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Speaker 1: Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from iHeartRadio. Hey there,

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Speaker 1: and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, Jonathan Strickland.

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Speaker 1: I'm an executive producer with iHeart Podcasts. And how the

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Speaker 1: tech are you. It's time for the tech news for

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Speaker 1: the week ending on Friday, June twenty first, twenty twenty four.

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Speaker 1: And we've had a little shuffle this week for the

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Speaker 1: title of world's most valuable company. And by that I

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Speaker 1: mean how a company is valued based upon the number

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Speaker 1: of shares that are available and the price per share.

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Speaker 1: All the contenders are tech companies and earlier this month,

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Speaker 1: Apple toppled Microsoft after Apple held its Worldwide Developer Conference

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Speaker 1: and got investors all excited, but that victory was short lived.

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Speaker 1: Microsoft regained the throne just two days later. This week,

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Speaker 1: a new challenger pushed past Apple to take a swing

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Speaker 1: at the king that was Nvidia. Like Apple, Nvidia achieved

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Speaker 1: the title of most valuable company in the world, only

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Speaker 1: to relinquish it back to Microsoft a couple of days later.

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Speaker 1: But on June eighteenth, Nvidia was on top of the

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Speaker 1: world with a market value of three point three four

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Speaker 1: trillion dollars. Geez Louise. Anyway, since then Nvidia stock price

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Speaker 1: dipped about three point four percent, and that was enough

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Speaker 1: to give Microsoft the top spot again, even though Microsoft

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Speaker 1: had also had a smaller dip in stock value in

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Speaker 1: that same time. Now, in case you're not familiar with Nvidia,

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Speaker 1: it's a microprocessor design company. Like they make the designs

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Speaker 1: for things like, you know, microprocessors, specifically graphics processing units

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Speaker 1: or GPUs, and then other companies fabricate those designs. Recently,

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Speaker 1: in Vidia's really big business has been in designing chips

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Speaker 1: that are used by companies for the purposes of running

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Speaker 1: AI implementations. On the tech and politics front, the US

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Speaker 1: White House has banned the sale of products and services

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Speaker 1: from the Russian cybersecurity company Kispersky Labs. So Kispersky Lab

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Speaker 1: it's a huge name in the cybersecurity space. They've played

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Speaker 1: a key part in identifying and mitigating various threats across

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Speaker 1: the Internet. Kisperski also makes lots of different products, including

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Speaker 1: antivirus software. So why would the US ban it? Well,

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Speaker 1: the main concern is that the White House believes the

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Speaker 1: Russian government could and would force Kaspersky Lab to harvest

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Speaker 1: and weaponize data from other countries, you know, primarily the

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Speaker 1: United States obviously, but there's also a fear that the

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Speaker 1: Russian government could force Kisperski Lab to actually serve as

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Speaker 1: a delivery system for malware rather than as a protection

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Speaker 1: against it. Imagine being told that your antivirus software needs

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Speaker 1: to be updated, and so you update it, but secretly

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Speaker 1: it's actually delivering malware to you. That's part of the concern. Now,

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Speaker 1: Kasperski Lab has protested this ban, which makes sense, and

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Speaker 1: have said that well, this is a case where the

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Speaker 1: US government is reacting to a perceived hypothetical threat as

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Speaker 1: opposed to know an actual threat, which is a sentiment

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Speaker 1: that we may have also heard regarding the upcoming US

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Speaker 1: ban on TikTok. I'll talk more about that in just

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Speaker 1: a moment. Kasperski Lab says it will pursue all legal

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Speaker 1: avenues open to the company to push back against this ban.

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Speaker 1: I don't know how I feel about this one, honestly,

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Speaker 1: because I mean, Kaspersky Lab undeniably has done some amazing work,

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Speaker 1: and without their contributions, I do believe the Internet would

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Speaker 1: be a much more dangerous place than it is already.

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Speaker 1: On the flip side, I don't think there's any way

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Speaker 1: you can deny that Russia has an authoritarian government in

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Speaker 1: place with various agencies that have shown in the past

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Speaker 1: to be more than willing to put pressure on whatever

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Speaker 1: levers they have to gain an advantage. But is that

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Speaker 1: potential enough to justify a ban. If you don't have

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Speaker 1: a specific instance to point out of saying yes, this

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Speaker 1: is happening, then are you justified in banning. I don't know.

