Speaker 1: Faster internet for free. Here's how Roku, Amazon and Sons
Speaker 1: all have new speakers. Facebook does dating the thing you
Speaker 1: should do if you use Gmail on your iPhone. Plus
Speaker 1: your questions answered?
Speaker 2: What's going on? I'm Rich Demiro.
Speaker 1: This is Rich on Tech, the podcast where I talk
Speaker 1: about the stuff I think you should know about happening in.
Speaker 2: The tech world.
Speaker 1: Plus it's the place where I answer the questions that
Speaker 1: you send me. Welcome producer Megan to the show.
Speaker 3: Welcome Rich to the show.
Speaker 2: Thank you. How's it going very good?
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's been busy.
Speaker 2: It has been very busy.
Speaker 1: And you know, next week is the whole big Apple thing,
Speaker 1: so we've prepping for that. Megan did a great job
Speaker 1: of booking her hotel room. She was like a pit
Speaker 1: bull on the phone with the hotel because we you know,
Speaker 1: the hotels all sell out, especially the ones that are close.
Speaker 1: And I usually, based on speculation, make a hotel reservation.
Speaker 1: Wayne advanced, just guessing when the event is gonna be. Yeah,
Speaker 1: years in advance. Yeah, I have next year's iPhone already on.
Speaker 1: And so I told Megan, well, were staying and you know,
Speaker 1: get a room, and of course they said, no, there's
Speaker 1: no rooms.
Speaker 2: There's no availability.
Speaker 3: Well you told me tuesday, You're like you can yeah,
Speaker 3: And I was like, okay.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it all happens.
Speaker 1: You get the invitation two weeks before, and then we didn't.
Speaker 1: I mean, yeah, we just didn't have time figured out. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but the reality is you did work it out. She
Speaker 1: went from having no availability at the hotel to them
Speaker 1: telling her it was a three day minimum to stay
Speaker 1: there to getting a room.
Speaker 3: I called like ten times and then at the tenth
Speaker 3: time they were like, oh, it's a three day minimum.
Speaker 3: And I was like, uh, okay, well if I stayed
Speaker 3: three days, and then I basically yeah, you.
Speaker 1: Got your way, So good job. That was very good.
Speaker 1: It was a new side of you that I that
Speaker 1: I have not seen.
Speaker 3: Before, but you coached me.
Speaker 2: Very impressed with that.
Speaker 1: On the flip side, for me personally, I finished my
Speaker 1: iPhone book the first draft, so yesterday. That was a
Speaker 1: huge deal because I'm you know, I have this book
Speaker 1: one hundred and one handy tech Tips for the iPhone.
Speaker 1: I'm revising it for iOS thirteen, so I've been using
Speaker 1: the beta to get all the new tips, and then
Speaker 1: my goal is to have it out as soon as
Speaker 1: possible when the new one, you know, the new phone
Speaker 1: comes out and the new software. But I still have
Speaker 1: a lot of work ahead. I got to revise it,
Speaker 1: i got to come up with a cover. I've got
Speaker 1: to everything marketing. It's a whole big thing. But in
Speaker 1: the meantime, if you do want to be notified when
Speaker 1: the new book is available, you can go to Amazon
Speaker 1: and follow my author page.
Speaker 3: Oh I'm going to do that, so you'll.
Speaker 1: Get notified, like literally the minute it's like up there,
Speaker 1: you'll get like the little notification.
Speaker 3: So it's really cool. That's so exciting.
Speaker 1: It is exciting, and I'm excited for this book because
Speaker 1: I made it simpler and better.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: I've this the third version, so I've learned a lot
Speaker 1: along the way, and I'm using a new program to
Speaker 1: write it, which I'm I can't wait to do, so
Speaker 1: I to publish it or whatever.
Speaker 2: You want to say. Let's talk about Facebook.
Speaker 1: Facebook is finally getting into the dating game. Facebook dating
Speaker 1: is brand new here in the US. And this is
Speaker 1: interesting because Facebook, it's weird. I have a love hate
Speaker 1: with Facebook because Facebook is the place that we all
Speaker 1: know and sort of love, but I feel like it
Speaker 1: has fallen out of favor with a lot of people,
Speaker 1: but people still use it in a big way. Now
Speaker 1: are the people that are dating using it?
Speaker 2: I'm not sure. So.
Speaker 1: I mean you have these big dating apps like tender Match.
Speaker 1: I'm sure there's a million others out there. I think
Speaker 1: what makes Facebook dating so interesting is that they have
Speaker 1: the most data on us. And so here's the line
Speaker 1: from what they're basically what they're doing. They're not going
Speaker 1: to link you up with your friends. They will if
Speaker 1: you do something, and I'll tell you about that in
Speaker 1: a second, But here's what they're doing. So how it
Speaker 1: works is you create a separate dating profile that's separate
Speaker 1: from your main profile, and they're going to suggest people
Speaker 1: on the Facebook platform based on your preferences, interests, and
Speaker 1: other things you do on Facebook.
Speaker 3: Okay, they stalk people, no.
Speaker 1: But they really understand who you are. They see what
Speaker 1: you're looking at on Facebook, they see the types of
Speaker 1: music that you like.
Speaker 2: They just see what you interact with.
Speaker 1: Right with something like Tinder or Match, they're not getting
Speaker 1: all that rich data about a person. The person's typing
Speaker 1: in saying I like wine, I like going for long
Speaker 1: walks on the beach. Facebook knows this person spends ninety
Speaker 1: five percent of their time looking at Iron Maiden records
Speaker 1: from the seventies or something.
Speaker 3: I don't know, Wait through through what Like, how do
Speaker 3: they know that whatever you do?
Speaker 1: No, while they can do that too. They can link
Speaker 1: up what you do on Google through the through the
Speaker 1: Facebook like buttons that are everywhere, so they're collecting all
Speaker 1: this data no matter where you are on the web.
Speaker 3: Okay, because I feel like with my Facebook, all the
Speaker 3: interests and all the artists that I've liked are from
Speaker 3: when I was like.
Speaker 1: Twelve, That's true, and a lot of people are trying
Speaker 1: to update that to be fair for you.
Speaker 2: That was only like two years ago.
Speaker 3: I know, because I'm fourteen. Everyone I don't know Rich
Speaker 3: told you I don't.
Speaker 2: Want to reveal Megan's very young age.
Speaker 3: But yes, but that's a thing that's when I started Facebook.
Speaker 1: But they're still going to see like the kind of
Speaker 1: posts that you interact with, the kind of things that
Speaker 1: you like.
Speaker 2: Okay, I mean, it's it.
Speaker 1: Facebook has a lot of data, and I agree, Like
Speaker 1: what you're saying is very valid that just because they
Speaker 1: build this profile of you doesn't necessarily mean it's right.
Speaker 1: Like you can go into Facebook and look at the
Speaker 1: advertiser like targeting for you right now, like half it's wrong,
Speaker 1: you know, but anyway, I find that interesting. The other
Speaker 1: interesting feature about this that I find could be very
Speaker 1: interesting is there's a secret crush feature where normally they
Speaker 1: don't link you up with your friends, but you can
Speaker 1: identify nine of your friends that you're interested in, and
Speaker 1: then let's say your friends identify you as one of
Speaker 1: those people that they're interested in. If you both do that,
Speaker 1: Facebook will notify you and kind of hook you up.
Speaker 1: But it only has it's all secret, so if if
Speaker 1: if someone doesn't request, you know, put you as a crush,
Speaker 1: then nothing happens. I'm curious how many times you can
Speaker 1: change those secret crushes?
