Speaker 1: Testing Google's new sleep feature. See if your phone number
Speaker 1: is part of that major Facebook breach. Best Buy has
Speaker 1: a new membership program. Plus your tech questions answered. What's
Speaker 1: going on? I'm Rich Demiro and this is Rich on Tech,
Speaker 1: the podcast where I talk about the tech stuff I
Speaker 1: think you should know about. It's also the place I
Speaker 1: answer the questions you send me. I'm the tech reporter
Speaker 1: at KTLA Channel five in Los Angeles. Hope you are
Speaker 1: having a fantastic day. Believe me when I say you
Speaker 1: love to send me questions. I mean I could spend
Speaker 1: all day answering questions from Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube, even
Speaker 1: when I decide to post there. I posted my first
Speaker 1: video to TikTok today, which don't get used to that
Speaker 1: because I you know, I just did that for fun man.
Speaker 1: So last week I was off. I don't know if
Speaker 1: you notice, but if you did, congrats You must listen
Speaker 1: to the show a lot. But otherwise, Yes, I'm back
Speaker 1: from Hawaii. I know, not the time to travel, but
Speaker 1: you know, with the vaccinations and all this good stuff,
Speaker 1: travel is definitely increasing. And so this was my first
Speaker 1: big trip since the pandemic started. Second time I was
Speaker 1: on a plane, so The first was to go up
Speaker 1: to Seattle for ces. This was the second one, And honestly,
Speaker 1: we rescheduled this trip so many times that we said
Speaker 1: we're doing it. We're sticking to it. And the wildest
Speaker 1: part about the whole trip is so my mom was
Speaker 1: scheduled to come with us on this trip to Hawaii.
Speaker 1: We had planned this, it's been her dream to go
Speaker 1: to Hawaii. Blah blah blah, and no joke. The morning
Speaker 1: of the trip, the morning of the trip, she is
Speaker 1: flying out from New Jersey to Los Angeles to meet
Speaker 1: us to fly to Hawaii. I get a call about
Speaker 1: three am saying, not good. I tripped on my suitcase
Speaker 1: and I can't make it. Because you know, when you're
Speaker 1: a little bit older and you trip, it's not so good.
Speaker 1: So she was all bruised and she had to go
Speaker 1: get X rays and thankfully she's okay. But you know,
Speaker 1: to go on a big trip from you know, New
Speaker 1: York to La La to Hawaii, you know, not so
Speaker 1: good when you're you know, when you're totally bruised and
Speaker 1: beaten up. So that was a bummer. But the funny
Speaker 1: thing was we were taking my other mother in law
Speaker 1: and so she still came. I mean it was a
Speaker 1: whole big thing. I mean, this is you know, this
Speaker 1: was just unbelievable circumstances. So we we had a fantastic
Speaker 1: time in Hawaii. Uh, notwithstanding all the issues or whatever.
Speaker 1: The worst part of getting over there was really the
Speaker 1: COVID test that you had to do to test negative
Speaker 1: to get over there. But otherwise, once we were there,
Speaker 1: it was great. I mean, obviously the island has been
Speaker 1: greatly impacted by the pandemic, with a lot of things
Speaker 1: closed and not open yet, but overall, once you were
Speaker 1: just like on the beach sitting there, it was fine,
Speaker 1: you know, and we had a really nice time. So
Speaker 1: I probably wouldn't recommend going right now, honestly, because if
Speaker 1: you're thinking of doing that, but you know, just wait
Speaker 1: for things to change. We're so close. We are so close.
Speaker 1: We're getting there. Things are, things are happening, They're they're
Speaker 1: in motion. So if you want to watch my video
Speaker 1: on the little trip I put it, you know, I didn't.
Speaker 1: I didn't set out to make a video, not like
Speaker 1: a YouTube vlogger, but I you know, I ended up
Speaker 1: recording so many videos on my phone that I ended
Speaker 1: up editing them together to h to make like this
Speaker 1: little clip video and you can find that on my
Speaker 1: Facebook page Facebook dot com slash Rich on tech. All right,
Speaker 1: let's get to the first story of the week. Kind
Speaker 1: of a big one. I mean, I don't know if
Speaker 1: you have an LG phone, but LG has said they
Speaker 1: are withdrawing from the mobile industry. Now. You might have
Speaker 1: heard that last week. They announced it, I think when
Speaker 1: I was in Hawaii. But the big update now, and
Speaker 1: it's really sad that LG is exiting industry because you know,
Speaker 1: it's one less choice for consumers. And you know, they
Speaker 1: did have a decent amount of phones. I think in
Speaker 1: recent years they didn't really have hit phone that I
Speaker 1: personally loved. But I always loved what they did with
Speaker 1: their phones, Like I always really enjoyed their software and
Speaker 1: their approach to things. But their camera, you know, it
Speaker 1: was good, but it wasn't exactly what I wanted personally,
Speaker 1: and some of the software the you know, a lot
Speaker 1: of the phones I've noticed in recent years of LG,
Speaker 1: and this might have been a problem with them, is
Speaker 1: that they were heavily, heavily influenced by the carriers, and
Speaker 1: so you'd get this phone to test and it would
Speaker 1: just be filled with Verizon software or filled with AT
Speaker 1: and T software, and you go to the iPhone and
Speaker 1: it's so clean and it's so pristine, and even Samsung
Speaker 1: in recent years has been really clean that it's just
Speaker 1: it kind of not you know, made for not a
Speaker 1: very good experience. Anyway, they said they will give three
Speaker 1: years of iOS of sorry not iOS of OS updates
Speaker 1: for their phones, and that applies to phones released in
Speaker 1: twenty nineteen and later the premium G series, the V series,
Speaker 1: the Velvet, and the Wing. Twenty twenty models like the
Speaker 1: LG Stylo and the K series, these were like they're
Speaker 1: less premium phones will get to operating system updates. So
Speaker 1: I mean, it's kind of interesting. Good to know that
Speaker 1: they're doing this pledge, but you know, I don't know
Speaker 1: they're gonna still make phones. They're winding down July thirty first,
Speaker 1: So sad for LG. You know, it's the end of
Speaker 1: an era because I really my first phone I ever
Speaker 1: tested was the LG Chocolate. That was my first assignment
Speaker 1: ever for c neet back in the day. So it
Speaker 1: just goes to show how how long I've been doing this.
Speaker 1: All right, let's get to the first question. All right,
Speaker 1: oh gosh, I'm gonna mess up your name. Hormaz says, Hey, Rich,
Speaker 1: thanks for your awesome podcast. I haven't missed even one
Speaker 1: episode in the last three years. Well, thank you. I
Speaker 1: need your advice to buy a perfect wireless charger stand
Speaker 1: for both my iPhone twelve and my Note twenty ultra,
Speaker 1: which vendor and modeled you suggest. I want to have
Speaker 1: one that works with both iPhone and Samsung. Thank you
Speaker 1: for your amazing podcast and your help. Well, oh gosh,
Speaker 1: or Moz, I think I'm looking at the perfect one.
Speaker 1: I have it on my desk right here. So it
Speaker 1: depends if you want a wireless charger stand, I mean,
Speaker 1: if you just want one device, or I don't know
Speaker 1: if you want to charge two devices at once or
Speaker 1: one device you know, at a time. But there's two
Speaker 1: i'd recommend. The first is this one I have in
Speaker 1: my desk right here. We featured it on KTLA today.
Speaker 1: It's called the au Key air Corps three and one,
Speaker 1: and it's a three and one charger. It's got a
Speaker 1: place for wireless AirPods, whatever earbuds you have that wirelessly charge.
Speaker 1: It's got a place for your Apple Watch, and it's
Speaker 1: got to stand for your phone, and it should work
Speaker 1: with your Samsung. It will work with your Samsung and
Speaker 1: also your iPhone, and so i'd recommend that it's only
Speaker 1: thirty bucks and it's that's a pretty fantastic deal. The
Speaker 1: other one I'd recommend is just a Mophi that has
Speaker 1: it's a two in one charger, so you can lay
Speaker 1: two phones on this device and charge two devices at once,
Speaker 1: and you know that should work as well. So those
Speaker 1: are the two that I would recommend. But realistically, you
Speaker 1: can go on Amazon. If you just need one device
Speaker 1: to charge at a time, you can just go on
Speaker 1: Amazon and find a charger. Make sure it's a high
Speaker 1: speed charger for these devices, and you know all Key
Speaker 1: makes them, Anchor makes them. I think i'd probably look
Speaker 1: at those two or Mophi is also the other big
Speaker 1: brand that makes these things. So that's what I would recommend.
