This Week in Tech 504 (Transcript)

Leo Laporte: It's time for TWIT: This Week in Tech! I have such a great panel for you. Devindra Hardawar from Engadget, Patrick Norton from Tech Thing, and you may know her as Cali Lewis, Luria Petrucci to talk about her new Geek's Life. It's all coming up next on TWIT.

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This is TWiT: This Week in Tech, episode 504, recorded Sunday, April 5, 2015.

Tell me I'm Not a Narcissist

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It's time for TWiT: This Week in Tech, the show where we talk about the week's tech news. As always, a great panel of my friends, I'm sorry to say. I never bring anybody who isn't my friend here.

Patrick Norton: One would hope.

Leo: I'm looking at Patrick Norton right now. I love your t-shirt. Learn something new, sleep with a librarian.

Patrick: My wife gave it to me.

Leo: I was going to say that's my life goal. Not sleeping with your wife—Marian the Librarian and the Music Man, librarians are attractive. Look! More guests. My grandma was a librarian.

Patrick: That's not helping, Leo.

Leo: Devindra Hardawar is also here from Engadget. Great to see you, Devindra.

Devindra Hardawar: Thanks for having me back.

Leo: I'm really thrilled to welcome back, she hasn't been on the show in a while, but I couldn't resist—you may know her as Cali Lewis, but she's really Luria Petrucci.

Luria Petrucci: Hey!

Leo: Hi Luria.

Luria: It's been forever!

Leo: I'm so glad to see you. We wanted to get you on to talk about your new enterprise, geekslife.com.

Luria: Thanks for having me.

Leo: If everyone would refrain from going to that website right now—

Luria: In the preshow you took it down. You have the power.

Leo: I think it's working for you. Flip some switches, because it's back up. This is where you're going to do your new podcasts. Out of the gate you've got eight.

Luria: Yes. So Geek's Life is a lifestyle channel. To me, Geek has always meant passion. It's always meant something your passionate about, and I'm passionate about technology as we all are in the studio and the audience, but I wanted a place to embrace my other passions as well, which is outdoors and stand up paddle boarding and music. As people, I think we are all passionate about various things, and I wanted a community that was able to embrace everything and be comfortable being ourselves.

Leo: Fun. I'm thrilled about this.

Luria: Me too.

Leo: Go to GeeksLife.com. I knew all along that your real name is Luria Petrucci, Cali Lewis was a creation, an invention.

Luria: The name itself was an alias because for whatever reason, when I started this whole video thing online, that people had butchered my name my entire life, so maybe I need an American name—

Leo: But it was also like a spy, right? It was a character that was a spy?

Luria: I was the head of the geek intelligence agency and some silly backstory to this thing when I first started doing shows online. Go ahead—

Leo: It sometimes sticks.

Luria: It stuck, and I didn't intend it to. I didn't know this would all turn into what it has. I realized over the last year that I really want to be doing this for the rest of my life, and I want to embrace me for who I am and I want people to be embracing themselves. Some stuff in my personal life, I found love. That helped me learn to be comfortable with me.

Leo: I'm going to talk about the love stuff in a second. Glad to hear that. I remember going through the same thing, becacuse when I got in radio, I had the same notion. I was Dave Allen, then Dan Hays... It wasn't until I started working in San Francisco and I asked my program director if I could use my real name. He said, "What's your real name?" I said, "Leo Laporte." You cannot use that. I said, "It's spelled like 'Leo." He said, "Use that." So I had to go through what you're going through in my own mind. So from now on, we're going to call you Luria. This is the name.

Luria: It was a scary thing for me to start to embrace that because of nine years. A lot of people have told me 9 years of Cali Lewis brand equity. It was actually a complete mistake to switch over to it. I just did a behind the scenes video when I opened up Geek's Life and having a heart-to-heart conversation with the audience, and I used my real name and said you might know me as Cali Lewis. People said, you're using your real name? You have to. I love it.

Leo: I love your real name.

Luria: I was like, "OK."

Leo: You're a nice Italian girl.

Leo: We've talked about your Grandma and making ravioli and all that stuff.

Luria: Making pasta and all that stuff. You'll see that on the show at some point.

Leo: Anyway, congratulations on the new venture. Congratulations on going back to your real name. I've always thought of you as Luria, so I'm going to call you Luria. All three of you! Happy Easter. I appreciate you working on a holiday. But, the tech news goes on. Friday we're going to be able to buy, or at least order Apple Watches. According to some, anyway. 12:01 Pacific AM on Friday, April 10. Patrick, you don't look like an Apple watch wearer. They don't make them that big.

Patrick: They don't. All the smartwatches they make, it's usually the last or second to last band that will fit me.

Leo: I never noticed this, but you have massive wrists.

Patrick: I have massive wrists. I could be a heavy weight boxer if I wanted to be, because I have the frame to support the punch.

Leo: I've never noticed that.

Patrick: Most people don't look at my bone structure, Leo. It's funny. When I started typing at magazines a bunch of years ago, I noticed that I had wrist pain, so I took the watch off when I started typing and the wrist pain went away, so I stopped wearing watches and went back to pocket watches. Then I got a phone and I stopped carrying a pocket watch. Now I need to test the Apple Watch. I can get the $350 one, I'm going to shatter the screen, I'm not going to be able to replace the screen. I'm going to be really pissed off, because the Apple Care is astonishing. Watching the way they're introducing this is so interesting even for an Apple product. Apple Care Plus—OK. I can afford the Apple Care Plus. It's $1000 for the edition watch.

Leo: If you spend $10,000 for a watch, it's only 10%. Come on, it's nothing! In fact it's 10% across the board.

Patrick: If you do the last two cars I bought, plus my computer, plus all the clothes I bought in the last year, I still wouldn't have enough money to buy the edition version of the Apple Watch. Go Apple! go for that luxury thing. $59 for the Sport. Go Apple. I'm really curious to see how the screen holds up.

Leo: I'm curious how Apple can get away with this. Apple Care doesn't replace the watch. Apple Care is extended warranties for it. It should be exactly the same for all three, because they're technically exactly the same.

Luria: But if you have to replace certain parts—

Leo: But the inside of the gold is the same!

Patrick: Yes, but the Bezzle is not the same. The band is not the same. The case is not the same. It's a joke that you're paying 10,000 for the same interface in a really shiny band. Also, I cracked—they didn't have any cases in stock when I bought my iPhone 6, so within 7 days I had cracked the screen and bent the case.

Leo: You should get Apple Care plus.

Patrick: I did. It was $99 to replace the phone after I bought the Apple care. It was a really expensive week.

Leo: So there's Apple Care which has a warranty. I never buy it, because if you figure it out, between the deductible and the limits, it's usually expensive.

Patrick: With the Apple Care Plus for the iPhone, it was cheaper to do the Apple Care Plus, plus the charge for the screen replacement, then it was to buy a replacement screen anywhere.

Leo: 200 bucks for the deductible. Here's my issue. You only get two a year. Anyway, I usually don't buy extended warranties. Will you get a replacement edition for 999? Mark German says it's not clear. So they'll come in white gloves and bring you a new thing?

Devindra: I'm surprised that you have to pay extra for insurance on the Edition. That's such a—that's the most expensive single product Apple has ever produced. That should be warranty built in, because at that price, why not? I don't understand the extra $1000 charge.

Leo: $17000 may be the most expensive, but $10000 is what the Lisa cost. It's not the most expensive Apple product.

Devindra: Some people got it closer to $20,000 with all the stuff.

Luria: If you're going to pay $10,000 for a watch, you're just not going to care about that price. You just won't. It's just a fashion thing or the next coolest thing. My main curiosity is how many they're limiting it to. Have we ever heard a number on that?

Leo: No. I think the thing to watch Friday is how busy the Apple stores will be. Will there be lines? I'm not going to go into an Apple Store. The way it works is you call online or you go ahead and make an appointment for a 15 minute window where you'll get to talk to a genius and try on a watch. They are encouraging people to do that. They want you—in fact it was last week with Christina Warren who wants the sport with the pinkish band. But she says I'm not sure. I have to try it on and see how it looks with my outfits. Does it work with your outfits?

Patrick: First of all, look at me. I'm not worried about things working with my outfits.

Leo: Here's a man who wore a kilt for many years on television.

Patrick: Yes. I obviously have my own distinct sense of fashion.

Leo: Does this Apple Watch make my shorts look fat?

Patrick: Does this Apple Watch make my ass look fat? There are people who own $25,000 worth of watches. They have the one they wear when they're going into the serious business meetings. They have their every-day work watches. It's great. They're directed at an entirely different community.

Leo: We've talked about this before. I agree with you, Luria, I'm interested in what kind of response there will be. On the one hand, there's a lot of people who don't wear watches, for any circumstance.

Luria: I haven't been an Apple user—my computers yes, but my phone, I've been on SamSung Galaxy, I'm on the Note—

Leo: Did you buy the Note 4 Edge?

Luria: Yes. I love that phone.

Leo: You do? I use a regular Note 4. I'm curious about the Edge.

Luria: I thought it was gimmicky at first, but It has changed the way I do everything and the way I move about my apps. It's great, but I haven't been on an iPhone for many years, but they have me wanting to go back to the iPhone just for the watch. That's pretty impressive for that drag to happy. I don't wear watches. I don't wear jewelry. I don't wear any of that stuff, so I think that's pretty impressive of them to continue to have that draw.

Leo: I'm going to have to carry a phone for a while, because I'm a Note 4 user, I'm an Android person.

Luria: I have to say, I don't think I'll be wearing the pink watch.

Leo: Since you say you found love, let me ask you if your loved one will be getting one too. A lot of the benefit of the Apple Watch is sending your heart beat to your honey. Listen to this:

COMMERCIAL: Here, you'll see the people you like to connect with most. You can add friends in the Apple Watch app on your iPhone.

Leo: This person has way too many friends. I have three friends, maybe.

COMMERCIAL(cont.): From here, you can make a call, or send a message, or if your friend has an Apple Watch, you'll see this icon, which means you can send a digital touch.

Leo: Watch what she does.

COMMERCIAL(cont.): When you tap the icon, you can draw a sketch. Your sketch will be sent to your friend's watch, where it will animate as you drew it.

Leo: Now how much would you pay? Wait a minute, that's not all. Watch.

COMMERCIAL(cont): You can also use your finger to send taps. Because your friend is wearing an Apple Watch, they'll feel the same tap pattern on their wrist.

Leo: So, Cali. With your honey, you set up a code. You say, "If I tap three times, I want to get the hell out of this party. If I go knock knock knock, it means I love you. Right? You would set up tap codes.

Patrick: I know sales people who would buy this for the ability to reach over and tap twice.

Leo: Watch, this is the one you're going to go for, Cali. What's your honey's name?

Cali: David.

Leo: Imagine this. You're there, wearing your pink eyewatch.

COMMERCIAL(cont): Finally, you can rest two fingers on the screen to send your heartbeat which your friend will also feel. Now just wait and see if your friend will send something back.

Luria: I have a question! What happens if you don't get it back? Relationship over!

Leo: Kelly, I wasn't wearing my watch. I was showering.

Patrick: Think about the Mashable and Huff post articles are going to be about Apple Watch breaking relationships.

Leo: It's like getting poked and not getting poked back.

Luria: Yeah. It's one of those things that seems really dorky and so gimmicky. Then again, I thought the Edge was gimmicky, and it may become one of those things that you find users for. I'll have to wait and see.

Leo: I'm surprised you found the Edge useful. Thats interesting.

Luria: Yeah.

Leo: I thought I don't need a screensaver on the Edge of my phone.

Luria: It's not about the Screne saver, it's about putting all your apps on the Edge so you don't have to click the home button to get to your next app. I'm a multi task user. I'm a power user. I go back and forth between my apps like a chicken with its head cut off. I'm constantly swiping on the Edge.

Leo: It's become a dock. It's like the dock for you.

Luria: Exactly. It is.

Leo: Interesting. I've ordered it, I think I get it on Tuesday, the S6 Edge. But it's not the same. It's cosmetic. It doesn't do all the stuff on the sides that your Note 4 does.

Patrick: It has some features. You can see some notifications on the Edge.

Leo: There's a night clock mode, but you have to put it face down. But I'm not going to put my glass screen face-down. Devindra, have you played with the S6 year?

Devindra: Yes, I played with the S6 and the S6 Edge. We reviewed it at Engadget, and the S6 Edge feels so great. I didn't like the way the Note 4 edge felt. That one is asymmetrical and makes the phone bigger than it needs to be. But the S6 feels great. I'm halfway tempted to send my iPhone 6 back. It feels very nice.

Leo: I'm interested in the camera. Early review units went out. One thing most reviewers seem to say is don't get the edge, because it's goofy. It does look like an iPhone 6, it really is beautiful, but I got the Edge because I'm a stylish guy.

Devindra: It feels like your touching a gadget that's advanced, even though it's the exact same as the S6. I spent a hundred bucks more for that. Now the iPhone 6 feels not as excitiing to me. Maybe I'm being the guy who wants the newest greatest thing.

Patrick: Taken in a slightly different direction, I get to review the Moto E. The Build quality on that is fantastic.

Leo: It's 150 bucks! Cheap!

Devindra: 150 with LTE, 120 with 3G and slower processor.

Leo: That's what I was going to say. For everything else, it's fine. The screen's not great, but the camera is useless. I don't even consider a phone unless it has a good camera. The iPhone has a great camera, the Note 4 has a great camera. I'm hearing raves about the S6, like best camera ever. In the Samsung demo they showed low light. What is it? F 1.8? Very fast lens.

Devindra: The S5 camera was pretty good. I thought that was the best Android camera we had until now. It seems like the S6 is better than what the iPhone was doing. It's surprising, because there aren't that many great Android cameras out there. It seems like Samsung is the only one who could do it.

