Speaker 1: Apple Watch gets its blood Oxygen feature back. Google launches
Speaker 1: a new way to find the exact flight deal. You
Speaker 1: want a new take on the classic Super eight camera,
Speaker 1: Plus your tech questions answered. What's going on? I'm Rich
Speaker 1: Tamiro and this is Rich on Tech. This is the
Speaker 1: show where I talk about the tech stuff I think
Speaker 1: you should know about. It's also the place where I
Speaker 1: answer your questions about technology. I believe the tech should
Speaker 1: be interesting, useful, and fun. Let's open up those phone
Speaker 1: lines at triple eight Rich one oh one. That's eight
Speaker 1: eight eight seven four to two four one zero one
Speaker 1: eight eight eight seven four to two four one zero one.
Speaker 2: Give me a call.
Speaker 1: If you have a question about technology, you can also
Speaker 1: send an email. Just go to rich on tech dot TV.
Speaker 1: Hit contact rich on tech dot TV, hit contact. All Right,
Speaker 1: We've got some great guests for you this week. Uh
Speaker 1: Brett Bristow, the creator of Tech with Brett, is going
Speaker 1: to share tips and tricks to make your smart home
Speaker 1: work the way you want it to. He is really,
Speaker 1: really great. He's gonna have some good stuff to share.
Speaker 1: And also another fantastic guest this week David Lombard, founder
Speaker 1: of the Laptop Elf Project, he's going to talk about
Speaker 1: the best ways to securely erase, recycle, or donate your
Speaker 1: old maccomputer or.
Speaker 2: Your Windows PC. He's gonna be great as well. Well.
Speaker 1: Thanks for tuning in to the show. Really appreciate you
Speaker 1: being here. Thanks for watching on KTLA Plus if you're
Speaker 1: streaming it there. We don't stream the show live. I've
Speaker 1: mentioned that from week to week, but we do record
Speaker 1: the first ten minutes of the show and then we
Speaker 1: put that on KTLA Plus, which is a free app
Speaker 1: that you can download pretty much on Roku, Apple TV,
Speaker 1: Fire TV, Samsung TV. So if you want to see
Speaker 1: a little behind the scenes of the show here, you
Speaker 1: can watch that for free no matter where you live. Also,
Speaker 1: thanks for tuning us in wherever you're listening from. My
Speaker 1: mom has been in town, so that's always been interesting.
Speaker 1: We actually extended her time here, which is wild. Most
Speaker 1: people are trying to, you know, get there. Well, my
Speaker 1: most my wife, if she was a typical wife, would
Speaker 1: probably be trying to get my wife, my mom out
Speaker 1: of town. But it's been fine. We actually extended her
Speaker 1: flight to stay out a little bit longer. It's been great,
Speaker 1: great to have her around with the kids. But you know,
Speaker 1: when you have someone in town, your schedule is just
Speaker 1: completely thrown out a whack, right, We've been going out
Speaker 1: to dinner on nights. I would never think about going
Speaker 1: out to dinner. Crammed with activities, you know, sight seeing,
Speaker 1: going around town, and you know, we're just trying to
Speaker 1: have a good time and make the most of it.
Speaker 1: You know, my mom lives on one coast, I live
Speaker 1: on another, and so anytime she's in town, we're trying
Speaker 1: to make the most And she's been very excited. She
Speaker 1: has been picking the bumper music for this very show,
Speaker 1: So if you like the bumper music, she's been doing
Speaker 1: it and I've been getting a lot of emails about it,
Speaker 1: so people clearly like her taste in music. She already
Speaker 1: picked next week's music, so we already have next week's
Speaker 1: planned as well. This was also a big week for
Speaker 1: me personally. I dropped my kid off to high school
Speaker 1: for the first time. I cannot believe it. I was
Speaker 1: I'm not sure who was sadder, me or him. I
Speaker 1: sat in my car and just was not doing well
Speaker 1: after I did this, just thinking about all the you know,
Speaker 1: just the vastness of the school compared to where he
Speaker 1: was throughout his whole life. You know, you got him
Speaker 1: at home for the first couple of years, preschool, elementary school,
Speaker 1: middle school, and now high school.
Speaker 2: And it's just wild.
Speaker 1: So this is coming from the person who left home
Speaker 1: at seventeen, by the way, flew across the country by
Speaker 1: myself on a plane which I'd only been on like
Speaker 1: three times before, and made my new life in la
Speaker 1: as a college student. And my wife always says, it
Speaker 1: was like this TV show Felicity, where they literally just
Speaker 1: drop you off with like your suitcases. I got dropped
Speaker 1: off by a taxi. There's no uber back. Then got
Speaker 1: dropped off at the entrance to the school and the
Speaker 1: school was closed because moving day was the day before,
Speaker 1: so I was like, all right, well now what so
Speaker 1: I'd to like find another entrance. It was a whole
Speaker 1: big thing. Anyway, I made it. I mean, it's okay,
Speaker 1: I'm doing fine. So I guess perseverance, right, You got
Speaker 1: to have a little grit in life. Speaking of grit,
Speaker 1: I did go to the DMV this week to get
Speaker 1: my real ID, and I got to say I was very,
Speaker 1: very impressed. So I think the last time I walked
Speaker 1: into a DMV was at least ten years ago, so
Speaker 1: things have gotten much more modern and updated since then.
Speaker 1: The toughest part for me was getting an appointment. That
Speaker 1: probably took a few i'd probably say a month or
Speaker 1: two to get the appointment. I checked DMV locations that
Speaker 1: weren't near me, because all the ones near me were
Speaker 1: just slammed. But I found one that was like a
Speaker 1: little bit further out, and I get there and the
Speaker 1: main thing you have to know is you have to
Speaker 1: do everything online first. Thankfully, I looked at that email
Speaker 1: they sent me because I was not going to and
Speaker 1: the day before my appointment, I just online and my
Speaker 1: emails and it said like, hey, you might want to
Speaker 1: fill out your information.
Speaker 2: Maybe I said you had to.
Speaker 1: I wasn't really reading it that clearly, but I ended
Speaker 1: up starting on the information and I was like, oh wow, no,
Speaker 1: there's a lot you have to fill out online first,
Speaker 1: And so I filled it out all online. So I
Speaker 1: was very impressed with how smooth the process was. You
Speaker 1: upload all of the documents right from your computer or
Speaker 1: your phone. That was really neat, and then they give
Speaker 1: you a barcode that you print out and you bring
Speaker 1: in with you. And so I get in there, and
Speaker 1: they say, all right, you're a little bit early, so
Speaker 1: just come here, you know, at this time, get there,
Speaker 1: get in line. Woman does quick you know, they verify
Speaker 1: the information. It's all done digitally, which I thought was great.
Speaker 1: You take a quick eye test, fingerprint, and then you
Speaker 1: take a photo and you tap to pay to pay
Speaker 1: the fee, which I thought was really smart too. And
Speaker 1: then the best part was and this happens a lot.
Speaker 1: You know, I'm on TV here in Los Angeles, and
Speaker 1: you know this happens from time to time where people
Speaker 1: will go through a whole transaction with you, right, they'll
Speaker 1: do the whole thing. They'll check you out at the
Speaker 1: grocery store, they'll help you, you know, pick out clothes
Speaker 1: at the mall, whatever it is. But then at the end,
Speaker 1: the very end, when you're ready to leave, like, oh,
Speaker 1: and by the way, I love your segment. It's like, Okay,
Speaker 1: you could have said that at the beginning. I probably
Speaker 1: wouldn't have been any nicer to you, because I'm always nice,
Speaker 1: believe me.
Speaker 2: But it's just funny.
Speaker 1: You go through this whole thing and this woman at
Speaker 1: the end is like, oh, I really love your segment
Speaker 1: on TV. So anyway, glad She likes it, so I
Speaker 1: hopefully will have my real ID very soon. But I did,
Speaker 1: you know, I did get an interesting question from someone
Speaker 1: on social media. They wrote me and they said, Rich,
Speaker 1: I can't believe you're okay with giving your fingerprint to
Speaker 1: the DMV.
Speaker 2: And I didn't even think about it.
Speaker 1: I'm like, all right, I just this is part of
Speaker 1: the process, right, I had to get my social my fingerprint,
Speaker 1: Like they know who I am. They can have me
Speaker 1: in that database, and they can, you know, if I
Speaker 1: ever do anything, you know, commit a crime or whatever.
Speaker 1: You know, they scan the you know, it's like those
Speaker 1: TV shows. They scan the database of all the fingerprints
Speaker 1: and boom, there he is. But I thought about this
Speaker 1: and I was like, wait a second, do we have
Speaker 1: the right as a human to be anonymous, right, Like
Speaker 1: can we be an anonymous person that lives in America
Speaker 1: and just kind of does our own thing, or should
Speaker 1: we be part of this massive database that they can
Speaker 1: search and cross reference. They've got the bio the biometrics
Speaker 1: on all of us. I mean, I'm already in that
Speaker 1: for the TSA. And it got me to thinking. I
Speaker 1: was like, I don't know, like it feels like we
Speaker 1: should be kind of allowed to just roam freely. But
Speaker 1: can we in today's modern society. I'm not sure, but
Speaker 1: I thought about it, and I remember as a kid
Speaker 1: they fingerprinted me, right Like, as a kid, you went
Speaker 1: through and you go to school and they would fingerprint
Speaker 1: you and and I guess that was for like the
Speaker 1: police in case you went missing or something. I'm not sure,
Speaker 1: but the point is for me, someone who's grown up
Speaker 1: in this digital world, like, I'm very privacy centric, but
Speaker 1: I think a lot of the up and coming kind
Speaker 1: of Gen xers or gen z ors whatever they call
Speaker 1: them now, Gen Alpha, they don't really have as many
Speaker 1: expectations of privacy as we did growing up. Right, Like,
Speaker 1: when we grew up, everything was analog and so you
Speaker 1: had to go in the you know, it was the
Speaker 1: the wildest thing that you can go in the white
Speaker 1: pages and literally find someone's address in there, Like it
Speaker 1: was just so crazy to think about that. And now
Speaker 1: you can go online and search anything and find anyone's address,
Speaker 1: home address, email, phone number, whatever. So I don't have
Speaker 1: an answer for that, but I just thought it was
Speaker 1: very interesting. It made me think speaking of the old days, AOL.
