Speaker 1: Get in touch with technology with Text Stuff from Hey there,
Speaker 1: and welcome to Text Stuff. I'm Jonathan Strickland, and today
Speaker 1: I am joined by a special guest, the busiest man
Speaker 1: in podcasting, Mr Tom Merritt. Hi, Tom, Hey John. How's
Speaker 1: it going man? It's going great, Thomas, it's fantastic. Um,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna call me if you call me John Thomas,
Speaker 1: that's fine, totally fair. Well, make up the it's the
Speaker 1: conservation of syllables. Yes, we have to. We have to
Speaker 1: maintain that balance. If we end up dropping in a
Speaker 1: then obviously people are going to realize the quality of
Speaker 1: the audios. And they can't see that we're both wearing
Speaker 1: white Thai Texas, so they don't know how formal we
Speaker 1: really are. Right, We've actually decided that normally we would
Speaker 1: only communicate through our servants, but we we've given them
Speaker 1: some time off. Yes, well, uh, tom Merritt. For those
Speaker 1: of you who who may not know hosts about every
Speaker 1: other podcast, that's not how Stuff Works. I think I
Speaker 1: think How Stuff Works and Serial are the only two
Speaker 1: you're not doing. So yeah, yeah, So I mean come on, well, unfortunately,
Speaker 1: this this episode will air well after everyone's had a
Speaker 1: chance to listen to that, although I have not. Tom,
Speaker 1: you are the host of numerous shows, as I said,
Speaker 1: including Daily Tech News Show, a phenomenal show. If you
Speaker 1: want to know what is going on in technology on
Speaker 1: a day to day basis, you gotta go check that
Speaker 1: one out. Highly recommended. I've even been a host a
Speaker 1: few times on that show. It's been hooray. I love
Speaker 1: doing it. And I've asked Tom here to do the
Speaker 1: one thing in the world that I look forward to
Speaker 1: the most every single year, which is the end of
Speaker 1: the year, beginning of the year predictions for the next
Speaker 1: twelve months. But instead of sticking my neck out or
Speaker 1: having Tom stick his neck out making ridiculous predictions for
Speaker 1: what's gonna happen in two thousand fifteen, we decided we
Speaker 1: were going to look at other people's predictions and then
Speaker 1: way in uh with our opinion about whether or not
Speaker 1: we agree with those predictions, or maybe maybe we conditionally
Speaker 1: agree something like that, And we've picked a whole bunch
Speaker 1: of them to go through. I have put on a
Speaker 1: powdered wig to sit in judgment over these predictions. I
Speaker 1: I have my scrying glass here. Um it's uh, it's
Speaker 1: actually a Palin Beer. It's not quite the Palantine. You know.
Speaker 1: I've always said, Jonathan, that you know all there is
Speaker 1: to know about the scrying game. This is true. You
Speaker 1: have said that. All right. So we're gonna start with
Speaker 1: some Samsung predictions that The Verge published, and these are
Speaker 1: the ones that that I thought would be kind of
Speaker 1: fun to begin with. The first one is that wearable
Speaker 1: technology is going to create a new era of power
Speaker 1: dressing for business leaders. So a a smart watch or
Speaker 1: other wearable device is now going to be seen as
Speaker 1: a status symbol. You're gonna be able to tell how
Speaker 1: important an executive is by the type of smart accessories
Speaker 1: they're wearing. I guess where do you? Where do you
Speaker 1: come in on this? Tom? So this is a prediction
Speaker 1: coming from Samsung, right, Yes, yeah, this is a fairly
Speaker 1: aspirational prediction, don't you think? I agree? I feel like
Speaker 1: Samson is trying to accept this into the mind of
Speaker 1: business leaders, like you'll need a gear watch if you
Speaker 1: want to be seen as powerful, which sometimes that's the
Speaker 1: way it works. I think if anybody makes that happen,
Speaker 1: it's going to be Apple. They're the ones trying to
Speaker 1: push the fashion end of this a lot harder. I agree.
Speaker 1: I think obviously, Sam Sung, I mean, all of Sam
Speaker 1: Suck's predictions are going to have that sort of of bias,
Speaker 1: if you will. You know, obviously it's it's how they
Speaker 1: want things to go because it's going to be where
Speaker 1: their businesses will be successful. So there's nothing wrong with that.
Speaker 1: And you know, there is something to say about drumming
Speaker 1: up enthusiasm for something that you have an interest in.
Speaker 1: I just I just don't know that there's been anything
Speaker 1: out yet that is really going to catch on. And
Speaker 1: I mean I say that as someone who owns a
Speaker 1: smart watch, and I've got a couple of other independent
Speaker 1: smart watches that I backed on various crowdfunding campaigns that
Speaker 1: we'll supposedly get to me it's some day. But I'm
Speaker 1: an early adopter type. I don't know that we're going
Speaker 1: to see high powered executives, you know, casually pulling their
Speaker 1: sleeves back to show off their smart accessory at every
Speaker 1: given opportunity without being mocked. Yeah, that's it's actually been.
Speaker 1: One of the things that Apple addressed when they announced
Speaker 1: the Apple Watch was the fact that watches haven't looked
Speaker 1: to that good and and that That's not to say
Speaker 1: that I am judging that Apple solve that problem or not, um,
Speaker 1: but that is that is the issue. Is they have
Speaker 1: to get that tag heure Rolex crowd to decide that
Speaker 1: they want to smart watch if they really want to
Speaker 1: get into the high dollar item game of this. Maybe
Speaker 1: this is Samsung tip in their hand a little huh,
Speaker 1: saying we will be coming with the Rolex of smart
Speaker 1: watches this year. Well, we'll have to keep an eye
Speaker 1: out and see. I I like you, Tom, I am
Speaker 1: a little skeptical of this one. So their next one
Speaker 1: is that people will restructure their working lives around personal
Speaker 1: power hours as technology reveals peak performance times. So this
Speaker 1: is this seems to say, as we're using these devices,
Speaker 1: they give us real time feedback on what is going
Speaker 1: on with our bodies, our heart rates. That way, you
Speaker 1: will start to see the peaks and troughs of our
Speaker 1: activity and when we are most effective, and that we
Speaker 1: will magically restructure our days so that they match those
Speaker 1: peaks and troughs and we avoid everything else, which I
Speaker 1: think sounds amazing, But I'm not sure that corporate America
Speaker 1: is ready to two go that route. Yeah, I can't
Speaker 1: see the excuse. Oh, I'm sorry, I can't have a meeting.
Speaker 1: Then it's not during my power hours going down very well.
Speaker 1: This one, at least is less directly related to a
Speaker 1: Samsung product, right, This is a general like Samsung is
Speaker 1: great with productivity, and so you know, this is the
Speaker 1: kind of thing you'll be able to get. I'm totally
Speaker 1: cool with this one. I just don't think it's gonna
Speaker 1: be true. I mean, I would like the idea of
Speaker 1: them telling me like, hey, you're gonna you're most productive.
Speaker 1: We've analyzed your personal data and you're most productive at
Speaker 1: these times of days. That'd be kind of cool. I
Speaker 1: just don't see that becoming a common track. And yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm lucky in that I work for a company where
Speaker 1: they are very flexible with the way we do our work.
Speaker 1: So I come in super early because I tend to
Speaker 1: be I'm one of those people. I'm most effective first
Speaker 1: thing in the morning, and so I also tend to
Speaker 1: stay late. But if I could leave earlier, if I
Speaker 1: so chose, I just tend to have other things going
Speaker 1: on in the office, like recording episodes of tech stuff stuff.
Speaker 1: Yeah no, no, no, this is not for me, not
Speaker 1: unusual for me. But yeah, I don't. I don't see
Speaker 1: this as being something that easily gets gets rolled out.