Patrick: I got to sit at a table with a developer that's worked on some of the guts on the Android operating system. When it's put together, they haven't thought about cameras as being that important for the mobile experience. By the time they realized it was a big deal, Apple had sown up all the sensors and all the technology and was a couple years ahead. Their code was a mess. Finally, they got to the point where their internal core has allowed them to do—is not doing terrible things to the photographic images. It takes somebody the size of Samsung to compete with somebody the size of Apple and get the latest sensors and technology in there. I hope Android technology is turning a big corner. I wonder how long it's going to take to get it down through the less expensive phones too.

Devindra: I feel bad for HTC. It's kind of tough to convince somebody to go for the one now with wha the S6 is doing.

Leo: Reviews are terrible for the M9 camera, even though it's 21 mega pixel, and a number of people pointed out the number on the SOC, a chip that they're using, they're clocking down to increase battery life performance. Lots of key issues. HTC, you can't afford to stumble when you're literally in this foot race with Samsung, well, not literally. This figurative race—

Patrick: Metaphorical?

Leo: Metaphorical foot race with Samsung, Apple. You stumble, you're Blackberry.

Patrick: Or AMD. AMD is fighting with Nvideo, but they fundamentally walked away from the CPU batltle a year or two ago. We can't compete.

Leo: Patrick is our host of a great show, this Week in Computer Hardware, among all the other things you do. You've got your new shows. We'll talk about that. What is this? Don't try this at home, because it's going to really hurt you?

Patrick: Tek Thing is—Possibly Unsafe is the show where I made my face stop working.

Leo: By making siracho out of habernero peppers. Did you eat it?

Patrick: I did. I got it all over the side of my face by accident. Raw haberneros. I never saw Max do anything safe in his life until I saw him wearing industrial strength safety gloves when he was cutting peppers.

Leo: They're dangerous things. Let's take a break. We've got a great team. We are going to talk about some hardware stuff. Cali, I've got to ask you about the Note 4 Edge, because the thing I didn't like about it was it was upside down. Remember they said you were going to be able to put it on a table, and the Edge you would be able to see notifications surruptitiously, except they're all upside down!

Luria: I haven't used it all like that, and I haven't figured out how to flip it.

Leo: So it wasn't just me. It's fine if you can read upside down.

Luria: I think if you place it, as opposed to leaving it like this and reading it from this side, you leave it like this—

Leo: You lean over it and—

Luria: You leave it in a position where you can see it from that angle. To be honest, the one thing that I haven't figured out, maybe I'm incorrect, but when you have it up, I haven't gotten it to show my notifications without hitting the activate button.

Leo: That worries me a little bit.

Luria: That was one of the things that I was looking forward to. When a notification comes in, it doesn't actually pop up on the whole screen without that thing activating.

Leo: Lately with my Note 4, I've had an issue with the accidental launching of things because it's gotten more sensitive in the buttons. You and I, we'll have a little clinic. Also, I've put Oxygen OS on my One Plus. Lots to talk about, but we're going to take a break and talk about something Luria needs to know about. squarespace.com. If your website has been going down a lot, SquareSpace is the easiest and best way to create a beautiful website, whether it's a blog, your photography portfolio, your online store. Just gorgeous. Elegant interface. They've got beautiful templates. I've learned a lot about this going through our own re-design process. The thing about these templates is you may not see it, but there's a lot of sophisticated technology that makes these unique. For instance, they're all mobile responsive. In fact, when you use SquareSpace and you post an image on it, it automatically generates 7 or 8 different images of different sizes so it fits the screen that it's going to be on, from an iPhone toa 30 inch, to a 55 inch HD TV. They make it so easy now with SquareSpace 7 to make changes too. No more going back and forth from Preview mode. Changes are live, you see what it looks like. It really is wonderful. Boy is it easy. Of course, if you have any issues, they've got the best help in the world. Live chat and e-mail support 24/7. Not outsourced from Squarespace in New York. All of this starts at $8 a mont! That's the hosting, that's the software. That's even the domain name when you register for a year. All SquareSpace sites look great. They all have e-commerce, every single one of them comes with a free-online store. Lots of support in shipping and calculations for taxes. All that's built in. They have this new feature called cover pages. Very useful if you want a one off page. Could be your about me page, but also a great landing page for a new podcast or show. Podcasters love SquareSpace because it never goes down. I want you to start a trial. You don't need a credit card. You get a couple of weeks, you can import data from your old site, change the template willy nilly. It's all separate from the data. Press a button, you get a whole new look, but when you decide to buy, I ask you to use the offer code TWIT. That gives you 10% off your first purchase. That's why your'e going to want to sign upf or a year or more. 10% off your first purchase. SquareSpace.com. Build it beautiful at SquareSpace.com. Luria Petrucci is here. her new thing Geekslife.com. You may remember her as Cali Lewis. What's David do? Is he one of your podcasters?

Luria: Yeah. He's been on the team for a while. He does marketing. He's also one of our hosts.

Leo: I can't wait to meet him. That's exciting. geekslife.com.

Luria: Where we embrace our passions.

Leo: Where we embrace our passions, however weird or perverted they might be. Let's not go crazy.

Luria: Bacon, you know.

Leo: I had bacon this morning. Don't ever eat bacon with a chat room watching. They yelled at me for eating bacon. Took all the fun out of it. Unless you want to be evil or perverse.

Patrick: I didn't realize eating bacon on camera was considered perverse.

Leo: It is now, because people in the chat room care about my health.

Patrick: The whole thing about food—

Leo: Fat is good for you, according to Patrick Norton.

Patrick: I didn't say fat is good for you, but it's part of a balanced diet. It turns out bacon is actually a perfect blend of protein and fats for the digestion of the human system.

Leo: You see Doctor mom?

Luria: Creamy Corn Cob is saying that you licked the bacon, so there might be something that you're not telling us.

Patrick: I can't defend lascivious bacon eating.

Leo: It wasn't lascivious! I was fully engaging. Have you ever seen a dog eat bacon? They lick it, then they swollow it whole. Tekthing.com, it's so good to have you. You're going to come back in two weeks. I felt bad when I realized you were coming in again in two weeks, but it's a special show. April 19 is our ten year anniversary. Can you believe it?

Patrick: Look at my hair line.

Leo: You didn't have hair then either.

Patrick: But I have less. Hi Devindra, how are you?

Leo: Is there less hair? It seems like it's just a growth issue. Does it not get longer?

Patrick: There's less of it per square inch.

Leo: Yeah.

Patrick: Eventually there will be none per square inch.

Leo: But you're almost 50. You're doing good. Patrick and I go way back. Devindra Hardawar here, also from Engadget. He also hosts a film podcast which I love. Slash Film.

Devindra: slashfilm.com.

Leo: This is the 40th Anniversary. April 4, 1975. What happened on April 4, 1975?

Patrick: Jaws.

Leo: Maybe. Actually Devindra has got a great analysis of that on Slash Film.

Devindra: Not me. A lot of people have been doing it.

Leo: Nope. It was the founding of Microsoft. Microsoft is middle aged, officially. Economist bank has an interesting look back that begins with the F word, right at the beginnig there, so a little word of warning, you might not want to put it into a sixth grade class. Actually, I should read the quote because it's really good. Microsoft at Middle age is the name of the article. Let's get an ad out of the way. I love you, Economist. I really do. I've got to pay for you. This is the quote. I will not read the word aloud, but those of you who are watching video can see it. "“WHAT are you on? The ‘f*** Windows’ strategy?” Back in the late 1990s, when Bill Gates was still Microsoft’s boss, any employee who had the temerity to suggest something that could possibly weaken the firm’s flagship operating system was sure to earn his wrath." The F windows strategy was a phrase used at Microsoft. Everything Microsoft did had to strengthen Windows, make it ever more crushingly dominant. Many of the company's best innovations were killed. They called it a strategy tax. You protect Windows at all costs, even if it means killing great products. Now the CEO completely changed the company. He recoils when he hears the term strategy tax and says he now tells his staff to build stuff people like. Wow. that's not the Microsoft—it's true. It's not Windows First anymore. Remember that Microsoft released touch first versions not on Windows phone, but on iPad. In fact, it's still not available on Windows phone.

Devindra: They have some office apps, but they're not as featured as the iPhone one.

Leo: Unheard of. But what they have said is Microsoft software will always work best. The best experience will always be on Windows, but we want to be where customers are. I submit that what Microsoft is going through is the way the tech industry. They grew up and we thank them, in a world where the desk top operating system is king. Bill Gates saw early on in 1975 that there would be two paralel developments. Hardware, chips, software. Without software, hardware doesn't do anything. By making a stable platform that was good for programmers, they jump started the PC revolution. We've moved away from desktop computers, what are those?

Patrick: I don't know if it's moved away so much as the mobile market has exploded in a way that Windows was unready to capitalize on.

Leo: Windows phone was dead in the water. I would saw the operating system doesn't matter anymore, because we live in the cloud, and the cloud doesn't care. Right?

Patrick: I don't know.

Luria: They've been struggling for a while as we've all seen. I'm liking where they're going. Right now I think they're growing into the space again and finding their way, which all companies have to do. Apple did it. We've praised them for being such a great company. They've had their struggles. So all companies are going to go through this ebb and flow, so Microsoft is hitting it on the head, or at least beginning to.

Devindra: I think we can look back at this whole strategy, Microsoft in the 90's. They weren't—Gates was slow to warm up to the Internet and the possibilities of it, and that mentality followed them. That allowed Google to rise up and Apple to do a lot more stuff as well. They're paying for a lot of these strategies, they're still paying for it today.

Leo: You've all probably seen the famous Orc Chart. I have this hanging on my wall at home. There's Amazon, Google, Facebook. Microsoft is a bunch of little units pointing guns at one another. I love this cartoon so much because it's right on. That's the old Microsoft. The question of course is whether Microsoft has made enough changes to survive. There's a natural business cycle, and for tech companies it's very quick. 40 years is a long time.

Patrick: Nobody thought they were stumbling in a big way until the last five years as it become more obvious throughout the planet that mobile was going to become the dominant way throughout the planet to interact or compute for lack of a better word. All of a sudden it became like, boy. Uh oh. By the time they realized that, I envision Ballmer screaming in the background.

Luria: I miss those days.

Leo: Ballmer was the whiplash of technology, JK Simmons of technology. It wasn't that bad.

Patrick: Can you imagine how many people were Microsoft employees at the time going, Yeah. We could have owned that. How's that going? It's not like they're not making money. They make a huge amount of money in Windows, a huge amount of money in Office 365, but you know there are people who are like if you just listened 6 or 7 years ago? This whole Android thing wouldn't be a problem right now.

Leo: Hindsight is always 20/20. I can think of this happening so often in tech. I remember Steve Jobs saying that we had such a lead in 1984 and then Mac came out but we coasted for 10 years and Microsoft caught up with Windows 3.1. Steve says Windows 3. This was back in 1994.

Patrick: 95, Windows 3.1 was an emotionally draining experience on a good day.

Leo: I think of Xerox park. They ahd the Mouse, they couldn't figure out how to make a computer out of it. HP. Steve Wozniak said I'd like to build this thing called an Apple—I'd like to build a personal computer, would you like to sell it? They said there's no market for personal computers.

Patrick: IBM decided to use micro channel architecture because they wanted to control this open platform that they created. It nearly wiped out all their consumer market share instantaneously.

Leo: Actually, as long as you're talking 40th birthday, it's interesting to think how Microsoft fumbled—how IBM fumbled and gave Microsoft the opening. Had IBM been more protective of their hardware, they built a computer that anybody could build. The only thing you had to do was figure out Vios.

Patrick: And if Bill Gates hadn't been raised by Lawyers.

Leo: Bill Gates was smart enough to say to IBM—that was one cagey thing when IBM came to him and said, "We need a CPM for a new computer. Do you have one?" Bill said, "...yeah." He quickly ran across the street and bought it saying, "We'll give you non-exclusive rights to sell it." IBM said no one is going to make a PC, so that's OK.

Patrick: There's only a world-wide market for a few thousand of them.

Leo: Gates was smart and has a big wallet to show for it. This was the week of April Fool's. I think all of us in the Tech news business hate April Fool's.

Patrick: Do you hate it?

Devindra: I'm pretty much tired of it at this point. Most people that get into it, they're not that funny. It feels like a dis-service to the readers where you post news that could be true and then aaaah. We're joking. How are readers supposed to trust us?

Leo: That's the worst one, is it's believable. I'll tell you the one that really pissed me off, they did a few days before April Fool's. An SEO company announced they had hired Mac Cuts from Google who is the guy who fights spam at Google. While he has spoken to SEO groups, he's not a big fan of SEO. I read it, and I thought is this possible?

Patrick: He's also on a hiatus. He's taking a break.

Luria: He couldn't come out and say—I liked the PlayStation one, to be honest.

Leo: Tell us about that.

Luria: The one where you pause your game and then you put on wet suit gear and goggles for swimming, and then you go into the water and you lived the game. I loved that.

Leo: It was obviously not true.

Luria: Obviously not true, but still something that you'd want to be true. Wouldn't you want to live that immersive game in the pool.

Leo: I would. That's why I'm going to buy an Oculus Rift and a holo lens. Did you see Microsoft? This was a practical joke that was real. They put MS DOS on Windows phone.

COMMERCIAL: Microsoft leads the foundation for the future of personal computing. MS DOS was a monochromatic milestone in the history of PC. Installed on millions of desktops, it's where our productivity story started. Today, we're going back to basic and booting it to DOS one last time. Today we're announcing MS DOS mobile, a new opperating system.

Leo: I completely forgot to bring it in. I had it on my Lumia. It totally works.

