Tech News Weekly Episode 296 Transcript
Please be advised this transcript is AI-generated and may not be word for word. Time codes refer to the approximate times in the ad-supported version of the show.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:00:00):
Coming up next on Tech News Weekly, it's me, Jason Howell, and I start off the show chatting with Kyle Kang from Nothing About The Nothing Phone too. And I'm Micah Sargent and I talk to Ben Shone of nine to five Google about Samsung Galaxy unpacked. Turns out it's a pretty iterative year. <Laugh>. I have my story of the week dealing with infotainment systems and that may make you feel happy or sad. And that's exactly the point. And I round things out with my story of the week. It's about caps. Can we please get rid of these ridiculous things? I'll answer that question coming up on Tech News Weekly. This episode of Tech News Weekly is brought to you by Cisco Meraki. Without a cloud managed network, businesses inevitably fall behind. Experience, the ease and efficiency of Meraki's single platform to elevate the place where your employees and customers come together. Cisco Meraki maximizes uptime and minimizes loss to digitally transform your organization, Meraki's intuitive interface, increased connectivity and multi-site management. Keep your organization operating seamlessly and securely wherever your team is. Let's Cisco Meraki's 24 7. Available support. Help your organizations remote, onsite, and hybrid teams always do their best work. Visit meraki.cisco.com/twit.
(00:01:26):
Podcasts you love from people you trust. This is twit. This is Tech News Weekly episode 296. Recorded Thursday, July 27th, 2023. Galaxy unpacked an iterative update. This episode of Tech News Weekly is brought to you by ZipRecruiter. If you're hiring, you're currently dealing with a slowing economy, which adds to your challenges. Thankfully, there's a hiring partner who is focused on you and your needs. Ziprecruiter, four out of five employers who post on ZipRecruiter, get a quality candidate within the first day. Try ZipRecruiter for free at ziprecruiter.com/tnw and by Duo Protect Against Breaches with a leading access management suite, providing strong multi-layered defenses to only allow legitimate users in. For any organization concerned about being breached and in need of a solution, fast Duo quickly enables strong security and improves user productivity. Visit css.co/twitch today for a free trial. And by dda, security professionals often undergo manual tasks of collecting evidence.
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With DDA companies can complete audits, monitor controls, and expand security assurance efforts to scale. Say goodbye to manual evidence Collection and hello to automation. All done, atda speed. Visit ada.com/twi to get a demo and 10% off implementation. Hello and welcome to Tech News Weekly, the show where every week we talk to and about the people making and breaking the tech news. I am one of your hosts. Micah Sargent. I'm the other guy coming from this, you know, downstairs den in my in my house. Jason Howell. It's not always set up. I know your set up Micah is like static and always in place. Yes. And ready to unchanging. Mine is like, mine is like sheer panic every time I gotta get it going <laugh>. It's like I gotta, you know, light the fire and do all these things to get it going. But anyways, we get there.
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Sure. This door basically remains closed. There are no, no kids. No. You know, so I understand it's just a different situation also. Is the ukulele new or has that always been there on the fireplace? Oh, that, that has always been there and it never moves 'cause I never play it <laugh>. Ah, got it, got it. It's an ornamental ukulele. Yes, exactly. If ever the the inspiration strikes me, I might pick it up, but it doesn't happen very often with a ukulele anyways. We're not here to talk music, even though my backdrop might suggest. So we are here to talk about many things, technology, but we're gonna start off today. We're gonna start off talking about the Nothing Phone two. I actually had the pleasure of reviewing the Nothing. Phone Two actually did it on this very show a couple of weeks ago.
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And it's a very unique device. So we bring on somebody from nothing to talk about kind of the story behind the device. 'cause I've given you the information and my perspective on, on using the device. Let's talk about the company and kind of what, what has led to the Nothing. Phone two, joining me as Kyle Kang from v from Nothing, of course, VP of North America. And it's great to have you here, Kyle, it's good to see you. We've had you on all about Android a number of years ago, so it's been a little while. Welcome back.
Kyle Kiang (00:04:53):
Thanks for having me. Good to see you again.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:04:55):
Yeah, really good to see you. Although we're not standing in the same place, so we can't revel at the fact that you and I are almost the same height. So we are very tall.
Kyle Kiang (00:05:05):
We'll get the back to back photo this time, so
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:05:07):
That's right, that's right. The next time we'll make it happen. So first of all, you joined nothing not a, not a huge amount of time before. So you've been with nothing for a little bit of time now. Yeah. And the brand story is I think, very interesting to me. And I thought might be kind of a good opportunity to kind of set up a little bit about what makes sure nothing as a brand unique from other brands. I know you're wearing the buds right now. Nothing has a very unique and, and very kind of consistent design language. Tell us a little bit about kind of, you know, since you've joined kind of the story about nothing that that kind of pulled you over and, and where we are with the phone two compared to where we started with the phone one.
Kyle Kiang (00:05:52):
Sure. So, I mean, I think probably Alyssa are kind of familiar with nothing, but maybe to kind of fill in the, fill in the stories. I've been involved kind of officially since this year wearing a couple hats kind of setting up the US business. And I'm also kind of serving as interim marketing head for, for this launch. But I've been kind of friends, you know, to, to the team since the start. You know, we obviously, you know had a previous life together in this industry. And so so I've been kind of involved since the early days. I think what you've seen from nothing is, this is year three when nothing launched it was more kind of sharing its philosophy, differentiating on differentiation in design and, and kind of a focus on a more enhanced user experience.
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In the first year obviously a pair of year one you know, headphones were launched. I think those were received positively. And in year one, nothing was different was differentiating itself on differentiation of hardware design. And I think for those of you that saw Phone one, you saw that from a differentiated hardware design. I think that's probably some of the unique things you were talking about earlier. But I think what's where, where nothing is now in year three is probably two things. Not just differentiating on different hardware design, which has been the reason why people have, have kind of raised their hand and said, we like nothing. This is what we like, what you guys are doing, you're doing something different. But also in this device you're seeing a differentiation on software design. And I think putting those things together. And so I think you're starting to see the bigger picture in terms of where nothing wants to eventually go. To be totally honest, building a hardware company from totally scratch as a startup is <laugh> is not the easiest thing in the world to do. So it, it's kind of been a step-by-step where first making products building up capabilities. And I think now in year three, making a device that I think really kind of shows, you know, shows nothing's potential. I think a response has been positive so far.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:07:32):
Yeah, indeed. And I mean it would be very easy if you were a new, well, very easy I suppose <laugh> depending on how you define that. But it would be easier to come out of the gate with a device that looks like a every other device that doesn't have that kind of additional flare that it seems like the brand of nothing is bringing to alt their hardware. But you guys were doing that from the very beginning. If you had to take a look at the first phone, the Nothing Phone one and where we're at with the Nothing Phone two, how, like I'm sure there were certain particular lessons that were learned from the initial kind of outing versus where the new device is. If you had to kind of summarize those Sure. What, what were some of those lessons that really made it into this latest model?