Speaker 1: I know you heard the news ending its dial up
Speaker 1: service on September thirtieth, twenty twenty five. Now, I don't
Speaker 1: know who is still using AOL dial up in this
Speaker 1: day and age. Clearly some people were, but not a
Speaker 1: lot of people because they're getting rid of this. But
Speaker 1: if you remember, AOL was it in the nineties and
Speaker 1: early two thousands, we could all recite that sound by heart,
Speaker 1: that modem screeching sound. AOL was king. I mean, they
Speaker 1: were the largest dial up provider in the US. They
Speaker 1: were the Internet for a lot of people, even though
Speaker 1: they weren't really the Internet. I mean, they eventually had
Speaker 1: had access to the Internet, but it was really like
Speaker 1: when you first went to AOL, it was sections. It
Speaker 1: was like entertainment, sports, you know whatever, and you would
Speaker 1: click and you would just go into these things that
Speaker 1: were sort of designed by AOL. It wasn't the Internet
Speaker 1: at large. Now it eventually it became just a way
Speaker 1: to get on the Internet. And remember dial up just
Speaker 1: how complicated it was. You had to wait for the connection.
Speaker 1: If someone picked up the other phone line in the house,
Speaker 1: it would mess things up. Census data shows about one
Speaker 1: hundred and sixty three thousand US households still use dial
Speaker 1: up as of twenty twenty three, that seems like a
Speaker 1: lot of people now AOL is not going away. I
Speaker 1: know a lot of people still love it. They love
Speaker 1: the email or they you know, for better or worse,
Speaker 1: they still use the email, but they're gonna still. AOL's
Speaker 1: not going anywhere. It's just the dial up Internet that's
Speaker 1: going any that's going away. And I remember because my
Speaker 1: mom not to put her on blast, but she is
Speaker 1: a big AOL user, and I remember trying to switch
Speaker 1: her from the dial up AOL to just the standard
Speaker 1: Internet connection and she didn't trust it. Like you know,
Speaker 1: I said, Mom, you could go to like high speed
Speaker 1: internet and still access your AOL. She didn't trust it.
Speaker 1: She said, no, I want to dial up. Said well,
Speaker 1: you know that's going to cost you an extra twenty
Speaker 1: bucks a month or whatever it was. But remember there
Speaker 1: was times when you couldn't even get through. You would
Speaker 1: literally dial up to AOL and it be a busy signal.
Speaker 1: You couldn't get on the internet. And now we just
Speaker 1: take for granted everything anytime on demand. I remember the
Speaker 1: first time, actually I could still remember the first time
Speaker 1: that I got on AOL and got on the internet.
Speaker 1: I logged on every day after high school and I
Speaker 1: would go to this little portal where aol said we
Speaker 1: are building the Internet. You're gonna be able to access
Speaker 1: it soon from here. And I just went there every day. Yes,
Speaker 1: I was a nerd even back then, and I would
Speaker 1: just look and to see if I can get on
Speaker 1: the Internet. And sure enough, one day it was like,
Speaker 1: all right, here you go. And I didn't know where
Speaker 1: to go because like, who knew a website. I think
Speaker 1: I went to like Yahoo. Maybe I don't even know
Speaker 1: if they had Yahoo back then, but now and then.
Speaker 2: I remember.
Speaker 1: Another memory I have is when I first got internet
Speaker 1: in college and I showed my friend streaming video and
Speaker 1: it was as little as a music video. I think
Speaker 1: I was using Excite at home. I think that was
Speaker 1: the Internet provider road I think it was before Roadrunner,
Speaker 1: and I remember showing him the video. I said, look
Speaker 1: at this is the future. You're gonna stream video on
Speaker 1: the Internet and it was postage stamp sized and he
Speaker 1: was like, rich, really, nobody's gonna watch this. And sure enough,
Speaker 1: now everything's delivered through streaming. All right, coming up on
Speaker 1: this show, we are going to take some of your
Speaker 1: calls at eight eight eight rich one oh one eighty
Speaker 1: eight seven four to two four one zero one. I'll
Speaker 1: tell you how Apple brought back the blood oxygen feature
Speaker 1: to the Apple Watch, plus more tech news. My name
Speaker 1: is Rich dmiro. You are listening to Rich on Tech.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to rich on Tech. Rich DeMuro here hanging
Speaker 1: out with you talking technology at Triple eight Rich one
Speaker 1: oh one. That's eight eight eight seven four to two,
Speaker 1: four to one zero one. Got a packed house today.
Speaker 1: We've got Bobo on the boards. Is it the boards?
Speaker 1: I guess the board? Maybe just one board to run
Speaker 1: the show. Kim on phones, you know, Kim and I
Speaker 1: we have a little side conversations throughout the whole show
Speaker 1: via text message, and she is she said. The reason
Speaker 1: the DMV person did not say anything until the end
Speaker 1: of the transaction is she wanted to make sure that
Speaker 1: I was a nice person.
Speaker 2: Before she said anything.
Speaker 1: And I guess that's probably true because that happened at
Speaker 1: dinner the other night. You know, we were like halfway
Speaker 1: through the dinner and you know, I get it. I'm
Speaker 1: on TV in Los Angeles. So it's one of these
Speaker 1: things where you never know the thing about you know,
Speaker 1: if you watch someone this is this is probably true
Speaker 1: of any like what I would say, micro celebrity like myself.
Speaker 1: If you know that person, you know them. If you
Speaker 1: do not know them, you don't know them. It's not
Speaker 1: like an actor in a movie like we were watching
Speaker 1: last night, where you're like, oh.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I know that guy.
Speaker 1: I know them, I've seen them, I don't maybe don't
Speaker 1: know their name, but I know them.
Speaker 2: For me, it is not that way.
Speaker 1: It is either you know or you don't, because you've
Speaker 1: either watched me or you didn't. And so if I'm
Speaker 1: going out, it's always like this idea of like, okay,
Speaker 1: do they.
Speaker 2: Know that they not.
Speaker 1: People generally tell you when they know, sometimes they don't,
Speaker 1: and they send me a text message afterwards when I'm
Speaker 1: at home, which is kind of weird. Dell's an ocean
Speaker 1: side you're on with Rich.
Speaker 3: Good morning, thank you so much for your show. You've
Speaker 3: helped me before and I really am I appreciative.
Speaker 2: Oh thank you. Love to hear that.
Speaker 3: Yeah. No, I am the very happy owner of our
Speaker 3: Galaxy S twenty four Ultra. And one morning when I
Speaker 3: woke up and checked my phone, I went to send
Speaker 3: a text and the alphabet was rearranged. Ooh yeah, all
Speaker 3: the keys were in like a different place, and I
Speaker 3: think there are different keyboards.
Speaker 2: I would have went right back to sleep.
Speaker 3: You know, I know, I know. It's well, I've just
Speaker 3: been voice texting. OK then, so, but it's really frustrating.
Speaker 3: How do I fix it?
Speaker 1: Okay, you're trying to get your your keyboard back on
Speaker 1: the Samsung. Well, I mean there are different layouts. In
Speaker 1: the US, we typically use the quirdy qwert y that's
Speaker 1: the standard layout, but there are all kinds of layouts
Speaker 1: you can choose. Now, I use g board, so I'm
Speaker 1: not as familiar with Samsung keyboard, but that is built
Speaker 1: into all the Samsung phones. But what I would do
Speaker 1: is when you're typing, so go into some sort of
Speaker 1: field that you can type on your phone, and at
Speaker 1: the top of the keyboard there should be a little
Speaker 1: gear icon and if you tap that gear icon, it
Speaker 1: will bring you to the settings for that keyboard, which
Speaker 1: is the Samsung keyboard that you're using all the way.
Speaker 1: At the top it should say languages and types and
Speaker 1: if you tap there, I'm thinking that this is what happened.
Speaker 1: I don't know how it happened or why it happened,
Speaker 1: but something got changed. So if you tap up in there,
Speaker 1: you'll see where it says quirdy. And I'm guessing. I
Speaker 1: don't know what these other options are, so I've never
Speaker 1: even seen them before.
Speaker 2: But one is.
Speaker 1: Called quartz that's another option, I guess. And then there's
Speaker 1: a zerdi and then there's three by four. Tap three
Speaker 1: by four just to see what that looks like, because
Speaker 1: I've never ever heard of that for a keyboard.
Speaker 2: So now I've got this.
Speaker 1: Oh wow, oh three by four is your T nine
Speaker 1: like the old days, remember when you had to like
Speaker 1: just tap out a text on like the one through
Speaker 1: nine keys. Oh that's okay. I never knew that it
Speaker 1: was called three by four. So you can do that
Speaker 1: if you want to. That's interesting if that's built in there. Okay,
Speaker 1: I didn't realize that. If we go back in, let's
Speaker 1: look at azerdi that is going to set up your keys.
Speaker 1: Oh A, Z, E R T, y uio p okay.
Speaker 1: So it's a little bit different than Oh wow, that's
Speaker 1: really different. So I think that's what you want to do,
Speaker 1: is just go back into the languages and types and
Speaker 1: under English tap quirty and that should bring you back
Speaker 1: to the standard uh or I guess I should say
Speaker 1: what many of us are used to when it comes
Speaker 1: to the keyboard. Thanksdale and ocean Side. Hopefully that fix
Speaker 1: it fixes it. Appreciate the kind words. Eighty eight rich
Speaker 1: one O one eight eight eight seven four to two
Speaker 1: four one zero one. So Apple has brought blood oxygen
Speaker 1: monitoring back to the Apple Watch. So they brought it
Speaker 1: back for the Series nine, the Series ten, and the
Speaker 1: Ultra two watches in the US. If you want to
Speaker 1: get the blood oxygen feature back, you have to update
Speaker 1: both your iOS and your iPhone and your watch OS
Speaker 1: to get it.
