only way
Speaker 1: you can get on that physical network is if you
Speaker 1: have access to a machine that's connected to it. Um
Speaker 1: A VPN simulates that it's not a true private network,
Speaker 1: but through code, creates a situation that is essentially like that,
Speaker 1: and it can send that communication across a larger public network.
Speaker 1: This means communication across the ep N is encrypted to
Speaker 1: protect data from snoopers. Otherwise you might as well just
Speaker 1: use a public network in the first place. It's typically
Speaker 1: used by businesses to allow remote employees access to company
Speaker 1: intranet systems. Other folks might use a VPN to communicate
Speaker 1: securely with other people or to access services that might
Speaker 1: otherwise be blocked in their real physical location. So you
Speaker 1: might log into a VPN and use that in order
Speaker 1: to access something that otherwise you would not be able
Speaker 1: to touch from wherever you are. It's really handy if
Speaker 1: you happen to be in a country that has a,
Speaker 1: you know, a more nanny state kind of approach to
Speaker 1: guiding how the Internet should be used by the population.
Speaker 1: So why would Infinium Labs want to operate a vpg N. Well,
Speaker 1: mostly it's to lock a customer into an ecosystem. And
Speaker 1: here's how the business plan would have worked if it
Speaker 1: had ever launched, you decide you're gonna go out and
Speaker 1: buy a Phantom console. Actually, you can have a couple
Speaker 1: of different options. You could purchase one for ad dollars
Speaker 1: at least that was one of the amounts quoted, which
Speaker 1: is actually incredibly cheap. Or you could rent it. Or
Speaker 1: you could sign up for a two year subscription agreement
Speaker 1: with Infinium Labs on their Virtual Private Games Network, and
Speaker 1: if you subscribe for two years, you would get the
Speaker 1: hardware for free. So the subscription would cost twenty nine
Speaker 1: dollars a month, and for that you would be able
Speaker 1: to use the Phantom Network to download games, uh to
Speaker 1: stream games, to play games online with other people. You
Speaker 1: would have access to a suite of games right away
Speaker 1: that would be included with your subscription fee, so you
Speaker 1: wouldn't have to pay any extra for a certain library
Speaker 1: of games. If you wanted games that were beyond that
Speaker 1: library and Infinium Labs had secured the rights, you would
Speaker 1: be able to download demo versions of those for free,
Speaker 1: and if you wanted to purchase it, you could do
Speaker 1: so through infinium labs as online store and down the
Speaker 1: game directly to the console. The console would keep track
Speaker 1: of how much storage space was left, and it could
Speaker 1: even dynamically manage it. So if you start getting close
Speaker 1: to your limit, Remember you've got that forty gigabyte limit.
Speaker 1: Let's say you start getting close to that. These days,
Speaker 1: it wouldn't take long at all because games are so huge.
Speaker 1: But let's talk about two thousand two four, you start
Speaker 1: getting close to that forty gigabyte limit, Well, the phantom
Speaker 1: would end up deleting older games that you had not
Speaker 1: played in a long time, but the service would keep
Speaker 1: track of which games you had purchased, so if you
Speaker 1: ever decided you wanted to go back and play an
Speaker 1: old title, then you could download it again for free
Speaker 1: because you had already purchased it previously, so there'd be
Speaker 1: a record of the fact that you had bought it before,
Speaker 1: and you wouldn't have to buy it a second time. Now,
Speaker 1: in many ways, this is how subscription services like Xbox
Speaker 1: Gold memberships work today. The business plan sounded actually pretty solid.
Speaker 1: It was very innovative for its time. There'd be incentive
Speaker 1: for gamers to subscribe month after month because they could
Speaker 1: get access to the games within the library, as well
Speaker 1: as a chance to buy other brand new games, possibly
Speaker 1: at a discount because you're not buying them the physical media,
Speaker 1: although now we know that doesn't always work out that way.
Speaker 1: You don't always get a discount just because you're not buying,
Speaker 1: you know, a disk. It can be just as expensive
Speaker 1: or sometimes more expensive, to buy the digital version, which
Speaker 1: is infuriating for a lot of people. There were also
Speaker 1: hints that game titles could come out a little earlier,
Speaker 1: so you could get them much quicker than you would
Speaker 1: if you were to have to go to the store.