Kyle Kiang (00:08:19):
Yeah, I mean, I think the things that are obvious are, one, to be totally honest, and I think, you know, and Carl mentioned this in some conversations is for, for Phone one, you know, it wasn't an internal software team. So this is the, the team that worked on nothing os which I think is one thing we've gotten very, very positive response on is by an entirely internal software team that I think has done a great job. And, you know, so there's some things that people have been really responded to well. So I think that's one. And then also there's a premium nature to this device in terms of a step up in certain, you know some of the design elements, some of the components that I think make it a premium product. And so that those I think are the two things probably to call out on, on Phone two. And I think people have kind of taken note of that.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:08:58):
Yeah, yeah. Oh, I'm 100%. And like, I, I didn't get the, I didn't have the opportunity to play around with the Nothing Phone one, so I was very happy to get the Nothing Phone two from you guys for review and for certain these software experience was really enjoyable. Like, you know, it's, it's always kinda like this weird kind of nebulous thing in the world of Android because I mean, at the, at the core of it, it is Android running underneath and there's, you know, there's, there's the companies that do that, that supplement the, let's say the vanilla experience with a little bit of, you know, features special things. There's some companies that lean heavily into that highly kind of like highly modified and highly customized approach. I felt like the Nothing Phone two kind of strikes a good balance. It has a very very unique approach to the software, kind of the visual aesthetic, the design of these things, but also not straying too far away from what you get and, and almost loading it, you know, overwhelmingly. So with all, all sorts of features that you're almost dodging in use, I didn't really get that with a nothing phone. How, how, how does nothing tell the story of the design language when it comes to the software?
Kyle Kiang (00:10:15):
Yeah, I mean, I think, and I think we maybe have a, a strong, a stronger point of view in the sense that I don't think, we think mobile software's in a great place in terms of user experience now. And you know, I think for it to be a fast, kind of smooth experience in terms of what you're describing in terms of being snappy, that's kinda like table stakes. And I think on the device, you know, it's, it's, it's a product that has to work well, has to, you know, the camera has to be good, has to perform well, that's, that has to happen. But I think to what you said earlier, in terms of a unique product, it's where the uniqueness is and where the differentiation is. Where we, I think our thinking about what we kind of say internally is purposeful smart intended smartphone usage.
(00:10:51):
And I think our point of view is actually a little bit different. Some of the things you probably noticed is, and it's actually to be totally honest, like there are about three or four things on this device that I think probably do change your behavior a little bit beyond, you know, just performance itself. You know, I think we've gotten very positive response to the monochrome design mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. and I think, to be very honest, I'm not sure how much you've used it, but like for myself personally, it's actually changed my behavior in terms of how I kinda use my smartphone. I found myself being really bad at kind of going into apps and, you know, historically I think our brains are trained to, you know, look at like colorful icons and get trapped and, and, and, you know, spending 30 minutes on our smartphone on when we weren't necessarily intended to.
(00:11:24):
It's actually makes you have to think about what you're using, you know, what, you know, what apps are going into and why you're going into those. That's actually been something I think that's been very kind of, I think called out by people. And so far we've gotten a really positive response on, in addition, I think you're seeing a design language that we're starting on, you know, like the weather widget for, for example, you know, it doesn't require you to go into an app. You can one click and see, you know, the forecast for the day, the forecast for the hours, and you're not having to, you know, go deeper, deeper into the device. And so we talk about you know, purposeful, smart plug usage. And I, I think what we're trying to do, and I think beyond design language that people respond to, you're starting to, I, I think see the future of, of what nothing's trying to do. And to be totally honest, I think, you know, in phone one the company was in its, you know, its second year now it's being able to show I think what, what the, what the design intention is and more importantly, where there's you know consumer benefit.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:12:15):
Yeah. Yeah. Now touching a little bit on the on the hardware design, again, I think it's, you know, important to to point out that nothing has a design relationship with teenage engineering who I highly respect. Yep. you know, the products and, and their kind of aesthetic, their approach on product is, is really impressive and very interesting. Right. So the, so the two brands work hand in hand as far as that's concerned. I'm, I'm just kind of curious to know how or what that design conversation looks like when you're working with a company and an outfit like teenage Engineering to design the, the aesthetics of not only the foam, but I know the earpieces as well. Like what, what is that conversation like?
Kyle Kiang (00:12:58):
It's pretty collaborative. I mean, to be totally transparent, it looks like I'm in a closet right now, but I'm actually in our like, design studio in, in, in London. And ironically I stuck up here 'cause we're having like a, a launch party kind of celebrate the teenage guys are are here. And it's, it's kinda like one team you know, where, you know, they've led kind of the overall industrial design and focus. We have a design team here in London that kind of you know, takes that leadership and works pretty closely. So it's pretty seamless. And I think the one thing we're trying to do is, and I'll put you guys, I'll, I'll ask you guys a question. How many companies out there have a design philosophy where when you see, you see the product, you know, it's from that company?
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:13:32):
Oh yeah, absolutely. Right. Like, that's not always that, that easy, especially in smartphone, I would say. Yeah, apple, apple does a really great job of d of differentiating themselves based on the design itself. But a lot of the others out there, you know, everything looks very similar.
Kyle Kiang (00:13:48):
Yeah. And I mean, I think nothing's kind of born out of this kind of fatigue on sea of sameness. And I think the goal is when you see a nothing product you know, it has a design philosophy and Id that you know, that you, you can identify with. And it's been received positively. And the teenage guys and, and the team here from London have, you know, I think have built a, have built something around design that's been really well responded to.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:14:07):
Yeah. Yeah. Indeed. so kind of speaking of that, the kind of this, this sea of sameness, like what's, what's your take on, on other filmmakers out there? Are, are they, is this current age of smartphone? Like, are they resting on their laurels? Where do you see kind of this competition kind of lagging or your competition specifically? Where, where are they lagging compared to what you guys are doing?
Kyle Kiang (00:14:32):
I don't think it's anybody's fault, but I mean, I'll be totally honest, this is a really tough, tough industry. Tough business. And I think it's very tough to differentiate and take risks. And I think any big company, they don't really have the luxury or, or the freedom to do that. I think nothing still pretty early stage is going to take some risks. I think we, we have to, because something has to happen in the industry or nobody else will at this point. I don't think we think anybody is coming behind us into this industry. 'cause The barriers are so high and it's so challenging. And so I think we think about this as if, if we don't do it, nobody else will. And so we're trying to do differentiation that is thoughtful, makes a better product experience and kind of creates a little bit of, of, of fun around it. I mean, I think we had this internal saying in terms of, to make tech fun again, is we're probably the only people in this industry that are willing to do this in this categories. Yeah. And we know why others can't and it's not, they don't want to, but it's, it's, it's much easier said than done.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:15:23):
Yeah. I'll be curious to see if others follow in the footsteps and go like, Hey, you know, maybe we should take some risks. I mean, obviously there's the foldables and I know that I mm-hmm. <Affirmative> saw that like foldables from nothing, probably not coming anytime in the near term anyways compared to at least according to what I believe. I, I read Carl Pay had mentioned something about Foldables and it not being on the horizon. So but not immediately. Yeah, not immediately. I mean,
Kyle Kiang (00:15:49):
No, but I think, I mean, I think to, to build on your point too, it's, I mean, to be totally honest, like we've seen, we actually, people have been calling out people, other people doing transparent design now, which was kind of the, the start of nothing. And so I think we, we, we showed that, you know, we can do that better than anybody. But I also think, like, to your point, like, I'm not sure you know, how much you spend time with the device, but like when we launched Phone one, I think there was a lot of questions on the Cliff being a kind of a gimmick mm-hmm. <Affirmative>. and I can, to be honest with you, I can understand that sentiment, but I think on Phone two, you're starting to see kind of a, a philosophy where we're actually, you know, doing product innovation where the intention is for you to be able to keep your phone down.