Speaker 4: Now.
Speaker 1: I did this on both my watch and the phone,
Speaker 1: and yes it's back, but there is a difference. It
Speaker 1: almost operates the same way. So you go to your
Speaker 1: Apple Watch, you tap to get into your apps, you
Speaker 1: tap blood oxygen, and you take your reading. But then
Speaker 1: to look at the reading you get they can no
Speaker 1: longer display on the watch because of this whole patent dispute.
Speaker 1: They now display on the iPhone. So I actually got
Speaker 1: when the reading was done. I got a little notification
Speaker 1: on my iPhone that the reading was ready, and so
Speaker 1: you tap into there and it will show you the
Speaker 1: reading in.
Speaker 2: The health app.
Speaker 1: So it's pretty much the same. By the way, my
Speaker 1: reading was fine. It's pretty much the same as it
Speaker 1: was before, except you just can't see the results on
Speaker 1: your Apple Watch screen. So this is all because of
Speaker 1: a patent dispute they had with this Massimo company, and
Speaker 1: so I guess they're they're not settling that, but they
Speaker 1: just figured out a way around it. Eight eight eight
Speaker 1: rich one on one eight eight eight seven four to two,
Speaker 1: four to one zero one. Rich on Tech dot TV
Speaker 1: coming up. I'll tell you what Kodak has to say
Speaker 1: about rumors it's going out of business. Welcome back to
Speaker 1: rich on Tech. Rich Demiro here hanging out with you,
Speaker 1: talking technology. Triple eight rich one on one eight eight
Speaker 1: eight seven four to two four one zero one. The
Speaker 1: website for the show rich on Tech dot TV. Can
Speaker 1: follow me on social media. I am at rich on Tech.
Speaker 1: You see the trend there.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Kodak says it is not going out of business, contrary
Speaker 1: to all the reports it's closing or going bankrupt. They
Speaker 1: say the confusion came from a routine accounting note in
Speaker 1: a government filing. Company says it has a plan to
Speaker 1: pay off what it owes and stay in business, and
Speaker 1: they expect a big cash boost in December that will
Speaker 1: help them pay down debt. I don't know what that
Speaker 1: cash boost is, whether they bring them back the thirty
Speaker 1: five millimeter camera. Kodak says sales are steady, business is healthy,
Speaker 1: and it's optimistic about the future. Of course they say that,
Speaker 1: but come on, let's be honest. When was the last
Speaker 1: time you bought something with the Kodak brand name on it?
Speaker 2: Now?
Speaker 1: This is an example of a company that it's interesting
Speaker 1: when you go out of the US to these trade
Speaker 1: shows in other places, they're more like almost like a
Speaker 1: licensing company at this point, Like people know the Kodak brand,
Speaker 1: and so if you're in a different country, you're wanting
Speaker 1: to buy a nice American brand name like this. And
Speaker 1: so you see a lot of licensed gadgets with the
Speaker 1: Kodak name. And they've had a few things here and there,
Speaker 1: but I know they're never going to recapture what they
Speaker 1: had in the past. And I think it's tough with
Speaker 1: the company like Kodak that owes a lot of money
Speaker 1: to a lot of people, probably to to recapture or
Speaker 1: to have something that really propels them again like that,
Speaker 1: like they used to have it's tough. I mean it's
Speaker 1: tough when you have something so big and then you
Speaker 1: never really are able to capture that again. I mean
Speaker 1: we've seen tech companies throughout the years, as it happens
Speaker 1: over and over. You have an amazing product, like let's say,
Speaker 1: like a TVO. I mean that like revolutionized TV, dvring
Speaker 1: things before streaming, right, But you know they never had
Speaker 1: another follow up to that. There's probably a long list
Speaker 1: of I mean, GoPro, I mean, look at that same thing.
Speaker 1: They were the way to record things and they still
Speaker 1: are for action sports and stuff like that. But you know,
Speaker 1: the iPhone came along, and then it came along with
Speaker 1: the wide angle lens, and you know, things just change.
Speaker 1: And really, actually, now that I think about it, the
Speaker 1: iPhone has just impacted everything. It's like everything we had
Speaker 1: that was good, the iPhone just took over. So blame them.
Speaker 1: Let's go to let's see John in Los Angeles. John,
Speaker 1: what's up?
Speaker 3: Yeah, Rich, I'm just trying to figure out. I'm sixty
Speaker 3: years old. Started out at cal Poly. I used to
Speaker 3: write software, you know, in basic right nineteen eighty.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, nice, and then self.
Speaker 3: Taught myself everything electrical contractor for a career, and I
Speaker 3: wanted to find out is there some place I can
Speaker 3: go back and get a little more structured education to
Speaker 3: you know, really understand about IP addresses and when I
Speaker 3: set up my router instead of just kind of fumbling
Speaker 3: my way through it. Is there something that's a little
Speaker 3: more structured, a little more that you know, everybody wants
Speaker 3: to teach me an entire education. I don't. I don't
Speaker 3: want to do that. I just want to pick up
Speaker 3: some some some pointers and some structure. If that makes sense.
Speaker 2: Oh, yeah, absolutely, you know I just do Yeah, I can.
Speaker 3: I can wire it all and tie it all down
Speaker 3: and put it all together. And physical part is great,
Speaker 3: but I really need to get a little a little
Speaker 3: bit out of the ether and get a little more
Speaker 3: focused on IP addresses and specifically what I'm doing.
Speaker 2: Yeah, no, I hear you.
Speaker 3: Any suggestions or ideas.
Speaker 1: I do my my biggest one of my biggest wins.
Speaker 1: I was so proud of myself. This was before mesh,
Speaker 1: you know, routers and networking and all that stuff. But
Speaker 1: I had my apartment. This was many years ago, and
Speaker 1: I couldn't get a Wi Fi signal in the other
Speaker 1: stretch of the like the other end of the apartment,
Speaker 1: and so I was so proud of myself. I took
Speaker 1: an old router, I formatted it, I installed like I
Speaker 1: forget what the software was called, like DDRS or something
Speaker 1: on it, and I put it and I and I
Speaker 1: connected it with an Ethernet cable and I was able
Speaker 1: to get the router to take the signal and put
Speaker 1: it in that other area and kind of blast it
Speaker 1: to the house. But I think the signal was the
Speaker 1: same as the other one. But anyway, it was just
Speaker 1: it all worked and it was so great. I was like,
Speaker 1: oh my gosh, I did this. Anyway, So I just
Speaker 1: did a story about this for TV. We're gonna erit
Speaker 1: very soon about basically learning technology, you know, outside of school.
Speaker 1: And yeah, you can go back to school and you
Speaker 1: can take a course and you do all this stuff.
Speaker 1: But like, there are so many platforms online to learn
Speaker 1: and a lot of it's free. You may have to
Speaker 1: pay for some of it depending on what you want
Speaker 1: to do. But I'll give you the one. I think
Speaker 1: there's probably two, I think three actually that you really like.
Speaker 1: So number one Courserah if you haven't heard of that,
Speaker 1: COURSERA is is basically a place where you can learn
Speaker 1: anything you want. And right now the AI stuff is
Speaker 1: really really hot. But you know, they have some free lessons.
Speaker 1: Some of it is paid, you know, but I think
Speaker 1: it's like sixty bucks a month unlimited, like you can
Speaker 1: take these at your own time. And they've got everything
Speaker 1: from quick lessons to certificates. So if you want to
Speaker 1: actually get a certificate that you can put on your
Speaker 1: LinkedIn your resume, you can do that as well. And
Speaker 1: a lot of those you can complete in under six months.
Speaker 1: Then there's one called ed x ed X. Let me
Speaker 1: see what the website is. I just have the name
Speaker 1: ed x ed X.
Speaker 2: Let's see dot org.
Speaker 1: And these are all kinds of I mean, they've got
Speaker 1: all kinds of skills and classes and you know, from
Speaker 1: big names, and I'm sure you can type in what
Speaker 1: you need so you can do you know, executive education courses, certificates,
Speaker 1: master's degrees or a bachelor degree if you want. So
Speaker 1: it's sort of like a one stop shop for just
Speaker 1: finding all kinds of things. And if we type in
Speaker 1: you said, IP IP addresses, I guess that would be
Speaker 1: like under networking. You know, there's networking basics and security
Speaker 1: Networking and storage essentials. I mean there's so many, and
Speaker 1: they all say the brand that's offering them as well,
Speaker 1: so that's another place to look. So let's say networking
Speaker 1: basics and security, which I think you're past, but yeah,
Speaker 1: let's see audit course. I don't know how much that
Speaker 1: one costs, but anyway, you got that on there. And
Speaker 1: then the other one is class Central, so class central
Speaker 1: dot com. This is almost like a like a Google,
Speaker 1: but for all online learning. So anything you want to find,
Speaker 1: it will search all of the different places that offer
Speaker 1: online courses, and so we're talking everything from Stanford, Google, Amazon,
Speaker 1: I mean there's so many look at this, thirteen hundred universities,
Speaker 1: one hundred provide and seventeen hundred institutions and it's all
Speaker 1: under that search. So if you wanted it, you know,
Speaker 1: to look up. Yeah, I mean TCIP which you're talking about,
Speaker 1: or IP addressing. Two hundred and fifty six courses available,
Speaker 1: and the neat thing is you can sort them by
Speaker 1: the highest rated the relevancy. I mean, there's a whole
Speaker 1: bunch of stuff and it gives you all the information
Speaker 1: you need before you sign up. So University of Washington
Speaker 1: Computer Networks it tells you how much it is right
Speaker 1: on there, free online course. So I mean this is
Speaker 1: this is pretty amazing and it just leads you right
Speaker 1: to where you are. So if you're trying to further
Speaker 1: your career, further your job, just pick up some new skills.
Speaker 1: I mean, yes, YouTube is a great place to start,
Speaker 1: but if you want to get a little bit more serious,
Speaker 1: one of these online courses can really help. And I
Speaker 1: think John, that's probably your best bet is to check
Speaker 1: out those three places.
