1 00:00:04,400 --> 00:00:07,800 Speaker 1: Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 2 00:00:12,240 --> 00:00:15,240 Speaker 1: Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 3 00:00:15,400 --> 00:00:18,239 Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio 4 00:00:18,280 --> 00:00:21,200 Speaker 1: and I love all things tech, and we are continuing 5 00:00:21,320 --> 00:00:24,919 Speaker 1: our episodes that give a sort of glossary overview of 6 00:00:25,040 --> 00:00:30,160 Speaker 1: some common acronyms and initialisms within tech and include a 7 00:00:30,200 --> 00:00:33,319 Speaker 1: little bit of backstory for each one. And because I'm 8 00:00:33,320 --> 00:00:36,360 Speaker 1: a chatty feller, in the first episode, we started off 9 00:00:36,400 --> 00:00:40,279 Speaker 1: with two f A or two factor authentication, and we 10 00:00:40,440 --> 00:00:44,239 Speaker 1: ended with d l C or downloadable content. So we're 11 00:00:44,280 --> 00:00:47,320 Speaker 1: gonna pick up right where we left off and continue 12 00:00:47,360 --> 00:00:51,680 Speaker 1: on down the alphabet. So next up is d l L. 13 00:00:52,320 --> 00:00:56,440 Speaker 1: This is Microsoft's approach to what is called a shared library, 14 00:00:56,960 --> 00:00:59,560 Speaker 1: and by that I mean that it's a file that 15 00:00:59,640 --> 00:01:03,840 Speaker 1: contain means non volatile resources that can be used by 16 00:01:04,000 --> 00:01:07,759 Speaker 1: different computer programs. Volatile in this case refers to whether 17 00:01:07,840 --> 00:01:10,840 Speaker 1: or not the information is changeable or or it gets 18 00:01:10,880 --> 00:01:14,119 Speaker 1: wiped out when the device is powered off. So these 19 00:01:14,160 --> 00:01:18,080 Speaker 1: libraries remain unchanged when the computer power is off, and 20 00:01:18,120 --> 00:01:20,320 Speaker 1: they are right back when the computer power is back on, 21 00:01:20,760 --> 00:01:24,520 Speaker 1: and that information persists even after the machine shuts down. 22 00:01:24,920 --> 00:01:28,760 Speaker 1: These libraries hold assets that other programs might need to 23 00:01:28,880 --> 00:01:32,400 Speaker 1: access in the process of, you know, the programs doing 24 00:01:32,480 --> 00:01:34,960 Speaker 1: whatever it is they're supposed to do. So, if you've 25 00:01:34,959 --> 00:01:38,600 Speaker 1: ever seen a file that has the d l L extension, 26 00:01:39,040 --> 00:01:42,440 Speaker 1: that's a dynamic link library and it means you're on 27 00:01:42,480 --> 00:01:45,920 Speaker 1: a PC that's running on Windows. Getting into more detail 28 00:01:46,040 --> 00:01:49,480 Speaker 1: would pretty much require a dedicated episode. So just think 29 00:01:49,600 --> 00:01:52,560 Speaker 1: of d l L files as being a resource cash 30 00:01:52,880 --> 00:01:56,280 Speaker 1: for programs running on a Windows computer. And if you've 31 00:01:56,280 --> 00:01:59,400 Speaker 1: ever had any sort of program give you an error 32 00:01:59,400 --> 00:02:02,800 Speaker 1: because it couldn't find a DLL file, that's what it's 33 00:02:02,800 --> 00:02:09,920 Speaker 1: looking for. Next is d n S or domain name system, 34 00:02:10,000 --> 00:02:12,840 Speaker 1: so you know how you can type in addresses in 35 00:02:12,840 --> 00:02:15,919 Speaker 1: a web browser to go to specific web pages, like 36 00:02:16,080 --> 00:02:19,640 Speaker 1: you know, YouTube dot com takes you to YouTube, and 37 00:02:19,760 --> 00:02:24,000 Speaker 1: Netflix dot com takes you to Netflix, and Facebook dot 38 00:02:24,040 --> 00:02:26,960 Speaker 1: com takes you to a wretched hive of scum and villainy. 39 00:02:28,160 --> 00:02:32,079 Speaker 1: Might be tiny bit of editorializing that made its way 40 00:02:32,080 --> 00:02:35,920 Speaker 1: in there, My apologies. Well, anyway, d n S is 41 00:02:35,960 --> 00:02:40,200 Speaker 1: the underlying system that makes all that possible. It's this 42 00:02:40,280 --> 00:02:43,720 Speaker 1: system that acts kind of like a massive address book 43 00:02:44,000 --> 00:02:47,440 Speaker 1: for all things Internet, not just the Web, but the 44 00:02:47,480 --> 00:02:51,320 Speaker 1: web stuff is probably the easiest to explain, typically because 45 00:02:51,360 --> 00:02:54,840 Speaker 1: it's how a lot of us interact with the Internet. Now, 46 00:02:55,080 --> 00:02:58,520 Speaker 1: every machine on the Internet has a numerical address in 47 00:02:58,560 --> 00:03:01,920 Speaker 1: the form of an I P address. But as we 48 00:03:02,040 --> 00:03:05,920 Speaker 1: established with binary language and machine code in the previous episode, 49 00:03:06,320 --> 00:03:10,239 Speaker 1: we humans do not handle tons of numbers super well, 50 00:03:11,040 --> 00:03:13,440 Speaker 1: so it would be really hard for us to remember 51 00:03:13,760 --> 00:03:16,760 Speaker 1: specific I P addresses if we had to rely purely 52 00:03:16,840 --> 00:03:21,000 Speaker 1: on putting in those numerical addresses. And by the way, 53 00:03:21,040 --> 00:03:23,520 Speaker 1: that's just for I p v four addresses, which is 54 00:03:23,720 --> 00:03:26,480 Speaker 1: outdated these days. You would really need to learn I 55 00:03:26,639 --> 00:03:30,960 Speaker 1: p v six addresses. Those are even longer strings of characters, 56 00:03:31,000 --> 00:03:34,400 Speaker 1: and they include not only numbers, but some letters as well. 57 00:03:35,000 --> 00:03:38,520 Speaker 1: More on that in a later entry. So the DNS 58 00:03:39,000 --> 00:03:43,440 Speaker 1: establishes which domain names relate to which IP addresses, and 59 00:03:43,440 --> 00:03:46,080 Speaker 1: it makes it way easier to navigate the Internet for 60 00:03:46,160 --> 00:03:49,680 Speaker 1: those of us incapable of committing strings of seemingly random 61 00:03:49,800 --> 00:03:52,960 Speaker 1: letters and numbers to memory. There's a lot more to 62 00:03:53,000 --> 00:03:56,240 Speaker 1: be said about d n s, including the various attacks 63 00:03:56,280 --> 00:03:59,840 Speaker 1: that hackers sometimes launch against the d n s, but 64 00:04:00,040 --> 00:04:04,360 Speaker 1: we can save that for other episodes. Next is DOSS 65 00:04:04,480 --> 00:04:09,000 Speaker 1: or d O S. That stands for disc Operating System, 66 00:04:09,040 --> 00:04:11,640 Speaker 1: and more often than not it refers to an operating 67 00:04:11,680 --> 00:04:15,760 Speaker 1: system that was derived from IBM S personal computers. There 68 00:04:15,800 --> 00:04:19,400 Speaker 1: have been many different flavors of DOSS, which share a 69 00:04:19,440 --> 00:04:23,800 Speaker 1: few elements in common. They are text based operating systems, 70 00:04:24,040 --> 00:04:26,599 Speaker 1: so in other words, you navigate these by typing out 71 00:04:26,680 --> 00:04:29,480 Speaker 1: various commands in a in a prompt, and you do 72 00:04:29,560 --> 00:04:33,200 Speaker 1: that to move through directories and folders. There's no Windows, 73 00:04:33,240 --> 00:04:36,440 Speaker 1: there's no know icons to click on. You're typing these 74 00:04:36,480 --> 00:04:39,719 Speaker 1: commands out, and you also type in commands to execute 75 00:04:39,760 --> 00:04:42,960 Speaker 1: specific files, so to run a program that's stored on 76 00:04:43,000 --> 00:04:46,800 Speaker 1: a computer. Before Windows, this was how people would interact 77 00:04:46,839 --> 00:04:50,080 Speaker 1: with computers that had hard drive storage. Prior to that, 78 00:04:50,120 --> 00:04:53,520 Speaker 1: your average user would typically just insert a disk into 79 00:04:53,600 --> 00:04:56,800 Speaker 1: a disk drive and the computer's boot process would launch 80 00:04:56,920 --> 00:05:01,000 Speaker 1: directly into that disks associated program. Although you would actually 81 00:05:01,080 --> 00:05:04,000 Speaker 1: navigate to a disk drive and executed program that way. 82 00:05:04,040 --> 00:05:08,080 Speaker 1: That was also possible for PCs. Windows would end up 83 00:05:08,120 --> 00:05:12,440 Speaker 1: replacing DOSS, and on Apple computers, the Mac operating System 84 00:05:12,560 --> 00:05:18,800 Speaker 1: replaced Apple's version of DOSSDAS was a pretty lightweight operating system, 85 00:05:18,920 --> 00:05:21,360 Speaker 1: and that meant you could reserve more of your computer's 86 00:05:21,520 --> 00:05:25,120 Speaker 1: resources to store and run the programs that you wanted 87 00:05:25,160 --> 00:05:29,560 Speaker 1: to execute, and some old fogies like yours truly got 88 00:05:29,600 --> 00:05:33,520 Speaker 1: really salty wind. Windows came along because it demanded way 89 00:05:33,520 --> 00:05:37,400 Speaker 1: more computational resources than Doss did. So while Windows was 90 00:05:37,520 --> 00:05:42,480 Speaker 1: inarguably easier to navigate and leagues more intuitive than Doss 91 00:05:42,560 --> 00:05:47,200 Speaker 1: ever was, it also encroached on precious computational resources, and 92 00:05:47,360 --> 00:05:50,680 Speaker 1: some folks like me got grouchy about it and held 93 00:05:50,720 --> 00:05:52,560 Speaker 1: out for a long time until pretty much all of 94 00:05:52,600 --> 00:05:55,520 Speaker 1: the software that was out there in the world required 95 00:05:56,080 --> 00:06:00,160 Speaker 1: a Windows operating system as the foundation. Not that I'm 96 00:06:00,200 --> 00:06:06,440 Speaker 1: still bitter nearly forty years later. Next is d p I. 97 00:06:07,080 --> 00:06:10,360 Speaker 1: This stands for dots per inch and it's typically used 98 00:06:10,400 --> 00:06:14,279 Speaker 1: to refer to the resolution of printed or scanned material. 