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And there's probably two or three features on that are actually useful. You know, the third party, you know, third party notification system where, you know, you can keep your phone down and you can see the progress of an Uber getting to you. I, I use that on Sunday. I was flying, you know, here from for to London from LA and like I had an eight minute wait for an Uber and I literally had the phone down. It allowed me to do like three or four more things before I had to go. You know, we have an essential notification on the back of the gly where basically, you know, 15 years ago, sure on a Blackberry there's a little light, you know, notifying you that you had something coming in. But the difference is you need to be able to have a notification where it tells you what app and specifically what the contact is. So for the two or three people that you want to kind of make sure you get a note from, you can have your phone down for a meeting for an hour and a half and you don't have to worry about it, but important piece of information can come through. So it's like, there are those type of things that we're getting to where now I think you can see legitimate usefulness for the, for the technology.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:17:11):
Yeah. And it's neat when it works the way you hope that it will in that regard too, you're like, oh wow. Oh, that, that sequence is going off. Oh, that means my wife is, you know, just sent me a message. It's cool when it, when it connects the dots like that. 'cause I do leave my phone. In fact, I have, you know, my Pixel seven pro and my nothing phone face down right now. 'cause You know, hey, well we're doing podcasting, we don't wanna take any chances. So I do that a lot. So it's nice to be able to do that and still get that, that feedback back as well. So anyways, Kyle, thank you so much for hopping on. I know we gotta let you go. Kyle King from nothing that's you know, us nothing tech or nothing tech to see what ev you know, everybody at Nothing is up to. You can get back to your your collaboration with teenage engineering and Kyle, thank you so much for hopping on with us today. We really appreciate it.
Kyle Kiang (00:18:00):
No problem. See you guys soon.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:18:03):
Whoa. Wait, hold on, hold on. Was that a beer?
Kyle Kiang (00:18:06):
So long Joke is actually the guys a teenage here and the guys in London are big beer fans, so we actually made actually legitimately made a
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:18:12):
Beer. Great. Is great. Like you said, you can immediately tell Yeah, right. <Laugh> Indeed. Right on Kyle, thank you. Enjoy the beer. We'll see you soon.
Kyle Kiang (00:18:23):
Alright, bye Jason Michael guys.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:18:25):
Take care. Bye-Bye. Alright, coming up Next Caps our favorite thing in the Whole Wide World. Maybe there's a change coming that might make you happy. If you don't like CAPTCHAs, that's up next. That's Micah's story of the week. But first, this episode of Tech News Weekly is brought to you by Zip Recruiter. If your hiring or your company's hiring, you're currently dealing with economic uncertainty, right? It's, it feels like it's everywhere. There's this, like this big looming question mark that adds to your challenge, right? It's not only are you hiring, but there's that uncertainty aspect that just makes things a little more difficult. Now, more than ever, it's important to hire the right people and to do it faster and more efficiently. That way you can keep overall costs down. And thankfully, there's a hiring partner who is focused on you and your needs, and that is, of course, ZipRecruiter.
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Hire the best with the help of a partner who's all about you. That's a ZipRecruiter. Four out of five employers who post on ZipRecruiter actually get a quality candidate within the first day. Just go to this exclusive web address to try ZipRecruiter for free. It's ziprecruiter.com/tnw. Again, that's ziprecruiter.com/tnw. Ziprecruiter is the smartest way to hire and we thank them for their support of Tech News Weekly. Alright, Micah, over to you and your story of the week. Yeah, so hold on. I need to solve this capture real quick. I think that looks like a smiling dog. Yes. So there are three those are buses and a no caps are, caps are annoying caps occasionally can I, for me at least can be kind of a delightful thing because I will come across CAPTCHAs that I haven't seen before. <Laugh> they've been different technology.
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So occasionally you'll get one where it's like, put the puzzle piece in the right place and it's like, oh, thank God I don't have to identify buses for once or I don't have to identify choose all the squares that have the bike in it, choose all the squares that have stoplights in it. That can be a blessing. But the old school caps of type in these characters and they're all wiggly and sort of look like you are eating magic mushrooms or something are annoying. And what is so frustrating is it seems as if there's not been a technological shift to try and get past the capture, right? So it turns out that there are some companies, big companies that are working on this and we're just on the cusp of, of, of this change. Shera oday over at the Washington Post wrote about capcha boxes and kind of the technology as it is how the technology might change and what people can expect.
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And I found some really interesting sort of tidbits in this piece. There was one company that was talking about caps and said that quote, for every dollar a business loses to bogus transactions, it turns away $30 by mistakenly blocking or discouraging legitimate customers. So, caps of course, are a tool used by websites to make sure that you are a human being. Who is visiting that website? There have been very common in ticketing systems for a long time. If you wanted to buy tickets to a show, typically caps would pop up in the first place because they don't want robots going in buying a bunch of tickets and then selling them for higher costs. But different sites will add capcha sort of stops depending on whether they can determine if you're a human being or not, because they don't want bots browsing their site.
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Because if a, if a bunch of bots go to a site and sort of drive up traffic that costs that site money potentially more money than they would otherwise, if you are, you know, an online seller, then you don't want robots buying your products because this could be a bogus transaction. And so there's this sort of balance that these companies are trying to strike between making sure that they stop bogus sales or bogus transactions, and then also trying to make sure that they don't annoy people so much that they don't visit a site. I recently, I can't, it was, it was some sort of tool that was supposed to be, you know, it was oh, I, I wish I could remember, but whatever it was, it needed to have pretty good security, right? But it, there was some error that kept requiring the capcha to be put in over and over and over again.
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So I eventually just gave up on going to the site because no, I don't, I don't have the time. And CloudFlare actually, which is one company that has a CAPTCHA system in place that, that sites can use their data shows that people take about 25 seconds on average to solve a CAPTCHA 25 seconds on average. So we are wasting, again, on average 25 seconds, if not more than that in just solving caps because we're trying to prove that we're human and that there's not a robot doing it. Now, another problem with this is the fact that there are a number of ways for robots, quote unquote, to solve these caps. In fact, ai, even before this new generative AI transformer model craze has been solving caps there have been systems that have been built specifically to solve caps.
