Speaker 1: Brought to you by the reinvented two thousand twelve camera.
Speaker 1: It's ready. Are you get in touch with technology? With
Speaker 1: text stuff from how stuff works dot com. Hello again, everyone,
Speaker 1: Welcome to tex stuff. My name is Chris Poulette, and
Speaker 1: I am an editor at how stuff works dot Com.
Speaker 1: Sitting across from me as always, just as he was
Speaker 1: a year ago, his senior writer, Jonathan Strickland. You all
Speaker 1: know me, know how I earn a living. I'll catch
Speaker 1: this bird for you, but it ain't gonna be easy.
Speaker 1: Bad fish now like going down the pond chasing bluegills
Speaker 1: and Tommy CODs. This shark swally a hole, little shaken,
Speaker 1: little tenderizing and down you go. Okay, so wow, I
Speaker 1: I yeah, I think we'll figure that out in a minute.
Speaker 1: Of course. You know, if you know the source of
Speaker 1: Jonathan's quotes, please let us know some of you of them. Yeah,
Speaker 1: some of you have been very good about that. We
Speaker 1: got one email that that listed I think thirty nine
Speaker 1: of the quotes. How much Jonathan loves Tron. Yes, but
Speaker 1: by the way, that movie I just quoted from not Tron. Alright, Uh,
Speaker 1: this is our this is our annual. Hey, let's see
Speaker 1: how well we did last year podcast where we we
Speaker 1: talked about the predictions we made the year before and uh.
Speaker 1: And first of all, we should mention that we're recording
Speaker 1: this podcast at the very beginning of December of two
Speaker 1: thousand ten, and this is about the predictions we made
Speaker 1: for two thousand ten. Now, the reason why I say
Speaker 1: that is because some of these wrong answers may still
Speaker 1: turn right before January, so don't write us in if
Speaker 1: something happened on December thirty one. Some of them were
Speaker 1: very clearly wrong, and mine is the most embarrassing. Now
Speaker 1: I'm looking at the list here, Polette, the list oh
Speaker 1: predictions that the two of us made together. Yeah, this
Speaker 1: was the second time we tried this. We tried this
Speaker 1: at the the end of two thousand eight for two
Speaker 1: thousand nine. Yeah, and uh, I remember being much more
Speaker 1: into it and excited about making predictions because I didn't
Speaker 1: realize how wrong I was going to be. And so
Speaker 1: Jonathan made a ton more predictions for two thousand ten
Speaker 1: than I did because I didn't want to go out
Speaker 1: on the limb, so I was really conservative. Yeah. Also,
Speaker 1: if you remember how I graded them last year, yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's the last time I'm giving you the marker. I
Speaker 1: guess I won't be doing that this year, all right,
Speaker 1: So we're gonna start this up. Because I made a
Speaker 1: few more predictions than Mr Pillette, We've decided that Mr
Speaker 1: Pellette will read out some of mine and then we
Speaker 1: will comment upon them, and then occasionally I will read
Speaker 1: out some of his, and then we'll make our way
Speaker 1: through there, and then we're gonna wrap up by talking
Speaker 1: about some of the big stories that neither of us predicted. Yes,
Speaker 1: because we thought that would be fun. Okay, cool, all right,
Speaker 1: let's get started. So you said, yes, that would be
Speaker 1: the year of the e reader, you know, the devices
Speaker 1: dedicated to books, like the Nook or the Kindle. Uh
Speaker 1: saying that you know, well, you were about to head
Speaker 1: out to see SUH the the show formerly known specifically
Speaker 1: as the Consumer Electronic Show. Every everyone assumes now that
Speaker 1: it's just ce S. I guess. But you said you'd
Speaker 1: see a lot of those when you went out in
Speaker 1: January to Las Vegas, and you did. Some of them
Speaker 1: have disappeared since then, never actually hit the marketing, some
Speaker 1: of them never really got a good chance. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: said that that Twain ten would be the year the
Speaker 1: e reader, and you disagreed. You said that it would
Speaker 1: take another year. Well, I was going by you know,
Speaker 1: the analyst Gartner said that the e reader wasn't yet
Speaker 1: ready for the masses. I think the Kindle sales prove
Speaker 1: that wrong. However, I'm gonna I'm gonna call this one
Speaker 1: a tie for us because one, it really is not
Speaker 1: in the United States at any rate. It's still pretty
Speaker 1: much a two horse race, right, And and the first
Speaker 1: horse is the Kindle, and it's way the heck ahead
Speaker 1: of the second horse, which is the Nook. And still
Speaker 1: have other readers, but those are the two main ones.