Patrick: I guess that's the way they're going to save Windows phone, right? With DOS.

Leo: It has a command line! If you type camera, it launches the camera! It's an 8 bit camera.

COMMERCIAL: When the team told us we were re-booting DOS and OS, that's exactly what we asked too. To be able to strip everything back and focus on the OS. It's a metaphor for modern life.

Luria: I'm not sure if it was a good move or a bad move for a company trying to move along into the future.

Leo: It's funny. Unfortunately, so few people have windows phone, I couldn't play with it. Alex came here and installed it. When you launch the Internet browser, it launches a little Windows 1.0 screen and you click the Internet browser. It has a modem sound.

Patrick: I'm sitting here like Windows Phone Marketshare is so small right now, could this have caused a bump?

Leo: It has auto exec.bat, it has confic.cis, you can edit the auto exec.bat. It probably took them 5 minutes to port dos.

Patrick: All of the things I didn't like about DOS suddenly being available in my pocket with a ten hour battery life. Oh boy! I remember getting video games running under Windows DOS.

Leo: In past years, Google has done a lot of April Fool's stuff. I think I and others last year said don't you have more important thigns to do? The entire company took a month off in March to create an April Fool's joke. This year there was com.google, which was a backwards Google page. Samsung did the Galaxy Blad Edge, which was a phone so thin that you could chop tomatoes with it.

Luria: That I would love.

Leo: Is it a knife that's a phone or a phone that's a knife? No one knows.

Luria: It also feeds information into your phone. I like the Groupon, the transportation with a cat.

Leo: Didn't see that one.

Luria: I didn't read all of it, but I think you get to book a ride with a cat driver.

Leo: I would like a cat driver. The PacMan was pretty cool. I'll take Petaluma on maps.com. I'm glad they left this one up. Now I can play pacman. The best thing about it is they must have licensed the Pacman sounds from Namco. Just in time to get eaten. Where am I? I'm coming down River street. Hang a left at the TWIT brickhouse. Oh no! You can tell they spend a lot of time on it. From now on we can do graphics with Pacman. Did you see the selfie shoes.

Luria: Those are brilliant, except for the fact that the people who would wear the selfie shoe would be wearing a dress, and then would be lifting their dress to take a picture of them.

Leo: You're a girl. You figured that out right away. Here they are, taking pictures of themselves. The Selfie shoe, you can insert a camera phone into your show and just do a high kick. Who wants to carry around an ugly looking selfie stick. The Selfie Shoe. This is from Miss Mood, which is apparently a shoe designer.

Luria: See? She's having to hold her dress down.

Leo: Well, it would be perfect for Meerkat, if you can stand on one leg for an hour.

Luria: It does take away the look of having your arm in the picture. So that's good.

Leo: Your thigh is in the picture.

Patrick: The Voltron cat tower was amazing. I wish I could buy that.

Leo: Think Geek does a bunch of April Fool's products, and then they say you can't have them. One year—

Luria: Sometimes they buy them.

Leo: The Ton Ton sleeping bag. That was a hit.

Patrick: thinkgeek.com/product/iljr.

Luria: Also, the iPad arcade game was a joke one year, and the next year they actually released it.

Leo: The Voltron Cat Condo. They're going to have to make this too. Although, at $189, you'd have to really love your cat.

Patrick: At $189, it is competative with the crappy cat condos that are sold at every pet store in the United States.

Devindra: I spent $300 on a cat tower.

Leo: What? You cat people are crazy. For my dog, I give him a sock. An old sock, that's all he needs.

Devindra: They also had Game of Thrones Clue.

Leo: I've played that.

Devindra: That was awesome, but I think they took it down.

Luria: I want to get a cat, just to have that.

Patrick: Adopt a cat, buy a Voltron.

Leo: Cats and the Internet just made for each other. That's what they need on the Apple Watch. A little paw print for your kitty.

Devindra: That's more useful than the heart beat thing.

Leo: Where is my cat button?

Patrick: They've opened it up to 3rd party developers. Who knows what cat related apps will be developed.

Leo: There is one product I thought would be an April Fool's joke, and it wasn't. There was one case where it went the other way, and that was the Amazon dash button. I thought for sure this was a joke.

Patrick: I was talking with willa Normand. I was sitting here and that came out, and I can't believe the push button to order more proctering Gamble products was real, and then Obama signing the executive order imposing sanctions on overseas hackers was released on April 1st. It was a weird day for April 1st.

Leo: First, let's cover this. Then we'll cover the Obama executive order. This is a true story. There are things you run out of in life. Things that you wish you could order.

Patrick: It's weird, but if you go to the bottom of the page for this, on the Amazon dash page.

Leo: The idea is, you glue this button to the front of your dishwasher,and when you run out of Tide, all you do is press the button and tide arrives. It'll take a couple of days, it's only for a couple of days. You buy the tide button.

Patrick: As near as we can tell, this is a giant proctoring Gamble experiment. But scroll all the way to the bottom.

Leo: There's an API?

Patrick: That's where it gets interesting. The downside if you scroll up, you're going to see where companies like this fall, OK. Whirlpool, you're going to be able to have detergent order, or your brita filter to order more filters. I was really disappointed, but the quirky coffee machine looks good. But I bought a bunch of quirky products and not a single one has shipped with firm ware that was complete. While I can kind of tolerate that with some weird temperature sensor in my house, I'm not ready to have a vicious coffee experience because Quirky can't finish the firmware before they ship the product.

Leo: Here's an ink jet printer that has a button that says send me more ink.

Luria: I would love that on a printer, because printers drive me insane, as they do all of us. You never know what you have to order. There are certain products where that makes sense.

Leo: So this is not an API—

Patrick: Build our stuff into your product, and we will help deliver the stuff that makes you more money. There's probably a vig for the coffee brands. Obviously brother is going to make money hand over fist on ink or toner or whatever.

Leo: I bet Amazon doesn't care. What Amazon's whole business is making it as easy as possible for you to buy crap. Right? That's why one click.

Luria: I like it.

Leo: At first I thought, Oh come on. Then I realized, it's a win win. Amazon wins, I'm already an Amazon customer. I probably would just go to the browser and order the browser anyway.

Devindra: It's more about the lack of transparency. You don't know exactly—I guess you could set it up right, what exactly you're going to be buying—

Leo: There's a web, phone app. So it sends the order. Use the Amazon App on your Smartphone to connect to your wifi network and select the product you want to re-order with the dash button. So even though it says "tide" I guess you could order Bounty or whatever.

Patrick: First of all, you have to apply. Look at this. It's a bizarre. Bounty paper towels, Clorox disinfecting wipes. Lara Bar gluten free nut and fruit bars, ole regenerous.

Leo: There's only one that matters, and that's the toilet paper. That's when I wish they had drone deliveries.

Devindra: They have pantry box deliveries.

Leo: I need it now. It's urgent. Can you open the front door, come in my house...

Patrick: The problem is that toilet paper is an ad-on in many cases.

Leo: They said that cottonelle toilet paper is going to be one of the things.

Patrick: Right here, they said it's an ad on item. So that could be coplicated.

Luria: I wonder how often they'll increase the price behind the things without letting you know. They have so many subscribers on one of these products, will that increase the price, because you're just going to click and not think about it? That could be a big downfall.

Patrick: Most of this stuff—OK. Fruit and nut bars. It's like 16 1.7 ounce bars, but a lot of this stuff is going to take you days, if not weeks to go through.

Leo: I like this. They use modern technology. They de-bounce the button. You know on a keyboard they have debounce routines, so if you type the letter twice, within a small amount of time, they'll know. They do the same thing. Until the Bounty towels are delivered, you can't press the button again.

Patrick: All I can think of is my 3 year old going bink bink bink.

Leo: That's why.

Patrick: A truck full of Tide showing up outside my house and a 2,000 bill on Amazon Prime. I think they went through early beta testing and put that feature in almost immediately.

Devindra: Once you get your shipment, if your kid accidentally hits it, a couple days later you get one.

Leo: That would be bad.

Devindra: You'll have your pantry filled with junk—

Leo: I already do. I use Amazon subscribe and save, so it already sends me stuff.

Luria: They should build in SMS notifications so if you order and your husband or partner doesn't know that it's arrived...

Patrick: Amazon sends a notification to your phone, so it's easy to cancel.

Devindra: My worry is we're seeing this weird lack of transparancey when buying stuff, when paying for stuff. Uber comes to mind, right? You can get an estimate for your ride. You have no idea how much your being charged, if you're sitting in traffic for a while, you don't know if that estimate—all of a sudden you'll be paying 10 or 20 bucks more. It's weird that we're getting used to this world where oh, just pay whatever. Get me the thing. The cost doesn't matter. These buttons kind of seem to be pushing that more forward.

Patrick: If you talk to people who do economic theory and people who work heavily with how cash is spent, the way we use debit cards is radically different from the way we consider purchases when we use physical bills and coinage. To some degree moving from physical money to debit card puts a huge layer of abstraction on the human mind between what spending is. Right? This is a second layer of abstraction. We've already jumped that.

Leo: That's why I love one click. I don't have to pay for it. I just press a button and it comes in two days. That's so awesome! Right? You've got two lap tops, I see.

Leo: I have several drones for no apparent reason, because it was so easy, I just clicked the button. You could remember me during commercial breaks, like I think I'll get that.

Patrick: I remember you having three phones at one point when that was a significant investment. I think you jumped phones three times in the space of 4.5 weeks.

Leo: I have a special phone locker in my house. You should hear it when somebody calls my Google Voice number. They all go off, and my desk top and my tablets. Everything. I feel like a swiss clock maker at midnight. Everyone has a different ring tone, it's just a cocophany.

Patrick: I'm just making sure I still have your number.

Leo: Let's take a break. I do want to talk about this Obama executive order, because it seems like a good idea to me, but I'm sure Patrick will school me on why it's not. First a word from Carbonite, online backup. We were talking about the Cloud. There are so many uses for the Cloud. There is no better use if you ask me than backup. The cloud based backup is such a great idea because it gets your data off site. Carbonite has trust no one encryption, they have absolutely safe policies about protecting your—it's HIPPA compliant if used properly, but the point is if the data is backed up somewhere next to your computer, it's still at risk. Fire, flood, human error, once you get it on the Carbonite Cloud, it's safe. It is protected around the clock with Carbonite's climate controlled, backed up operation center, then they back up the back up. For the hands on business owner it couldn't be easier. Carbonite makes it hands free and hassle free. They back it all up to the Cloud automatically and securely. Carbonite is a success. 1.5 million customers including 70,000 businesses trusting Carbonite for around the clock protection of their business files. You know, it's tax time. Imagine if you lost your tax records. Imagine if your business lost your invoices, you accounts receivable, your inventory. It could be the end of the world. Carbonite protects you at home and at work. I want you to go to carbonite.com, you get 2 bonus months with your purchase if you use our offer code TWIT. C-a-r-b-o-n-i-t-e, carbonite.com. I tell you what; there are people in your life, your parents, your family, and your friends, who haven't a clue. Ask them; they are not backing up, or if they are backing up they are doing something kooky. I asked my dad what you do you do to backup stuff? He said I have this thumb drive and every once in a while I stick it in the computer and I copy stuff over. I got him Carbonite. Do your friends and family a favor, go to carbonite.com. We love them. Offer code TWIT is 2 months free. 

Leo: Patrick Norton, Obama, the President, signs an executive order posing sanctions on overseas hackers.

Patrick: Well the title is really awesome. Blocking the Property of Certain Persons Engaging in Significant Malicious Cyber Enabled Activities.

Leo: Is that an acronym? Does it spell anything?

Patrick: PCPESDEA.

Leo: The Executive Order does allow the government to freeze the asset of someone who is attacking us from outside the United States.

Patrick: My first thought was like, wow, is this a shot across the bow of all of the pretty severe hacking that has been traced back to China for example? One of the articles that came up later, it was a ZDNet article, "After Obama's Cyber Security Order Threatens Snowden Funds Bitcoin Donations Spike".

Leo: Oh, so this could be used against Snowden if he had any assets left stateside. I'm sure they seized those a long time ago.

Patrick: It's kind of interesting. How far does the Executive Order go? "Any person determined by the Secretary of Treasury in consultation with the Attorney General and the Secretary of State to be responsible for, compliant in, or too engaged in the receipt or use of commercial or competitive advantage..." So this covers industrial espionage...

Leo: So you are worried that this is going to be widely interpreted to be anything that we don't like?

Patrick: Well it seems that whoever is in power that everything gets widely interpreted to serve their particular needs at that particular moment, right? If Snowden's funds are overseas we have to send the fund overseas to support Snowden or anything else that you might believe that the Federal Government disagrees with does that become something those they can freeze or block?

Leo: Yeah, but they have always, they have always, look...they have tanks. They have ICBMs. If the Federal Government doesn't like something, they have means.

Patrick: I'm not saying that they don't.

Leo: What I thought was interesting was that Obama actually written about this on Medium. He published an article on Medium explaining this, which tells you something about who he needs to do the PR with. It's people like you, it's the techno elite who might be worried about this. I think that the problem is how do you take arm against hackers who are outside of the US soil? What do you do? Do you escalate cyber warfare? That's probably not the answer. But on the other hand we need to defend ourselves.

Patrick: It's going to be interesting. I will be at DEF CON this year for the first time in several years, and I think that it will be interesting to see what the kind of reaction of the hacker community is to this. A bunch of the stuff that has been put in place could easily block white hat activities, or pen testing activities, or has been interpreted in ways that people who make their living making networks more secure or researching ways to make networks more secure. A company saying that there are no holes in our product is not actually security. Its denial and denial actually isn't very effective in the long run. I think that it is going to be curious to see how this is used and the response moving forward. It's been an interesting few weeks in Washington for technology to be understated.