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On top of that chat G p T was used according to this piece to solve even more difficult caps and other, you know, sort of interstitial systems that have been in place. And even if you get past the AI systems that have been built, and Chad, G P T and all this stuff, there are also companies who pay human beings who are actually human and therefore are using the capcha correctly to solve the capcha and get into the system for the robot to do the work that it's supposed to be doing. So you can imagine someone who's buying a bunch of tickets to a Taylor Swift show, they've gotta get through that capcha, right? So this th this company or whatever, hi, this person hires a hundred people to to get through the capcha part so that they can go in and buy up as many tickets as possible and then sell them for more money.
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It's, this is the situation where you're going, caps are annoying, caps are a waste of time. Caps are this, and hey, at least they stop the bots, right? At least no, they don't. So why are we still using them? Well, there are companies that are looking, trying to look past the capcha. One of those is CloudFlare. Apple is doing a new system that I'll talk about in a moment. And then there are just a number of companies in general who are trying to use a standard called Privacy Pass. And Privacy Pass is sort of a framework system that is going to a protocol is is the best word for it that is going to serve as a means for newer CAPTCHA style systems to kind of bless a specific person, a specific instance, and then have that kind of carry through.
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So it's almost as if you are given you know, a membership card, if you will, and that membership card is your access on different sites, and as you're using it, then you kind of are, okay, this is that person I know, this is that person. We don't need to keep doing all of these things to make sure that they are that they are truly a, a person and not a robot. But the membership card doesn't have your name on it, right? It, it, it is protecting your privacy. And that turns out this is something that I did not know about capis. 'cause A lot of this stuff was sort of a collection of information that's been out there, but I was not aware that in many cases, CAPS are also capturing some of your data and using that as part of the Capcha network.
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So the privacy aspect of CAPS is also a big concern and why companies like Apple are trying to make sure that there is a privacy preserving way to confirm that you're a human being without necessarily confirming that you are you specifically. And so with Privacy Pass and these new technologies together, then you have a system in place to grant human beings access to different sites and get into things. Now let's talk about these technologies. There are a few approaches that can happen on the backend, and that's kind of where companies are looking now, or they're saying, even though we're trying to determine that this person is a real person, let the computers talk to each other to determine that this person is a real person. So it's kind of ironic, it's, it's, it's not what you'd expect, right? In one way there's a technology that kind of looks at, at the, the data out there that shows typically where the bots are, what, what devices, what computers, what browsers the bots are using, and then looks at what you are using whenever you log into a website or try to buy a ticket or whatever.
(00:29:57):
And if you don't fall into that huge group, then you can, then they can kind of reasonably assume that you are you and not a robot. So they do this using things like the typefaces, the fonts that are available to the browser. Say that most bots are, the software system that they're using is Windows xp on the Chrome browser. And it is like, you know, two, two software versions out of date. So, you know, CloudFlare or whatever site or whatever service, I mean sees that there are, you know, multiple hundred thousand accounts that are using this kind of, of browser, this specific system. And they know that those are bots. Now, if you log in with your Mac running Safari on the latest version of the software, then they can with somewhat you know, with somewhat accuracy, assume that you are not bot.
(00:31:07):
That's one way. Another way is by looking at cursor movements. So lots of websites right now do have the ability to determine where you are resting your cursor on the page. And then because they can determine where you're resting your cursor, they can see how your cursor moves across the page. And this is this technology has been around for a long time and they call it like hotspots. So a website designer or a an online shop can look at where people tend to focus their virtual attention and see, oh, maybe I should move that buy button up, or I should move this to the left, or move that to the right. But because they can see how you're moving your cursor, they can recognize that human beings move their cursor in a way that is different from the way that a robot moves the cursor.
(00:32:06):
So a, you know, an AI system is probably going to have very specific and direct movements, whereas as I'm moving my mouse across the screen, there are all these subtle little sort of shifts and, and bumps as I'm getting to where I'm trying to go. And I might be using the cursor to kind of move across the page and try to see what I'm what I'm, you know, to look for what I'm trying to find. And so they can use that. Again, it's kind of a scoring system. This, it's, it's a vibe check, right? It's not giving robot, I think it's probably a human <laugh>. Yeah, right? And so those, those systems can kind of work together. So it's actually all these systems in the background that are working up towards a score that is like, okay, we've got like an 87% certainty that this is a human being because they're using this browser on a phone and they are scrolling through the page in this specific way we think it's a human being.
(00:33:07):
And then the systems can kind of talk to each other in the background and go, okay, you're, you, you're real. You can get through. And this takes the onus off of the human being to have to prove themselves. There's also another system that Apple specifically is working on, and it will be available in iOS 17. So I have iOS 17 and because I'm running beta software, and it is something that that, that sites are going to have to take advantage of. It's not something that's just going to be on by default, or rather, it, it, you can turn it on, but it won't necessarily kind of communicate with the system by default. And I'm trying to find it now. But essentially what it does is it will okay, so it's called automatic verification. And the idea is if you are logged in to an Apple ID on your phone or on your Mac, then there's a high likelihood that you are a human being who is logged in on your device.
(00:34:14):
And it's not just that alone, it's also I just saw this person, you know, on their phone doing something, now they've gone to the mat. Like they're all of these little kind of subtle things that, that play into it. But all of that together can kind of go, this is a human being. So essentially what's happening is we're moving from this Capcha system where it is on the human being to prove that they are themselves to being kind of a background thing. But in the meantime she Shera offers some advice. She spoke to different folks who you know, work on these systems. And the biggest piece of advice that I read in, in the article, and also that seems to kind of be across the, the industry is using A V P N is more than likely going to result in you having to solve CAPTCHAs.
(00:35:09):
And I can confirm that's true, because when I try to do a Google search while using A V P N, I am often presented with a capcha. It is just the way of things. And the last note I wanna make is that people should be aware that in many cases we are actually doing kind of free labor for artificial intelligence. Because when we are identifying stoplights not, it's not bikes and mopeds or motorcycles, actually according to this piece in the Washington Post don't fall into the same category. The kind of original engineers of this version of captcha figured out that globally people recognize no matter what country they're in have a higher chance of being able to understand what is and be able to recognize a bike and a motorcycle. So if you get one that says, you know, click on the bike in this, it's probably not that you're training ai, but if you get one that says, click on the, the squares that represent a bus, or click on the squares that represent a traffic signal or other things, you're probably training an AI system that will be used to, in theory in the future, help vehicles move around on their own and be able to recognize that.
(00:36:31):
So yeah we're gonna be moving on from that, that free labor that we're doing, hopefully. But at the same time, you have to wonder, Jason, is it like, why would these systems want to move on if right now they have like the entire population helping to train these AI vision systems? Yeah, I, I, I'm a little suspect on that too. They're getting a lot of free labor. Anytime a company of that si, you know, the size of of Alphabet or Google or Facebook or whatever has that much free labor happening, <laugh> just automatically for them. I don't see them switching away from that anytime soon. Yeah. so let's hope that caps go the way of the Dodo. But I think they're gonna be around for a while, even though companies are trying to move past them and also help to preserve and protect our privacy.