Speaker 1: And that's if you're going strictly by devices dedicated to readers, right,
Speaker 1: because the iPad has become a real contender in the
Speaker 1: e reader space. But the iPad, of course is not
Speaker 1: just an e reader, so that you know. But I
Speaker 1: would say that the iPad still has not um It
Speaker 1: hasn't made e readers obsolete. No, some people said that
Speaker 1: it would because it can do so much more. But
Speaker 1: it turns out that some people just like the e
Speaker 1: reader form factor specifically for reading books. Plus the prices
Speaker 1: come down, and there was another factor by a very
Speaker 1: famous woman who came out in favor of e readers,
Speaker 1: who probably tilted the market a little bit more than
Speaker 1: it might not have benefit had been allowed to sit
Speaker 1: with a lot of anonymous people reading books. Are you
Speaker 1: talking about Wait wait wait wait, are you talking about
Speaker 1: Nicole Kimman? Wait wait wait wait? Are you talking about
Speaker 1: um Red Fraggle? Yes? Not Oprah. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: I was talking about the lady who has the network
Speaker 1: starting January one. In January, Sorry, I can remember. I
Speaker 1: think eleven, isn't it? I don't know. You want to
Speaker 1: go back on that. Yes, it was indeed Oprah I
Speaker 1: was speaking of with the the new network on Discovery. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and uh yeah, Oprah. Really the kindle became one of
Speaker 1: her favorite things, right, Yeah, and of course she she
Speaker 1: has a bully pulpit in her show, so we're so.
Speaker 1: You know, as soon as she mentioned that, a lot
Speaker 1: of people who may not necessarily have been interested, you know,
Speaker 1: checked it out and discovered they liked it. Yeah. Actually,
Speaker 1: that was one of those devices that that quickly got
Speaker 1: outside that niche market of the you know, the the
Speaker 1: early adopter tech guys gals, and hit a broader audience
Speaker 1: pretty quickly and and they still have been doing pretty well.
Speaker 1: I'm still calling it a tie. I still don't think
Speaker 1: was really technically the year of the e reader. I
Speaker 1: think the iPad managed to two deflect that quite a bit.
Speaker 1: So um, but it certainly did hit public mass consciousness. Yes,
Speaker 1: readers did really well, and they continued to do well
Speaker 1: during Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales as well. Okay,
Speaker 1: so let's go. I guess to another one of mine.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, and one of your on the iPad, the
Speaker 1: iPod Touch camera. Hey look at that ding? Yeah, I
Speaker 1: got one right? Um, that was it was almost I
Speaker 1: think I said last year that that one was pretty
Speaker 1: much gimme. Uh. And even though Apple had not said
Speaker 1: anything to that effect, I could not imagine another year
Speaker 1: going by of iPod updates and not seeing a camera
Speaker 1: in the new iPod Touch and uh. And of course
Speaker 1: they've They've added the capability of being able to join
Speaker 1: face time using iPod Touch over WiFi, just like if
Speaker 1: people who use the iPhone. So I got one, right,
Speaker 1: you got one right? More. I think this would be
Speaker 1: a good time for my first one. All right, So
Speaker 1: Apple release something likely. I love that you said something
Speaker 1: talk about hedging your bets. I told you I was
Speaker 1: being really conservative because it could have released like doves
Speaker 1: and it would have been right. They released a plague
Speaker 1: of locusts in the in the Google headquarters and it
Speaker 1: would have okay. Anyway, so Pletts says Apple will release something,
Speaker 1: you know, the master prognosticator here. But then he went
Speaker 1: on to say it would likely be a tablet and
Speaker 1: it would sell well, but not as well as all
Speaker 1: the hype leading up to the tablet would have indicated.
Speaker 1: In other words, if you remember lots of hype, right, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: if you remember this time, well, this time, I don't
Speaker 1: know when you're listening to this, If you remember the
Speaker 1: winter of two thousand and nine, that was really when
Speaker 1: people were speculating about this tablet device more than ever before,
Speaker 1: and that that speculation had started years earlier. I mean
Speaker 1: we're talking like, I think it had been like two
Speaker 1: years since people had started talking about an Apple tablet
Speaker 1: and uh and so yeah, everyone was was really convinced
Speaker 1: that Apple is going to come out with this. Um.
Speaker 1: I should also say that I made a similar prediction,
Speaker 1: except I said that Apple would come out with a
Speaker 1: tablet and that it would tank. I think we both
Speaker 1: technically got this a little wrong. I got it. I
Speaker 1: got it way wrong. I was completely wrong. I mean,
Speaker 1: apart from the fact that they came out with a tablet,
Speaker 1: that part was right. Did you all hear that it
Speaker 1: wasn't just me? I know, yes, Okay, Once in a
Speaker 1: while I say things that don't turn out to be
Speaker 1: true because, like John teethor I traveled back from an
Speaker 1: alternate future where the iPad flocked. That's my defense. I
Speaker 1: clearly it's three degrees of difference from my reality. I
Speaker 1: hope you I hope you guys listened to the j
Speaker 1: T podcast anyway. So, yeah, I said it was gonna flop.
Speaker 1: I was totally wrong. Chris said it was gonna sell well,
Speaker 1: but not as well as people thought. Actually ended up selling.
