Category
🤖
TechTranscript
00:00Hey, what's up guys, MKBHD here.
00:05All right, story time.
00:06So it's 2020, folding smartphones are all the rage
00:11and there's a bunch of different options now,
00:13almost none of which you should probably actually buy.
00:15But I mean, we have the Galaxy Z Flip from Samsung,
00:18we have the Galaxy Fold, the Moto Razr,
00:22and then sort of the rest, you know,
00:24everything from the TCL tri-fold concept phone
00:27to the Royal FlexPai.
00:29And you may have seen another story floating around
00:30of another folding phone by Escobar.
00:35Yeah, that Escobar.
00:36Just a little filler in on the Escobar name
00:38if you're not familiar.
00:39So Pablo Escobar was the Colombian drug lord,
00:41ended up being known as basically
00:42the wealthiest criminal in history
00:44for monopolizing cocaine trade into the United States
00:48before, fun fact, he died of a gunshot wound to the head
00:51the day before I was born.
00:52So you know, this isn't exactly a positive sentiment
00:55around this name, like being known for the killings
00:58of police officers and politicians
01:00and making Colombia the murder capital of the world.
01:03Not the best way to have your name known,
01:06but it is a known name, like y'all have heard of Escobar.
01:09So now suddenly on every tech website,
01:11there's this new folding phone
01:13with the Escobar name on it, curiously.
01:15And it's getting a lot of eyeballs,
01:17turning a lot of heads, very interesting,
01:20and it's 350 bucks.
01:21And looking at the actual phone, it is a curious one.
01:26It's a gold accent, which is a nice touch.
01:29But if you study the specs or the design long enough at all,
01:32you literally realize it's just a Royal FlexPai
01:35with a gold accent tape to it.
01:37So naturally, I ordered one.
01:40So on December 5th, 2019, I spent my 350 bucks,
01:44free shipping, and placed my Escobar Fold order.
01:48Something a lot of people think about this channel
01:49is that like I get everything for free.
01:52And while it's true that I get review units
01:54and I will make first impressions videos with those,
01:58I end up buying pretty much everything
02:00that I review on this channel.
02:01Like that's why I haven't reviewed
02:02the Moto Razr folding phone yet, for example,
02:04because I sent the review unit back.
02:06That's what I did the first impressions with.
02:07And now the one that I bought
02:09has been delayed by several weeks.
02:10So anyway, I didn't reach out to Escobar Inc.
02:12I didn't even think to ask if they had a review program.
02:16I just, I quietly bought one.
02:18So that was in December and yeah, I never got it.
02:22I mean, I guess I shouldn't be surprised.
02:24It was a little suspicious to begin with.
02:26I mean, you look around their website
02:28and it's a little suspect.
02:30There's some pretty wild pictures and statements
02:32trying to sell you this phone, some pretty bold claims.
02:36And it's just overall not the most professional looking
02:39website I've ever bought a phone from.
02:41But I think we knew from the beginning
02:42I wasn't really ever gonna get this phone.
02:44Like I put down the money in the off chance I was surprised
02:47and then, hey, that would be kind of funny.
02:49But when I put my order into the tracker,
02:52it never updated from pending, pending.
02:54It just sort of said it was in production for months.
02:57So that was it.
02:58You know, we never made a video on it.
03:00We were sharing some other pretty cool stuff at the time.
03:03It sort of went under the radar.
03:04It was just lost money.
03:06That's sort of where I thought it would end.
03:08But then we saw headlines of another new Escobar Fold phone.
03:14It was the Escobar Fold 2.
03:17And once again, there were articles, there were headlines,
03:21there were even some videos of this new thing,
03:23a $400 Escobar Folding phone that looks like this.
03:27It's looking kind of familiar again.
03:30Oh, that's just a Samsung Galaxy Fold.
03:32And then on February 2nd, I got an email from Escobar Inc.
03:35just asking mailing address.
03:37Like, what's your mailing address?
03:39At that point, I was again, like sort of genuinely interested
03:43but after a few back and forths, it basically declined
03:45because they wanted to guarantee a video
03:47by sending it to us.
03:48And I wasn't willing to commit to guaranteeing a video
03:52just from them sending a phone.
03:53That's not something we do.
03:55So they ended up not sending one.
03:56But I did buy a second one
04:01because apparently I like giving money away
04:03to anything tech related.
04:04So maybe if you guys wanna buy the merch and support,
04:07we won't have to worry about this so much.
04:09But I bought another Escobar Fold 2.
