WEBVTT - The 12th Anniversary Spectacular 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.800 Welcome to text Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 0:00:12.080 --> 0:00:14.800 He there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 0:00:15.000 --> 0:00:18.280 Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio 0:00:18.440 --> 0:00:22.079 and I love all things tech. And it is the 0:00:22.239 --> 0:00:25.800 end of June twenty twenty, which means we have crossed 0:00:26.120 --> 0:00:30.920 another anniversary for tech Stuff. This show began publishing back 0:00:31.080 --> 0:00:34.839 in June two thousand eight. I've been working for a 0:00:34.880 --> 0:00:38.199 company called how Stuff Works dot com for about a 0:00:38.280 --> 0:00:41.519 year then really about a year and a half before 0:00:41.560 --> 0:00:44.600 we launched this show. And originally I had a co 0:00:44.720 --> 0:00:48.440 host named Chris Palette, and Chris was also my editor 0:00:48.720 --> 0:00:51.160 for all the articles I wrote for how stuff Works 0:00:51.200 --> 0:00:54.520 dot com. And together we would tackle tech topics and 0:00:54.960 --> 0:00:58.640 Chris would make a lot of puns, like a lot 0:00:58.960 --> 0:01:01.320 a lot of them. Mean seriously, you guys seem to 0:01:01.320 --> 0:01:04.240 think that I do a lot of puns, but honestly, 0:01:04.319 --> 0:01:08.319 Chris went above and beyond. Now, over the years, this 0:01:08.360 --> 0:01:11.480 show has changed. Chris left to pursue a career he 0:01:11.520 --> 0:01:14.600 had wanted for years. That we occasionally paying each other 0:01:14.680 --> 0:01:16.679 to check in, but we haven't really been in the 0:01:16.720 --> 0:01:19.360 same room for more than a few years now. But 0:01:19.480 --> 0:01:23.559 after Chris Lauren Vogelbaum joined the show as a co host, 0:01:23.680 --> 0:01:25.920 and she stayed on for a while, but she really 0:01:25.920 --> 0:01:29.000 wanted to develop her own shows, which makes total sense, 0:01:29.400 --> 0:01:31.759 and so she came into Tech Stuff to help me out. 0:01:32.080 --> 0:01:34.400 But she had her own goals and couldn't really pursue 0:01:34.440 --> 0:01:38.000 those while also doing Tech Stuff. She's kicking butt on 0:01:38.040 --> 0:01:42.600 several shows now, including Saver, an incredible podcast all about food. 0:01:42.640 --> 0:01:45.280 If you haven't listened to the Saver podcast s a 0:01:45.440 --> 0:01:49.560 v O R. I highly recommend it. It's very informative, 0:01:49.800 --> 0:01:53.520 it's awesome, and you're gonna want to eat after every episode. Now, 0:01:53.560 --> 0:01:55.960 I had a few other guest co hosts who kind 0:01:56.000 --> 0:01:58.480 of jumped on for an episode or two after that, 0:01:58.560 --> 0:02:01.040 but for the most part, Tech Stuff kind of settled 0:02:01.040 --> 0:02:04.800 into what it is now, a solo host show about 0:02:04.840 --> 0:02:08.160 tech and its role in society. And of course, most 0:02:08.200 --> 0:02:12.720 recently the show has changed again because we are now 0:02:12.840 --> 0:02:16.440 in the era of COVID nineteen. I'm pretty sure you 0:02:16.440 --> 0:02:19.560 guys are aware of that. So I'm recording my episodes 0:02:19.800 --> 0:02:22.880 from my home and I have been doing that since March. 0:02:24.000 --> 0:02:27.920 That means that not even super producer Tari is present 0:02:28.080 --> 0:02:32.079 when I record, it's just me sitting at my desk 0:02:32.440 --> 0:02:37.080 speaking into my microphone and recording it on my computer. Now, 0:02:37.480 --> 0:02:40.560 I'm going to be real with you guys, this gets 0:02:40.600 --> 0:02:44.280 hard for me. I'm mostly an extrovert, and I really 0:02:44.320 --> 0:02:47.760 benefit from being around other people and bouncing ideas off 0:02:47.840 --> 0:02:50.640 of them, or taking short breaks when I'm doing my 0:02:50.720 --> 0:02:53.679 research so I can have a chat and that kind 0:02:53.680 --> 0:02:57.440 of re energizes me and lets me refocus. But at home, 0:02:57.760 --> 0:03:02.000 I don't really have at So it's been really challenging 0:03:02.080 --> 0:03:06.000 to research right and record these shows. Not that I 0:03:06.080 --> 0:03:09.440 don't like doing it. I still love Tech Stuff, It's 0:03:09.520 --> 0:03:12.880 just harder now. And my hope is that this hasn't 0:03:12.919 --> 0:03:15.480 affected the quality of the show at all, apart from 0:03:15.520 --> 0:03:19.280 obviously a dip in audio quality since I'm in my 0:03:19.400 --> 0:03:22.280 home and not in an honest to goodness recording studio. 