Speaker 1: And you know, if you want to see my video
Speaker 1: on the Auki, I've got that on my Facebook page
Speaker 1: as well. Let's talk about best Buy. They have a
Speaker 1: new membership program. I don't think it's exactly competing with
Speaker 1: Amazon because Amazon sells everything in the world, but they
Speaker 1: have this new membership program called best Buy Beta. That
Speaker 1: does seem pretty compelling if you are a tech person
Speaker 1: that likes to buy, you know, gadgets, you'd have to
Speaker 1: buy a couple of gadgets to make this worth it
Speaker 1: because it is two hundred dollars a year. Here are
Speaker 1: the benefits of the membership, dedicated and exclusive concierge support.
Speaker 1: So what does that means? That mean like tech support?
Speaker 1: I don't know concierge support. I don't really know what
Speaker 1: that means. But it's available twenty four to seven by phone, chat, email,
Speaker 1: or through the best Buy app. I mean, I don't
Speaker 1: know what that what the concierge would help you with?
Speaker 1: Like you know now they do have unlimited geek squad
Speaker 1: tech support on all technology in your home, whether you
Speaker 1: purchased it at best Buy or not. So that's compelling
Speaker 1: and that could be quite helpful, especially if you have,
Speaker 1: you know, a family member that you are the tech
Speaker 1: support person for. This could help with that. But you know,
Speaker 1: what's the weight line? What's the weight time on that?
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't know how good that is. Either
Speaker 1: fast and free shipping with no minimums. Okay, that's cool, exclusive,
Speaker 1: but you know a lot of things you buy best
Speaker 1: Buy our gadgets, they're more expensive, so you know a
Speaker 1: lot of times it's over thirty five anyway or fifty whatever.
Speaker 1: Their minimum is exclusive member pricing on a wide range
Speaker 1: of products, free in home, standard delivery and installation on
Speaker 1: most products. I mean, but how many times a year
Speaker 1: are you buying like a dishwasher? So I don't know
Speaker 1: about that one. This is compelling. Two years protection on
Speaker 1: most purchases at best Buy, including Apple Care on Apple products.
Speaker 1: Now that is the compelling part because if you buy
Speaker 1: an iPhone once a year, which yeah, not many people
Speaker 1: do that. It's usually once every three years, you know,
Speaker 1: you buy Apple Care for two hundred bucks or whatever costs,
Speaker 1: you know, that could pay for itself, sixty day extended
Speaker 1: return window, and ten percent off subscription services build through
Speaker 1: best Buy. So I mean, I don't know, two hundred
Speaker 1: dollars a years a lot. And you know with Amazon
Speaker 1: they're charging what one twenty for their Amazon Prime and
Speaker 1: that's like, you know, you're getting something shipped from Amazon
Speaker 1: or a lot of people are like on a weekly basis.
Speaker 1: For us, it's like twice weekly. So this is interesting.
Speaker 1: It's got a lot of perks. You know, there are
Speaker 1: a lot of interesting perks, especially the two year protection.
Speaker 1: But you have to figure out if it's worth two
Speaker 1: hundred dollars a year. I mean, that's that adds up
Speaker 1: very quickly. I mean, you do this thing for five years,
Speaker 1: that's one thousand dollars. So are you getting one thousand
Speaker 1: dollars worth of tech support and in home delivery and
Speaker 1: installation and protection. I don't know, but this is starting
Speaker 1: at select stores through at Iowa, Oklahoma, eastern Pennsylvania. Then
Speaker 1: in April it's gonna expand to Minnesota, North Carolina, and Tennessee.
Speaker 1: I'm surprised they didn't do it in Minnesota at the
Speaker 1: beginning because that's where best Buy I think is headquartered.
Speaker 1: So they're gonna have it a total of sixty stores.
Speaker 1: Best Buy has many more stores than that, so I
Speaker 1: don't know. Just keep an eye out for it. Best
Speaker 1: by best By Beta membership program. Everything's a membership in
Speaker 1: the future. All right, let's get to the next question.
Speaker 1: This comes from. Let's see, I don't have a name
Speaker 1: on this. Let's just say sore, okay, Hi, Richard. I'm
Speaker 1: wanting someone calls me Richard, except my mom I'm wanting
Speaker 1: to get a new Samsung watch, but I'm not sure
Speaker 1: what to get. I don't know if Samsung is coming
Speaker 1: out with a new version soon, and if so, the
Speaker 1: watch face will be different. I'm not crazy about the
Speaker 1: round ones. I would appreciate any advice. Thank you so much,
Speaker 1: and a heart sent for my T mobile four G
Speaker 1: LTE device. Well, let's see, is Samsung coming out with
Speaker 1: a new version soon. They recently came out with one,
Speaker 1: so I don't know. Usually their cadence is h Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think it just came out, so I would say
Speaker 1: probably not. And I don't see them changing to a
Speaker 1: square watch face like the Apple Watch. So if you
Speaker 1: don't like the round, ah, that's a tough one. So
Speaker 1: the thing I would look into is perhaps a fitbit.
Speaker 1: They do the square faces, and they've got the Fitbit
Speaker 1: versa I think three now. And you know, it's been
Speaker 1: a while since I tested a fitbit. I don't know fitit.
Speaker 1: It's gone like they like never get in touch with
Speaker 1: me anymore. I don't know why. I mean, the last
Speaker 1: time I did a fipbit review, it was like it
Speaker 1: went bananas online. I mean, I'm talking bananas. I never
Speaker 1: saw so many people click on a review in my life.
Speaker 1: That was the Versa. That was a Fipbit versa. So
Speaker 1: that was like the first like real alternative to the
Speaker 1: Apple Watch that was like a smart watch. And I
Speaker 1: wrote up a little review and it just went wildly viral.
Speaker 1: That was a couple of years ago and ever since then.
Speaker 1: And I bought that watch on Amazon and I used
Speaker 1: it for a long time and they never get in
Speaker 1: touch with me after that, and anyway, so I digress.
Speaker 1: So it's been a while since I've tested one. Yes,
Speaker 1: I guess I can go out and buy one and
Speaker 1: test it out, but it seems, you know, like I'd
Speaker 1: rather just borrow one and test it and you know whatever,
Speaker 1: So I would just probably go with a Fipbit. There's
Speaker 1: another watch that's coming out called the one Plus Watch,
Speaker 1: which is a nice alternative to the Samsung. I'll have
Speaker 1: my full review on that next week. I've been testing it,
Speaker 1: but I can't really talk too much about it right now.
Speaker 1: But the fippit would probably be good. The one Plus
Speaker 1: is great, but it's uh, well, I can't say it's
Speaker 1: great just yet. It seems like it's going to be nice,
Speaker 1: but it does have a round watch face. So if
Speaker 1: you want square like Apple, then you know you're gonna
Speaker 1: have to you know, really the Pippit is the way
Speaker 1: to go. The other one is the whys Wyse has
Speaker 1: a smart watch for twenty dollars. And in fact, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna just go ahead and read these next two emails
Speaker 1: because I guess it plays into this. Tomas says, hey, rich,
Speaker 1: I just received my phone today and set it up
Speaker 1: for twenty dollars on my phone. I think he meant
Speaker 1: watch because it says why's watch and set it up
Speaker 1: for twenty dollars plus another five dollars for an extra strap.
Speaker 1: It's really trick. I'm guessing that means cool, auto correct,
Speaker 1: auto correct. I had to wait almost four months to
Speaker 1: receive it. It's a great deal. It does a lot of
Speaker 1: things the other more expensive watches do. I guess I
Speaker 1: won't be wearing my Rolex from now on. Sent from
Speaker 1: my iPhone. Oh interesting, he's using it with an iPhone too. Yeah,
Speaker 1: the wise Watch works with iPhone Android. The main downside
Speaker 1: to the wise Watch there's no onboard GPS. So but
Speaker 1: it's twenty dollars. I mean, it's a nice little smart watch.
Speaker 1: I haven't tested it again. I think they were supposed to
Speaker 1: send it to me. They never did, but whyse I
Speaker 1: love what Whys is doing. They make really really nice
Speaker 1: stuff for very inexpensive. Kevin writes, Rich, have you gotten
Speaker 1: to the new wise Watch? My wife and I received
Speaker 1: ours this week. It's nineteen ninety nine. It's pretty fun.
Speaker 1: Definitely not an Apple watch, but maybe an overgrown fitpit.