Speaker 2: Microsoft also has their own hub for learning. It's called
Speaker 2: Microsoft Learn.
Speaker 1: Google has one, and then LinkedIn has one, IBM has
Speaker 1: one they call their Skills Build, LinkedIn Learning is LinkedIn.
Speaker 1: So I mean there's just there is no there is
Speaker 1: no shortage of information available and I get it, like
Speaker 1: you were saying, you know, everyone wants to teach you
Speaker 1: this and that, but like these are very highly targeted
Speaker 1: courses to what you want to learn. And by the way,
Speaker 1: it's not just for it, it is for all kinds
Speaker 1: of stuff in this world. So great question, John, Thanks
Speaker 1: so much and appreciate the call today.
Speaker 2: Eight eight eight.
Speaker 1: Rich one oh one eight eight eight seven four to
Speaker 1: two four one zero one. If you want to email.
Speaker 1: You can also do that. Rich on tech dot TV.
Speaker 1: I know I just gave you a lot of resources.
Speaker 1: You're sitting there trying to write them all down. Do
Speaker 1: not worry about that. Just go to the website. Rich
Speaker 1: on tech dot tv. I've got the show notes there.
Speaker 1: They're not there just yet for what I just said,
Speaker 1: because it takes me a minute to get them on there.
Speaker 1: But this is episode one thirty four, and so if
Speaker 1: you visit in the next couple of minutes, they will
Speaker 1: be on there.
Speaker 2: And uh yeah, enjoy.
Speaker 1: Before we go to break, the Better Business Bureau is
Speaker 1: warning of fake passport renewal websites. Be careful because now
Speaker 1: that you can renew your passport online, which I did,
Speaker 1: and it was a very easy process.
Speaker 2: Look at me.
Speaker 1: In one month, I got my passport and my real ID.
Speaker 1: I am ready to travel and I'm ready to be tracked.
Speaker 1: So these websites, here's the deal. Anytime there's a legitimate
Speaker 1: thing you could do online, there's some sort of bogus
Speaker 1: website that's trying to prey upon you. Right, So what
Speaker 1: do people do they search on Google renew passport online?
Speaker 1: And what do you think The first five sponsored links
Speaker 1: are these bogus websites that will charge you to fill
Speaker 1: out a form. By the way, they're charging a processing
Speaker 1: fee to fill out a form that's free. Now is
Speaker 1: that illegal?
Speaker 2: I don't know. I mean they're just helping you, right,
Speaker 2: But is it shady? Yes? So what do you need
Speaker 2: to do? Number one?
Speaker 1: If you are filling out and renewing your passport, you
Speaker 1: can do it online.
Speaker 2: It's not free.
Speaker 1: You do have to pay, you know, the government a
Speaker 1: little bit. I think it was one hundred and fifty bucks.
Speaker 1: But you can go to the make sure you're going
Speaker 1: to travel dot state dot gov. If you're putting your
Speaker 1: information in a different website, don't do it. The victims
Speaker 1: said they lost their money, but they also handed over
Speaker 1: personal details like their Social Security number and their data
Speaker 1: birth US Passport renewals, you know, you can be done
Speaker 1: online if you qualify. You have to you know, you qualify.
Speaker 1: You got to fill out a little thing and see
Speaker 1: if you qualify. Mostly I think it's for renewals, but
Speaker 1: just make sure that you are you're going to that
Speaker 1: travel dot state dot gov site avoids sponsored links. Anything
Speaker 1: that's at the top of your Google that's sponsored with
Speaker 1: the passport renewal is probably someone that's going to charge
Speaker 1: you more.
Speaker 2: So just be careful.
Speaker 1: And this is the thing, like I often my mom
Speaker 1: is in town, and so she shown me the stuff
Speaker 1: on her Facebook and her Google searches, and a lot
Speaker 1: of the stuff that comes up as a sponsored link
Speaker 1: is kind of bogus. And so I personally use like
Speaker 1: an ad blocker, and I also use Nord has an
Speaker 1: awesome feature that I love. If you subscribe to their VPN,
Speaker 1: they've got this threat blocker and not only does it
Speaker 1: block like threats, but it also happens to block ads,
Speaker 1: which you know, I get it. People need to make
Speaker 1: money on the Internet, So I understand why the ads
Speaker 1: are there. But if I'm getting scammed because of these
Speaker 1: ads that are targeting me, that's a problem. And so
Speaker 1: that's why I don't feel bad blocking them. And it's
Speaker 1: my internet, it's my screen, it's my web browser.
Speaker 2: I could do what I want.
Speaker 1: Eighty eight Rich one oh one eight eight eight seven
Speaker 1: four to two four to one zero one. We'll get
Speaker 1: back to your calls and I'll tell you why Yahoo
Speaker 1: is uh cutting its free storage when we come back.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to rich On Tech. Rich DeMuro here hanging
Speaker 1: out with you talking technology at Triple eight Rich one
Speaker 1: oh one eight eight eight seven four to two four
Speaker 1: one zero one. Uh, let's go to I can't see
Speaker 1: the name on the screen. Is it Chris in Orange County?
Speaker 1: There you go, Chris in Orange County?
Speaker 2: Are on with Rich?
Speaker 5: Yeah?
Speaker 6: Hey, Rich, thank you very much, appreciate your time. Hey,
Speaker 6: I do a lot of podcasting actually broadcasting of live sports,
Speaker 6: and I do everything via Logitech's product and maybe familiar
Speaker 6: with Mivo cameras. They're a great little tool to use
Speaker 6: for what I'm doing in my broadcasting. I've got a
Speaker 6: question about Wi Fi connectivity because my workflow is cameras
Speaker 6: into an iPad. I've got a hot spot that's designated
Speaker 6: to create my signal to connect things with. But I
Speaker 6: run into problems with latency and bitrate and all that
Speaker 6: with the cameras having to be adjusted just because I'm
Speaker 6: having problems with connectivity, and I'm just looking for a
Speaker 6: better means and support tool that might be able to
Speaker 6: eliminate the dropouts, eliminate the bitrate and the latency issues
Speaker 6: that I encounter, and something that has pretty good range.
Speaker 2: Any thoughts on.
Speaker 1: That, well, I think it all comes down to what
Speaker 1: are you using to broadcast out like a hotspot or
Speaker 1: using your phone or using a dedicated.
Speaker 4: Are using a hotspot? So I use a Nighthawk, which
Speaker 4: is a very powerful tool, and you know, I align
Speaker 4: with you know, various networks that are available out there
Speaker 4: with different companies, and the tool works well. But you know, obviously,
Speaker 4: if I'm in a place where there's a bunch of
Speaker 4: iPhones that are being used, I'm pinging the same tower
Speaker 4: everybody else is. Yeah, I all cut in line because
Speaker 4: I've got an isolated signal. My concern is is, you know,
Speaker 4: we've heard things around cellular bonding and different things, et cetera,
Speaker 4: et cetera, but it's very expensive often yep, and just
Speaker 4: kind of wondering what your thought process is into how
Speaker 4: to improve it because I can run multiple cameras and
Speaker 4: I'd love to have center field first base, you know,
Speaker 4: I've got behind home plate, but I can't do that
Speaker 4: because of the fact that my Wi Fi connectivity often
Speaker 4: is slow and sluggish.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: Well, I mean, look, it comes down to you know,
Speaker 1: consumer versus pro tools, And like you said, you know,
Speaker 1: when we're broadcasting, we use cellular bonding, which of course
Speaker 1: is taking various signals and merging them together and it's
Speaker 1: making one signal.
Speaker 2: So if one if one.
Speaker 1: Of the carriers drops out a little bit, you know,
Speaker 1: the other carrier picks up the slack. But that, like
Speaker 1: you said, is very expensive. So if you're talking just
Speaker 1: kind of over the counter stuff, I mean, obviously, a
Speaker 1: wired connection is going to be the absolute best way
Speaker 1: to do things. Even if you were doing a wired
Speaker 1: connection from your you know, your iPad, it sounds like
Speaker 1: you're broadcasting from the iPad to the hot spot. The
Speaker 1: mevo camera, I'm guessing is connecting to the iPad and
Speaker 1: the iPad to the hot spot. So if you can
Speaker 1: get that connection wired, that would that would help immensely.
Speaker 2: You know.
Speaker 1: I think it also has to do with the signal
Speaker 1: that you're using. So you said you're using a hot spot,
Speaker 1: but you know, you're at the mercy of wherever you
Speaker 1: happen to set up that hot spot and whatever this
Speaker 1: the that signal is in that area, and there's two
Speaker 1: things that are going on. Number One, the signal may
Speaker 1: not be that good in that area, and that's what's
Speaker 1: causing the dropout and the problem. Number Two, you may
Speaker 1: be using such a large amount of data on this
Speaker 1: system every month that your carrier is deprioritizing your signal
Speaker 1: because there's too many other people in the area that
Speaker 1: need to get their calls and data through. It's saying, look,
Speaker 1: this guy we know is gobbling up a ton of data,
Speaker 1: so we're going to just kind of put him on
Speaker 1: the back burner for a little bit. And that can happen.
Speaker 1: I mean, these networks, these companies have the ability to
Speaker 1: do what's called network congestion management, so they will sit
Speaker 1: there and prioritize different types of data based on the
Speaker 1: user and based on the level of account. So a
Speaker 1: lot of people talk about, you know, when you have
Speaker 1: like a nice premium data plan from one of the
Speaker 1: big carriers like an AT and T, T Mobile, Verizon,
Speaker 1: when you're paying that one hundred dollars a month, you're
Speaker 1: going to be on the top tier of data priority
Speaker 1: unless you go over your limits. And if you go over,
Speaker 1: you know, they say, oh, you get unlimited hotspot. Well
Speaker 1: nothing's really unlimited anymore, so they may really limit you
Speaker 1: after using fifty gigabytes or on a hundred gigabyte. I
Speaker 1: think AT and T is the only one that has
Speaker 1: a plan where they will not limit you in any way.