0:03:22.720 --> 0:03:25.840 But through all these changes, the show has continued to 0:03:25.919 --> 0:03:28.600 look at tech and its place in our world. So 0:03:28.680 --> 0:03:31.280 today I thought we would look back on one or 0:03:31.320 --> 0:03:34.760 two big stories from each year of tech Stuffs existence, 0:03:35.080 --> 0:03:38.080 starting with two thousand eight. And I hope this goes 0:03:38.120 --> 0:03:41.120 well because I thought of it at the last minute 0:03:41.320 --> 0:03:44.320 and then scrambled to do it. So two thousand eight, 0:03:44.600 --> 0:03:47.160 the first episode of tech Stuff was about how the 0:03:47.160 --> 0:03:50.400 Google Apple Cloud computer will work, which I admit in 0:03:50.520 --> 0:03:54.640 retrospect may have been a tad off. But as for 0:03:54.680 --> 0:03:58.000 the story that really was dominating the news in two 0:03:58.000 --> 0:04:01.960 thousand and eight, would probably the announcement that Microsoft was 0:04:02.040 --> 0:04:06.760 making a bid for Yahoo. Now that actually happened in February. 0:04:07.440 --> 0:04:10.600 It took place before tech stuff was really a thing. 0:04:10.760 --> 0:04:14.640 But whatever, I'm going by calendar year here, not month 0:04:14.720 --> 0:04:18.040 to month, because I don't want to go crazy. Microsoft, 0:04:18.120 --> 0:04:21.919 of course, is the software company famous for the Windows 0:04:21.960 --> 0:04:26.720 operating system and the Microsoft Office Suite, among many other 0:04:26.880 --> 0:04:31.320 things like the Xbox game consoles, and Yahoo was frequently 0:04:31.360 --> 0:04:34.120 referred to as a search engine, but really was more 0:04:34.160 --> 0:04:38.599 of a web portal that aggregated content and later actually 0:04:39.080 --> 0:04:44.680 generated content, and it also did search. Microsoft's move was 0:04:44.720 --> 0:04:47.279 to make an offer of thirty one dollars per share 0:04:47.320 --> 0:04:50.520 of Yahoo's stock, So if you took all the Yahoo 0:04:50.600 --> 0:04:53.400 stock and you multiplied it by thirty one dollars, it 0:04:53.560 --> 0:04:56.680 meant that this would even out to about forty four 0:04:56.720 --> 0:05:01.960 and a half billion with a b dollar. Nine days later, 0:05:02.080 --> 0:05:05.440 Yahoo's board of directors responded with yeah, now, we're good. 0:05:05.480 --> 0:05:08.680 Thanks anyway, Actually it was a little less firm of 0:05:08.720 --> 0:05:11.360 a know than that, because their board said that the 0:05:11.800 --> 0:05:17.320 four billion dollar deal actually undervalued Yahoo, and they countered 0:05:17.440 --> 0:05:20.159 that offer and they suggested that, you know, we really 0:05:20.200 --> 0:05:23.560 think that forty dollars per share is more fair. But 0:05:23.640 --> 0:05:27.000 that went nowhere. Microsoft would not agree to that, and 0:05:27.080 --> 0:05:30.400 Yahoo would put a little more pressure on Microsoft. They 0:05:30.400 --> 0:05:33.480 made a deal with Google so that Google would actually 0:05:33.480 --> 0:05:37.640 power Yahoo's search engine, and this story kind of fizzled 0:05:37.680 --> 0:05:40.760 out as a result. It never really went anywhere. And 0:05:40.800 --> 0:05:43.679 of course, with the benefit of hindsight, we could say 0:05:43.720 --> 0:05:47.800 that maybe that was good for Microsoft, considering how Yahoo 0:05:47.880 --> 0:05:52.960 kind of languished in the years since. Or you might 0:05:53.080 --> 0:05:55.560 argue that maybe if Microsoft had been able to go 0:05:55.640 --> 0:05:58.760 through with that deal, maybe they would have made something 0:05:58.760 --> 0:06:02.039 out of Yahoo that would be a bigger success. Looking 0:06:02.120 --> 0:06:05.400 at Microsoft and its history, that's a that's kind of 0:06:05.400 --> 0:06:08.880 a coin flip situation in my my point of view. Now. 0:06:08.920 --> 0:06:12.359 Honorable mentions