Speaker 1: But for about one hundred and eighty nine dollars less
Speaker 1: than an Apple Watch, it's nifty. Thanks Kevin sent for
Speaker 1: my iPhone. Another iPhone user wow with the wise Watch.
Speaker 1: So anyway, that's probably another good option. If you just
Speaker 1: want like a watch that tracks your steps and can
Speaker 1: give you your notifications and you know, all that good stuff,
Speaker 1: and you know, track a little bit of your fitness,
Speaker 1: the wise Watch is going to be just fine. And
Speaker 1: so is a Fitbit. So those are some good options
Speaker 1: for you there if you don't necessarily want the round
Speaker 1: watch face that Samsung offers. And I've tested the Samsung watches.
Speaker 1: I think they're fine. They're not my favorite, but I
Speaker 1: think they're just fine. I personally, I know, I know Apple,
Speaker 1: you're such an Apple fanboy, Rich, I just I've gotten
Speaker 1: so spoiled with the Apple Watch. I just I love it.
Speaker 1: I feel naked without it, I really do. I just
Speaker 1: feel like everything I want out of a smart watch
Speaker 1: the Apple Watch does. And it just it's truly unbelievable.
Speaker 1: I mean, it really feels like it watches over me.
Speaker 1: I told the story about how I almost fell, and
Speaker 1: it would have called nine one one if you noticed that.
Speaker 1: It just attracks my runs and my music is on there,
Speaker 1: and the notifications are so good, the haptics are so good.
Speaker 1: Everything is just so good about it. And I've said
Speaker 1: this before. I would give up my iPhone quicker than
Speaker 1: I would my Apple Watch because the Apple Watch is
Speaker 1: just so good. It's got cellular connectivity, which I just
Speaker 1: I'll be honest. Okay, I can't talk too much about
Speaker 1: the OnePlus watch, but I went out for a run
Speaker 1: with the OnePlus watch yesterday to test it, and I
Speaker 1: felt like I was missing something because I did not
Speaker 1: have my cellular connectivity that I'm so used to on
Speaker 1: my Apple Watch. And I know these are all things
Speaker 1: that are like, oh, first world problems, rich I get it, Yes,
Speaker 1: they all are one hundred percent, but you know, when
Speaker 1: you test tech for a living. You see these differences,
Speaker 1: and the difference of the Apple Watch among all the
Speaker 1: other wearables that I test is that it really truly
Speaker 1: is leaps and bounds ahead of them, and you know
Speaker 1: it's gonna take some catching up. Just the ecosystem that
Speaker 1: Apple has built is so strong and it's so solid,
Speaker 1: and just you know, I don't try to I don't
Speaker 1: set out to say, oh my gosh, I love all
Speaker 1: Apple stuff. I love all you know, whatever Apple does
Speaker 1: is amazing. Like no, I'm actively testing other things out there,
Speaker 1: you know, to see if I can love other stuff
Speaker 1: as much. And the Apple Watch is just one of
Speaker 1: those things where it just has become such a big
Speaker 1: part of my life. We were testing walkie talkie feature
Speaker 1: the other day, which we don't really use, but my
Speaker 1: wife and I were testing it and we're like, ah,
Speaker 1: this is so cool. Why don't we ever use this?
Speaker 1: And we didn't use it. After that, All right, let's
Speaker 1: get to oh and Apple story. How convenient rich you
Speaker 1: Apple lover? Apples find My Network now offers new third
Speaker 1: party finding experiences. This is from the Apple newsroom. So
Speaker 1: what Apple has done is they have taken on tile
Speaker 1: and they have expanded the find My app. Remember it
Speaker 1: used to be called find my iPhone. Now it's just
Speaker 1: called find My. And what they've done is they've opened
Speaker 1: up their network, they're finding network to third party gadgets.
Speaker 1: And yes, I'm sure that these third party gadgets have
Speaker 1: to pay a nice licensing fee to Apple to use this,
Speaker 1: but it hear me out, this is pretty phenomenal. So
Speaker 1: three gadgets that now have the find my tech built in,
Speaker 1: one from Belkan, one from Chipolo, and then bikes from
Speaker 1: Van Moove. So Belkan's doing a pair of earbuds the
Speaker 1: uh what are they called, the sound form Freedom true
Speaker 1: wireless earbuds. Then Chopolo has a it's a little finder.
Speaker 1: So I hate to use the example of Tile because
Speaker 1: this is who they're you know, totally annihilating in the
Speaker 1: process here. But Chopolo is kind of an alternative to Tile,
Speaker 1: and I remember liking Chopolo. I can't remember what the
Speaker 1: reason was. I think they have batteries that pop out
Speaker 1: and you can put new ones in there, whereas Tile
Speaker 1: always had the batteries that were built in. Maybe they
Speaker 1: changed that, but it's been a while since I used one.
Speaker 1: But Schoppolo is called the one spot and you can
Speaker 1: put this on keys, luggage, backpacks and more. And to
Speaker 1: be completely honest, I will likely be buying these now
Speaker 1: because here is the OH and then the Van Mouf bikes,
Speaker 1: the S three and the X three. These are e bikes.
Speaker 1: They cost about two thousand dollars and I got to
Speaker 1: test one because not that I think my audience is
Speaker 1: purchasing these e bikes for two thousand dollars, but I
Speaker 1: get so many emails about them. People are really hip
Speaker 1: on these e bikes that are, you know, electronic. They
Speaker 1: kind of give you a little assistance when you're driving them.
Speaker 1: I you know, I don't know. To me, it seems
Speaker 1: very expensive, but I don't know. People seem to like them,
Speaker 1: and I should probably get some experience hands on with them.
Speaker 1: But the okay, So here's how this this find my works.
Speaker 1: It basically turns any Apple products into a beacon like
Speaker 1: a locator for these lost gadgets. So let's say you
Speaker 1: had one of these Chipolo items on your backpack, right
Speaker 1: these little tags, and let's say you lose your backpack
Speaker 1: in the airport, Well, how many people are walking by
Speaker 1: with an iPhone? And yes, I believe you have to
Speaker 1: activate the third party like crowdsourcing feature on it, but
Speaker 1: it's all anonymous and Apple has done their homework, so
Speaker 1: they're making sure that it doesn't eat up all your
Speaker 1: power on your phone or doesn't give away your private info.
Speaker 1: But when you walk by, your iPhone sees that little beacon,
Speaker 1: that little on someone's backpack and it says, oh, it
Speaker 1: just it just sends that little day to the network
Speaker 1: saying oh, we located this. And then you a thousand
Speaker 1: miles away say where's my backpack and the Apple network
Speaker 1: on fine my says, oh, well, we saw it at
Speaker 1: the Lax an hour ago, and here's the precise location
Speaker 1: of it, because we had one hundred and seventy five
Speaker 1: iPhones walk past it in the past hour, and so
Speaker 1: we're pretty sure it's right here. I mean, that is phenomenal.
Speaker 1: Now you might say, rich Tyle did this years ago,
Speaker 1: this is what Tile did so many years ago. But
Speaker 1: here's the thing Tile was. I think it worked, but
Speaker 1: I'm not sure that it was ever able to work
Speaker 1: in the way that Apple was because the difference is
Speaker 1: that someone had to have the Tile app on their
Speaker 1: phone enable the finding feature and walk past that device
Speaker 1: and the chances of that happening were a lot less
Speaker 1: than some random iPhone or iPad or computer. If it
Speaker 1: does computer, I'm not sure it does. But you know,
Speaker 1: let's just say iPhones alone. I mean, how many iPhones
Speaker 1: are floating around in the world. In the world, So
Speaker 1: if you lose your device in Japan, someone's probably gonna
Speaker 1: walk past it with an iPhone and locate it for you.
Speaker 1: So in that case alone, this is phenomenal. And I
Speaker 1: can see why manufacturers are gonna want to jump on board.
Speaker 1: In fact, if I was tile, if I wanted to
Speaker 1: sell some more tiles, I would jump on board. I
Speaker 1: know it probably kills them to do that, but this
Speaker 1: is huge, and I will say this again, this is huge.
Speaker 1: The potential here is enormous, and I think that the
Speaker 1: beauty here is that these devices, these these little clips,
Speaker 1: you know, these little Chipolo add ons, and the things
Speaker 1: they put inside these uh you know, bikes and stuff.
Speaker 1: They don't have to have their own GPS to locate them.
Speaker 1: They're just piggybacking on the GPS built into every iPhone.
