WEBVTT - Tech News: Facebook's Very Bad Week 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.800 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 0:00:12.119 --> 0:00:15.040 Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm Jonathan Strickland. 0:00:15.040 --> 0:00:17.320 I'm an executive producer here at iHeart Radio and a 0:00:17.360 --> 0:00:20.440 love all things tech. It is time for the tech 0:00:20.520 --> 0:00:26.000 news for Tuesday, October twelfth. One. Let's get into it. 0:00:27.080 --> 0:00:30.680 Last week was a tough one for Facebook, to put 0:00:30.720 --> 0:00:35.200 it lightly, with a whistleblower appearing before Congress and testifying 0:00:35.240 --> 0:00:39.880 that her former employer knowingly engaged in practices that were 0:00:39.920 --> 0:00:43.800 harmful to its users and two entire countries. As it 0:00:43.800 --> 0:00:48.200 would turn out, while Facebook went into damage control last week, 0:00:48.760 --> 0:00:52.680 some of the measures that were taken by PR spokespeople 0:00:52.760 --> 0:00:55.360 in an attempt to kind of deflect or to defend 0:00:55.400 --> 0:01:00.040 themselves ended up rubbing other current and former employees a 0:01:00.120 --> 0:01:04.280 Facebook the wrong way. One person who had already been 0:01:04.280 --> 0:01:08.399 critical of the company is Sophie Young. She used to 0:01:08.440 --> 0:01:12.320 work as a data scientist for Facebook. Well. She first 0:01:12.400 --> 0:01:16.399 came forward with concerns about Facebook last year, and she 0:01:16.480 --> 0:01:20.640 even published a full blog post that contained her concerns, 0:01:20.680 --> 0:01:26.240 like she wrote this very long farewell message to Facebook employees, 0:01:26.240 --> 0:01:28.319 and then she also posted it to her own website. 0:01:28.319 --> 0:01:34.280 Facebook then subsequently sent a takedown notice to the the 0:01:34.520 --> 0:01:40.080 administrator for the website itself, so it got taken down. 0:01:40.200 --> 0:01:43.120 It's pretty bad anyway. Jiang has now said she's willing 0:01:43.160 --> 0:01:46.479 to testify in front of Congress as well. She has 0:01:46.480 --> 0:01:52.120 said that she sent potentially incriminating documents regarding Facebook practices 0:01:52.480 --> 0:01:57.480 to a US law enforcement agency. Other people have also 0:01:57.560 --> 0:02:01.280 shown support for investigations into face Book, as well as 0:02:01.320 --> 0:02:05.240 condemning the company's tactics of trying to dismiss criticisms by 0:02:05.320 --> 0:02:09.720 questioning the credentials of the whistleblowers. My guess is that 0:02:10.160 --> 0:02:13.800 it's likely going to be another tough week for Facebook. 0:02:14.320 --> 0:02:18.320 Sticking with Facebook, I want to talk about Louis Barclay. 0:02:18.480 --> 0:02:22.880 Barclay is an app developer from the UK app and 0:02:22.919 --> 0:02:27.840 software developer, and he created a browser extension specifically to 0:02:28.040 --> 0:02:33.800 use on Facebook called Unfollow Everything, and you know, it 0:02:33.919 --> 0:02:36.480 does exactly what it says on the tin, as they 0:02:36.480 --> 0:02:41.760 say across the pond. A user activating unfollow Everything would 0:02:41.800 --> 0:02:45.640 see that they had unfollowed every single friend and every 0:02:45.639 --> 0:02:48.480 single page that they had previously followed on Facebook. So 0:02:48.880 --> 0:02:51.920 they would unfollow everything and you could still you know, 0:02:52.080 --> 0:02:56.359 connect to people on Facebook, but you unfollowed them, you 0:02:56.360 --> 0:03:00.480 would have to use other methods, And um, it is 0:03:00.520 --> 0:03:02.720 interesting because it would essentially mean that your news feed 0:03:02.720 --> 0:03:05.760 would be blank except for stuff that maybe you had posted. 