(00:37:25):
Let's take a quick break before we come back with my interview. Up next, we're gonna talk about Samsung's event where they announced new hardware. But first I wanna tell you about Duo who are bringing you this episode of Tech News Weekly Duo protects against breaches with a leading access management suite. You get strong multi-layered defenses and innovative capabilities that only allow legitimate users in and keep bad actors out. For any organization concerned about being breached that needs protection Fast Duo quickly enables strong security while also improving user productivity. Duo prevents unauthorized access with multi-layered defenses and modern capabilities that thwart sophisticated malicious access attempts. You can increase authentication requirements in real time when the risk rises and Duo enables high productivity by only requiring authentication when needed. Enabling Swift, easy and Secure Access Duo provides an all-in-one solution for Strong M F a passwordless single sign-on and trusted endpoint verification. And Duo helps you implement zero trust principles by verifying users and their devices. So start your free trial and sign up today at cs.co/twit. That's cs.co/tw, and we thank DUO for sponsoring this week's episode of Tech News Weekly. All righty, folks, it is time to talk about Samsung's latest devices. Yes Samsung has announced a slew of new devices. It actually did so yesterday, as we record this on Thursday joining us today to talk about Samsung's new hardware has been shown of nine to five. Google, welcome back to the show.
Ben Schoon (00:39:24):
Thanks for having me again.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:39:25):
Yeah, great to get you on to talk about this stuff. Let's kick things off with the Galaxy Z Flip five and the fold five. In your piece, you mentioned that the phones are very, are, are quote, very iterative. Is there anything to get excited about with these new devices? And should folks who own the fold four or the flip four consider upgrading to the fives?
Ben Schoon (00:39:50):
Well, as far as things to get excited about, they are objectively better phones. Like they are, they've got a faster chip in the Snapdragon eight gen two the thinner profile, I actually have my flip five here. The thinner profile profile is very nice. And then on the flip you have the new cover screen, which is actually genuinely useful. Now as far as upgrading, if you have a fold four, it is definitely not worth going to a fold five because the differences are so minimal. <Laugh> the other day, I actually was holding my fold four in my pocket while I was getting ready to set the fold. Five. Didn't even realize it was the fold four thought it was a fold five <laugh>. The flip five is a genuinely good upgrade, especially with the trade-in because you can get $900 for fold four or for a flip four. So you, it's only a hundred dollars to upgrade, that's absolutely worth it. But flip fold four to fold five, definitely not
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:40:44):
Understood now what is new in, in the latest versions outside of that display. 'cause I wanna talk a little bit more about that display in a moment, but are we getting better cameras? Are we getting better button click feel <laugh>? Does it have a scent now? Like what, what did they change?
Ben Schoon (00:41:01):
Well, they have the exact same cameras. The, one of the new things is the hinge on both of them. It is now a hinge that has a water drop inside, so the display doesn't condense down quite as far as on the previous versions, which means that the gap that used to be in place on the older versions is gone. There's still a little bit of a gap, but it's not to a big point. And that makes the phones much thinner. And it's, you feel that especially on the fold five, like it is a much thinner much phone, which is really like genuinely nice. But really in terms of hardware, they're basically the same. Some of the new colors are nice. I like the blue on the fold five, and I like the the mint color on the flip five, but really it's, they're the same phones. The crease isn't, hasn't changed. It's really just a hinge gap and a new chip under the hood. That's about it.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:42:02):
Got it. Did you say a water drop, like a droplet of water?
Ben Schoon (00:42:08):
So not, not an actual water droplet. The shape of the
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:42:12):
Screen
Ben Schoon (00:42:12):
Okay. When it's folded up is the shape of a water drop. That's just what that's called.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:42:17):
Got it. Okay.
Ben Schoon (00:42:18):
But it basically just means there's more room when the display is folded up, so it's not quite as tight. Normally that would fix a crease, but for whatever reason Samsung's implementation just did not do that.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:42:30):
Understood. Understood. Okay. so then with these phones one would think that availability would be soon if they just sort of, oh, just, just go down the line and pop out the chip and pop in a new one. When are we looking at being able to get our hands on the latest five or flip and fold five? And of course talk about pricing. You mentioned that trade-in thing, but what are the standard prices for these, these new folks?
Ben Schoon (00:43:02):
Yeah, so at least in the United States, pricing hasn't changed. It's still 9 99 for the flip and 1799 for the fold. Trade-In offers are really good. You can get about $900 from Samsung at the most for the flip towards the flip. And you can get a thousand dollars towards the fold which is definitely, it's a great deal should the prices have gone down. That's up for discussion. But pre-orders are open now and everything starts shipping, I think August 11th.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:43:33):
Understood. Okay. Well then let's move along because that pretty much takes care <laugh>, the, the flip five and fold five to talk about the Galaxy Watch six. Yes, it has. We've made it all the way to the sixth version. Tell us about what's new here. Certainly a lot right
Ben Schoon (00:43:55):
<Laugh> if only the watch six and the watch six classic. The regular watch six is, is a watch five just with a new chip. The new chip is the XOs W nine 30. It's a little bit faster, it's a little more efficient, and it gave them the ability to make the watch just a little bit slimmer while still giving it a bigger battery. So it should have much better battery life. It feels nice on the wrist, but there's really not that much new. Except they did also make the bezels a little bit smaller, which means there's bigger display. It, it's a good look. The Watch six classic same, it's a, just a new chip in the same design that was used in the watch for classic, but that means they brought back the rotating bezel, which is always nice to
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:44:39):
Have. Yeah, that's one of the things as a, as an Apple Watch user, I have always been jealous of that idea of the rotating bezel. I think it's, it's one of the things I used to love about non-smart watches that I've owned in the past and just a nice little fidget <laugh> built into my wrist. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. And this is an actual practical fidget for folks who aren't aware of Samsung's offerings, what does that you know, sort of tactile mechanism do in the software?
Ben Schoon (00:45:13):
So in, in, in Wear os, 'cause these are wear OSS watches the rotating bezel acts kinda like a scroll wheel. So just like on the Apple watch how you have the what do they call it? The Digital Crown? Digital Crown mm-hmm. <Affirmative> that will, you know, let you scroll through things and then certain apps like make Let it Zoom in and stuff like that. It basically will do the same thing. Scroll one way, the interface will go down, you scroll the other way, it'll go up. And then I think if you're on the home screen, it'll let you scroll through your widgets, which is a nice little touch.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:45:41):
Nice. Yeah. That's pretty cool. And I'll ask the same question here. Is this a worthy upgrade for folks who are rocking the last model of the Gala Galaxy Watches?
Ben Schoon (00:45:57):
It's honestly a tough one. If you're having trouble with like your battery life over time, stuff like that, it might be worth upgrading. But realistically, the watch four to the Watch six, there's only so many differences and none of them are really worth the cost. But there's like, like with the folds and the flip, Samsung has trade-in deals. I don't know them off the top of my head, but it'll, you know, make a dent in the cost.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:46:21):
Mm-Hmm. <affirmative> and availability. When will folks be able to get their, I guess, wrists on these <laugh>?