Speaker 2: Could think about it?
Speaker 1: What if you could change them every day and you
Speaker 1: just went through all your friends until you found a match, right.
Speaker 3: Yeah and then yeah wow yeah, So anyway, I think yeah.
Speaker 1: Anyway, So that is Facebook dating in a nutshell. It
Speaker 1: is available starting today. The other thing that's weird about
Speaker 1: this are you gonna try it?
Speaker 3: I don't know, maybe you should.
Speaker 2: You should try it and report that quest.
Speaker 3: Okay, I'll let you know how go.
Speaker 1: But the other thing that's interesting is that they're sort
Speaker 1: of merging Facebook and Instagram for the first time because
Speaker 1: now it's cross friends, so it's your friends from Instagram
Speaker 1: as well.
Speaker 3: Okay, yeah, because I feel like Instagram's a great way
Speaker 3: to you know, slide into dms meet people. Right, yeah,
Speaker 3: I don't.
Speaker 2: Know theoretically, you would know better. I have no idea.
Speaker 3: All right, So this first question comes from Jerome. And
Speaker 3: by the way, if you want to send a question,
Speaker 3: all you have to do is go to Rich on
Speaker 3: tech dot tv, click on the contact link, and you
Speaker 3: can send Rich your question. So Jerome writes in is
Speaker 3: it The subject is video chat Android to iPhone. The
Speaker 3: question is it possible? How to make it happen?
Speaker 1: This is one of those questions that I read and
Speaker 1: I'm just like, oh wow, this is interesting that this
Speaker 1: is a question because it seems so simple in my mind.
Speaker 1: But the reality is, all we've heard about over the
Speaker 1: years is FaceTime, FaceTime, FaceTime, FaceTime. That's the way people
Speaker 1: video chat and skype. But in reality, there are many
Speaker 1: other ways to do this, and there are many simple ways.
Speaker 1: The simplest way is the program that's probably installed in
Speaker 1: your both phones already, even if you're iOS and Android,
Speaker 1: and that is Facebook Messenger. People forget that Facebook Messenger
Speaker 1: has a video chat feature and you can easily use that.
Speaker 1: So if Facebook Messenger is installed on both phones, go
Speaker 1: ahead and use that to chat. You're already friends on there.
Speaker 1: You don't have to set up a separate account. It's
Speaker 1: all done and it works nicely. The other thing, and
Speaker 1: I think this is probably the better way to do it,
Speaker 1: is Google Duo and Google Doo. I did a video
Speaker 1: on Facebook when this came out a couple of years ago.
Speaker 1: I think it was like five years ago at this point,
Speaker 1: let's say August sixteenth, twenty sixteen.
Speaker 2: Three years ago.
Speaker 3: I was nine.
Speaker 2: Sorry, continuing with the young joke.
Speaker 1: I like that, okay, But this app came out and
Speaker 1: I thought it was the greatest thing ever because it
Speaker 1: was really the first time you had a dedicated app
Speaker 1: that you could use to video chat. And Google Duo
Speaker 1: is very simple, it has better quality video than a
Speaker 1: lot of the other apps out there. It's totally free.
Speaker 1: It works on both Android and iOS. But for some reason,
Speaker 1: nobody thinks about it ever. Did it come to mind
Speaker 1: when you saw this?
Speaker 3: I think about it all the time. No, no, no,
Speaker 3: I've actually never this is the first time I've ever
Speaker 3: heard of it.
Speaker 2: But I really the first time see that.
Speaker 3: But I was also thinking, I know people that not
Speaker 3: a ton of people, but my sister facetimes or video
Speaker 3: chats with people on Instagram, like her friends on Instagram.
Speaker 1: Yes, you can do Instagram as well. So there, okay,
Speaker 1: So here are your options. Instagram, Facebook, Messenger, Google Duo,
Speaker 1: and obviously face and Skype.
Speaker 2: Skype is a little bit more old school.
Speaker 1: I think that's more like people think of that for
Speaker 1: business purposes, yeah, for personal and yeah, Instagram is probably
Speaker 1: one of those other ones that's really easy because it's
Speaker 1: already on your phone and everybody's on Instagram. So I
Speaker 1: would say those are probably the two or three ways
Speaker 1: to check it out.
Speaker 2: But it can be done. It's very simple.
Speaker 1: I think the main thing is that on Android versus
Speaker 1: iOS or going cross platform, it's not as simple as
Speaker 1: FaceTime because FaceTime, it's like you click their phone number
Speaker 1: if they have an iPhone, boom, it just connects. And
Speaker 1: that's of course part of the magic and nightmare of
Speaker 1: the way Apple sets things up.
Speaker 3: Is it going to be blurry if you're on an
Speaker 3: iPhone and you're video chatting with the Android on Duo.
Speaker 1: Yeah, no, quite quite contrary. It's Duo is very clear.
Speaker 1: In fact, they have this cool night site feature which
Speaker 1: makes your nighttime chatting like even brighter, which is kind
Speaker 1: of cool.
Speaker 2: And no, it looks great.
Speaker 1: And the thing that when Duo came out versus FaceTime,
Speaker 1: the thing that was different is FaceTime was I mean,
Speaker 1: it's gotten better, yeah, and plus internet speeds.
Speaker 2: Have gotten better over the years.
Speaker 1: But when FaceTime was first, it was it always dropped out,
Speaker 1: it was blurry, it didn't hold a connection very well.
Speaker 1: So when Duo came out, Google was using their YouTube.
Speaker 1: Google has learned so much from YouTube about compressing video
Speaker 1: and making video delivered very fast. They apply that to
Speaker 1: all their products, so Duo is no different. They're figuring out.
Speaker 1: You know, when you have a good connection, they'll make
Speaker 1: the screen look really good, the picture really clear. When
Speaker 1: you don't have as good of a connection, they'll drop
Speaker 1: back that quality, but still keep the conversation going and
Speaker 1: still keep the video. Sometimes the video may go out
Speaker 1: if you have a really terrible connection, but I rarely
Speaker 1: see that anymore. Anyway, good question and check those things out, Jerome,
Speaker 1: Thanks for emailing in so many things to talk about
Speaker 1: this week, including Samsung. And I'm not going to give
Speaker 1: this much more than like thirty seconds, because nobody cares
Speaker 1: about this phone. Nobody is buying this phone, and the
Speaker 1: only reason we care about it is because it's like
Speaker 1: our hurt player in sports. I'm not sports guy, so
Speaker 1: I don't even know this analogy, but like you're hope
Speaker 1: that you want to see them win, right that guy?
Speaker 3: That never mind, I'm not going to also try to because.
Speaker 1: No, we don't do sports analogies here because we don't
Speaker 1: do sports sports. There's a reason why I talk about technology.
Speaker 1: But the thing is, the Galaxy Fold was supposed to
Speaker 1: launch on April twenty sixth. It did not launch because
Speaker 1: there's a whole bunch of problems. We've been waiting for
Speaker 1: it to launch. Nobody's really been waiting for it to
Speaker 1: launch except the media that just wants to talk about it.
Speaker 1: Nobody really, Like, no one go up to thirty people
Speaker 1: in the street and not one person is ready to
Speaker 1: buy this thing. But nonetheless, it's cool that Samsung is
Speaker 1: experimenting with new technologies, and I do think this will
Speaker 1: be indicative of technologies to come, and I think we
Speaker 1: will see more foldable phones. But the story is that
Speaker 1: the Galaxy Fold will launch in the US in the
Speaker 1: coming weeks. It is available in South Korea. So Megan,
Speaker 1: if you have nothing to do this weekend and you
Speaker 1: want to get.