for stories from two thousand eight that I 0:06:12.360 --> 0:06:15.800 didn't really do a deep dive into include Apple announcing 0:06:15.800 --> 0:06:19.880 that it was leaving Macworld behind. It would actually continue 0:06:19.920 --> 0:06:21.800 to have a presence in two thousand nine, but that 0:06:21.839 --> 0:06:23.800 was going to be the last year that Apple would 0:06:23.839 --> 0:06:27.560 attend Macworld. Macworld, by the way, was an annual industry 0:06:27.640 --> 0:06:32.760 conference that really centered on Apple products. Uh the conference 0:06:32.800 --> 0:06:35.440 itself would last until two thousand and fourteen, when it 0:06:35.480 --> 0:06:39.400 was kind of put on hold indefinitely. Windows seven was 0:06:39.520 --> 0:06:43.919 also announced in two thousand eight, and Google would launch 0:06:44.000 --> 0:06:47.520 the Chrome browser as well as the Android smartphone in 0:06:47.560 --> 0:06:50.720 two thousand eight. But let's move on to two thousand nine. 0:06:51.200 --> 0:06:54.520 This was another year of really big moves in the 0:06:54.560 --> 0:06:59.080 tech industry. Google announced the Chrome operating System. They had 0:06:59.080 --> 0:07:02.040 already launched the browser back in two thousand and eight, 0:07:02.240 --> 0:07:06.680 but the Chrome OS would become a really light operating system, 0:07:06.720 --> 0:07:11.040 and it emphasized cloud services rather than native applications running 0:07:11.120 --> 0:07:14.280 on the computer itself. So this was at a time 0:07:14.440 --> 0:07:18.920 when cloud computing wasn't really a common term outside of 0:07:19.160 --> 0:07:22.080 you know, a few companies in the computer industry. The 0:07:22.160 --> 0:07:25.840 Chrome operating System wouldn't stand as a major threat to 0:07:25.920 --> 0:07:30.520 either Microsoft or the Mac operating systems, but it did 0:07:30.680 --> 0:07:34.280 pave the way for lower priced laptops that didn't need 0:07:34.400 --> 0:07:37.640 the horsepower of other machines. Of the time, and that's 0:07:37.680 --> 0:07:40.120 because really all you needed was a good connection to 0:07:40.160 --> 0:07:43.320 the Internet in order to access the apps and services 0:07:43.360 --> 0:07:46.320 you wanted to run. While I don't think the Chrome 0:07:46.440 --> 0:07:50.040 operating system really changed the world, it definitely helped set 0:07:50.080 --> 0:07:53.560 the stage for the era, as short lived as it was, 0:07:54.080 --> 0:07:59.080 of the netbook. Netbooks were super lightweight computers that probably 0:07:59.440 --> 0:08:01.760 would have uck around a bit longer if it were 0:08:01.760 --> 0:08:03.200 not for the fact that some of them were just 0:08:03.400 --> 0:08:07.000 too small and they had such crappy keyboards that it 0:08:07.000 --> 0:08:09.440 would legit hurt to work on them if you were 0:08:09.440 --> 0:08:12.600 doing so for a long time. Perhaps more importantly for 0:08:12.680 --> 0:08:15.320 the long run was that Google's push for web based 0:08:15.400 --> 0:08:19.640 services moved us closer to adopting the cloud computing strategy 0:08:19.840 --> 0:08:25.440 more wholeheartedly. Between Google's emphasis on internet based applications and 0:08:25.600 --> 0:08:28.600 Apple saying the stage for smartphone apps the year before, 0:08:28.960 --> 0:08:31.280 there was a new focus on what the web could 0:08:31.280 --> 0:08:34.319 do beyond provide a place to browse for shoes, or 0:08:34.400 --> 0:08:38.160 look at kitten videos or watch hamsters dance. Today, it's 0:08:38.200 --> 0:08:42.439 not unusual at all to rely heavily on web based programs. 0:08:42.640 --> 0:08:46.360 Even video game consoles have embraced this approach. Now, I 0:08:46.360 --> 0:08:49.079 wouldn't lay all of that at the feet of Google 0:08:49.240 --> 0:08:51.800 and say that the Chrome operating system is the reason 0:08:51.840 --> 0:08:54.640 why cloud computing became a huge thing. But I do 0:08:54.679 --> 0:08:58.440 think Google's influence helped move things along at a faster pace. 0:08:59.040 --> 0:09:01.600 Another big thing to happened in two thousand nine was 0:09:01.640 --> 0:09:04.840 that Steve Jobs would leave and then come back to Apple. 