0:03:05.840 --> 0:03:09.280 I'm assuming I don't know. I haven't actually seen pictures 0:03:09.480 --> 0:03:12.640 of what this looked like when it was an action, 0:03:12.800 --> 0:03:16.360 but it it's it confuses me a little, only in 0:03:16.360 --> 0:03:18.320 the sense of I don't know what it would look like. 0:03:18.320 --> 0:03:21.400 Would it just be your posts? Would it become the 0:03:21.440 --> 0:03:25.440 true narcissists Facebook? I don't know. His extension, however, got 0:03:25.440 --> 0:03:28.320 the attention of researchers in Switzerland who wanted to see 0:03:28.520 --> 0:03:31.440 what impact there might be on this kind of thing. 0:03:31.480 --> 0:03:34.480 Would would there be an impact on happiness for users 0:03:35.480 --> 0:03:38.240 who were still on Facebook but no longer had a 0:03:38.280 --> 0:03:40.560 real news feed. They also wanted to see what kind 0:03:40.560 --> 0:03:43.240 of impact it might have on the amount of time 0:03:43.560 --> 0:03:46.920 that users typically would spend on the platform. And I 0:03:46.960 --> 0:03:51.120 honestly wonder really what that experience is like. Maybe it 0:03:51.160 --> 0:03:54.480 would be like Facebook would become essentially your photo album 0:03:54.600 --> 0:03:58.080 or maybe a journaling exercise. If you were posting and 0:03:58.200 --> 0:04:00.320 you were the only one posting there. Any ways, you 0:04:00.320 --> 0:04:03.160 can imagine Facebook was not happy about any of this. 0:04:03.800 --> 0:04:07.640 So the company booted Barclay off Facebook as well as 0:04:07.680 --> 0:04:11.320 Instagram and banned him from ever having an account with 0:04:11.440 --> 0:04:14.600 either of those now. The article I read on Business 0:04:14.640 --> 0:04:19.480 Insider didn't indicate whether Facebook has also banned him from WhatsApp, 0:04:19.839 --> 0:04:22.640 the messaging app, but Barkley did say that he had 0:04:22.680 --> 0:04:25.440 been on the platform for about fifteen years and you 0:04:25.800 --> 0:04:27.520 used it a lot to stay in touch with friends 0:04:27.520 --> 0:04:31.880 and family, so this has had an impact on him. 0:04:32.080 --> 0:04:36.120 Facebook says that Barclay's browser extension violates Facebook's terms of Service, 0:04:36.200 --> 0:04:39.680 which in parts says that users and developers are not 0:04:39.680 --> 0:04:43.200 not to do anything that would interfere with the intended 0:04:43.360 --> 0:04:47.760 operation of Facebook. And you know, Barklay said the tool 0:04:47.760 --> 0:04:51.400 had only been downloaded a few thousand times. The whole thing, 0:04:51.480 --> 0:04:53.960 to me is really interesting. I wonder how many people 0:04:54.000 --> 0:04:56.920 would actually use a tool like this, and whether they 0:04:56.920 --> 0:04:58.719 would continue to use it or if they would just 0:04:58.800 --> 0:05:01.160 you know, turn it off after a it. I get 0:05:01.200 --> 0:05:04.080 why Facebook is kind of going nuclear because the entire 0:05:04.160 --> 0:05:07.440 revenue model for Facebook depends upon ads being served up 0:05:07.440 --> 0:05:11.400 in the news feed and keeping folks on the platform 0:05:11.440 --> 0:05:14.400 for as long as possible to sell as many things 0:05:14.440 --> 0:05:17.000 as possible, right to serve up as many ads as 0:05:17.040 --> 0:05:21.000 possible and rack up the big bucks. But if there's 0:05:21.000 --> 0:05:24.120 no news feed, then people would likely spend way less 0:05:24.120 --> 0:05:27.480 time on the platform and Facebook would make way less money. 