Speaker 1: There was no danger of them selling out. You didn't
Speaker 1: have to worry about pre registering for a game and
Speaker 1: hoping that the the local game stop or whatever game
Speaker 1: store you would go to would have enough copies on
Speaker 1: launch day. You could just download it. So there were definitely,
Speaker 1: you know, reasons that a gamer might be interested in this,
Speaker 1: Although the thought of having to pay an ongoing subscription
Speaker 1: service to keep using a video game console that you
Speaker 1: would already purchased rubbed a lot of people the wrong way.
Speaker 1: It was an idea that maybe wasn't quite ready yet.
Speaker 1: So on the business side it sounded fantastic because you
Speaker 1: would have a company that would have an incoming, steady
Speaker 1: flow of revenue because it's not just selling a console
Speaker 1: once to a customer. It's selling a console and then
Speaker 1: offering a subscription service and then getting a monthly subscription
Speaker 1: fee from that customer, and then you put that across
Speaker 1: thousands of customers. That's an incredible revenue stream and it's
Speaker 1: obviously one that works for a lot of game developers
Speaker 1: today and game consoles today. But at the time, again
Speaker 1: it was a pretty uh radical idea. Now, on top
Speaker 1: of that, using a proprietary approach for games distribution solved
Speaker 1: another problem the company would otherwise encounter. So this is
Speaker 1: another reason for that virtual Private Games network. The Phantom was,
Speaker 1: as I said, essentially a PC connected to a television,
Speaker 1: So without any sort of proprietary overlay, nothing would necessarily
Speaker 1: stop gamers from downloading games from other sources outside of
Speaker 1: Infinium Labs. If you could just log into the Internet
Speaker 1: and maybe go into a Torrent site, if you had
Speaker 1: a bit Torrent installed on your Phantom, you could end
Speaker 1: up pirate in games if you wanted to. But by
Speaker 1: having that proprietary layer on top that was encoding games
Speaker 1: in a way that only Infinium Labs machines would run,
Speaker 1: then you didn't have to worry so much. You know,
Speaker 1: people couldn't just take their their phantom and make it
Speaker 1: do anything. They were limited in what they could do
Speaker 1: with it. So it is a kind of a special
Speaker 1: purpose PC, uh, or at least you could reduce the
Speaker 1: number of people who are using it to pirate games.
Speaker 1: I mean, someone is always going to find a way
Speaker 1: to hack hardware and make it do something it wasn't
Speaker 1: intended to do, especially if it started off as a PC.
Speaker 1: That makes it easier and if you know what you're
Speaker 1: doing now. All of the US was met with some skepticism,
Speaker 1: though again I have to stress that we've seen these
Speaker 1: sort of things pan out in the long run with
Speaker 1: stuff like Steam and various video game console markets. But
Speaker 1: at the time it seems so ambitious and so sudden
Speaker 1: and out of the blue that a lot of people
Speaker 1: were worried that this was too good to be true.
Speaker 1: And you know how the rest of that saying goes well.
Speaker 1: Athenium Labs had made some big promises, including a desire
Speaker 1: to get a product on the market in time for
Speaker 1: the two thousand three holiday season. That time came and went,
Speaker 1: and the company had no consoles to show for it,
Speaker 1: but they said, don't worry, it's gonna come out in
Speaker 1: holiday season two thousand four. That time came and went
Speaker 1: as well, and still no console. They did show it
Speaker 1: off a couple of times at different at different trade events,
Speaker 1: like I said, but at least in some cases it
Speaker 1: turned out that it wasn't really a console that people
Speaker 1: were seeing, just the concept of what the console would be,
Speaker 1: even before in Phenium Labs had slipped that two thousand
Speaker 1: four holiday dates. Some people were really suspicious of what
Speaker 1: was going on behind the scenes, which include some folks
Speaker 1: who wrote for hard O c P. That's an online
Speaker 1: magazine that caters to PC owners. You can find tons
Speaker 1: of articles and reviews about all sorts of things over there,
Speaker 1: including a pretty tough investigation into Infinium Labs and Timothy
Speaker 1: Roberts in particular. All Right, so it's September two thousand
Speaker 1: three Wednesday, as it turns out, and an article goes
Speaker 1: up on hard O c P News titled behind the
Speaker 1: Infinium Phantom Console, and it takes a really hard look
Speaker 1: at Timothy Roberts's past as well as the claims made
Speaker 1: by Infinium Labs. The article argued that Roberts had a
Speaker 1: history of starting companies that ultimately failed while raising millions
Speaker 1: of dollars in investment money in the process. So the
Speaker 1: article alleged that Infinium Labs, as of September two thousand three,
Speaker 1: had raised at least twenty five million dollars in venture
Speaker 1: capital and had nothing to show for it. Now, I
Speaker 1: might be inferring too much here, but even the opening
Speaker 1: of this article, to me, it sounds like they're at
Speaker 1: least hinting that perhaps these business ventures weren't meant in sincerity.