Speaker 1: I think it's sell better hot cakes. Yeah it was.
Speaker 1: It flew off store shelves well. Keeping in mind that
Speaker 1: the previous tablets, the Windows based tablets, which were essentially
Speaker 1: laptop computers that the screen flipped around. Yeah, uh, they
Speaker 1: didn't really do so well. So I kind of figured,
Speaker 1: you know, well, they they'll probably do well, but nobody
Speaker 1: really wants to tablet as much as they say we do.
Speaker 1: Once it turns out Chris and I totally underestimated how
Speaker 1: Apple can convince us to buy stuff. In fact, I
Speaker 1: will go so far as to say fifty of the
Speaker 1: people in this room have an iPad right now. Of
Speaker 1: the people in this room at the moment caved within
Speaker 1: a week of the release, and it's still upset. Actually,
Speaker 1: I should I should amend that people in this recording
Speaker 1: area of this room, because we have our producer out
Speaker 1: there and I don't. Hey, Matt, do you have an iPad?
Speaker 1: Matt does not. So the people in this room own
Speaker 1: an iPad? How do you like them? Odds? So, yeah,
Speaker 1: Anyway did really, really well. So we both got that
Speaker 1: kriska just a little wrong. But I'm going to give
Speaker 1: him a checkmark on this because he was more more
Speaker 1: right than not right. I was totally wrong. Alright, So
Speaker 1: it's your turn to read another one of my predictions. Yes,
Speaker 1: here's another one we got that you got mostly right,
Speaker 1: and uh yeah, Anyway will come and go without an
Speaker 1: announcement of a new console from Sony or Microsoft. But
Speaker 1: Nintendo might come out with something, and I agreed with you.
Speaker 1: I thought that would be likely. Yeah, I thought at
Speaker 1: the time that Nintendo might announce a successor possibly to
Speaker 1: the Wei. As it turns out, Nintendo did not do that.
Speaker 1: Nintendo or hasn't so far. December. We still have December
Speaker 1: to go. Yeah, this isn't the time for announcements like
Speaker 1: that because people don't want to cannibalize the today sales.
Speaker 1: They're gonna keep mom on it even I'm sure they're all.
Speaker 1: I agree with my earlier self when I said that
Speaker 1: I think they're working on the next All of them
Speaker 1: are working on the next generation. They're just ready to
Speaker 1: share with us what they're doing. Yeah, and and and
Speaker 1: my reasoning behind that was that both Sony and Microsoft
Speaker 1: were coming out with new peripherals and that would be
Speaker 1: the move and the connect um and uh and I thought, well,
Speaker 1: if you're doing that, you wouldn't want to cannibalize those
Speaker 1: sales by suggesting that you were going to come out
Speaker 1: with a new console the following year, because people might say, well,
Speaker 1: what if the peripherals aren't compatible with the new console.
Speaker 1: So um, yeah, I was I was right. Sony and
Speaker 1: Microsoft did not announce anything. Nintendo did announce the three DS,
Speaker 1: which is a new gaming device, but it's not a console.
Speaker 1: It's a handheld. It is an interesting handheld device, and
Speaker 1: it is a variation on an original on their Earth.
Speaker 1: So you know, I'm more right than not with this one,
Speaker 1: but I think, uh, yeah, it's not a it's not
Speaker 1: a total win on this one either. Yeah, the tech
Speaker 1: industry is kind of aren't to pin down on. Yeah, alright,
Speaker 1: hit me with another one. We have one of these
Speaker 1: science more science e This is before we had a
Speaker 1: science oriented podcast. So we actually talked about the Large
Speaker 1: Hadron Collider, which is the if you'll remember, the Large
Speaker 1: Particle Accelerator in Europe, Europe, Europe. There we go. Uh,
Speaker 1: and you said it would either uncover evidence of the
Speaker 1: Higgs boson particle or something even weirder. Yeah, that has
Speaker 1: not really come to pass. Although recently the LHC has
Speaker 1: managed to recreate on a miniscule scale conditions similar to
Speaker 1: that that we believe existed right after the Big Bang.
Speaker 1: So that's pretty cool, but nothing to the point where
Speaker 1: at least none of the information has trickled out where
Speaker 1: it's something brand new that we didn't know, it's something
Speaker 1: that we haven't achieved before. But it's not like we
Speaker 1: have new information that either confirms our hypotheses or uh
Speaker 1: disproves them, and now we have to come up with
Speaker 1: a new model. So right, so nothing as drumatic as that,
Speaker 1: all right, can I read another one of yours? Now? Okay,
Speaker 1: so Chris, here's another one of yours. The Nexus one
Speaker 1: will come out and be a consumer device and will
Speaker 1: be exclusive to T Mobile. And I agreed with that.
Speaker 1: The Nexus one phone, uh, Android phone did come out
Speaker 1: through both Google and through T Mobile. Uh, it was
Speaker 1: a consumer device. Um, it wasn't technically exclusive to T Mobile,
Speaker 1: but there was no real easy way to use it
Speaker 1: on other networks if you were just purchasing for yourself.