0:05:27.720 --> 0:05:31.000 Barclay is kind of without options here. He lives in 0:05:31.040 --> 0:05:34.200 the UK, and that means that if he took Facebook 0:05:34.240 --> 0:05:36.479 to court over the matter, and if he lost, he 0:05:36.560 --> 0:05:40.839 would be liable to pay Facebook's court costs. And you know, 0:05:40.880 --> 0:05:45.360 Facebook's a company with billions of dollars. Facebook could even 0:05:45.400 --> 0:05:48.400 if they fought this in a way where they weren't 0:05:48.920 --> 0:05:52.800 going to win, they could really drain Barclay's resources. And 0:05:52.839 --> 0:05:56.360 if they did win and they really drew this out 0:05:56.520 --> 0:05:59.960 so it was a very long court battle, it could 0:06:00.200 --> 0:06:03.080 bankrupt him. So he's kind of resigned himself to being 0:06:03.120 --> 0:06:07.200 Facebook free. He sounds like he's both a little sad 0:06:07.240 --> 0:06:09.520 about it, but also kind of relieved because he had 0:06:09.560 --> 0:06:11.440 said that he was trying to cut back for a 0:06:11.440 --> 0:06:14.680 while now and now he has no choice but to 0:06:14.720 --> 0:06:18.960 go cold turkey. We usually hear about successful hacker attacks. 0:06:19.320 --> 0:06:21.520 It is fairly rare when we hear about a hacker 0:06:21.560 --> 0:06:25.240 attack that was unsuccessful, that had been defeated, but we 0:06:25.360 --> 0:06:28.719 have a report like that. Now, Microsoft says that it's 0:06:28.760 --> 0:06:32.919 Azure Cloud service was able to mitigate a massive distributed 0:06:33.000 --> 0:06:37.680 denial of service ord DOS attack in late August of 0:06:37.680 --> 0:06:41.320 this year. Now, let's explain what that means. And we're 0:06:41.320 --> 0:06:45.920 gonna start first with a denial of service or DOS attack, 0:06:46.400 --> 0:06:50.960 because that's that's our basic unit here. That's an attack 0:06:51.040 --> 0:06:55.719 where someone tries to overwhelm a specific targeted server or 0:06:55.760 --> 0:07:00.280 system on the Internet, typically by sending tons of messages 0:07:00.400 --> 0:07:04.440 to that system. And I often use a specific analogy here. 0:07:04.520 --> 0:07:07.239 So imagine that you live in a house. The house 0:07:07.279 --> 0:07:10.360 has a front door with a doorbell, and part of 0:07:10.400 --> 0:07:12.320 the condition of you living in this house is that 0:07:12.440 --> 0:07:15.840 if someone rings that doorbell, you have to answer the door. 0:07:16.040 --> 0:07:18.480 It doesn't matter what else is going on. If the 0:07:18.520 --> 0:07:21.480 doorbell rings, you've got to go answer it. And so 0:07:21.640 --> 0:07:25.760 someone is starting to ring your doorbell and then run away. 0:07:26.400 --> 0:07:28.840 And even though you know that there is a very 0:07:28.880 --> 0:07:30.640 good chance that you're going to go to the door 0:07:30.680 --> 0:07:32.800 and open it and no one's gonna be there, you 0:07:32.880 --> 0:07:36.920 still have to answer it. You're not allowed to ignore it. 0:07:36.920 --> 0:07:40.200 It would be really hard to get anything else done. 0:07:40.240 --> 0:07:43.920 If someone was continuously ringing your doorbell and running away. Well, 0:07:44.040 --> 0:07:47.680 denial of service attack is kind of similar. The attacker 0:07:48.080 --> 0:07:51.720 is directing messages to a targeted server, and the server 0:07:51.840 --> 0:07:55.440 is trying to answer these messages. But those messages are 0:07:55.440 --> 0:07:58.880 coming in thick and fast, as you might say, and 0:07:58.960 --> 0:08:01.960 soon the server can't do anything at all. It's just 0:08:02.080 --> 0:08:05.320 overwhelmed by these incoming messages. It might even crash the server. 