Speaker 2: A plane the fold, go ahead.
Speaker 3: That's what I'm going to do tomorrow after work.
Speaker 1: They did not say anything about the price. But the
Speaker 1: other thing that I do want to mention is that
Speaker 1: there's a rumor going around that Samsung will create a
Speaker 1: second foldable phone for next year, and that one's supposed
Speaker 1: to be more like the Motorola Eraser where it folds
Speaker 1: in half, like like it flop folds down. I guess
Speaker 1: you should say, right, instead of folding in half, you know,
Speaker 1: so it folds like a flip phone, like the old.
Speaker 2: School flip phone.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And I think that that's really interesting because that could
Speaker 1: be kind of cool to have a big screen phone
Speaker 1: in your pocket that folds up small, not the one
Speaker 1: square into a square, not the weird one that the
Speaker 1: Galaxy Fold is just really thick and weird, Like, yeah,
Speaker 1: you want like a thin phone that also when you
Speaker 1: open it up, has.
Speaker 2: A giant like a nice big screen. Yea.
Speaker 1: Anyway, so I'm rooting for it.
Speaker 3: You're excited.
Speaker 2: I am excited for next year the square, not for
Speaker 2: this one.
Speaker 3: All right. This next question comes from Stephen. He writes,
Speaker 3: thank you again for all your information. You're a life saver.
Speaker 3: Oh wow, what is your opinion on thumb I D
Speaker 3: for your iPhone? I don't want my thumb print out there,
Speaker 3: so I don't use that doesn't matter.
Speaker 1: I haven't heard uh number one. I didn't even know
Speaker 1: people still use the thumb print. But I guess you
Speaker 1: have it on your phone.
Speaker 4: Okay, all right, but hate and this could be this
Speaker 4: could apply to various phones because the Samsung phone still
Speaker 4: have a fingerprint reader.
Speaker 2: But is he talking about the iPhone or is he
Speaker 2: talked does this say sent for my phone?
Speaker 3: Thumb ID for your iPhone?
Speaker 2: Your iPhone?
Speaker 1: Okay, So the thing about thumb I D they call it,
Speaker 1: it wasn't called it called touch id.
Speaker 3: Yeah, but you I guess you could use your thumb.
Speaker 3: You could also you can use your finger, but not
Speaker 3: your elbow.
Speaker 2: Not your elbow.
Speaker 1: So the thing about this is that Apple has been
Speaker 1: very clear that they do not store the fingerprint anywhere
Speaker 1: except on your phone in what they call the secure enclave,
Speaker 1: and that's just a fancy word for like a little
Speaker 1: lock box inside your phone that all this secure stuff
Speaker 1: is stored inside, and it's really tough to crack into,
Speaker 1: and there are various safeguards that if someone did crack
Speaker 1: open your phone or try to steal it, they wouldn't
Speaker 1: be able to retrieve your information. And it doesn't go
Speaker 1: on the internet. It's not transmitted anyway. It's not stored
Speaker 1: in iCloud. So when you take an imprint of your
Speaker 1: fingerprint on your iPhone, it's staying on that phone and
Speaker 1: that's it. And it's only being used to authenticate the device,
Speaker 1: and everything happens on device. It's not being sent to
Speaker 1: the cloud for verification all that stuff I just said.
Speaker 1: So I think that you're safe using the touch ID. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and the face ID works in the same way. And
Speaker 1: you know, Apple has been a very big proponent of
Speaker 1: privacy on your phone, and it shows. I mean a
Speaker 1: lot of things that happen on the iPhone do happen
Speaker 1: on device. I'll give you an example, since I'm writing
Speaker 1: the book, and I was experimenting with a new photos
Speaker 1: app on iOS thirteen, and it scans your pictures for
Speaker 1: things that are inside them. So if you take a
Speaker 1: picture of a piece of p pizza, you can search
Speaker 1: for pizza and your iPhone will show.
Speaker 2: You your pizza pictures.
Speaker 1: And Google can do this on the you know, on
Speaker 1: any phone with Google Photos. The difference is your pictures
Speaker 1: are being sent to a server to be scanned by
Speaker 1: Google's artificial intelligence, and that information indexed through Google. So
Speaker 1: it's not as secure as the iPhone, where it's just
Speaker 1: being done on the iPhone. So Apple sends a whole
Speaker 1: bunch of instructions to the iPhone saying, here's how you
Speaker 1: recognize pizza, Here's what a beach looks like, Here's what
Speaker 1: a dog looks like, and then your iPhone identifies those
Speaker 1: things and it's all kept kind of secret on your phone.
Speaker 2: See the difference.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that makes sense. But now I'm curious about Google, Like,
Speaker 3: so they have access to all of our photos basically,
Speaker 3: or am I?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Pretty much?
Speaker 1: I mean they're scanning them to see what's in them
Speaker 1: there but we know that well, I mean I do, yeah,
Speaker 1: but it is there is a level of trust that
Speaker 1: has to be given to these companies, especially when you're
Speaker 1: getting something for free. Now, I would argue the iPhone
Speaker 1: comes at a premium because if you really think about it,
Speaker 1: and I go between iPhone and Android a lot, and
Speaker 1: you can see, I've got my Android in front of
Speaker 1: me and my iPhone, and there's a lot of things
Speaker 1: that are different. Like when you think about it, I
Speaker 1: message is really a service that you're sort of paying
Speaker 1: for built into the price of your phone, because that
Speaker 1: is a whole separate messaging service that is very private
Speaker 1: and very encrypted and secure photos.
Speaker 2: I mean, even though you might pay.
Speaker 1: For iCloud space to store your photos, again, that's a
Speaker 1: private service that nobody else is seeing your photos unless
Speaker 1: you choose to share them. But with something like Google,
Speaker 1: when you're uploading your photos, Google is looking at those
Speaker 1: photos for different reasons.
Speaker 2: And let's see what else.
Speaker 1: Notes, like the notes app, you know, if you look
Speaker 1: at the notes app on your iPhone is syncs with
Speaker 1: your computer. That again, it is another service that you
Speaker 1: might pay for. You might pay forever, Note, you might
Speaker 1: pay for Bear, you might pay for any of these
Speaker 1: other app note taking app programs. So a lot of
Speaker 1: things that are built into the iPhone, you're sort of
Speaker 1: they're front loaded. You're paying, you paid for it, You
Speaker 1: paid for the iPhone and you're kind of getting these
Speaker 1: services to go along with it. And yes, you have
Speaker 1: to pay for iCloud to at more online storage. Yeah,
Speaker 1: but a lot of the software that's built into the iPhone,
Speaker 1: like maps, you know, a lot of that is much
Speaker 1: more private than what Google's doing with Google Maps. When
Speaker 1: you drive around, Google's recording everything that you do and
Speaker 1: everywhere that you go to make their products and services better. Apple,
Speaker 1: to a lesser extent, is doing that. They're still looking
Speaker 1: at the place you're going. I'm not sure how they're
Speaker 1: using that data, but in general, it's a little bit
Speaker 1: more secure than what Google's doing.
Speaker 3: So if you write in a doc on Google like right.
Speaker 1: Google Docs, Yeah, I don't know, I mean, where does that?
Speaker 1: I mean it is?
Speaker 3: It's it's yeah, So all right, good to know.
Speaker 1: All right, let's talk about some of the there's like
Speaker 1: three speakers right now, three new speakers.