0:09:05.120 --> 0:09:07.480 He had to take a medical leave of absence, and 0:09:07.480 --> 0:09:11.760 originally the reason they reported for his absence was given 0:09:11.760 --> 0:09:15.520 as as a hormonal imbalance, but in actuality, he was 0:09:15.559 --> 0:09:19.400 recovering from a liver transplant. Early in two thousand nine, 0:09:19.679 --> 0:09:22.560 Steve Jobs went on leave and he skipped Macworld. You know, 0:09:22.600 --> 0:09:25.560 Apple was still attending it, but it was the last 0:09:25.559 --> 0:09:27.360 time Apple would be at the conference. That had to 0:09:27.400 --> 0:09:30.680 be a double punch to the Macworld attendees, because not 0:09:30.760 --> 0:09:32.480 only was the last time Apple would be there, but 0:09:32.520 --> 0:09:36.319 Steve Jobs himself would not be there, which meant that 0:09:36.360 --> 0:09:38.400 two thousand and eight was the last time they would 0:09:38.400 --> 0:09:42.200 see Steve Jobs present at Macworld. Now, on the one hand, 0:09:42.640 --> 0:09:46.040 it seems pretty crass to dig into someone's personal life 0:09:46.040 --> 0:09:49.480 and medical history and then to publish that as news. 0:09:49.880 --> 0:09:54.400 But on the other hand, Steve Jobs was CEO of Apple. Moreover, 0:09:54.840 --> 0:09:58.960 you could argue that no other tech brand identified as 0:09:59.000 --> 0:10:02.319 closely with a foul under than Apple did with Steve Jobs. 0:10:02.800 --> 0:10:05.319 When the company held big press events, it was Steve 0:10:05.400 --> 0:10:09.199 Jobs who had stunned the crowd with revelations of new products. 0:10:09.720 --> 0:10:13.960 He was part leader, parts salesman, parts celebrity, and so 0:10:14.040 --> 0:10:17.600 Steve jobs health could also be viewed as an extension 0:10:17.800 --> 0:10:21.120 of the company's health. The danger of having such a 0:10:21.240 --> 0:10:24.920 centralized figure is that there's a perception that forms that 0:10:25.160 --> 0:10:27.160 without that figure, the company is going to be in 0:10:27.240 --> 0:10:30.079 choppy waters, and when we get a bit further on, 0:10:30.559 --> 0:10:34.719 will revisit this. Honorable mentions for big stories in two 0:10:34.800 --> 0:10:38.400 thousand nine include the scuttle butt that eBay was preparing 0:10:38.440 --> 0:10:41.080 to sell off Skype, and that would mean it would 0:10:41.120 --> 0:10:43.360 exit what had widely been viewed as one of the 0:10:43.400 --> 0:10:47.880 worst acquisitions in tech history. Microsoft and Yahoo were able 0:10:47.880 --> 0:10:50.520 to patch things up from the year before, and they 0:10:50.559 --> 0:10:53.679 agreed that Microsoft would supply Yahoo's search tool in an 0:10:53.679 --> 0:10:57.560 effort to compete against Google. The two thousand eight elections 0:10:57.600 --> 0:10:59.880 in the United States gave rise to more people you 0:11:00.040 --> 0:11:04.679 using online social networks to push political philosophies and agenda 0:11:05.160 --> 0:11:10.000 and to market campaigns online, and we can definitely see 0:11:10.040 --> 0:11:14.040 that that is an even bigger trend today. Windows seven 0:11:14.160 --> 0:11:18.440 got a much better reception than the previous Microsoft operating system, 0:11:18.520 --> 0:11:22.439 Windows Vista, and now it's time to move to twenty ten. 0:11:24.000 --> 0:11:27.800 This was a big year, a tumultuous year. Wiki Leaks 0:11:27.800 --> 0:11:31.960 made world headlines after receiving and then publishing an enormous 0:11:32.040 --> 0:11:36.280 number of documents that revealed tons of previously unknown or 0:11:36.400 --> 0:11:41.000 unacknowledged moves by various governments and government agents around the world, 0:11:41.600 --> 0:11:46.000 including and primarily those who call the United States home. 0:11:46.440 --> 0:11:49.920 This included documents about deliberate efforts to deceive the American 0:11:49.960 --> 0:11:53.400 public about various operations around the world. It had some 0:11:53.480 --> 0:11:56.839 really heavy stuff in it, including information about how US 0:11:56.960 --> 0:12:00.920 government was working hard to protect a merror Rican officials 0:12:00.920 --> 0:12:03.440 and agents who had established practices around the world that 0:12:03.480 --> 0:12:08.040 could easily fall under the general category of torture, which 0:12:08.200 --> 0:12:11.199 I don't think I have to mention is truly awful. 