0:08:05.400 --> 0:08:07.960 In fact, that's often the goal. If it's not to 0:08:08.040 --> 0:08:11.080 just gum it up, it's to bring it down entirely. Well, 0:08:11.120 --> 0:08:15.560 a distributed denial of service attack is the same thing, 0:08:15.640 --> 0:08:19.680 but on a much bigger scale. Typically, hackers will first 0:08:19.760 --> 0:08:23.280 use malware to infect as many computers as they possibly 0:08:23.320 --> 0:08:27.880 can to get sort of backdoor access to these computers 0:08:28.160 --> 0:08:31.040 and have them join what's called a bot net or 0:08:31.120 --> 0:08:35.280 sometimes called a zombie network. So the infected computers are 0:08:35.520 --> 0:08:38.200 the zombie army, and the hacker can use this army 0:08:38.240 --> 0:08:41.920 to direct messages to this targeted server. Now, instead of 0:08:41.960 --> 0:08:45.720 one machine just trying to overwhelm a target, you could 0:08:45.720 --> 0:08:50.520 be talking tens of thousands, like seventy thousand computers. Is 0:08:50.559 --> 0:08:53.520 not unheard of for this sort of thing. For this reason, 0:08:53.960 --> 0:08:57.120 we often describe the magnitude of DIDOS attacks and how 0:08:57.200 --> 0:09:01.440 much data is being sent toward a target. In this case, 0:09:01.720 --> 0:09:05.840 it was a whopping two point for terra bytes per second. 0:09:06.200 --> 0:09:10.120 That's the largest DIDAS attack on record by volume. A 0:09:10.240 --> 0:09:13.360 terabyte is a trillion bytes, so a gigabyte is a 0:09:13.400 --> 0:09:16.400 billion bytes. Terabyte is a trillion bites. This was two 0:09:16.400 --> 0:09:20.720 point four terabytes per second. Microsoft says Azure detected the 0:09:20.720 --> 0:09:23.760 flood of traffic and was able to mitigate it to 0:09:23.800 --> 0:09:27.400 hold it back so that the targeted server didn't get overwhelmed, 0:09:27.600 --> 0:09:31.400 which is pretty impressive. Microsoft did not identify the target, 0:09:31.760 --> 0:09:35.160 but only said it was located in Europe. Amazon has 0:09:35.200 --> 0:09:38.000 become the latest company to back off of an official 0:09:38.080 --> 0:09:42.120 return to the office plan for their corporate employees. Like 0:09:42.320 --> 0:09:45.600 several other big tech companies, Amazon originally hoped to be 0:09:45.679 --> 0:09:48.200 back in the office this year, but had pushed back 0:09:48.240 --> 0:09:50.760 to a plan that would see corporate employees returned to 0:09:50.840 --> 0:09:52.960 at least three days a week in the office by 0:09:53.040 --> 0:09:57.439 January two. Now, the company has sent out another message 0:09:57.760 --> 0:10:00.440 saying employees will not have to return to the office 0:10:00.679 --> 0:10:04.120 in the new year. Rather, team leaders will make decisions 0:10:04.160 --> 0:10:06.480 on a team by team basis as to whether people 0:10:06.480 --> 0:10:09.760 need to return or not. Uh, some people will be 0:10:09.800 --> 0:10:14.560 able to work remotely indefinitely. In addition, employees will still 0:10:14.600 --> 0:10:16.600 be able to work for up to four weeks in 0:10:16.640 --> 0:10:20.520 any location within their home country, but they should spend 0:10:20.559 --> 0:10:23.040 the rest of the year somewhere that would allow them 0:10:23.080 --> 0:10:27.480 to attend, say, an in person meeting, given a day's notice. 