Speaker 1: In other words, there might not have ever been an
Speaker 1: intent to actually have a working business there. Again, this
Speaker 1: is my interpretation. The article does not say this outright. Instead,
Speaker 1: it just seems like there's a hint that maybe there's
Speaker 1: some sort of scam shady business stuff going on, And
Speaker 1: it sounds a lot like the main plot behind the Producers. Like,
Speaker 1: if you raise a lot of money for a business
Speaker 1: and that business ultimately fails, you never have any profits.
Speaker 1: You have to worry about paying out to shareholders. If
Speaker 1: the business didn't profit, then you have nothing to pay
Speaker 1: So what what? Who cares if you just happen to
Speaker 1: have bought a few cases of incredibly expensive wine in
Speaker 1: the process, but this may be putting words into hard
Speaker 1: O CPS figurative mouth. At least in that first section,
Speaker 1: there are no outright accusations that Roberts was running any
Speaker 1: sort of scam. But the article continues with a breakdown
Speaker 1: of what the phantom console is supposed to have, essentially
Speaker 1: running that same press release I read earlier, but pointed
Speaker 1: out that at least to that point, the only images
Speaker 1: that had been seen outside the company were three D
Speaker 1: renderings and not actual photographs of a working device. Later
Speaker 1: we would get photos and videos of a device that
Speaker 1: appeared to be working, but at this time there were
Speaker 1: there were no such images available. Next, the article laid
Speaker 1: out the places that Roberts had worked over the previous
Speaker 1: eight years. He had held eight different CEO or director
Speaker 1: level positions in those eight years, according to his own website.
Speaker 1: They included two other companies, when Force LLC and med
Speaker 1: Hire LLC, that were operating operating concurrently within Phinium Labs. So,
Speaker 1: according to his website, he was a director on one
Speaker 1: Force LLC and med Hier LLC while simultaneously serving as
Speaker 1: the CEO of Infinium. Now, the writers at hard O
Speaker 1: c P took time to contact med Hire LLLC to
Speaker 1: check in on Roberts's history. The article states that a
Speaker 1: woman who was identified as Laura Roberts picked up the
Speaker 1: phone and indicated that Laura Roberts different person, uh, and
Speaker 1: Timothy Roberts's mother was in fact the director of med
Speaker 1: Higher lll C, and that Timothy, while being her son,
Speaker 1: was not a director. Later this same Laura Roberts said, oh, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: Timothy Roberts is a co director, but I don't have
Speaker 1: any contact information for him. I don't have a phone
Speaker 1: number or an email address or anything. And when they said,
Speaker 1: isn't it strange that you work for a company but
Speaker 1: you don't have any contact information for one of the
Speaker 1: supposed directors of this company, and her response was he
Speaker 1: changed his phones a lot, which also seems a little weird.
Speaker 1: They also tried contacting when Juan Force LLC, and they
Speaker 1: found out that Timothy's brother, Peter, was the executive vice
Speaker 1: president of that company. So there's a lot of family
Speaker 1: business going on here. The piece then talks about Roberts's
Speaker 1: time at Big and Interira, which I've already covered here,
Speaker 1: so I'm not gonna go back over it. But the
Speaker 1: section framed Roberts as someone who had been involved in
Speaker 1: several remarkable failures, including ones that earned a reputation for
Speaker 1: lavish spending before the coffers ran dry. Next, the article
Speaker 1: turned attention towards the headquarters for the company itself. It
Speaker 1: showed that the register information listing had Infinium Labs is
Speaker 1: address noted as fifty three eighty Gulf of Mexico Drive
Speaker 1: and Longboat Key, Florida. The magazine hired a photographer to
Speaker 1: go to the address to get pictures of the location,
Speaker 1: and what they got back where photos of a small
Speaker 1: strip mall that had one open office space that had
Speaker 1: inside of it a single desk with a telephone on it.