Leo: It's a challenging problem. It really is. You had hackers reputedly from North Korea effectively shutting down Sony Pictures Entertainment. How do you prosecute something like that? You can tell Sony you have got to tighten up your security. Obviously they did a bad job of that. You have Iranian hackers upset with the Sands Casino because they are owned by Shelly Adelson, who gives money to Israel, breaking in and totally hacking. I have got to figure that if anyone has good security it's a casino back house operation. They broke in. You have the Lizard Squad bringing down Microsoft Xbox and PlayStation Live all day Christmas day using our routers because apparently so many routers are full of so many bugs and exploits that they were able to create a band of marauding routers.

Patrick: That's why people are so up in arms about the whole Internet of Things because the Internet of Things is even a less kind of well looked at corner. You look at routers for example; most routers there is a chip set, there is a set of software that comes with the chip set, most router vendors are going to throw an interface on it, and then...

Leo: Then they are going to walk away and never come back.

Patrick: They might do an update, but that's one of the reasons for why the Open Source community has been so valuable for routers because in many cases there has either been like one update a few months after the router is released or it's never been updated, which means that they may have patched inherent flaws in the code that may have come from the factory because they take the factory code, they scan it, and then they walk away from it. The Internet of Things promises to be even worse because in many cases you have this chip that goes into this thing, and it's got, you know, it's amazing how many holes are being created.

Leo: Just put everything on the internet and cross your fingers. What do you think? I haven't asked you about this, but I'm sure that you and Ryan have talked on TWiCH about this, but in fact, I remember doing this on the Screen Savers, maybe not, but putting DDWRD on a Linksys 54, WRT 54...

Patrick: I remember that.

Leo: ...so ASUS now ships routers with support for WRT 54. They made I think a weird version of WRT on here, but then you can upgrade it, it's called ASUS WRT, but then you can upgrade it to the full Open Source WRT. That's one way to handle this, to say okay, we will put our own firmware on here, but we will make it possible for the Open Source community to do something.

Patrick: It's something that is happening at the high end, and it gets rancorous because the people who are developing these, I'm assuming at this point that they have worked closely with the DDRT community, and please don't roast me online if this is not true, but it's interesting that when Linksys said they were going to have I want to say Open WRT and the Open WRT community was like what? There was this like 2 month cycle as they kind of worked everything out. I think that it's good. I think that it's smart because it allows people who are buying a $250 router there is kind of 2 categories. They are like, hey, its $250, and it’s going to make my stuff faster. That isn't probably true depending on some areas. If you have 80211 B or 80211 G, this multi-zillion dollar router isn't going to make things better. But there is the other side of the people who are spending this much on the router who are depending performance, and will take the time to set it up, and configure it, and are thrilled at the idea of having a big, fat, Open Source operating system available for it. That's a good thing. 

Leo: These are expensive routers, you are right. They are not, they are Apple expensive.

Patrick: Well, $180 is not that expensive. You can get a router for $50. You can also, there it is down there, and there are the big honking $300 routers.

Leo: The more antennas the better, right? How many does that have? 6 antennas?

Patrick: I've been working on an article discussing the sort of like, AC45833 and what that actually means. That's kind of hysterical.

Leo: I think that you don't want your neighbor to get this because they are going to suck all of the bandwidth out of the sky. Right? This is like your worst nightmare if your neighbor has a 6 antenna router, there is nothing left for you.

Patrick: It's interesting. Look at the reviews on that.

Leo: They are very positive. It looks like the reader's choice.

Patrick: No, no, no, look at the eggs. The reviews, the people who own them review. 200 people with an average of like 2 1/2 eggs that is not a spectacular score. But it's got a lot of antennas.

Luria: With all of the Internet of Things, you know, security holes that you were talking about; I imagine a day where everything is connected, our stoves, and our ACs, and our heaters, and all of that. Just imagine one day like a huge hack on an entire neighborhood. We give, give, and give so much of our privacy and our security away just in an effort to get such cool tech. I think that it will come to a head, and the bubble will burst, and eventually we are going to have to start paying attention to security. I'm not sure that people are really putting their efforts into it as much as they should. As you kind of alluded to, Patrick, it's certainly something that we are going down the path of a potential huge issue.

Leo: I think that we have talked about this before, too, these surveillance cameras that are so easily hacked. This is a website that has online cameras that you can just log into because the password is either default or the firmware has an error. There are 1,411 in the United States, I'm not sure that I want to show these, but anyway...

Patrick: I think that most of these are pretty benign.

Leo: Those are pretty benign? Okay. Those are well known hacks that have gone on for a long time. I don't remember what the brand was that was particularly vulnerable, Foscam, I don't know if Foscam ever went around and fixed those old cameras that they sold.

Patrick: They can't.

Leo: There is no process.

Patrick: Well, this is a caveat kind of entry situation. If you don't take responsibility for the technology that you are running then whose fault is that?

Leo: Here is what I imagine that we will end up doing. If you think about it, I don't care if people can look at my thermostat. What I have got to do is isolate the stuff that I want to keep secure from the network, so almost have a guest network for the Internet of Things stuff that is isolated, firewalled from the network where I have important stuff.

Luria: You will care if you are in Chicago in the middle of winter and somebody turns your heat off.

Leo: Who is going to do that really? That is a lot of work.

Patrick: Have you heard about squatting Leo? If people will pretend there is a hostage situation...

Leo: I'm going to get you. I'm going to turn your heat up. You are going to be so sorry. Gosh, it's awfully warm in here, maybe I should check the Nest.

Patrick: If I know that you are on vacation for two weeks and I turn your heat up to 100 degrees and you come back to a $700 gas bill. Or if I turn the heat off in your house and the pipes freeze. Have you ever seen what happens to a house in Chicago in January when the heat is off for 3 days?

Leo: There is some question to what is the benefit of having a fridge or a thermostat on the public internet.

Luria: Well, not the on the public internet.

Leo: Nest gets weather reports, right? So part of what it does is that it says I'm going to check what the weather is in this locale so that I can make sensible decisions about how warm to make it or how cold to make it. I guess there is a reason.

Devindra: I hope as we get deeper into the functions of some of these kitchen gadgets, like I hope that we won't be able to turn our stoves on and off over an app over the web, because just don't build that.

Luria: You already can.

Devindra: Oh, you can?

Luria: There is one.

Leo: Samsung makes a smart stove, right, that you can control?

Devindra: I know, yeah. But I didn't know that you could actually turn it on.

Leo: I came home and all of the burners were on full. And my thermostat was turned up all the way. That would be a disaster.

Devindra: Nothing bad could happen there. Or just let the gas run for a while. Nothing bad can happen there.

Leo: Then my Amazon Echo had ordered 300 boxes of diapers.

Luria: Where I am excited for it is where you pull the milk out and it is done, it doesn't get returned, and the refrigerator knows that you have done that and it ships you some more.

Leo: Just like a Las Vegas hotel that charges you $38.

Luria: Yeah, you know, all of these smart devices certainly present issues where all of our stoves come on.

Leo: We had some poor pizza guy come here and said I got your pizza. We said we didn't order pizza. He said, yeah you did, you ordered 38 pizzas. We just bought it and ate it because it was good. We said, okay, here is $50, thanks.

Patrick: But, I mean, look at this in the news, separate swatting hoaxes draw large police responses in the Boston area, East Chester, Savanna, Tennessee...

Leo: We got swatted last week. I don't want to talk about it. Revenge porn...

Patrick: I didn't know that.

Leo: We will just keep that quiet. That is maybe why you may have noticed an armed guard and a metal detector.

Patrick: I was going to ask you about that.

Leo: We actually had to change our policies here. Here is a good one. Here is a story with a happy ending. This jerk that had a revenge porn site, Kevin Christopher Baller, of San Diego. This guy was so evil that he was soliciting pictures of ex-girlfriends then going to the ex-girlfriend saying if you give me $300 I won't post this. So he was both at a revenge porn site and was extorting people, putting people's names up. He was found guilty in February, glad to say, on 6 counts of extortion, 21 counts of identity theft for running a website that was posting nude photos of individuals as well as identifying information without their consent. 18 years in the slammer. Couldn't happen to a nicer guy. 18 years. I think that he didn't expect that. He looks like he didn't expect that. 18 years in the slammer.

Luria: Of course he didn't expect it. Good.

Leo: Nice, huh? Nice. Let's hope that there are more of these. Furthermore, let's hope this sends a message to the rest of the world. This is not okay.

Patrick: The article is really depressing because his website would only post photos if they had identifying information, Facebook accounts tied into the photos.

Leo: No wonder why they threw the book at him.

Patrick: Then there was a completely separate website that would offer to take the photos down.

Leo: Changemyreputation.com. Talk about hoodspa.

Patrick: Talk about vile.

Leo: Vile. Changemyreputation.com. The sad thing is that he didn't make that much money; $900 a month. But ChangeMyReputation he received payments totaling $30,000. So maybe that was where the money was, in the extortion.

Devindra: I almost feel like we need some sort of black mirror punishment for this guy. He is in jail for 18 years and whenever he takes a shower it is all live stream and he doesn't know or something.

Leo: You will be Meerkatted for the rest of your life. It's kind of double punishment. Not only are you going to be streamed for the rest of your life, you are going to be on a dying service.

Luria: That would be not punishment, though, wouldn't it? No, you are right, you are right. I still like Meerkat, but Kevin Marks on This Week in Google show this week kind of took some of the fun out of it, out of all of this live streaming. Including the live streaming that we do here with the chatroom and all of that. He said well, that's really, I think that Kevin is too smart, that really is all about the ego of the person streaming. It's useless for viewers because they want to watch it on demand, they don't want to watch it when you are doing it. So Meerkat is all about the interaction you get. The periscope with the little hearts flying up.

Luria: I would disagree with that. On the viewer side of things, yes, people want on demand, but they love live as you well know. That is the reason that you stream live.

Leo: Make me feel better, because I was feeling crappy the rest of the week. Tell me that I'm not a narcissist.

Luria: Well, I mean, you know.

Leo: Look, bunt cake. Tell me that I'm not a narcissist, please, because you do the same thing.

Luria: I do the same thing, yes.

Leo: You are going to do a live stream every Friday on Geeks Life, right?

Luria: Exactly, and I have been playing with Periscope constantly since it was released. I love it. The audience loves it. They love to get that kind of live interaction. The thing with on demand is, just like TV, you don't get to interact with the host. That's what this world today with the internet provides us is that one on one and that ability to feel like we are friends. Not just feel like, but we are friends with the audience. So you have got to have that combination of on demand and live.

Leo: That's what we do. I do like the feedback. It's definitely an ego boost. I'm sorry Devindra, I didn't mean to interrupt.

Devindra: No, it's okay. I think that is part of the argument against Meerkat, is that they don't have on demand. It's all, you know, live. You have to watch it live. Every time I have gone to try to watch a Meerkat I always get the message that the stream is over. So you need both. You guys kind of proved Leo, that having that live streaming interaction that has been important for the grip of all of your shows. It's like when I started doing a movie podcast, we did it live, too, when we were recording, because it was great to have that audience interaction. There is a lot more to it than just you being...

Leo: A narcissist?

Devindra: ...a narcissist. Yeah, narcissistic. There is that too. You really want us to see you eat bacon.

Luria: Correction. Lick bacon.

Patrick: Licking bacon just isn't as wonderful if people aren't watching.

Leo: On Screen Savers live, because it is more fun. The Tonight Show is live on tape, they just show it later.

Patrick: The Screen Savers was kind of an acrosism. Screen Savers, some new shows, and live sports. Most people don't make live television live. We didn't even have a 7 second delay, so if we screwed up everybody watching go to see if and share in the fun and then see it over and over in reruns. I think that another thing that has been interesting is watching this whole what is wrong with tech journalism backlash because everybody talks about Meerkat, then Meerkat raised a bunch of last minute funding. Then Periscope shows up, and now people are arguing whether Periscope has completely crushed Meerkat or not. You guys probably know more over at Engadget than I do, but I continue to watch the reaction, the kind of meta reaction of technology coverage and how excited people were about Meerkat until they weren't. Or am I just sort of so far outside of this that I can't even see it?

Devindra: There has been all sorts of criticism. I saw the article you guys are talking about is talking about how Meerkat is sort of killing tech journalism.

Leo: That was the worst link baity article I ever saw in my life.

Devindra: It was a little much. I think that there is a certain tendency among people who really love tech to be like, oh man, this thing is new and shiny and I am going to hype this up. Especially before something like SXSW or around SXSW. Twitter blew up, but also FourSquare. Remember Hipster and all of those like social where your friends are.

Leo: Highlight.

Devindra: Yeah, Highlight and things like that. We have had a lot of apps right before that that just never went anywhere. Meerkat, I think that Meerkat just benefited from a lot of that hype early on. I don't think that means that tech journalists are dying or not doing their jobs, but I do think that we have to wake up and think about what this tech means for normal people. When Meerkat was in it's heyday, for that one week, or that one weekend, it was all just tech people talking to tech people. That's the sort of thing that bugs me, because you have to talk to normal people...

Leo: Periscope seems to have much more of a global audience, and more diverse.

Luria: It's got to get back on Android as well.

Leo: Both Meerkat and Periscope say that they are doing Android. We actually interviewed the founder of Meerkat on Triangulation a week ago, Ben Ruben. He's not a dumb fella. I thought that he had some insight. He said that it's a very vertical niche. You have live streaming, but it's ephemeral, it's just one of many niches. Periscope takes another niche; they save it, but only for 24 hours. YouTube Live you could argue takes a third niche where it's saved forever. We do that, we save it forever, but we also edit it after the fact to tighten it up a little bit. I think that Meerkat is very interesting.

