GIGAOM ROADMAP, SAN FRANCISCO — Nest Lab’s smart and sexy thermostat is becoming the iPhone of home heating, says its designer, Tony “the Podfather” Fadell.

Speaking at the GigaOM Roadmap conference, Fadell described how a Texas utility called Reliant is using the Nest Learning Thermostat to attract customers.

“Nest is to Reliant what the iPhone was to AT&T,” said Fadell. It’s a killer piece of hardware that’s attracting customers to the utility in droves.

LAS VEGAS, CES 2012 — Our very British Editor Leander and I were invited to sit in with Leo Laporte, Sarah Lane, and Alex Lindsay for Tuesday’s live episode of Macbreak Weekly. We had a hoot ‘n hollerin’ good time playing with new gadgets from the show floor, talking about this year’s trends in tech, and pondering how Microsoft just might be becoming the next Apple.

The full video is almost 80 minutes long, so feel free to skip around to all the good parts where it’s just me talking.