Speaker 1: Maybe it's something we'll see happened in the United States
Speaker 1: over time. I mean, certainly in Europe they have very
Speaker 1: different approaches to the work day. But it may be
Speaker 1: that that it'll still take some time for that to
Speaker 1: come over to North America. Um. They also said that
Speaker 1: virtual reality technology and innovative you of displays will lead
Speaker 1: to a new generation of digital shops, allowing retailers to
Speaker 1: overcome space constraints and high rent. So I guess this
Speaker 1: would be where you'd go to a mall, except the
Speaker 1: mall is a kiosk with a head mounted display and
Speaker 1: you put that on and then you just virtually walk
Speaker 1: through all the stores, and the gear VR will be
Speaker 1: the way to do it. Um. You know, I'm actually
Speaker 1: with them right up until they say a new generation
Speaker 1: of digital shops. I could totally see as as things
Speaker 1: like the gear VR and the Oculus Rift and Sony's
Speaker 1: Morpheus Project Morpheus come around and and and this seems
Speaker 1: to be is the year will see the first of
Speaker 1: these really hit retail that. Um. They Yeah, there will
Speaker 1: be digital shops and we'll be able to walk around
Speaker 1: the shop. Whether that will actually allow retailers to overcome
Speaker 1: space constraints and high rent that seems more of a stretch. Well,
Speaker 1: they still have to have the inventory somewhere right right right.
Speaker 1: I mean I can see it taking a business that
Speaker 1: might have been stu I mean by the fact that
Speaker 1: they really can't afford the shop front that they need
Speaker 1: open a digital shop instead. In that case, yeah, they
Speaker 1: would overcome space constraints. But I don't Yeah, I don't
Speaker 1: see the mall Kiosks suddenly becoming a huge showroom. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I also worry about, um, the the disorientation factor because
Speaker 1: I've played with the Oculus Rift for a while and
Speaker 1: I'm not sure I want to go to a mall
Speaker 1: that's just coded and vomit um. I mean, it's not
Speaker 1: my scene. Hey, you know, we'll not judge, but I'm
Speaker 1: with you not my not my scene either. Uh yeah,
Speaker 1: And maybe I'm just maybe I've just reached that age, Tom,
Speaker 1: I've just always loved the vomit covered mall. Well, I
Speaker 1: was thinking more about being being able to to adjust
Speaker 1: to the disorientation of the Oculus Rift. But sure, let's
Speaker 1: go back, all right. Well, they also said that automated
Speaker 1: home systems will move from geek to sheet driven by
Speaker 1: a dramatically improved user experience. This is one I really
Speaker 1: can get behind because we've been seeing the progression of
Speaker 1: this with stuff like Nest, despite their their smoke detector
Speaker 1: problems that they had in two thousand fourteen, we've seen
Speaker 1: these sort of systems that are starting to get more
Speaker 1: and more interconnected, become more user friendly, easier to install,
Speaker 1: more attractive, and less of the Jerry Riggs systems that
Speaker 1: a lot of geeks were using the bleeding edge adapter
Speaker 1: adopters rather and uh so I actually agree with this one.
Speaker 1: I think we will see a lot more automated home
Speaker 1: systems enter into the mainstream. Yeah, this is one that
Speaker 1: you could easily dismiss his self share of incause Samsung
Speaker 1: Smart Home exists, But I think that doesn't matter. I
Speaker 1: think they're totally right. Maybe geek Tschika is overstating at
Speaker 1: a touch, but yeah, I'm with you. I think automated
Speaker 1: home systems this year will come into their own and
Speaker 1: we'll see, like you say, the like Nest become even
Speaker 1: more popular, more competitors for that, and more people who
Speaker 1: aren't on the bleeding edge, uh, saying oh, yeah, I
Speaker 1: think I might try out one of those smart lightbulbs,
Speaker 1: slash thermostats, slash smoke alarms, etcetera. Yeah, I think it's
Speaker 1: kind of the way I see it as I see
Speaker 1: the automated home system year of two thousand fifteen be
Speaker 1: kind of like the fitness wearable of two thousand fourteen,
Speaker 1: where we saw two thousand fourteen we saw numbers double
Speaker 1: in in fitness adoption wearable adoption, but it was still
Speaker 1: it's still relatively small compared to the overall consumer market,
Speaker 1: but it shows a trend of growth. So I think
Speaker 1: that's what we're gonna see. Definitely with you on that one.
Speaker 1: And then I love this one. I don't know that
Speaker 1: I agree with it, particularly living in the state of Georgia,
Speaker 1: but every child born the next twelve months will learn
Speaker 1: coding as a core subject alongside numeracy and literacy. Did
Speaker 1: you say codeine ding programming? Yeah? Yeah, not no, no,
Speaker 1: not not opiates. That's good. That's good because I would
Speaker 1: totally disagree with that one. This one, you know, it
Speaker 1: throws you off the way they phrased it here where
Speaker 1: they say, like every child born in the next twelve
Speaker 1: months will learn coding. You gotta keep reading because it's like, no,
Speaker 1: they won't, little baby Pappy learning right, right. But what
Speaker 1: they're saying is as they grow up over the next
Speaker 1: twelve to thirteen years, coding will become a course subject.
Speaker 1: And I kind of think they're right about this. You
Speaker 1: know that. The nice thing about this prediction for them
Speaker 1: is that's going to take a while before they're proven
Speaker 1: right or wrong. Yeah, it's a clever way to do right.
Speaker 1: You're saying, the baby is born this year will and
Speaker 1: now a prediction that will take twelve years to prove through. Yeah, yeah, So,
Speaker 1: uh look cool. I like that you're optimistic about this.
Speaker 1: I'm a little more pessimistic simply because I see so
Speaker 1: many issues with the various school programs that are already
Speaker 1: in existence. I do think cod coding is a very
Speaker 1: Porton's skill set to to learn. It's something that I
Speaker 1: learned on my own, and even then it was very limited.
Speaker 1: I mean I was working in Apple Basic at the time. Um,
Speaker 1: so it's one of those things I think definitely needs
Speaker 1: to be taught. If you talk to computer scientists professors,
Speaker 1: they always mentioned about how incoming classes coming into the
Speaker 1: freshman level computer science courses have little to no experience
Speaker 1: encoding usually at the college level, and that it's very
Speaker 1: I mean, that's the reason why we see things like
Speaker 1: the Raspberry Pie coming out like it was supposed to
Speaker 1: be an inexpensive way to help young kids learn and
Speaker 1: get interested in programming. So I certainly many programs and
Speaker 1: I don't mean the pun in that case, uh, that
Speaker 1: are trying to encourage education to pick up programming and
Speaker 1: coding as as something that they need to teach that
Speaker 1: I feel like over the time scale they're saying, which is,
Speaker 1: you know, children born next year will grow up into
Speaker 1: a world where it becomes that that it's almost inevitable
Speaker 1: to me. But I also see where you're coming from, John,
Speaker 1: nothing where it actually uh it actually is going to
Speaker 1: take a lot to get it there. Um, there's my
Speaker 1: My my belief in the prediction is because there just
Speaker 1: seems to be an overwhelming force pushing for it. But
Speaker 1: it's not gonna happen next year. It's not even gonna
Speaker 1: happen the year after that. It's gonna it's gonna take
Speaker 1: that force to continue to build up and and people
Speaker 1: starting to see the benefits of it directly and and
Speaker 1: all of that. So yeah, it's gonna take probably five
Speaker 1: to ten years before it actually happens. But then that
Speaker 1: still works with this predict right, I mean, yeah, this
Speaker 1: is that, And you make a really good point. Plus
Speaker 1: things that I didn't even consider, things that will probably
Speaker 1: talk about a little bit later in this episode, uh,
Speaker 1: that have unfolded also create a real impetus to teaching
Speaker 1: people how to code things like security breaches, where we're
Speaker 1: going to knee a new generation of people thinking about
Speaker 1: security in a new way to protect the data that
Speaker 1: we have. I mean, two thousand fourteen was the year
Speaker 1: of the security breach. We had so many eBay you had,
Speaker 1: you had target yet Kmart, you had mount Gox getting destroyed.
Speaker 1: I mean it was entertainment and timely picture. Yes, yes,
Speaker 1: so this is definitely something I could I could see
Speaker 1: as being a real, a real incentive to try and
Speaker 1: get coding into schools more more universally. So all right,
Speaker 1: I'm coming around to that one. Well, I've I've got
Speaker 1: some other predictions here. Here's some from the street dot com.