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Speaker 1: It doesn't feel good to me, but at the same

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Speaker 1: time I can understand the concern. So you could also

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Speaker 1: argue that this is really just more political posturing, that

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Speaker 1: it's the US attempting to kind of shut down an

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Speaker 1: important business that's in Russia as a way to indirectly

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Speaker 1: pressure Russia itself. I'm not smart enough to understand all

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Speaker 1: the ins and outs, so I just look at it

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Speaker 1: and think, wow, that's a big mess. Also, speaking of TikTok,

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Speaker 1: Reuter's reports that TikTok and its parent company byte Dance,

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Speaker 1: the Chinese company, have requested essentially a dismissal of the

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Speaker 1: upcoming national ban on TikTok in the US that's scheduled

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Speaker 1: to happen on January nineteenth, twenty twenty. So the argument

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Speaker 1: that TikTok is making is that despite several attempts to

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Speaker 1: negotiate a solution to the various concerns the US government

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Speaker 1: has raised regarding TikTok and its relationship to its pairing company,

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Speaker 1: the US government has refused to really engage on a

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Speaker 1: serious level since twenty twenty two. So TikTok is saying,

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Speaker 1: We've come forward in good faith in an attempt to

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Speaker 1: work this out, and the government has just roadblocked us

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Speaker 1: and then gone to a ban which doesn't seem fair.

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Speaker 1: And then also TikTok's arguing that this is a violation

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Speaker 1: of First Amendment rights as well. TikTok reps have also

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Speaker 1: claimed that divestiture from the Chinese pairing company is quote

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Speaker 1: not possible technologically, commercially, or legally end the quote. I

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Speaker 1: don't know. I feel like I need to call bs

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Speaker 1: on at least the first two of those three, simply

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Speaker 1: because we've also read reports that TikTok has quietly been

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Speaker 1: working on an alternative recommendation algorithm, which sounds like it

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Speaker 1: could be a contingency plan if this band does go through.

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Speaker 1: You know, the band hinges on TikTok's relationship to Byte

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Speaker 1: Dance and by extension, China itself. The band has said

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Speaker 1: that if TikTok were to be divested from Byte Dance,

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Speaker 1: that this band would not necessarily happen. So the fact

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Speaker 1: that TikTok has apparently been working on this alternative recommendation algorithm,

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Speaker 1: one that's distinctly independent of the version that Byte Dance

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Speaker 1: uses for say du Yan, the Chinese version of TikTok

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Speaker 1: or the Chinese you know, like close cousin of TikTok,

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Speaker 1: That to me suggests that TikTok is quietly exploring those possibilities.

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Speaker 1: But obviously the company wants to avoid having to do

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Speaker 1: that at all, and it would be better for the

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Speaker 1: company if they didn't have to go through the whole

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Speaker 1: divestiture process. As for commercially, I mean, TikTok still operates

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Speaker 1: rather independently from the other products of Byte Dance, so

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Speaker 1: I would imagine that divesting it commercially actually is entirely possible.

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Speaker 1: I mean, no one by Dance wouldn't want to do

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Speaker 1: it because TikTok makes money, so why would you want to?

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Speaker 1: But I still think it's possible. I don't think it's impossible.

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Speaker 1: That's based on my own opinion, but yeah, the legal part,

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Speaker 1: that's harder for me to answer. That's what the courts

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Speaker 1: are for. I personally have doubts that the courts are

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Speaker 1: going to reach a decision as to whether the ban

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Speaker 1: is legal or not before the deadline actually gets here,

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Speaker 1: But we'll see. Reuter's also reports that Apple has recently

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Speaker 1: switched gears and has stopped work on a successor to

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Speaker 1: the Apple Vision Pro, which is Apple's mixed reality headset.

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Speaker 1: That headset has a hefty price tag, and it's also

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Speaker 1: had a fairly slow start, which I believe mostly comes

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Speaker 1: down to two really big reasons. The first is obviously

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Speaker 1: the base cost. It is huge. It's a whopping three

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Speaker 1: five hundred dollars at the beginning, before you've done any

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Speaker 1: like upgrades or accessories or anything like that. And that's

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Speaker 1: a lot more money than most people can PLoP down

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Speaker 1: for a new tech gadget. But the other big barrier

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Speaker 1: is that development for this platform is still in its

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Speaker 1: very early days, which means there's really not that much

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Speaker 1: you can do with the darn thing. Yet every review

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Speaker 1: I have read of the Vision Pro says that it

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Speaker 1: performs really well. It's really impressive. But that outside of

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Speaker 1: the basic things you're able to do, there's just not

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Speaker 1: much there yet. And for developers, I could see why

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Speaker 1: there'd be a reluctance to jump on board because if

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Speaker 1: the installed base of potential customers is a very small one,

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Speaker 1: you might not be able to capitalize on the invested

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Speaker 1: time and energy it took to make something compelling because