Speaker 1: They did sell that well, the Google the phone you
Speaker 1: could get from Google was unlocked GSM phone, so you could,
Speaker 1: you know, use it with a T and T here
Speaker 1: in the United States. That would mean you'd have to
Speaker 1: shave down the simcard though, right or no? The SIM
Speaker 1: cards on a T and T are different, our size,
Speaker 1: differently from the ones on T Mobile. So that was
Speaker 1: the that was the plan. I'm sorry I misspoke then, No, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: I think but they were unlocked. Yeah, they were unlocked
Speaker 1: and so um, but you didn't have to buy a
Speaker 1: contract with mobile to exactly. Yeah, you could use this
Speaker 1: on an existing contract if you already had one with
Speaker 1: T Mobile, you didn't have to sign a new contract. Um,
Speaker 1: I will. I'm gonna say that this is a win
Speaker 1: for you. Um. Now. Granted, the next one did not
Speaker 1: remain a consumer device for all of two thousand and ten,
Speaker 1: it did go off the market eventually. Yeah, it actually,
Speaker 1: it actually left the market pretty quickly all things considered. Yeah,
Speaker 1: it was one of those things where I think Google
Speaker 1: discovered that trying to sell a device through their own
Speaker 1: system just didn't work as well. For one thing, it
Speaker 1: didn't allow consumers the chance to get a device in
Speaker 1: their hands and play with it before committing to purchasing
Speaker 1: the device. And uh, and smartphones aren't cheap, so it's
Speaker 1: hard to say, you know what, I'm just gonna take
Speaker 1: it on faith that this is a good hand set
Speaker 1: and a good operating system, and I'm just gonna buy
Speaker 1: it without getting my hands on it. So um, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it didn't stay out for the consumer market for all
Speaker 1: of two thousand and ten, but I think it's still
Speaker 1: count and uh, although I have fewer predictions, I think
Speaker 1: it might be a good point time to point out
Speaker 1: that My next one was sort of related, which was
Speaker 1: T Mobile's merger with another company, which, man, it's been
Speaker 1: rumored like every three months, and it was I think
Speaker 1: it was big around this time last year, around the
Speaker 1: end of the year two thousand nine. But it's just
Speaker 1: as as many times as people have predicted its death.
Speaker 1: T Mobile is still hanging in there as a separate company. Independent.
Speaker 1: I think we called out survey says you would get
Speaker 1: an on this one. Yeah, I think you're right, all right,
Speaker 1: so why don't you do it? Um? Okay, uh, here's
Speaker 1: here's a ding on the game show buzzer for you.
Speaker 1: We'll start to see the pay version of Hulu appear
Speaker 1: in hooray it. As a matter of fact, we both
Speaker 1: had predicted that one. Hooray for both of us. Um, well,
Speaker 1: I mean this was this was one of our more
Speaker 1: uh easy targets. I would say, well, the low hanging fruit.
Speaker 1: It was. It was one of those things where it
Speaker 1: was being talked about at in in two thousand nine,
Speaker 1: but the question was whether or not Hulu would actually
Speaker 1: go through with it, because you know, sometimes companies talk
Speaker 1: about potential business models but nothing ever happens of it.
Speaker 1: In this case, it did happen. Hulu does have a
Speaker 1: paid version, Hulu Plus, which has some some benefits and
Speaker 1: some limitations compared to the free Hulu service. So yeah,
Speaker 1: that one was that one we both got right. Hooray,
Speaker 1: let's do another one of mine. All right. You also
Speaker 1: said that we would see wireless HD components. Okay, never,
Speaker 1: that's just market Yeah, all right, Okay, so that didn't happen.
Speaker 1: This was talking about things like devices like DVD players
Speaker 1: and Blu ray players and cable boxes even that would
Speaker 1: not require you to use a cable to hook up
Speaker 1: directly to your TV. They would have power cables, but
Speaker 1: otherwise would transmit data wirelessly. We're still not there yet.
Speaker 1: Despite the fact that I've seen such systems at the
Speaker 1: CSU conference every year since we started going, they still
Speaker 1: have not really hit the market. My guess is it
Speaker 1: may partially be due to the economy, because people's stuff
Speaker 1: already works and there I would imagine that the manufacturers
Speaker 1: are probably thinking, yeah, I'm not sure that people are
Speaker 1: ready to upgrade. I think it might also be due
Speaker 1: to those guys in the parking lot all holding bats
Speaker 1: and wearing jackets that say Monster Cable on the back.
Speaker 1: You're anyway, that was not me. Um, I predict next
Speaker 1: year my legs will be broken. Um. You also said
Speaker 1: we'd see the war of the four G technologies take off.