Speaker 1: And the first one is kind of interesting that Facebook
Speaker 1: in sometime in two thousand fifteen will come out with
Speaker 1: a Facebook for Work campaign, which would make it more
Speaker 1: of a competitor to LinkedIn, and it would incorporate things
Speaker 1: that Facebook's already worked with, things like instant messaging or
Speaker 1: maybe even bringing back some of the Facebook email stuff
Speaker 1: they experimented with earlier, and that it would also include
Speaker 1: probably some form of productivity, cloud based software, you know,
Speaker 1: doc sharing, collaboration. And so the thought here is that Facebook,
Speaker 1: in order to grow, uh, you know once once you
Speaker 1: hit a billion users, it's it's hard to find those opportunities,
Speaker 1: is really going to aim at the enterprise level to
Speaker 1: create something that specifically allows companies to work together. But
Speaker 1: in the Facebook realm, do you agree with that? I
Speaker 1: think it is almost a hud certain that Facebook has
Speaker 1: at least one project underway exploring this, and probably multiple
Speaker 1: projects exploring this. When there's a lot of you know,
Speaker 1: Microsoft Bot Yamur long time ago, LinkedIn is extremely popular.
Speaker 1: There's a lot of case studies to show that social
Speaker 1: networks in the workplace, you know, are helpful in this
Speaker 1: in that way. And I can't believe that Facebook wouldn't
Speaker 1: be exploring this. It's a different matter of whether they
Speaker 1: will get it to the point where they say, yes,
Speaker 1: we've got a product that we're gonna we're gonna launch
Speaker 1: this year. The one thing that I think people forget though,
Speaker 1: which might make you think, I don't know if Facebook
Speaker 1: is gonna want to do this? Would work? Places want
Speaker 1: to be associated with the Facebook name because it's you know,
Speaker 1: it's got all of this baggage about personal sharing and privacy, etcetera.
Speaker 1: Facebook is now lots of other companies, you know, the
Speaker 1: most prominent being Instagram, but they own lots of other
Speaker 1: projects like paper that they launched that uses Facebook more
Speaker 1: as a back end for something. I could see them
Speaker 1: basically creating a startup within Facebook that's not called Facebook,
Speaker 1: doesn't market themselves as Facebook, that does this. That seems
Speaker 1: to be the most likely way that this happens. I agree.
Speaker 1: I think that if they position themselves in such a
Speaker 1: way where it's not you know, not Facebook for work,
Speaker 1: which and I don't mean to suggest that the street
Speaker 1: dot com feels like that would be the name of
Speaker 1: the service. Obviously they had to call it something for
Speaker 1: their prediction, but I agree. I think if they marketed
Speaker 1: a different way, but use the Facebook back end as
Speaker 1: the platform upon which all this was built, it makes
Speaker 1: perfect sense. Um, it is an untapped market for Facebook,
Speaker 1: apart from I mean, you could argue that Pages is
Speaker 1: kind of them dipping their toe in that, but that's
Speaker 1: a different That's a forward facing, a customer facing approach
Speaker 1: as opposed to something that allows companies to do the
Speaker 1: work they need to do, uh internally. So yeah, I
Speaker 1: agree with that one. To the next one, I'm not
Speaker 1: so sure about. I go back and forth on it.
Speaker 1: Amazon is going to get there, gosh darn delivery drones
Speaker 1: in the air before the end of two thousands, get
Speaker 1: their drone on. Yeah, that was the prediction they went
Speaker 1: They went on to say that they felt that the
Speaker 1: f a A and Congress would be under intense pressure
Speaker 1: to allow this to happen, and that that alone would
Speaker 1: be enough to propel the issue forward so that Amazon
Speaker 1: would get the clearance. A couple of companies have already
Speaker 1: received some clearance to use drones in commercial matters, but
Speaker 1: not Amazon. So the thought is that by pointing out
Speaker 1: these other cases, Amazon would be able to make a
Speaker 1: very strong argument to get their drones in the air.
Speaker 1: Do you think that is true. Do you think by
Speaker 1: the end of two thousand fifteen, the stuff that you
Speaker 1: will be ordering for the holidays for your friends and
Speaker 1: family will be delivered by drone. If I live in Sydney, Australia. Possibly,
Speaker 1: but yeah, I don't. The f a A is famously
Speaker 1: not sensitive to pressure. They're not pressure sensitive. Uh. I
Speaker 1: think I think back to how long it took to
Speaker 1: get the ability to keep your phone on during takeoff
Speaker 1: even an airplane mode. This is this is not an
Speaker 1: agency that moves fast, and they've proven that with the
Speaker 1: drone issue. Uh. And they've shown in all of the
Speaker 1: decisions they've made about the drone issue that they are
Speaker 1: going to continue to drag their feet. They wouldn't describe
Speaker 1: it that way. They would say, you know, be cautious
Speaker 1: and careful. And so no, they're they're not going to
Speaker 1: be able to fly Amazon drone shipping in the United
Speaker 1: States by the end of this year. We might have
Speaker 1: a little movement on on the approval. They might get
Speaker 1: a test site by the end of this year maybe,
Speaker 1: but as far as launching a service, absolutely no way. Now.
Speaker 1: In other countries like Australia that I mentioned, where they're
Speaker 1: they're much more open about drone testing and allowing people
Speaker 1: UH to fly this around. It's still an outside possibility,
Speaker 1: but I think at least could happen there. It's definitely
Speaker 1: not gonna happen in the US. Yeah, I have to
Speaker 1: agree with you once again. Um, I can't imagine the
Speaker 1: f a A even with the argument that other businesses
Speaker 1: are able to kind of try this out. I mean,
Speaker 1: when you look at the size of Amazon's delivery business,
Speaker 1: they just that the lot of that many drones flying
Speaker 1: through the air dropping packages, willy nilly, is enough to
Speaker 1: send most people to say, we need to be really
Speaker 1: careful and make sure this works of the time before
Speaker 1: we agree to it, because this is an incredibly huge
Speaker 1: and diverse and complicated system. So uh yeah, I will
Speaker 1: be absolutely shocked if Amazon's drone program is in the air. Uh.
Speaker 1: It also will mean that will probably by the time
Speaker 1: Amazon does get this launched. Literally, um, we're else gonna
Speaker 1: see the competing services like Google's proposed drone delivery service.
Speaker 1: So at that point we may not ever see the
Speaker 1: sky again. Yeah, that'll just be covered in drones, just
Speaker 1: covered in drones. Yeah, you you'll but you'll get your
Speaker 1: electric toothbrush on time, So that's good alright. Our next
Speaker 1: prediction was that in two thousand and fifteen, Uber will
Speaker 1: file an I p O. Uber will go public in
Speaker 1: two in fifteen. That's despite the various trials and tribulations
Speaker 1: Uber has had UH not just with trying to get
Speaker 1: UH trying to get a foothold in various markets that
Speaker 1: have resisted Uber moving in, but also the internal issues
Speaker 1: that have faced Uber. So do you think Uber is
Speaker 1: going to be able to overcome all that and go
Speaker 1: forward in declaring H or to to file an I
Speaker 1: p O. And my instinct is to say no, that
Speaker 1: that would be a bad idea. They really need to
Speaker 1: focus on their public image, etcetera, etcetera. But two things
Speaker 1: make me think that I'm wrong in having that impulse.
Speaker 1: One is, whenever I think that about a company going
Speaker 1: I p O, they always go ip O anyway, because
Speaker 1: the reason they put out their stock has nothing to
Speaker 1: do with my instincts. They usually have some other, much
Speaker 1: more arcane financial calculation that shows them that it is
Speaker 1: the right time. And the other thing I would say
Speaker 1: is the folks at Uber don't really seem to mind
Speaker 1: if people have a perception of them that they don't
Speaker 1: agree with. They go ahead and do what they want anyway.
Speaker 1: Like operating their service in places that have declared it illegal,
Speaker 1: for instance. So yeah, I think it's probably like that
Speaker 1: if Uber thinks it's the right time to I p
Speaker 1: O the l I p O this year. Now I've
Speaker 1: got another related question this, This doesn't have to do
Speaker 1: with the prediction, just uh, I want to get your
Speaker 1: perspective on this. Uh. You know, Uber is often referred
Speaker 1: to as part of the the sharing economy. Do you
Speaker 1: actually see Uber as as a type of sharing kind
Speaker 1: of service. I always think of Uber as really a
Speaker 1: taxi replacement. I mean that I've used it, but I
Speaker 1: don't think of it as sharing like the way I
Speaker 1: thought the sharing economy was intended to be used. And
Speaker 1: actually I think that's the problem that Uber has run
Speaker 1: into an Airbnb start to run into this a little
Speaker 1: bit as well, which is it started as Hey, it's
Speaker 1: just somebody who wants to use a thing they already
Speaker 1: have and make a little extra money off it. Right,
Speaker 1: I'm going to have a ride, and so I'm going
Speaker 1: to make my car available when I'm driving somewhere, and
Speaker 1: it's become people who said, oh, that's a really great idea.