99 00:06:14,839 --> 00:06:19,520 Speaker 1: So with displays and screens and monitors, we talk about 100 00:06:19,640 --> 00:06:22,760 Speaker 1: resolution in terms of the number of pixels that are 101 00:06:22,920 --> 00:06:26,919 Speaker 1: on display within a full screen, right, So greater pixel 102 00:06:27,040 --> 00:06:30,920 Speaker 1: density means that you have higher resolution. So another way 103 00:06:30,920 --> 00:06:33,280 Speaker 1: to think of it is to imagine that you are 104 00:06:33,920 --> 00:06:37,800 Speaker 1: tasked with making a yellow smiley face image and you're 105 00:06:37,839 --> 00:06:40,720 Speaker 1: given a frame that frame is one foot square, and 106 00:06:40,760 --> 00:06:43,360 Speaker 1: you're gonna make this image using wooden blocks that are 107 00:06:43,400 --> 00:06:46,120 Speaker 1: painted a single color. You're giving a bunch of yellow 108 00:06:46,200 --> 00:06:48,839 Speaker 1: blocks and a bunch of black blocks. Each of these 109 00:06:48,839 --> 00:06:53,400 Speaker 1: blocks is one inch square, so you've got a foot 110 00:06:53,440 --> 00:06:56,440 Speaker 1: by a foot, so you can fit twelve squares across 111 00:06:56,440 --> 00:06:59,880 Speaker 1: and twelve squares down and you make your little smiley 112 00:07:00,000 --> 00:07:04,119 Speaker 1: face image. It would be a very blocky smiley face. 113 00:07:04,279 --> 00:07:06,800 Speaker 1: But let's say you keep that same frame, so it's 114 00:07:06,800 --> 00:07:09,720 Speaker 1: one ft by one ft, But now you're given blocks 115 00:07:09,760 --> 00:07:13,640 Speaker 1: that are half an inch square, so they're half the size, 116 00:07:13,760 --> 00:07:16,400 Speaker 1: half the width, and half the length, and now you 117 00:07:16,440 --> 00:07:19,680 Speaker 1: can fit way more squares in. While it's gonna look 118 00:07:19,680 --> 00:07:22,160 Speaker 1: a little better. Maybe you go down to a quarter 119 00:07:22,280 --> 00:07:26,320 Speaker 1: of an inch for a square, and as those blocks 120 00:07:26,320 --> 00:07:28,240 Speaker 1: get smaller, you can fit more of them into the 121 00:07:28,280 --> 00:07:31,960 Speaker 1: same physical space, and you create smoother lines as a result, 122 00:07:32,240 --> 00:07:35,240 Speaker 1: giving your image a higher resolution. Well, the same is 123 00:07:35,280 --> 00:07:39,360 Speaker 1: true for displays and well for printers. So dots per 124 00:07:39,440 --> 00:07:43,120 Speaker 1: inch is the resolution of the number of dots of 125 00:07:43,200 --> 00:07:47,520 Speaker 1: half tone that uh can appear per inch of paper. 126 00:07:48,000 --> 00:07:51,280 Speaker 1: Generally speaking, a higher dp I means that you get 127 00:07:51,320 --> 00:07:55,200 Speaker 1: a more clear, sharp and detailed print job. But just 128 00:07:55,280 --> 00:07:59,040 Speaker 1: like photo resolution, there is a point of diminishing returns 129 00:07:59,120 --> 00:08:03,400 Speaker 1: in which boosting that DPI number even higher might not 130 00:08:03,640 --> 00:08:08,640 Speaker 1: lead to a noticeable improvement. It might on paper, to 131 00:08:08,760 --> 00:08:11,800 Speaker 1: use a pun be an improvement, but you might not 132 00:08:11,800 --> 00:08:14,440 Speaker 1: be able to actually see it. It's not unusual to 133 00:08:14,480 --> 00:08:17,760 Speaker 1: have printers with a high dpi in excess of around 134 00:08:17,760 --> 00:08:23,040 Speaker 1: two thousand. Next is dr M. This is the dreaded 135 00:08:23,200 --> 00:08:27,800 Speaker 1: digital rights management. This refers to copyright holders attempting to 136 00:08:27,800 --> 00:08:31,680 Speaker 1: control the consumption of digital media in some way. So 137 00:08:31,880 --> 00:08:35,320 Speaker 1: let's take a step back for a minute. When I 138 00:08:35,400 --> 00:08:39,240 Speaker 1: was a kid, if I had been anaird, well, which 139 00:08:39,280 --> 00:08:40,839 Speaker 1: I wasn't. I was a good kid. But let's say 140 00:08:40,840 --> 00:08:43,840 Speaker 1: that I was a rotten kid. Maybe I might go 141 00:08:43,960 --> 00:08:49,040 Speaker 1: down to the local Turtles music store in Gainesville, Georgia, 142 00:08:49,120 --> 00:08:51,200 Speaker 1: and I decide I'm going to try and shoplift a 143 00:08:51,200 --> 00:08:54,480 Speaker 1: cassette tape of I don't know Bruce Springsteen's greatest hits. 144 00:08:55,080 --> 00:08:57,280 Speaker 1: If I had done that, well, I mean, first of all, 145 00:08:57,320 --> 00:08:59,360 Speaker 1: I would have been a thief, But on top of that, 146 00:08:59,559 --> 00:09:02,760 Speaker 1: I would have deprived that Turtles from being able to 147 00:09:02,800 --> 00:09:06,360 Speaker 1: sell that particular cassette. The store would be unable to 148 00:09:06,360 --> 00:09:08,800 Speaker 1: sell it because it's gone right, I mean, the physical 149 00:09:08,840 --> 00:09:12,040 Speaker 1: copy is in my hands. So stores had to come 150 00:09:12,080 --> 00:09:16,080 Speaker 1: up with various methods to discourage or prevent shoplifting. But 151 00:09:16,200 --> 00:09:19,240 Speaker 1: then skip ahead a few decades now you're in a 152 00:09:19,360 --> 00:09:22,800 Speaker 1: world with digital files, and that world is very different. 153 00:09:22,840 --> 00:09:25,560 Speaker 1: For one thing, it is way easier to make copies 154 00:09:25,600 --> 00:09:28,160 Speaker 1: of digital files than it would be with physical media. 155 00:09:28,400 --> 00:09:31,400 Speaker 1: Not that you couldn't make physical copies. We could, it 156 00:09:31,480 --> 00:09:35,120 Speaker 1: was just very time consuming and by the way, big 157 00:09:35,120 --> 00:09:37,920 Speaker 1: companies weren't huge fans of even that kind of copying 158 00:09:38,000 --> 00:09:41,800 Speaker 1: back in the day. So various media companies came up 159 00:09:41,840 --> 00:09:45,559 Speaker 1: with ways to limit or restrict how users could experience 160 00:09:45,640 --> 00:09:50,280 Speaker 1: and more specifically, how they could copy media. So, for example, 161 00:09:50,640 --> 00:09:53,600 Speaker 1: there might be copy protection on a file that only 162 00:09:53,640 --> 00:09:56,319 Speaker 1: allows it to be copied a certain amount of times 163 00:09:56,320 --> 00:09:59,559 Speaker 1: before it's lockdown, so you can only install this file 164 00:10:00,080 --> 00:10:02,880 Speaker 1: on a certain number of machines, and then after that 165 00:10:03,280 --> 00:10:05,960 Speaker 1: the code would not allow you to transfer it to 166 00:10:06,000 --> 00:10:10,000 Speaker 1: a new device. Um Or there might be DRM that 167 00:10:10,200 --> 00:10:14,360 Speaker 1: connects to the Internet where it phones home back to 168 00:10:14,480 --> 00:10:18,720 Speaker 1: whatever the I P holders system is and keeps them 169 00:10:18,760 --> 00:10:22,960 Speaker 1: informed about how that media is being used. The goal 170 00:10:23,040 --> 00:10:27,520 Speaker 1: of DRM is mostly to prevent piracy and to stop 171 00:10:27,559 --> 00:10:32,720 Speaker 1: the unlicensed sharing of technology, and I frequently think of 172 00:10:32,720 --> 00:10:35,520 Speaker 1: it in terms of media. That's the example that I 173 00:10:35,559 --> 00:10:39,120 Speaker 1: always go to. However, DRM can actually cover all sorts 174 00:10:39,160 --> 00:10:43,200 Speaker 1: of technologies beyond even digital files. That includes hardware, like 175 00:10:43,240 --> 00:10:48,400 Speaker 1: physical hardware, including stuff like tractors. So why tractors. Well, 176 00:10:48,480 --> 00:10:51,680 Speaker 1: let's say you're a company like John Dear, because John 177 00:10:51,760 --> 00:10:54,839 Speaker 1: Deer does this, and you make tractors, and you know 178 00:10:55,240 --> 00:10:57,600 Speaker 1: that somewhere down the line, people are going to need 179 00:10:57,640 --> 00:11:00,400 Speaker 1: to have those tractors repaired or have some sort of 180 00:11:00,440 --> 00:11:04,040 Speaker 1: maintenance done on them. By including dr M, you can 181 00:11:04,080 --> 00:11:07,800 Speaker 1: make sure that only licensed mechanics, which are people who 182 00:11:07,880 --> 00:11:10,880 Speaker 1: have paid you for the privilege of being able to 183 00:11:10,920 --> 00:11:13,600 Speaker 1: work on these types of machines. They're the only ones 184 00:11:13,600 --> 00:11:19,040 Speaker 1: who can legally repair John Dear tractors. Because the Digital 185 00:11:19,080 --> 00:11:22,840 Speaker 1: Millennium Copyright Act or d m c A made it 186 00:11:22,960 --> 00:11:27,679 Speaker 1: illegal to try and circumvent dr M, So even if 187 00:11:27,720 --> 00:11:31,360 Speaker 1: you were a mechanically savvy farmer and you wanted to 188 00:11:31,400 --> 00:11:34,520 Speaker 1: do your own repairs, you would not be allowed to 189 00:11:34,520 --> 00:11:37,319 Speaker 1: do that legally. You would have to break the law 190 00:11:37,360 --> 00:11:39,840 Speaker 1: because you'd have to get around the DRM to do it, 191 00:11:40,240 --> 00:11:42,480 Speaker 1: or I guess you could go through the trouble to 192 00:11:42,600 --> 00:11:45,800 Speaker 1: apply and become a licensed mechanic with John Dear, but 193 00:11:45,840 --> 00:11:48,960 Speaker 1: I think that's probably going too far. So one of 194 00:11:49,000 --> 00:11:52,120 Speaker 1: the really big issues with DRM is that it can 195 00:11:52,160 --> 00:11:56,520 Speaker 1: have unintended consequences and make it more difficult to legally 196 00:11:56,679 --> 00:11:59,920 Speaker 1: make use of a product that you've actually purchased yourself. 197 00:12:00,320 --> 00:12:04,760 Speaker 1: So in many ways, DRM can actually end up encouraging piracy. 198 00:12:05,120 --> 00:12:09,160 Speaker 1: And that's because frequently pirates will actually work to strip 199 00:12:09,320 --> 00:12:13,280 Speaker 1: DRM out of products. That removes all those restrictions, which 200 00:12:13,320 --> 00:12:16,520 Speaker 1: again affect not just people who are trying to steal stuff, 201 00:12:16,520 --> 00:12:20,160 Speaker 1: it affects people who have legitimately purchased things. The moral 202 00:12:20,240 --> 00:12:22,240 Speaker 1: of the story, I think is that if you make 203 00:12:22,320 --> 00:12:25,760 Speaker 1: it harder for people to use something legally, they are 204 00:12:25,840 --> 00:12:30,040 Speaker 1: far more likely to turn to illegal means to do so. Anyway, 205 00:12:30,160 --> 00:12:33,160 Speaker 1: dr M comes in all different forms, Some are less 206 00:12:33,160 --> 00:12:36,400 Speaker 1: obnoxious than others, and I do want to make this clear. 207 00:12:36,520 --> 00:12:39,760 Speaker 1: I get the motivation for using it. I mean, companies 208 00:12:39,840 --> 00:12:42,920 Speaker 1: make revenue off their intellectual property. They don't want to 209 00:12:42,920 --> 00:12:46,840 Speaker 1: see that go away, so it's in their best interests 210 00:12:46,920 --> 00:12:50,480 Speaker 1: to try and find ways to protect that. It's just 211 00:12:50,559 --> 00:12:53,319 Speaker 1: that a lot of the d r M approaches seem 212 00:12:53,400 --> 00:12:58,160 Speaker 1: to not quite achieve that goal and instead just create frustrations. 