Speaker 1: That's wy max and LTE. We're just starting to see
Speaker 1: that come to a head right now. So I I
Speaker 1: say that's a partial win. I would, but Verizon will
Speaker 1: be At the time we're recording this, Verizon has announced
Speaker 1: that it's going to be launching its LTE network and
Speaker 1: I think thirty eight cities in just a few days.
Speaker 1: So by the time this this publishes, it will already
Speaker 1: have happened. The launch will have happened. Yeah. I have
Speaker 1: a similar related prediction. Yeah, oh you said, um, on's
Speaker 1: where it's the next to last one on the next Yeah,
Speaker 1: the first LTE structure will get built out in the
Speaker 1: United States because there were some in Europe already. And
Speaker 1: that's true. Although it's really funny because it wasn't Verizon
Speaker 1: who did it first, nor was it a T n
Speaker 1: T or sprint to our T mobile. It was metro
Speaker 1: PCs who beat everyone to the punch. Where you at? Dog?
Speaker 1: Where am I at? I'm sorry? Yeah, tro PCs is
Speaker 1: actually I've got friends who use that that that that
Speaker 1: there's subscribers to metro PCs. Yeah. Now they are a
Speaker 1: much smaller carrier, which probably helps them in building out
Speaker 1: their LTE network. But uh yeah, one day tuned into
Speaker 1: the Tech News Metro PCs builds out an LTE network
Speaker 1: and I said, I'm sorry, what but they did it?
Speaker 1: So they I get a point. My next the next
Speaker 1: for me is a another big win for me, for me,
Speaker 1: not for them. Ah. Yes, that would be Palm, the
Speaker 1: formerly independent company. Uh that came out with the Palm
Speaker 1: Pre smartphone. Of course, the Palm pilots for years the
Speaker 1: handheld digital assistance. You said that they would either go
Speaker 1: out of business or get acquired, and they got acquired,
Speaker 1: So there you go. I actually now again this was
Speaker 1: one of those things that this was not a sure
Speaker 1: thing when I predicted it, but it was it was
Speaker 1: something I felt fairly confident about because they were coming
Speaker 1: out with a new phone. The Pre actually know at
Speaker 1: this point was the Pixie. The Pre had already come out.
Speaker 1: Um at the beginning of nine they showed it c
Speaker 1: E S CS two thousand nine. It was yeah, everyone
Speaker 1: went crazy for the Pre. When c S two thousand nine,
Speaker 1: it didn't come out until the spring of two thousand nine,
Speaker 1: which was the problem, right, They couldn't capitalize on that buzz,
Speaker 1: and then the Pre just did not sell very well.
Speaker 1: They came out with the Pixie towards the end of
Speaker 1: two thousand nine, but I said that the Pixie was
Speaker 1: not priced at such a point that it would keep
Speaker 1: the company going. I had forgotten and uh, and sure
Speaker 1: enough I was right. They started to really waiver and
Speaker 1: then they got acquired. But they were acquired by Hewlett
Speaker 1: Packard and p HP is talking about doing some things
Speaker 1: with the Palm, the new web OS, the operating system
Speaker 1: for the Pre and Pixie, talking about using it for
Speaker 1: tablets or possibly even phones, even though they said at
Speaker 1: one time they weren't interested in doing phones. Then that's
Speaker 1: one of those things that kind of flip flops on. Well,
Speaker 1: you know, when you got a good platform. And apparently,
Speaker 1: from from what I've heard, the web os is a
Speaker 1: pretty decent operating system. So there, okay, so let me
Speaker 1: do one of yours. Apple will embrace music rental and
Speaker 1: or streaming service on iTunes. We are still waiting for this,
Speaker 1: but it appears that something along those lines may be coming.
Speaker 1: They the company purchased La La. Yeah, and La La
Speaker 1: was a streaming music service. Yep. And they're building in
Speaker 1: a huge data center in North Carolina. So it may
Speaker 1: be that this is still going to hit. It's just
Speaker 1: doesn't look like it's going to hit by the end
Speaker 1: of Yeah, and there are there are a lot of
Speaker 1: licensing agreements that have to be in place for something
Speaker 1: like this to happen, and it wouldn't. It's also prevented
Speaker 1: Spotify from launching in the United States. There's licensing agreements exactly.
Speaker 1: It wouldn't surprise me to see this if they do
Speaker 1: get all their those those problems tucked away. It wouldn't
Speaker 1: surprise me to see this announced being announced in January,
Speaker 1: because there's usually an Apple announcement sometime in January. Of course,
Speaker 1: that might also be the next iPad that we hear about. Yep.
Speaker 1: Do you want to do another oil skip skip the
Speaker 1: next one that's on my list, because that's the one
Speaker 1: that I want to save to the end. Okay, we
Speaker 1: can do that. You mentioned the rise in three D entertainment.