Speaker 1: I'm going to become a professional at that, and then
Speaker 1: Uber has to start vetting the drivers, and then Uber
Speaker 1: has to start taking more responsibility for the system as
Speaker 1: a whole and institute surge pricing, and suddenly you're right,
Speaker 1: it is a taxi service. So I think it has
Speaker 1: evolved beyond just being the sharing economy. Like I think
Speaker 1: of the sharing economy, Airbnb still exists more in that
Speaker 1: where it's I can say, Okay, I'm going to rent
Speaker 1: out the place that I live in for a couple
Speaker 1: of weeks. But even then, the airbnb economy has become
Speaker 1: so big you have to do a lot to prepare
Speaker 1: your place for someone to stay in it. It's less
Speaker 1: of the couch surfing feel. And I think Uber's well
Speaker 1: beyond that. Like just because you own a car doesn't
Speaker 1: mean you're just gonna hop in and start using Uber
Speaker 1: as a driver. I mean, I totally agree. Well, how
Speaker 1: about a couple of predictions. These came from a site
Speaker 1: called Bread and beyond that. I assumed the predictions were
Speaker 1: made quite some time ago, but they are for two fifteen.
Speaker 1: But here's one that I thought was incredibly optimistic. They
Speaker 1: said they believe that Google glass will head into mass
Speaker 1: production in two thousand and fifteen. Mm. Yeah, yeah, I can.
Speaker 1: I'll give that one like a s Okay, you're you're
Speaker 1: more optimistic than I am. Although I well, I'll say this,
Speaker 1: Google has proven time and again that they are willing
Speaker 1: to charge into something, whether there's any proof that there's
Speaker 1: going to be a modicum of success or not a lot.
Speaker 1: I think there are a lot of strikes against Google Glass.
Speaker 1: I say this as someone who owns Google Glass. I
Speaker 1: love Google Glass, but there have been I think most
Speaker 1: of the coverage of Google Glass, the vast majority of
Speaker 1: it has really been couched in caution, saying it's not
Speaker 1: really ready yet. It's not it's not appealing enough to consumers,
Speaker 1: and that makes me think that it's just enough of
Speaker 1: a risk, considering that this is a hardware thing as well,
Speaker 1: that Google may not jump in by the end of
Speaker 1: two thousand and fifteen. But that's that's just based upon
Speaker 1: the thing, the various articles I've read. Uh, and you know, I, well,
Speaker 1: I have mine, so I don't I don't have a
Speaker 1: dog in this fight. I've got my pair. So yeah,
Speaker 1: but don't you want the new pair, the more stylish pair,
Speaker 1: the more capable pair with a better resolution. Well, yes,
Speaker 1: of course I do. Yeah, exactly, that's why. And and
Speaker 1: Google has formed so many partnerships with design companies, people
Speaker 1: who do eyewear. I feel like this has been on
Speaker 1: simmer because they're busy making sure that what they come
Speaker 1: out with looks a lot better. Uh. And as we
Speaker 1: saw there were those leaked snapchat emails about them partnering
Speaker 1: with an eye word company. In fact, I think they
Speaker 1: might have acquired uh, the eyewear company that makes a
Speaker 1: kind of Google glass, except it's not actively connected to
Speaker 1: the Internet. It doesn't have WiFi in it. You have
Speaker 1: to download the video later, and it's very focused on video.
Speaker 1: But they looked like stylish glasses, and that that's really
Speaker 1: the big thing that I think people think of when
Speaker 1: they think of Google glasses, that they're kind of awkward looking.
Speaker 1: And so Google, don't forget they made partnerships with several
Speaker 1: different eyewear companies. I I would be very surprised if
Speaker 1: we didn't see at least a line of stylish Google
Speaker 1: Glass showed off at that maybe Google I oh in
Speaker 1: the summer, uh and then possibly launched in I can
Speaker 1: also see them sort of saying, well, we're going to
Speaker 1: do another pilot program for certain people to try these
Speaker 1: out to kind of build the buzz back up around
Speaker 1: them being stylish before they actually put them in mass production.
Speaker 1: So that's why i'm more because they might not quite
Speaker 1: go into mass production until Okay, all right, well how
Speaker 1: about this one. This is also from Brent and beyond.
Speaker 1: Firefox OS will flop and never go mainstream. Well, the
Speaker 1: OS from the mobile device. Um, yes, I'm going to
Speaker 1: make the same prediction about sail Fish and all the
Speaker 1: other operating systems that have small market share, Like, why
Speaker 1: are you picking on Firefox O S. Yeah, I I
Speaker 1: don't think anyone has huge expectations for Firefox O S.
Speaker 1: I kind of hope that it catches fire and I
Speaker 1: think it has a shot at catching on because the
Speaker 1: developing market, especially for low cost phones is kind of
Speaker 1: open for everybody right now, and they've got a compelling offering.
Speaker 1: But I think it's pretty obvious the cards are stacked
Speaker 1: against them, So I'm not going to dispute that, but
Speaker 1: I'm still cheering for Firefox away. Well, yeah, you've got
Speaker 1: you've got the mountain of Android and iOS. Basically, I mean,
Speaker 1: Microsoft can't overcome those problems, so I mean, and they've
Speaker 1: been in this game for a while. Of course, you
Speaker 1: could argue that they've just been playing the wrong game
Speaker 1: the entire time, but but they've been in it. I
Speaker 1: guess my reaction is because they say Firefox OS will flop,
Speaker 1: as if the entire world is cheering, like Firefox OS
Speaker 1: is going to be the big hit of And I
Speaker 1: think to flop it would have to have that kind
Speaker 1: of expectation, I don't thin so, so it's more like
Speaker 1: Firefox OS will U we'll we'll never get beyond a
Speaker 1: modest but respectable market cheer. Yeah, that's probably right on
Speaker 1: right there. All right, How about this one? This is
Speaker 1: another pretty ambitious one. We might see autonomous cars before
Speaker 1: the end of Wow. Really that's true, but I'm very
Speaker 1: skeptical that that would be true. I can't believe it.
Speaker 1: I mean, I I've covered this so much. But the Google,
Speaker 1: of course, they have their prototype uh smart cars that
Speaker 1: they produce like a maybe like a hundred of them.
Speaker 1: They're not meant to go on sale there specifically for testing.
Speaker 1: But uh, if if we saw a truly autonomous car
Speaker 1: for sale in it would shock me. I would I
Speaker 1: I would also be shocked and lying on the floor
Speaker 1: next to you. Okay, yeah, because because just for my
Speaker 1: listeners here, it's not the technology that I really see
Speaker 1: as the big obstacle, although there you know, you still
Speaker 1: want to get the technology in a form factor that's
Speaker 1: going to be pleasant. You don't want a car that
Speaker 1: has a big, weird antenna things sticking out of it
Speaker 1: that's gonna make everyone stare at your vehicle. Uh, or
Speaker 1: maybe you do, I don't know. But the real challenge
Speaker 1: I think is going to be legislative. How do we
Speaker 1: convince the various UH regions to allow this sort of thing. Now,
Speaker 1: there's some places that have already passed laws that have
Speaker 1: made it very simple for Google to test their vehicles
Speaker 1: in those areas. But the thing about cars is their
Speaker 1: mobile and they go to different places. So what if
Speaker 1: your car suddenly becomes illegal when you pass a certain area.
Speaker 1: Wouldn't wouldn't a self driving car have to already be
Speaker 1: in the approval process to be able to be sold.
Speaker 1: But I would imagine, I would imagine, So, I mean,
Speaker 1: I can't imagine that that would move quickly enough for
Speaker 1: that to happen. So that's another reason. I mean, especially
Speaker 1: when you look at the Google cars they have essentially
Speaker 1: two controls, which is start this car and turn this
Speaker 1: car off, and then everything else is handled by I
Speaker 1: guess pairing with a phone or something along those lines.