Speaker 1: So this is a huge when I think it has
Speaker 1: a lot of potential, mark my words, this will be
Speaker 1: one of the most successful programs that Apple does. If
Speaker 1: people can get over the privacy concerns of I'm using
Speaker 1: my phone to find other people's stuff, don't worry about it.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be just fine to find. My network is
Speaker 1: a crowdsource network of hundreds of millions of Apple devices
Speaker 1: that use Bluetooth to detect missing items nearby, then report
Speaker 1: the approximate location back to the owner. Apple says the
Speaker 1: entire process is end to end encrypted and anonymous, so
Speaker 1: no one, not even Apple or the third party manufacturer,
Speaker 1: can view a device's location or information. In fact, I
Speaker 1: think I'm gonna buy some of these Chipolos today. Why
Speaker 1: would I not. I want this on everything. I want
Speaker 1: this on my car, I want this on my backpack,
Speaker 1: I want this on my luggage. I want this on
Speaker 1: my keys. Oh my gosh. How much is one of
Speaker 1: these Chipolos Chipolo one? Now, I will tell you I
Speaker 1: covered Chipolo many many years ago with KTLA, and it
Speaker 1: was at CES. I saw these things and it didn't
Speaker 1: go anywhere because it was like, well, Tile is like
Speaker 1: the big one. Okay. Chipolo one spot starts shipping in June,
Speaker 1: and how much? How much? How much? Does not say,
Speaker 1: I'm guessing they're expensive of regular Chipolo's twenty five dollars. So, ah,
Speaker 1: this is huge. This is going to be big. Oh wow.
Speaker 1: And let's see replaceable battery, twelve month battery. Oh, this
Speaker 1: is going to be huge. Wow. I'm so I've never
Speaker 1: been so excited. But no price has been announced just yet,
Speaker 1: so we will we will keep an eye on that story. Anyway,
Speaker 1: let me move on. Let's see. Thomas says, Hey, Rich,
Speaker 1: I love this show. We have the two hundred gigabyte
Speaker 1: thank you. We have the two hundred gigabyte iCloud Family
Speaker 1: Share storage plan, and we are running out. I don't
Speaker 1: really want to bump up to the nine to ninety
Speaker 1: nine a month one terabyte plan. I want to remove it.
Speaker 1: How can I go about this? Where do I put
Speaker 1: these a local drive? Another less expensive cloud service? Thanks Tom, Tom,
Speaker 1: I feel your pain, buddy, because I am right there
Speaker 1: with you now. I pay for the two hundred dollars
Speaker 1: iCloud Family Share plan as well. I think that's three
Speaker 1: dollars a month. I also pay for the ten dollars
Speaker 1: a month Google Drive plan, which is one two terabytes,
Speaker 1: and I believe Apples is two terabytes. As well. I think, yeah,
Speaker 1: two terabytes, so it's two terabytes for ten dollars. Now
Speaker 1: I'm at the place where I'm right up against my
Speaker 1: two terabytes. So I get this thing that says you're
Speaker 1: ninety percent full, and the next level up for me
Speaker 1: is fifty dollars a month, which is like, that's a lot. Now.
Speaker 1: I pay eighteen bucks for YouTube, which you know, I mean,
Speaker 1: so it's not that big of a deal to pay
Speaker 1: for it, but it's still fifty dollars a month. Six
Speaker 1: hundred dollars a year for cloud storage seems like a lot. Now,
Speaker 1: I see what you're saying. You're saying I want to
Speaker 1: remove the videos. But here's the deal, Tom, You're gonna
Speaker 1: go through this whole I mean, you're gonna go through
Speaker 1: your iCloud and remove all those videos, and then now
Speaker 1: you're gonna have them somewhere else, and now when you
Speaker 1: want to look for them, you gotta look somewhere else
Speaker 1: for the videos. It's a whole big thing. So I
Speaker 1: would say, at this point, there's not really another place
Speaker 1: where you can put those videos for free. Even Google's
Speaker 1: gonna start charging on June fifteenth for storage, so you
Speaker 1: could I don't even know if you can upload them
Speaker 1: there before then to get them to get them in
Speaker 1: there for free. But I would say, I think you
Speaker 1: just go for the ten dollars a month. I know
Speaker 1: it pains you, and it's ten dollars a month, and
Speaker 1: it's a new fee, but you're already paying three dollars,
Speaker 1: so you're only paying seven more dollars a month. And
Speaker 1: you know, do you really want your videos in a
Speaker 1: different place? I don't know. Probably not. Now, a local
Speaker 1: drive is fine. Yeah, you can go to Costco buy
Speaker 1: a four terabyte hard drive for sixty bucks and offload
Speaker 1: your videos there, which is fine, But you still need
Speaker 1: to have them in a second place. So now you're
Speaker 1: gonna be sitting there, You're gonna be going through your iCloud,
Speaker 1: downloading all these videos, putting them on off separate hard drive.
Speaker 1: Then you got to copy that to another hard drive.
Speaker 1: Then you got to bring that hard drive to a
Speaker 1: friend's house, so you have them in two places. Then
Speaker 1: every time you add new videos, you gotta do the
Speaker 1: same process over and over. So it just sounds like
Speaker 1: something you don't want to do. And so I for
Speaker 1: that reason, would recommend just just ponying up for the
Speaker 1: ten dollars a month. I know it's tough. I gotta
Speaker 1: do it for the fifty dollars a month. It's going
Speaker 1: to really kill me to do that. But I think
Speaker 1: I don't know what. I'm gonna try to save money
Speaker 1: somewhere else, and I'm just trying to figure out where
Speaker 1: that is. There's got to be a subscription I have
Speaker 1: that I'm not getting the full use of. And last
Speaker 1: week or the last show I talked about Verizon has
Speaker 1: a twenty dollars a month unlimited storage plan. But again
Speaker 1: it's the same problem. Do I really want to split
Speaker 1: up my stuff? I was thinking about it and I'm like, okay,
Speaker 1: well I can use some you know, some of the
Speaker 1: unlimited storage and Verizon to free up space in my
Speaker 1: Google Drive. But then I have two different places I
Speaker 1: got to look for stuff, and that, you know, there's
Speaker 1: also something about making life easier, and that's the goal
Speaker 1: with all this stuff, and so you want to you know,
Speaker 1: you can't. You can't discount the fact of is my
Speaker 1: life more complicated because I'm saving five dollars? And you know,
Speaker 1: I always say to someone, did you buy a beer
Speaker 1: for five bucks? Have you ever purchased a beer for
Speaker 1: five dollars. How long does that last? A half an hour?
Speaker 1: An hour and it was five bucks. Now think about that,
Speaker 1: you're paying a whole month for seven There's probably something
Speaker 1: in your month that you purchase for seven dollars that
Speaker 1: doesn't last very long. Whether it's a Starbucks, whether it's
Speaker 1: a beer, whether it is you know, whatever it is.
Speaker 1: So just think about it that way. That's the way
Speaker 1: I've gotten through all these little fees and hopefully that
Speaker 1: helps all right. Speaking of Google, I tried Google's latest
Speaker 1: gadget that helps you get a better night's sleep, and
Speaker 1: I'm obsessed. That is the headline from my KTLA segment
Speaker 1: on the Google Nest Hub two. This is you know,
Speaker 1: one of my favorite gadgets is the Google nest It's
Speaker 1: just my favorite part about it is that it shows
Speaker 1: pictures when you're not using it, like all your Google photos.
Speaker 1: It's so cool. And then of course it does all
Speaker 1: this stuff, like the smart home stuff, like you know,
Speaker 1: you can play music on it, you can answer phone calls,
Speaker 1: all that good stuff. Now, there's no camera on the
Speaker 1: original Nest Hub. This has a seven inch screen and
Speaker 1: Google found that a lot of people put it in
Speaker 1: their bedroom because of that, the bigger one has a
Speaker 1: camera and this has Now the new feature on the
Speaker 1: two is a radar sensor. It's called solely, first appeared
Speaker 1: on the Pixel four and they realize that they can
Speaker 1: use this solely radar to figure out when you're sleeping
Speaker 1: and kind of track your sleep patterns. And so I
Speaker 1: tested this out. I had this by my bed for
Speaker 1: a couple of weeks and it's fantastic. I mean, you
Speaker 1: just go to sleep and when you wake up, you
Speaker 1: get a little report card of your sleep and it
Speaker 1: tells you how long you slept, how long you're in bed,
Speaker 1: which gives you your sleep efficiency, So how long it
Speaker 1: took you to go to sleep, how long it took
Speaker 1: you to wake up, how many times you moved throughout
Speaker 1: the night, if you snored, if you coughed, and it's
Speaker 1: pretty wild and so how you're breathing. The idea here
Speaker 1: is that Google is going to offer insights into your
Speaker 1: sleep plus suggestions on how to make make it better,
Speaker 1: get a better night's sleep. So for me, the suggestion
Speaker 1: it had is that I go to bed and wake
Speaker 1: up at very different times throughout the week, which is
Speaker 1: causing me disturbances. So there you have it. This is
Speaker 1: one hundred dollars. I highly recommend it that the Nest
Speaker 1: Hub is. My only problem with the Nest Hub is
Speaker 1: that it's sluggish. And maybe they're going to fix this
Speaker 1: with a software update, but it's like the thing is
Speaker 1: brand new, and you know, I was using it and
Speaker 1: it's like you tap it and it takes like three
Speaker 1: seconds to respond. Now why is that? Google? Come on?