Speaker 1: There were other small businesses at that address, but they
Speaker 1: were all identified that none of them were in Phinium Labs.
Speaker 1: Six months later, the magazine had tried again, sending another
Speaker 1: photographer out to that same location. Again there was no
Speaker 1: evidence of an office operated by Infinium Labs there. They
Speaker 1: decided to inquire at a nearby mailboxes, etcetera that was
Speaker 1: part of this area, and they found that the mail
Speaker 1: that was being sent to Infinium Labs was going to
Speaker 1: a p O box at mailboxes, etcetera, and that the
Speaker 1: company did not appear to operate any physical space at
Speaker 1: that particular address. Curious or and curious er. Well, a
Speaker 1: story gets even more weird, But before I jump into
Speaker 1: any more of it, let's take another quick break to
Speaker 1: thank our sponsor. Back to the story, So hard OCP
Speaker 1: reaches out to Timothy Roberts to get his response, and
Speaker 1: Robert said that things were just getting started over at
Speaker 1: Infinium Labs, and he admitted that there was no physical
Speaker 1: office yet, but that it was on its way and
Speaker 1: they are just trying to, you know, get everything in order. Now.
Speaker 1: You could be really generous and say, all right, I
Speaker 1: believe you, but considering that the company was going to
Speaker 1: have to go into production soon to get units out
Speaker 1: by the holiday season, that was kind of tough, right,
Speaker 1: hard o CP was really skeptical because that time was
Speaker 1: coming up quickly and if they didn't have a physical space,
Speaker 1: how are they going to actually build these consoles that
Speaker 1: supposedly we're going to be on sale in time for
Speaker 1: the holidays. They even followed up by sending a volunteer
Speaker 1: to a different address in Thenium Labs Corporation announced it
Speaker 1: was moving into a new headquarters building at eighteen nineteen
Speaker 1: Main Street, Suite eight hundred in Sarasota, Florida, and the
Speaker 1: volunteer said that when she went to the building, she
Speaker 1: looked at the directory and saw no companies listed for
Speaker 1: the eighth floor at all. There was an eighth floor,
Speaker 1: so at least there's that, but there was no one
Speaker 1: listed for it. So she took an elevator ride on
Speaker 1: up to the eighth floor, and then she said, it
Speaker 1: was a post town. There was there's no occupation on
Speaker 1: that floor. Now, near the end of the article, you
Speaker 1: get to a pretty tough paragraph. I'm going to quote it.
Speaker 1: The facts speak for themselves. Company closures, bankruptcy, investors losing
Speaker 1: millions of dollars, and current director positions where the company
Speaker 1: isn't even sure he works for them and cannot find
Speaker 1: his email address or telephone number. Mr Roberts has been
Speaker 1: involved with one successful business venture in eight years, according
Speaker 1: to his own resume. He followed that one up with
Speaker 1: several bankrupt and failed businesses. It's been documented by other
Speaker 1: sources that millions and millions of dollars were burned through
Speaker 1: in the last six years. We think that it's possible
Speaker 1: that the same fate could very possibly befall in Phinium Labs. Now.
Speaker 1: The response from Infinium Labs was just as harsh. The
Speaker 1: company complained and said that they were going to file
Speaker 1: a lawsuit against hard O c P in Florida, saying
Speaker 1: that they had made these UH these unsubstantiated claims and
Speaker 1: accusations against the company and therefore had hurt the company's
Speaker 1: UH chances of raising money and getting investment, and therefore,
Speaker 1: if they failed, it would be because of criticism like
Speaker 1: the kind from heart O CP. Heart O CP responded
Speaker 1: by filing a lawsuit for a declatory judgment and saying
Speaker 1: that they didn't do anything wrong from a judge. So
Speaker 1: the judge decided that he would hear the case and
Speaker 1: said that Anthidium Labs would need to present information about
Speaker 1: the company's business in Texas because they reportedly had an
Speaker 1: office located in Texas. They would also have to provide
Speaker 1: information about their investors board minute meetings from around the
Speaker 1: time that the article was published in order to indicate
Speaker 1: whether the company was, as they had claimed, much further
Speaker 1: along than the article had indicated, and also other information
Speaker 1: such as Timothy Roberts's own personal income tax records, and
Speaker 1: Phinium Labs failed to acquiesce to those demands, and ultimately
Speaker 1: the company would settle out of court, reportedly paying hard
Speaker 1: O c p. Fifty thousand dollars in the process. Now,
Speaker 1: in two thousand four, despite having nothing to show for
Speaker 1: itself other than this prototype that had been demonstrated, a
Speaker 1: couple of trade show events and Phenium Labs went public.