Speaker 2: So Roku came.
Speaker 1: Out with a Roku Smart soundbar, and the only thing
Speaker 1: you need to know about this one hundred and seventy
Speaker 1: nine bucks going to be available in October.
Speaker 2: And the thing.
Speaker 1: That I think is kind of interesting about this is
Speaker 1: that it includes Roku in the bar, which is kind
Speaker 1: of cool because I don't know about you, but most
Speaker 1: TVs have terrible sound, Like even my TV like it
Speaker 1: just don't have very good sound. I have Sonos, so
Speaker 1: it sounds better, but it's still sometimes really tough to
Speaker 1: hear dialogue. Maybe I'm just getting older, I don't know, but.
Speaker 2: It's tough to you can't hear It's tough to hear.
Speaker 1: Dialogue, and you know, my wife complains about that. And
Speaker 1: Sonos has like a feature that supposedly.
Speaker 2: Makes it better. It really doesn't, I don't think.
Speaker 1: But the Roku Smart Soundbar apparently makes dialogue sound better,
Speaker 1: and I think a soundbar is just a good thing
Speaker 1: to have on any TV because think about it, TVs
Speaker 1: are mainly screen. They're not known for their speakers. So
Speaker 1: one hundred and seventy nine dollars you get a Roku
Speaker 1: plus the soundbar built in, which is kind of cool.
Speaker 3: Now.
Speaker 1: I don't see anything when it comes to compatibility for
Speaker 1: either Airplay or chrome Cast, which are two services that
Speaker 1: might make it easier to use audio from your phone
Speaker 1: with this soundbar. But if you have Roku, you don't
Speaker 1: really need that because you can just dream, Spotify and
Speaker 1: stuff from the Roku. Yeah, you'll have Roku, right, So
Speaker 1: they have like a Spotify Appy, Pandora app.
Speaker 3: Yeah, they have. They have it all almost.
Speaker 2: So that's that.
Speaker 1: The other thing that I'm more excited for because I'm
Speaker 1: out of Roku house, but I am a Sono's house.
Speaker 1: They have a new speaker called the Move and this
Speaker 1: is the first battery powered Sono speaker.
Speaker 2: That you can use outside.
Speaker 1: And not only does it connect to your existing son
Speaker 1: No system, but it also uses Bluetooth. So for me,
Speaker 1: for instance, let's say I'm having a party. I've had
Speaker 1: a son No speaker on my back patio for a while.
Speaker 1: Problem is, I always forget it in the rain and
Speaker 1: next thing you know, you know, it's plugged in.
Speaker 2: So that's dangerous. Number one.
Speaker 1: Number two gets in the rain. It's lasted even getting
Speaker 1: wet rain, yeah, which is I guess it dries out
Speaker 1: and it's fine. I don't really trust it as much
Speaker 1: and the control on it has kind of worn out
Speaker 1: because of the rain, so I have to use.
Speaker 3: It doesn't really rain that much, no, but it did
Speaker 3: for a while, but you forget, Yeah, and it did
Speaker 3: for a while all the time.
Speaker 1: So I think that's really cool. So anyway, this is
Speaker 1: going to be much better outside. So in the backyard
Speaker 1: it would just connect to my existing Sonos system. But
Speaker 1: let's say we go to the beach and you want
Speaker 1: to use your son No speaker. You can now take
Speaker 1: this speaker and it has a battery which lasts for
Speaker 1: let's see, ten hours, oh wow, which is fine. And
Speaker 1: it also has Bluetooth streaming, so you can just use
Speaker 1: it with Bluetooth on your phone.
Speaker 3: Nice.
Speaker 2: I love this.
Speaker 1: It also has an IP fifty six rating, which I
Speaker 1: don't believe is that that with stands falls, bumps, rain
Speaker 1: and moisture, dust and dirt. I don't think IP fifty
Speaker 1: six is as good as you know, like a higher rating.
Speaker 1: But that's still fine. It's still going to be able
Speaker 1: to withstand being outside. I don't think it's meant to
Speaker 1: be left outside, but it can be brought outside and
Speaker 1: kind of like if you forget it overnight, it's gonna
Speaker 1: be okay, right, okay, what else? Hands free Airplay two.
Speaker 1: Here's the kicker on this whole Sono speaker. And what
Speaker 1: my problem with Sona says over and over is that
Speaker 1: it is a three hundred and ninety nine.
Speaker 3: Dollars I was about to ask is it the praise?
Speaker 1: Oh wait, hold on, that's for Is that a different story?
Speaker 1: Oh that's not Yeah, it is three and ninety nine okay, yeah, three.
Speaker 2: Hundred nine dollars. That's expensive for a Bluetooth speaker.
Speaker 3: You can get a blue Tooth speaker for way cheaper,
Speaker 3: way cheaper.
Speaker 1: But the thing is, if you're like me and you're
Speaker 1: in a son's house, you're kind of building out that
Speaker 1: system that works really well. Like the first thing I
Speaker 1: do every single day when I get home is put
Speaker 1: on Sonos every single day.
Speaker 3: What do you listen to?
Speaker 1: Actually, recently I've been listening to I found a new
Speaker 1: feature inside YouTube music which I use, and it basically
Speaker 1: you search for an artist and then you scroll all
Speaker 1: the way down it gives you all the similar artists.
Speaker 1: So one of my favorite artists for like working is Tycho.
Speaker 1: It's like instrumental music, and so it just I just
Speaker 1: pick one of the other artists and listen to them
Speaker 1: on shuffle or I do Tycho Radio Artist Radio, and
Speaker 1: it mixes in all the Taycho songs and then all
Speaker 1: the other artists that are similar, and I just leave
Speaker 1: that on for like hours. It's very easy, kind of
Speaker 1: like yeah, eats like cool, just chill beats.
Speaker 3: Oh I want to listen, so Tycho write that.
Speaker 2: Down, Tycho.
Speaker 1: I believe that the album that I really fell in
Speaker 1: love with is called Awake, and it is fantastic.
Speaker 2: If you just want to get some.
Speaker 3: Work done, Yeah, you can like focus.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Tycho away, it's really great.
Speaker 3: Yeah, because when I listen to rap music, I can't really.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's tough.
Speaker 3: It's tough.
Speaker 1: It's tough with little Nas, Little Nas as your study guide. There,
Speaker 1: let me do one more. I'll just get all the
Speaker 1: kind of audio video stuff away. But they also have
Speaker 1: a new Amazon Fire TV Cube. This is kind of
Speaker 1: the highest end Fire TV as far as I know.
Speaker 1: And the thing about the cube that is different than
Speaker 1: the Fire TV sticks is that the cube lets you
Speaker 1: control your TV hands free and your cable box. So
Speaker 1: it has a lot of smarts built in where you
Speaker 1: can say tune to channel five and it will turn
Speaker 1: on your TV and tune into that channel on your
Speaker 1: cable box.
Speaker 2: So it's kind of cool.
Speaker 1: It's only one hundred and nineteen dollars, and I think
Speaker 1: that this is now the most powerful fire TV stick
Speaker 1: because I have the or the Fire TV because I
Speaker 1: have the stick four K, which is forty dollars, and
Speaker 1: I'm looking at this and it has Yeah, the fire
Speaker 1: TV Cube has a built in speaker, which means you
Speaker 1: can have Alexa right there. You've got far field voice control,
Speaker 1: which means the thing can be off and you can
Speaker 1: just scream from across your room and well, yell whatever,
Speaker 1: and you can you know, you don't.