Speaker 1: So I don't know if they're using like a low
Speaker 1: powered you know, whatever the processor is, or if they
Speaker 1: just you know, I don't think the processor's changed from
Speaker 1: the first one. Perhaps maybe it did, I don't know,
Speaker 1: but it seems just as slow as the first one.
Speaker 1: And so that's my only big problem with it. But
Speaker 1: for a hundred bucks, it's a great, you know, digital
Speaker 1: photo display and it does all your smart home stuff
Speaker 1: and if you don't, you know, if you're in the
Speaker 1: Google ecosystem with Google Photos, it's it's a pretty cool
Speaker 1: way to see your pictures throughout the day, and then
Speaker 1: with this little feature, it's pretty cool as well. The
Speaker 1: only thing to know is that Google says this is
Speaker 1: a free preview, so they eventually plan to charge for
Speaker 1: this thing, so just know that they didn't say how much.
Speaker 1: But that's the idea, is that this is free for now,
Speaker 1: and later on they will likely charge for the service.
Speaker 1: And if you're wondering if they're going to use your
Speaker 1: sleep data to sell you ads, Google says they will
Speaker 1: not do that. So there you have it. Linda says,
Speaker 1: good morning, Rich. I recently I always joke that people
Speaker 1: say good morning because they see me on TV and
Speaker 1: they go, oh, I need to email that guy. Good morning, Rich.
Speaker 1: I recently found out that my Samsung Note nine is
Speaker 1: resending pictures without me knowing. How do I fix this? Signed?
Speaker 1: Confused Linda, get out look for Android. Oh, Linda, this
Speaker 1: was a problem a while while back. I mean I'm
Speaker 1: talking like I thought this was like a couple of
Speaker 1: years ago. And I guess if you're on the Note nine,
Speaker 1: that was probably at least yeah, three years ago, because
Speaker 1: at the Note ten and they did the twenty so yeah.
Speaker 1: Uh So it's interesting because I thought they fixed this.
Speaker 1: I would Number one, do a software update. Update all
Speaker 1: of your software, so that means going into the there's
Speaker 1: three places I want you to go. Number one Google
Speaker 1: Play update all your apps there, and then restart your phone.
Speaker 1: Then I want you to go into the Galaxy Store
Speaker 1: update all of your apps there. That's a secret one.
Speaker 1: On Android phones that are that are Samsung, sometimes you
Speaker 1: miss that. It's not necessarily prevalent on your phone. Sometimes
Speaker 1: you get to pop up maybe that says, hey, you
Speaker 1: got some updates, but maybe turn that off. I would
Speaker 1: go into their update your apps there, and then I
Speaker 1: would go into the software update in the main settings
Speaker 1: and update your phone there, and you know, go through
Speaker 1: that process. So if that does not fix it, I
Speaker 1: would go ahead and switch to Google Messages. This is
Speaker 1: Google's SMS app. I believe that Samsung is replacing their
Speaker 1: messages app with this anyway in the future, and I
Speaker 1: think that's what they're doing. If not, I mean it's
Speaker 1: it's just better anyway. I would just go with the
Speaker 1: Google Messages. So all you have to do is download
Speaker 1: what's called Google Messages, and once you download it, you
Speaker 1: open it up. It will bring over all your old texts.
Speaker 1: You don't have to worry about doing anything special and
Speaker 1: boom you can. It'll say do you want to use
Speaker 1: this as your defall app? Say? Yes? And I don't
Speaker 1: think that app has that problem. So I think the
Speaker 1: software update should probably fix this, but the fact that
Speaker 1: it's still happening this late into the game, I would
Speaker 1: just go ahead and switch. I think that the Google
Speaker 1: Messages app is better anyway, and it's certainly updated more often,
Speaker 1: and just I think they're switching to it anyway, So
Speaker 1: I would just do that. Man, every story and every
Speaker 1: question is leading into the next story. So this this
Speaker 1: goes right into the story that Samsung has unveiled their
Speaker 1: cheapest five G smartphone, and just full disclosure, I have
Speaker 1: not tested this phone, so I can't say how good
Speaker 1: or bad it is. But it's the Samsung A thirty
Speaker 1: two five G A thirty two five G. It's their
Speaker 1: first five G device under three hundred dollars. And I
Speaker 1: was looking at this device because they came out with
Speaker 1: that the Samsung FE last year, which was a pretty
Speaker 1: pretty solid device for the price, but that was still
Speaker 1: like six seven hundred bucks. This is two eighty nine,
Speaker 1: a toot eighty. I mean, that's a steal. And I
Speaker 1: looked at it. They undercut a lot of these other phones,
Speaker 1: like a lot of these other devices that were really inexpensive,
Speaker 1: and Samsung at this point, you know, when it comes
Speaker 1: to Android, and we saw this with LG. It's like
Speaker 1: they're just they're killing it in their own way because
Speaker 1: it's a two party it's a what do they call it,
Speaker 1: two pony game, two horse race, I don't know what
Speaker 1: you call it. But it's basically Apple versus Samsung. When
Speaker 1: people think Android, don't even think Android, they think Samsung.
Speaker 1: It's Samsung versus Apple. It's not Google, it's not Android,
Speaker 1: it's not LG, it's not Huawei, it's not Pixel. It
Speaker 1: is Samsung versus iPhone. That's what people think. And so
Speaker 1: Samsung has done a really good job of just building
Speaker 1: on their momentum of Look, we're the we're the Android king,
Speaker 1: and we make a lot of different phones at a
Speaker 1: lot of different price points. You don't want to spend
Speaker 1: one thousand bucks on a super high in S twenty
Speaker 1: one or a Note twenty boom. Here's your five G
Speaker 1: A thirty two for twot eighty, and it's got the
Speaker 1: features you need. It's got four K video, it's got
Speaker 1: the scene optimizer for the camera, so the camera should
Speaker 1: be decent. It's got these special ar lenses for snapsh
Speaker 1: which I don't know how many people use that but whatever,
Speaker 1: it's got a huge battery five thousand million hours. That's
Speaker 1: that's among the biggest. In fact, I think that's the
Speaker 1: biggest you can put in a smartphone. It's got the
Speaker 1: fast charging, it's got power saving mode, and it does
Speaker 1: have a micro SD card slot, which is really nice,
Speaker 1: so you can add extra memory to this forty eight
Speaker 1: megapixel main shooter. It's got a six point five inch
Speaker 1: HD LCD screen, so it's not the highest quality screen.
Speaker 1: And again with a lot of these things, you're not getting,
Speaker 1: you know, the absolute best quality. Maybe you're not getting
Speaker 1: the best quality camera. Maybe you're not getting you know,
Speaker 1: you're not getting the top refresh rate. This is ninety hertz,
Speaker 1: which you know the top is is one twenty. You're
Speaker 1: not getting a super ammal ed screen. You're getting an LCD,
Speaker 1: you're not getting the full HD, You're just getting an HD, so,
Speaker 1: you know, but it's still fine. I think for the
Speaker 1: average user, you're not getting the most ram it's four gigs,
Speaker 1: and some of these phones now and Android top out
Speaker 1: at twelve. You're not getting the most memory. It's sixty
Speaker 1: four gigs, which generally one twenty eight is the base nowadays.