Speaker 1: I think it's like one hundred I don't know how
Speaker 1: much it is a month, but it's it's a pricey plan.
Speaker 1: But they will not deprioritize your data. So I think
Speaker 1: those are some of the things you have to look at.
Speaker 1: I think if you really want to get serious, you know,
Speaker 1: if you had something like a starlink where you know
Speaker 1: it was going to be a dedicated and pretty much
Speaker 1: the same signal everywhere you go, that's probably a better
Speaker 1: way to do it. So, you know, I think for
Speaker 1: the most part, this probably works for a ninety nine
Speaker 1: percent of the time, but there are just some times
Speaker 1: where it's just not going to be you know, it's
Speaker 1: just not going to be as good. And we've seen this,
Speaker 1: like I, you know, I broadcast from all kinds of
Speaker 1: places all the time, you know, going live on TV.
Speaker 1: Now for the radio, you know, obviously you don't really
Speaker 1: need as much bandwidth for the radio when I do
Speaker 1: a remote show versus TV TV. I mean even TV
Speaker 1: don't even need that much, but you still need it.
Speaker 1: But the other thing about the going live from places
Speaker 1: is that but you know, if you get higher end equipment,
Speaker 1: if you get equipment that is, you know, a hot
Speaker 1: spot that is meant for more consumers versus professionals.
Speaker 2: It's just not going to be as good. It may
Speaker 2: not pull in as strong of a signal.
Speaker 1: The one I use for the radio show remote is
Speaker 1: this like high end hot spot that's like you know,
Speaker 1: I guess it uses cellular bonding. I think we're just
Speaker 1: using one network, but it has the potential to use
Speaker 1: more than one network.
Speaker 2: But anyway, it's a great question, Chris. It's definitely.
Speaker 1: As people are broadcasting more of these Little League games
Speaker 1: and various sports around the nation, you know, they're broadcasting
Speaker 1: them wherever they are. I've got a friend at work
Speaker 1: that's actually doing this and he uses a starlink and
Speaker 1: he's just said it's game changing. It's truly unbelievable that
Speaker 1: he can broadcast a game no matter where he is,
Speaker 1: in the middle of nowhere with Little League or whatever
Speaker 1: he's doing, and with all the off the shelf kind
Speaker 1: of products and software, it's just pretty incredible what you
Speaker 1: can do. Thanks for the call today, Chris, appreciate it.
Speaker 1: If you have Yahoo email, by the way, or actually,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm gonna do that when we come back,
Speaker 1: because we don't have enough time for that, but I'm
Speaker 1: gonna I'm gonna answer this question from Lisa. Lisa writes
Speaker 1: in I received two class action lawsuit notices recently, including
Speaker 1: one tied to the AT and D data breach. I
Speaker 1: must have gotten one hundred of these emails this week.
Speaker 1: How can I verify these are legitimate? Go to the
Speaker 1: website Topclassactions dot com. That's where I go to type
Speaker 1: in AT and T and you'll see the website that's
Speaker 1: the legitimate one. Just make sure that's the one you're
Speaker 1: getting the email from. And that's when you're going to
Speaker 1: eighty eight rich one on one eighty eight seven four
Speaker 1: to two, four to one zero one. This is rich
Speaker 1: on Tech. Welcome back to rich on Tech. Rich DeMuro
Speaker 1: here hanging out with you, talking technology at triple eight
Speaker 1: rich one oh one. That's eight eight eight seven four
Speaker 1: to two four one zero one. Website is rich on
Speaker 1: Tech dot tv. This is episode one three four. A
Speaker 1: lot of you go into the website to look for
Speaker 1: information on those learning websites I mentioned, they're all linked
Speaker 1: up there. John and Los Angeles asked where he can
Speaker 1: continue his education, and you have lots of places you
Speaker 1: can do that online, so it's all linked up on
Speaker 1: the website. Rich on tech dot tv. While you're there,
Speaker 1: sign up for my free newsletter, the one my wife
Speaker 1: says is way too long every week she reads it.
Speaker 1: This is way too long, my mom yesterday while I'm
Speaker 1: writing it. You spent a long time doing that. Yes,
Speaker 1: it's a good newsletter. It takes a lot of time.
Speaker 1: I pride myself with my newsletter. So go to rich
Speaker 1: on tech dot tv.
Speaker 2: Sign up for it. You be the judge.
Speaker 1: You know, you don't have to read it all. You
Speaker 1: can skim it whatever you want to do. Coming up
Speaker 1: this hour, we've got Brett Bristow, a creator of tech
Speaker 1: With Brett, he's got a great YouTube channel. He's going
Speaker 1: to share all kinds of tips and tricks about smart
Speaker 1: home tech. And I'm gonna ask him about the fact
Speaker 1: that a lot of people are unhappy right now with
Speaker 1: the way Google has been operating their Google homes. Like
Speaker 1: when you ask it a question, it basically just defaults
Speaker 1: to the web.
Speaker 2: Now.
Speaker 1: It used to give you an answer. Now it's just like, oh,
Speaker 1: here's what I found on the web. So I think
Speaker 1: they're making that transition a gemini. So in the meantime,
Speaker 1: it's not as good. This week I did test out
Speaker 1: a new printer, the EPSOM Eco tank Et twenty nine eighty.
Speaker 1: Get a lot of questions about these. You know, I've
Speaker 1: got the HP this is This is a different one
Speaker 1: because you basically squeeze it. You don't really squeeze the
Speaker 1: ink into it. You just let the ink drop into it.
Speaker 1: It's like these little almost look like injectors that you
Speaker 1: put into the device and it puts the ink in
Speaker 1: there instead of replacing a cartridge. And so you've got
Speaker 1: these bottles that you put in you fill it up.
Speaker 1: That was the trickiest part. I was just worried that
Speaker 1: the ink was gonna get everywhere. It didn't. Thankfully, the
Speaker 1: bottles they the ink apparently last for a very long time.
Speaker 1: You can refill it easily. And I found the setup
Speaker 1: of the printer was actually quite simple because they did
Speaker 1: this interesting thing where they just kind of lead you
Speaker 1: through the process with an app. So on your phone,
Speaker 1: you've got the app and it almost chats with you
Speaker 1: back and forth. So it's like chat style where it
Speaker 1: says okay, now, first things first, do this you go okay?
Speaker 1: I did that? Goes okay? Now do this, and you
Speaker 1: do that, and then it sends you a picture. It says,
Speaker 1: all right, now see this part, open up that flap
Speaker 1: or whatever. So that was really cool. So I got
Speaker 1: this thing set up. It was very easy to get
Speaker 1: set up and all, like I said, all from my phone.
Speaker 1: The thing that really threw me off was loading the
Speaker 1: paper because I'm so used to that trayloader. This has
Speaker 1: a rear top loading design, so you put the paper
Speaker 1: kind of in the back of it and then it
Speaker 1: kind of comes through it. So that threw me for
Speaker 1: a loop. But I will tell you the advantage of
Speaker 1: that is for swapping paper, so when you want to
Speaker 1: put in different paper sizes, you no longer have to
Speaker 1: do it. You know, pull out the tray, put in
Speaker 1: the other paper. And it's especially handy for printing photos
Speaker 1: because if you have a five x seven or four
Speaker 1: x six photo paper you want to put in there,
Speaker 1: you can easily just pop out the eight and a
Speaker 1: half by eleven paper and put in the photo paper.
Speaker 1: So I love that feature and I've been printing all
Speaker 1: kinds of pictures because of it.
Speaker 2: It's quiet, it works well.
Speaker 1: It's a little bit slower than the HP I think
Speaker 1: but overall, I think the software is better designed and simpler.
Speaker 1: Like HP is always pushing you to kind of purchase
Speaker 1: their protection plans and their ink plans and all this
Speaker 1: other stuff, but the EPSOM just sort of does what
Speaker 1: it needs to do, which is be a printer. The
Speaker 1: other downside is that there's a tiny display on the
Speaker 1: front which is really small, and you have to like
Speaker 1: navigate it using all these buttons on the front of
Speaker 1: the device, which it would have been way easier if
Speaker 1: that was just a touch screen. Maybe they have a
Speaker 1: version that's more expensive that has a touchscreen. But the
Speaker 1: price here three hundred and twenty nine dollars, which I
Speaker 1: would say watch for a sale. That seems like the
Speaker 1: regular price, Like you could probably get it on sale
Speaker 1: at some point. Maybe this is brand new, I'm not sure.
Speaker 1: The refills for the ink are about seventy five dollars
Speaker 1: for all of the ink, and I think the ink
Speaker 1: is supposed to last for a couple of years, so
Speaker 1: I'm curious to see if that's the case. Overall, very
Speaker 1: very impressed, I really kind I was using the scanner
Speaker 1: on the printer yesterday. It was great, very simple, and
Speaker 1: really it's very hands off with the software. Like you
Speaker 1: saw the app on your phone, but you can print
Speaker 1: from Android and iPhone without installing really much more. You
Speaker 1: don't have to go through the app if you don't want,
Speaker 1: you just kind of natively print to it.
Speaker 2: So I thought that was cool. Next up, I'm.