0:12:11.880 --> 0:12:15.440 Other reports were equally disturbing and included incidents in which 0:12:15.440 --> 0:12:19.640 American forces had done stuff like firing upon journalists or 0:12:19.760 --> 0:12:23.200 civilians and then tried to cover it up. A lot 0:12:23.240 --> 0:12:26.520 of information about other nations and leaders were also part 0:12:26.600 --> 0:12:30.480 of this information dump, including messages that revealed how various 0:12:30.480 --> 0:12:36.000 ambassadors or officials viewed other world leaders and that caused 0:12:36.240 --> 0:12:39.640 a lot of embarrassment in official channels around the world. 0:12:40.000 --> 0:12:42.920 Wiki Leaks continues to play a big part in world politics, 0:12:43.040 --> 0:12:46.000 though in recent years there's been a lot more scrutiny 0:12:46.040 --> 0:12:49.520 and more accusations that the organization has its own agenda 0:12:49.840 --> 0:12:53.040 that goes beyond revealing the truth, that the truth plays 0:12:53.080 --> 0:12:55.640 a part in it, but it's a selective use of 0:12:55.679 --> 0:13:00.320 the truth in order to direct things down a particular path. 0:13:01.200 --> 0:13:06.680 Honorable mentions go to Gizmoto essentially stealing a prototype iPhone 0:13:06.720 --> 0:13:09.839 three gs then publishing a story about it, including a 0:13:09.920 --> 0:13:13.760 breakdown of the internal components. That story gained Gizmoto a 0:13:13.800 --> 0:13:16.920 lot of heat in the tech journalism world for the 0:13:17.000 --> 0:13:20.400 ethically questionable decision to lift the phone and then run 0:13:20.400 --> 0:13:23.679 a story on it. Apple was put in the unusual 0:13:23.720 --> 0:13:27.200 position of having to defend a product as people found 0:13:27.240 --> 0:13:29.480 it really hard to get a signal and to make 0:13:29.559 --> 0:13:33.520 calls on the new iPhone. This would later fall into 0:13:33.679 --> 0:13:36.600 a whole story that was referred to as antenna GIT, 0:13:36.760 --> 0:13:40.360 the idea that the placement of the antenna was creating 0:13:40.559 --> 0:13:44.760 a challenge to get and maintain a good signal, and 0:13:45.160 --> 0:13:47.000 of course one of the famous things in that is 0:13:47.000 --> 0:13:49.520 Steve Jobs claiming that the whole reason why there are 0:13:49.640 --> 0:13:52.480 problem was that people were just holding it wrong. In 0:13:52.520 --> 0:13:56.160 the US, Apple emerged from its exclusivity deal with a 0:13:56.280 --> 0:13:58.360 T and T and prepared to release the iPhone on 0:13:58.480 --> 0:14:02.959 other cellular carriers. Plus, the company released the iPad, which 0:14:03.000 --> 0:14:07.760 was initially ridiculed for its name upon launch, and in September, 0:14:08.960 --> 0:14:13.680 the BP oil drilling rig called deep Water Horizon caused 0:14:13.679 --> 0:14:19.240 what became the largest marine oil spill ever, a colossal 0:14:19.840 --> 0:14:25.960 and catastrophic event, and the the consequences of that are 0:14:26.040 --> 0:14:29.320 something that's going to be felt for a really long time. Okay, 0:14:29.320 --> 0:14:31.480 it's time for us to cover two thousand eleven and 0:14:31.480 --> 0:14:34.120 then we're gonna take a short break now. I don't 0:14:34.160 --> 0:14:37.680 think there's another story I could cover that had as 0:14:37.760 --> 0:14:41.440 big an impact on headlines in the United States as 0:14:41.520 --> 0:14:46.160 the death of Steve Jobs. He had retired as CEO earlier, 0:14:46.200 --> 0:14:51.560 in handing the company over to Tim Cook on October five, 0:14:51.680 --> 0:14:55.680 two thousand eleven he passed away, we saw people actually 0:14:55.800 --> 0:14:59.760 grieve for him in public. People left notes and flowers 0:14:59.800 --> 0:15:02.840 in tribute outside of Apple stores, and this sort of 0:15:02.880 --> 0:15:06.400 response is pretty much unheard of in the business world. 