Speaker 1: That would be a great day old ding. Yeah, for
Speaker 1: at least for movies. For TV, it's still pretty slow
Speaker 1: to take off. Although three D televisions are on the
Speaker 1: market as of the holiday season, and there are three
Speaker 1: D channels out already. Um, but it's it's still in
Speaker 1: its earliest days for television. But as far as movies go, Yeah,
Speaker 1: it went crazy. Avatar really helped that a lot. Yep,
Speaker 1: it hasn't uh, it hasn't stalled out, so it's continuing
Speaker 1: to move. It's just moving slowly. So yeah, I think
Speaker 1: I think it's a win. Um. Also, you uh you
Speaker 1: said more virtual machines will be used in the workplace. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that one is kind of hard for me to verify.
Speaker 1: I don't know that that many companies actually switched to
Speaker 1: a virtual machine. Uh system. Now, that would be of course,
Speaker 1: where you don't necessarily have a computer. You might have
Speaker 1: a monitor and a keyboard and you have a vert
Speaker 1: wall of virtual machine that you lug into the it's
Speaker 1: actually kind of hosted on a another corporate machine and
Speaker 1: uh so you don't have your own personal computer. Uh.
Speaker 1: There may be some companies have switched over, but it
Speaker 1: wasn't a big movement as far as I can tell,
Speaker 1: So I'm going to call that a miss on my part.
Speaker 1: Then you've got movie studios will start testing downloadable movie
Speaker 1: business models, possibly through through the Comcast acquisition of NBC Universal. Well,
Speaker 1: the acquisition is still pending pending, so that's we'll have
Speaker 1: to wait and see if that actually goes through. But
Speaker 1: as far as the studios testing downloadable movie business models,
Speaker 1: we we can see streaming versions of this all over
Speaker 1: the place. Right, there's Plus, there's Netflix, there are other um,
Speaker 1: there are other actual set top devices that are doing this.
Speaker 1: I call this a win. Well Netflix, Uh, the Netflix
Speaker 1: CEO just not terribly long time before we recorded this,
Speaker 1: in early December, announced that Netflix is a streaming video
Speaker 1: company and not a DVD mail company anymore. So it's
Speaker 1: definitely the way they're they're headed. Well, I only have
Speaker 1: two more left, so, um, there's one more I have,
Speaker 1: but I think we should save that before right before
Speaker 1: yours then, so let's go with yours. The newspaper attempt
Speaker 1: to get behind a paywall. That was a big thing
Speaker 1: at the end of last year. Um, people talking about
Speaker 1: the possibility of removing themselves from Google. Uh, you know
Speaker 1: for some companies that have newspapers behind the paywall. Now,
Speaker 1: if you access the article through Google instead of going
Speaker 1: directly to the site, you can read the whole article.
Speaker 1: I won't mention any you know, major newspaper names. Rupert
Speaker 1: Murdoch may be involved with them, famous business publications owned
Speaker 1: by Yes, but yeah, I mean there there are situations
Speaker 1: where in which they've said, you know, hey, no free
Speaker 1: ride if you come to our site, no matter how
Speaker 1: you get there, You're gonna have to pay if you
Speaker 1: want to read our content. And um, yeah, at the
Speaker 1: time him, you said that you expected other newspapers and
Speaker 1: blogs would step in if some of them went behind
Speaker 1: a paywall, and uh, the big, bigger papers would go
Speaker 1: back to the old business model. Yeah, we haven't seen
Speaker 1: it happen whole sale like that. No, No, I mean
Speaker 1: the Telegraph just announced that it's going to be having
Speaker 1: some sort of not a paywall, but it's going to
Speaker 1: have a paid uh access model of some sort. And
Speaker 1: the details were not available as of the recording of
Speaker 1: this podcast, but they did specifically say it wasn't going
Speaker 1: to be a paywall system. Uh. So there are other
Speaker 1: newspapers that are trying this, but it did not happen
Speaker 1: at the speed at which I imagined. So this one,
Speaker 1: this one's is still just a maybe. Yeah. I I
Speaker 1: just thought have a prediction uh for the Predictions podcast
Speaker 1: based on this, so I'll bring that up when we
Speaker 1: actually do our predictions. But yeah, I kind of expected
Speaker 1: it to happen with a couple of them have been
Speaker 1: rumbling around, but they didn't. Actually it was saying go forward.
Speaker 1: It moves slower than we thought. So alright, so we're
Speaker 1: down to the lab the final two. Right, So here's
Speaker 1: here's Chris Palette's final prediction for which was Jonathan's computer
Speaker 1: will die before people. I want you to listen carefully
Speaker 1: to this. All right, hang on, that's me hitting the
Speaker 1: E key and nothing is happening. Still, I still have
Speaker 1: the same computer, and the E key does not work.