Speaker 2: Have to press anything.
Speaker 1: Yeah, you need to say a turn on the TV
Speaker 1: and tune into whatever Netflix there's and it works with
Speaker 1: a lot of different things as well. Okay, so the
Speaker 1: processor is now hexacore instead of quad core, and HEXA.
Speaker 2: Don't quote me, but hex is what eight hexagon? How many?
Speaker 2: How many sides does a hexagon have? Six sides?
Speaker 1: Okay, so six cores and two Okay, so six cores
Speaker 1: versus four. And it has sixteen gigs of storage versus eight.
Speaker 1: And it also has an Ethernet adapter built in, which
Speaker 1: is really cool because if you want really fast Internet
Speaker 1: instead of using Wi Fi, you can plug an Ethernet
Speaker 1: cable into the.
Speaker 2: Back of the fire TV Cube.
Speaker 1: So if you want the best kind of home system
Speaker 1: for fire TV, the cube is now the best.
Speaker 2: I may have to upgrade. But I'm very happy with
Speaker 2: my stick. It works.
Speaker 3: Just that's what my mom and dad have.
Speaker 2: I gave it to them, oh Christmas.
Speaker 3: They never use it.
Speaker 2: Well, then it's oh it doesn't work. What do they use?
Speaker 3: They just you know, watch cable. I can't really get
Speaker 3: into it right now.
Speaker 2: We need an old school, old.
Speaker 3: School, all right. So this next question comes from Sam.
Speaker 3: He says, who do you recommend for online backup? I
Speaker 3: had a bad experience with Carbonite, so not them.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, abrupt endings Carbonite. I'm wondering what the bad
Speaker 1: experience was. I think that the experience with all these
Speaker 1: online backups, and the reason why I don't use them
Speaker 1: is because there's two number one. Almost everything I'm doing
Speaker 1: is in the cloud these days. So I'm laughing because
Speaker 1: Megan was taking a sip of her was it coffee, Yeah,
Speaker 1: trying to trying to get caffeinated here. It was just
Speaker 1: a very funny sip because we wear these microphones and
Speaker 1: you kind of have to, like anything you have to do,
Speaker 1: you have to.
Speaker 2: Like kind of do it around and Ale, Yeah, it's
Speaker 2: it's just funny.
Speaker 3: Yeah. I was trying not to look at you.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I know, but you did and you looked like
Speaker 1: those funny eyes that are like off to the side
Speaker 1: that you're doing something wrong.
Speaker 3: So classic.
Speaker 1: So uh, the reason why I find these online backup
Speaker 1: services kind of tricky is because a almost everything I'm
Speaker 1: doing is in the cloud. Anyway, I'm using Google Docs,
Speaker 1: all my pictures are with Google. I like to have
Speaker 1: a physical backup close by. Because Number one, to do
Speaker 1: one of these backups, if you have everything on your computer,
Speaker 1: takes a while to like actually get the first backup,
Speaker 1: and then after that it's fine. It's incremental, so anything
Speaker 1: that changes on your computer, it will update, but that
Speaker 1: first update could take a couple of weeks depending on
Speaker 1: your internet connection.
Speaker 2: And I used to do I should probably do this again.
Speaker 1: And because last week we talked about on the show
Speaker 1: how I did lose my desktop because that wasn't backed up.
Speaker 1: But if you have iCloud and a Mac, your desktop
Speaker 1: can be backed up on iCloud. In fact, a lot
Speaker 1: of your computer can be backed up in die cloud.
Speaker 2: So anyway, to.
Speaker 1: Get to his answer, I would say, the other one
Speaker 1: to look at is Backblaze, and Backblaze is kind of
Speaker 1: like the biggest competitor to carbonite and all of these companies.
Speaker 1: There used to be a ton of them out there.
Speaker 1: They've all pivoted sort towards the enterprise or business solutions.
Speaker 1: But Backblaze, I am checking. They still do a personal
Speaker 1: backup for six dollars a month. Now, six dollars a
Speaker 1: month doesn't sound expensive, but over time, that is a
Speaker 1: very expensive way to back up your computer. Six dollars
Speaker 1: times twelve is seventy two dollars. You can get a
Speaker 1: drive on Amazon to back up your computer for I
Speaker 1: think it's like sixty dollars for like a terabyte or
Speaker 1: even wow, let me look that up.
Speaker 3: You know what. You're right, that's definitely how much mine
Speaker 3: was what I think.
Speaker 2: It was sixty Yeah, for like one terabyte of hard drive.
Speaker 1: It might even be two terabytes. At this point, Western
Speaker 1: Digital two terabyte drive is now sixty dollars, So imagine
Speaker 1: a two terabyte drive sixty bucks. You plug it into
Speaker 1: your computer. Both Windows and Mac both have very easy
Speaker 1: to use backing up systems, which on Makets Time Machine.
Speaker 1: On Windows it's just backup, so search on your Windows
Speaker 1: and if you just go to backup settings and if
Speaker 1: you go into there you plug in a drive. Windows
Speaker 1: will say hey, backup using file history.
Speaker 2: So that's what it's called. So you just plug in
Speaker 2: your drive.
Speaker 1: Every time you plug in that drive, it automatically backs
Speaker 1: up all the new stuff and boom, sixty bucks, a
Speaker 1: lot cheaper than seventy two for the year. The benefit
Speaker 1: to the online is that it's online, so you don't
Speaker 1: really have to think about it as much. You don't
Speaker 1: have to worry about your backup drive crashing. The problem
Speaker 1: comes when you want to restore from an online backup
Speaker 1: and guess what, Downloading all those terabytes.
Speaker 2: To your computer takes forever.
Speaker 1: And so what they want to do is they'll say, oh,
Speaker 1: we'll send you a hard drive with all this stuff
Speaker 1: on it. Maybe they do it for free, but a
Speaker 1: lot of times it might cost you a one time
Speaker 1: fee of like, you know, twenty five fifty bucks, okay,
Speaker 1: which again, now add that all up and you're talking
Speaker 1: it's a lot of money.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 2: But with that said, it's peace of mind totally.
Speaker 1: And you're using back blaze or carbonite. It's very simple
Speaker 1: because it's peace of mind.
Speaker 3: Yeah, and that reminds me, I think I really need
Speaker 3: to backup my laptop, my old laptop.
Speaker 1: You should, yeah, but I think in general, if you
Speaker 1: have the external hard drive with Time Machine or on Windows,
Speaker 1: and you have everything on your computer that's in two places,
Speaker 1: so hopefully both of those things don't crash at the
Speaker 1: same time. Yeah, you're hoping either you're not hoping, but
Speaker 1: either your computer hard drive is going to crash or
Speaker 1: the external is going to crash, hopefully not at the
Speaker 1: same time.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: The only time that you have to be worried is
Speaker 1: I mean, God forbid, you're in the house, your computer's
Speaker 1: in your house, and your heart drives in your house
Speaker 1: and everything burns down, right, Yeah, that's when you.
Speaker 3: But again the other but if there was a fire,
Speaker 3: I'd probably just grab my laptop.
Speaker 1: No, you probably wouldn't grab my dog. You'd want to
Speaker 1: save yourself and you know, anyone else, my puppy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, but I always think about that.
Speaker 1: I'm like, oh, with a fire like that puts you
Speaker 1: in a tough place if you didn't back up.
Speaker 2: Yeah, because you're like, I knew I should have listened
Speaker 2: to Rich on tech.
Speaker 3: I don't know why, but that really stresses me out.