04:13So I still didn't have the first one.
04:14I went to their site again, bought the second one
04:17under a different name.
04:19So now I've given them $750, free shipping both times
04:22and I've gotten nothing in return.
04:24So for a while, I didn't get one
04:25and neither did many other people.
04:28But then videos started popping up and this always happens.
04:32I've had this happen before where I declined something
04:35in my inbox, some opportunity and then a week later,
04:38I see a bunch of videos about it on YouTube
04:41in my sub box, et cetera.
04:43So this is one of those things I was curious about
04:45because the product isn't that great,
04:49but the company behind it and the schematics behind it
04:52are so weird.
04:53So I tweeted this, zero out of 10, would not recommend,
04:56didn't get the phone, both times I ordered.
04:58But then that night, believe it or not,
05:00when I got home from the studio to home,
05:04which is the shipping address that I put in
05:06for my first order, guess what was waiting for me
05:09at my door, an Escobar Fold box.
05:14So on February 24th, which is like four days after
05:17this tweet and the box showing up,
05:18I got an email saying that they upgraded my Fold 1 order
05:23to a Fold 2, which I guess I believe
05:26because it had my name on it from the first order I placed
05:29and it went to the shipping address
05:30of my first order I placed.
05:32And other people have gotten the same upgrade happen
05:36who also happened to be tech reviewers.
05:39I feel like the only reason I'm talking about this
05:40is because it's based around a tech product.
05:43Like I talk tech, but if this was happening
05:46with like a kitchen appliance product
05:49or some makeup product or something else like that,
05:51I probably wouldn't have cared nearly as much.
05:54But because it's tech, and they really seem
05:56to be trying hard to make it seem like a great phone to buy.
06:00Well, that's what made it so fascinating to me.
06:03Okay, so the unboxing experience, super simple.
06:06And within about 30 seconds of using a phone,
06:09and no, I'm not putting my SIM card in it,
06:11but from using the phone just for a little bit,
06:13it's pretty clear this appears to be
06:15a legit Samsung Galaxy Fold and the new one at that.
06:19So I have my regular Galaxy Fold here
06:21with the dust caps on the hinges
06:23and the little plastic cover that's on the back.
06:26And I'm not gonna get into the details of the phone
06:28because I'm not gonna get into the details of the phone.
06:30I have my regular Galaxy Fold here
06:31with the dust caps on the hinges
06:32and the new slightly stiffer hinge and everything.
06:35And this Escobar Fold, it's the same phone
06:38with a gold sticker glued to it.
06:44No, actually, it's actually a Galaxy Fold
06:47with gold tinfoil adhesive to it.
06:50You take a bit of that gold off of the hinge on the back
06:52and right underneath is that Samsung logo,
06:55right where it's supposed to be.
06:57And the gold foil comes off the back
06:59with a box cutter or a knife
07:01or really enough heat to melt the adhesive.
07:03So it's not pretty, but yeah, it is an actual Galaxy Fold,
07:07fully working, minus any of the stuff
07:09that normally comes in the box
07:10and it's a really poor rebranding job.
07:13It's an actual Galaxy Fold.
07:15So from this point, if you're reviewing an Escobar Fold 2,
07:18you're really just reviewing a Samsung Galaxy Fold
07:21with a gold sticker on the back
07:23and some weird pre-installed mugshot wallpapers.
07:26But the Galaxy Fold costs $1,800
07:31and the Escobar Fold 2 costs $400.
07:37So how are they pulling this off?
07:40Well, it's not just the lower quality packaging.
07:42It's not just the lower quality marketing.
07:45My theory is that they are going through orders,
07:48finding the names of YouTubers or just people in tech media
07:53or people who they think will talk about the phone
07:55if they get it and shipping those
07:58and then just not shipping the rest.
08:00That's probably why they found my first order
08:02because I had my name attached to it
08:03and why they upgraded me and shipped mine out.
08:05They were probably hoping I would speak
08:07pretty positively about it.
08:09That's why I tweeted what I did.
08:11But if you really wanna get into it,
08:13they tell everything on their site.
08:14So the two main people involved are these two guys,
08:18Roberto Escobar, so Pablo Escobar's older brother
08:21and chief of assassinations,
08:26and this other guy, Olaf Gustafson,
08:29who is the CEO of Escobar Inc.
08:32Now, I don't know why both the photos look like mug shots.