Luria: Meerkat and Periscope are getting so much attention. HangWith was also another one that has gotten a lot of attention. But Quick 4 years ago, was it 4 years ago that it started?

Leo: That's right Luria, because we didn't have bandwidth, we didn't have cameras, it's much better now. They seem to have found a UI. For one thing, now it's portrait mode, so it's more natural to watch on a portrait mode phone. You get the live chat. It really is geared to narcissistic broadcasters. Oh look, all the people watching me. Oh look, all of the people talking to me. Oh, look at the hearts.

Luria: I do like the hearts.

Leo: See?

Devindra: That's like any social medium, right? There's Twitter, there are people who are breaking down the content, there are the people who sit back and read all of the tweets. I love the feedback from Twitter, like all of the notifications and everything, unless I'm talking about game, or gig, or something. But I love that feedback, so it kind of makes sense for Meerkat, why it is taking off now but it didn't before with the social structure of Twitter or something. That kind of allows for more of this content to get out there. Live streaming has been out there for a while, DotTV was doing it for a long time before the whole Twitch thing.

Leo: I should have said Hangout On Air, not YouTube Live. YouTube Live is for trained professionals. Don't try this at home. Yep, this is the article. It's Terro Houtinian, who, we are going to freeze his assets in the United States, "Meerkat is dying and it's taking US tech journalism with it." You know what? We talk about stuff not based on how many downloads that it has, but whether it is interesting, whether it is transformative, whether the technology is meaningful, not because it's the number one app on iTunes. That is what makes something of interest. It's not a popularity contest.

Luria: Sometimes it is.

Leo: We've got a great panel. I would just hang out with these guys if I could. Well, I guess that I will because it's TWiT.

Patrick: We are here forever.

Leo:  We are here for the rest of your life. Devindra Hardawar from Engadget, nice to have you. Mr. Patrick Norton, my old friend from tekthing.com, and possiblyunsafe.com. I love it. That's a good name. Long, but good.

Patrick: Yeah, we couldn't let that one go.

Leo: No, too good to waste. Of course, Luria Patrucci, you may know here as Cali Lewis from her new site geekslife.com. Everybody must get in line. Sign up, join up, become a fan. I immediately signed up. I don't want to get all mushy on you or anything, but I think that you are great, and I'm really glad to see you kind of branch out on your own.

Luria: Well thank you.

Leo: You are doing your own thing.

Luria: Me too, I'm excited to do so. What was it, 8 or 9 years ago when I joined Call For Help?

Leo: Yeah, you filled in for Amber some weeks and did such a great job.

Luria: You taught me a lot about television and about how to be a host because I was brand new back then, so I owe a lot to you and I appreciate it.

Leo: You had that spark even then. There was something about you even then. We were looking for somebody to fill in for Amber on her vacation, and I think I must have seen you on the internet.

Luria: Yeah, you saw me, but then I called your radio show.

Leo: Oh yeah, that's why I saw you, because you called the show. So I said let's see what this is. That was a smart move. A little self-promotion there. Anyway, a longtime friend and very, very talented person.

Luria: Thank you Leo.

Leo: Luria, you've got spunk. I hate spunk. I know people know GeekBeat and so forth. Is GeekBeat continuing without you? What is happening there?

Luria: No, no, GeekBeat is done.

Leo: John says that he is retiring. I guess he said that he had deals that he had to do, NAB or something?

Luria: Yeah, we are still doing NAB show because we are the official broadcaster for NAB Show.

Leo: So you have a contractual obligation?

Luria: Yes, we are still doing that under GeekBeat, but that will be the last thing.

Leo: The contractual fulfillment tour.

Luria: Something like that. But I'm looking forward to it, I love NAB Show.

Leo: We will see you there. I will be there. We are doing the Broadcast Mind's Panel with the folks from Tricaster Newtek. That's going to be a lot of fun.

Luria: Oh, awesome. I was on that last year.

Leo: Yeah, it's a fun thing. I've done it once or twice. They rotate through people, and I guess nobody said yes so they got me again.

Luria: Well come on the show.

Leo: If I have time I will. Where will you be?

Luria: At the NAB booth, which I believe is between Central Hall, or right at the entrance of Central Hall.

Leo: Nice location. Tell us a little bit about what you want to do with the new thing. What is new? What is different?

Luria: It's more of a real look at how technology or how our other passions can affect your life. So from a technology perspective, on Tech Whisper, which will be my tech show, it will be a real world look at how these new technologies affect your life, and what they can do for you, and what you need to watch out for, things like that. Then embracing all of our other passions, I love music, and I love stand up paddleboarding, so we will just be having fun with our passions. I really want to get the community involved more. This is the number 1 thing that I have loved about doing shows online is the community, and the interaction, and sharing that passion, I know I say that a lot, with the community members. So we are going to be looking at ways that they can participate a lot more.

Leo: What happens to the studio? You built that beautiful Geek House.

Luria: Sometimes you over extend yourself.

Leo: Oh, was it expensive? Tell me about that. Do you know what our rent is? Oh, I'm sorry. Do you know what my electricity bill is?

Luria: Yeah, you know that these things are expensive.

Leo: I tried to warn you. I tried to warn Louie. Louie? It's Luria meets Cali is Louie. I'm going to call you Louie. So I tried to warn you Louie.

Luria: I know.

Leo: This stuff is expensive.

Luria: In business, and that's what this is, we have an entire team who have mouths to feed at home. You try things and they may or may not work out. It's okay to say, you know what, that didn't quite work out. We are going to take a step back and we are going to grow more organically, and we are going to grow with a base that helps us stay alive forever. Because I want to do this forever.

Leo: Best thing we ever did, I looked at the Revision 3 model, you guys, you are no longer there, but you had investment, actually your stuff still says Revision 3 at the end I noticed Luria.

Luria: Correct.

Leo: You are still a Revision 3 partner?

Luria: Correct. We are still licensed. I own my content, but they license it and we partner with them.

Leo: That was one of the issues. You got a lot of money up front in investment capital and you want to spend it. So I think that the discipline for us of only spending the money that you can afford to spend, what money we made, has been a good discipline and slow growth.

Patrick: Which is why I have been working out of somebody else's warehouse.

Leo: Daren is doing a good job, though. Hack 5 is doing a good job.

Patrick: Yes, and the Hack Shop is amazing.

Leo: Yeah, but I think that is part of their success. They had another side business which is selling that stuff online. You have got to have a revenue stream.

Patrick: Yes, that's a very...

Leo: It's a minor detail.

Patrick: Well, but it's also something that can be so funny about working in the Bay Area, in venture capital land, and people are like, here is a giant...I'm sorry Devindra. 

Leo: He just slugged you Devindra. I don't think that you felt it, but man. He had a sledgehammer.

Patrick: But it's so funny. A lot of people don't realize until a giant check is in their bank account that the venture capital company wants a 10 or 100 times return on that investment, or at least a business that is going to yield gigantic amounts of cash.

Leo: Right, so they put pressure on you. You either have to have an exit or you have to have massive growth.

Patrick: Or massive growth and then an exit. I don't know. It's interesting.

Leo: We don't have massive growth. We have little tiny growths all over us. No, we actually grow slowly, but not the size that a VC would want. 5%-10% of growth a year in the tech business is nothing. But Cali, Luria, to the point that you make, failure, and this is one of the things that has really spurred innovation in Silicon Valley, failure is not in any way a black mark in this arena.

Luria: No.

Leo: Everybody has failures.

Luria: You learn from them. I don't even really think of them as failures per say. It's a bad word. It's learning. You grow, and you change, and you adjust, and only can you make it long term if you do that adjustment and not just sit back and go crap.

Leo: You don't want to beat your head against the same wall over and over. You always want a new wall to beat your head against.

Luria: Yeah.

Leo: Ben Rubin, the Meerkat guy, actually Meerkat came out of the failure of Yevvo, which was a live streaming company that they had founded in Isreal where they are from, a couple of years ago. Yevvo never gained ground, so they said, oh, let's tear it all down. What they are going to do, and I thought that this was interesting, is we are going to do experiment after experiment. This is what Kevin Rose did with Milk. We are going to do experiment after experiment. If something fails we will kill it fast and move on. It just happened that Meerkat was a quick hit, but it could have been a failure and then they would try something else. We are learning each time. I think that is exactly the way to look at it.

Luria: Exactly. Thomas Edison, how many times did he try for the light bulb, right?

Leo: He just stole it. That was the easiest part. If you can't figure it out then just steal it. Then no problem. Let's take a break, I want to talk more with, what a great panel, friends of mine I'm happy to say for a long time. Devindra, you are a relatively new friend, but it's great to have you as part of the group.

Devindra: You guys feel like old friends. I have been watching you all forever.

Leo: You are in the geek fraternity. I meet people all the time that I've never met before, but we always feel like, don't we, when we meet people in the real world and we are like these are friends.

Patrick: I'm always amazed, I don't know, there are so many cool people out there.

Leo: Did you miss anything this week? It was an amazing week. Let's take a look back at this week on TWiT.

(Video Plays): Previously, on TWiT. The Meerkat Hat TM is an especially designed hat so that you can Meerkat hands free. I hate April 1st. Triangulation. Ben Rubin is the founder of Meerkat, which is literally the hottest app out there right now. If the last decade was about sharing then the next decade is going to be about participating. All About Android. I have the S6 Edge in my hand right now, and I'm just so impressed with the camera quality of this. I really just fell in love. You want the phone to be the one to say I love you first. Security Now. Then we have the ever popular list of the 50 most used passwords. This page shows the 20 most common keyboard patterns. ADGJMPTW. I don't see a pattern. TWiT, bring your brain, we will do the rest. Type Win. OMG! OMG! I think that I spent half of my morning convincing people that this was real. Oh my god, it's 8 bit!

Leo: Okay, I was just a little over excited about that I think. I've calmed down a bit. I want to tell you a little bit about Audible. I think that we have done a lot for Audible over, I don't know, how many years have we been fans of Audible? I started on Audible in 2000 when I was still commuting to The Screen Savers. Audible has been an advertiser for probably 7 years, 7 or 8 years; for a long time. I will tell you what, I have a feeling that more than a few devoted Audible listeners found out about it here. Audible is an audio book store with more than 150,000 titles. All of the new books when they come out nowadays come out on Audible. In fact, I'm listening to the new Steve Jobs book, Becoming Steve Jobs on Audible. It's great. I have to say, I was a little skeptical at first. I had heard these stories before. There it is. But as I have been listening Brent Schlender and somebody else, Rick somebody, Tetzeli? Poor Rick, he doesn't get any of the credit. I think that they wrote probably the most insightful book about Steve, both his genius and his flaws, that I have read yet. It's really interesting. It's on Audible. Tell you what, I have got 2 books for you on Audible. Audible is great because you can listen on your computer, you can listen on your phone, they have Audible apps for everything. They just updated their Windows Phone app, it's really great. IOS, Android, Windows 8, I actually found out that I can finally listen on a Chromebook. I didn't know this, but they have a player on the Audible site. I have been listening on the Chromebook. So I'm a happy camper. Everywhere you go, of course in the car is where I mostly listen, but Audible is nice for anytime that you can't hold a book, you can't read a book, but you are doing something mindless that reading a book would be really fun. Like on the treadmill, walking the dog, doing the dishes, commuting. My commute is not as long as it used to be, but I listen to Audible every single day. Because Audible lifts you up. It informs you, it entertains you, and when you are listening to a great book on Audible you are transported. When you listen to, some of the science fiction that I have been listening to lately, it just takes you to another world. Time goes by, and suddenly you are at the end of your commute, and you go I think that I am going to have to drive around the block a couple of times because I've got to finish this chapter. The dishes are washed magically. So there is one book I've been listening to, the new Walter Isaacson book people say is good, The Innovators. My friend John Salinis, JammerB, our studio master here, has recommended this and I can't wait. This is the Otherland series, which just made it to Audible, Tad Williams story of virtual reality and how it is both wonderful and challenging to say the least. It's the Otherland series. How many of them are there? 4 of them? Book 1 I just downloaded, City of Golden Shadow. He, this sounds great, I haven't started it yet John, but I will soon. Neil Gaiman's newest, Trigger Warning, I just downloaded. Let's see what else. I have really been loving that Beatle's biography. I'm still listening to that, it's like 800 hours. Here is one if you like The Princess Bride. Cary Elwes, who was, you know, the guy.

Patrick: The Dread Pirate Roberts?

Leo: Dread Pirate Roberts? Wesley, he was Wesley, then later the Dread Pirate Roberts.

Patrick: A friend of mine just saw this movie for the first time 2 days ago.

Leo: It's such a good movie!

Patrick: And a really good read.

Leo: Cary has made a book called As You Wish: The Inconceivable Tales of the Making of the Princess Bride. Here is what I'm going to do. I have got a deal for you son. Here is what I'm going to do. I'm going to get you 2 books absolutely free when you go to audible.com/twit2, that's audible.com/twit and the number 2. You are going to be signing up for the Platinum Plan, that's the 2 books a month subscription. That's the one that I use. You get 2 book credits per month. Now, this is free for the first 30 days. You will also get the Daily Digest, or the Wall Street Journal, or the New York Times, which is really nice. It keeps you up to date on what is going on in the world. You can cancel at any time in the first 30 days, pay nothing, those books are yours forever. You get to keep those forever. I think that this is a great deal. You may say, I don't know, am I going to enjoy listening to books compared to reading them? I may not be for everybody, but all that I can do is say try it. It changed my life forever. I know so many people who feel that way about Audible. Audible.com/twit and the number 2.

Google says that 5% of the visitors to its site, you know when you go to google.com they are able to see kind of what is going on, they did a study in conjunction with UC Berkley, 5% of people visiting Google's sites and services have at least 1 ad injector installed. That's 1 in 20.