Speaker 1: But there's no break or accelerators. So even if you
Speaker 1: wanted to take manual control of one of those prototype cars,
Speaker 1: you couldn't. There's no option there. They in fact, they
Speaker 1: had to modify them to meet the street rules because
Speaker 1: of that. People, you know people, they're like, look, as
Speaker 1: long as you have a stop button, that's really all
Speaker 1: that matters, and and they got a lot of flak
Speaker 1: for that. So there's still a lot of a lot
Speaker 1: of fear, uncertainty, and doubt around self driving cars. And
Speaker 1: then I personally, I'm really looking for it. I don't drive,
Speaker 1: so I'm really looking forward to self driving cars coming
Speaker 1: around and being being a real thing because I know
Speaker 1: that these systems can react at a fraction of the
Speaker 1: time that it takes a human to react in those situations.
Speaker 1: It's really only the worst case scenario where something has
Speaker 1: gone irreparably wrong with the system that you would have
Speaker 1: to worry about something. And I don't think it's as
Speaker 1: common as a lot of people seem to think it is.
Speaker 1: Especially when you compare it to all the terrible things
Speaker 1: that can happen to a human behind the wheel of
Speaker 1: a car, where something as simple as a distraction can
Speaker 1: cause a terrible accident. Yeah. Absolutely, it's it is a
Speaker 1: psychological reluctance, not a scientific reluctance. Yeah. Well, I d
Speaker 1: C also had some predictions. One was that the fablet market.
Speaker 1: Are you a fan of the term fablet? Okay, that's
Speaker 1: I'm glad to hear it. Those those phone tablet hybrids,
Speaker 1: the enormous phones like the six plus and the next
Speaker 1: to six uh that that market will grow as people
Speaker 1: demand these larger devices, but wearables will underperform, which is
Speaker 1: kind of going against what that first prediction said. I
Speaker 1: think the the idea that I and and by the way,
Speaker 1: when you when you asked me if I don't like fablett,
Speaker 1: you said the name, and that's where met right. I
Speaker 1: don't want people to get the misimpression that I don't
Speaker 1: like six inch devices and they're fine. You know, I
Speaker 1: don't have a moral stance on them. If that's the
Speaker 1: kind of size of uh screen you need them, that's great,
Speaker 1: And I know that's right for a lot of people.
Speaker 1: I think that this is a very safe prediction for
Speaker 1: I dc like, oh, we got our first couple of
Speaker 1: six inch phones this year, so we'll have more and
Speaker 1: therefore we'll sell more. I think that's true because we
Speaker 1: haven't seen a big backlash or disappointing sales from the
Speaker 1: next to six or the iPhone six plus, So why
Speaker 1: wouldn't we sell more? The wearables underperforming is is more
Speaker 1: of it not a risky prediction, but that to me
Speaker 1: is more of a substantial prediction that what we've been
Speaker 1: seeing with wearables won't be changed by the onslaught of
Speaker 1: more wearable releases, in which we're definitely going to see
Speaker 1: We're gonna see more products put out there. What they're
Speaker 1: saying is people still won't flock to them. I think
Speaker 1: that's probably true. Yeah, I mean there's certain certain markets
Speaker 1: that I think, Uh, wearables obviously appeal to the fitness market,
Speaker 1: being like that was such a great way of getting
Speaker 1: into the whole fitness or the wearable industry, I should say,
Speaker 1: because it appeals in so many ways that that is
Speaker 1: a that is a particular space in our lives where
Speaker 1: we crave to have that feedback, that data, where we
Speaker 1: can either use it to figure out if we're if
Speaker 1: we're pushing ourselves enough, if we're pushing too hard, we're
Speaker 1: not doing something correctly. It makes perfect sense. Going beyond
Speaker 1: that is a real challenge, and I don't I think
Speaker 1: it's I think it's a challenge will overcome. I don't
Speaker 1: know necessarily that the products that are going to be
Speaker 1: coming out in two thousand and fifteen are going to
Speaker 1: do that where we start to see wearables that are
Speaker 1: addressing other things in our lives apart from fitness and
Speaker 1: activity tracking, to make it more of a um something
Speaker 1: that we absolutely must have. I still think the fitness
Speaker 1: ones are gonna do fine. I think those are gonna
Speaker 1: continue to do well. Um assuming that the bands that
Speaker 1: people may don't have medals in them that cause folks
Speaker 1: to break out. So don't they keep saying it's not
Speaker 1: the band, it's not the band. Yeah, I think they do.
Speaker 1: But you know, I didn't own one of those, so
Speaker 1: I didn't have that particular experience. I am particularly sensitive
Speaker 1: to nickel. I can't have nickel against me or else
Speaker 1: I break out, So I just get careful about any
Speaker 1: kind of wearable device at this point. But yeah, I
Speaker 1: I think I agree, and especially not just that we're
Speaker 1: going to see more of the fablet form factor come
Speaker 1: out in two thousand and fifteen, but just that it's
Speaker 1: it's interesting. It's a reverse of the trend that we
Speaker 1: used to see. Do you remember back when the trend
Speaker 1: was that our phones were getting smaller and smaller, and
Speaker 1: that became like a status symbol if you had a
Speaker 1: really small phone. Yeah, I remember being so proud and
Speaker 1: excited that I had gotten a Motorola razor because it
Speaker 1: was so thin and small, right and slide it in
Speaker 1: a pocket. I remember there was an snl skit where
Speaker 1: Will Ferrell had a character who pulls out a phone
Speaker 1: that's so small. I think you had to use tweezers
Speaker 1: to do the little flip. Wasn't that a Steve Job's imitation?
Speaker 1: It may have been. There was. There was one of
Speaker 1: the it was one of the mall ones. Jimmy Fallon
Speaker 1: was in. It was laughing the whole time. I know
Speaker 1: that doesn't narrow it down at all. Right, So there
Speaker 1: was the tonight show, the entire run exactly it was
Speaker 1: that the roots came out. It was amazing. So but no,
Speaker 1: it's so funny that now it's the other way around.
Speaker 1: And of course the obvious answer to that is that
Speaker 1: now we have these devices that can act as a
Speaker 1: second screen, and obviously screen landscape is going to be
Speaker 1: really important in that in that form factor. Now we
Speaker 1: now we've shifted what our phones do, so it wouldn't
Speaker 1: make sense to continue to push for smaller and smaller
Speaker 1: phones in that new world. So, uh, it's just funny
Speaker 1: to me that we've we've gone from an era where
Speaker 1: we always thought the future is going to have us
Speaker 1: have smaller and smaller phones. Now it's no, we want
Speaker 1: bigger and bigger phones because it stopped being about voice.
Speaker 1: Right when it was all about voice, they're like, well,
Speaker 1: we don't, we don't need an object, We just want
Speaker 1: to hear the voice. And now it's the opposite. Smartphones
Speaker 1: are rarely about calls. They are almost entirely about apps
Speaker 1: and and and messaging, So you need a screen to
Speaker 1: be able to take advantage of that. That's absolutely correct. Well,
Speaker 1: here's another incredibly risky prediction from I d C. The
Speaker 1: Internet of Things will continue to grow and drive innovation,
Speaker 1: with embedded tech and preventive maintenance becoming really important. I
Speaker 1: think you could just drop off things. Yeah, yeah, I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't know how we could be how we can
Speaker 1: make that not be true. You know, I guess. I
Speaker 1: guess there's still some people who might be skeptical about
Speaker 1: the Internet of Things just to play Devil's advocate, uh
Speaker 1: and and that it will end up just being a
Speaker 1: bunch of buzzwords that don't do anything, so that that's
Speaker 1: why they make this prediction. Is like, no, it's gonna
Speaker 1: continue to grow. We're gonna tendue to have more sensors.
Speaker 1: The one prediction that I saw someone make out there
Speaker 1: that I've started to think about is the idea of
Speaker 1: the Internet of things being rentable, so that you don't
Speaker 1: buy the things, but there's an't there's an internet of
Speaker 1: things out there you can take advantage of when you
Speaker 1: need it. Interesting. I could see that because I mean
Speaker 1: that it obviously if you were to to jump into
Speaker 1: the world to the Internet of things, if you wanted
Speaker 1: to incorporate embeddable technology in your world, that's a pretty
Speaker 1: big upfront cost that not everyone can do. But something
Speaker 1: along those lines where it's more like a service as
Speaker 1: opposed to something you own, I could I could see that,
Speaker 1: like the one. The one example I saw I had
Speaker 1: to do with the insurance company. It was like Internet
Speaker 1: of Things as a service, so that you can only
Speaker 1: pay for just the amount you actually need. Mm hmm.