Ben Schoon (00:46:29):
So it's the same as the fold and flip. They'll be shipping August 11th and the watch six starts at 2 99 and the classic at 3 99, if I'm remembering that correctly. Oh,
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:46:38):
Wow. Those are really good prices. Again, coming from the, the Apple Watch world where <laugh> it's rather rather expensive. Okay, cool. And then the other big announcement is the Galaxy tab SS nine. And you know, you talk a little bit about how Android tablets kind of as a whole are making a comeback. I was hoping you could start there before we dig into this specific model and talk about the accessories that it has and everything else. Because again I want to sort of cover the, the whole gamut of, of our listeners. What, when you say that Android tablets are making a bit of a comeback I assume you mean like, in comparison to where we are with tablets now, and I mean the only other tablet I've seen out in the wild are those very inexpensive tablets from Amazon that folks will occasionally buy for their kids, but Android tablets are back.
Ben Schoon (00:47:42):
Yeah. So Android tablets, you know, have, they've always had a reputation of not being as good as the iPad. And through the pandemic they've kind of resurged in popularity. People started taking an interest again. Back in the day we had a bunch of Android tablets back in like the Nexus days. You know, Google had a whole lineup of Nexus tablets and Samsung had a bunch of, of tablets and everyone had a bunch of tablets. So you get a different size, you get different performance, different prices, everything. Before 2020 there was, that was kind of stopping. No one was making Android tablets anymore. Google was done. Lenovo was kind of taking a backseat on it. And even Samsung really wasn't experimenting as much. They had cheap ones and they had expensive ones and that was it. Now they're kind of making a comeback. We just had the Pixel tablet launch last month. And now Samsung's refreshing what was already the best Android tablet out there.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:48:42):
Okay. So yes, let's talk about the ss, what is it, the SS nine, the S nine plus and the S nine Ultra? That's a lot of tablets. Talk about the differences between them and then again, in your piece you mentioned that it's, it's kind of an accessories game this time around.
Ben Schoon (00:49:02):
Yeah, so Tablets nine is an 11 inch tablet. The S nine plus is I think like a 12 and a half inch. And the SS nine Ultra is a giant ridiculous 14 inch tablet, which <laugh>, that's, that's foursome, I'm sure it's not for me
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:49:17):
<Laugh>.
Ben Schoon (00:49:18):
But the big, the big upgrade this year with all three of them is that they're IP six eight water resistant, which is very rare in high-end tablets. Mm-Hmm. Especially nice looking ones. And then also the 11 inch now has an ammo lead screen. 'cause In previous years they had, they, Samsung's big selling point has always been oh, lead displays in tablets, but they always let the 11 inch have a L C D display. So it's a nice upgrade to have that this year as well. But yeah, the accessories were really what caught my eye when I got to play around with them because realistically, they're the same software. They're, you know, one ui, Android, 13, multitasking, you know, all that stuff. But the accessories really impressed me. They have a official rugged case this year, which is, seems really protective, but isn't like really overly thick like a lot of other ones are. You know, they have their keyboard, they have a Folio case, they have a really nice or official origami case, which can fold to where you can have the tablet in landscape view and then also in portrait view, depending on how you set it up.
(00:50:25):
And then they also have like you know, there's an SPEN included, which is nice. And there's, you know, a lot of the cases have docking options for that. One of the ones that really caught my attention is I can't remember the name of it, but it's a special attachment for one of the cases that lets you put a clear piece of plastic over the display. One of them is completely clear and is designed to make it feel like you're writing on paper when you're using the S mask. Ooh,
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:50:52):
Cool.
Ben Schoon (00:50:53):
The other one, the other one has the same texture, but it's a privacy filter, so way so if you're using the tablet out in public, you can people can't see what you're seeing if you, if they're off angle, it's just only you can see it. And, you know, both of those have existed in traditional screen protectors, but those are, like, you install 'em, they're on there all the time. And, you know, a privacy film especially is kind of annoying if it's there all the time. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. So I think it's really cool that they have it to where you can just kind of use it on demand.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:51:21):
That is okay. That's really cool because yes I, I was actually surprised at how many quote unquote normal people I see who are using those privacy filtering screens. And I that thought of like, man, I'd hate to have that on my phone at all times because it does make a difference in what you can see through it, or in this case, a tablet, what, you know, what you see through the tablet. But in, I think about like healthcare, people buying these in bulk and being able to have that on there temporarily, but maybe outside of when they're doing that, they could they could have that taken off. That's a pretty clever idea. Now these, these three options has, and forgive me, you know, I, I don't have the, the historical knowledge of Samsung. Has Samsung in the past offered multiple tablet sizes like this, and if they have, have they ever done a 14 inch tablet?
Ben Schoon (00:52:17):
Yeah, so this year's lineup is literally just a refresh of last year. Last year they also had eight, eight plus and eight Ultra, and they were all the same size. The only difference this year in terms of the hardware is, like I said, it's water resistant and then you have OLE on the smallest model. But that's, this is only the second year they're doing that. So if you're kind of looking to, you know, buy on the SS model, get the better version, this is definitely the year to do that.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:52:45):
Understood. my last question for you. It, I joked about it along the way, but it does seem to be like a very iterative year for Samsung models. Now, apple as the comparison here does a year where it's an, it's a pretty all new design or an all new look and feel. This is for the iPhone and then a year where it iterates and then it's the TikTok cycle, right? Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>, what is, is, is it, you never know with Samsung, is it that things tend to be pretty iterative? Is it that this year kind of stands out as a super, okay, I guess these are the latest devices. Just gimme your insight about what's going on here and if you think that folks will be encouraged to buy these latest and allegedly greatest devices from from Samsung.
Ben Schoon (00:53:40):
Yeah. I would say with Samsung, you never really know what you're gonna get. Like they don't follow a strict pattern. But I don't think that makes these bad devices. Like I think all of these are objectively going to be the latest and greatest. Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>, they're just not all that different. It's gonna be, if you're the kind of person who jumps on every single upgrade as it comes out, these are really, really boring. But if you're someone who hasn't upgraded their phone in or is, you know, looking for their first foldable, these are great foldables. If this is your first tablet in like, five, six years, this, that's the tablets nine is great. And the same thing with the watch. If you, if you're still on a ties and wearable, because those are, you know, starting to lose update support. This is a great place to jump in. You've got a better design, you've got better performance, and things have kind of stabilized from the switch to R oss. So yeah, it's, it's boring from someone who's just looking in. 'cause They're like constantly like, oh, what's the latest? What's the latest? Mm-Hmm. <affirmative>. But if you've been waiting for your time to upgrade, this is really a good time because things are as stable as they're gonna get. 'cause Surely we can't have another year that's quite this iterative.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:54:54):
Right. Okay. That makes sense. That makes sense. Ben, I wanna thank you so much for your time today. Taking me someone who's not as versed in all of this through everything, and also for our listeners out there who might be curious about what's going on with Samsung, of course folks can head to 9 2 5 Google to check out your work. But if they wanna follow you online and keep up with what you're doing, where should they go to do so?