Speaker 2: Oh, it's totally stressful.
Speaker 1: It's the worst, like anything that has to do with
Speaker 1: your house or that's why it's.
Speaker 3: Better to live in a brick house, right, because I
Speaker 3: can't catch on.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: I'll never forget asking my Oh my gosh, this is embarrassing.
Speaker 3: You have to tell us now.
Speaker 1: I didn't even want to tell because it gets into
Speaker 1: religion and stuff, but I'll never forget. In third grade,
Speaker 1: my teacher we were talking about fires and somehow like
Speaker 1: a church came up and I was like, well, a
Speaker 1: church can't burn down because it's God's house. Yeah, and
Speaker 1: my teacher was like, and I didn't go to Catholic school,
Speaker 1: it's just public school, and she's like, oh, no, I
Speaker 1: can burn down.
Speaker 2: I was like what.
Speaker 1: I was like devastated to know that, Like, oh my gosh,
Speaker 1: God can't protect his own house.
Speaker 3: It was really that's really sad.
Speaker 2: I'm just going to end the podcast here.
Speaker 3: Yeah, well, if it's made out of stone, right, I
Speaker 3: don't know anyway I.
Speaker 1: Can still burn. I've seen churches burn, Notre Dame that
Speaker 1: wasn't that a church that burned?
Speaker 3: That was really sad.
Speaker 1: All right, let's talk about something fun, talking about backing
Speaker 1: up your stuff. If you live in the LA area
Speaker 1: or any area that is serviced by Spectrum in a
Speaker 1: large city, you might want to do a speed test.
Speaker 1: I saw commercial on TV and I think we talked
Speaker 1: about this in a previous podcast where it said now
Speaker 1: speeds you're double to two hundred, and I pay for
Speaker 1: one hundred. So I was like, what I want two
Speaker 1: hundred because faster internet is always better. So I tweeted
Speaker 1: about this and I got some responses online and some
Speaker 1: of the folks said that, yeah, they live in the
Speaker 1: LA area and they're all already getting the faster internet,
Speaker 1: and one person told me that you don't have to
Speaker 1: do anything. They chatted with the Spectrum folks and they said, yeah,
Speaker 1: just reset your modem and you'll notice.
Speaker 2: The faster speeds we have.
Speaker 3: Spectrum I think.
Speaker 1: Went to my house, went to my house and did
Speaker 1: a speed test, and sure enough, I was not getting
Speaker 1: the faster speeds. So this morning I chatted with Spectrum
Speaker 1: and they said, oh, we looked up your account. You
Speaker 1: are getting you got it. We are automatically upgrading pretty
Speaker 1: much everyone that's paying for one hundred to two hundred,
Speaker 1: which is awesome. Wow, never mind you I pay sixty
Speaker 1: five dollars a month, so two hundred sounds, you know,
Speaker 1: way better than one hundred for that price. Yeah, long
Speaker 1: story short, I did a speed test and sure enough
Speaker 1: I got over two hundred down. Still ten up, but whatever,
Speaker 1: it's fine. So the thing is, they figure most people
Speaker 1: are more downloading than uploading. But when you're uploading, that
Speaker 1: comes in handy for things like backing up all that
Speaker 1: good stuff, you know. But they're thinking most people are
Speaker 1: just downloading stuff.
Speaker 3: So wait, sorry, my brother has a YouTube channel, yes,
Speaker 3: and he's always uploading stuff. Does that like slow our
Speaker 3: internet down for us?
Speaker 2: It could?
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean you get a certain amount of bandwidth,
Speaker 1: so yeah, it could do that if he's uploading all
Speaker 1: the time.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it can. You know, you only get so much
Speaker 2: of the pie, you know.
Speaker 1: Yeah, And that's why with cable internet in your neighborhood,
Speaker 1: when all of your neighbors are online at the same time,
Speaker 1: that's one of the downsides of cable internet versus the
Speaker 1: internet from the phone company is that you're sharing that
Speaker 1: line among your neighbors. Now, I think that things have
Speaker 1: gotten so good these days that it's not that much
Speaker 1: of an issue. But I will say sometimes at night
Speaker 1: on a Friday or Saturday night, when everyone's streaming Netflix,
Speaker 1: you might notice a hit on your speed versus two
Speaker 1: pm during the day when I'm normally home. So anyway,
Speaker 1: my advice to you is, if you have Spectrum, definitely
Speaker 1: do a speed test. Couple of ways you can do that.
Speaker 1: Number one, go to fast dot com on a web
Speaker 1: browser that is connected to your Wi Fi at home
Speaker 1: and check out the speed and see if you're getting
Speaker 1: close to two hundred. If you're not, I would call in.
Speaker 1: If you're getting something under one hundred. You got to
Speaker 1: check see what's going on with your internet.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: Your WiFi is not necessarily the best way to test
Speaker 1: your internet because Wi Fi is generally slower than what's
Speaker 1: coming into the modem because the signal is sometimes getting interrupted.
Speaker 1: But if you have a system like Ero or one
Speaker 1: of these mesh Wi Fi systems, generally like me, I
Speaker 1: get the perfect Internet throughout my house because of that system.
Speaker 1: The other thing to do if you're not getting it
Speaker 1: is to just unplug your modem and restart it and
Speaker 1: see if that triggers the upgrade. But otherwise, I put
Speaker 1: this on my Facebook page and I got a lot
Speaker 1: of responses, and people are all posting their Internet speed
Speaker 1: tests and they're saying.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Rich, I got it.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, that's so cool, and it just feels
Speaker 1: good to get more for what you're already paying for.
Speaker 1: Right the other way to test and I like an
Speaker 1: app called Meteor met eo R. It's available for both
Speaker 1: iOS and Android, and you can do a speed test
Speaker 1: with that. It's just a fun little app that just
Speaker 1: looks cooler than your typical speed test app.
Speaker 2: All right, Megan, it's all you, all right.
Speaker 3: So this next question comes from Madelina. She writes, Hi,
Speaker 3: do you have any solutions for stopping mail from a
Speaker 3: sender that uses various forms of an app called spot
Speaker 3: dot com. I've been getting hundreds of unsolicited trashy emails
Speaker 3: on my hotmail account. She says the suggestions that she's read,
Speaker 3: I wait suggestions to set rules, and the settings do
Speaker 3: not work. Although they automatically go to junk box, they're
Speaker 3: irritating just the same. One blogger said they're even going
Speaker 3: to his child's account. And then she goes on to say,
Speaker 3: I've never seen this addressed by tech pros.
Speaker 1: Thinks you've never seen spam addressed by tech pros.
Speaker 3: Come on, I think it's specifically this. No.
Speaker 1: I looked up that website number on that website is
Speaker 1: not trashy, so I don't know what there might be,
Speaker 1: like a variation on that website. Yea, I looked up
Speaker 1: the spot website and it's not trashy. So look, the
Speaker 1: reality is she's saying that these are going to her
Speaker 1: junk spam.
Speaker 2: I mean, have you ever checked her spam? There's all
Speaker 2: kinds of garbage.
Speaker 3: Yeah, that's the thing.
Speaker 1: So it doesn't to me if it's going into spam.
Speaker 1: I don't really care. Yeah, and yes, I will take
Speaker 1: a casual glance at the spam every once in a
Speaker 1: while just to see like what's in there besides the spam,
Speaker 1: and sometimes some legit emails do get in there. But
Speaker 1: if you look at this stuff in spam, I mean,
Speaker 1: it's garbage. A lot of it is just terrible, terrible
Speaker 1: stuff that you know, who cares though it's in your spam.
