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00:00Hey what's up, MKBHD here.
00:29And if you're looking for the most elaborate possible way to lose your wireless charging,
00:35I think we might have found it.
00:36This is a custom-backed iPhone 12 Pro with a crazy design by a certain company called
00:43Caviar.
00:44And we've seen crazy custom Caviar iPhones before, right?
00:47They're calling this one Space Odyssey Moon, and the theme here is all about space.
00:52So from the unboxing experience you just saw with the lights and the stars, to the phone
00:57itself.
00:58This metal you see here is steel and titanium, and it kind of just looks like this illustration
01:02of a starry night sky.
01:04And something about it being on the flat back of the iPhone 12 with the flat sides and everything,
01:10and the exact depth of the camera being taken up by this canvas, kind of feels more like
01:16an art piece basically.
01:17And as I hold it, there is absolutely added weight here.
01:20It's heavier and a little thicker than just the regular iPhone by itself.
01:25The texture at the bottom is significantly raised.
01:28So the craters, I guess is what you'd call them.
01:31You can feel every single one of them.
01:32You can run your finger over it and feel everything.
01:34And then in the middle of the bottom, apparently in this little bubble here, is a piece of
01:41the moon.
01:42Like a real piece of the act- how do- how do you get a- see this is- I don't know.
01:49That sounds rare, right?
01:51I don't know if that's really rare, but Caviar is selling this on their site for $6,940,
01:58which is crazy.
01:59But I don't know, like a real piece of the- I have no way of verifying, or even knowing
02:07if that could end up in- you know what?
02:10I know who to talk to about this.
02:12Yo, Neil.
02:13What's up, man?
02:14Marcus.
02:15Yeah.
02:16How you been, man?
02:17I'm doing all right.
02:20Thanks for the time on such short notice.
02:23I have some questions about some stuff.
02:27I hope I can answer them.
02:28So- Okay.
02:29So let me just start with like- because you would know this.
02:32Okay.
02:33How do pieces of the moon end up on Earth?
02:37Yeah.
02:38Well, there are three ways you can do it.
02:39One of them is that you go there, scoop up some material, and bring it back.
02:45The six Apollo missions that landed on the moon all brought back satchels of rocks.
02:51Another way are on sample return missions that don't even involve astronauts.
02:56You can send a spacecraft to the moon, it'll do some scooping, and then it'll launch back,
03:00and then you collect it.
03:01Got it.
03:02The third way, and this way exceeds all other rocks ever brought to Earth from the moon,
03:09is from asteroid strikes on the moon itself.
03:13So you see what the moon looks like, right?
03:15It's completely pockmarked.
03:16There's no atmosphere to burn up most of what falls to it.
03:20So you have one asteroid striking the surface of the moon with such energy that a shock
03:26wave builds in the surrounding regions, and it flings rocks into space.
03:32And some of those rocks will achieve escape velocity from the moon.
03:35They'll just leave the moon entirely.
03:38And then they're wandering in space, in the Earth-moon system.
03:44Eventually, 100% of those rocks will collide with Earth.
03:48Now, the smaller ones will burn up, and you'll see them as like a shooting star at night.
03:52And you say, well, isn't that cool?
03:54That could have been moon dust.
03:55The larger pieces will survive their trip through the atmosphere and land on the Earth.
04:02But you do the calculations, there's tons of moon rocks that got here by that method.
04:07Oh, wow.
04:08Tons.
04:09Okay.
04:10Is there a way to verify that a meteorite you might have is definitely from the moon?
04:18Okay.
04:19So I have colleagues who are in the business of verifying whether what you found is a meteorite,
04:24an authentic meteorite at all, whether or not it's from the moon.
04:28And they have this saying, it's called most people have meteor wrongs.
04:35You see this odd-looking rock because you think that's what meteors look like, and then
04:38you bring it in.
04:39We used to have a meteor identification day, meteorite identification day.
04:44And most rocks you think are meteorites are not.
04:47So you would do a chemical analysis of it.
04:49If it was not otherwise obvious to a meteorite specialist, you can do a chemical analysis.
04:54If it's heavy in iron, it's definitely not from the moon's surface, which has barely
05:00any metals at all.
05:02So there are ways to figure it out.
05:04But we only know that because we've been to the moon, and we know what that sample looks
05:08like, and then we get to compare.
05:09Ah, got it.
05:11Okay.
05:12There's a reason for all these moon questions.
05:13Sorry, I didn't even tell you.
05:15Yeah, I'm wondering.
05:16You're like, wait, what?
05:17Are you hankering for some moon dust?
05:20What's your thing?