Patrick: That's a lot.

Leo: That's millions given the amount of traffic that Google has. So what is an ad injector? Could you explain maybe Patrick what an ad injector does?

Patrick: Something that injects ads that you maybe don't want inside of your system including potentially malicious code.

Leo: This is what we were so upset with Lenovo for, is they had that thing that they said well, we know that our customers want Superfish. Superfish would look at what you were visiting on the web and then add ads to an existing page that are related to the things that you are looking for. I don't think that anybody wants that. They come bundled often, and I have to yell at CNet for this, they come bundled often from download.com, which is one terrible place to get your shareware by the way.

Patrick: It's funny how many things now that did not have bundled applications. You really, really, really have to pay attention because you know, there are still toolbar installers out there. 

Leo: A lot of this comes from ask.com. Don't get the toolbars kids. 

Devindra: The thing about CNet and download.com, I was talking with an executive there who shall go unnamed, but they pretty much admitted, oh yeah, yeah, there is a ton of spyware in that crap. A ton of stuff.

Leo: Well why do they do that?

Devindra: Because they made a ton of money. They made so much money. It's ridiculous. 

Leo: You know, I could make money by robbing banks, but I don't do it. I could set up a revenge porn site, but I don't do it. There are some things that make you a lot of money that are just wrong.

Luria: This is the problem with big companies, right. As you were saying, you have VCs to answer to, and you have people to answer to, and you start doing things that you shouldn't otherwise do or things that you wouldn't do. So somebody is always having to keep people responsible, and that has to be the consumer sometimes.

Leo: Are you excited about the Surface 3 Patrick?

Patrick: Not as excited as other people are.

Leo: Other people are very excited. I don't know why. The Surface Pro 3 is actually a pretty good system. A lot of people do like it. It's a very big screen, it's running Windows 8 Professional, but it's expensive. It starts at $800 and if you want a keyboard it's even more. Microsoft this week announced a new Surface 3. First of all, a couple of things deduced from this, Windows RT is dead.

Patrick: Whew, that was a big mistake.

Leo: So this takes up that space in the market where the $500 tablet was. It's very light. 

Patrick: It's not only the Windows operating system, but unlike RT there are applications that you can run.

Leo: It's actual Windows. It's running on an Atom, a Cherry Trial Atom. It's not the fastest processor, but for most people it's plenty. It's 2 GB of RAM, 64 GB of storage. That's $499, and by the way Microsoft has already said that if you have Windows 7 or 8 you can upgrade to Windows 10, so this summer you will get Windows 10 on it. They say available May 5. 1920X1280 display, that's 3:2, which the Surface Pro 3 is 3:2, right?

Patrick: Yep.

Leo: You know the Pixel? It's also 3:2, right? I have mixed feelings about it. I want kind of more.

Luria: You always want more Leo.

Devindra: It's technically more. When everything started having wide screen displays everybody started complaining, oh I wanted more, because you used to have more vertical space. It seems like a constant trade off. I really like the change in the Surface Pro 3 to that ratio.

Leo: So you like it? Okay. I just have mixed feelings about it. Some things it's great. Like if you are just doing a full screen it's fine. It's not good for multiple screens.

Patrick: Well it's a tablet.

Leo: Right. But is it?

Luria: That has the ability to do multiple screens, so you might as well use it, right?

Leo: It's just skinny.

Luria: Yeah right.

Devindra: It just seems like a tablet that is more than a tablet.

Leo: Yeah. 1.37 lbs. It's a third of an inch thick; very thin. Dolby speakers, 2 cameras, 8 mp in the back, 3.5 on the front. No fan. I like that. Still has the kickstand, but it's not the new kickstand, it's the 3 position kickstand.

Devindra: It's got full touchscreen and stylus support, which is nice. 

Leo: It doesn't come with a stylus, but you can buy a stylus.

Devindra: It doesn't come with a keyboard either. That is Microsoft's perpetual mistake with all of these Surface things. You are advertising a price that is effectively a lie. You can think of this as a $499 computer, but what is it, $630 with the keyboard? It's an inexpensive computer that can do a lot with the touchscreen. It's actually pretty interesting I would say, it's just not super powerful.

Leo: It comes with a 1 year subscription to Office 365 Personal. That is the latest thing, which I love. They are smart, because after a year you are probably going to renew.

Luria: I think that all of these tablets are really interesting and good. Of course, you know, like you said, it's not going to do a huge amount. I don't know, am I alone not being able to handle it not doing a lot? I see the benefit for students and stuff, but I want more.

Patrick: The day I replaced the trashed and tattered iPhone 6 there was a Tesla store and a Microsoft store at the place I was at, and the Tesla store was hysterical because it was a Tesla, and another Tesla, and Tesla lunchboxes, and a Tesla t-shirt. It was like this bizarre shopping experience where there was a lot of this Tesla branded crap, then the car itself, which is obviously not crap. Then around the corner is a Microsoft store, and there is all of these $200-$250 Microsoft laptops from major vendors that are incredibly usable. Part of the reason that they are creating them, they are Atom processors and may or may not have a touch screen, but despite the fact that their specs sound really tiny or make you think, oh, netbook, run away. Because of the way that Windows 8 is handling memory and they have worked very hard about what they are putting inside of these laptops they are incredibly usable. Would I want to do 70 MB photos in Photoshop? No. Would I want to edit video on them? No. For 98% of what most people are doing they will work just fine.

Leo: They have Micro USB charging. I like that. I wish it were Type C, but I think that Type C isn't quite there, so the next generation. I noticed that you are using the new Dell XPS 13.

Patrick: This is actually the 2013 XPS 13.

Leo: Oh, you have the old one.

Patrick: The new Dell XPS 13 is a fantastic piece of engineering.

Leo: Sweet.

Patrick: It's gorgeous.

Leo: The only thing wrong with it is Windows.

Patrick: I'm okay with Windows.

Leo: Oh, you don't mind?

Patrick:  It's kind of funny. Everybody that I work with currently runs Windows so I'm going to have to buy another MacBook so that I can be the person that talks about the OSX stuff because nobody else will do it.

Leo: Everybody is running Windows?

Patrick: Everybody is running Windows or Linux.

Leo: So let me see your desktop. You used to have a very bad habit of putting icons like crazy on your desktop.

Patrick: You know, I just cleaned it up about a year ago. 

Leo: Oh Patrick.

Patrick: This is very tame for me.

Leo: This is cleaned up. Yeah, it used to be like full. You need a big screen just so you have more room for icons.

Patrick: I spent about 6 months last year working on a 4k desktop, and the ironic thing was that I had like 6 icons on the desktop and 6 applications open all of the time. I did not have icon cruft on my desktop.

Leo: Do you like that ASUS, the new Transformer?

Patrick: Yeah, it's the new 300 CHI. It feels really nice, and I'm deeply in love with the idea of a laptop. It's a convertible, right, so the keyboard comes separate.

Leo: You broke it again. You cannot give Patrick a notebook, he just rips the screen right off of it.

Patrick: That's true. But it's really interesting to play around with the Core M Processor.

Leo: So that's what is going to be in the new MacBook when it comes out just this Friday?

Patrick: Yeah.

Leo: What do you think? Is it really slow? I'm worried.

Patrick: No, it is not really slow. But I haven't done any benchmarking yet, I've just been using it hands on, I haven't run into any situation where I was like err.

Leo: See, I don't care about benchmarks. That's what I want to know is if I'm going to scream if it's too slow.

Patrick: No, you are not going to scream if it is too slow.

Leo: That MacBook looks pretty sweet.

Patrick: And it comes in gold.

Leo: You read my mind.

Patrick: You are going to laugh. I was like, you know what? I want a gold laptop.

Leo: That's the one that you should get.

Luria: Are you serious?

Patrick: I have never had interest in a gold Apple or Android anything, but for some reason the idea of a gold laptop...

Luria: I'm very disappointed in you Patrick. Very disappointed.

Patrick: I don't know where it is coming from. I just remember looking at that and thinking I want that. It's just so I can get that look on the bus.

Leo: This is Patrick, he has opulence.

Patrick: Oh yeah.

Leo: He loves gold.

Patrick: I will climb out of my opulent 2003 Subaru that is parked out there.

Luria: I hear the word gold and I run screaming.

Leo: I think that Patrick's opulence is really the story. I also want a mini giraffe. If only I can get a mini giraffe. If I had a mini giraffe I would be happy. That's me with my gold laptop. I has opulence. Are we gosh Luria? Do you think?

Luria: Are we gosh?

Leo: Are we gosh, Patrick and me, for liking gold.

Patrick: The fact that we are already in the royal we at this point.

Leo: You and me, not we.

Patrick: I just think that it's hysterical. I just think that it's really curious that all of the sudden that all of these color options that came out on the iPhone is now available on the laptops.

Luria: I have to admit that the gold from Apple is not wretched. As much as I hate it, it's like it's a subtle gold.

Patrick: That's a pull quote for a box, "This gold is not wretched." GeeksLife.

Leo: So would you consider dating a guy with a gold laptop?

Luria: Well my boyfriend has a gold iPhone, so.

Leo: I'm just saying.

Luria: But it was the only option available, so.

Leo: Yeah sure. I'm sorry honey, I didn't have any choice. As long as we are talking hardware did you see this? At CES Intel announced a new computer on a stick. Google is going to launch something that will be, they didn't say the price, under $100, called the Chromebit Dongle, which is probably the worst name ever, but it does come in gold. It is a thing that you plug into your TV with an HDMI port.

Patrick: It's the same processor that is in the new Chromebook laptops. Apparently the keyboard, the touchpad, and the screen for the Chromebooks is $51 because this is going to sell, this is an ASUS Chromebook.

Leo: There is a $150 higher in HiSense Chromebook. This is $50 less. Google has said that it is less than $100, we don't know exactly. I think that is too much. It should be $50 or less. 

Patrick: I heard it was like $99.

Leo: That's less than $100, but barely. I know, and I think that anybody who watches a lot of TWiT knows this already, but you fellas and gals don't; I did not like the Chromebook, I thought it was a stupid idea. Then lately I've been using a Chromebook Pixel and I kind of love it.

Luria: It's great for the simplicity.

Leo: It's expensive.

Luria: Well yeah.

Leo: It's not gold. I've got the Type C charging / data connector.

Patrick: Good to know.

Leo: I think that is a good choice. I'm not sure that Apple's decision to make it the only connector is the right choice, but on the Pixel it's nice because there is 2 of them, one on each side so you can put the power on either side. That's very flexible, it's still has USB ports and still has a USB card.

Devindra: The thing about the Pixel, for what the Chromebook does it is just a little too expensive. It's cheaper than the first Pixel, which I had some time to play around with. I hated it. I hated what it represented because at that time Chromebook was so limited, you could do so very little with it. Now there are more offline apps and you can actually use Chromebook like a real computer. 

Leo: That's my point, is that at first it was still a browser. It does almost anything that I want to do. You can't edit video. It's about the one thing that I can't do. But Adobe has announced that they are going to streaming Lightroom, Photoside Lightroom. I'm sorry, Photoshop, I'm hoping that they are going to do Lightroom. I couldn't write software in the past so well. But there are great solutions for that. I feel like I really like it. It's fast. I feel like people spend too little on their computers. Don't you think? What do you think Luria? Shouldn't they be spending more on their computers? I feel like sometimes, what are we, nuts? A $250 computer? That's nuts.

Luria: Yeah.

Patrick: Yeah, it's nuts, right? The average family of 4 in the United States is making $40,000-$60,000. That's not so nuts.

Devindra: Also not everyone needs the high end, the media editing like we do.

Leo: There are $200 Chromebooks, $250 Chromebooks. They are plasticy.

Devindra: That's fine. That's fine. I have become a really big fan of the tech that is becoming more capable at lower price points because it's like we are being bombarded by so much consumerism like Amazon frigging buy button, you know? It feels nice to see the tech coming down in price that is vaguely affordable by many, many people. Then yeah, you have the crazy high stuff like the Pixel for crazy people. Sorry Leo.

Leo: I come from an era where the computer that you wanted was $2500.

Patrick: I remember that, sure.

Leo: $999 doesn't sound like that much to me for a really usable, really robust, very snappy, gorgeous high res screen, touch interface. If feels like the right price.

Devindra: It's still a fancy web browser, though. No matter how you...

Leo: Yeah, but it's a really fancy web browser.

Devindra: It feels like a step back. I don't know.

Leo: I don't know, I think that it is great.

Luria: I would rather have a better computer and spend a little bit more on it rather than have multiple, to have to get one simple computer and one computer for complicated editing and things like that. I don't like switching back and forth between computers because I'm a hoarder of information and apps, and I like to have access to all of my stuff as it is on the computer. I don't like switching back and forth.

Leo: That's the amazing experience on a Chromebook is that you can wipe it off, log in to your Google account, and all of your stuff is there all of the sudden.

Luria: It is, but apps, I mean, I hate reinstalling apps.

Leo: All of the apps reinstall. It has a lot of apps now. There are very few things that I can't do as I use it.

Luria: It has gotten better.

Leo: Video editing is the one, and that is the one thing that you do a lot. What do you use?

Luria: I actually haven't edited in a while unfortunately. I want to get back into it because I love editing, but you know, my team, Dave Curly is an amazing editor.

Leo: Let them do it.

Luria: I know, but it's fun.

Leo: No it's not. You have diluted yourself because you had to do it. It's not fun.

Luria: They have switched to Premier, though, from FinalCut.

Leo: So have we. We went out because we were looking, and we decided not to buy MacPros. The MacPros were kind of feeling a little long in the tooth. We decided, you know what? We are going to buy Dell PCs. And for the price we got much better hardware and we are going to move to Premier because it's Windows. Anthony Neilson is running the board because Jason Howell on break this week because it's Easter or something, I don't know. Anthony is a godless heathen so he doesn't mind being here. You do a lot, you mainly an editor?