Speaker 1: Gonna test the HP version of this, I guess because
Speaker 1: epsyn is coming out with these ink tank printers. HP decided, hey,
Speaker 1: we need an ink tank printer now, and so it's
Speaker 1: the five to one oh one and I've got that
Speaker 1: to test as well, so I'm gonna see if that's
Speaker 1: a better system too. So anyway, ink tank printer is
Speaker 1: kind of different than what you're typically used to with
Speaker 1: the with the cartridges, but I like it. Also, Oh,
Speaker 1: this is this is really wild. Ring now if you
Speaker 1: if you say yes, and I think you probably have
Speaker 1: to be on some sort of paid plan if I'm guessing,
Speaker 1: but they are now sending AI notifications, so not only
Speaker 1: you know the ring if you have a ring doorbell,
Speaker 1: it just says like someone's at your front door. No,
Speaker 1: now it looks at the video using AI and it
Speaker 1: will describe what's happening in the video. So someone literally
Speaker 1: just came to our house delivering food that was not
Speaker 1: meant for us, and it says person is moving on
Speaker 1: the porch with bags. Person is standing on the porch
Speaker 1: holding a plastic bag. And then this morning when I
Speaker 1: came back from my run, it said, you know, person
Speaker 1: is it does like child adult moving towards your front
Speaker 1: door with earphones. I mean it's really specific and actually
Speaker 1: quite useful because you can see in an instant if
Speaker 1: something's important or if it's not. So if you don't
Speaker 1: have the AI toggled on, you know, if you have
Speaker 1: a Ring device and you're paying for I think you
Speaker 1: have to have a subscription or some sort of extra
Speaker 1: add on whatever, it's worth trying it out. The difference is,
Speaker 1: and I'll tell you what the big difference is is
Speaker 1: that because it's AI, they have to send your video
Speaker 1: to RING servers for processing. So yeah, your video is
Speaker 1: probably passing through Ring at some point because it's got
Speaker 1: to deliver it to your phone. But because it's looking
Speaker 1: at that video to analyze what's happening in the video,
Speaker 1: there was some sort of like little warning that said
Speaker 1: you have to be okay with this?
Speaker 2: Do you agree? And I said, yeah, sure.
Speaker 1: I mean if your Ring cameras are in public places,
Speaker 1: which is, by the way, they should be at your house,
Speaker 1: you know, front yard, backyard, door. It shouldn't be that
Speaker 1: big of a deal because it's nothing that nobody else
Speaker 1: can see.
Speaker 2: I mean, I guess they're inside. That's different. Let's go
Speaker 2: to Mark and woodn Hills. Mark, you're on with rich A.
Speaker 5: Hi.
Speaker 7: Rich. I just want to make you know I've been
Speaker 7: a cable cutter since nineteen ninety eight because most of
Speaker 7: the stuff was just rubbish and you know, junk food
Speaker 7: for the mind, right, But it was the ro Coup
Speaker 7: that really turned me on back to entertainment and programming.
Speaker 7: I picked up a Roku four. I have a stick
Speaker 7: that I take when I go and travel. The Ultra
Speaker 7: is awesome, but my problem is with the Roku number four.
Speaker 7: It seems to be a rather common reputation and problem
Speaker 7: for folks. What it's it's known for whining and grinding sound.
Speaker 7: I mean, it will still pour out. I use it
Speaker 7: on a TV that I don't use often, but when
Speaker 7: I turn it on after a couple of minutes, it
Speaker 7: starts grinding and all weird sound. And I've looked online
Speaker 7: and the only solution I've seen thus far. Was somebody suggested,
Speaker 7: turn it upside down and see if the noise goes away.
Speaker 2: What was the solution? I'm sorry I missed that. What
Speaker 2: was the solution?
Speaker 7: Oh yeah, yeah, I've seen it once or twice. People said, yeah,
Speaker 7: I turn it upside down.
Speaker 2: In other words, well that can help.
Speaker 1: I mean this so it's making some sounds. I mean this,
Speaker 1: this player specifically is going on what ten years old?
Speaker 1: So and I think, what's happening here? It's got to
Speaker 1: be the fan because there's no moving parts inside this
Speaker 1: thing except a fan, I'm guessing, so that's got to
Speaker 1: be what's happening. So have you tried? I mean, there's
Speaker 1: if you're trying to, you know, save this thing, which
Speaker 1: you know after ten years. I mean, look, Rocus are great,
Speaker 1: by the way, I love them. The Ultra, like you said,
Speaker 1: is fantastic. They've got a great range of apps. Pretty
Speaker 1: much every app is if it's available, is there. I
Speaker 1: you know, I love Roku because they pretty much And
Speaker 1: the guy who started it for it, what his name
Speaker 1: is off the top of my head, James might have
Speaker 1: been his name, but he basically I was at an
Speaker 1: event and he said, like I built this because this
Speaker 1: is what I wanted to be able to watch TV, right,
Speaker 1: And so I think that out of all the companies
Speaker 1: out there that make these streaming sticks, they really have
Speaker 1: like the viewer in mind. And that's what I think
Speaker 1: is the greatest thing and why people love Roku because
Speaker 1: if you think about it, you know, when I put
Speaker 1: on my Google TV, they're trying to sell me all
Speaker 1: kinds of stuff. There's ads everywhere. You know, there's like
Speaker 1: here's what's you know, They're trying to get me to
Speaker 1: download apps and this and that. Yeah, same thing with
Speaker 1: Fire TV. I mean Fire TV is just like a
Speaker 1: vessel for like all things Amazon and whatever ads they
Speaker 1: can do. Apple TV is great, but it's Apple. So
Speaker 1: it's like, oh, here's our way or the highway, right,
Speaker 1: like we don't we don't they care about you, but
Speaker 1: only to a certain extent. They really care about, you know,
Speaker 1: the way they want to do things. But Roku is
Speaker 1: like this independent. It's like Switzerland. It's like, hey, we
Speaker 1: want to remain independent of everything. We're just gonna give
Speaker 1: you what you want. But I would say, Mark, if
Speaker 1: you're trying to solve the issues here, maybe a little
Speaker 1: canned air if there's a place to like spray that
Speaker 1: in there.
Speaker 2: I mean, you could try opening it. I wouldn't really
Speaker 2: recommend that because who knows what's going to happen there,
Speaker 2: could you know, be electrical shock whatever. But yeah, the
Speaker 2: fan is probably what's causing this. After ten years, it's probably.
Speaker 1: Did you Yeah, you live in La so I mean
Speaker 1: look the air, it's probably just got a lot of
Speaker 1: gunk in there, right, I mean that's probably what's happening.
Speaker 1: So that's what I recommend. Or I mean, look, Roku's
Speaker 1: are not that expensive.
Speaker 2: I get it.
Speaker 1: This thing has been going for ten years. It's great,
Speaker 1: but you know, you can get a new one if
Speaker 1: this one is just really annoying. And to me, if
Speaker 1: I'm trying to watch TV and I'm hearing a whining,
Speaker 1: worrying sound, that's going to be really obnoxious. I barely
Speaker 1: like to watch TV with the you know, the washing
Speaker 1: machine on or something like that in the background, dishwasher.
Speaker 1: But yeah, so did you solve this problem or no?
Speaker 7: Uh no, sir? Yeah, And you're right, it's a wonderful.
Speaker 7: It just it was a game changer. I do watch
Speaker 7: a lot of Pluto, which I can put on my phone,
Speaker 7: even you know, pick up. But the Roku and Pluto
Speaker 7: allow you to, uh, if you're in the news like
Speaker 7: I am a lot, you know, politician, like international perspectives
Speaker 7: on what we don't hear here is very important. So
Speaker 7: this Roku for I don't use as much, mainly because
Speaker 7: of that. But the Ultra is just fantastic. I have
Speaker 7: in my office and in the background I'm listening to
Speaker 7: this or that. Yeah, I'm gonna have to tear it
Speaker 7: apart and maybe louve it in some respect. I didn't
Speaker 7: want to break it open, but I guess I'm gonna
Speaker 7: have to.
Speaker 2: Yeah, keep me posted. I'm curious.
Speaker 1: I mean, look, it's probably not got that much inside, right,
Speaker 1: It's got a couple of things going on in there.
Speaker 1: It's if there's screws on the bottom, you can open
Speaker 1: it up easily, you know, obviously make sure it's not
Speaker 1: plugged in or anything like that. He thinks, Yeah, I
Speaker 1: mean there's you know, just see what you got and
Speaker 1: you know, and if it doesn't work out, you know,
Speaker 1: probably get a new one. I mean, they're they're like
Speaker 1: I said, you're the man.
Speaker 2: Thank you, Mark, appreciate the call.
Speaker 5: Today.
Speaker 1: Eight to eight rich One O one eight eight eight
Speaker 1: seven four to two four one zero one. I'll tell
Speaker 1: you why Yahoo is cutting its free storage. Coming up next,
Speaker 1: Welcome back to rich On Tech. Rich Demiro here hanging
Speaker 1: out with you, talking technology at Richontech Dot TV. UH
Speaker 1: eighty eight rich one O one eight eight eight seven
Speaker 1: four to two four one zero one. You know, not
Speaker 1: every song Mom picks is gonna work out. No that
Speaker 1: I don't know what that was, but that that was, uh,
Speaker 1: that was strange.
Speaker 2: Uh.
Speaker 1: Yahoo Male is cutting their free storage apparently from one
Speaker 1: terrorbyte to twenty gigabytes, So you know, I got a
Speaker 1: couple of emails about this from folks. Seems like a
Speaker 1: big deal. I mean, if you're going from a terrorbyte
Speaker 1: to twenty gigabytes, that is a ninety eight percent reduction.
Speaker 1: But Yahoo, in a support page, says that users over
Speaker 1: the limit are going to get email notices and a
Speaker 1: grace period before their service is impacted.
Speaker 2: Yahoo calls the.
Speaker 1: Change reasonable and they, you know, they say that the
Speaker 1: I guess the reasonable limit, you'll you'll be fine for
Speaker 1: a while. I guess once you're over the limit, though,
Speaker 1: you cannot send or receive emails until you free up
Speaker 1: your space or better yet, which is what they probably
Speaker 1: want you to do is upgrade. So now they have
Speaker 1: paid plans one hundred gigs for two dollars a month,
Speaker 1: one terabyte for nine So you're telling me you used
Speaker 1: to get the terabyte for free and now it's ten
Speaker 1: dollars a month. See this is weird because okay, Yahoo
Speaker 1: mail Plus, Oh that's that's interesting. Yahoo Mail Plus is
Speaker 1: two hundred gigabytes with no ads for five dollars a month.
Speaker 1: So here's the deal. We have become accustomed to not
Speaker 1: paying for email. Most people out there just don't pay
Speaker 1: for their email unless you have a business or something
Speaker 1: like that special address that you want.