0:10:28.080 --> 0:10:30.960 In the ongoing battle between Apple and Epic Games, Apple 0:10:31.040 --> 0:10:33.600 is now seeking an appeal to the court ruling that 0:10:33.720 --> 0:10:37.880 requires Apple to allow app developers and alternative payment option 0:10:38.280 --> 0:10:41.160 and not just go through Apple's own in app system. 0:10:41.200 --> 0:10:44.080 While seeking the appeal, Apple has asked for a stay 0:10:44.120 --> 0:10:47.000 on the injunction that would otherwise require them to follow 0:10:47.000 --> 0:10:50.120 the court order. So essentially, they're saying, until we've actually 0:10:50.160 --> 0:10:52.480 settled this matter for good, we don't want to have 0:10:52.520 --> 0:10:55.240 to change stuff. And from that perspective, it makes kind 0:10:55.280 --> 0:10:57.600 of sense, right if Apple were to change things and 0:10:57.640 --> 0:11:03.920 then subsequently when their court appeal reversing that change after implementing, 0:11:03.960 --> 0:11:09.079 it would be a messy thing at best. Apple claims 0:11:09.120 --> 0:11:12.160 that allowing developers to use their own payment systems could 0:11:12.200 --> 0:11:15.760 lead to incorporation of other stuff like external links and 0:11:15.840 --> 0:11:20.319 potentially bring risks to Apple users. We think of the children. 0:11:21.120 --> 0:11:23.800 So the argument here is that this could potentially lead 0:11:23.840 --> 0:11:26.280 to security risks, and it's hard to argue against that. 0:11:26.600 --> 0:11:29.880 But honestly, I don't think that's what Apple's main concern is. 0:11:30.080 --> 0:11:32.679 I think their main concern is that they take a 0:11:32.720 --> 0:11:36.960 fifteen to thirty cut out of in app purchases, and 0:11:37.320 --> 0:11:40.600 if you allow for alternative payment systems, you have to 0:11:40.600 --> 0:11:44.319 say goodbye to that kind of revenue. But then Apple 0:11:44.559 --> 0:11:47.200 has lots of security concerns to think about. Two like 0:11:47.640 --> 0:11:49.720 how a company is like n s, a group have 0:11:49.880 --> 0:11:53.280 targeted eye message to create zero click attacks that turned 0:11:53.280 --> 0:11:58.640 phones into spy devices. Apple did subsequently patch out certain vulnerabilities. 0:11:58.920 --> 0:12:02.080 My point being that you know, there are security concerns 0:12:02.080 --> 0:12:04.880 that have nothing to do with the apps being developed 0:12:04.880 --> 0:12:08.120 by third parties. When you really dig into this case, 0:12:08.240 --> 0:12:11.600 no one looks super awesome in the full light. I 0:12:11.640 --> 0:12:14.199 think I'm more on the developer side on this one. 0:12:14.240 --> 0:12:16.800 I feel that Apple and Google to have a real 0:12:16.840 --> 0:12:20.520 stranglehold that can hurt developers. At the same time, there's 0:12:20.520 --> 0:12:25.480 some legit arguments to make for a streamlined, trustworthy payment system. 0:12:25.520 --> 0:12:27.880 We've got a few more stories to go through before 0:12:27.920 --> 0:12:38.560 we get to that. Let's take a quick break. So 0:12:38.640 --> 0:12:40.840 before the break, we were talking about Apple and Epic, 0:12:40.880 --> 0:12:43.520 and a large part of that court argument is about 0:12:43.559 --> 0:12:46.840 anti competitiveness and whether companies like Apple and Google are 0:12:46.880 --> 0:12:52.199 being anti competitive with demanding developers use their in app purchasing. Well, 0:12:52.240 --> 0:12:55.200 speaking of anti competitive issues, we've got a different story 0:12:55.640 --> 