Speaker 1: Now I like that idea. Someone should get on that.
Speaker 1: As for whether or not the Internet of Things ends
Speaker 1: up being a bunch of buzzwords, at least in the
Speaker 1: short term, it doesn't matter because so many companies are
Speaker 1: so invested in bringing this kind of stuff to market
Speaker 1: that it's going to be a factor. Whether or not
Speaker 1: it works is another question, but it's gonna be out there,
Speaker 1: so it's it's definitely gonna play an important role in it.
Speaker 1: Maybe is the year where we decide whether or not
Speaker 1: it ends up working and or what it works for. Like,
Speaker 1: I have a feeling that it's just too broad of
Speaker 1: a concept for it not to work somewhere in some
Speaker 1: niche somewhere, and I think we'll figure out what that
Speaker 1: is in the coming year, or at least in going
Speaker 1: back to automotives. I mean, you could easily see an
Speaker 1: Internet of things approach helping out there with everything from uh,
Speaker 1: just route planning for your daily commute to on a
Speaker 1: city planning level to figure it out, Well, what's the
Speaker 1: best way we need to relook at at how all
Speaker 1: of our intersection uh traffic lights time out. And now
Speaker 1: we've got all this amazing data that we can sift
Speaker 1: through and actually make a city that you're not gonna
Speaker 1: be sitting in traffic for you know, two and a
Speaker 1: half hours every day, Tom, you live in Los Angeles, Right, yeah,
Speaker 1: we we don't have that problem here because, as the
Speaker 1: City of Los Angeles is proud to point out, all
Speaker 1: of our lights are timed across the entire city, which
Speaker 1: has solved all traffic proble. Was in Los Angeles, exactly
Speaker 1: the same in Atlanta just the other day, as we
Speaker 1: were stopped on the highway, I got my car and
Speaker 1: just marveled at how well everything was moving. Alright, Well,
Speaker 1: moving over to to Gartner, Uh, there was There were
Speaker 1: a lot of predictions. They said lots of stuff was
Speaker 1: gonna double in two thousand and fifteen. For example, getting
Speaker 1: back to the Internet of Things, that the number of
Speaker 1: physical objects connected to the Internet would double. That would
Speaker 1: be from six fifty million to thirty one point three billion.
Speaker 1: I guess that's a lot. They also thought that the
Speaker 1: market for three D printers would go from a billion
Speaker 1: dollars to two billion dollars, so it would double as well,
Speaker 1: that we would see twice as many car models with
Speaker 1: connectivity to the Internet as we did in two thousand
Speaker 1: and fourteen. I don't know that that's that huge of
Speaker 1: a number really when you get down to it, depending
Speaker 1: upon what you mean by connectivity. And then um, we'll
Speaker 1: see more companies create positions for chief data officers in
Speaker 1: chief digital officers. So a lot of these I I
Speaker 1: I don't know that I would agree that all of
Speaker 1: them are going to double. I certainly see all of
Speaker 1: these being trends that are on the rise. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: don't know if I doubled down on Gardner's predictions, but
Speaker 1: I and that's really what Gardner is saying. I mean,
Speaker 1: Gardner deals in numbers, so they're probably pretty close to accurate.
Speaker 1: But they're saying like, we are going to see significant
Speaker 1: increases in all of those areas. And I think the right.
Speaker 1: I think three D printing is ripe for its big
Speaker 1: moment in the sun. Uh you know it's I don't
Speaker 1: think it's quite to the level of three D printer
Speaker 1: in every home yet, but I think it'll start to
Speaker 1: hit the mainstream probably, so I'm with most of those.
Speaker 1: I actually think the chief Digital Officer chief data officer
Speaker 1: is definitely going to be affected by what we talked
Speaker 1: about earlier with the security hacks. Yeah, I think it
Speaker 1: will become even more of a security position, or even
Speaker 1: a position of chief cyber security officer. As much as
Speaker 1: I hate that term, it does convey what companies mean
Speaker 1: when they talk about it. M hmm, that's excellent point,
Speaker 1: I agree. Uh. Moving over to to Recode, I love
Speaker 1: that almost all of their predictions were about cloud based
Speaker 1: services and mobile devices. We almost I didn't write it down.
Speaker 1: Who was this Steve Sonofsky, Microsoft head of UH office
Speaker 1: and so yeah, it was all about cloud based services,
Speaker 1: mobile devices. I love that the first one was about
Speaker 1: the behavior of millennials and talking about UH, the behavior
Speaker 1: of millennials on top of the security issues related to
Speaker 1: having emails that contain attachments. The problems that that that
Speaker 1: ends up bringing along with companies means that we're going
Speaker 1: to see more of a move to alternatives to email,
Speaker 1: stuff like instant messaging or other means of linking to
Speaker 1: content but not actually sending it as an attachment so
Speaker 1: that you don't have all these copies floating around. Uh,
Speaker 1: meaning that email isn't gonna die, but it's importance is
Speaker 1: going to decrease in two thousand and fift What do
Speaker 1: you think, Yeah, I I think this plays into a
Speaker 1: couple of other things. I think the idea of ubiquitous
Speaker 1: cloud is going to make it so that you can
Speaker 1: use that option more often. It's interesting to me that
Speaker 1: Google this very week announced that you can now attach
Speaker 1: Google Docs to email, not just send a link. So
Speaker 1: there's obviously still a demand out there for No I
Speaker 1: actually needed the attachment. I don't want to link. I
Speaker 1: want the document to be there in their inbox, even offline,
Speaker 1: once that email has been downloaded. Uh. So it maybe
Speaker 1: a little early for getting rid of attachments altogether, but
Speaker 1: it is certainly is more efficient. So having that option
Speaker 1: is great, and it will continue to be used in
Speaker 1: more than greater numbers. I think we are starting to
Speaker 1: learn as a society how to use email. I don't
Speaker 1: think email is gonna go away. I don't think email
Speaker 1: is gonna die, but I think he is pointing to
Speaker 1: something important here, which is there are times when you
Speaker 1: need to message some one and people sometimes use email
Speaker 1: for that and I think we're we're learning, oh, you
Speaker 1: know what, don't use email as if it's into messenger,
Speaker 1: use instan a messenger, use text messaging for that. Uh,
Speaker 1: and we'll probably start getting better at figuring out what
Speaker 1: tool to use for the right communication. John and I
Speaker 1: also agree with the point that we're seeing, you know,
Speaker 1: the millennial generation moving through the workforce, getting promoted, getting
Speaker 1: further up into leadership positions over time. Obviously that's going
Speaker 1: to be go hand in hand with a shift in
Speaker 1: the way we use the technology, because just because there's
Speaker 1: a generational difference. I mean, I remember when I first
Speaker 1: got into the workforce that there was a generational difference.
Speaker 1: I work for people who asked me to print out
Speaker 1: all their emails, so they had to have all of
Speaker 1: them like printed out on file. They didn't they didn't
Speaker 1: understand that they could go and look at the digital
Speaker 1: version anytime they wanted to, and that it was in
Speaker 1: fact easier to track it down then it filing away
Speaker 1: of a printed out email. So it is one of
Speaker 1: those things that does change over time. And again, maybe
Speaker 1: it's just that I've gotten to this certain age where
Speaker 1: I'm just thinking, like, don't maybe use all those new
Speaker 1: fangled messagings things. I'm tired of learning things. I don't
Speaker 1: wanna don't make me snap my chat. I don't want
Speaker 1: to instant my Graham. I just want my emails. Yeah, yeah, no,
Speaker 1: it's funny. I worry about that, Like, am I assifying?
Speaker 1: Or is this a bad app? I just don't know anymore. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: I I sit there and I usually have to turn
Speaker 1: to my wife and say, does this come across as
Speaker 1: someone who is rationally pointing out flaws in the design
Speaker 1: of an app? Or does just descended into cranky old
Speaker 1: man territory? And uh, yeah, it's a it's a coin
Speaker 1: flip usually you know, situation. Uh. There was also an
Speaker 1: interesting prediction that said that tablets in two thousand and
Speaker 1: fifteen would make a surprising come back, that they would
Speaker 1: become more uh popular, which is particularly interesting because there
Speaker 1: was another site, msp Mentor that predicted that tablets would
Speaker 1: fade away as a secondary device behind laptops and smartphones.