Speaker 1: They went from a privately held company to a publicly
Speaker 1: traded company. Timothy Roberts owned a whole lot of shares
Speaker 1: of stock, and by two thousand five things were looking
Speaker 1: particularly shady over at in Phinium Labs. Remember they had
Speaker 1: missed to ship dates already with the Phantom Console. Well,
Speaker 1: Roberts decided to step down as CEO. He still had
Speaker 1: millions of dollars worth of stocks at the time, and
Speaker 1: he did something that got the attention of the US government.
Speaker 1: He hired a stock promoter to send out a facts
Speaker 1: blast to potential investors with claims that the company was
Speaker 1: on the verge of releasing the Phantom Console and then
Speaker 1: the value of the company was set to blast off
Speaker 1: into the stratosphere. So at the time, this was a
Speaker 1: penny stock, meaning super cheap stocks for infinium labs. But
Speaker 1: with penny stocks, even the increase of just a couple
Speaker 1: of cents can mean a huge profit if you own
Speaker 1: a ton of stocks. So, as it turns out, it
Speaker 1: looked like Timothy Roberts was trying to drive up the
Speaker 1: stock price before he sold off his own stock. Roberts
Speaker 1: was ready to unload it once that price goes up,
Speaker 1: and that's called a pump and dump scheme. You do
Speaker 1: something to artificially pump up the value of a stock
Speaker 1: before you sell off your supply. When the dust settles
Speaker 1: and people see that the hype was just hype, the
Speaker 1: price comes back down, but by then you're already moving
Speaker 1: on to your next gig. Right, Well, that's what the
Speaker 1: SEC said Timothy Roberts had done. That he had effectively
Speaker 1: run a pump and dump scam using infinium labs, and
Speaker 1: the SEC is the Security Exchange Commission, that they were
Speaker 1: not happy and they had some serious concerns. Now Roberts
Speaker 1: would end up getting off relatively easy, all things considered.
Speaker 1: He was ultimately hit with a thirty thousand dollar fine
Speaker 1: after he reached a settlement with the SEC and as
Speaker 1: part of that settlement, he also agreed to not be
Speaker 1: an officer or director of a publicly traded company for
Speaker 1: five years, and he was supposed to stop playing with
Speaker 1: penny stocks too. Back to Infinium Labs, the company changed
Speaker 1: its name to Phantom Entertainment, and by two thousand six
Speaker 1: they had kind of quietly ended all promotion and discussion
Speaker 1: of this console that never ever materialized. Instead, the company
Speaker 1: decided it was going to pivot and release a gaming
Speaker 1: mouse and keyboard, which sounded a lot like the lapboard
Speaker 1: that was originally going to be part of the Phantom
Speaker 1: console hardware. In September two thousand six, they said this
Speaker 1: lap was going to start hitting store shelves in November
Speaker 1: two thousand six. In reality, it would take two more
Speaker 1: years before the lap board was actually available, towards the
Speaker 1: second half of two thousand eight. In two thousand seven,
Speaker 1: ARS Technica wrote another piece about the company, detailing its
Speaker 1: many problems, including how the headquarters had bounced around from
Speaker 1: Florida to Washington State to New York and was supposedly
Speaker 1: going to move back into Florida. The article's author, Nate Anderson,
Speaker 1: detailed the many problems the company had with various creditors
Speaker 1: and its strategy of issuing more stock when it needed cash,
Speaker 1: and it did this a lot with companies like Merrill
Speaker 1: Lynch or the Motley Fool or Center Point Property, and
Speaker 1: on three occasions by issuing stock to members of the
Speaker 1: Basharra family that had leveled three different lawsuits against the company. Now,
Speaker 1: this did not exactly paint the picture of a legitimate corporation.