0:12:58.439 that falls into that category. And Video has run into 0:12:58.480 --> 0:13:00.880 a speed bump in its quest to acquire the chip 0:13:01.000 --> 0:13:04.520 design company ARM. Now, if you listen to my episodes 0:13:04.559 --> 0:13:07.760 about ARM, that's a r M, you know that's a 0:13:07.800 --> 0:13:10.640 company that's based in the UK. And Video has a 0:13:10.720 --> 0:13:14.840 fifty four billion dollar acquisition deal to bring ARM into 0:13:14.920 --> 0:13:18.400 the company fold. But this move has raised some concerns, 0:13:18.400 --> 0:13:21.160 and some of those originate in the UK itself. ARM 0:13:21.360 --> 0:13:24.280 is an important company in the UK, and there have 0:13:24.360 --> 0:13:27.040 even been some questions raised as to whether an acquisition 0:13:27.080 --> 0:13:29.880 by a foreign company, because in Video is based out 0:13:29.880 --> 0:13:33.400 of the United States, could constitute a matter of national security. 0:13:33.800 --> 0:13:38.480 Then there are the questions about competitiveness. ARM creates chip 0:13:38.559 --> 0:13:43.080 designs and then issues licenses to manufacturing companies. So a 0:13:43.160 --> 0:13:47.760 chip manufacturing company makes a deal with ARM and gets 0:13:47.800 --> 0:13:50.439 the design for a specific type of processor and then 0:13:50.480 --> 0:13:52.719 they go and make it. Now, the fear is that 0:13:52.800 --> 0:13:58.080 if in Vidia, which also makes chips, acquires ARM, maybe 0:13:58.080 --> 0:14:01.559 in Video would say no more of doing that. Right, 0:14:01.760 --> 0:14:05.120 Maybe in Video would prevent ARM from licensing designs to 0:14:05.320 --> 0:14:09.520 in videos competitors. The EU plans and antitrust investigation to 0:14:09.559 --> 0:14:12.160 look into the matter further. And this does not mean 0:14:12.200 --> 0:14:14.360 that the acquisition is off the table, but it could 0:14:14.360 --> 0:14:16.680 take a bit longer than in Video was hoping for. 0:14:17.200 --> 0:14:19.800 Last year, many school systems in the United States shifted 0:14:19.920 --> 0:14:22.960 to a distance learning model due to the pandemic. However, 0:14:23.560 --> 0:14:26.400 that meant that, you know, kids needed access to computers 0:14:26.400 --> 0:14:29.160 in order to participate in class, and not everyone comes 0:14:29.240 --> 0:14:32.200 from a family where that's a possibility. There is a 0:14:32.320 --> 0:14:36.280 real digital divide in the United States, so numerous programs 0:14:36.320 --> 0:14:39.640 popped up to provide hardware to students. Now, a research 0:14:39.640 --> 0:14:42.600 paper from the Center for Democracy and Technology shows that 0:14:42.840 --> 0:14:46.920 a lot of these computers contained monitoring software on them 0:14:46.960 --> 0:14:52.160 that logged student activities on these computers. Essentially, many computers 0:14:52.200 --> 0:14:55.360 come loaded with spyware, and it gives schools the ability 0:14:55.400 --> 0:14:58.480 to see what students are doing on those computers. This 0:14:58.560 --> 0:15:02.680 opens up a pretty difficult series of topics. So the 0:15:02.760 --> 0:15:05.960 argument to support this initiative says that students are vulnerable 0:15:06.360 --> 0:15:09.400 and monitoring could allow school systems to detect a problem 0:15:09.480 --> 0:15:12.320 early on and potentially address it before it gets worse. 