Ben Schoon (00:55:19):
Well, yeah, you'll see me on nine to five Google all day every day. But if you wanna follow me, I'm on Twitter threads and every other competitor at best, <laugh>.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:55:27):
Excellent. Thanks so much.
Ben Schoon (00:55:30):
Thank you for having me.
Mikah Sargent & Jason Howell (00:55:32):
Thank you Ben. Good to see you. All right coming up next, I'm gonna talk a little bit about in-Car Infotainment systems. And that either fills you with joy or fills you with Dread <laugh>. That's kind of the point of what I'm gonna talk about. But first, this episode, tech News Weekly is brought to you. Byta is your organization finding it difficult to collect manual evidence and achieve continuous compliance as it's growing, as it's scaling? Well, as a leader in cloud compliance software by G two, draw to streamlines your SOC two, your ISO 27 0 0 1 P C I D, ss, S G D P R, HIPAA and other compliance frameworks providing 24 hour continuous control monitoring. So you can actually focus on scaling securely with a suite of more than 75 integrations. Rada easily integrates through applications like a w s Azure, GitHub, Okta, and CloudFlare, and countless security professionals from companies like Lemonade Notion, bamboo, hr.
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So say goodbye to manual Evidence collection, say hello to Automated Compliance by visiting rada.com/twit and I'll spell that out for you. It's D r A T a. That's dda.com/twit. Bringing automation to compliance at DDA speed. We thank them for their support of Tech News Weekly. Alright, so let's talk a little bit about car infotainment systems. Because I think, I mean my experience with infotainment systems is always like I have yet to have one that doesn't have at least a little bit of frustration along the way. I'm curious to know what you have in your, in your car, Micah. Yeah, I have, so I have an older vehicle which means that the infotainment system that was built in did not come with any of the new stuff. It just had like a Bluetooth connection at the most. So I went and installed a, an aftermarket system that supports Apple CarPlay.
(00:59:50):
And so I use Apple's CarPlay in my vehicle. And we are a, an Apple CarPlay house household. My partner also, his vehicle's new enough that it just came with the system but it also has Apple CarPlay and neither of us really ever touch the default system that is, you know, built in. We kind of skip past that and go straight to apple CarPlay as quickly as we can. Yeah. And kind of streaming from your phone, that sort of thing? Well, it turns out, so my situation is, is similar to yours in one vehicle, we have one vehicle that has like a dated, you know, it's like a 2014. So it, it has its own apps and stuff inside of it, but you know, it's, it's very much isolated to like the Toyota 2014 experience. And things have come a long way since then.
(01:00:45):
So really we're just using it for like xm, the XM radio and then, you know, connecting via Bluetooth and any of the rest of the bells. It was like the onboard navigation, not using it. The other car we have, it's, it's a Tesla, so it's got its own, you know, Tesla doesn't, doesn't do Android auto, it doesn't do car play, which is a, I feel like is is a big missed opportunity and a bummer. But, so there's some things that are good about it. It's some things that are frustrating. Well, it turns out people aren't very satisfied with what they're getting inside their vehicles. JD Power has a yearly study that's been doing now for 28 years, the automotive performance execution and layout study and just came out and for the first time ever, the report shows consecutive year over year declines in owner satisfaction.
(01:01:35):
And one big cause for that. And that's just like overall, right? One big cause for that drop is isolated to the infotainment systems. In 2020, 70% of people preferred to use their car's infotainment system. Which actually that, when I hear that, that sounds kind of high to me. Like, if the infotainment system is something aside from something like CarPlay or Android Auto, like I'd be amazed if 70% were super satisfied with it. But apparently according to the report, that was the case in the latest report, only 56%. And I think last year, you know, it was a drop from 70% as well. So it's kind of like this steady decline in people's satisfaction with their infotainment system. Less than half of the owners shared their desire to use the cars built in controls. Things like navigation, voice recognition calls. I know in our to in our Toyota, they're so bad.
(01:02:25):
Yeah, they're bad. Like it's got navigation, but it's so complicated compared to what you got. Yeah. And what I have on my phone or the voice recognition, like I use it sometimes to read an incoming text message just because it's, it's easier for me to hit the button on the screen in the Toyota than it is to like, you know, hit it on the phone sometimes, but it's super robotic and you know, it gets many words wrong and there's no inflection. I mean, it's 10 years old basically at this point. So you can imagine, you know, the system that we were, the, the, the text voice that we were hearing 10 years ago versus what we hear now, which is actually pretty, pretty impressive. I feel like it's come so far. But this is all related to the built-in systems. Just as a clarification when often they're, you know, they're design and they're presented by the car company itself.
(01:03:16):
So when it comes to things like CarPlay or Android Auto, people actually seem pretty satisfied and be surprised just because they are actually a lot better than those built in. The report does show that systems built around Android automotive score higher in the infotainment category than those with no Android automotive OSS whatsoever. And this might actually require a little bit of an explanation 'cause it can get a little confusing in the realm of Android and, and the car. Android Auto is the car experience that streams from your phone to the system similar to how Airplane works for iOS, Android Automotive OSS is Google's built-in automotive os So you know, it it would be kind of like the built-in in dash companies, install that in their cars. Is is how that works. Yes. Essentially install that in their cars and it would, it would have controls depending on how the companies integrate with it, it would have controls over more things than just like your infotainment.
(01:04:18):
It would have controls for your air conditioner and it could even tap into, you know, your mileage and, and all that stuff on an, on a separate screen. Some cars have Android automotive OSS kind of stretching across all of the, all of the glass in there that that would get a screen and, and it would operate at all. So they're kind of different things. So when people have Android Automotive OSS in their vehicle, apparently according to this report, that's the highest level satisfaction that people were reporting. But this is where things kind of get a little fragmented. 'cause You can get Android Automotive OSS installed in a vehicle with Google's automotive services. So things like Google's apps and services very akin to Android by the way. You can get Android phones that have all of Google's apps and services, and then you can get that OSS without those services by default.
(01:05:09):
So it might be Amazon that's inserting kind of their apps services on top of it. Apparently that's STIs, I hope I'm pronouncing that right vehicles that have Android automotive oss. But Amazon provides the apps and the integration there with the services and stuff. So in that case, if you're getting Android Automotive OSS without Google's automotive services, they actually scored the lowest of them all in the Infoam category. So, oh my. Apparently people really like the Google apps and services personally. I'm hardly surprised about that. But anyways, I thought the report was just kind of interesting and because I do feel like, so I'm, I'm so often disappointed by the in dash infotainment system offerings that I've seen and the different vehicles that, you know, when we rent a vehicle and everything, if it doesn't have the Android Auto kind of like streaming or the CarPlay streaming, I'm usually pretty disappointed.