Speaker 1: According to Anderson, by two thousand seven, the company had
Speaker 1: been operating at a net loss of more than seventy
Speaker 1: three million dollars. Yikes. When the Lapboard finally did come out,
Speaker 1: it ended up getting really lackluster reviews. A quick jump
Speaker 1: over to the Phantom Entertainment website shows that, amazingly enough,
Speaker 1: it still exists. I don't know if the company does,
Speaker 1: but the website is still up. It hasn't been updated
Speaker 1: since two thousand eleven, but it is still there. As
Speaker 1: for Timothy Roberts, why has that scamp been up to
Speaker 1: since his departure from Athinium Labs. Well, in two thousand
Speaker 1: seven he founded a company called Game Streamer, or at
Speaker 1: least that's when the company's press release says it was
Speaker 1: founded was two thousand seven. The actual existence of the
Speaker 1: company wasn't revealed until two thousand nine, so whether it
Speaker 1: had existed for two years secretly or not, who's to say.
Speaker 1: Now Roberts had listed himself as the CEO and CTO
Speaker 1: and president and CEO B on the company profile. This
Speaker 1: was a privately held company, however, so there was no
Speaker 1: conflict with this agreement that he had made with the
Speaker 1: c C a few years earlier, because that only applied
Speaker 1: to publicly traded companies. It was also based in Tampa,
Speaker 1: and it was supposed to be a leading innovator in
Speaker 1: digital distribution and streaming solution for games. Now, Roberts wouldn't
Speaker 1: stay there for very long. In two thousand and ten,
Speaker 1: he and a guy named Terence F. Taylor, the CFO
Speaker 1: of Game Streamer, resigned to start a new company together.
Speaker 1: This was originally going to be a company called Platforms
Speaker 1: with a Z at the end, and it was a
Speaker 1: digital distribution company. But we can't leave game Streamer that quickly,
Speaker 1: you see. The company would end up suing both Roberts
Speaker 1: and Taylor. They claimed that both of them had tried
Speaker 1: to secure trade secrets belonging to game Streamers for themselves Essentially,
Speaker 1: the allegation was that Timothy Roberts had registered domain names
Speaker 1: and trademarks under his own name rather than under the
Speaker 1: Game Streamers company name, and that he then planned on
Speaker 1: using those same ideas in a business this that would
Speaker 1: compete directly with game Streamers. The company also accused Roberts
Speaker 1: of threatening them, saying that he was going to reveal
Speaker 1: confidential company information that would ultimately harm the business. Now,
Speaker 1: Taylor and Roberts countersued Game Streamers. They alleged, among other things,
Speaker 1: that they were both being fired for game Streamers because
Speaker 1: they refused to convert to Seventh day adventist. I am
Speaker 1: not making any of that up. Ultimately, those lawsuits would
Speaker 1: all settle out of court in two thousand eleven. But
Speaker 1: our story ain't over yet, folks. Roberts and Taylor would
Speaker 1: launch another business in two thousand eleven, and it was
Speaker 1: called Savtira. It was billed as a cloud computing company,
Speaker 1: and its name was a combination of Savva's. Remember that
Speaker 1: was the first company Roberts had worked with, and in Tira,
Speaker 1: which was that big failed company he had worked with,
Speaker 1: Which makes me wonder if Roberts was running out of
Speaker 1: ideas at this point to combine two names of previous
Speaker 1: businesses into a third one, and it's height. Savtira had
Speaker 1: a valuation of five hundred million dollars. But he is
Speaker 1: the problem. It was actually worthless. In fact, Sevtira had
Speaker 1: to declare bankruptcy in two thousand twelve and it went
Speaker 1: into Chapter eleven, but then was forced into Chapter seven,
Speaker 1: which means it was liquidated. A judge ordered all assets
Speaker 1: liquidated to pay off creditors. Robertson Taylor had been selling
Speaker 1: stock certificates for a company that simply could not conduct
Speaker 1: business as was claimed, and this wasn't just bad news
Speaker 1: to wealthy investors who were out of a big wad
Speaker 1: of cash. Savtira's employees suffered as well. There were real
Speaker 1: people who had been working for a company under the
Speaker 1: belief that it was a legitimate business, but their paychecks
Speaker 1: stopped as the company ran out of cash, and toward
Speaker 1: the end, the company's bank account was at negative five
Speaker 1: thousand dollars before they were able to secure at two
Speaker 1: fifty thousand dollar alone. Allegedly, a good amount of that
Speaker 1: loan would end up going to some personal expenses that
Speaker 1: roberts had accumulated, rather than to actually pay off creditors
Speaker 1: of the company. According to prosecutor, because yes, of course
Speaker 1: this is going to end in another court case. It
Speaker 1: was all based on false revenue projections. That's what the value,
Speaker 1: the perceived value of this company was hinging upon. Robertson
Speaker 1: Taylor would be arrested on charges that they committed wire fraud.