213 00:12:59,760 --> 00:13:03,760 Speaker 1: Net is DVD and I included this one because I mean, 214 00:13:03,800 --> 00:13:06,400 Speaker 1: I'm pretty sure everyone out there knows what a DVD is, 215 00:13:06,480 --> 00:13:09,840 Speaker 1: but the actual initialism used to trip me up all 216 00:13:09,840 --> 00:13:11,680 Speaker 1: the time, because I grew up in the era in 217 00:13:11,720 --> 00:13:15,720 Speaker 1: which compact discs or c d s first debuted and 218 00:13:15,800 --> 00:13:19,680 Speaker 1: they transformed the music industry, and then DVDs came around 219 00:13:19,720 --> 00:13:21,880 Speaker 1: to do the same for the home video market and 220 00:13:21,880 --> 00:13:25,880 Speaker 1: then beyond, so the humble VHS tape eventually faded away 221 00:13:25,880 --> 00:13:28,560 Speaker 1: as a result, And I always used to think that 222 00:13:28,679 --> 00:13:34,079 Speaker 1: DVD stood for digital video disc. But that ain't it, 223 00:13:34,320 --> 00:13:36,160 Speaker 1: or at least that's not the whole story. And I'm 224 00:13:36,160 --> 00:13:38,080 Speaker 1: sure a lot of you out there are way smarter 225 00:13:38,160 --> 00:13:40,200 Speaker 1: than I am, way more informed than I am, and 226 00:13:40,240 --> 00:13:44,280 Speaker 1: you're all shouting the real name, which is digital versatile 227 00:13:44,400 --> 00:13:48,160 Speaker 1: disc now, to be fair, at least according to some sources, 228 00:13:48,360 --> 00:13:52,480 Speaker 1: the original name was digital video disc. But at some 229 00:13:52,559 --> 00:13:56,080 Speaker 1: point the manufacturers who were putting this together figured that 230 00:13:56,679 --> 00:13:59,880 Speaker 1: this could give people the impression that DVDs are only 231 00:14:00,080 --> 00:14:05,000 Speaker 1: good for storing video content because people can get very 232 00:14:05,120 --> 00:14:08,240 Speaker 1: narrow focused on this sort of stuff. But of course 233 00:14:08,320 --> 00:14:12,720 Speaker 1: DVDs can hold all sorts of different types of digital information, 234 00:14:13,080 --> 00:14:16,920 Speaker 1: so that was why they swapped out video for versatile 235 00:14:17,400 --> 00:14:19,840 Speaker 1: that would replace video. Except no one really paid much 236 00:14:19,880 --> 00:14:22,880 Speaker 1: attention to that, and they just still called DVD digital 237 00:14:23,000 --> 00:14:26,800 Speaker 1: video disc or just DVD. They never bothered to call 238 00:14:26,880 --> 00:14:31,520 Speaker 1: it the full thing anyway. Light compact discs DVDs are 239 00:14:31,560 --> 00:14:34,600 Speaker 1: a type of optical storage, which means we use light 240 00:14:34,840 --> 00:14:38,800 Speaker 1: to read and write information on those discs. Companies like 241 00:14:38,880 --> 00:14:42,840 Speaker 1: Sony and Phillips started working on DVD technology not long 242 00:14:42,920 --> 00:14:47,360 Speaker 1: after releasing the first compact discs. So the c D 243 00:14:47,680 --> 00:14:51,600 Speaker 1: allowed for the storage of large digital files like high 244 00:14:51,680 --> 00:14:55,680 Speaker 1: quality audio files, but with a refinement, these companies knew 245 00:14:55,720 --> 00:14:59,080 Speaker 1: that they could cram even more information onto a disk. 246 00:14:59,600 --> 00:15:03,160 Speaker 1: So for about a decade uh two different big groups 247 00:15:03,200 --> 00:15:05,520 Speaker 1: of companies began to work on the next generation of 248 00:15:05,520 --> 00:15:09,720 Speaker 1: optical discs, and it came down to two competing formats. 249 00:15:09,760 --> 00:15:13,280 Speaker 1: So in this corna you had Sony and Phillips that 250 00:15:13,400 --> 00:15:17,120 Speaker 1: had developed a technology that they called the Multimedia c 251 00:15:17,320 --> 00:15:21,320 Speaker 1: D or m M c D, and in this corna 252 00:15:21,440 --> 00:15:24,440 Speaker 1: you had Tashiba and Time Warner a couple of other companies, 253 00:15:24,840 --> 00:15:27,800 Speaker 1: and they had really led the development on a format 254 00:15:27,840 --> 00:15:32,680 Speaker 1: called super Density discs or s D. Seeing how two 255 00:15:32,760 --> 00:15:36,760 Speaker 1: competing formats could ultimately hurt the market. As anyone who 256 00:15:36,800 --> 00:15:39,560 Speaker 1: has been a consumer during a format war can tell you, 257 00:15:40,000 --> 00:15:42,560 Speaker 1: the group's ultimately decided that it would make way more 258 00:15:42,600 --> 00:15:46,080 Speaker 1: sense for them to collaborate and make a common format 259 00:15:46,480 --> 00:15:49,680 Speaker 1: that combined elements of both s D and m M 260 00:15:49,920 --> 00:15:55,080 Speaker 1: c D. That is what became DVD. DVD players went 261 00:15:55,120 --> 00:15:58,840 Speaker 1: on sale in Japan in n took another year for 262 00:15:58,880 --> 00:16:01,120 Speaker 1: them to come out over in the United States. And 263 00:16:01,200 --> 00:16:04,280 Speaker 1: the DVD could really hold way more information than a 264 00:16:04,360 --> 00:16:06,640 Speaker 1: c D. In fact, if you had a dual layer, 265 00:16:06,800 --> 00:16:10,520 Speaker 1: double sided DVD, you can store more than ten times 266 00:16:10,560 --> 00:16:14,520 Speaker 1: the amount of information that could fit on a compact disc. Well, 267 00:16:14,880 --> 00:16:17,800 Speaker 1: we are finally through the d s. Everyone and when 268 00:16:17,880 --> 00:16:21,200 Speaker 1: we come back will jump on those ease. But I 269 00:16:21,200 --> 00:16:23,560 Speaker 1: only have a couple of them, so stay tuned. We're 270 00:16:23,560 --> 00:16:35,200 Speaker 1: gonna take a quick break, and our first e goes 271 00:16:35,280 --> 00:16:39,200 Speaker 1: to e f F. So in technology, this stands for 272 00:16:39,240 --> 00:16:44,760 Speaker 1: the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Back in a trio of guys 273 00:16:44,800 --> 00:16:48,960 Speaker 1: decided to form a nonprofit organization dedicated to defending civil 274 00:16:49,000 --> 00:16:53,400 Speaker 1: liberties in the digital world. And these founders included a 275 00:16:53,440 --> 00:16:56,000 Speaker 1: programmer who was perhaps best known for his role in 276 00:16:56,040 --> 00:17:00,160 Speaker 1: developing the spreadsheet software Lotus one, two three. That was 277 00:17:00,280 --> 00:17:04,399 Speaker 1: Mitch Kapor. Then there's an activist and developer named John 278 00:17:04,440 --> 00:17:08,320 Speaker 1: Gilmour who worked on many different types of software, including 279 00:17:08,720 --> 00:17:12,840 Speaker 1: tons of software under the GANOW license, so more about 280 00:17:12,880 --> 00:17:17,520 Speaker 1: GNU in the future. And then there was John Perry Barlow, 281 00:17:17,640 --> 00:17:22,480 Speaker 1: who was, among many many other things, a lyricist for 282 00:17:22,520 --> 00:17:26,159 Speaker 1: the band The Grateful Dead. Now, those three men shared 283 00:17:26,200 --> 00:17:29,280 Speaker 1: a common passion for the defense of civil liberties, and 284 00:17:29,280 --> 00:17:32,679 Speaker 1: they saw technology as being both a great enabler of 285 00:17:32,760 --> 00:17:36,080 Speaker 1: liberty as well as a potential threat to it depending 286 00:17:36,080 --> 00:17:39,560 Speaker 1: on how it's used. The inciting incident that led to 287 00:17:39,600 --> 00:17:42,119 Speaker 1: the formation of the e f F revolved around a 288 00:17:42,200 --> 00:17:46,280 Speaker 1: games publisher called Steve Jackson Games. And when I say 289 00:17:46,359 --> 00:17:50,480 Speaker 1: games publisher, I mean hard copy stuff like board games 290 00:17:50,520 --> 00:17:53,600 Speaker 1: and role playing games and card games, not video games 291 00:17:53,640 --> 00:17:57,159 Speaker 1: or computer games. So some famous ones include shay Geek, 292 00:17:57,400 --> 00:18:00,280 Speaker 1: which is sort of a comedy card game, or money Skin, 293 00:18:00,520 --> 00:18:05,919 Speaker 1: another comedy card game, This one fantasy oriented. There's Illuminati, 294 00:18:05,960 --> 00:18:09,440 Speaker 1: which is a game of various conspiracies competing against each 295 00:18:09,440 --> 00:18:12,880 Speaker 1: other in a way. And then there's girp's the Generic 296 00:18:13,000 --> 00:18:16,280 Speaker 1: Universal role Playing System and their tons of other ones. 297 00:18:16,800 --> 00:18:20,320 Speaker 1: So what does a company that makes board games and 298 00:18:20,440 --> 00:18:23,000 Speaker 1: RPGs and card games have to do with the e 299 00:18:23,160 --> 00:18:27,040 Speaker 1: f FF. Well, back in nine Steve Jackson had his 300 00:18:27,080 --> 00:18:30,960 Speaker 1: company headquarters in Austin, Texas, and they were raided by 301 00:18:31,000 --> 00:18:36,840 Speaker 1: the Secret Service. What all, right, now, stay with me. So, 302 00:18:37,000 --> 00:18:41,399 Speaker 1: in the late eighties, someone got hold of a proprietary 303 00:18:41,560 --> 00:18:45,320 Speaker 1: document that belonged to Bell South. They were able to 304 00:18:45,720 --> 00:18:48,600 Speaker 1: get hold of this and then they shared it. That 305 00:18:48,680 --> 00:18:52,840 Speaker 1: document pertained to the nine one one emergency system, and 306 00:18:52,880 --> 00:18:56,080 Speaker 1: the fear was that if hackers were able to exploit 307 00:18:56,119 --> 00:18:59,280 Speaker 1: that system, they might come up the works and thus 308 00:18:59,320 --> 00:19:02,000 Speaker 1: people who actually had to report emergencies would have no 309 00:19:02,040 --> 00:19:04,720 Speaker 1: way of doing it. So it represented sort of a 310 00:19:04,760 --> 00:19:07,920 Speaker 1: major threat. The Secret Service got involved to find out 311 00:19:08,000 --> 00:19:10,959 Speaker 1: who was at fault, who had who was responsible, and 312 00:19:11,000 --> 00:19:14,240 Speaker 1: to to go after them, and they found that the 313 00:19:14,320 --> 00:19:19,320 Speaker 1: document had been posted on a bulletin board system or BBS. Now, 314 00:19:19,359 --> 00:19:22,879 Speaker 1: I guess I could have included BBS in our tech glossary, 315 00:19:22,960 --> 00:19:27,560 Speaker 1: but BBS is a pretty outdated term these days. It's 316 00:19:27,600 --> 00:19:31,200 Speaker 1: essentially a predecessor to the kind of stuff you would 317 00:19:31,200 --> 00:19:34,720 Speaker 1: see with the Internet, where someone would have special software 318 00:19:35,080 --> 00:19:37,800 Speaker 1: that would allow other people to dial into their computer 319 00:19:38,119 --> 00:19:40,040 Speaker 1: so their computer could host all sorts of stuff like 320 00:19:40,080 --> 00:19:43,240 Speaker 1: message boards and games and files and that kind of thing. 