0:15:06.640 --> 0:15:11.040 And again, it really pointed at jobs celebrity status, right 0:15:11.160 --> 0:15:13.320 that he was more than a business leader. He was 0:15:13.560 --> 0:15:17.040 a celebrity, a figurehead, and there was a lot of 0:15:17.080 --> 0:15:20.920 worry that Apple the company would falter. And even to 0:15:20.960 --> 0:15:23.680 this day you will occasionally hear people say something like 0:15:24.160 --> 0:15:27.160 that's not how Steve would have done it, though you 0:15:27.160 --> 0:15:30.440 don't hear it as frequently as you used to. However, 0:15:30.480 --> 0:15:34.880 despite the undeniable impact his death had on business, Apple 0:15:34.960 --> 0:15:38.080 the company has continued to do quite well in the 0:15:38.120 --> 0:15:41.600 following years. Now, I would argue that as monumental as 0:15:41.640 --> 0:15:44.840 that story was, it should take a back seat to 0:15:44.880 --> 0:15:47.480 the events that were occurring in the Middle East through 0:15:47.560 --> 0:15:51.720 much of twenty eleven. While protests and demonstrations had begun 0:15:51.960 --> 0:15:55.320 late in two and various countries, we really saw an 0:15:55.360 --> 0:15:58.400 increase in twenty eleven as people in numerous countries in 0:15:58.440 --> 0:16:01.960 the Middle East leveraged apps and social media in order 0:16:01.960 --> 0:16:06.640 to stage protests against various governments. We called it the 0:16:06.680 --> 0:16:09.720 Arab Spring, and this sort of use of social media 0:16:09.880 --> 0:16:12.960 would also serve as a building block for how great 0:16:13.040 --> 0:16:17.640 movements like Black Lives Matter use social media, as well 0:16:17.680 --> 0:16:21.720 as how hate groups take advantage of those same tools, 0:16:21.760 --> 0:16:26.320 both to organize and two so discord. Honorable mentions for 0:16:26.440 --> 0:16:30.400 two thousand eleven include the rise of the amorphous hacktivist 0:16:30.520 --> 0:16:35.080 group Anonymous, thus bringing the guy Fox mask back into fashion, 0:16:35.600 --> 0:16:39.080 the launch of the Google Plus social network that, despite 0:16:39.080 --> 0:16:42.520 a fairly enthusiastic reception when it was in beta, never 0:16:42.680 --> 0:16:46.360 managed to get much traction against Facebook, and IBM. S 0:16:46.400 --> 0:16:51.880 Watson defeated two former Jeopardy champions in a special Jeopardy exhibition. 0:16:52.560 --> 0:16:55.800 When we come back, we will pick up with twenty twelve, 0:16:55.920 --> 0:17:06.800 but first let's take a quick break. Early in in 0:17:06.840 --> 0:17:12.320 the United States, two pieces of proposed legislation grabbed world headlines. 0:17:12.640 --> 0:17:16.160 They were the Stop Online Piracy Act for A SOAPA, 0:17:16.680 --> 0:17:22.240 and the Protect Intellectual Property Act or PIPPA. These proposals 0:17:22.280 --> 0:17:25.720 emerged due to the entertainment industries pushed to find ways 0:17:25.800 --> 0:17:29.879 to prevent and crack down upon piracy online, and a 0:17:29.960 --> 0:17:34.360 lot of what the pieces were based upon was conjecture 0:17:34.600 --> 0:17:39.159 and faulty reasoning. For example, the entertainment industry would claim 0:17:39.400 --> 0:17:43.439 enormous losses due to piracy. But the problem is you 0:17:43.480 --> 0:17:46.159 can't prove that because you can't prove that the people 0:17:46.440 --> 0:17:51.880 who downloaded something illegally would have otherwise purchased it legally. 0:17:52.240 --> 0:17:54.480 And if they would have never purchased it, let's say 0:17:54.520 --> 0:17:56.919 that they didn't pirate it, nor did they purchase it, 0:17:57.520 --> 0:18:00.359 then you can't call that a loss. That just wasn't 0:18:00.400 --> 0:18:05.199 a sale. So it was based on faulty logic to 0:18:05.320 --> 0:18:10.359 begin with, and the implications meant that if these proposals 0:18:10.359 --> 0:18:12.840 were put into law, we would really see a fractured 0:18:12.880 --> 0:18:15.280 Internet where people in the United States wouldn't be able 0:18:15.320 --> 0:18:19.720 to even see that some sites exist because of effectively 0:18:19.800 --> 0:18:23.399 digital blockades. It would have been difficult to implement, it 0:18:23.400 --> 0:18:26.359 would have been hard to enforce, and if it did work, 0:18:26.560 --> 0:18:29.919 it would essentially break parts of the Internet. Lots of 0:18:29.960 --> 0:18:34.600 