05:21Yeah.
05:22So there's this iPhone right here.
05:23This is a – it's a custom phone, and it's got this art piece on the back, and it's beautiful.
05:30It's very space-themed.
05:31I think you'd like it.
05:32But the piece I'm curious about is down here at the bottom.
05:36There is a claimed very tiny piece of the moon on the back of this phone, and I'm just
05:43trying to figure out if it's possible that that's actually what this is.
05:46Okay.
05:47So it's a really tiny piece of the moon, okay?
05:51So the rules are – I'm just saying what the rules, not the reality.
05:54The rule is the Apollo astronauts who brought back moon rocks, that is all in the possession
06:00of the United States government, okay, at NASA and the Smithsonian.
06:05So technically, you're not supposed to have access to that, all right?
06:09But like I said, whatever we brought back from the moon pales compared to the tonnage
06:14of rocks that have come from the moon naturally.
06:19So you can open up meteorite catalogs, and some of them will be lunar, and some will
06:25be Martian, and you can buy them.
06:28So you could sell 100,000 iPhones with a microgram of moon dust in it using a pound of moon dust.
06:35And that sounds like it's a – you can make a lot of money that way.
06:39Now, I don't value carrying around moon dust.
06:43It'd be fun if I had a rock, yeah, but here's one microgram that's embedded in this thing
06:47in my iPhone.
06:49Maybe it's bragging rights.
06:50I don't know.
06:52But let me just say it does look cool.
06:54What you held up looks kind of cool.
06:56Yeah, it's – to me, the question is, number one, could it really be a piece of the moon?
07:01Sounds like yes.
07:02But then number two is the price.
07:05So how much would you actually charge for something like this?
07:09This phone, they're charging $6,920 for.
07:13Yeah.
07:14So that's – okay, I would expect that.
07:16So if you look at the prices of meteorites, you can buy one that's within your budget.
07:22It's just depending what size you want to get it at.
07:25So I've seen meteorite catalogs.
07:27They're around in Arizona.
07:29They're companies based in places where – so there's much –
07:32There's much less Mars dust that's known.
07:35And if you find one that has Mars dust on it, I think that'd be kind of a way – I'd
07:38rather have it as its own conversation piece because one day, you're going to throw away
07:42that iPhone, okay, because the next iPhone is going to come out.
07:46And so that's – it'd be odd to put something so interesting on what is amounted to a disposable
07:52item.
07:53Ah, and that is what I want to talk about.
07:57Sorry, Neil.
07:59But see, I don't have the tools to cut this open and determine if it's actually a piece
08:04of the moon, but the consensus is you can buy and sell a piece of the moon meteorites
08:10for up to about $1,000 a gram.
08:13This might as well be a piece of the moon.
08:15But at this point, three videos in, I'm not even interested in this custom iPhone anymore
08:21so much as I'm trying to figure out caviar.
08:25This is actually the third video I've made about a ridiculous caviar custom iPhone because
08:31they decided to reach out and send one to the studio.
08:34And I'm not even going to call out any other fellow YouTube creators, but if you just look
08:37through YouTube and search for any other custom or gold or crazy expensive iPhone, YouTube
08:44is filled with glorious thumbnails and crazy headlines, and almost all of those videos
08:50are about a caviar iPhone.
08:53So if my natural question is, what is the point of this stuff and why do they keep sending
08:56me and other fellow tech YouTubers these caviar iPhones?
09:01The answer is because we'll keep making videos about them.
09:04If you send a crazy $100,000 gold iPhone to someone who makes videos about phones for
09:11a living, you're probably going to get a video of someone posing with it and a crazy thumbnail,
09:15and it's probably just a channel for free marketing again.
09:18If you're caviar, it's kind of a no-brainer, right?
09:20You cross your fingers that hopefully they link back to your site, but basically all
09:24press is good press, right?
09:27So the other question is just, who is actually buying these things?
09:31Like, I actually think it's really cool that there are people out there making cool custom
09:36art pieces with a piece of the moon.
09:39And let's say we give them the benefit of the doubt that it is a real piece of the moon.
09:42And I even think it's pretty cool that it's on the back of an iPhone 12 Pro, and it fits
09:47perfectly over this rectangular shape, and they thought a lot about this layout.
09:51It's impressively well-built.
09:53Like I said, the flat sides of the iPhone make it look more well-integrated than ever.
09:57But what's the point of attaching it to a working iPhone, and then actually selling
10:02it like someone might use this phone?
10:05Well, it turns out, the more you look into Caviar Global as a company, the more it all
10:09starts to make sense.