321 00:19:43,600 --> 00:19:47,440 Speaker 1: People could dial into that computer or BBS and access 322 00:19:47,480 --> 00:19:52,199 Speaker 1: those things anyway. The guy who ran this particular BBS, 323 00:19:52,200 --> 00:19:56,040 Speaker 1: but again not necessarily the actual person responsible for posting 324 00:19:56,119 --> 00:19:59,920 Speaker 1: the file there, was an employee of Steve Jackson Game. 325 00:20:00,560 --> 00:20:03,480 Speaker 1: So the Secret Service decided they would seize all of 326 00:20:03,520 --> 00:20:06,359 Speaker 1: this guy's computers, but they would also seize all of 327 00:20:06,400 --> 00:20:09,280 Speaker 1: the computers of his employer to make certain that this 328 00:20:09,359 --> 00:20:15,040 Speaker 1: proprietary document wasn't getting spread around. This was a crushing 329 00:20:15,359 --> 00:20:18,720 Speaker 1: blow to Steve Jackson Games and Steve Jackson himself. His 330 00:20:18,760 --> 00:20:21,960 Speaker 1: company just couldn't conduct business while the computers were in 331 00:20:22,000 --> 00:20:26,400 Speaker 1: Secret Service custody, and eventually Steve Jackson Games got their 332 00:20:26,400 --> 00:20:29,399 Speaker 1: computers back, but it was clear that the Secret Service 333 00:20:29,400 --> 00:20:32,960 Speaker 1: had really combed through the internal emails inside the company, 334 00:20:33,200 --> 00:20:36,800 Speaker 1: and Steve Jackson wanted to pursue civil action against the 335 00:20:36,840 --> 00:20:40,199 Speaker 1: Secret Service for damages and wanted to lean on a 336 00:20:40,240 --> 00:20:44,920 Speaker 1: civil rights organization to help with that lawsuit, but there 337 00:20:44,960 --> 00:20:49,120 Speaker 1: really wasn't such any organization in existence that would really 338 00:20:49,160 --> 00:20:53,240 Speaker 1: fit the bill. That's what precipitated the formation of the 339 00:20:53,280 --> 00:20:58,439 Speaker 1: Electronic Frontier Foundation. Today, the e f F helps in 340 00:20:58,680 --> 00:21:02,919 Speaker 1: similar legal cases that revolve around civil liberties and technology. 341 00:21:03,200 --> 00:21:07,320 Speaker 1: The e f F sometimes helps fund lawsuits or supplies 342 00:21:07,400 --> 00:21:11,920 Speaker 1: expertise in technical and digital matters, and the organization isn't 343 00:21:11,960 --> 00:21:14,560 Speaker 1: without critics. There's some people who argue that the e 344 00:21:14,760 --> 00:21:17,920 Speaker 1: f F has really helped tech companies kind of entrenched 345 00:21:17,920 --> 00:21:22,760 Speaker 1: themselves and protect themselves against regulation and other matters that 346 00:21:24,000 --> 00:21:27,399 Speaker 1: maybe didn't lead to the right outcome. But you know, 347 00:21:27,800 --> 00:21:30,600 Speaker 1: it's it's kind of like anything with humans. There's stuff 348 00:21:30,600 --> 00:21:34,879 Speaker 1: that is good and stuff that's not so good. Next, 349 00:21:34,920 --> 00:21:37,439 Speaker 1: we have e O L. So in the movie Tron, 350 00:21:38,040 --> 00:21:40,560 Speaker 1: e O L was the Master Control programs way of 351 00:21:40,680 --> 00:21:43,080 Speaker 1: ending a line of communication. I mean it literally meant 352 00:21:43,359 --> 00:21:46,040 Speaker 1: end of line. There's the end of Line club in 353 00:21:46,080 --> 00:21:49,440 Speaker 1: the Tron Legacy film. But in this case, I actually 354 00:21:49,440 --> 00:21:53,119 Speaker 1: mean e O L as end of life, meaning the 355 00:21:53,160 --> 00:21:55,600 Speaker 1: stage of a products life cycle. In which it's just 356 00:21:55,640 --> 00:21:59,120 Speaker 1: gonna get worse from here on out. So, for example, 357 00:21:59,520 --> 00:22:02,919 Speaker 1: let's take Windows XP, which is a very or was 358 00:22:02,960 --> 00:22:06,160 Speaker 1: a very popular operating system. There's still people out there 359 00:22:06,160 --> 00:22:08,719 Speaker 1: who are using it today, despite the fact that it's 360 00:22:08,760 --> 00:22:12,520 Speaker 1: sadly outdated. Microsoft released Windows XP way back in two 361 00:22:12,520 --> 00:22:15,480 Speaker 1: thousand one, and that system dominated the market share for 362 00:22:15,520 --> 00:22:19,360 Speaker 1: operating systems on personal computers at the time. And while 363 00:22:19,400 --> 00:22:23,120 Speaker 1: Microsoft would release the successor to Windows XP in two 364 00:22:23,160 --> 00:22:26,639 Speaker 1: thousand and seven, it actually continued to release service packs 365 00:22:26,680 --> 00:22:30,200 Speaker 1: for Windows XP up through two thousand eight, and even 366 00:22:30,240 --> 00:22:34,280 Speaker 1: provided extended support until two thousand fourteen. But by then 367 00:22:34,440 --> 00:22:37,520 Speaker 1: Microsoft was really pushing people to please, for the love 368 00:22:37,560 --> 00:22:41,880 Speaker 1: of technology, update to a more recent operating system. Companies 369 00:22:42,200 --> 00:22:46,520 Speaker 1: can't continue to support old software indefinitely and still dedicate 370 00:22:46,560 --> 00:22:51,359 Speaker 1: resources to making new stuff. Plus, fewer pieces of current 371 00:22:51,440 --> 00:22:55,119 Speaker 1: software were actually compatible with this older Windows operating system, 372 00:22:55,440 --> 00:22:58,280 Speaker 1: and so really, by two thousand eight, Windows XP was 373 00:22:58,440 --> 00:23:02,160 Speaker 1: entering its e o L phase. Microsoft would stop updating 374 00:23:02,160 --> 00:23:05,840 Speaker 1: it and the product would grow increasingly obsolete over time. 375 00:23:06,520 --> 00:23:09,880 Speaker 1: Another example of e o L is easy to see 376 00:23:09,880 --> 00:23:13,760 Speaker 1: with smartphones. Smartphones depend upon the interaction of hardware, that 377 00:23:13,840 --> 00:23:18,200 Speaker 1: being the actual smartphone mobile device and software that being 378 00:23:18,200 --> 00:23:21,120 Speaker 1: the operating system for that device, on top of which 379 00:23:21,160 --> 00:23:24,800 Speaker 1: all the apps live. So with Apple, we are now 380 00:23:24,880 --> 00:23:28,520 Speaker 1: on IO S Sport Team, and the oldest iPhone capable 381 00:23:28,600 --> 00:23:32,439 Speaker 1: of running that version of iOS is the iPhone six S. 382 00:23:32,680 --> 00:23:34,680 Speaker 1: That one is the one that originally launched in two 383 00:23:34,680 --> 00:23:38,959 Speaker 1: thousand fifteen. Older iPhones before the success, even if they 384 00:23:38,960 --> 00:23:42,000 Speaker 1: are still operational, are firmly in the e o L 385 00:23:42,080 --> 00:23:44,399 Speaker 1: phase because they can no longer keep pace with the 386 00:23:44,480 --> 00:23:47,480 Speaker 1: latest operating systems, which means fewer apps are going to 387 00:23:47,600 --> 00:23:51,360 Speaker 1: run on them and they will become increasingly useless as 388 00:23:51,359 --> 00:23:55,440 Speaker 1: time goes on. For companies, e OL might arrive much 389 00:23:55,440 --> 00:23:59,120 Speaker 1: earlier than for customers, so a company will end sales 390 00:23:59,160 --> 00:24:01,960 Speaker 1: and marketing effort around a product that it designates as 391 00:24:02,000 --> 00:24:04,720 Speaker 1: being in e o L. Essentially, the company says, we're 392 00:24:04,760 --> 00:24:06,719 Speaker 1: no longer going to sell this stuff. We're going to 393 00:24:06,720 --> 00:24:09,440 Speaker 1: sell the next version of this or you know, some 394 00:24:09,560 --> 00:24:12,920 Speaker 1: improved version of this, and they focus on that instead. 395 00:24:13,160 --> 00:24:16,600 Speaker 1: So they say we're done dedicating resources to supporting this 396 00:24:17,200 --> 00:24:20,280 Speaker 1: so that we can sell more stuff, more new stuff. 397 00:24:20,520 --> 00:24:23,160 Speaker 1: So a company could actually start stop selling a product 398 00:24:23,600 --> 00:24:26,280 Speaker 1: but continue supporting it for a while longer. In the 399 00:24:26,280 --> 00:24:30,200 Speaker 1: case of Microsoft, for example, they stopped selling XP long 400 00:24:30,280 --> 00:24:34,919 Speaker 1: before they stopped actually providing support for it. Next is 401 00:24:35,000 --> 00:24:37,760 Speaker 1: fact f a Q. I included this one even though 402 00:24:37,800 --> 00:24:40,959 Speaker 1: I think probably everyone listening to this already knows it. 403 00:24:41,480 --> 00:24:45,240 Speaker 1: It of course stands for frequently asked questions. Anyone who 404 00:24:45,240 --> 00:24:47,879 Speaker 1: has ever served as a point of contact for any 405 00:24:48,080 --> 00:24:52,320 Speaker 1: organization knows that of the time, you're answering the same 406 00:24:52,359 --> 00:24:56,000 Speaker 1: basic questions repeatedly throughout the day. So one way to 407 00:24:56,040 --> 00:24:59,240 Speaker 1: address that is to create a fact and that has 408 00:24:59,280 --> 00:25:02,800 Speaker 1: those basic answers already in there, so people can see 409 00:25:02,840 --> 00:25:05,399 Speaker 1: them right off the bat. So when people use the fact, 410 00:25:05,680 --> 00:25:07,880 Speaker 1: it frees up the time of the person who otherwise 411 00:25:07,920 --> 00:25:11,080 Speaker 1: would have to respond, and you know, it just makes 412 00:25:11,119 --> 00:25:15,200 Speaker 1: it easier to find answers. In general, the term fact 413 00:25:15,240 --> 00:25:19,359 Speaker 1: actually predates the web, possibly emerging from the electronic mailing 414 00:25:19,400 --> 00:25:23,240 Speaker 1: lists and Usenet groups in the nineteen eighties. Next, we 415 