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Speaker 1: there's just not enough people to pay that investment off anyway. Now,

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Speaker 1: Apple is reportedly backing away from making a true Apple

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Speaker 1: Vision Pro two or whatever they would call it, but

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Speaker 1: the company is still working on a more affordable mixed

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Speaker 1: reality headsint at that would be available before the end

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Speaker 1: of next year. Presumably such an affordable model will have

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Speaker 1: fewer features than the Vision Pro. What I find interesting

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Speaker 1: is whether or not customers will flock to a cheaper

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Speaker 1: version of this platform, or if the lack of those

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Speaker 1: certain features is going to sap away any excitement about

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Speaker 1: the technology and people won't be willing to pay for

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Speaker 1: it because you know, it'll be a cheap imitation of

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Speaker 1: the thing that came out a couple of years earlier.

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Speaker 1: If I had to make a guess, I would say

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Speaker 1: more folks would be willing to buy a less expensive

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Speaker 1: headset made by Apple, because Apple's reality distortion field is

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Speaker 1: still a thing, and maybe we would hear folks later

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Speaker 1: complain that the headset isn't as impressive as they were

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Speaker 1: led to believe, but who knows. I guess we'll find

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Speaker 1: out before the end of next year. Okay, we've got

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Speaker 1: more tech news to cover before we get to that, though,

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Speaker 1: Let's take a quick break to thank our sponsors. Ilia Sutzkev,

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Speaker 1: one of the co founders of open ai, who later

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Speaker 1: was forced to resign from the board of directors and

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Speaker 1: then a couple months later resigned completely from the company itself,

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Speaker 1: is now starting his own AI company, which is called

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Speaker 1: Safe Superintelligence, and as the name indicates, the founding principles

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Speaker 1: are similar to what inspired the initial creation of open Ai,

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Speaker 1: before that company began to embrace profit to a greater degree.

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Speaker 1: The Safe Superintelligence website says the company will have offices

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Speaker 1: in Palo Alto, California, and Tel Aviv. Sutzkever posted on

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Speaker 1: x that the plan is for the company to focus

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Speaker 1: entirely on the safe development and deployment of AI, without

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Speaker 1: regard to stuff like market forces and trends and things

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Speaker 1: like that how he's going to achieve that remains to

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Speaker 1: be seen because AI development is a really expensive thing.

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Speaker 1: In fact, that's why open Ai launched a for profit

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Speaker 1: arm in the first place. But I do think it's

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Speaker 1: a lofty goal to aim for. I just don't know

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Speaker 1: how achievable it is. AI company Anthropic has unveiled the

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Speaker 1: Claude three point five Sonnet AI language model this week.

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Speaker 1: In fact, I've already started seeing ads online for this thing.

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Speaker 1: The model can do pretty much all the things we

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Speaker 1: associate with chatbots built on generative AI. You know. It

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Speaker 1: can respond to prompts, it can write code, it can

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Speaker 1: analyze text. According to Ours Technica's Binge Edwards, it can

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Speaker 1: be really difficult to compare different AI models to each

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Speaker 1: other for various reasons. But that being said, Claude three

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Speaker 1: point five Sonnet seems to perform pretty well impressively so.

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Speaker 1: In fact, now I haven't used it yet, but then

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Speaker 1: I don't use any AI models on a regular basis.

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Speaker 1: I've only dipped my toe in goofy ways to see

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Speaker 1: what kind of response I can get for silly queries.

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Speaker 1: But for those of y'all who are either researching AI

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Speaker 1: or occasionally making use of AI. It might be something

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Speaker 1: you want to check out just to see if it

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Speaker 1: gives you better responses than alternatives on the market. Back

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Speaker 1: to Reuters, which reports that Amazon is looking to monetize

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Speaker 1: its Alexa service soon. The plan, which is code named Banyan,

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Speaker 1: is to introduce a more advanced version of the Alexa assistant,

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Speaker 1: capable of holding generative AI conversations with users. Access to

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Speaker 1: this level of Alexa will actually require a monthly fee

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Speaker 1: somewhere in the neighborhood of five dollars a month. The

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Speaker 1: report says that Amazon is given developers until August to

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Speaker 1: get this version of Alexa ready, though that doesn't necessarily

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Speaker 1: tell us when such a service would actually launch. I

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Speaker 1: honestly don't know if this is going to work from

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Speaker 1: a commercial standpoint. I'm not sure most folks care if

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Speaker 1: their personal assistant is generating a conversation or just pulling

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Speaker 1: something directly off the web to answer various questions. That's

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Speaker 1: possibly due to the fact that as I get older,

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Speaker 1: I see fewer reasons for me to use tools like

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Speaker 1: this for anything beyond really basic stuff like, you know,

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Speaker 1: asking for an update on the weather or whatever, which

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Speaker 1: is like ninety nine times out of one hundred, if

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Speaker 1: I'm asking my smart assistant speaker for something, it's to

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Speaker 1: give me an update on whether. Other times it's to

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Speaker 1: play music so that my dog can listen to music

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Speaker 1: while I'm leaving the house. The rare occasions I do

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Speaker 1: that or to ask if certain fruits are safe for

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Speaker 1: dogs to eat. Those are like my three go tos.