10:10They're a Russian company, they make a lot of luxury tech products, and they thrive.
10:18They absolutely thrive on headlines.
10:22They're like everything the Escobar company wanted to be.
10:26So instead of gluing a gold sticker to the back of a Galaxy Fold, Caviar mostly focuses
10:31on heavily customizing iPhones.
10:34So they sell an iPhone with a piece of the moon in it, as you can see, sure.
10:38They also have a $6,000 iPhone with a piece of Mars in it, they have one with a piece
10:43of Mercury.
10:44There's a $10,000 iPhone with a piece of the first Apple One computer, and a $120,000 gold
10:51on gold iPhone.
10:53They also make a $15,000 gold American flag Trump-Biden phone, which is even weirder coming
11:03from Russia.
11:04Their latest addition, which you might have seen headlines on, is an iPhone 12 with a
11:08custom back with a piece of Steve Jobs' original turtleneck in the logo of the phone.
11:18Okay.
11:19And then on their site, instead of a couple of dumb, obviously paid videos on a YouTube
11:23channel, they've got a whole page on their site of famous clients, ranging from hockey's
11:28Alexander Ovechkin, to boxing's Roy Jones Jr., to other Russian politicians and Olympians.
11:34Basically all of them with some sort of caption that they received this gift as a gift for
11:39their new Russian citizenship, or their alignment with Russian politics.
11:43And also, super weird, but if you Google like I did, if you got super into this, and you
11:48actually look up each of these people, the photo that is on Caviar's site of them posing
11:53with the phone like that, is the only photo I can find of each of these people with any
11:59Caviar iPhone.
12:00Like you can try this yourself.
12:01Google Alina Zagitova, Caviar.
12:05Nothing else comes up, just Caviar's picture.
12:07Google Roy Jones Jr., Caviar.
12:09There's one article with that same one blurry photo for the whole entire internet.
12:14If you Google Alexander Ovechkin, Caviar, well he's a hockey player and apparently he
12:18filled up the Stanley Cup with Caviar after he won it and ate out of it, so that came
12:22up before any Caviar phone.
12:24Now look, unlike the whole Escobar Inc. thing, I don't actually know anyone or have ever
12:30seen anyone who's actually tried to buy one of these Caviar phones, or accessories, or
12:37lighters, or AirPods, or any of the stuff they make.
12:39So I'm not here to tell you that it's a scam or anything like that, but what I am here
12:44to tell you is, number one, it's kind of weird to spend thousands of dollars on a brand new
12:50phone and it arrives already set up and turned on out the box just for like a wallpaper.
12:58Only other people I've seen do that is actually Escobar.
13:00And then number two, aside from the precious metals like gold and diamonds, there's no
13:07way for me and most regular people to ever verify the authenticity of any of the things
13:14they're claiming, whether it's a piece of the moon, or a piece of Mars, or a piece of
13:20Steve Jobs' original turtleneck.
13:23And even if it is actually that thing, it's still pretty overpriced.
13:28Like if anything here is obvious, it's that people shouldn't be buying this stuff for
13:31value.
13:32But there are collectors out there and collectors actually care more about limited editions
13:37to preserve low supply than anything else.
13:40So everything Caviar makes is always like one of a small number.
13:43This one here is one of 19 for pieces of the moon phones.
13:48And the only real reason they have for constantly attaching this stuff to new iPhones and pieces
13:54of tech, it's a constant free supply of new hype and headlines and YouTube videos.
14:03Because if there's one thing we know for sure, it's people are always talking about the newest
14:07tech.
14:08So if you try to put yourself in Caviar's shoes and you want to make a crazy expensive
14:12super limited edition little art piece, and you want free marketing to go with it, you
14:17should attach that art piece to the most talked about new tech product of every year, the
14:23iPhone.
14:25And people will talk about it.
14:26So there you go.
14:27You know, after this video, Caviar, they'll probably email me again, probably ask for
14:31the phone back like usual, I'll send it back.
14:34And they'll probably never send another Caviar phone here again.
14:39Although maybe if they have that same stubbornness that we've seen from companies like Escobar
14:46Inc, maybe they do realize maybe they'll actually think all press is good press.
14:51And I'll keep just just spamming that send button to as many YouTubers as possible because
14:56kind of works.
14:57Anyway, in the meantime, if you want a custom iPhone, just grab an icon skin, I'll link
15:02it below.
15:03It's way cheaper.
15:04If you want a piece of the moon, just buy a piece of the moon, I guess.
15:10Either way, that's been it.
15:12Thanks for watching.
15:13Catch you guys in the next one.
15:15Peace.