08:34Maybe that's their cool vibe or whatever,
08:37but there's a Twitter account behind this Olaf guy
08:40who honestly just looks like a younger,
08:42maybe somewhat tech-savvy dude
08:43who's just convinced this older guy
08:46he can use the Escobar name
08:48and make them lots more money from it.
08:49So he's tweeted all these articles
08:51and tons of photos with celebrities somehow,
08:53and he seems very proud of any press he can get,
08:56including when he also cloned
08:59the Boring Company flamethrower
09:01and tried to get Elon to stop selling his,
09:03and when he helped Mr. Escobar start a cryptocurrency
09:06that didn't exactly work out.
09:07But the marketing for the Escobar Fold
09:10is easily the best part.
09:12So if you go to their YouTube channel,
09:13which is truly incredible, I'll link it below,
09:16it currently has about 14 videos on it,
09:18including a one-minute video panning back and forth
09:21across five Fold phones,
09:24maybe all that they'd made at that time.
09:26There's an unboxing video that I'm pretty sure
09:28if I show more than about three more seconds of it,
09:30it's gonna get this video demonetized.
09:33They have a video called ripsamsung.com,
09:37where they take a bunch of non-rebranded
09:39original Galaxy Folds out of the box
09:42and then put safety glasses on,
09:45but no other protective clothing,
09:47and then just start smashing Galaxy Folds
09:50with sledgehammers until they literally catch on fire.
09:53And if you look it up, if you go to ripsamsung.com,
09:58which is in the title and this whole video's point,
10:00the Escobar guys bought that URL
10:03and they have a redirect to escobaring.com,
10:07which is crazy because this phone wouldn't exist
10:10without Samsung's phone.
10:11And then there's two other endorsement videos.
10:13So I guess this is really how you make sure
10:15you sell a lot of phones,
10:16from Chris Hansen and Anna Anka.
10:19Hey guys, Chris Hansen here of Hansen versus Predators.
10:22And to catch a predator, I just wanted to tell you all
10:25that I've seen this amazing new smartphone
10:27called the Escobar Fold 2.
10:31It appears to be the best phone out right now.
10:34I've been looking at the transcripts.
10:35So have a seat, check it out,
10:38and remember, I'll be watching.
10:40Take care.
10:42It's probably a good thing
10:42they disabled comments on these videos.
10:45Hi, I'm Anna Anka from Sweden.
10:46I used to be married to the singer Paul Anka,
10:48and I just wanted to tell you
10:50that the Escobar Fold 2 smartphone
10:53is a really, really incredible innovation
10:55from some amazing people in Stockholm, Sweden.
10:58I hope you guys will enjoy it and use it a lot.
11:01Lots of love.
11:03Bye.
11:04Also conveniently, both of these celebrities
11:05are on a site called Cameo,
11:08which is where you can send requests
11:09and pay 50 or 100 bucks or so
11:11and get a personalized video in return.
11:14I'm pretty sure videos on the site are typically like,
11:16oh, have Arnold Schwarzenegger say happy birthday
11:19to your friend or something.
11:22I doubt that these two people even know
11:25that their videos are being used to help promote a scam.
11:28So look, I'm a tech reviewer,
11:30so I'm typically just focusing on the final product,
11:33the finished thing, should you buy it or not.
11:36But this piece of tech, we've reviewed already.
11:39It's the Galaxy Fold.
11:40I've talked about it.
11:41It just has gold tinfoil on the back.
11:43So the interesting part now
11:45becomes the behind the scenes part,
11:47which is the company that's trying
11:48to maybe sell some of them and also not ship most of them.
11:52They're trying to scam you.
11:53It's one of those situations where you know
11:54you have to take any preferential treatment you might get
11:58with a gigantic grain of salt.
12:01So I guess the lesson we've learned
12:04is there are way, way, way too many cases
12:06of people not getting their Escobar Fold
12:09for me to ever recommend you ever buy anything
12:11from this company.
12:12So don't.
12:14Don't buy an Escobar Fold 2.
12:16If you want a Galaxy Fold, it is very pricey,
12:19but I also typically don't recommend you buy one either.
12:21And just for your own safety of money,
12:24don't buy anything that any of these guys
12:25are associated with at all.
12:28I took the hit, so you don't have to.
12:29There you have it.
12:30If you want an Escobar Fold review,
12:32watch my Galaxy Fold review.
12:34I've already done it.
12:34Link below the like button if you wanna check it out.
12:36That's pretty much it.
12:38That's the truth.
12:39Thanks for watching.
12:40Catch you guys in the next one.
12:42Peace.
12:44Peace.