Speaker 1: The W key does not work, the A key does
Speaker 1: not work, the S key does not work. The tilty
Speaker 1: is still missing in action. I never found the tilty key,
Speaker 1: so I have to actually plug in a supplemental keyboard
Speaker 1: if I want to type anything on this computer. But
Speaker 1: the key the keyboard is although it is not functioning,
Speaker 1: the rest of the computer is well for a given
Speaker 1: definition of functioning. Yes, so it did not let me
Speaker 1: it this way. I don't have a new one, so
Speaker 1: that one is U for all intents and purposes on
Speaker 1: this alright, technically that's a technicality, and I still have
Speaker 1: three weeks. Um that's true. Actually you could if you
Speaker 1: wanted to, maybe maybe it will quote unquote slip off
Speaker 1: my desk before the end of the year, so you
Speaker 1: uh can I can I read the last one for
Speaker 1: you to Jonathan will appear on This Weekend Tech sometime
Speaker 1: in well, so c E. That's in January. Yeah, that
Speaker 1: was like two weeks after we recorded my podcast. So
Speaker 1: we recorded the podcast about two weeks later. I went
Speaker 1: to c and as I was there, I was passing
Speaker 1: by Leo Laporte and he had his This week in
Speaker 1: Tech live coverage of c e S table up and running,
Speaker 1: and his producer saw me and waived me on and
Speaker 1: got me on This week in Text live coverage. Now,
Speaker 1: technically that was not an episode of This Weekend Tech.
Speaker 1: It was, however, on the This Weekend Tech network and
Speaker 1: I was live, so I thought in January, I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: I'm just going to call us a win. I still
Speaker 1: haven't been technically on the show This Week in Tech, however,
Speaker 1: I have appeared several times on Tech News Today, which
Speaker 1: is one of the shows on This Weekend Tech hosted
Speaker 1: by Tom Merritt. So yeah, and I'd like to point
Speaker 1: out that you have a very nifty cap on. I'm
Speaker 1: also wearing a This Weekend Tech baseball cap right now.
Speaker 1: I totally wasn't thinking about that, but yes, I am
Speaker 1: wearing a baseball cap with the Twit logo on it.
Speaker 1: And that's because I got that at CS and not
Speaker 1: because he is a Twit. No, that that's unrelated but
Speaker 1: also true. So, yes, you wanted to mention a few
Speaker 1: of the stories before we wrap it up, on things
Speaker 1: that we didn't hit here. So I I see some
Speaker 1: of those stories that you listed that interrupt him? Sorry, no,
Speaker 1: go ahead, Uh, but you know some of these things
Speaker 1: I think the listeners will agree we we wouldn't necessarily
Speaker 1: have hit anyone they were they were not Yeah, they
Speaker 1: were not on the radar. Yeah yeah there, and and
Speaker 1: they're probably. I'm sure there's some big ones I didn't.
Speaker 1: I did this off the top of my head, so
Speaker 1: I was mostly thinking of the stories that were recent.
Speaker 1: I'm sure there were stories that happened throughout the year
Speaker 1: that anyway. We did not predict Google TV. No, we didn't.
Speaker 1: We didn't predict Google Buzz nor the massive fallout that
Speaker 1: immediately followed the launch of Google Buzz, because if you
Speaker 1: don't remember, some people, probably a lot of people aren't
Speaker 1: using Google Buzz at all anymore. I do. I still
Speaker 1: use it, and there's there's been a legal settlement involving
Speaker 1: that too, right, but Google Buzz, if you don't remember,
Speaker 1: there were a lot of there was a big outcry
Speaker 1: about privacy issues where you could see people who were
Speaker 1: context of the people you knew and um, and there
Speaker 1: were a lot of other issues around it. So we
Speaker 1: didn't predict that at all, Nor did we predict the
Speaker 1: other big Google story of about the driverless car program.
Speaker 1: That's true, that's true. Yeah, for a while there it
Speaker 1: looked like Google is going to be in the news
Speaker 1: every week. Actually, for a while there, Google was in
Speaker 1: the news every week. Uh, I meant for the rest
Speaker 1: of our lives. I wouldn't be surprised if that still
Speaker 1: holds true. You mentioned Facebook the exactly where all of
Speaker 1: your messages are going to go through a kind of
Speaker 1: central funnel on Facebook, So it's kind of like email messaging,
Speaker 1: instant messaging. All that the notes and all that kind
Speaker 1: of stuff all kind of goes through one I don't
Speaker 1: have access to that yet. But we didn't predict that.
Speaker 1: We didn't think that. We didn't think about Facebook having
Speaker 1: a what some people had been calling a Gmail killer,
Speaker 1: and even Facebook has said since then that that's not
Speaker 1: what this is intended to be. UM did not predict
Speaker 1: my spaces redesign, despite the fact that I think they
Speaker 1: had announced it sometime in two thousand nine. Where do
Speaker 1: we predict that they would be partnering with Facebook? I
Speaker 1: think I think maybe gone out of business or something else.
Speaker 1: I think we mostly didn't think about my Space at all.