0:15:12.560 --> 0:15:16.040 For example, a student writing about you know, self harm 0:15:16.480 --> 0:15:19.920 might need counseling to help them, or someone who's engaging 0:15:20.000 --> 0:15:23.280 in some form of online bullying might similarly need someone 0:15:23.360 --> 0:15:26.240 to step in and intervene and help that person before 0:15:26.400 --> 0:15:29.760 that gets worse. On the other hand, the argument against 0:15:29.840 --> 0:15:32.840 this points out that this becomes a surveillance state and 0:15:32.920 --> 0:15:36.120 it places an unhealthy burden of responsibility on teachers who 0:15:36.200 --> 0:15:38.440 end up having to serve multiple roles in addition to 0:15:38.520 --> 0:15:42.840 making lesson plans and educating children. Plus, it disproportionately harms 0:15:43.160 --> 0:15:47.240 the less fortunate, like the less economically fortunate, because those 0:15:47.280 --> 0:15:52.200 are people who likely don't have any other computer to use, 0:15:52.400 --> 0:15:55.160 or smartphone or anything like that, so they rely even 0:15:55.240 --> 0:16:00.280 more on the school supplied devices than another students do, 0:16:00.800 --> 0:16:05.040 and thus they are disproportionately affected by this monitoring. The 0:16:05.080 --> 0:16:07.440 Guardian has a great rite up on this. It's called 0:16:07.720 --> 0:16:11.200 us Schools Gave Kids laptops during the pandemic, then they 0:16:11.280 --> 0:16:14.400 spied on them. It was written by Jessa Crispin. I 0:16:14.400 --> 0:16:16.200 think it's a good read if you want to learn 0:16:16.200 --> 0:16:18.960 more about what happened, why it happened, and whether or 0:16:19.040 --> 0:16:22.480 not it's a good idea and spoiler alert. Jess thinks 0:16:22.520 --> 0:16:25.640 it's a bad idea and I am inclined to agree. 0:16:26.040 --> 0:16:28.000 One news item from last week that I did not 0:16:28.080 --> 0:16:30.360 get to is that NASA has pushed back the launch 0:16:30.400 --> 0:16:33.080 of a test flight for the Boeing star Liner spacecraft. 0:16:33.120 --> 0:16:36.080 This would have been the second test flight for the 0:16:36.160 --> 0:16:39.480 Boeing star Liner, and the plan was to conduct it 0:16:39.560 --> 0:16:42.840 within this year, but now it's gonna happen next year 0:16:42.840 --> 0:16:45.200 at the earliest. The reason for the delay is that 0:16:45.280 --> 0:16:49.680 a component on the spacecraft and oxidizer isolation valve isn't 0:16:49.720 --> 0:16:53.120 functioning correctly, and this component is not exactly in an 0:16:53.160 --> 0:16:56.800 easy to access spot in the spacecraft, so it requires 0:16:56.800 --> 0:16:59.160 a lot of planning just to figure out how to 0:16:59.200 --> 0:17:02.280 address this and fixed the issue without causing more damage 0:17:02.320 --> 0:17:06.040 along the way. Boeing Starliner did have an earlier unscrewed 0:17:06.240 --> 0:17:09.760 test flight this year, but that one encountered problems with 0:17:09.800 --> 0:17:12.960 its onboard software, which prevented it from docking with the 0:17:13.000 --> 0:17:16.399 International Space Station. So for right now, the only U 0:17:16.480 --> 0:17:18.400 S space craft that can make the journey to the 0:17:18.520 --> 0:17:23.840 I S S is space X's Crew Dragon. Finally, Magic Leap, 0:17:24.040 --> 0:17:27.320 which was a company I thought might be headed towards insolvency, 0:17:27.640 --> 0:17:31.240 has turned things around, at least for the time being. Now. 0:17:31.320 --> 0:17:33.760 If you're not familiar with this company, it started creating 0:17:33.800 --> 0:17:37.920 Buzz several years ago as a pretty secretive business aimed 0:17:37.960 --> 0:17:42.480 at creating an incredible augmented reality headset, presumably meant for 0:17:42.480 --> 0:17:46.480 the consumer market. They released some promotional material that truly 0:17:46.520 --> 0:17:50.760 made it look magical, so the name seemed fitting. The 0:17:50.800 --> 0:17:55.680 company raised billions of dollars and investments like three billion dollars. 