Speaker 1: But again you have that extra memory slot, you are
Speaker 1: getting fast charging. I don't see wireless charging, so you're
Speaker 1: not getting that. But the reality is, for most many,
Speaker 1: many people who just won an expensive phone, two hundred
Speaker 1: and eighty dollars is the difference between saving up your
Speaker 1: money for a couple of months and buying a phone
Speaker 1: and having a phone payment for twenty four months. So
Speaker 1: why buy a thousand dollars phone with all these things
Speaker 1: you don't need when you know you can buy a
Speaker 1: two hundred and eighty dollars phone and get ninety nine
Speaker 1: percent of what you need. Yeah, your pictures may not
Speaker 1: be the absolute best, it may not be the fastest,
Speaker 1: it may not have wireless charging, but it's going to
Speaker 1: be pretty good for the price. And it's a Samsung,
Speaker 1: so it's going to be a nice, you know, overall
Speaker 1: nice device with a lot of support, a lot of accessories.
Speaker 1: So check it out if you want a cheap phone,
Speaker 1: a thirty two to five G from Samsung. That's the
Speaker 1: big announcement. They're cheapest five G phone yet. All right,
Speaker 1: Rich writes in uh, can you tell me if I
Speaker 1: delete a picture from my picture account on my laptop
Speaker 1: and I have an iCloud account, or I have a
Speaker 1: cloud account where I think the picture goes for backup.
Speaker 1: Is the picture also deleted from the cloud account or
Speaker 1: do I have access to the cloud account to delete
Speaker 1: it there? Also? Thanks always enjoy your text segments on
Speaker 1: the news Rich well, thank you rich. From one rich
Speaker 1: to another rich Richie Rich, thanks Rich, thanks a lot,
Speaker 1: thanks a bunch um. Okay, so this gets a little confusing,
Speaker 1: and I know a lot of people are confused by this,
Speaker 1: so let me explain what happens. Okay, So, if you
Speaker 1: are using Google Photos or something similar on your phone, right, so,
Speaker 1: you've downloaded Google Photos, You've downloaded one drive, You've downloaded
Speaker 1: Amazon Photos. What it does is it takes that picture
Speaker 1: from your phone, it sucks it up and puts it
Speaker 1: in to the cloud, and so it now lives in
Speaker 1: the cloud. And if you're on your smartphone and you
Speaker 1: go into your smartphone's photo gallery, not the Amazon Photos app,
Speaker 1: not the Google Photos app, and you delete that picture,
Speaker 1: it will remain safe and secure in the cloud. So
Speaker 1: that's the way it works. If you go to your
Speaker 1: desktop computer and you go to Amazon photos dot com
Speaker 1: and you look for that photo and you say, eh,
Speaker 1: it's not very good, and you delete it, it will
Speaker 1: delete it off the cloud, but it will not delete
Speaker 1: it off your phone. Do that makes sense? So stick
Speaker 1: with me here. If you have Google Photos, same thing.
Speaker 1: You upload a picture from your phone to Google Photos,
Speaker 1: you go on Google Photos on the web app on
Speaker 1: your laptop, you delete a picture in Google Photos, it
Speaker 1: remains on your phone. If you delete that same picture
Speaker 1: from your gallery on your phone, it remains in Google Photos.
Speaker 1: So imagine it's kind of taking a copy of that
Speaker 1: picture and sucking it up to the cloud and keeping
Speaker 1: it there. Now Here is the big exception. If you
Speaker 1: go into Google Photos on your phone and you say, oh,
Speaker 1: let me delete that picture from the app, it says,
Speaker 1: would you also like us to delete this picture from
Speaker 1: your gallery? And you say yes, and it will delete
Speaker 1: it off your phone. I know. Now, if you're using iCloud,
Speaker 1: this is where it gets really interesting. If you're using
Speaker 1: iCloud and you sink your pictures from iCloud, you know,
Speaker 1: from your phone gallery to iCloud, and you delete a
Speaker 1: picture off your phone, it deletes it across everywhere. It
Speaker 1: will be gone out of the cloud, it will be
Speaker 1: gone off your laptop. If you use Apple Photos, it
Speaker 1: will be gone off the web. If you access your
Speaker 1: photos through through iCloud on the web, it will be
Speaker 1: gone everywhere. So this is often a thing that happens
Speaker 1: to people. They delete a picture and they think it's
Speaker 1: going to be deleted just from their phone, and it
Speaker 1: deletes it off the cloud. So what you need to
Speaker 1: do in the event that you use iCloud is you
Speaker 1: need to go into settings and use a setting called
Speaker 1: Optimize Phone Storage. And what this does is iCloud will
Speaker 1: manage your storage on your phone. Because you're thinking, well,
Speaker 1: you know if I if I upload to the cloud,
Speaker 1: I can delete it off my phone. No, not if
Speaker 1: you using iCloud, because it's not. It doesn't work that way.
Speaker 1: It's an integrated platform. So it's a little bit different
Speaker 1: and it's a little trickier because if you go deleting
Speaker 1: things off your phone, it deletes it off iCloud as well.
Speaker 1: So what you need to do is let Apple manage it.
Speaker 1: And here's how they manage it. If you have that
Speaker 1: Optimized Phone Storage turned on in your photo settings iCloud
Speaker 1: Photo Settings, it will look through your phone and as
Speaker 1: you reach the end of your storage on your phone,
Speaker 1: the physical storage on your phone. It will say, okay,
Speaker 1: we're gonna we're gonna offload some of these pictures. So
Speaker 1: what it does is it deletes some of the pictures
Speaker 1: off your phone, but it keeps a tiny copy, like
Speaker 1: a thumbnail copy, but it keeps the original in the cloud.
Speaker 1: And so let's say you go back, you scroll back
Speaker 1: on your camera roll all the way a year ago,
Speaker 1: and you notice that there's a little cloud icon in
Speaker 1: the corner. That means that the photo is not actually
Speaker 1: on your phone, it's grabbing that data from iCloud. When
Speaker 1: you tap that picture, it will immediately download it from
Speaker 1: the cloud and it will be on your phone just
Speaker 1: like it was before. I know this who very very
Speaker 1: confusing f from your mortals that may not be a
Speaker 1: tech nerd that you know specializes in this stuff, but
Speaker 1: it's what you need to know is if you know,
Speaker 1: if you're using iCloud, if you're you know, just if
Speaker 1: you're using iCloud, don't delete stuff off your phone. Let's
Speaker 1: make sure that that feature is in there. And if
Speaker 1: you need to free up storage, like if there's something
Speaker 1: you don't need like a picture or a video, like
Speaker 1: for me, I ran out of storage on my phone.
Speaker 1: The other day, I went through and I deleted a
Speaker 1: whole bunch of videos on my camera roll number one.
Speaker 1: I know those videos are backed up in Google Photos,
Speaker 1: so I'm fine doing that. If I was just using iCloud,
Speaker 1: I would only delete things that I knew or that
Speaker 1: were stuff I don't need, because I don't you. I
Speaker 1: don't use the optimized iPhone storage because I don't use
Speaker 1: iCloud for all my photos. So it's a little bit
Speaker 1: different for me. But if you're using that, just know
Speaker 1: that if you delete something off your phone or computer.
Speaker 1: If you're on Apple Photos on your computer and you
Speaker 1: delete something, yes it will delete it off everything. It'll
Speaker 1: lead it delete that video or picture off your phone
Speaker 1: as well. Hope I explained that, and I'm not, and
Speaker 1: you're not sitting there more confused than before. Talk about Facebook.
Speaker 1: You probably heard about this giant Facebook data breach. Facebook
Speaker 1: does not call it a breach. They say that bad
Speaker 1: actors scraped giant amounts of information off of their website,
Speaker 1: including phone numbers, email addresses, all kinds of stuff whatever
Speaker 1: you had on there five hundred million people. So one
Speaker 1: of the big things that was a little different this
Speaker 1: time is phone numbers were and before we've seen email addresses,
Speaker 1: we've seen passwords. It's sad that we're you know, sort
Speaker 1: of immune, not immune, but we've we've grown accustomed to
Speaker 1: seeing this happen and so we're just like, ya on, okay,
Speaker 1: my private information's out there again. Great now what uh?