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Speaker 1: But Amazon's trying to find a way to make Alexa moneymaker,

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Speaker 1: and maybe this will work out for them. I personally

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Speaker 1: have my doubts. I think a lot of people will say,

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Speaker 1: why am I going to pay for something that previously

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Speaker 1: I got to use for free, even if the new

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Speaker 1: version is at least in theory better. Meta has reorganized

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Speaker 1: its Reality Labs division. A quick reminder, this is the

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Speaker 1: part of Meta formerly Facebook that is tasked with bringing

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Speaker 1: the metaverse into reality, whether people want it or not.

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Speaker 1: It's the division that Meta has dedicated billions of dollars

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Speaker 1: to in that effort, which is something that has concerned

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Speaker 1: many investors in that company. But anyway, this reorg has

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Speaker 1: divided Reality Labs into two major organizations, one that will

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Speaker 1: focus on wearables and the other that will focus on

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Speaker 1: the metaverse. So wearables are things like the Quest VR

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Speaker 1: headsets and the ray Band smart glasses. The Verge reports

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Speaker 1: that the reorganization also meant the company laid off a

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Speaker 1: quote unquote small number of employees, although I haven't seen

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Speaker 1: any sources that give more detail as to how much

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Speaker 1: a small number actually is. Bloomberg reports that Elon Musk

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Speaker 1: is pushing hard to get an X payment service launched

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Speaker 1: before the end of this year. You might recall that

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Speaker 1: one thing Musk wanted to do with Twitter, apart from

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Speaker 1: opening it up to folks who had previously been banned

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Speaker 1: from the platform for violating various policies, was to convert

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Speaker 1: it into sort of an everything app, an app where

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Speaker 1: you could chat with friends, post to the general population,

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Speaker 1: shop for goods and services, and pay for stuff like

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Speaker 1: transfer money, all from one app. The payment service thing

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Speaker 1: is part of this overall puzzle, and one that Musk

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Speaker 1: has aggressively pushed for this year. To that end, X

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Speaker 1: has secured payment transmitter licenses with twenty eight states here

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Speaker 1: in the US, by the company's goals to secure such

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Speaker 1: licenses for every state by the end of the year.

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Speaker 1: It sounds to me like this is really a matter

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Speaker 1: of when not if, and at some point we will

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Speaker 1: see the X payment services roll out, possibly with many

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Speaker 1: other features to follow. Must's goal is to get users

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Speaker 1: to rely on X for financial transactions and to store

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Speaker 1: their money in high yield savings accounts, which might work.

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Speaker 1: It might actually entice people who have so far either

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Speaker 1: stayed off of the platform for various reasons or who

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Speaker 1: left due to similar reasons, and to have them come

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Speaker 1: back and jump in and order not to lose out

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Speaker 1: on an opportunity. However, I think it's safe to say

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Speaker 1: that skeptics like myself, you know, folks who have seen

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Speaker 1: Musk apply the ban hammer on X in a very

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Speaker 1: mercurial way, are less eager to put our money into

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Speaker 1: a platform where the owner has been shown to be unpredictable, temperamental,

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Speaker 1: perhaps unreliable is another good word. I just I think

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Speaker 1: it would be very risky to do personally. That's my

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Speaker 1: own opinion though, so you know, if you don't value

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Speaker 1: my opinion. One, I don't know why you're listening, but

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Speaker 1: thank you anyway, And two, yeah, do you don't make

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Speaker 1: your own decisions? It's totally cool if you happen to

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Speaker 1: live near Dallas, Texas or King of Prussia, Pennsylvania. I

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Speaker 1: have a homework assignment for you. Don't worry. It's not

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Speaker 1: coming up anytime soon. It'll be next year, but it's

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Speaker 1: to visit either of the two Netflix House venues that

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Speaker 1: are opening up in the upcoming months. They're slated to

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Speaker 1: open in twenty twenty five. Netflix first announced the intent

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Speaker 1: to debut some brick and mortar locations, and now we

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Speaker 1: know where those first two are going to be. Dallas, Texas,

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Speaker 1: King of Prussia, Pennsylvania. They'll be taking over the spaces

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Speaker 1: of former department stores and shopping centers, which I don't know.