Anthony Neilson: Yeah.

Leo: How has that been, the transition from FinalCut to Premier?

Anthony: It's kind of like a lateral move from 7.

Leo: You used Premier before you came to us, right?

Anthony: Not really?

Leo: No, you were FinalCut all along?

Anthony: My last gig I was doing I moved over to 10.

Leo: You weren't using Avid or something? Emmy Award winning editor here. This guy is good. You don't feel let down that you had to learn something new I'm sure?

Patrick: Yeah, it's just pretty much the same as 7. Except they did a lot of things involving less expensive hardware, working in groups, being able to manage workflow. Final cut is a perfect thing for someone in the corner making art. Then Premier actually talked to people who made television on a large scale and actually build in a lot of stuff that FinalCut had never even thought about.

Leo: We have 6 editors, 6 edit suites. Has anybody complained? You can tell me their names, it's okay.

Anthony: No, we just have a few bugs that we are working on.

Leo:  I think Josh's machine is haunted. Or his bird got into it.

Anthony: Well today is the first time that he is editing with his PC, so we will see.

Leo: We will see how it goes. Oh, I'm a little nervous. Alright, let's take a break. We've got more with a great panel. I don't want to keep you too late because I know something is waiting, something wonderful.

Devindra: Dinner.

Leo: Dinner, that kind of thing. I know that people have to eat. Maybe some Easter Eggs that you didn't find this morning. Do you have kids Devindra?

Devindra: No, no, I have 2 cats. They are all I have got right now.

Leo: Do you have an Easter Egg hunt with your cats?

Devindra: No, that would be hilarious though.

Leo: If you do Meerkat it, would you? Our show today is brought to you buy FreshBooks. It's a lifesaver for me. Luria, when I was back in Toronto doing Call For Help, I had to invoice Rogers in Canadian every month.

Luria: That's annoying.

Leo: I don't speak Canadian. Then I bought the plane tickets and the hotels and I had to expense it. It was annoying because I hated doing it, firing up Word, or Excel, or whatever, and cranking out an invoice. So I put it off. I would go months without getting paid. This was not fun, not to mention the fact that the bookkeepers at Rogers would say you cannot give us 6 months of invoices at the same time.

Patrick: Why not?

Luria: They don't like that.

Leo: They don't like that. So it was Amber McCarthy who said maybe you should try FreshBooks. She was right. FreshBooks actually started in Toronto. Nice bunch of folks. Boy, they saved my life. They made it easy. They still do 10 years later. There are over 5 million users now. Use FreshBooks to send out invoices, to save time billing, to keep track of time and hours, to automatically import receipts. FreshBooks is built for the growing business, the freelancer or the small business that wants to get bigger. On average FreshBook customers double their revenue in the first 24 months. This is the one that I like, they get paid on an average of 5 days faster. I got paid on the average of 6 months faster.

Patrick: That's a big jump.

Leo: And they do, by the way, handle Canadian. They do any currency, which is really, really convenient. I could just go on and on. They have got great apps on Android and IOS. You can actually use the apps to record time and hours. It's so easy to bill, and when tax time come, oh man, your accountant is going to love you because these great reports make it very easy. Try FreshBooks right now, no obligation, 30 days free. Freshbooks.com/twit, at the end of sign up they say how did you hear about us. Just put This Week in Tech if you would. I would appreciate that. Or TWiT. Freshbooks.com/twit; saved my life and I feel like I owe them a big debt of gratitude. By the way, their support is local from the FreshBooks offices in Toronto. These are really nice people and really willing people. Freshbooks.com/twit.

Cali, did you see that people are bending the Galaxy S6?

Luria: I did.

Leo: Stop it! Everything will bend if you put enough pressure on it. Stop it!

Patrick: Some things break. Some things shatter.

Luria: I think that it is awesome that here we are wanting flexible displays. We want this technology to move forward with our bendy screens, and then we yell at the companies trying to give it a little bit more bend.

Leo: Jeez. Jeez. Has anybody tried Riff? This is another Facebook app that has sunk without a trace. They have an incredible record at this point. Riff is an app that we played with a little that lets you make a video, and then tag it, and then others in your group can add to that video, and more, and more, and more. Anthony, you were playing with it here. A lot of us here around were playing with it. But I think that it is dead already. It is like 4 days old. It's like gone.

Anthony: Yeah, there hasn't been much activity.

Luria: What do you mean it's gone? It's like gone gone?

Leo: You can still download it. What did Facebook do, Poke? I don't even remember.

Luria: I think that you can still Poke people.

Leo: Yeah you can, thank you.

Luria: I'm going to go on Facebook and do that .

Leo: There was Paper. Paper wasn't so bad, I liked Paper.

Patrick: I don't remember Paper.

Leo: Nobody remembers it. Facebook Hello? Nothing.

Luria: Pillow?

Leo: Hello, Pillow, I don't know.

Devindra: They made a phone guys, remember that?

Patrick: Right, because Google Wave really worked out so well long term.

Leo: How about this? You are a parent Patrick, you are the only parent; I am a parent, but my kids are grown. The Scrapbook that lets your kid have a Facebook presence.

Patrick: Yeah, because my 7 year old needs to be on Facebook.

Leo: Do you think that is a good idea? I don't think that I'm going to do this either.

Luria: I'm not a parent, but I think that the Scrapbook looks pretty cool for a parent to do. But they said that they were looking into figuring out how when a kid turns 13 they can take over that Scrapbook.

Leo: Of course.

Luria: But no 13 year old in the history of 13 year olds is going to want their kid pictures, their baby pictures, on their profile.

Leo: Mom, can I put my baby book online?

Luria: But when they turn 25 or 30 they probably will want to...

Leo: Maybe.

Luria: ...they probably will want to combine that, so they may have to put a little more thought into that.

Leo: You can opt to go in with The Scrapbook with a partner with whom you are in a relationship with on Facebook. Facebook is like a nanny. Oh no, you are not in a relationship. You can have a tag, you can choose what you call the tag, your child's name, initials, whatever you want, Bozo, anything. You and your partner chose which photos to tag, only you and your partner can tag your child in photos.

Patrick: I think that this is only going to help guarantee that an entire generation, first of all Facebook is already the place where you hang out when you have to talk to your relatives, right? It's not where you hang out with your friends.

Leo: Or in my case other Screen Savers alumni.

Patrick: Okay, you know, another good example. It's just guaranteeing that no one after a certain birthdate is going to hang out on Facebook except to talk to their parents or deal with their like aunts and uncles.

Leo:  You were at Ziff Davis when we were using Lotus Notes for email, right?

Patrick: Yes.

Leo: The most painful period that I can ever remember.

Patrick: No, Lotus Notes was not the most painful period.

Leo: It wasn't fun though. You liked Lotus Notes?

Patrick: I had been using it for so long at that point that it never bothered me.

Leo: I was the official email at Davis.

Patrick: It was the official pain in my ass at Davis, but it was one of many.

Leo: It predated widespread internet mail. It was company mail. It was also predated before the United States allowed you to export crypto that actually worked.

Patrick: Oh yeah, because crypto is a munition. Or was.

Leo: So here is how they solved it at Lotus. They got permission to export 64 bit crypto, which is pretty strong, as long as the first 24 bits were the NSA's public key. Then the NSA would only have, what is it, 40 bits, which is nothing. They could take an old 8088 and solve that one. Everybody else would get a 64 bit key space that wasn't really 64 bits. So a fellow has reverse engineered, I love this, has reverse engineered it, and has discovered the public key for the NSA that was in Lotus Notes. It's name was Minitruth. The organizational name was Minitruth. The common name was Big Brother. You got the truth now, because the Ministry of Truth, or Minitruth, in 1984 was what Big Brother kept an eye on people with.

Devindra: At least they've got a sense of humor. Or had.

Leo: He says I saw this on my debugger late one night and it was spooky. So there you go, even the NSA has a sense of humor. 

Patrick: Had.

Leo: Had a sense of humor. The Minitruth Big Brother.

Patrick: User ID Director NSA.

Leo: Was it?

Patrick: Scroll all the way down to the bottom.

Leo: Director NSA, dirnsa@nsa.gov. Yep, there you go.

Devindra: If only we could see Snowden's expression when he read that one.

Leo: For all we know that is what set him off. Oh, I'm telling everybody. Let's see, what else? Elon Musk, makes one tweet, gains a billion dollars in value. That must be nice work if you can get it. He tweeted out on March 30th, speaking of Tesla, that there would be a major new, there are going to be 2 things to add to the store now, a major Tesla product line. Not a car. April 30th they will unveil it. Do you think that it is a Tesla plane?

Patrick: No.

Leo: A Tesla hang glider?

Luria: I'm pretty sure it is a cat scratcher post.

Leo: It is a voltron tech gadget? People have speculated that it is a battery.

Patrick: Yeah, like a home battery.

Leo: What would that mean?

Patrick: That Tesla has a market to place all of the batteries that they are making at the supercenter in Reno.

Leo: They built an incredible battery back there.

Patrick: So basically you can store solar energy locally on your house.

Leo: See, okay, right now what you do, most people don't store solar energy, right? You just sell it back to the power company. So the solar panels just get stuff back down the line in the grid and you get a credit on your bill. But that doesn't give you self-sufficiency. What you would like is 300 lead acid batteries in your basement.

Patrick: I am really down with being off grid, but managing a whole collection of Rolls traction batteries which requires...

Leo: Car batteries.

Patrick: If you do it right it's probably not going to go wrong. But if something goes wrong it is a really bad scene.

Leo: But that it true of Lithium Ion, too, right?

Patrick: Yes, but either way...

Leo: Anything that stores a lot of energy has the potential to suddenly release all of that energy.

Patrick: But, in theory, in speculating, if there is a box that I can bolt to my house that they have figured out how to keep from exploding when it gets rolled 17 times on a highway and runs into a bridge I probably don't have to worry about one of my sons hitting it with a ballpeen hammer.

Leo: So now I am interested in this. This would be for solar power, to store it?

Patrick:  That is the theory.

Leo: It would have a lot of capacity?

Patrick: It could also be a watch. We don't know until the 30th. It could be a gold plated Tesla. We don't know until the 30th. I like the idea that if they are going to build this giant battery factory in Reno, just down the street, it would be cool if they did something that would take this incredible potential, just having all of these batteries and being able to drop the scale, because it is just incredibly inefficient if you have a global power grid the idea of shipping power during the day from this part of the world that is underneath the sun to this part of the world that is dark is really really cool. Right now there is no effective way to store energy when the sun is not shining.

Leo: That is the only thing, by the way, that keeps me from doing it. We live in a great place for solar energy, we get a lot of sun. I've got a roof that faces in the right direction. Actually somebody told me don't put them on the roof because you can't wash them off. You can't hose them off. So put them somewhere where you can keep them clean. So I have actually a hillside that would also work.

Patrick: Must be nice. They are on the roof or they are not going anywhere on my house. I will just put a hose on a stick.

Leo: Yeah, get on a ladder and wash them off. But I want to store it. I don't just want to sell it back to the grid right away. We are on well. If I could have the pump on the well work then I could just put a big fence around the house.

Patrick: I was going to say, where is your big zombie fence?

Leo: Then I could leave, and I could just check in and never check out.

Patrick: But you can do that now, you just have to have big banks of batteries, and make sure that those are maintained and taken care of, and a controller system.

Luria: I think that the bigger story here is the fact that he got any traction out of Twitter.

Leo: We've seen it before. Who was it that tweeted about his water? Was it Jay Z or somebody? They tweeted, and they made a million dollars, and they didn't even get into trouble.

Patrick: 1.9 million followers.

Leo: Yeah, that's what happened.

Patrick: It probably helps at scale.

Leo: So I have 500,000 followers. Maybe I could make half a billion dollars.

Patrick: You know, there is a thin line between self-promotion and going to prison. So just be careful what you promote.

Leo: May 30th we are going to announce the most exciting product that TWiT has ever launched.

Patrick: But only if you send $1 right now.

Leo: Oh, I like that. You are working both sides. That makes sense. So one last story, and this is why I want to build a zombie fence around the house and get off of the grid. The large Hadron Collider is operating again.

Patrick: Yes!

Luria: Nice!

Leo: Did you know that it was out of, you knew because you were kind of a geek, since 2013?

Patrick: Kind of.

Leo: Because they wanted to double the power. It seems like such a bad idea.

Devindra: We are going to have a black hole. The earth is going to get sucked in.

Patrick: No, I joke because one of my wife's friends has a PHD in Physics, and she is just going to say horrible things to me if she hears me say things like that. I do not believe that.

Leo: No, it is not a black hole generator. Probably.

Patrick: Yet.

Leo: This morning at 10:41 a proton beam was back in their 27 km ring, the most amazing science experiment in history. Then at 12:27 this afternoon, this is of course Geneva time, a second beam rotating in the opposite direction, the beams circulated at their injection energy of 450 gigawatts, GeV. They are going to check all systems and then they are going to increase the beam power. This will allow them to literally double the amount of juice that they can fire into this thing.

Patrick: I'm trying so hard not to make a Stay Puff Marshmallow Man joke right now.

Leo: Double season 1, 6.5 TeV per beam is the final goal with the 13 TeV proton proton collisions expected before summer. He's like, you have got a month. Then, it says, this is the blogpost from the CERN labs, the LHC experiments will soon be exploring uncharted territory.

Patrick: Dun dun dun.

Leo: This is how you make zombies. They are going to, literally, this will be our attempt to get past the standard model of physics, and to come up with a unified model of theory, and black holes for everyone. That will power your house.