00:25:23,320 --> 00:25:28,160 Speaker 1: have f c C. This stands for the Federal Communications Commission, 416 00:25:28,359 --> 00:25:31,600 Speaker 1: part of the United States government. It's easiest for me 417 00:25:31,680 --> 00:25:34,560 Speaker 1: to just quote the f CC's website to describe what 418 00:25:34,640 --> 00:25:38,639 Speaker 1: it does. So here it is quote The Federal Communications 419 00:25:38,640 --> 00:25:44,959 Speaker 1: Commission regulates interstate and international communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, 420 00:25:45,160 --> 00:25:48,600 Speaker 1: and cable in all fifty states, the District of Columbia, 421 00:25:48,960 --> 00:25:53,760 Speaker 1: and US territories. An independent US government agency overseen by Congress, 422 00:25:53,960 --> 00:25:57,439 Speaker 1: the Commission is the federal agency responsible for implementing and 423 00:25:57,600 --> 00:26:03,800 Speaker 1: enforcing America's communications laws and regulations. So that organization formed 424 00:26:03,840 --> 00:26:07,119 Speaker 1: after the passing of the Communications Act of nineteen thirty four, 425 00:26:07,400 --> 00:26:10,840 Speaker 1: and it has helped shape the landscape of technology quite 426 00:26:10,840 --> 00:26:13,760 Speaker 1: a bit in the United States, sometimes for the better 427 00:26:14,040 --> 00:26:18,240 Speaker 1: and sometimes not. The FCC is supposed to promote competition 428 00:26:18,280 --> 00:26:22,960 Speaker 1: between various communications companies while also encouraging innovation and investment 429 00:26:23,080 --> 00:26:26,679 Speaker 1: in services so that people get access to stuff like 430 00:26:26,720 --> 00:26:31,360 Speaker 1: broadband connectivity. But a quick look at the telecommunications landscape 431 00:26:31,359 --> 00:26:33,719 Speaker 1: in America tells you that for a lot of folks, 432 00:26:33,800 --> 00:26:37,479 Speaker 1: the whole competition thing really isn't a thing. It's not 433 00:26:37,520 --> 00:26:41,679 Speaker 1: that prominent. I mean, over the years, through various mergers 434 00:26:41,720 --> 00:26:45,160 Speaker 1: and acquisitions, we've seen many regions get carved out by 435 00:26:45,240 --> 00:26:49,040 Speaker 1: one or maybe two telecommunications companies. And I don't know 436 00:26:49,080 --> 00:26:51,600 Speaker 1: what it's like where you live, however, at my home, 437 00:26:51,800 --> 00:26:53,840 Speaker 1: because I checked it this morning, just to make sure. 438 00:26:54,520 --> 00:26:59,280 Speaker 1: We only have one telecommunications provider that offers connectivity at 439 00:26:59,359 --> 00:27:03,800 Speaker 1: high speed needs at my place, and even that isn't fiber. 440 00:27:03,880 --> 00:27:06,679 Speaker 1: I don't get fiber connectivity where I live. And I 441 00:27:06,720 --> 00:27:09,920 Speaker 1: live in the city of Atlanta, y'all. I mean, I'm 442 00:27:10,200 --> 00:27:12,800 Speaker 1: not in like the sticks or something. I'm in the 443 00:27:12,800 --> 00:27:16,680 Speaker 1: city limits. But enough about me griping about my personal 444 00:27:17,000 --> 00:27:21,160 Speaker 1: lack of connectivity. The FCC has also played an inconsistent 445 00:27:21,280 --> 00:27:25,040 Speaker 1: role in terms of ensuring net neutrality in the United States. 446 00:27:25,240 --> 00:27:28,240 Speaker 1: The concept of net neutrality includes a lot of stuff, 447 00:27:28,560 --> 00:27:31,520 Speaker 1: but one of the big ones is all content should 448 00:27:31,520 --> 00:27:35,480 Speaker 1: be treated equally across all service providers. So, in other words, 449 00:27:35,840 --> 00:27:37,920 Speaker 1: if there's a company that's both an I s P 450 00:27:38,400 --> 00:27:41,879 Speaker 1: and a content company, that I s P should not 451 00:27:42,000 --> 00:27:46,200 Speaker 1: prioritize its own traffic over that from other content providers. 452 00:27:46,720 --> 00:27:49,440 Speaker 1: There's a lot more to it than that. Net neutrality 453 00:27:49,520 --> 00:27:54,080 Speaker 1: is a very big topic, and during certain political administrations, 454 00:27:54,080 --> 00:27:57,000 Speaker 1: the FCC has pushed to create rules and policies that 455 00:27:57,080 --> 00:28:01,399 Speaker 1: strengthen net neutrality, such as under the Obama administration, while 456 00:28:01,440 --> 00:28:05,640 Speaker 1: in others the FCC has largely dismantled those same systems, 457 00:28:05,680 --> 00:28:09,359 Speaker 1: such as during Trump's presidency fun times. And the reason 458 00:28:09,400 --> 00:28:11,600 Speaker 1: for that change, by the way, is that the leadership 459 00:28:11,720 --> 00:28:15,680 Speaker 1: of the f c C comes by appointment by whomever 460 00:28:15,880 --> 00:28:20,320 Speaker 1: is president at that time, and so as presidential administrations change, 461 00:28:20,640 --> 00:28:24,400 Speaker 1: so too does the f c C. Anyway, you'll hear 462 00:28:24,440 --> 00:28:27,400 Speaker 1: a lot about the FCC being involved in various tech 463 00:28:27,440 --> 00:28:33,280 Speaker 1: related issues here in the United States. Next up flops. Now, 464 00:28:33,320 --> 00:28:36,320 Speaker 1: this doesn't just describe that one stage play I was 465 00:28:36,359 --> 00:28:38,920 Speaker 1: in back in two thousand two. Now, this is an 466 00:28:38,960 --> 00:28:43,560 Speaker 1: acronym that stands for floating point operations per second. So 467 00:28:43,720 --> 00:28:45,800 Speaker 1: if you remember when I talked about c p U 468 00:28:45,960 --> 00:28:49,120 Speaker 1: s in the previous episode, I mentioned that we measure 469 00:28:49,160 --> 00:28:52,840 Speaker 1: their performance in part by clock cycles, which is kind 470 00:28:52,880 --> 00:28:56,840 Speaker 1: of like how many instructions the CPU can execute per second. 471 00:28:57,440 --> 00:29:00,480 Speaker 1: But there's another way to measure computer perform mormants, and 472 00:29:00,520 --> 00:29:03,440 Speaker 1: that's in how many floating point operations it can handle 473 00:29:03,480 --> 00:29:07,160 Speaker 1: per second. So what is a floating point Well, you 474 00:29:07,160 --> 00:29:10,720 Speaker 1: can think of it as being similar to scientific note notation, 475 00:29:10,840 --> 00:29:14,200 Speaker 1: So you know, really big or really small numbers are 476 00:29:14,240 --> 00:29:17,400 Speaker 1: difficult to handle, even for computers, especially computers that have 477 00:29:17,440 --> 00:29:20,080 Speaker 1: to handle both at the same time. A computer has 478 00:29:20,120 --> 00:29:23,160 Speaker 1: a limit to how many digits it can hold at 479 00:29:23,200 --> 00:29:26,120 Speaker 1: any given moment. So floating points are a way to 480 00:29:26,200 --> 00:29:30,200 Speaker 1: indicate very large or very small numbers and makes them 481 00:29:30,280 --> 00:29:34,240 Speaker 1: much easier to handle and process. When we talk about supercomputers, 482 00:29:34,240 --> 00:29:37,040 Speaker 1: we typically refer to the number of flops those computers 483 00:29:37,040 --> 00:29:41,640 Speaker 1: can handle. The fastest supercomputer by this metric today is 484 00:29:41,680 --> 00:29:46,640 Speaker 1: the Fugaku, which is incredible. It's set an insane record 485 00:29:46,960 --> 00:29:51,200 Speaker 1: of four hundred forty two headah flops using the HPL 486 00:29:51,320 --> 00:29:54,520 Speaker 1: computer benchmark. It's a way of testing how many floating 487 00:29:54,520 --> 00:29:58,240 Speaker 1: operations are floating point operations I should say a computer 488 00:29:58,320 --> 00:30:02,160 Speaker 1: can complete in a second. So in the tech world, uh, 489 00:30:02,320 --> 00:30:04,440 Speaker 1: what does peda flop mean? Well, we use the word 490 00:30:04,520 --> 00:30:07,560 Speaker 1: kilo or the prefix kilo for thousand, we use mega 491 00:30:07,840 --> 00:30:12,200 Speaker 1: for a million, Giga for billion, terra for trillion, and 492 00:30:12,280 --> 00:30:17,080 Speaker 1: petta is for quadrillion, which means the Fugaku supercomputer reached 493 00:30:17,160 --> 00:30:21,640 Speaker 1: four hundred forty two quadrillion floating point operations per second 494 00:30:21,960 --> 00:30:25,800 Speaker 1: against this particular benchmark, which is pretty astounding, right. But 495 00:30:25,840 --> 00:30:29,520 Speaker 1: according to Tech Republic, Fugaku was also able to achieve 496 00:30:29,880 --> 00:30:33,680 Speaker 1: two point oh exa flops against the benchmark of high 497 00:30:33,680 --> 00:30:40,360 Speaker 1: performance computing Artificial intelligence workload or hpc AI another benchmark test. 498 00:30:40,880 --> 00:30:45,680 Speaker 1: So an exa flop is one quintillion flops. It's even 499 00:30:45,760 --> 00:30:48,640 Speaker 1: more like it's just the sucker is fast, is what 500 00:30:48,680 --> 00:30:52,840 Speaker 1: I'm saying. But typically when we're talking about flops, we're 501 00:30:52,840 --> 00:30:56,760 Speaker 1: talking about high performance compute. We're not talking about you know, 502 00:30:56,880 --> 00:31:01,120 Speaker 1: your standard laptop. Next is FPS. This one's actually tricky 503 00:31:01,160 --> 00:31:04,440 Speaker 1: because there are a few different FPS initialisms, and some 504 00:31:04,520 --> 00:31:07,000 Speaker 1: of them can actually apply to the same stuff but 505 00:31:07,080 --> 00:31:10,240 Speaker 1: in different ways. So, for example, in the world of 506 00:31:10,320 --> 00:31:14,520 Speaker 1: video games, you can have FPS, meaning a first person shooter, 507 00:31:14,840 --> 00:31:16,880 Speaker 1: which is a type of game in which your perspective 508 00:31:16,960 --> 00:31:19,400 Speaker 1: is from the first person point of view and you 509 00:31:19,480 --> 00:31:23,720 Speaker 1: run around, you know, shooting stuff. But FPS can also 510 00:31:23,880 --> 00:31:27,680 Speaker 1: stand for frames per second, as in the number of 511 00:31:27,800 --> 00:31:32,480 Speaker 1: rendered frames presented to a viewer each second, and this 512 00:31:32,600 --> 00:31:35,480 Speaker 1: version of FPS can apply to all sorts of games, 513 00:31:35,560 --> 00:31:38,840 Speaker 1: including first person shooter games, So you can talk about 514 00:31:38,880 --> 00:31:42,120 Speaker 1: the FPS for an FPS, which is a lot of fun. 515 00:31:42,240 --> 00:31:46,360 Speaker 1: Right anyway, frames per second is important for creating a 516 00:31:46,480 --> 00:31:50,400 Speaker 1: smooth video experience. So our vision tricks us if we 517 00:31:50,480 --> 00:31:53,640 Speaker 1: see a series of similar images and they're presented to 518 00:31:53,720 --> 00:31:56,680 Speaker 1: us in quick succession. We experienced this as if we're 519 00:31:56,720 --> 00:31:59,920 Speaker 1: watching something that's actually in motion, that the image itself 520 00:32:00,080 --> 00:32:03,320 Speaker 1: is moving. That's the whole basic foundation for film and 521 00:32:03,400 --> 00:32:06,880 Speaker 1: for animation. So with a classic film like something that's 522 00:32:06,920 --> 00:32:11,200 Speaker 1: actually on film itself, we watched the playback of images 523 00:32:11,280 --> 00:32:14,240 Speaker 1: at a rate of twenty four frames per second. That's 524 00:32:14,240 --> 00:32:16,440 Speaker 1: fast enough to make it seem as though we're watching 525 00:32:16,640 --> 00:32:19,600 Speaker 1: moving images, but in fact, if you just stop the projector, 526 00:32:20,000 --> 00:32:24,280 Speaker 1: you would see you're just looking at a series of photographs. Well, 527 00:32:24,280 --> 00:32:27,800 Speaker 1: in the digital world, fps is important too, and a 528 00:32:27,920 --> 00:32:31,200 Speaker 1: higher FPS typically means a better experience for the viewer, 529 00:32:31,560 --> 00:32:35,120 Speaker 1: particularly with video games. Higher FPS can help a gamer 530 00:32:35,160 --> 00:32:38,360 Speaker 1: make better choices while playing and time things out just right, 531 00:32:38,480 --> 00:32:40,640 Speaker 1: picking up on details that they might miss if they 532 00:32:40,640 --> 00:32:44,280 Speaker 1: had a lower FPS. But just as we saw with resolution, 533 00:32:44,360 --> 00:32:47,239 Speaker 1: there's a law of diminishing returns at play here, so 534 00:32:47,280 --> 00:32:50,240 Speaker 1: once you get over a certain FPS, which varies from 535 00:32:50,240 --> 00:32:54,320 Speaker 1: person to person, the benefits become less obvious as they 536 00:32:54,320 --> 00:32:57,640 Speaker 1: crank up. There are other fps is within the tech 537 00:32:57,680 --> 00:33:01,040 Speaker 1: world to like fast packet switching that refers to how 538 00:33:01,080 --> 00:33:05,200 Speaker 1: certain systems handled data transmissions across the system, but there's 539 00:33:05,240 --> 00:33:07,800 Speaker 1: no need to jump into all that here, All right, 540 00:33:08,960 --> 00:33:11,440 Speaker 1: I got a couple more f's to get through after 541 00:33:11,480 --> 00:33:22,840 Speaker 1: this break, so stick around for f's sake. Next up, 542 00:33:22,840 --> 00:33:25,200 Speaker 1: we got the f t C, and we're back to 543 00:33:25,280 --> 00:33:28,440 Speaker 1: another U. S government agency similar to what we talked 544 00:33:28,440 --> 00:33:31,640 Speaker 1: about with f c C, but the f t C 545 00:33:32,200 --> 00:33:35,560 Speaker 1: stands for the Federal Trade Commission. So while the f 546 00:33:35,680 --> 00:33:38,960 Speaker 1: c C specifically focuses on laws and regulations that relate 547 00:33:39,000 --> 00:33:43,120 Speaker 1: to communications, which includes telecommunications and the Internet and radio 548 00:33:43,160 --> 00:33:46,680 Speaker 1: and etcetera, the f t C is primarily focused on 549 00:33:46,800 --> 00:33:50,880 Speaker 1: enforcing antitrust laws and protecting consumers in the United States. 550 00:33:51,360 --> 00:33:54,200 Speaker 1: So in this case, the word trust refers to an 551 00:33:54,320 --> 00:33:58,160 Speaker 1: entity or sometimes a small group of entities that dominates 552 00:33:58,320 --> 00:34:02,560 Speaker 1: an industry and uses areas means to maintain that dominance 553 00:34:02,960 --> 00:34:06,440 Speaker 1: by keeping other companies from being able to compete. So 554 00:34:06,920 --> 00:34:11,719 Speaker 1: that can include stuff like fixing prices to undercut smaller competitors, 555 00:34:11,760 --> 00:34:16,040 Speaker 1: and these smaller competitors might not have the financial ability 556 00:34:16,120 --> 00:34:19,880 Speaker 1: to survive and they're effectively starved out because the dominant 557 00:34:19,880 --> 00:34:23,280 Speaker 1: company could sell stuff at a loss and just endure 558 00:34:23,360 --> 00:34:26,560 Speaker 1: that loss while waiting for the other businesses to die, 559 00:34:26,960 --> 00:34:29,920 Speaker 1: and at that point the company can then drive prices 560 00:34:29,960 --> 00:34:33,120 Speaker 1: way up because there's no competition for consumers to turn to. 561 00:34:33,719 --> 00:34:36,200 Speaker 1: So the FTC gets involved in a lot of the 562 00:34:36,239 --> 00:34:39,839 Speaker 1: tech world because we see some massive consolidations going on 563 00:34:40,120 --> 00:34:44,800 Speaker 1: within the space, whether it's Facebook gobbling up another social platform, 564 00:34:44,920 --> 00:34:49,360 Speaker 1: or Amazon buying up another marketplace, either real world or online, 565 00:34:49,880 --> 00:34:53,360 Speaker 1: or Google buying up pretty much everything in sight. The 566 00:34:53,480 --> 00:34:56,880 Speaker 1: FTC plays apart in making certain that companies are playing 567 00:34:56,880 --> 00:35:00,239 Speaker 1: by the rules, and like the f c C, this 568 00:35:00,360 --> 00:35:04,600 Speaker 1: isn't always you know, apparent, but then I guess it 569 00:35:04,600 --> 00:35:07,560 Speaker 1: all depends on how you interpret what the rules actually are. 570 00:35:08,000 --> 00:35:11,239 Speaker 1: On the consumer protection side, the FTC is also the 571 00:35:11,320 --> 00:35:16,360 Speaker 1: agency responsible for enforcing stuff like KAPPA, the Children's Online 572 00:35:16,400 --> 00:35:19,840 Speaker 1: Privacy Protection Act that we recently talked about. Because KAPPA 573 00:35:19,920 --> 00:35:23,120 Speaker 1: mostly relates to how companies collect and use children's information 574 00:35:23,160 --> 00:35:26,319 Speaker 1: by using the Internet, you might be tempted to think 575 00:35:26,360 --> 00:35:28,960 Speaker 1: that it's the f c C that would be in charge, 576 00:35:29,120 --> 00:35:31,640 Speaker 1: but that's just not the case. So it can get 577 00:35:31,680 --> 00:35:34,200 Speaker 1: a bit confusing when you're talking about the f c 578 00:35:34,440 --> 00:35:38,399 Speaker 1: C versus the f TC, and I sometimes mix up 579 00:35:38,440 --> 00:35:41,680 Speaker 1: the two myself. I've been guilty of it. The FTC, however, 580 00:35:41,800 --> 00:35:44,120 Speaker 1: is also older than the f c C. It traces 581 00:35:44,200 --> 00:35:48,640 Speaker 1: its history all the way back to nineteen fourteen. Moving 582 00:35:48,640 --> 00:35:52,840 Speaker 1: on f TP. You down with f TP, Yeah, you 583 00:35:52,880 --> 00:35:56,640 Speaker 1: know me? All right, I'm kind of dating myself here. 584 00:35:56,719 --> 00:36:00,120 Speaker 1: I'm actually very curious if producer Tari even recognized is 585 00:36:00,160 --> 00:36:04,240 Speaker 1: that reference? Okay? So, f t P stands for File 586 00:36:04,480 --> 00:36:07,719 Speaker 1: Transfer Protocol, and a protocol is just a set of 587 00:36:07,840 --> 00:36:11,880 Speaker 1: rules or instructions. So from a high level, this is 588 00:36:11,920 --> 00:36:16,280 Speaker 1: the set of rules that the guide how you transfer 589 00:36:16,360 --> 00:36:18,799 Speaker 1: files across networks. And when I say you, I really 590 00:36:18,840 --> 00:36:24,280 Speaker 1: mean how systems transfer files from one machine to another 591 00:36:24,440 --> 00:36:28,080 Speaker 1: across a network. It's one of the underlying technologies for 592 00:36:28,120 --> 00:36:31,680 Speaker 1: the Internet, with others being things like email and the 593 00:36:31,719 --> 00:36:35,479 Speaker 1: World Wide Web and stuff like that. FTP is also 594 00:36:35,520 --> 00:36:38,160 Speaker 1: one of the older protocols with regard to the Internet. 595 00:36:38,239 --> 00:36:42,680 Speaker 1: It was first outlined back in ninete. And that's it 596 00:36:42,760 --> 00:36:46,319 Speaker 1: for the f Alright, let's move on to g and 597 00:36:46,400 --> 00:36:49,680 Speaker 1: first up, we've got g d p R and we 598 00:36:49,719 --> 00:36:52,800 Speaker 1: start off with a biggie. This stands for General Data 599 00:36:52,840 --> 00:36:56,840 Speaker 1: Protection Regulation and it refers to a regulation in in 600 00:36:56,960 --> 00:37:01,319 Speaker 1: law in the European Union, and it concerns itself with 601 00:37:01,400 --> 00:37:06,239 Speaker 1: the privacy and data protection of EU citizens. So in 602 00:37:06,280 --> 00:37:09,960 Speaker 1: the EU member countries drafted out rules to protect privacy 603 00:37:09,960 --> 00:37:13,279 Speaker 1: and personal information and gave EU citizens more of a 604 00:37:13,400 --> 00:37:16,480 Speaker 1: say in how their data could be collected and used. 605 00:37:17,040 --> 00:37:20,520 Speaker 1: G d PR puts the onus on companies to follow 606 00:37:20,600 --> 00:37:25,800 Speaker 1: these rules or potentially face huge fines. Over in the 607 00:37:25,880 --> 00:37:29,920 Speaker 1: United States, the explosive growth of the Internet far outpaced 608 00:37:30,000 --> 00:37:35,400 Speaker 1: privacy laws, which in the US of been fairly lucy 609 00:37:35,440 --> 00:37:38,279 Speaker 1: goosey like there's only a few privacy laws or like 610 00:37:38,400 --> 00:37:42,240 Speaker 1: outright privacy laws in the United States. So as a result, 611 00:37:42,880 --> 00:37:45,960 Speaker 1: these companies that were web based had established some pretty 612 00:37:46,000 --> 00:37:49,920 Speaker 1: aggressive strategies when it comes to collecting, using, and sharing 613 00:37:50,000 --> 00:37:53,880 Speaker 1: personal information. In fact, there's an entire industry based around 614 00:37:54,000 --> 00:37:57,839 Speaker 1: establishing huge databases of personal info and then charging other 615 00:37:57,880 --> 00:38:02,960 Speaker 1: companies to access those databases. Our information are. Personal info 616 00:38:03,320 --> 00:38:07,000 Speaker 1: is the currency of much