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Speaker 1: Maybe that'll breathe some new life into malls. I haven't

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Speaker 1: been to a mall in years, but in fact, the

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Speaker 1: place where I used to go when I was a

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Speaker 1: kid is now essentially vacant. I think there's like only

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Speaker 1: a handful of stores that are still open and everything

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Speaker 1: else is closed down, which, as I understand, it is

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Speaker 1: not that unusual today. But then I don't ever leave

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Speaker 1: the house, So what do I know anyway? What's going

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Speaker 1: to go on in these Netflix houses beats me. Netflix

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Speaker 1: has not shared a whole lot of information. They have

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Speaker 1: said that there will be themed experiences as well as

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Speaker 1: some special food and drink offerings, and that presumably these

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Speaker 1: are going to draw inspiration from original Netflix films and series.

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Speaker 1: And when I think back to some of those originals

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Speaker 1: on Netflix, I'm not convinced I really want to experience

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Speaker 1: that stuff myself in real life, but I am definitely curious,

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Speaker 1: and heck, maybe I'll go to the King of Presha

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Speaker 1: one because my partner has family up in that area,

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Speaker 1: So maybe if we're happy to be there, I'll be like, hey,

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Speaker 1: let's go see what this is all about. The two

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Speaker 1: astronauts who recently journeyed to the International Space Station aboard

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Speaker 1: a Boeing Starliner spacecraft are staying a little bit longer

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Speaker 1: than they had planned. This is because the Starliner experienced

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Speaker 1: some technical issues that engineers really want to review further

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Speaker 1: before bringing the astronauts back home in the spacecraft on

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Speaker 1: June twenty six. So, during the trip to the ISS,

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Speaker 1: the star Liner had a few helium leaks, like five

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Speaker 1: of them. Now, helium itself is non toxic, it's non flammable,

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Speaker 1: so as long as the leaks weren't bad enough to

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Speaker 1: displace oxygen and cause asphyxiation, then the astronauts were deemed

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Speaker 1: to be safe. Then five of the twenty eight reaction

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Speaker 1: control system thrusters on the star Liner also failed as

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Speaker 1: the spacecraft was nearing the iss. It's not exactly the

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Speaker 1: sort of thing you want to chance when you're bringing

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Speaker 1: folks back home, as these thrusters play a part in

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Speaker 1: orienting the spacecraft properly upon re entry. NASA reps have

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Speaker 1: said the agency wants to review the test spacecraft's issues

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Speaker 1: before signing off on future missions, which makes perfect sense

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Speaker 1: to me. Okay, some quick reading recommendations for y'all. Mickey

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Speaker 1: Carroll has a piece for sky News titled self driving

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Speaker 1: cars found to be safer except at dawn, dusk, or

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Speaker 1: when turning according to a study. I recommend reading that

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Speaker 1: it's one of the biggest selling points for R and

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Speaker 1: D and self driving vehicles. This idea that you know,

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Speaker 1: ideally they would be fre safer on the roads than

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Speaker 1: vehicles that were driven by human beings. But as this

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Speaker 1: study points out, there are still scenarios in which AI

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Speaker 1: powered vehicles are more prone to accidents, and obviously that

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Speaker 1: shines a spotlight on areas where engineers need to improve safety.

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Speaker 1: Next up is a piece by Mike Masnik at tech

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Speaker 1: Dirt titled five hundred thousand books have been deleted from

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Speaker 1: the Internet Archives Lending Library. I talked a little bit

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Speaker 1: about this when I did an episode about the Internet

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Speaker 1: Archive recently, but this piece dives into how publishers have

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Speaker 1: leveraged their considerable power to deny the archive access to

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Speaker 1: library copies of various works. And last up is a

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Speaker 1: piece by Ashley Bellinger of Ours Technica titled lawsuit Meta

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Speaker 1: engineer told to resign after calling out sexist hiring practices.

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Speaker 1: This article details the claims made by a former Meta

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Speaker 1: employee who says the company retaliated against him after he

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Speaker 1: brought forward concerns and misogynistic practices in the company. All

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Speaker 1: of those are well worth your time to read. That's

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Speaker 1: it for this week. I hope you are all well

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Speaker 1: and I will talk to you again again really soon.

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Speaker 1: Tech Stuff is an iHeartRadio production. For more podcasts from iHeartRadio,

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Speaker 1: visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen

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Speaker 1: to your favorite shows.