Speaker 1: So I wouldn't worry about it too much. I think
Speaker 1: if the spam filter is doing its job, people are
Speaker 1: gonna send spam. You're not gonna like put these people
Speaker 1: in jail. It's like, the spam is going to come
Speaker 1: no matter what. I think that if it's coming to
Speaker 1: your inbox, that's a problem. And yes, some people are
Speaker 1: saying to do filters, and usually I know a Gmail,
Speaker 1: you can go into the menu for any email and
Speaker 1: say filter messages like this. If it's not if your
Speaker 1: spam blocker is not working, you can filter a message
Speaker 1: and just send it straight to trash. If it's like
Speaker 1: a mailing list that will just not stop. The other
Speaker 1: thing you can do is report spam, and almost all
Speaker 1: of the email providers let you report spam by pressing
Speaker 1: the report spam.
Speaker 2: She mentioned Hotmail.
Speaker 1: I mean, realistically, if you're still using Hotmail, like, it's
Speaker 1: not the best email out there, So I would switch
Speaker 1: over to something like Outlook dot com or Gmail dot
Speaker 1: com or anything but Hotmail. Yeah, just I don't think
Speaker 1: it's really kept up with the time.
Speaker 2: So my mom uses AOL and it's so annoying.
Speaker 3: My parents use SBC Global.
Speaker 2: I don't even know what that one is. That like
Speaker 2: back in the day.
Speaker 3: I made my dad a Gmail, like four years ago.
Speaker 1: Yes, so did I my mom dad, and they barely
Speaker 1: use it, and it's like it's just one of these
Speaker 1: things where Gmail has sort of mastered email. So even
Speaker 1: if you have to use iCloud, like you can set
Speaker 1: up a free iCloud email address if you want, and
Speaker 1: there's probably not as much spam there, but.
Speaker 2: Anything but hotmail.
Speaker 3: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Oh, speaking of email, if you're using Gmail on the iPhone,
Speaker 1: there is a setting that I think you should look
Speaker 1: into and this will help cut down on spam and
Speaker 1: all kinds of emails that you don't want. But now,
Speaker 1: in the iOS version of Gmail, there is a way
Speaker 1: that you can turn off automatic image loading. And I
Speaker 1: have this setting turned on on both my Android device
Speaker 1: and also my web Gmail. What it does is it
Speaker 1: does not load images. So when you get an email
Speaker 1: like this, you can see.
Speaker 2: Well, that loaded the image.
Speaker 3: Wait, I thought you said it was on iOS.
Speaker 1: Well, this is new on iOS. It's always been available
Speaker 1: on the desktop and on Android. Now it's coming to iOS.
Speaker 1: So let's see if this one works.
Speaker 3: Well.
Speaker 2: That one that's weird. Uh, both of those images loaded.
Speaker 2: That's so strange.
Speaker 1: Here's one okay, So here's my Spectrum bill. See this
Speaker 1: and see where it says Spectrum logo at the top.
Speaker 1: How it's not loaded. It's like a broken image.
Speaker 3: Ye.
Speaker 1: That means that it's not going to load the images
Speaker 1: until I press display images below. And now you see
Speaker 1: how it all comes in the reason why I do
Speaker 1: that is because inside these images are a whole bunch
Speaker 1: of trackers, and those trackers help identify when you've opened
Speaker 1: an email, where you've opened an email, how many times
Speaker 1: you've opened an email, and it just generally lets people
Speaker 1: track you in different ways.
Speaker 3: It's crazy.
Speaker 1: So by having these off, you are less apt to
Speaker 1: be tracked. Also, it does not send a signal to
Speaker 1: these spammers that your email address actually works. Because let's
Speaker 1: say you look at a spam email, it loads that image.
Speaker 1: It tells a spammer, oh, we know that Megan just
Speaker 1: opened this email. It then tells you that that's a
Speaker 1: good email address. A lot of times spammers are just spamming,
Speaker 1: they're just sending a bunch of emails. So if you
Speaker 1: have this feature turned on, it helps protect your email
Speaker 1: address just a little bit more. And yes it's annoying
Speaker 1: because a lot of times you do have to press
Speaker 1: you know, let me see these images. But you can
Speaker 1: also press the option for let me see these images
Speaker 1: every time for this email address. So with people like
Speaker 1: my family and friends, like obviously I press always load
Speaker 1: images for them, and when they send me something, I
Speaker 1: see it immediately. I don't have to take that extra step.
Speaker 1: But for all the other garbage that you get, all
Speaker 1: the bills and the you know, random unsolicited emails and
Speaker 1: all the mailing list, it's just kind of one extra
Speaker 1: little step. So you can go into settings on iOS
Speaker 1: and look for the option to turn image blocking on,
Speaker 1: which it probably will say something like load images by
Speaker 1: default or ask and I.
Speaker 3: Would change it under the Gmail like.
Speaker 1: Yeah, should be under the You have to probably go
Speaker 1: into the app settings, so it's probably into Gmail apps side.
Speaker 1: On iPhone, there's two different settings. There's your setting settings
Speaker 1: and then there's like inside the app you have setting right.
Speaker 1: Very confusing sometimes, but there you go. All right, let's
Speaker 1: see what do I want to talk before we go?
Speaker 1: Let's see, Well, Android ten I know launched, but nobody
Speaker 1: has it, but I do have it on my Pixel.
Speaker 1: And the problem with Android ten this is like the
Speaker 1: new version of the operating system. It's great, but nobody
Speaker 1: really gets it unless you have a Pixel And if
Speaker 1: you have a Samsung phone, you're not going to get
Speaker 1: this for six to nine months, which is wild because
Speaker 1: with iPhone, when the update comes out with iOS, you
Speaker 1: get it that day. With Android it takes forever, so
Speaker 1: I have been playing with this on my Android on
Speaker 1: the pixel and it's really cool.
Speaker 2: It's very beautiful. They've had a lot of new features
Speaker 2: that are just very nice.
Speaker 1: It works great. Smart reply is one of my favorite
Speaker 1: features on Android. When someone sends you a text, it
Speaker 1: gives you a bunch of options at the bottom, which
Speaker 1: I don't know if you know that, but so for instance,
Speaker 1: like if you look at this text message on here,
Speaker 1: this one didn't work, of course, but okay, so you
Speaker 1: sent me a text that says everything's set up, and
Speaker 1: at the bottom it says yay, little smiley face, awesome
Speaker 1: and great. So with one tap, I can just send
Speaker 1: you that message. So that's really I don't have to
Speaker 1: think about it. And they're expanding it into more apps
Speaker 1: so it works across various apps. They've got a dark theme,
Speaker 1: so you can now have dark theme. I noticed on
Speaker 1: my phone this morning as I was driving in everything
Speaker 1: was black. That was kind of cool because it gives
Speaker 1: you that dark theme. Easy on the eyes. Gesture navigation,
Speaker 1: which is just like the iPhone. Location sharing is really
Speaker 1: upgraded in Android ten. So a lot of apps when
Speaker 1: you first use them, like Yelp, it gave me a
Speaker 1: notification and said, hey, YELP just asked for your location.
Speaker 2: In the background.