Speaker 1: So somebody's gonna be wrong, but somebody's gonna be right.
Speaker 1: So who do you think it's gonna be right? Tom,
Speaker 1: I'd say, Jonathan, don't call it a comeback. Tablets have
Speaker 1: been here for years. That's fair. Uh No, I I
Speaker 1: think probably we won't see a huge spike in tablet sales,
Speaker 1: but they're far from dying. My theory of why we've
Speaker 1: seen a stall in tablet sales is based on my
Speaker 1: own experience, which I have an original next to seven
Speaker 1: that I still use. I'm just now getting to the
Speaker 1: point where I think maybe I should get a new
Speaker 1: seven inch tablet because there are a few apps that
Speaker 1: have come out that won't run on it because it's old.
Speaker 1: The operating system still up to date, but it just
Speaker 1: doesn't have the oomph uh to run certain things. And
Speaker 1: I have an iPad third generation that I still haven't run.
Speaker 1: I haven't run into a problem with. So tablets are
Speaker 1: more like desktop computers in that way you can use
Speaker 1: them for longer. And so, yeah, we had a huge
Speaker 1: spike in sales of tablets as people discovered them and
Speaker 1: started using them and buying them. And of course we're
Speaker 1: going to have a stall as people say I've got
Speaker 1: a tablet, I don't need to buy another tablet, And
Speaker 1: then it will start to come back as those tablets
Speaker 1: get older and you're like, wow, this one's this one's
Speaker 1: starting to not be as useful, I need to upgrade,
Speaker 1: get a new one. Uh And and so I think
Speaker 1: we'll maybe see a slight rise, a slight come back.
Speaker 1: I don't I don't think it'll be sharp, but probably
Speaker 1: a little bit of a come back. In tablets, I
Speaker 1: can see that being more of a kind of a
Speaker 1: cyclical thing, Like when when the first iPad came out
Speaker 1: and then iPad two came out, we saw a lot
Speaker 1: of people upgrading from the iPad to iPad two because
Speaker 1: the novelty was still there, right, the desire to have
Speaker 1: the newest, shiniest thing, this thing that was so amazing
Speaker 1: that Apple had come out with this tablet that no
Speaker 1: one had ever made a table buble it before, or
Speaker 1: at least no one made one that was appealing to
Speaker 1: a mass consumer market like Apple did. And then the
Speaker 1: iPad two recaptured some of that excitement. And I think
Speaker 1: since then it's it's people have realized, like you were saying,
Speaker 1: that this is a device that is there's no need
Speaker 1: for me to upgrade it yet there's not a compelling
Speaker 1: enough reason it does what I need it to do.
Speaker 1: And I'm actually seeing that across a lot of different
Speaker 1: things now where people are kind of settling in the
Speaker 1: way they would with computers. They buy a computer and
Speaker 1: they think, well, sure, the computer I owned this year,
Speaker 1: you know, I bought it last year. It's nowhere near
Speaker 1: as fast as the newest ones, but it does everything
Speaker 1: I needed to do, So I'm gonna stick with it
Speaker 1: until I need to upgrade. I'm seeing that more with
Speaker 1: other kinds of electronics now, so I and I do
Speaker 1: think we are hitting that that part of the phase.
Speaker 1: I also have an excess seven. I also I'm getting
Speaker 1: into the point where I'm thinking it might be time
Speaker 1: to upgrade because there's some loading issues I'm having now.
Speaker 1: Things are taking longer, gets it just gets a little
Speaker 1: slower at running everything. Yeah, so, uh yeah, I can.
Speaker 1: I can see it that way. I I that makes
Speaker 1: more sense to me than calling it a comeback. It
Speaker 1: definitely makes more sense in that respect, as opposed to
Speaker 1: people just suddenly rediscovering tablets again. Um well, I've got
Speaker 1: a couple of questions that are just general questions for you, Uh,
Speaker 1: something that I've been wondering every single year. I kind
Speaker 1: of have an NFC prediction, which was always that NFC
Speaker 1: is going to continue to be pushed and it's going
Speaker 1: to continue to encounter resistance for adoption and we're not
Speaker 1: going to see it happen. But do you think that
Speaker 1: two thousand fifteen is finally the year that NFC actually
Speaker 1: enters mainstream use in the United States. I think Apple
Speaker 1: may have done NFC the biggest favor it could ever
Speaker 1: have as a standard by putting in an Apple Pay.
Speaker 1: I still don't think NFC is going to be a
Speaker 1: huge thing that people thought it was going to revolutionize
Speaker 1: the way you use devices. I just I just don't
Speaker 1: see that. There's plenty of things that can do similar
Speaker 1: things to NFC, which is why I don't think we've
Speaker 1: ever seen people get on board. At the same time,
Speaker 1: I feel like we're seeing NFC follow the route of Bluetooth.
Speaker 1: Bluetooth was out in comdex right, and it it took
Speaker 1: years for the technology to finally figure out, oh, that's
Speaker 1: what we can use bluetooth for. And at first it
Speaker 1: was bluetooth headsets for your cell phones, and and then
Speaker 1: it marched on into other things. So NFC maybe following
Speaker 1: that more plotting route to like, oh, Apple Pay is
Speaker 1: sort of the equivalent of the Bluetooth headset. The Bluetooth earpiece,
Speaker 1: and and and we'll we'll have another one coming along
Speaker 1: here in the next year or two. That. Oh, NFC
Speaker 1: is also good for that, But I still don't think
Speaker 1: it's going to be that revolutionary thing that some people
Speaker 1: said it would become. Yeah, I think the one thing
Speaker 1: that is really in favor of NFC, apart from Apple
Speaker 1: getting involved, obviously, that just adds more confusion and competition
Speaker 1: in that that space because we've seen vendors, so some
Speaker 1: retail establishments resist Apple Pay because they have their own
Speaker 1: NFC based payment system base. But yeah, right, that's true.
Speaker 1: Uh So it's it's interesting to see, right, have you
Speaker 1: heard of these things? Uh? They used to be on
Speaker 1: movie posters and no one knew why. Um no, it's
Speaker 1: it's I think I think the the hack the hacks
Speaker 1: we saw with the Kmart incident, for example, that Kmart's
Speaker 1: credit card machines were that essentially hacked, that people got
Speaker 1: credit cards that information that way. That is adding a
Speaker 1: lot more pressure, and the United States government is adding
Speaker 1: more pressure calling for more secure systems to protect consumers.
Speaker 1: That that might end up helping more than anything else,
Speaker 1: at least in two thousand fifteen. Uh, whether we see
Speaker 1: n FC being the solution, I don't know. I think
Speaker 1: Chip and Pin is another possibility, UM, not necessarily in
Speaker 1: NFC implementation, but I think it's got the best chance
Speaker 1: in two thousand fifteen that it's ever had. I agree
Speaker 1: with you there. I don't know that it's gonna make it,
Speaker 1: but it's it's way closer than it was in two
Speaker 1: thousand fourteen. Uh. And then my last question for you,
Speaker 1: a burning question everyone wants to know. Will the Firefox
Speaker 1: browsers switching to Yahoo search engine make a big difference? Huge? Huge?
Speaker 1: You're gonna see Google selling off YouTube and it's headquarters buildings.
Speaker 1: All of their autonomous cars are now going to come
Speaker 1: with drivers, right right, They're gonna hire drivers. No. I
Speaker 1: I think it will be interesting. I think it'll be
Speaker 1: good for Yahoo. I think it will make Google a
Speaker 1: little sharper. But that company Google, UH in particular, UH
Speaker 1: has way too much money as it is. UH. So
Speaker 1: I think all this does is pokes the bear and
Speaker 1: lets them know that they can't rest on their laurels. UH.
Speaker 1: And it gives Marissa Mayer a victory, which she desperately needed.
Speaker 1: So it's good for Yahoo in that way. And yeah,
Speaker 1: I mean it makes a difference. I don't know that
Speaker 1: it it really is going to upset the balance of
Speaker 1: the search engine marketplace too terribly. Um, you know, being
Speaker 1: got onto uh iOS in Syrie. Uh and and that
Speaker 1: didn't like shake the ground. Bing is the default search
Speaker 1: engine on iOS and a couple of different areas, just
Speaker 1: not in the browser. Yet. Maybe it'll get in the browser.