Speaker 2: But most people just get like a.
Speaker 1: Gmail, a wel, Yahoo, Outlook, dot com, and they just
Speaker 1: don't pay for email. And so the fact that Yahoo
Speaker 1: is now trying to get people to do that, you
Speaker 1: know it's worth a try. But the thing is like, okay,
Speaker 1: so if you're on something like a Gmail, right you
Speaker 1: get fifteen gigs of storage for free, that's fine. But
Speaker 1: the thing that Google has. The advantage they have is
Speaker 1: that they have a whole bunch of other products you're
Speaker 1: using that you might use storage on, so it's linked
Speaker 1: to your Google Photos. It's linked to your drive, it's
Speaker 1: linked to your docs, and so it might seem more
Speaker 1: reasonable to pay five dollars a month, two dollars a month,
Speaker 1: ten dollars a month, or you know, whatever you pay
Speaker 1: for Google because you're getting a whole bunch of stuff.
Speaker 1: So for this, two dollars a month for one hundred
Speaker 1: gigs not bad? But does that? Does Yahoo? I don't
Speaker 1: even know what Yahoo services? What do they have it
Speaker 1: these days? I mean, it's just what do they have
Speaker 1: at this point? I don't think they have like a
Speaker 1: Yahoo drive. They have Yahoo Mail, Yeah, who's secure? Yahoo Support,
Speaker 1: Yahoo Fantasy yeah. I mean it's not like they have
Speaker 1: a I don't think they have like a Yahoo drive
Speaker 1: or even Yahoo Photos. Does Yahoo have a Photos? I
Speaker 1: don't think they do. I mean it used to be
Speaker 1: Flicker as part of that, but they're gone. They're part
Speaker 1: of their own thing now there's I think they're smug
Speaker 1: mug bought them. Uh anyway, So yeah, if you're affected
Speaker 1: by this, I would go to the help page on
Speaker 1: I'll put the link to the help page. But they're
Speaker 1: going to give you tools to manage your space, to
Speaker 1: get rid of you know, big files. And things like that.
Speaker 1: The other thing is you can try that's easy. It's
Speaker 1: just empty your trash after deleting your emails, because otherwise
Speaker 1: it's still taking up storage and they probably so once
Speaker 1: you put the emails in the trash, they probably stay
Speaker 1: there for a certain amount of time before they fully delete.
Speaker 1: So if you don't delete them, if you want to
Speaker 1: reclaim your storage instantly, you could just empty the trash instantly.
Speaker 1: But I think you know it's just you'll know if
Speaker 1: you're affected by that. Speaking of email, Richard and Calabasas says,
Speaker 1: I have way too many old emails in Gmail, almost
Speaker 1: two hundred thousand, and I want to delete them from
Speaker 1: particular senders in bulk. The problem is Gmail only seems
Speaker 1: to let me do fifty at a time. Here's the
Speaker 1: trick to that, Richard. You have to go to your desktop.
Speaker 1: Go to your desktop. And what I do is, I've
Speaker 1: told you this, I am ruthless when it comes to
Speaker 1: cleaning out my email. I do have a ton of
Speaker 1: emails in Gmail. But what I do is, when someone
Speaker 1: sends me an email I want to get rid of
Speaker 1: all the emails. I just take their email address and
Speaker 1: copy and paste it and so copy that in, put
Speaker 1: it in the search bar, and now all of the
Speaker 1: emails from that person comes up. And what you want
Speaker 1: to do is tap the select icon, the box right
Speaker 1: underneath the froom up at the top almost and that
Speaker 1: will select all their emails. And if there's more emails
Speaker 1: that are not on that first page, it'll pop up
Speaker 1: with a little thing that says, hey, do you want
Speaker 1: to select all emails in the conversation, like all one thousand?
Speaker 1: Tap yes, and it will select every email from that
Speaker 1: person and then you can delete them. Now, keep in
Speaker 1: mind your screen takes a second or two to refresh,
Speaker 1: so if it looks like nothing's happening, it's it's deleting
Speaker 1: the oldest emails first, and it's making its way to
Speaker 1: that first email in the top. Eighty eight rich one
Speaker 1: on one eighty eight seven four to two four one
Speaker 1: zero one. Coming up, we're talking tech with Brett right
Speaker 1: here on rich On Tech. Welcome, Welcome back to rich
Speaker 1: On Tech. Rich DeMuro here hanging out with you, talking
Speaker 1: technology at triple A rich one oh one eight eight
Speaker 1: eight seven four to two four one zero one. What
Speaker 1: you can't see at home is what I see, and
Speaker 1: what I see is Bobo our boardop And when I
Speaker 1: do something silly or most of the time when I
Speaker 1: mess up, he just falls on the floor laughing.
Speaker 2: And that's what he's doing right now.
Speaker 1: So you don't see that I do, and uh, it's
Speaker 1: just it entertains me every time. Uh, but I see
Speaker 1: the calls. I know We've got you going to get
Speaker 1: to the calls in just a few minutes. Right now,
Speaker 1: we've got Brett Bristow on, creator of Tech with Brett.
Speaker 1: He runs a popular YouTube channel that's all about smart
Speaker 1: home and technology.
Speaker 2: And Brett, welcome to the show.
Speaker 8: Thanks for having me on, Rich.
Speaker 1: So tell me what was the you know, why did
Speaker 1: you create this YouTube channel? Like what was your kind
Speaker 1: of first idea for it? And it's taken off?
Speaker 2: I know.
Speaker 8: Yeah, Well, when I was growing up, I was surrounded
Speaker 8: by technology, and then as more technology came out, I
Speaker 8: found that there was missing pieces of people on YouTube
Speaker 8: talking about certain parts, especially how they're going to be
Speaker 8: used by a consumer like me. So I began starting
Speaker 8: with the smartphone I had, and talked about how to
Speaker 8: use all the things that you can do, because definitely
Speaker 8: we're not using all the features that these products have.
Speaker 8: So I began to demo different tutorials on what these
Speaker 8: can do and made YouTube videos about how they can
Speaker 8: benefit your life. Because you've already bought it, why not
Speaker 8: make the most out of it.
Speaker 2: What was that first phone?
Speaker 8: The first phone I think was a Galaxy S five
Speaker 8: and I remember making a video of me dunking it
Speaker 8: in water and then my daughter drank the water. Then
Speaker 8: you just dunk the phone real nice brat. Yeah, hey,
Speaker 8: it was a fun video. We had a great time.
Speaker 1: Oh my gosh, that was so it's so wild because
Speaker 1: now phones, I mean, they're not boring, but like the features,
Speaker 1: like we understand their water proof or this or that,
Speaker 1: but like when these phones first came out with these
Speaker 1: unique features, Like I remember going to a hotel pool
Speaker 1: with one of the Galaxy S whatever when it got
Speaker 1: water resistance, and I brought it to the pool and
Speaker 1: like took under, you know, pictures of my kid, Like
Speaker 1: we went swimming.
Speaker 2: So it was like kind of fun, you know.
Speaker 1: Now it's like okay, yeah, it's like everything is like
Speaker 1: table stakes, Like okay, it's water resistant, what else can
Speaker 1: you do? And yeah, some of your most popular videos
Speaker 1: are the ones that tell you all the things you
Speaker 1: can do with these gadgets, which you know most people
Speaker 1: are not. They're not getting the most out of all
Speaker 1: of them. So that's good that you do that. So
Speaker 1: give me the current state of smart home tech. Who
Speaker 1: do you think is winning?
Speaker 9: Uh?
Speaker 2: Who is winning?
Speaker 8: Right now? It's kind of all over the place. I'm
Speaker 8: still a Google Home fan. Alexis doing great, But there's
Speaker 8: some other third parties like home Assistant. I don't know
Speaker 8: if you've heard about that, but that's a lot of
Speaker 8: people are going that way where it's kind of all
Speaker 8: done on your own, at your own home, with your
Speaker 8: own server. I haven't got there, but a lot of
Speaker 8: people are leaning that way because they're tired of waiting
Speaker 8: for these other companies to come out with these features
Speaker 8: that work across the board with all products.
Speaker 1: Well, that's interesting. Is that kind of like what Thread
Speaker 1: is on these other ones? Because I know Thread does
Speaker 1: everything locally, but that's not the same thing, is it.
Speaker 8: Yeah, Thread is kind of like a protocol that you
Speaker 8: can use. So Home Assistant has all the protocols, at
Speaker 8: least they say they do, so you can take whatever
Speaker 8: kind of device you have and then incorporate it into
Speaker 8: their platform, where others like Apple Home, Google Home, Alexa.
Speaker 8: You can use specific devices that are kind of built that,
Speaker 8: but Thread has allowed you to add pretty much all
Speaker 8: of these different devices into those platforms as well.
Speaker 1: Oh I see Home Assistant is like open source. That's
Speaker 1: cool exactly. Yeah, oh okay, So you have to have
Speaker 1: a little how would you run this? Like would you
Speaker 1: run out on like a computer or something in your home?
Speaker 8: You can You can totally do that all on your own,
Speaker 8: but they do sell a little I think it's one
Speaker 8: hundred dollars box that you can then apply. I haven't
Speaker 8: done this myself, but everyone tells me I need to
Speaker 8: because it answers all the problems with smart homes. But
Speaker 8: it's a little thing you can add to your home
Speaker 8: like a hub and then start working from there.
Speaker 1: It sounds like it's much more hands on, like it's
Speaker 1: not for the average like the average person could plug
Speaker 1: in a Google Home or a smart speaker from Amazon
Speaker 1: and be up and running in like ten seconds. This
Speaker 1: seems like you have more control over what you're doing,
Speaker 1: but it's more for like tinkerers that know what they're doing.
Speaker 8: Exactly where I myself, I like to have it, I
Speaker 8: pick it up, I set it up and it's ready
Speaker 8: to go. I don't need a tinker with too much
Speaker 8: to get it working the way.
Speaker 2: I want it to.
Speaker 1: Now, you mentioned Google Home that you're a big fan.