Speaker 1: Did you know that? Did you want that? And it'll
Speaker 1: give the option to say no. You don't realize that
Speaker 1: all these apps are asking for a location in the
Speaker 1: background all the time. So now with Android ten, you'll
Speaker 1: be much more aware of that. Somehow you can mark
Speaker 1: notifications to be silent. I've not really figured that out,
Speaker 1: but there's definitely more control there. And there's Focus Mode,
Speaker 1: which I've talked about I think in the last podcast,
Speaker 1: where you can now press one button and kind of
Speaker 1: gray out some of the apps that disturb you or
Speaker 1: distract you.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I love that feature and it's been really fun.
Speaker 3: So and you have that on your Instagram.
Speaker 1: Right showing I think I put on my Instagram to
Speaker 1: show the folks. I think it might be on Twitter.
Speaker 2: I don't. I don't. I don't think it made it
Speaker 2: to Instagram. Did it? No? It did not? Sadly, Oh
Speaker 2: that's so sad. Did not?
Speaker 1: Should I talk about cyber insurance anyway? If you think
Speaker 1: you need cyber insurance, Mercury's got it. You can google
Speaker 1: about that one.
Speaker 2: Do you want to do? One more question before we go?
Speaker 2: Quick question A quick one.
Speaker 3: Yeah, I have a quick one from Kathleen. She just
Speaker 3: bought a Sony Bravia Bravia Ravia. On the box it
Speaker 3: says I must agree to a Google account to use
Speaker 3: the TV. I'm not thrilled about giving up my privacy.
Speaker 3: Is this TV just an excellent spy that's.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: If she's saying that you have to have a Google account, Yeah,
Speaker 1: I have a Sony TV that was pre Google, pre Android.
Speaker 1: So the Sony TVs, you know, like you have a
Speaker 1: Roku TV, or you have an Amazon TV or a
Speaker 1: Samsung TV or an LGTV, they all use different operating systems,
Speaker 1: but the Sony uses Android Android TV specifically from Google.
Speaker 1: And yeah, you probably have to agree to that, which,
Speaker 1: if you think about it, Google is collecting stuff, collecting data,
Speaker 1: probably information on what you watch, what you're streaming, how
Speaker 1: you're using the TV. They're getting some of that data.
Speaker 1: So if you're not comfortable with that, I would recommend
Speaker 1: taking the TV back. And the TV might also have
Speaker 1: a microphone on it, depending on the model.
Speaker 2: I don't know.
Speaker 1: That could also be a considering excellent It's probably funneling
Speaker 1: more information to Google about you now. It also depends
Speaker 1: on whether you think that's evil or not. Do I
Speaker 1: care if you're seeing what I'm watching on my TV?
Speaker 1: Not really, I don't really care. So at Google it
Speaker 1: if you do care, and that's a concern, And since
Speaker 1: you're emailing me, that probably is a concern of yours,
Speaker 1: I would say go with a different TV.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: The problem is all the smart TVs are doing the
Speaker 1: same thing. Whether it's Visio, whether it's Samsung. They're all
Speaker 1: collecting data on what you're doing on that TV, and
Speaker 1: now with the internet connections, they're sending it back.
Speaker 3: But you don't need a Gmail account for Roku, do you?
Speaker 1: No? But Roku's doing their own thing. Yeah, they're also
Speaker 1: they're doing their own thing. Yeah, Roku they're a huge
Speaker 1: advertising platform. Why do you think they're trying to get
Speaker 1: people to get their system? It's all advertising. Yeah, they say, hey,
Speaker 1: we've got twenty million people using Roku's we can sell
Speaker 1: ads against them, and we know that Megan is this
Speaker 1: age and she makes this much money and she lives
Speaker 1: in this area, and we can target ads to her.
Speaker 1: Don't you have ads on your homescreen on Yoku?
Speaker 3: You do? It's like a billboard in my room.
Speaker 1: Exactly, and they know exactly who you are, and they
Speaker 1: also know what you're watching. They know what you like,
Speaker 1: they know what you don't like. It's all linked up.
Speaker 2: That is so so if you don't want that to happen.
Speaker 1: If you don't want that to happen, you need to
Speaker 1: get a TV that is not smart. Alternatively, you can
Speaker 1: not connect your TV to Wi Fi. Then it's going
Speaker 1: to be tough to stream stuff.
Speaker 3: Aka, it's not gonna happen.
Speaker 2: It's not gonna happen.
Speaker 1: All right, that's going to do it for the show.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for listening. We do appreciate it. If
Speaker 1: you have a question for me, you can go to
Speaker 1: my website rich on tech dot tv, hit the contact
Speaker 1: button and send it my way. I can't guarantee at
Speaker 1: this point any personal responses because I'm getting so many emails,
Speaker 1: so many emails, I do try to respond to each
Speaker 1: and every one of them. If it's something that I
Speaker 1: don't understand or can't really easily explain in an email,
Speaker 1: I just or you know, I may just explain it
Speaker 1: here and I may just ignore you. It's nothing against you,
Speaker 1: and you're free to email again if you think you're
Speaker 1: not getting the service.
Speaker 3: You should email ten times a day. If you don't,
Speaker 3: please don't don't do that.
Speaker 1: But again, I am one person and I you know,
Speaker 1: I do try to respond best to my abilities. But
Speaker 1: I do have family, kids, and.
Speaker 3: This is just part of my job kind of a life.
Speaker 1: Oh, I don't have a life, So that's okay, that
Speaker 1: part you're covered with. Yeah, let's see. I told you
Speaker 1: about the book. If you want to follow me on Amazon,
Speaker 1: go ahead and do that, or you can sign up
Speaker 1: for my newsletter go to rich on tech dot TV
Speaker 1: hit newsletter and that is where I tell you about
Speaker 1: all the stuff I think you should know in newsletter
Speaker 1: format and that's kind of fun. And Meghan, how can
Speaker 1: people get in touch with you?
Speaker 3: I'm on Twitter and my Twitter account is producer Megan,
Speaker 3: and I'm on Instagram. But it's not like.
Speaker 1: Really tough to find until she changes it to producer Megan,
Speaker 1: which she's really how is it hard to find?
Speaker 3: Meghan mcmonoca?
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, that's that just rolls off the monocle.
Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a very easy last name to pronounce.
Speaker 1: I am at rich on Tech and you can find
Speaker 1: me there on Instagram and Facebook. On Twitter, I'm at
Speaker 1: Rich DeMuro, which is really tough to find too. I mean,
Speaker 1: how are you going to find that? You know how
Speaker 1: to spell DeMuro? Just off the top of my head.
Speaker 3: Should I changed my Instagram handle to Meg with tech No.
Speaker 2: I think you should do producer Megan. It's good because
Speaker 2: here's how easy this is.
Speaker 1: You say producer Megan, and now you can just be
Speaker 1: like I'm producer Megan across all things and people just
Speaker 1: find you Preucer Megan. But for a while, producer Megan
Speaker 1: had her face, had her Instagram closed down. So but
Speaker 1: now it's open again.
Speaker 3: You had a private Oh yeah, I've gone in and out.
Speaker 3: Yeah yeah, I changed my mind periodic.
Speaker 1: All right, that's gonna do it. Thanks so much for
Speaker 1: listening to the show. If you like the show, please
Speaker 1: rate and review us on iTunes. Tell your friends about
Speaker 1: the show. We do appreciate it.
Speaker 2: You know, we're trying to grow, trying to grow the show,
Speaker 2: grow the show. Yeah, I am going to rhyme in
Speaker 2: no time.
Speaker 3: Oh maybe we should just end the show now, I
Speaker 3: think so.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for listening. Have a fantastic day, Umrich
Speaker 1: shmiro Rich on tech dot TV.
Speaker 2: We'll see you real soon.