Speaker 1: I don't know. I think I think those sorts of
Speaker 1: things pale by comparison to Google's ridiculously dominant market share worldwide,
Speaker 1: especially in Europe where it's like abo. Yeah, I agree,
Speaker 1: I agree. I when I read about it, I thought, well,
Speaker 1: that's interesting, and I respect what's going on. Um, it
Speaker 1: almost sounded like Google was just bidding up its own
Speaker 1: uh its own claim to Firefox, just enough for it
Speaker 1: to be inconvenient for anyone else. And I disclosed that
Speaker 1: my wife is an employee of Google, So don't believe
Speaker 1: anything I say. Okay, that's fair, all right, we will
Speaker 1: just completely disregard the last question. Well, well then, Tom,
Speaker 1: is there anything else you want to say, any other
Speaker 1: predictions that we didn't mention that you felt were interesting
Speaker 1: or controversial or anything like that. Um, no. I you
Speaker 1: know what, we didn't bring up any of the like
Speaker 1: will Apple release X because we know they're doing the
Speaker 1: Apple Watch that's coming next year, that's announced, and you know,
Speaker 1: there are certain things you can count on every year.
Speaker 1: You can count on updates to the hardware from Apple,
Speaker 1: that sort of stuff. Uh, there's not really any point
Speaker 1: in predicting that. I guess the click the burning question
Speaker 1: that we've had for years. The other burning question we've
Speaker 1: had for years is an Apple television Are we gonna
Speaker 1: Are we actually going to get that? I saw that
Speaker 1: Jane Munster said we're gonna get one, in which you know,
Speaker 1: every year Jean Munster has been saying we're gonna get
Speaker 1: one in a couple of years, so that seems pretty consistent.
Speaker 1: I don't disbelieve that he has sources on the inside.
Speaker 1: That's ay. Yeah, Apples still working on something regarding television.
Speaker 1: I just I don't know that we'll see it this year.
Speaker 1: That that is such a problematic arena. I guess the
Speaker 1: one thing that I would say is, don't forget that
Speaker 1: both Verizon, Dish, and Sony plan to come out with
Speaker 1: internet only cable television services in the United States. In
Speaker 1: the coming year. We don't know what shape they're gonna take,
Speaker 1: but they will have many of the same channels that
Speaker 1: you would get in a normal cable or satellite package.
Speaker 1: And of course you have HBO saying they're gonna launch
Speaker 1: a direct to the consumer Internet service. Cb I already
Speaker 1: launched their direct to the Internet direct to the consumer
Speaker 1: Internet service, so that landscape will changed by the end
Speaker 1: of the year. I don't know if Apple is UH
Speaker 1: is going to get in on it yet, but maybe
Speaker 1: in after we see how that all shakes out. That
Speaker 1: is interesting. It could be that, who knows, Maybe at
Speaker 1: the predictions episode for for sixteen, we start talking about serious,
Speaker 1: you know, some serious talk about the decline of cable
Speaker 1: at that point. I mean, we're we're we've been talking
Speaker 1: about this for years and we've been seeing this. I mean,
Speaker 1: you've got a whole show devoted to this kind of thing.
Speaker 1: Cord cutters or cord killers is er. Yeah, I apologize,
Speaker 1: I I am such a guy, you know, but no
Speaker 1: chord killers where you talk about these kind of things,
Speaker 1: and it's something that we've seen for a while. Heck,
Speaker 1: I talked to CNN about it several years ago and
Speaker 1: then got in trouble um. But now we're we're actually
Speaker 1: seeing this come to fruition. It's it's pretty interesting and
Speaker 1: exciting to see it, you know, roll out on a
Speaker 1: broader scale. And I really do wonder by the end
Speaker 1: of what that's going to mean for the cable industry
Speaker 1: as a whole, not just um, not just a channel
Speaker 1: here are a channel there. I mean the it may
Speaker 1: open up opportunities, and I'm sure it's going to put
Speaker 1: a lot of people in a very stressful position for
Speaker 1: most of Yeah, I think we might be seeing peak
Speaker 1: cable right now. Yeah, I think you might be right.
Speaker 1: I mean, if we get to a point, if we
Speaker 1: ever get to that point where people can go more
Speaker 1: a lak heart, which is it's incredibly hard to do.
Speaker 1: It's incredibly from a from a provider standpoint, it's incredibly
Speaker 1: hard to do because you're a counting as a provider
Speaker 1: on the money from your big name channels to support
Speaker 1: the ones that supply content to a niche audience but
Speaker 1: just don't make the money that they would in order
Speaker 1: to survive on their own. If you enter into a
Speaker 1: world where people just get to pick and choose, some
Speaker 1: stuff is gonna die. It's just not gonna it's not
Speaker 1: going to be able to maintain the level of production
Speaker 1: that people expect. So it may be that, who knows,
Speaker 1: in a couple of years, our expectations for what is
Speaker 1: entertainment is going to change fundamentally. Yeah. I don't even
Speaker 1: think that necessarily means we'll have worse things to watch either.
Speaker 1: It just means that we might have fewer outlets or
Speaker 1: a different selection of outlets. I mean, don't forget Amazon, Prime,
Speaker 1: Hulu and obviously Netflix all making high quality television entertainment
Speaker 1: that they deliver through their internet only services. So it's
Speaker 1: not like there's a lack of providers out there. I
Speaker 1: think some of those on off channels that not as
Speaker 1: many people watch, though, go the way of the nineties.
Speaker 1: You just you think of them as as something old fashioned. Right, Well,
Speaker 1: I mean, if this just means that I get more
Speaker 1: quality programming, like a re a a reincarnation of the Tick,
Speaker 1: because it's coming back on Amazon, I'm happy. I love
Speaker 1: that series, all right. Well, Tom Merritt, thank you so
Speaker 1: much for joining me on this episode. Thank you, Jonathan.
Speaker 1: It's it was. It was a fun talk. I can't
Speaker 1: believe it's already been through an hour. Here, this was
Speaker 1: just time flew by. This was fun. Yeah, this is
Speaker 1: this was This was the right way to do a
Speaker 1: predictions episode. Two smart movie looks great other people and
Speaker 1: not talking about UM. So, where can people find your stuff? Well,
Speaker 1: tom Merritt dot com to ours two t s is
Speaker 1: my main website to collects all the shows I do
Speaker 1: in one place, so you can find the subscription page
Speaker 1: there and and find out the different shows. But probably
Speaker 1: of most interest to it folks interested in tech stuff
Speaker 1: would be Daily Tech News Show, Daily Tech News Show
Speaker 1: dot com. I do it entirely crowdfunded. Uh so it's
Speaker 1: absolutely free and add free. Go check it out. We
Speaker 1: do it every day Monday through Friday, most of the day.
Speaker 1: We'll have a little holiday break, but we'll have some
Speaker 1: special episodes. They're including a predictions episode where I will
Speaker 1: actually go out on a limb and and make some
Speaker 1: some predictions. I will learn next year from Jonathan not
Speaker 1: to do that. I can't believe you haven't learned that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think you did it with Cena. You've got it.
Speaker 1: You've done a long history of making predictions. The fun
Speaker 1: part is coming back a year later and actually grading
Speaker 1: yourself yeah, I do that too. Actually, the Predictions Results
Speaker 1: show is actually really fun. Yeah, it could be a blast.
Speaker 1: I usually end up giving fake prizes for all the
Speaker 1: nice well yeah, yeah, this year I think um, I
Speaker 1: think the top prize was a stretch armstrong whose arms
Speaker 1: have been stretched out too far. That's prize. Yeah, that's
Speaker 1: pretty good. Well, it gives up, gives a good hug. Well, guys,
Speaker 1: thank you so much for listening. Remember you can get
Speaker 1: in touch with me with the email address tech stuff
Speaker 1: at how stuff Works dot com, or drop me a
Speaker 1: line on Facebook or Tumbler. I have to handle tech
Speaker 1: stuff hs W at all three and we'll talk to
Speaker 1: you again. Releases for more on this and thousands of
Speaker 1: other topics. Because it has to work dot Com