Speaker 1: Roberts pled guilty or pleaded guilty, and his sentencing was
Speaker 1: scheduled to happen in two thousand and seventeen, though as
Speaker 1: of the recording of this podcast, that still hasn't happened.
Speaker 1: It may happen sometime in mid March. Last I heard, Uh.
Speaker 1: He faces up to twenty years in prison. His buddy
Speaker 1: Terrence Taylor, also pleaded guilty to wire fraud charges, and
Speaker 1: he was recently sentenced to five years in prison back
Speaker 1: in December two thousand seventeen. Now, there's a lot more
Speaker 1: I could say about roberts For example, he also led
Speaker 1: a company called hashing Space, which is a bitcoin minor
Speaker 1: hosting service. Terrence Taylor was the CFO over there too,
Speaker 1: but after the Feds served a six count indictment against
Speaker 1: the two guys, they both up down from that company.
Speaker 1: Hashing Space continued on buying out Roberts's ownership of the company. Anyway,
Speaker 1: that's the story of Timothy Roberts and the Phantom Console,
Speaker 1: and I want a cookie. I do not know to
Speaker 1: this day whether or not the Phantom Console was ever
Speaker 1: sincerely going to be built, or if in fact it
Speaker 1: was just a shell so that Timothy Roberts could raise
Speaker 1: a lot of money from investors and then spend it
Speaker 1: however he liked. I don't know the answer to that.
Speaker 1: There are a lot of indications that showed that there
Speaker 1: were at least some cursory attempts to create some hardware,
Speaker 1: and I'm sure people who are working for the Phantom
Speaker 1: are for Infinium Labs and then later Phantom Entertainment believed
Speaker 1: in their heart of hearts that they were working on
Speaker 1: a product that was going to go to market. But
Speaker 1: whether it was a sincere attempt or just a hoax
Speaker 1: from the beginning, the fact remains it never went anywhere,
Speaker 1: and it became kind of the laughing stock. It was
Speaker 1: one of those things that was held up as not
Speaker 1: just something that to ridicule, but something to show as
Speaker 1: an example of what can happen with Vaporwar, so an
Speaker 1: incredible story, and uh, maybe we'll follow up on this
Speaker 1: later on and talk more about some of the fallout
Speaker 1: and also some of the things that have happened in
Speaker 1: the wake of the Phantom console that brought some of
Speaker 1: those ideas to life. Like I said, while those ideas
Speaker 1: were way ahead of their time, they are ones that
Speaker 1: have found their ways into various game platforms today, whether
Speaker 1: it's PC based stuff like Steam or it's video game consoles.
Speaker 1: We've seen those concepts worked into video gaming. So there
Speaker 1: were some really good ideas there. If they had been
Speaker 1: executed properly, maybe the landscape of gaming would be very
Speaker 1: different today. Maybe in Phinium Labs would be the valve
Speaker 1: of today where they'd be the dominant player in PC
Speaker 1: gaming distribution. But as it stands, not so much. As
Speaker 1: for Phantom Entertainment, I honestly don't know if they're still
Speaker 1: an operation or not. The website still up though, so
Speaker 1: you can go check that out. If you guys have
Speaker 1: any suggestions for future topics I should tackle on this show,
Speaker 1: let me know. You can send me an email the
Speaker 1: addresses tech Stuff at how stuff works dot com, or
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Speaker 1: You'll see the schedule printed there, and you can join
Speaker 1: me and chat in the chat room, and I'll chat
Speaker 1: back at you whenever I get a chance, which is
Speaker 1: usually during the ad breaks and we have a good
Speaker 1: old time. I'd love to see you there and I'll
Speaker 1: talk to you guys again really soon. For moralness and
Speaker 1: thousands of other topics is at how stuff works dot com.
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