Speaker 1: We did not We didn't think that Windows Phone seven
Speaker 1: was going to be uh well, we didn't predict that
Speaker 1: Windows Phones seven was really gonna look as awesome as
Speaker 1: it does. You know, Um, I actually got to play
Speaker 1: with Windows Phone seven recently, and uh and I was
Speaker 1: really impressed with the operating system. I thought for a
Speaker 1: while I was skeptical that Windows could I know, crazy
Speaker 1: huh A skeptical that Windows could jump back into the
Speaker 1: smartphone wars, because I thought that Android and Apple really
Speaker 1: had that sewn up. But Windows fun seven does look
Speaker 1: like it's a legitimate contender. I mean it, it's slick,
Speaker 1: it does what it's supposed to do, at least the
Speaker 1: limited amount of time I've had with it, it did. Um,
Speaker 1: so I would not be surprised to see that actually
Speaker 1: take off, especially if if Windows partners with some really
Speaker 1: good handset manufacturers. Uh. We did not predict the iPhone
Speaker 1: for the massive redesign of the iPhone. I mean, we
Speaker 1: didn't predict that. We didn't predict FaceTime. We did not
Speaker 1: predict and ten I gait. There was no way we
Speaker 1: can know that we were holding it wrong. I'm left handed,
Speaker 1: by the way. So anyway, UM, we did not predict
Speaker 1: the whole this was Yeah, this is the story that
Speaker 1: one of the stories that drove me crazy in Gizmodo
Speaker 1: and leaking the iPhone four story months before it actually launched,
Speaker 1: and not just the leak, but the whole stolen slash
Speaker 1: missing iPhone for debacle, finding it quote unquote on a
Speaker 1: bar stool and or stealing it depending on who you ask,
Speaker 1: and then selling it essentially to Gizmoto and then Gizmodo
Speaker 1: running the story. Did not predict that. UM didn't predict
Speaker 1: the Microsoft Kid going on sale, then not being on sale,
Speaker 1: then being on sale again. We didn't predict the Danger debacle. Either,
Speaker 1: that's true. Yeah, that's something that came up earlier, the
Speaker 1: Danger servers, and I would not have I would not
Speaker 1: have imagined that after Microsoft acquired Danger. I mean that
Speaker 1: the kin as kin to uh, the T mobile sidekick, um,
Speaker 1: and I would not have expected that to have gone
Speaker 1: away the way it did. But and I also have here,
Speaker 1: we did not predict this one's. This one's the juicy
Speaker 1: story of the bunch. We did not predict HP CEO
Speaker 1: Mark Heard having to resign from HP due to a scandal, which,
Speaker 1: depending again upon whom you ask, either was about inappropriate
Speaker 1: relationships or just mismanagement of money or or unreported expenses.
Speaker 1: I guess it's the nice way of putting it. Uh.
Speaker 1: Nor did we predict that that he would then just
Speaker 1: turn around and become a co president over at Oracle. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that was actually a pretty scandalous story all around, because,
Speaker 1: I mean HP and Oracle. You're talking about two major companies,
Speaker 1: and you're talking about a man who presumably has quite
Speaker 1: a bit of knowledge about one company's I p going
Speaker 1: to work for a competitor, Yes, in a very prominent position, Yes,
Speaker 1: as a prominent as it gets as it turns out. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a little freaky. Yeah, we also didn't know I
Speaker 1: think about it, predict the wiki leaks. That's something that
Speaker 1: you know, has become very and it's still unfolding as
Speaker 1: we record this podcast. They've been undergoing denial of service attacks.
Speaker 1: They switched over to the Amazon Cloud system, and now
Speaker 1: I've just heard before we win in that Amazon has
Speaker 1: pulled that. Yes, they are no longer on Amazon. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're like, you know what, maybe we don't want to
Speaker 1: have the target of all these d d o S attacks. Yeah, no,
Speaker 1: we didn't predict that at all. Um. Yeah, there's and
Speaker 1: what we didn't predict could go into another eight episodes.
Speaker 1: So let's wrap this up because I think we've gone
Speaker 1: way too long for this one. Yeah, it's it just
Speaker 1: goes to show you how mercurial I hate that word mercurial.
Speaker 1: The tech world is. Things changed so frequently, and you know,
Speaker 1: we take our our best shots, but we don't always. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I can't wait for us to record the predictions for eleven.
Speaker 1: We're not doing that during this particular record wording sessions. Yeah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they should be fun though. All right, So if you
Speaker 1: guys have any predictions for eleven, that you think are
Speaker 1: absolutely positively going to come true. Email me and that
Speaker 1: way I can get the advantage over Poulette, or you
Speaker 1: can post to our Facebook or Twitter accounts they handle
Speaker 1: There is tech Stuff H s W. Our email address
Speaker 1: is tech stuff at how stuff works dot com and
Speaker 1: Chris and I will talk to you again, probably before
Speaker 1: really soon. For more on this and thousands of other topics.
Speaker 1: Is it how stuff works dot com. To learn more
Speaker 1: about the podcast, click on the podcast icon in the
Speaker 1: upper right corner of our homepage. The how Stuff Works
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Speaker 1: It's ready, are you