of modern technology. While the 617 00:38:07,040 --> 00:38:10,319 Speaker 1: member states of the EU wanted to create rules to 618 00:38:10,400 --> 00:38:14,719 Speaker 1: restrict how companies could do this with EU citizens, so 619 00:38:14,840 --> 00:38:18,080 Speaker 1: they wouldn't be given free regin to collect and exploit data. 620 00:38:18,160 --> 00:38:21,160 Speaker 1: They would actually need to follow specific rules, which includes 621 00:38:21,239 --> 00:38:25,080 Speaker 1: alerting users to any points of data collection, as well 622 00:38:25,120 --> 00:38:28,120 Speaker 1: as to declare how and why that data will be used. 623 00:38:28,800 --> 00:38:32,120 Speaker 1: The restrictions meant that companies had to change how they 624 00:38:32,200 --> 00:38:36,319 Speaker 1: handled information, and that in itself became a kind of 625 00:38:36,440 --> 00:38:39,800 Speaker 1: micro industry. We had a lot of consultants that worked 626 00:38:39,840 --> 00:38:43,160 Speaker 1: with tech companies to make certain that their policies and 627 00:38:43,280 --> 00:38:46,960 Speaker 1: processes were compliant with g d p R, because otherwise 628 00:38:47,280 --> 00:38:51,239 Speaker 1: things could get super expensive, really fast. They also tend 629 00:38:51,280 --> 00:38:54,600 Speaker 1: to involve some pretty negative press. If a company is 630 00:38:54,600 --> 00:38:57,400 Speaker 1: found to have violated g DPR, it's not a good look. 631 00:38:58,080 --> 00:39:01,240 Speaker 1: The passing of g d p R effectively since shock 632 00:39:01,320 --> 00:39:04,440 Speaker 1: waves through the tech industry, which at that point really 633 00:39:04,520 --> 00:39:07,640 Speaker 1: wasn't used to governments getting that proactive in the protection 634 00:39:07,640 --> 00:39:10,960 Speaker 1: of citizen data, and g DPR has gone on to 635 00:39:11,040 --> 00:39:14,360 Speaker 1: inspire some places, like the state of California, to draft 636 00:39:14,480 --> 00:39:17,719 Speaker 1: privacy acts that essentially use g DPR as the basis 637 00:39:17,800 --> 00:39:22,279 Speaker 1: for that law. There are some exemptions to g d 638 00:39:22,440 --> 00:39:26,080 Speaker 1: p R, though, for example, law enforcement is not required 639 00:39:26,120 --> 00:39:30,080 Speaker 1: to abide by g DPR, and in matters of national security, 640 00:39:30,200 --> 00:39:33,960 Speaker 1: g DPR does not apply. G DPR has also changed 641 00:39:34,000 --> 00:39:37,120 Speaker 1: a bit since passing. Originally, there was this concept called 642 00:39:37,120 --> 00:39:40,680 Speaker 1: the right to be forgotten, which generally meant that an 643 00:39:40,719 --> 00:39:43,399 Speaker 1: EU citizen would have the right to request that their 644 00:39:43,440 --> 00:39:48,000 Speaker 1: personal information be deleted from any online sources, including stuff 645 00:39:48,040 --> 00:39:51,600 Speaker 1: like online search engines. But critics pointed out that this 646 00:39:51,640 --> 00:39:54,759 Speaker 1: policy was flawed. So let's say that we've got a 647 00:39:54,760 --> 00:39:59,000 Speaker 1: case where a public figure does something truly terrible, newsworthy 648 00:39:59,080 --> 00:40:03,759 Speaker 1: and terrible, like they've committed a crime of some sort. Uh, 649 00:40:04,560 --> 00:40:08,800 Speaker 1: if that person were to then follow this this process, 650 00:40:08,840 --> 00:40:12,359 Speaker 1: they might be able to demand that all mention of 651 00:40:12,400 --> 00:40:15,360 Speaker 1: that crime get a race from the internet, which you 652 00:40:15,360 --> 00:40:18,640 Speaker 1: could argue as against the public good. So these days, 653 00:40:18,840 --> 00:40:22,279 Speaker 1: the right to be forgotten is now known as the 654 00:40:22,400 --> 00:40:26,280 Speaker 1: right of a racer. And uh, it's not the band 655 00:40:26,320 --> 00:40:29,480 Speaker 1: eraser I tried to discover a little something to make 656 00:40:29,560 --> 00:40:34,319 Speaker 1: me sweeter. No, it's a it's it's a process that's 657 00:40:34,320 --> 00:40:37,200 Speaker 1: a little more limited. It cannot go nearly as far 658 00:40:37,280 --> 00:40:40,360 Speaker 1: as the right to be forgotten. And uh, it includes 659 00:40:40,400 --> 00:40:43,880 Speaker 1: stuff like you have to put in the request of 660 00:40:43,920 --> 00:40:46,880 Speaker 1: a ratier within a certain amount of time from publication 661 00:40:46,960 --> 00:40:50,920 Speaker 1: or else you missed the boat. Also, there's the consideration 662 00:40:50,960 --> 00:40:54,400 Speaker 1: about whether or not removing the information would represent a 663 00:40:54,400 --> 00:40:56,600 Speaker 1: public harm, or if it would be more harmful to 664 00:40:56,680 --> 00:41:00,200 Speaker 1: the individual if that information were to remain up. There 665 00:41:00,200 --> 00:41:02,520 Speaker 1: are a lot of different parts to it. In other words, 666 00:41:03,840 --> 00:41:07,520 Speaker 1: next up is Gift, and this is one of our 667 00:41:07,560 --> 00:41:11,879 Speaker 1: more contentious entries on this list. So obviously I still 668 00:41:11,920 --> 00:41:16,640 Speaker 1: pronounce g I F as GIF. I do not pronounce 669 00:41:16,719 --> 00:41:22,360 Speaker 1: it as jeff. The initialism stands for Graphics Interchange Format 670 00:41:22,800 --> 00:41:26,640 Speaker 1: and it's a subtype of bitmap image formats. The online 671 00:41:26,640 --> 00:41:30,759 Speaker 1: service provider compu Serve developed the GIFT file format in 672 00:41:30,800 --> 00:41:34,680 Speaker 1: the nineteen eighties, led by developer Steve will Hit. Now 673 00:41:34,719 --> 00:41:39,680 Speaker 1: Steve Wilhit pronounces it Jeff and that therefore he's wrong, 674 00:41:40,239 --> 00:41:43,760 Speaker 1: which I'm joking. I'm not. He's not really wrong. In fact, 675 00:41:44,200 --> 00:41:48,080 Speaker 1: the various dictionaries say that both pronunciations are acceptable, but 676 00:41:48,520 --> 00:41:54,480 Speaker 1: I mean, come on. The G stands for graphic, not giraffic. Anyway, 677 00:41:54,719 --> 00:41:57,200 Speaker 1: will Heights team was looking for a way to create 678 00:41:57,239 --> 00:41:59,920 Speaker 1: image files that didn't take up an enormous amount of 679 00:42:00,040 --> 00:42:03,759 Speaker 1: file space. So this was before the Worldwide Web, but 680 00:42:03,840 --> 00:42:08,080 Speaker 1: people were using online service providers and bulletin boards and 681 00:42:08,200 --> 00:42:11,360 Speaker 1: they wanted a way of being able to share images 682 00:42:11,600 --> 00:42:15,319 Speaker 1: or to download images, and the Gift team created a 683 00:42:15,360 --> 00:42:19,279 Speaker 1: format that limited color selection to two fifty six colors, 684 00:42:19,320 --> 00:42:22,120 Speaker 1: which helped keep file sizes down, and they used a 685 00:42:22,120 --> 00:42:25,279 Speaker 1: compression algorithm to kind of squitch these file sizes down, 686 00:42:25,640 --> 00:42:29,440 Speaker 1: and the gift was born. The compression algorithm identifies repeating 687 00:42:29,480 --> 00:42:32,600 Speaker 1: patterns within an image and then takes those patterns and 688 00:42:32,640 --> 00:42:36,160 Speaker 1: simplifies them for the purposes of expressing them within the file. 689 00:42:36,719 --> 00:42:39,080 Speaker 1: So this means that let's say you've got an image 690 00:42:39,120 --> 00:42:41,240 Speaker 1: that has a lot of, you know, a particular shade 691 00:42:41,239 --> 00:42:45,160 Speaker 1: of blue in one section, the file can essentially say, hey, 692 00:42:45,200 --> 00:42:48,560 Speaker 1: over here, in this part defined by these parameters, all 693 00:42:48,600 --> 00:42:51,319 Speaker 1: of that is just blue, rather than laying out that 694 00:42:51,520 --> 00:42:55,440 Speaker 1: each blue pixel is individually in each position. Now I 695 00:42:55,520 --> 00:42:58,880 Speaker 1: am oversimplifying here, but that from a high level is 696 00:42:58,960 --> 00:43:01,840 Speaker 1: kind of what was going on on. By stringing together 697 00:43:01,920 --> 00:43:05,279 Speaker 1: a sequence of gifts, it's possible to have them play 698 00:43:05,280 --> 00:43:08,120 Speaker 1: in a loop, and thus we get the animated gift. 699 00:43:08,560 --> 00:43:10,799 Speaker 1: Though many of the animated gifts we see today are 700 00:43:10,840 --> 00:43:14,080 Speaker 1: actually small video files that just kind of you know, 701 00:43:14,120 --> 00:43:17,000 Speaker 1: they use code to make them behave in a way 702 00:43:17,040 --> 00:43:20,400 Speaker 1: that we think of as animated gifts. But it turns 703 00:43:20,400 --> 00:43:25,480 Speaker 1: out that the video coding technology has actually outpaced gift code, 704 00:43:26,000 --> 00:43:28,920 Speaker 1: so we tend to see small video files rather than 705 00:43:28,960 --> 00:43:33,000 Speaker 1: actual gifts. However, the gift name has stuck around, even 706 00:43:33,000 --> 00:43:37,160 Speaker 1: though it's not necessarily a gift file extension. Next up 707 00:43:37,280 --> 00:43:41,799 Speaker 1: is GPS. This stands for Global Positioning System. Often we 708 00:43:41,880 --> 00:43:44,520 Speaker 1: refer to a device, like, you know, something that we 709 00:43:45,080 --> 00:43:48,400 Speaker 1: use in a car, as a GPS, by which we 710 00:43:48,440 --> 00:43:52,400 Speaker 1: mean a navigational device that relies upon this Global positioning 711 00:43:52,440 --> 00:43:56,480 Speaker 1: system to calculate that devices position relative to the surface 712 00:43:56,480 --> 00:43:59,000 Speaker 1: of the Earth. That's a wordy way of saying that 713 00:43:59,200 --> 00:44:02,319 Speaker 1: the devices using information from satellites to figure out where 714 00:44:02,360 --> 00:44:05,239 Speaker 1: the heck it is. Back in the nineteen seventies, the 715 00:44:05,239 --> 00:44:08,120 Speaker 1: Department of Defense in the United States began working on 716 00:44:08,160 --> 00:44:11,400 Speaker 1: what would become the GPS, and it would take a 717 00:44:11,400 --> 00:44:14,560 Speaker 1: couple of decades to complete it. But by the early 718 00:44:14,640 --> 00:44:18,400 Speaker 1: nineteen nineties, the full complement of twenty four satellites that 719 00:44:18,440 --> 00:44:22,360 Speaker 1: were part of this original plan were up in orbit, 720 00:44:22,560 --> 00:44:25,760 Speaker 1: and they were needed so that you could get global 721 00:44:25,840 --> 00:44:29,360 Speaker 1: coverage for GPS. Otherwise, before that, you know, coverage was 722 00:44:29,400 --> 00:44:32,880 Speaker 1: sporadic based upon whether or not you had the appropriate 723 00:44:32,960 --> 00:44:37,200 Speaker 1: number of satellites within range of you in orbit. Now 724 00:44:37,200 --> 00:44:40,120 Speaker 1: these satellites are not in geosynchronous orbit with the Earth, 725 00:44:40,280 --> 00:44:43,720 Speaker 1: so in other words, they're not remaining in a fixed 726 00:44:43,760 --> 00:44:47,319 Speaker 1: position relative to a point on the Earth's surface, so 727 00:44:47,560 --> 00:44:50,160 Speaker 1: they are in an orbit that's at a different rate 728 00:44:50,239 --> 00:44:55,640 Speaker 1: than the Earth's rotation, also a different trajectory than Earth's rotation, 729 00:44:56,480 --> 00:44:59,680 Speaker 1: and that's why you need to have multiple satellites, like 730 00:44:59,680 --> 00:45:03,359 Speaker 1: twenty four of them to maintain constant coverage, because satellites 731 00:45:03,360 --> 00:45:06,960 Speaker 1: pass out of range at certain points and other satellites 732 00:45:06,960 --> 00:45:10,000 Speaker 1: will come into range. That's why you need that many 733 00:45:10,120 --> 00:45:14,080 Speaker 1: up there. The satellites send out signals that receivers on Earth, 734 00:45:14,239 --> 00:45:16,799 Speaker 1: like the one in your car can pick up, or 735 00:45:16,840 --> 00:45:19,279 Speaker 1: the one on your phone for that matter, And each 736 00:45:19,400 --> 00:45:22,759 Speaker 1: signal sent by a satellite contains some information that it's 737 00:45:22,760 --> 00:45:25,440 Speaker 1: really important. One of it those pieces of information is 738 00:45:25,440 --> 00:45:29,680 Speaker 1: a precise time stamp that says exactly when the satellite 739 00:45:29,719 --> 00:45:32,840 Speaker 1: broadcast that that signal, and also there's some data that 740 00:45:32,880 --> 00:45:38,160 Speaker 1: indicates that particular satellites orbital location. So the receiver has 741 00:45:38,200 --> 00:45:40,920 Speaker 1: to pick up signals from at least three satellites to 742 00:45:40,960 --> 00:45:45,279 Speaker 1: get a physical location. Because of the time stamp, the 743 00:45:45,320 --> 00:45:49,320 Speaker 1: receiver quote unquote knows how long that signal had traveled 744 00:45:49,800 --> 00:45:52,640 Speaker 1: from the satellite to the receiver. The receiver has to 745 00:45:52,719 --> 00:45:56,440 Speaker 1: compare this against its own time reading, typically from an 746 00:45:56,440 --> 00:45:59,480 Speaker 1: atomic clock. But more on that in the second Now, 747 00:45:59,480 --> 00:46:02,480 Speaker 1: this means that the receiver knows how far away it 748 00:46:02,719 --> 00:46:06,600 Speaker 1: is from the satellite, because the satellite communication travels at 749 00:46:06,640 --> 00:46:09,520 Speaker 1: the speed of light. So you just take the amount 750 00:46:09,520 --> 00:46:11,480 Speaker 1: of time it took for the signal to go from 751 00:46:11,560 --> 00:46:13,680 Speaker 1: when it was broadcast to when it was picked up 752 00:46:13,680 --> 00:46:16,640 Speaker 1: by the receiver, and you use that to figure out 753 00:46:16,680 --> 00:46:19,520 Speaker 1: how many miles it traveled in that span of time 754 00:46:19,520 --> 00:46:21,920 Speaker 1: because it was traveling at the speed of light. So 755 00:46:22,040 --> 00:46:24,880 Speaker 1: then you could draw a sphere around the satellite, like 756 00:46:24,920 --> 00:46:28,319 Speaker 1: a virtual sphere, that represents all the points that are 757 00:46:28,480 --> 00:46:32,319 Speaker 1: that distance away from the satellite in every single direction. Now, 758 00:46:32,360 --> 00:46:35,319 Speaker 1: granted you're only interested in the points that make an 759 00:46:35,360 --> 00:46:37,680 Speaker 1: intersection with the Earth, but there will be a lot 760 00:46:37,719 --> 00:46:41,560 Speaker 1: of those. So then you want to compare that with 761 00:46:41,680 --> 00:46:44,759 Speaker 1: other satellites. You need at least three, and then you're 762 00:46:44,800 --> 00:46:49,680 Speaker 1: looking at the intersection of where these different spheres meet, 763 00:46:50,480 --> 00:46:53,520 Speaker 1: and with three satellites you get two points where the 764 00:46:53,560 --> 00:46:57,200 Speaker 1: spheres will all intersect. One of those two points will 765 00:46:57,280 --> 00:47:00,399 Speaker 1: definitely be on the surface of Earth. The other one 766 00:47:00,520 --> 00:47:03,759 Speaker 1: may or may not be. So, then by looking at 767 00:47:03,760 --> 00:47:05,439 Speaker 1: the point that's actually on the surface of the Earth, 768 00:47:05,520 --> 00:47:07,960 Speaker 1: the receiver says, Okay, now I know where I am 769 00:47:08,040 --> 00:47:11,320 Speaker 1: because I'm able to tell by the distance I am 770 00:47:11,400 --> 00:47:16,000 Speaker 1: from these three different satellites. It's really really neat um. 771 00:47:16,040 --> 00:47:20,600 Speaker 1: It's it's kind of similar to um triangulation, but not 772 00:47:20,719 --> 00:47:25,240 Speaker 1: exactly the same. Anyway, with four satellites, you can actually 773 00:47:25,239 --> 00:47:27,319 Speaker 1: eliminate the need for the receiver to have access to 774 00:47:27,360 --> 00:47:30,560 Speaker 1: its own atomic clock to make certain to correct for errors. 775 00:47:31,160 --> 00:47:33,520 Speaker 1: And there's a lot more to it than that. For example, 776 00:47:33,680 --> 00:47:37,319 Speaker 1: until the nineteen nineties, within the US, civilian use of 777 00:47:37,360 --> 00:47:41,439 Speaker 1: GPS was really limited because GPS was meant for military use, 778 00:47:41,880 --> 00:47:47,120 Speaker 1: so civilian receivers they existed, but they also purposefully introduced 779 00:47:47,239 --> 00:47:51,840 Speaker 1: errors into the display, so you could not use a 780 00:47:51,880 --> 00:47:54,520 Speaker 1: GPS to get a specific reading of your location. You 781 00:47:54,520 --> 00:47:57,440 Speaker 1: can get kind of a general reading, so you wouldn't 782 00:47:57,440 --> 00:47:59,480 Speaker 1: be able to use it to do stuff like make 783 00:47:59,600 --> 00:48:03,120 Speaker 1: turn I turned directions in real time because your receiver's 784 00:48:03,120 --> 00:48:07,359 Speaker 1: location readoubt could be off by several hundred feet, so 785 00:48:07,480 --> 00:48:10,879 Speaker 1: it could be like turn left, you're gonna turn left 786 00:48:10,920 --> 00:48:13,000 Speaker 1: either in a hundred feet or it might be three 787 00:48:13,320 --> 00:48:17,760 Speaker 1: feet behind you, so not very useful. But then later 788 00:48:17,800 --> 00:48:21,480 Speaker 1: on President Clinton lifted that restriction, and since then we've 789 00:48:21,520 --> 00:48:23,799 Speaker 1: been able to use GPS receivers to help us get 790 00:48:23,800 --> 00:48:26,319 Speaker 1: to where we're going. Or you know, if you're using 791 00:48:26,360 --> 00:48:29,080 Speaker 1: Apple Maps, you can use it to drive into a river. 792 00:48:29,800 --> 00:48:33,320 Speaker 1: I'm kidding. I'm just using a very outdated joke about 793 00:48:33,360 --> 00:48:38,000 Speaker 1: the reliability of Apple Maps, which obviously has improved significantly 794 00:48:38,200 --> 00:48:40,759 Speaker 1: since it first launched, so it's an unfair joke for 795 00:48:40,800 --> 00:48:43,960 Speaker 1: me to make. These days, there are more than thirty 796 00:48:44,000 --> 00:48:47,280 Speaker 1: five GPS satellites out in orbit, and the technology also 797 00:48:47,400 --> 00:48:50,240 Speaker 1: is a great way to explore the concepts of general 798 00:48:50,280 --> 00:48:54,000 Speaker 1: and special relativity, because you have to have an understanding 799 00:48:54,040 --> 00:48:56,520 Speaker 1: of both of those things in order to correct for 800 00:48:56,600 --> 00:49:00,239 Speaker 1: the issues of time dilation. But that's a complicate, aided 801 00:49:00,280 --> 00:49:02,839 Speaker 1: subject for another time. In fact, I have covered that 802 00:49:03,280 --> 00:49:06,160 Speaker 1: in past episodes, so check that out if you want 803 00:49:06,160 --> 00:49:10,759 Speaker 1: to learn how it is that GPS proves that Einstein 804 00:49:10,880 --> 00:49:14,960 Speaker 1: was right. It's pretty fascinating stuff, all right, And that's 805 00:49:15,000 --> 00:49:17,759 Speaker 1: it for this episode. We're gonna leave off here. We're 806 00:49:17,760 --> 00:49:20,960 Speaker 1: gonna pick back up in our next one to continue 807 00:49:21,000 --> 00:49:24,160 Speaker 1: our glossary that will be next week, starting on Monday, 808 00:49:24,320 --> 00:49:26,560 Speaker 1: and we'll continue to work our way through these various 809 00:49:26,600 --> 00:49:30,959 Speaker 1: acronyms and initialisms to kind of demystify the world of tech, 810 00:49:31,160 --> 00:49:34,760 Speaker 1: which gets very reliant on jargon and acronyms and stuff 811 00:49:35,120 --> 00:49:36,640 Speaker 1: to the point where it can feel kind of like 812 00:49:36,680 --> 00:49:39,319 Speaker 1: it's excluding others on purpose. And I don't dig that. 813 00:49:39,680 --> 00:49:42,160 Speaker 1: I like to be inclusive, so we're gonna keep on going. 814 00:49:42,640 --> 00:49:44,759 Speaker 1: In the meantime, if you have suggestions for topics I 815 00:49:44,760 --> 00:49:47,359 Speaker 1: should cover in future episodes of tech Stuff, reach out 816 00:49:47,400 --> 00:49:49,200 Speaker 1: to me. The best way to do that is on Twitter. 817 00:49:49,440 --> 00:49:53,000 Speaker 1: The handle we use is tech Stuff hs W and 818 00:49:53,040 --> 00:50:01,840 Speaker 1: I'll talk to you again really soon. Text Stuff is 819 00:50:01,880 --> 00:50:05,040 Speaker 1: an I Heart Radio production. For more podcasts from I 820 00:50:05,160 --> 00:50:08,759 Speaker 1: Heart Radio, visit the i Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, 821 00:50:08,880 --> 00:50:10,840 Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.