0:17:55.720 --> 0:17:58.560 But over the years things changed, and I'm guessing that 0:17:58.600 --> 0:18:01.640 some of the engineering challenges is were far more significant 0:18:01.680 --> 0:18:05.520 than they had first anticipated, and this in turn drove 0:18:05.560 --> 0:18:09.920 costs up. Ultimately, Magic Leap released a professional level headset 0:18:09.960 --> 0:18:13.720 called Magic Leap One Creator. A name like that suggests 0:18:13.720 --> 0:18:16.359 that this headset was intended for developers so that they 0:18:16.359 --> 0:18:20.480 could build useful or compelling augmented reality experiences that would 0:18:20.560 --> 0:18:25.280 rely on this headset. But it definitely wasn't priced at 0:18:25.480 --> 0:18:29.840 or targeted for a consumer user base. It was professional only. 0:18:30.400 --> 0:18:34.240 Magic Leap also laid off about half its workforce last year. 0:18:34.800 --> 0:18:37.760 One of the co founders, Ronnie abbo It's, left the 0:18:37.880 --> 0:18:41.119 company in July last year. But now the company has 0:18:41.160 --> 0:18:45.639 raised an additional half billion dollars, which pretty phenomenal that 0:18:45.720 --> 0:18:48.440 they were able to do that after all these issues. 0:18:49.000 --> 0:18:51.520 And they plan to release a new a R headset 0:18:51.560 --> 0:18:55.000 called the Magic Leap To next year. Some early headsets 0:18:55.040 --> 0:18:59.639 are reportedly already in circulation, and this new headset is 0:18:59.760 --> 0:19:02.440 light and it has a larger field of view than 0:19:02.480 --> 0:19:05.560 the previous model. But it is however, still being targeted 0:19:05.680 --> 0:19:08.960 at enterprise level customers. So this is not something you 0:19:09.160 --> 0:19:11.600 or I would purchase in order to you like, turn 0:19:11.680 --> 0:19:15.640 our homes into like a Willy Wonka Wonderland or something. Nope, 0:19:15.800 --> 0:19:17.840 these are meant for companies that might use it for 0:19:18.119 --> 0:19:21.400 design departments, or maybe they might use it for really 0:19:21.520 --> 0:19:25.560 technically complicated installations like the a R headset could show 0:19:25.680 --> 0:19:29.560 you exactly where you might need to solder something, or 0:19:29.960 --> 0:19:33.320 where you need to connect cables or lay certain electronics 0:19:33.400 --> 0:19:36.720 in a very compact space. I'm glad to see that 0:19:36.760 --> 0:19:40.000 magic leap, hasn't you know, leapt off a cliff? But 0:19:40.080 --> 0:19:42.119 I'm left wondering how long it will take before we 0:19:42.240 --> 0:19:46.520 eventually do see a good consumer targeted air headset. And 0:19:46.760 --> 0:19:50.520 that's it for the news for Tuesday, October twelve, twenty one. 0:19:50.600 --> 0:19:53.359 We'll be back with more news later this week. If 0:19:53.440 --> 0:19:55.800 you have suggestions for things I should cover on tech Stuff, 0:19:55.800 --> 0:19:58.080 reach out to me on Twitter. The handle is tech 0:19:58.200 --> 0:20:02.960 stuff hs W and I'll talk to you again really soon. 0:20:03.640 --> 0:20:10.680 Y text Stuff is an I Heart Radio production. For 0:20:10.800 --> 0:20:13.760 more podcasts from I Heart Radio, visit the I Heart 0:20:13.840 --> 0:20:17.000 Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your 0:20:17.040 --> 0:20:17.760 favorite shows.