(01:06:11):
So this report seems to reflect that <laugh>. Yeah, so this is, see this is always interest interesting to me too because there's so many components to understanding who is, you know, partaking in the surveys and how sort of culturally those aspects play because we have seen overall generationally speaking a drop in car ownership. Yeah, we've seen and, and even when there's not a, a drop in car ownership, we've seen vehicle affinity dropping. You know, it used to be like, it's part of your personality, what vehicle you own and drive. And a lot of folks of the generation younger than mine are saying, you know, it, it's, it's even less the, the, the a car doesn't it, it's just this tool that gets me from, you know, one place to the other. And so all of that factors into who is answering, you know, these surveys what their thoughts are on the surveys.
(01:07:19):
And then you also have, I feel there's in some cases a difference sort of personality and culturally whenever you're talking about what systems folks are using. I think about how it, this is anecdotally speaking, but I wonder if there's like a larger thing here. It's tended to be the people I know who are the car fixers and tinkerers who go in and they like add l e d lights to their car and they, you know, soup up the engine and they replace their their headlights with l e d light. They have anecdotally been Android users. And I wonder, you know, the, the, and Android users sort of from, from the group that I hear from are always talking about how what they love about Android is its ability to be you know, customized and changed and all this kind of thing.
(01:08:18):
And so there's just, there's so many factors that can play into this, but what seems to be universally true is we all hate the systems that these car manufacturers build into the cars. And yet, who is it gm? Whoever it was that was saying, yeah, we're thinking about ditching any third party infotainment system in our vehicles going forward. How foolish. Yeah, that you, that's right. This was just, just last March phasing out CarPlay in EVs, which yeah, I, I agree. It's kinda like if people are telling you that they're incredibly satisfied about this thing, even if you don't control it, like, I don't know, like you, you want people to be satisfied with their vehicle experience. They bought a vehicle from you. This is like one aspect that like, just let it be, let them mm-hmm. <Affirmative> let them get what they, what they want.
(01:09:09):
And I suppose you could just offer, 'cause you know, some, some manufacturers do this where they offer their own infotainment system that supports also CarPlay and Android Auto. And so you get the best of all worlds, I suppose that way. But, you know, they all wanna control it all. And I I suppose there's some sort of monetary incentive there behind them controlling everything and data gathering. Data gathering. Exactly. And so as a result, you end up with people who are not satisfied. And that doesn't seem like a good thing. No. 'cause then people <laugh> I think it's a, it's what one of those, what is that game? Not kitty cat, where you've got two vehicles or two people running at each other and then one of the moves <crosstalk>. Oh, like you like a chicken game of chicken. Chicken, yes.
(01:10:01):
Chicken. It's like a game of chicken. A little bit like the, the car manufacturers are going, well, everybody needs a car, so whatever we do, you're gonna end up needing a car anyway. And then the people on the other side are like, but I want a car that makes me happy and gives me the things that I need. And it's like, who's going to Twitch first? But the way things are going, those car manufacturers might wanna stop thinking like it's you know, 19 7 82 <laugh>. I'm trying, I don't know what year people were really cars. Like it's the 19 hundreds <laugh> Yes. Some time ago when people were super into cars and it was everything and they did their little cruises down, you know, 1950s we'll say. Yeah. yeah, there you go. So getting fed up with your infotainment system, you're not alone.
(01:10:52):
And that's all that we're gonna say about that. And that's all she wrote, that's all she wrote. We've reached the end of this episode of Tech News Weekly. Thank you so much for watching and listening. We do this show every Thursday. If you go to twit tv slash tnw, you'll find all the ways that you can subscribe to this show. And we do appreciate when you subscribe because then you'll get the episode like magic. But that's a really wonderful signal that is sent to us. We know how many people are downloading. We pass that along to our yes, our advertisers and our sponsors that keeps the show on in your podcast feed week after week. So thank you. When you subscribe, please do that. Twitter tv slash tnw. We also appreciate it when you join the club at twit tv slash club twit for starting at $7 a month or $84 a year.
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(01:13:18):
Soon there will also be an AI show to hit the club. Jason is currently noodling on that, and so it should make its way there soon. And I am looking forward to checking out that show. The only way for you to check out that show is by joining the club. So please do. It is an immense help. We think. Those of you who have joined I'm always popping into the the Club Twit Discord because it shows whenever new folks join the Discord, there's a welcome page. And so all day, every day we're seeing new folks joining the club and we just appreciate each and every one of you. And thank you so much for your support. So please consider joining the club, checking out that extra content again at twit TV slash club twit. If you'd like to follow me online, I'm at Micah Sergeant at many a social media site, or you can enter to Chihuahua Coffee, that's C H H O A h OA Coffee, where I've got links to the places I'm most active online.
(01:14:15):
Please check out Hands on Mac later today. If you are a member of the club. I'm covering Mac OSS Sonoma, which is the next version of Mac oss. It's gonna be hitting it's available in public beta, so folks might wanna check out some of these new features. So I'm just talking about the, the new features you can see. And on Sundays you can watch, ask the Tech guys featuring Leo LaPorte and Micah Sargent, where we take your tech questions live on air and do our best to answer them while also just having a great time. It's kind of a variety show. We have, we have a great time and love to have you there. And then on Tuesdays you can check out iOS today with Rosemary Orchard and myself where we cover all things. Apple, it, it's basically everything but Mac oss.
(01:15:02):
So pretty much all the mobile operating systems we cover on the show. And we'd love to have you tune in there. If you've got an iPhone or an iPad or something, you gotta be watching that show 'cause we've got so many tips and tricks and great apps you should check out. Jason Howell, what about you? Well find me at Jason Howell on, are we calling it X or are we calling it Twitter? Right? I don't, we didn't even talk about that today. Oh, that's right. It's 10 formerly known as Twitter. You know, he's never said it out loud, so it might be 10. The Roman <inaudible>. I hadn't thought about that. Okay. That, that, that's, that's news because I feel weird calling it X it's just, it feels weird. I, so I spent years as a, a copy editor and it, it was part of my role.
(01:15:48):
And one obviously the, the copy editor's Bible is the AP style book. And so I've been checking and AP style book has updated their guidance and they are calling it X or 10 comma, formerly known as Twitter. That is the current guidance for how we refer to the platform. So, oh boy, that's even easier. Yeah, you can find me on Jason Howell on X, formerly known as Twitter <laugh>. You can find me on masted on Twitter social slash at Jason Howell. I, you know what I need to do, I need to put together one of those pages a, a Chihuahua coffee, but for me so I'll have to figure that out so I have all my links on the page. Yeah, probably. Yeah, you should rattling them all off. Anyways, you can find me on the internet. I'm there, just do a search for my name, you'll find me. And then behind the scenes working on things like the AI show for Club Twit, of course, producing this week in tech every week twig security now. So they're keep me busy around here, but I enjoy it nonetheless as well. So thank you so much for watching. We appreciate you. We appreciate everyone at the studio for helping us do this show each and every week. Can't thank you all enough, and we will see you next time on Tech News Weekly. Bye everybody. Byebye.