sites held a simulated Internet blackout to raise awareness of 0:18:34.640 --> 0:18:39.200 the issues, and advocates for free exchange of ideas protested 0:18:39.240 --> 0:18:42.440 the proposals and the idea of regulating the Internet, and 0:18:42.520 --> 0:18:46.399 ultimately the United States government let the two pieces just 0:18:46.600 --> 0:18:49.480 die rather than risk a fallout with pushing it through 0:18:49.560 --> 0:18:55.480 into law. Another big story was that Facebook colossally mishandled 0:18:55.960 --> 0:18:59.080 its initial public offering or i p O. Then, yeah, 0:18:59.080 --> 0:19:03.920 I'm butchering language, but man, this was such an enormous mistake. 0:19:04.480 --> 0:19:07.560 So this is the process that a private company has 0:19:07.600 --> 0:19:10.359 to go through in order to become a publicly traded company, 0:19:10.480 --> 0:19:13.520 or typically it's the way a privately held company becomes 0:19:13.520 --> 0:19:17.760 publicly traded. And this process ends with one where you've 0:19:17.800 --> 0:19:21.280 got this publicly traded company where anyone with cash can 0:19:21.359 --> 0:19:24.399 buy stocks in that company. The process of an i 0:19:24.440 --> 0:19:27.720 p O is really complicated, and it involves a lot 0:19:27.800 --> 0:19:30.320 of analysts who have to look at a company. They 0:19:30.359 --> 0:19:33.360 have to assess its value in an effort to come 0:19:33.440 --> 0:19:37.360 up with a proposed opening stock price. So essentially these 0:19:37.359 --> 0:19:39.560 are people who say, yeah, you know, based on what 0:19:39.640 --> 0:19:43.200 we know about how much the company makes, its assets, 0:19:43.440 --> 0:19:46.919 its debts, all that kind of stuff, we figure that 0:19:47.040 --> 0:19:50.880 it would cost X number of dollars per share, assuming 0:19:50.920 --> 0:19:54.360 that there are why number of shares available. A company's 0:19:54.440 --> 0:19:58.439 value is essentially the share price multiplied by the number 0:19:58.480 --> 0:20:02.480 of shares before going public, The estimated value of Facebook 0:20:02.600 --> 0:20:05.800 was one hundred four million dollars. The stock was to 0:20:05.920 --> 0:20:09.320 debut at nearly forty dollars per share, but there were 0:20:09.359 --> 0:20:13.400 technical glitches, including the fact that too many shares were issued. 0:20:13.960 --> 0:20:17.639 There were other issues just with Nasdaq, the stock exchange 0:20:17.680 --> 0:20:20.359 where this was happening, that had nothing directly to do 0:20:20.400 --> 0:20:23.880 with Facebook. UH. There were also problems with Morgan Stanley 0:20:23.960 --> 0:20:26.480 that was the company that was acting as an underwriter 0:20:26.600 --> 0:20:29.639 for the I p O. They were accused of using 0:20:29.760 --> 0:20:35.760 some price influencing UH mathematics, so there were some shady 0:20:35.800 --> 0:20:38.800 things going on there. The stock price would ultimately take 0:20:38.840 --> 0:20:41.639 a huge hit over the course of twenty twelve. You know, 0:20:41.680 --> 0:20:44.639 it came out just under forty dollars. It fell to 0:20:44.680 --> 0:20:47.560 a low of seventeen dollars and fifty five cents per share, 0:20:47.840 --> 0:20:51.600 so less than half of what debuted at UH and 0:20:51.600 --> 0:20:54.560 it meant that Facebook would have some ground to make up. 0:20:55.359 --> 0:20:58.199 But honorable mentions for two thousand twelve stories include the 0:20:58.320 --> 0:21:02.480 raid upon Mega Upload founder Kim dot Com in New Zealand, 0:21:02.920 --> 0:21:06.879 and Nintendo made a pretty big misstep with the launch 0:21:06.960 --> 0:21:10.520 of the Wii U, which never really took off, but 0:21:10.640 --> 0:21:14.600 Felix Baumgartner definitely took off. He wrote a balloon up 0:21:14.640 --> 0:21:17.679 to the edge of space and then jumped for the 0:21:17.800 --> 0:21:22.840 longest refall ever and eventually parachuted to safety many many 0:21:22.920 --> 0:21:26.720 minutes after jumping out of the balloon. Also, Marrissa Meyer 0:21:26.920 --> 0:21:32.840 would leave Google to become the new CEO of Yahoo Time. Hey, 0:21:33.040 --> 0:21:35.600 remember when I talked about that Wiki leaks dump and 0:21:35.600 --> 0:21:38.879 how it disrupted stuff, Well, that definitely set the stage 0:21:38.880 --> 0:21:41.080 for an even bigger story in the United States, and 0:21:42.480 --> 0:21:45.760 Edward Snowden, who was a contract worker for the n 0:21:45.880 --> 0:21:50.000 s A that stands for National Security Agency, leaked documents 0:21:50.040 --> 0:21:52.840 showing that the n s A had been instituting processes 0:21:52.920 --> 0:21:57.320 and policies and technologies that were at best gross violations 0:21:57.359 --> 0:22:01.280 of privacy. The n s AS focus is monitoring, collecting, 0:22:01.320 --> 0:22:04.879 and processing communications, all in an effort to further the 0:22:04.920 --> 0:22:08.560 interests of national security for the United States. So when 0:22:08.560 --> 0:22:11.160 it comes down to it, it's a spy agency and 0:22:11.280 --> 0:22:13.720 it really tries to suss out what everyone is talking 0:22:13.720 --> 0:22:18.240 about all the time across all different communication media. Snowdon 0:22:18.600 --> 0:22:21.720 revealed that the n s A had put in some 0:22:22.440 --> 0:22:26.640 listening devices and had agreements with these various communications companies. 0:22:26.800 --> 0:22:30.040 All of these agreements were classified. The companies were not 0:22:30.080 --> 0:22:32.800 allowed to disclose them. There was all this kind of 0:22:33.480 --> 0:22:37.240 dark veil of secrecy over everything and a lot of 0:22:37.320 --> 0:22:41.440 threats of repercussions if anyone broke that. And the whole 0:22:41.480 --> 0:22:45.119 idea was that it was scooping up information wholesale. It 0:22:45.119 --> 0:22:47.520 didn't matter if that information had anything to do with 0:22:47.680 --> 0:22:50.240 national security or not, didn't matter if the n s 0:22:50.280 --> 0:22:53.639 A suspected someone or didn't suspect them. They were just 0:22:53.720 --> 0:22:57.439 essentially pulling all data in through a funnel, and that 0:22:57.520 --> 0:23:00.200 the agency had ways to search through all that information. 0:23:00.600 --> 0:23:03.560 His actions made snowed In a target and he fled 0:23:03.600 --> 0:23:07.120 the United States. But while the government condemned the leaks 0:23:07.280 --> 0:23:10.159 as being against the interests of the United States, a 0:23:10.200 --> 0:23:14.120 lot of citizens like me began to ask, Hey, um, 0:23:14.240 --> 0:23:17.960 what are you actually defining as the United States? Because 0:23:18.000 --> 0:23:20.480 I live here and this, sure as heck doesn't sound 0:23:20.480 --> 0:23:24.439 like it's in my interests. So it didn't help that 0:23:24.480 --> 0:23:26.960 there were reports of folks who are working for the 0:23:27.080 --> 0:23:29.359 n s A who had made use of the agency's 0:23:29.400 --> 0:23:32.600 tools for their own purposes, such as to snoop on 0:23:32.720 --> 0:23:37.879 former lovers and stuff. Yeah, this was a huge, ugly story, 0:23:37.920 --> 0:23:41.120 but it wasn't the only ugly story of that year, 0:23:41.160 --> 0:23:43.560 not by a long shot. This was also the year 0:23:43.680 --> 0:23:48.560 of the Boston Marathon bombing, a truly awful event, and 0:23:48.680 --> 0:23:52.000 it also served as a harsh classroom where we all 0:23:52.080 --> 0:23:55.280 learned what happens when you have the rapid dissemination and 0:23:55.359 --> 0:24:00.000 analysis of information. Within a very short time, data about 0:24:00.119 --> 0:24:02.399 the bombing was flying across the Internet, and you had 0:24:02.440 --> 0:24:04.760 a ton of armchair detectives who were all trying to 0:24:04.800 --> 0:24:08.119 figure out who perpetrated the bombing. This led to some 0:24:08.200 --> 0:24:11.480 hasty and poorly formed hypotheses that were totally on the 0:24:11.520 --> 0:24:15.399 wrong track. People were brought under suspicion who had nothing 0:24:15.400 --> 0:24:18.040 to do with anything. So in short, the events following 0:24:18.040 --> 0:24:22.879 the bombing illustrated how dangerous misinformation and faulty assumptions can be. 0:24:23.359 --> 0:24:26.879 Honorable mentions for big tech stories of go to the 0:24:26.960 --> 0:24:30.720 embarrassing failure of the healthcare dot gov site in the 0:24:30.800 --> 0:24:34.040