Patrick: I'm just looking at the list of large Hadron Collider experiments.

Leo: It's so cool. In all seriousness this is really exciting.

Devindra: A good reminder to watch Particle Fever, the great documentary about that.

Leo: If you want to know what it is about, yeah. It's on Netflix, it's free right now.

Devindra: Yep.

Leo: Watch it. Devindera Hardawar, so great to have you at engaget.com. Don't forget Slash Film, his wonderful movie podcast.

Devindra: We just did the Furious 7 review. I love that movie so much.

Patrick: No spoilers.

Leo: Patrick also is a big Fast and Furious fan.

Devindra: Enjoy. Bring a box of tissues, that's all that I can tell you.

Luria: Yeah, that's all that I have heard.

Leo: Wait a minute. Oh no, don't tell me that Bumblebee is going to die.

Devindra: Wrong car franchise.

Leo: Oh, never mind.

Patrick: We mock what we don't understand Leo.

Leo: I've never seen a single Fast and Furious.

Patrick: Start with the Tokyo one, you will love it.

Leo: Tokyo Drift? Shouldn't I start with number 1 though? Shouldn't I?

Devindra: I saw number 1 when this whole series started back in 99, it was the late 90's.

Leo: Back when you were 12?

Devindra: I was what, 17, going into college I guess. That was a fun little movie, but what they did with Tokyo Drift in the 4th one, and the 5th one especially with Justin Lin coming in and turning this series into like a comic book action movie franchise. It's kind of amazing what they did. I think that every geeky person out there would love this series because it is so amped up.

Leo: Speaking of geeks, Glen, who sits over here, he is our marketing guy and a wonderful guy, he says, you watch them in this order, 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, 3, 7.

Devindra: I mean, sort of. I like to pretend that number 2 doesn't exist. Even in the spectrum of movies Fast and Furious 2 is not a very good movie.

Leo:  So they just drive really fast and spin around?

Devindra: It's about family Leo.

Patrick: Ironically it is.

Devindra: It is.

Patrick: The nature of relationships and truth within them.

Devindra: Yeah.

Luria: I had no idea. I'm with you Leo, I haven't watched a single one, so.

Devindra: You are so cool.

Leo: Well, in that case you will want to watch their podcast about Better Call Saul. 

Devindra: Yes.

Leo: That's another one.

Devindra: Yes, that's a separate podcast. We do it at Slash Film with my cohost David Chen, but that series has been great too. So watch the show and check it out.

Leo: I just love the development of this guy. I'm not going to say anything more, but it's very interesting. He starts out as a parking attendant. Fascinating. Alright, Slash Film, which is at slashfilm.com, which is amazing.

Devindra: The Slash Film Cast at slashfilm.com.

Leo: Yeah, nice.

Devindra: Spoiler.

Leo: Spoiler, do not go there.

Devindra: There are no spoilers in the title. We are okay.

Leo: Oh, the title is not a spoiler?

Devindra: No.

Leo: Okay.

Patrick: Pretty sure we knew Paul Walker passed away.

Leo: Is The Rock in Fast and Furious?

Devindra: Oh yeah. And so is Jason Statham in this movie.

Leo: I love Jason Statham.

Devindra: Yeah, it's got everything that I love about action movies kind of molded into one franchise.

Leo: Do I need to watch 1-6?

Patrick: Yes.

Devindra: I would recommend watching 1, but you could watch 4, 5, and 6. 5 is one of the best action movies in the past few decades.

Leo: Really?

Devindra: It's an incredible action movie.

Leo: Really? I thought it was just crap. I really did. I thought it was just crap. I'm not going to watch this movie, I'm going to go see the Academy Award winning foreign film Eda, which is in Polish, and black and white, and 4x3. I'm just going to watch that. Instead I should have watched Fast and Furious 7.

Patrick: You know, we mock what we don't understand, Leo. Keep mocking. You are going to watch it, and you are going to weep.

Leo: Lisa is a huge fan. She loves these shows. She loves explosions. Sometimes she’s in the gym, and I'm down the hall, and I think that the whole house is blowing up.

Devindra: Did you like the Road Warrior Leo?

Leo: I did like Mad Max.

Devindra: So I think that Fast 5, for a car action movie, has done something on that level of insanity. 6 was a lot of fun as well, but I think that 7 takes it to another level as well. You should check them out at some point.

Leo: I'm going to take the week off ladies and gentlemen, I'm going to watch all 7 Fast and Furious movies.

Devindra: Enjoy.

Patrick: Just in time for the new Mad Max.

Leo: Actually we have had a little Fast and Furious action over the last couple of days because I rented 6 Segway’s. We terrorized San Francisco.

Patrick: Did I just see the entire TWiT crew go by in Segway’s?

Leo: Yep. I'm going to buy one. I love them. Cali, not Cali, Luria Petrucci, one of these days I'm going to call you right. Louie.

Luria: It's going to happen for a while.

Leo: Louie, you are the greatest. Geekslife.com, everybody should go there, they should sign up, they should join. Do you have a Patrion as well?

Luria: Yes, patrion.com/geekslife.

Leo: Is that how you are going to support it, or are you going to do advertising? What are you going to do?

Luria: Well right now we are going advertising, but idealistically I would love to get to a point and find a way to make it fully community supported.

Leo: Good, that's what all of the kids are doing now.

Luria: I think that it's interesting because now is the prime time for that. People are now becoming willing to pay for the things that they love and enjoy. Like I said earlier, we are looking at doing some community stuff that will get people more involved as audience members. That's where it lies for me. I love the advertisers who have supported us, but wouldn't it be awesome if we could do that? That would be fantastic. We are going to look at ways to incorporate that a little bit more.

Leo: When we started TWiT I would have loved to done it, but there were just not the mechanisms to do it this way. I would have just had to spend hours begging on every episode.

Patrick: We did pretty good when we launched the Tip Jar.

Leo: It was okay, it was like at most it got to $8,000 or $9,000 a month.

Patrick: I love how that is just okay in your world.

Leo: No, that's okay to do 1 or 2 shows, but you are not going to build this. We do how many shows, 25 shows? You can't do that on a Tip Jar. Although, Cali, it looks like you are doing quite well. It looks like you have 339 patrons and almost $7,000 a month.

Patrick: That's huge.

Leo: But before people go crazy and say I'm not giving her any money, she's got $7,000. Remember that Jack takes like $5,000, so Jack is going to take almost all of it. She's going to see $1.20. So give more. Give more. 

Luria: Obviously there are costs involved to run that site.

Leo: That sounds like a lot of money. It is for one person.

Luria:  Right, and again, we have a whole team. We have hosts of hosts, so we have several shows that we are going to be running, my Tech Whisperer, Hipster and The Geek, we've got David who is doing music and other tech stuff, Giovanni who is doing photography, Dave Curly who is actually doing movies as well, and maybe you can join us on there for that show. That would be great. We've got Demoni, who is doing kind of fashion stuff and event technology, so a range of passions. I will definitely be out on the water this summer talking about stand up paddleboarding and kayaking.

Leo: Do you do paddleboard yoga ever?

Luria: I do actually, that's a lot of fun.

Leo: I see people on the river doing warrior 2 on a paddleboard.

Patrick: Paddleboards are pretty stable Leo.

Leo:  Are they?

Luria: They are. You have to get out on one because unless you are doing tricks out there like trying get yourself...

Leo: For me a trick would be standing up.

Patrick: It's a lot like standing on a dock Leo.

Leo: Oh, so it's not like a surfboard. I'm thinking that it's like a surfboard where it's hard. i could never get up on a surfboard because it's going like that all the time.

Luria: No, it's pretty stable. They are meant to hold like...

Leo: So what is the point then?

Luria: To walk on water.

Leo: Oh.

Luria: No, you just get out there. It can be a really relaxing time out on the water, and you can take it slow, or it can be the best work out of your life.

Leo: Should I try this?

Patrick: You should.

Luria: You should.

Leo: You ever see a really fat old guy on a paddleboard?

Patrick: Yes.

Leo: With a bowtie?

Luria: Patrick, I'm counting on you getting him out there.

Leo: You know who does it? Becky Wirrly also does it. She's been trying to get Lisa to go out, and I thought it's not for me because I can't stand up on a surfboard.

Patrick: You can stand up on a paddleboard. If you can stand up on a sidewalk you can stand up on a paddleboard.

Leo: I like a Segway, it balances for you. Geeks Life is on Patrion at patrion.com/geekslife. Patrick Norton is also doing, I think that you are also doing pretty well on the Patrion as well.

Patrick: Getting there.

Leo: Patrion.com/...

Patrick: Tekthing t-e-k-t-h-i-n-g.

Leo: That's where you can go to see Patrick and Snubs, and their tech thing. I'm really glad, Jack Cahey did this, of Pamplemousse, and I think that it has really become a powerful way for individuals to go out and do their own thing, which is great.

Patrick: It's kind of neat to be doing this. I've been doing this inside of large companies for so long, now I get to solve all of the problems myself whether I want to or not, which is strangely liberating.

Leo: Yeah, own your own stuff. I think that you should. We are thinking about taking one of our shows and just saying look, we are going to cut them off. If you want to save them then go to patrion.com.

Patrick: This is starting to sound like an episode of Survivor.

Leo: Which show the charity dogs gets it. I don't know, I'm thinking of it just to see how that works. Obviously we couldn't do the whole TWiT network on Patrion, but one show.

Patrick: That's how it starts.

Leo: We are going to take the weakest show, you are the weakest link, and put it on there. Don't worry, TWiCH is safe.

Patrick: I'm going to call Ryan.

Leo: You know what? TWiCH does really well. That's a good show.

Patrick: Good.

Leo: You guys are doing great. I love it, don't ever leave. Do we pay you to do that? 

Patrick: Yes.

Leo: Oh good.

Patrick: Feel free to check it. You know, perhaps it's time to discuss my contract. 

Leo: I would say that we should talk about pay a little bit more.

Patrick: Ryan is having a baby. Kentucky lost, but he is having a baby.

Leo: Kentucky lost?

Patrick: Kentucky lost to Wisconsin. We shouldn't talk about that.

Leo: Oh, I will be he is very sad.

Patrick: It apparently was a very quiet ride back to Kentucky from Indiana after the loss.

Leo: Devindra, do you have a Patrion?

Devindra: I do not. I haven't done any of that. We get tips from the podcast and stuff, and it's all very nice and interesting. It's nice that people support people who are creating things. That's very new.

Leo: No, I think that it is kind of amazing.

Luria: It didn't used to be that way. When we all first started this people were anxious to get it for free, and now that the tech has evolved and the community has evolved, as we pay developers for apps on our phones we also are paying creators for things that we enjoy, which is amazing.

Leo: I think for the time being we are going to stick with our model because it works, but I think that there are shows that would be well suited to that model. We did it with OMG Craft, we have a Minecraft show, Chad Johnson did a great job. He's got it on YouTube. But it wasn't going to be a show that was going to do well on our network because frankly the people who watch TWiT weren't really into Minecraft. But he has taken it to Patrion and done great. We are really pleased with that. I think that is a good model for the future. Devindra, Patrick, Luria, thank you so much, it's been great doing the show with you. Always fun to see you all again, please come back soon.

Patrick: Thank you.

Luria: Thanks Leo, always blessed.

Leo: Easter, even Easter we do TWiT. Every Sunday afternoon at 3 pm Pacific, 6 pm Eastern time, that's 2200 UTC. Please stop by. We would love it if you would watch live, because that interactivity is great for my ego. It also helps us respond to your questions and thoughts. But if you can't watch live I understand. We of course make on demand versions of all of our shows available at twit.tv, that's our website, or everywhere that you can get podcasts, including, and I know that most of you do this now, whatever stripe app on your mobile device. We also have the TWiT apps, we didn't do them, great 3rd party TWiT apps on every platform including IOS, Android, Windows Phone, Roku. Please, whatever app you prefer to use, check it out and download one of those great apps. Those folks do a great job with those apps. Thank you for joining us. If you want to be in studio, as I mentioned, we are being a little more strict with that. It would be good if you didn't just wander it, you can email tickets@twit.tv. It does a couple of things, it makes sure that we have enough room for you, that we have a chair for you, we have a nice bagel under your seat. No, don't look under your seat, there is no bagel. But we do love it if you are here, tickets@twit.tv. We are, I should say, sold out for the April 19th show, our 10th anniversary show. More than full. In fact, what we have done is created a waiting list. So if you had asked for ticket on our April 19th show and you know that you can't make it please let us know. Just email tickets@twit.tv so that we can release your seat or seats to someone who on the waiting list. We are actually wait listing people now because the first marshal won't let us put a million people in here. It's going to be fun. We are getting custom director's chairs made for everybody. Kevin Rose, Patrick Norton, David Prager, Robert Harren, John C. Devorak; it's going to be the panelists that were on the first few episodes of TWiT.

Patrick: Roger Chang

Leo: Roger Chang is a maybe.

Patrick: Well, he just had a baby.

Leo: Can you put some pressure on him?

Patrick: I will see what I can do.

Leo: We got him a chair.

Patrick:  Have you ever tried to pressure Roger?

Leo: I know, that's why I'm just leaving it alone. I don't want some Changry to happen. Roger has a new baby, I understand, he can't make it. Devindra, do you want to come in and just do Roger Chang?

Devindra: I will come in whenever guys. I will be around.

Leo: Are you in New York? Where are you based?

Devindra: I am. I'm in Brooklyn right now.

Leo: Nice place to be. I hear they have wonderful pizza.

Devindra: We do. We do have amazing pizza.

Leo: Luria, you are still in Dallas, right? You haven't left Dallas?

Luria: Correct, Dallas.

Leo: Thanks everybody, we will see you next time! Another TWiT is in the can.