Speaker 1: And you shouldn't feel like that, bully. I'm just saying
Speaker 1: that it's just happened so often that we're like, you know,
Speaker 1: we just see it. So the phone numbers were the
Speaker 1: things that raised a lot of eyebrows because people are like, oh,
Speaker 1: and Facebook, because we feel like Facebook is always getting hacked,
Speaker 1: but this happened in twenty nineteen. Facebook says that basically
Speaker 1: bad actors abused what's called the contact import feature. So
Speaker 1: if you've ever downloaded the Facebook app or Messenger or
Speaker 1: you know, Instagram, it says, hey, do you want us
Speaker 1: to check your contacts and see if any of them
Speaker 1: are on Instagram? And you say yes, And what they're
Speaker 1: doing is they're uploading your address book and then they're
Speaker 1: comparing it against all the people on Facebook that have
Speaker 1: inputted their details like their phone number or their email
Speaker 1: address and saying, oh, we notice here that you know
Speaker 1: this person and you want to friend them. And so
Speaker 1: what these bad actors did apparently is just fake a
Speaker 1: whole bunch of phone numbers to see if it matched
Speaker 1: anyone on Facebook. And now they had the information about
Speaker 1: who that person was. So that's what Facebook explained, and
Speaker 1: they said this wasn't a hack. It was sort of
Speaker 1: a you know, using our systems in a way they
Speaker 1: were not intended, and we since patched this up. So
Speaker 1: at the long story short, the phone numbers are still
Speaker 1: out there, and so there is a website if you
Speaker 1: want to check to see if your phone numbers out there.
Speaker 1: It's have I Been Pooned? Have I been pwned? That's
Speaker 1: how you spell it have And you would think that
Speaker 1: would be have I been pawned, but it's pned like owned.
Speaker 1: Have I been poned dot com? Pwned dot com? You
Speaker 1: can type in your phone number and you can see
Speaker 1: if it was part of the breach. Mine was not. Miraculously,
Speaker 1: and you might be saying, rich, why what I type
Speaker 1: my phone number into this website? Aren't they just gonna
Speaker 1: steal it? And this guy is a security guy, the
Speaker 1: guy who runs it, and his name's Troy Hunt. He's
Speaker 1: been doing it for many years. You can cross check it.
Speaker 1: He's pretty good. So he's not sitting there trying to
Speaker 1: collect your stuff. He's just trying to make people aware
Speaker 1: of when their stuff is out there on the open web.
Speaker 1: So you have to type in your phone number because
Speaker 1: the reality is, even if your phone numbers out there,
Speaker 1: there's nothing you can do about it. You can't recall it.
Speaker 1: You can't say, oh, please put this back in your
Speaker 1: in your data storage and keep it in there, please.
Speaker 1: You can't do that. You just know that your phone
Speaker 1: numbers out there for hackers to or spammers to send
Speaker 1: spam to. And I was talking about this on my
Speaker 1: Facebook page Facebook dot com slash rich on tech about
Speaker 1: how all this information that's out there about us is
Speaker 1: really bad because because the smart spammers are gonna start
Speaker 1: linking up our email address with all this personal information
Speaker 1: we have. And so let's say our phone number was
Speaker 1: on here, and so now these smart hacks are texting us,
Speaker 1: and they can text us with our real name and
Speaker 1: with our real email address, and so these texts that
Speaker 1: we get seem more legitimate. And I've always thought about
Speaker 1: this with all these companies that try to like verify
Speaker 1: who we are. I mean how much how many ways
Speaker 1: can they verify who we are? I mean, there's only
Speaker 1: so many pieces of personal information about us. You know,
Speaker 1: the street you grew up on, your mother's may name,
Speaker 1: your date of birth. I mean a lot of these
Speaker 1: things are now floating around out there, especially with the
Speaker 1: amount of information we put out there on the web
Speaker 1: about ourselves. So I mean social security number is one
Speaker 1: of those things that still reserve for like you know,
Speaker 1: hopefully that's not floating around, but sometimes those are floating around.
Speaker 1: So I always am concerned for the future that we
Speaker 1: need a better way of identifying people about who they are,
Speaker 1: because how do you really know someone is who they
Speaker 1: say they are? Because how many ways can you verify them?
Speaker 1: And I always think this is interesting too. We have
Speaker 1: all these computer systems that try to attempt to verify someone.
Speaker 1: But imagine you as one human to another. You can
Speaker 1: have a friend call you up thirty years later and
Speaker 1: you can identify them instantly by the sound of their voice.
Speaker 1: So just think about that for a second. All these
Speaker 1: systems that we create, right, all these systems that eighteen
Speaker 1: T has and Verizon and Google and Facebook and Instagram,
Speaker 1: none of them compare to what our human brain can do,
Speaker 1: which is identify someone by face or by voice in
Speaker 1: about a fraction of a second. Think about that amazing, right,
Speaker 1: And I always I always think about this in my mind.
Speaker 1: All these systems we're coming up with are basically trying
Speaker 1: to to recreate the human brain and the human body
Speaker 1: that's already out there. It's already perfect, it's already exactly
Speaker 1: what we need as humans to interact with each other. Right,
Speaker 1: you want to build trust with someone, you can identify
Speaker 1: them in one second. If someone comes up to you
Speaker 1: and says they're your mom, you know if they are
Speaker 1: not one second, right, there's no there's no like faking it.
Speaker 1: You know, someone says your friend from you know, freshman
Speaker 1: year college, you can tell on about one second if
Speaker 1: they are. Anyway, I find that stuff fascinating. So anyway,
Speaker 1: another podcast, the The Extistential rich on Tech podcast. All right,
Speaker 1: I don't even know if that is. What does extistential mean?
Speaker 1: Let's see, Uh, I just say these words. I'm not
Speaker 1: even sure what they mean, but let's see extestential relating
Speaker 1: to existence. Philosophy concerned with existence, especially human existence, as
Speaker 1: viewed in the theories of ex distentialism. How do you
Speaker 1: use the word to define the word. Come on, Oxford,
Speaker 1: what are you doing Google logic affirming or implying the
Speaker 1: existence of a thing? Anyway, Okay, maybe it is existential
Speaker 1: Let's get to another question here. kJ says, good morning, Rich.
Speaker 1: I love all the information you shared daily. I've been
Speaker 1: watching KTLA way back since Jennifer Yorke barbar Beck Das.
Speaker 1: I'm a dedicated fan forever to KTLA. Love the way
Speaker 1: you make your audience feel like family. I have a
Speaker 1: question for you, now that you've buttered me up. Okay,
Speaker 1: let's hear your question. Can you please give me advice
Speaker 1: on the best cellular phone that is out there? Now?
Speaker 1: I currently have the Note ten I want to upgrade.
Speaker 1: I trust only your advice, not the sales associates. I
Speaker 1: fax email, scan documents all the time for work using
Speaker 1: my phone because I don't have any of these devices
Speaker 1: in my home. If you please give me advice, I
Speaker 1: greatly appreciate it. Thanks in advance. Oh, Lakeisha, kJ l
Speaker 1: J interesting Lakeisha? Okay, Well, anyway, I always it's always
Speaker 1: interesting to see people's names but their email address. Because kJ,
Speaker 1: I would think her first name would be kJ because
Speaker 1: her middle name is Jay. Anyway, Okay, you have a No. Ten.
Speaker 1: I mean a No ten is still pretty solid. I
Speaker 1: would say you could probably upgrade to the Note twenty
Speaker 1: and be just fine if you want to continue with
Speaker 1: the Samsung route. If you don't want to continue the
Speaker 1: Samsung route, I would say a standard iPhone twelve would
Speaker 1: be perfect. And I will say one thing. I do
Speaker 1: find that the iPhone scans documents better than the Samsung's.
Speaker 1: I don't know why they just do, but I would
Speaker 1: also there's also a new app for the Androids called
Speaker 1: Stack by Google, which does some pretty clean scans. But
Speaker 1: I find that the scanning on the samsungs varies a bit.
Speaker 1: Sometimes it's clear, sometimes it's not. But anyway, so those
Speaker 1: are my advice. I would say Note twenty. If you
Speaker 1: want a big phone and you want to continue with Samsung,
Speaker 1: I'd go with the Note twenty. If you don't necessarily
Speaker 1: need the Note, I would say the S twenty one
Speaker 1: plus if you want to continue with a big phone,
Speaker 1: would be just fine, but you don't get the stylus.
Speaker 1: And if you want to switch to iPhone, which you
Speaker 1: know rich you're such an iPhone lover, why do you
Speaker 1: always recommend iPhone? I mean, it's a good phone and
Speaker 1: it's got, you know, everything she needs, and so you know,
Speaker 1: you can do that and you can probably get a
Speaker 1: good trade in price if you go through Samsung dot
Speaker 1: com if you're trading up to a new Samsung, and
Speaker 1: if you go through the iPhone route, Apple will give
Speaker 1: you some money for your Note ten. So those are
Speaker 1: the phones I'd recommend S twenty one plus Note twenty
Speaker 1: if you need not twenty, I think is like that's
Speaker 1: only if you need the you know, biggest best phone
Speaker 1: for you know, if you want to continue on the
Speaker 1: note route. Otherwise, I think S twenty one plus or
Speaker 1: the S twenty one Ultra is kind of like the
Speaker 1: Note ten or the Note twenty rather, but it's like
Speaker 1: the newer version of it, so it's got. I'd probably
Speaker 1: go with that over the note because you can still
Speaker 1: use the stylus with it. In fact, you can use
Speaker 1: your old stylus from the Note ten, So save some
Speaker 1: money there, all right. I think I answered that, let's
Speaker 1: uh move on to Marriott. Is it Marriott or Marriott
Speaker 1: or you know I read somewhere that you're supposed to
Speaker 1: say Marriott like Chariot. Oh sorry, yeah, like Marriott. I
Speaker 1: don't know anyway, now I'm saying it. It's like do
Speaker 1: you ever say a word so many times that it
Speaker 1: feels it sounds weird when you say it, Like like
Speaker 1: if I say Marriott, Marriott, Marriott, Marrio, it so Marriott,
Speaker 1: I say Marriott. Marriott is introducing contactless arrival kiosks. And
Speaker 1: this is not new necessarily, I've seen these in Vegas,
Speaker 1: believe me. But for Marriott Marriott Marriott to do this
Speaker 1: is a big deal because they own let's see, seventy
Speaker 1: six hundred properties woo, and they these kiosks are not
Speaker 1: at their main hotels just yet. They're at courtyards. They're
Speaker 1: at the Moxie, which is kind of like their hip
Speaker 1: young fun brand and Townplay suites. And so these kiosks
Speaker 1: are for guests who prefer low contact interactions, so you
Speaker 1: can skip the traditional check in desk altogether and complete
Speaker 1: an easy three step process at the kiosk to check
Speaker 1: in and get your room keys. And so they have
Speaker 1: these kiosks have anti microbial technology baked into the touchscreen glass.
Speaker 1: Then there's UV light to kill bacteria and viruses, and
Speaker 1: I think this is fantastic. I love it, and I know, oh,
Speaker 1: you know, it does affect the job situation with the
Speaker 1: front desk clerks, but let's be real, there's always people
Speaker 1: that want to bypass the human contact, the human connection.
Speaker 1: I find it's interesting as I get older, I kind
Speaker 1: of like the human stuff, but there are places where
Speaker 1: I don't necessarily need it, Like at the grocery store.
Speaker 1: I do like the cashier because I think they're faster
Speaker 1: than the self checkouts. The self checkouts I will use
Speaker 1: if I only have a couple items and if the
Speaker 1: lines are long at the checkout and everyone's like, ah,
Speaker 1: I'm not using that because they are so bad. I
Speaker 1: find that Target is decent with their self checkout. The
Speaker 1: grocery stores, most of them are terrible. Costco was pretty fast,
Speaker 1: but you know, it's like anyway, So I would say,
Speaker 1: I think this is fine. And I think in Vegas
Speaker 1: a lot of people don't use the kiosks because I
Speaker 1: don't know if they're looking for a room upgrade or
Speaker 1: if they just don't trust them. But you know the
Speaker 1: reality is it's uh, I don't know. It's just one
Speaker 1: more option for people, and I think it's pretty cool.
Speaker 1: And I think these hotels are starting at because you know,
Speaker 1: do you ever hear that thing where you slip the
Speaker 1: cashier twenty and they or the front desk perse a
Speaker 1: twenty person a twenty and they will, you know, upgrade
Speaker 1: your room, which, by the way, has never worked for me.
Speaker 1: I don't think I've ever gotten a room upgrade in
Speaker 1: my life staying hotels. I mean never. They're always like,
Speaker 1: we're all full or completely full? What do they say?
Speaker 1: They say, We're completely committed. That's I think that's the
Speaker 1: word they use. We're completely committed, mister Demiro, we don't
Speaker 1: have a room. We noticed it one time I booked
Speaker 1: a room on Google because it was so simple. It
Speaker 1: was like one click and they had all my information.
Speaker 1: And the hotel person actually called me out when I
Speaker 1: asked for an upgrade, and they're like, oh, you booked
Speaker 1: the cheapest possible way on Google. No way or giving
Speaker 1: you an upgrade we give We usually give those people
Speaker 1: the worst rooms. So I was like, oh, and I've
Speaker 1: heard before from other hotel people that like, you know,
Speaker 1: if you book on Priceline, they give you like the
Speaker 1: worst rooms. So I'm talking price line with the price
Speaker 1: line with the auction bidding. You know, they're like, oh,
Speaker 1: we reserve our worst rooms for those people. So I
Speaker 1: don't know. I've I've I've booked all different ways, believe me,
Speaker 1: and even with diamond status at Hilton, and they still
Speaker 1: don't care. It seems they're like they might give you,
Speaker 1: like a better view perhaps, but it doesn't. I find
Speaker 1: that the hotels you gotta pay if you want an upgrade. Anyway,
Speaker 1: I digress. So I think the kiosk is cool. I
Speaker 1: would definitely use it if it was like a Hampton
Speaker 1: in or something where it's like, you know, courtyard. There's
Speaker 1: really not a better room at the courtyard. It's not
Speaker 1: like there's like a fantastic suite you're gonna get upgraded
Speaker 1: to by sweet talking the front desk person. So I
Speaker 1: think it works in that kind of hotel. I think
Speaker 1: that if you're staying at a five star hotel, I
Speaker 1: don't think there's an expectation that you would be checking
Speaker 1: yourself in, although if they offered that as an option,
Speaker 1: I'm sure some people would use it. And if you're
Speaker 1: at a Moxie, which is really their their kind of fun,
Speaker 1: young hip hotel, you do everything on your phone and
Speaker 1: so you would expect to check in on a kiosk.
Speaker 1: And I know, with Hilton at least, which is a
Speaker 1: brand I've been kind of loyal to over the past
Speaker 1: couple of years, they let you check in on your
Speaker 1: phone and so you can use your phone as a
Speaker 1: key for the room. And I don't know, I don't
Speaker 1: know if Marriott, Marriott Marriott. I don't know if Marriott
Speaker 1: does that. But anyway, so there you have it, all right,
Speaker 1: one more story real quick. I thought this was interesting.
Speaker 1: This little website called Wormhole wormhole dot app, and it's
Speaker 1: a way to send files quickly, end to end encryption,
Speaker 1: and it's a link that expires in twenty four hours.
Speaker 1: And I saw this on product ton I thought it
Speaker 1: was pretty cool. You know, they say their security is
Speaker 1: pretty hip. But if you need to send a file
Speaker 1: to someone quickly and easily, but it's called wormhole dot
Speaker 1: app and you dragon, oh send up to ten gigabytes.
Speaker 1: That's pretty good. So if you need to send like
Speaker 1: a big video file to someone or you know whatever,
Speaker 1: a big file you get a presentation, you need to
Speaker 1: share it with someone, you drag and drop it onto
Speaker 1: this website Wormhole dot app. It creates a link. It's
Speaker 1: end to end encrypted, which is really good for security,
Speaker 1: and the link expires in twenty four hours, which is
Speaker 1: really quick. But you know, if you're just sharing something
Speaker 1: with someone and time is of the essence, this is
Speaker 1: a really quick and fast and easy way to do it.
Speaker 1: There's another website called Firefi Send, which I recommended, but
Speaker 1: that's shut down and this seems to be a pretty
Speaker 1: good alternative to that. Ope, you know what that sound means.
Speaker 1: It is the end of the show. That's gonna do it.
Speaker 1: For this episode of rich on Tech. If you would
Speaker 1: like to submit a question for me to answer, there
Speaker 1: are two ways to do it. Just go to rich
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Speaker 1: You can watch me from anywhere. Now. I love it,
Speaker 1: Love it, love it. My name is Richar dmiro. Thanks
Speaker 1: so much for listening. I am telling you that more
Speaker 1: of you are listening now. I don't know if it's
Speaker 1: because more people are driving, commuting, going to work, whatever,
Speaker 1: but the numbers are slowly ticking up to the pre
Speaker 1: pandemic levels, which is good. So thank you for sharing
Speaker 1: this show with your friends. Please tell a friend about
Speaker 1: it so we can expand our reach. There are so many,
Speaker 1: so many ways you can spend an hour of your time.
Speaker 1: I do appreciate you spending it with me. Stay safe.
Speaker 1: I will talk to you real soon.