Speaker 1: Now I know my Google Home in recent months has
Speaker 1: pretty much just given answers from the web at this point,
Speaker 1: like anything you ask it, it's like it's not really
Speaker 1: it's like in this in between phase of it used
Speaker 1: to be Google Assistant, it's not yet Gemini. What is
Speaker 1: happening with that? Like, are we gonna get Gemini on
Speaker 1: these Google Home devices?
Speaker 8: Yeah, this is something I've been waiting for for a
Speaker 8: long time because Google's really pushing Gemini and I'm on
Speaker 8: the public beta preview or whatever. So I do currently
Speaker 8: have Gemini on my Google Home speaker. So you may
Speaker 8: be able to do it in the settings. You can
Speaker 8: actually go in and switch if you want to use
Speaker 8: Google Assistant or if you want to switch it to Gemini,
Speaker 8: which is rolling out to certain devices that you can
Speaker 8: use it. And I've been using that on my devices
Speaker 8: at home and there's some good things that work great.
Speaker 8: Other things it's still trying to figure out how to
Speaker 8: do and learning and it's a stepping process. But I
Speaker 8: think they're headed in the right direction.
Speaker 1: I'm on the public preview and I check like every
Speaker 1: day if I can get Gemini, and like, it's just not.
Speaker 1: It's either I'm looking in the wrong place or it's
Speaker 1: just not available to me just yet. So I am, yeah,
Speaker 1: I don't have it just yet still, So but once
Speaker 1: you have it, I mean that should make things a
Speaker 1: lot better.
Speaker 2: So is Gemini.
Speaker 1: It can answer questions, but it can also control the
Speaker 1: smart home stuff.
Speaker 8: Yeah, so the main thing I'm using it for still
Speaker 8: is controlling my smart home stuff, so it now has
Speaker 8: all that integrated. One of the new things that I've
Speaker 8: noticed is if I set a timer, I can now
Speaker 8: see the timer on my Android phone without having to
Speaker 8: ask again and again when the timer's going to run.
Speaker 8: So there's some integration there. There's still some things like
Speaker 8: I asked it to turn off a fan last night,
Speaker 8: but it turned off the wrong fan, so we're still
Speaker 8: getting that kind of worked out. But then there's some
Speaker 8: extra integration, like if you have a Google Nest camera,
Speaker 8: the new Nest cameras can understand what's happening in the scene,
Speaker 8: so I can actually ask when my son was in
Speaker 8: the backyard camera and it will let me know when
Speaker 8: it last saw him.
Speaker 2: Oh, that's cool. That's it.
Speaker 1: I was just talking about the Ring notifications I'm getting
Speaker 1: that are AI. So Ring is using AI to look
Speaker 1: at what's happening with the video camera and it will
Speaker 1: send you notification saying not just someone's at your front door,
Speaker 1: it'll say there is a delivery person with a bag
Speaker 1: at the front door, you know, something like that.
Speaker 8: So yeah, very similar to what that's doing. And it's
Speaker 8: really helpful. You can go on the app too, and
Speaker 8: it shows you know, this person was on their phone
Speaker 8: under the umbrella in the backyard, and I'm like, wow,
Speaker 8: that's pretty cool to have all that detail that you
Speaker 8: can even search through.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's cool.
Speaker 1: Any standout gadgets you've been testing recently that you would recommend.
Speaker 8: That I would recommend. Well, this year has been the
Speaker 8: year of robots at my house, so we've been doing
Speaker 8: all kinds of robot vacuum in mops, robots, lawnmowers. I
Speaker 8: don't have a pool, but I've also tested out a
Speaker 8: few robot pool cleaners, and the latest ones is the Narwal.
Speaker 8: I just test out their new Narwal Flow, which mops
Speaker 8: perfectly in the home and vacuums up everything. So makes
Speaker 8: our house a lot cleaner as we have all these
Speaker 8: kids running around to make it dirty every day.
Speaker 5: Yeah.
Speaker 2: Wait, how many kids you have? We have four kids? Okay,
Speaker 2: four kids. Yeah, that's a lot. My parents had five.
Speaker 1: I've got two and I we're good with two because
Speaker 1: it's it's it's a lot, you know, kids are My
Speaker 1: kid just went to high school this week, so I'm like, oh,
Speaker 1: it's it's wild.
Speaker 2: So there's a lot to clean up, that's sure.
Speaker 1: Well, I've got one of those robotic vacuums the now,
Speaker 1: the narwalal Flow. Is that an upright or is that
Speaker 1: an actual? Like it just goes by itself. It just
Speaker 1: goes by itself, so okay, all on its own. You
Speaker 1: can have it run while you're sleeping and it mops
Speaker 1: and vacuums and does everything. Okay, Yeah, that's handy. I mean,
Speaker 1: I've got the upright one from robo Rock and I
Speaker 1: love it. I mean, is it is so cool to
Speaker 1: be able to mop and vacuum at the same time,
Speaker 1: because you would think that it wouldn't be good at
Speaker 1: either of those, but it's really good at both of
Speaker 1: those things.
Speaker 8: That's the favorite product I brought home from my wife.
Speaker 8: She loves how it's just so quick and easy to
Speaker 8: quickly get it done.
Speaker 1: Yeah, okay, So let's talk about a common question. I
Speaker 1: know you got probably a lot of emails from people
Speaker 1: that watch your channel on YouTube Tech with Brett. What
Speaker 1: are some of the common questions you get these days
Speaker 1: about technology and smart homes.
Speaker 8: So one of the biggest things is how things are
Speaker 8: going to work together or how you can have them
Speaker 8: work together. So you know, what smartlights should I get
Speaker 8: to incorporate it into my smart home if I want
Speaker 8: them to automatically turn off at night, or when I
Speaker 8: open a door with a sensor. So those are some
Speaker 8: of the big things that people are focusing on, and
Speaker 8: in my life that's what I use mainly, just simple
Speaker 8: little products that benefit my life. Like we have a
Speaker 8: garage without a window, and nobody ever wants to go
Speaker 8: in there if it's dark. So I have a little
Speaker 8: door sensor right on the door. You open the door,
Speaker 8: and it automatically turns on the lights that are on
Speaker 8: a smart light switch. So the grudge has never been
Speaker 8: dark to us, even though it's just because we're opening
Speaker 8: the door. The light's automatically tron, which is a huge
Speaker 8: benefit to our lives.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and it's such a small thing, but this is
Speaker 1: what I find about the home. The smart home tech
Speaker 1: stuff is like it's like you set it up once
Speaker 1: and hopefully it works for a very long time. But
Speaker 1: it really like changes the dynamic of things in your home,
Speaker 1: and it seems intimidating at first to like set it up.
Speaker 1: Like I've got a system in my kitchen where I've
Speaker 1: got those lights underneath the cabinets and I set up
Speaker 1: a sensor, like a motion sensor. So every time I
Speaker 1: walk into my kitchen, the lights under the cabinets come on,
Speaker 1: and I love it. And I set it up like
Speaker 1: years ago and it still works. And it's just one
Speaker 1: of those things that was like, yeah, it took a
Speaker 1: little bit to figure out, but once you do. Or
Speaker 1: in the hallway, I've got a light that you know,
Speaker 1: you've got a sensor in the hallway and every time
Speaker 1: you get near that hallway, the light comes on. And
Speaker 1: by the way, at night, the light comes on at
Speaker 1: a varying brightness, like a lower brightness. So it's like
Speaker 1: these little things that like once you figure it out
Speaker 1: and you get it up and running, it really does
Speaker 1: impact your life in a pretty beneficial way.
Speaker 8: Yeah, you're talking advanced automations now, but clearly pretty easy
Speaker 8: to do and something that changes the way you run
Speaker 8: life and it makes things easier and more fun kind.
Speaker 1: Of Now in your home? Can anyone else figure out
Speaker 1: these automations? Because that's the thing, Like if I do
Speaker 1: something wrong, my wife is like, why isn't this work?
Speaker 2: And I'm like, I give you.
Speaker 1: A minute here, Like something changed, clearly, Yeah, that's That's
Speaker 1: been a.
Speaker 8: Problem on a few things I've added. So whenever I'm
Speaker 8: adding a new product to the home, I think about
Speaker 8: is everyone going to be able to use this? So
Speaker 8: I really like products that you can easily use, Like
Speaker 8: I use Cassada smart light switches in my home and
Speaker 8: they have controllers right on your light switch, or I
Speaker 8: can go on the app and control everything, or I
Speaker 8: can set up automations where at nine o'clock at night
Speaker 8: and the light automatically turns on and then it turns
Speaker 8: off at a certain period of time. So I like
Speaker 8: having all the different ways you can control the home
Speaker 8: instead of me being the only one that knows how
Speaker 8: to do anything.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's a good one, all right. We got less
Speaker 1: than a minute. Any useful apps or websites you want
Speaker 1: to recommend before we go.
Speaker 8: You know, I think we talked about Gemini, but even
Speaker 8: just using Gemini, they have this new video feature you've
Speaker 8: probably talked about a lot, but that you can ask
Speaker 8: it questions. And my dad's even using that to help
Speaker 8: him learn how to use his Alexa better. So there's
Speaker 8: kind of some integration there that you can use. Because
Speaker 8: now they're pretty smart.
Speaker 2: All the AI.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean AI is everywhere, and yes, I know
Speaker 1: people are scared of it and it's apprehensive, but it's
Speaker 1: it does do some really cool things when it works right.
Speaker 1: Brett Pristo Tech with Brett is the YouTube channel all
Speaker 1: kinds of tips and tricks to help you make your
Speaker 1: tech work the way you want it to check them
Speaker 1: out on YouTube.
Speaker 2: Thanks for joining me today, Thanks so much. Rich all right,
Speaker 2: I'll put.
Speaker 1: The link to Brett's YouTube channel my website rich on
Speaker 1: tech dot tv coming up. We'll take your calls at
Speaker 1: eighty eight rich one O one eight eight eight seven
Speaker 1: four to two.
Speaker 2: Four one zero one. Welcome back to rich on tech.
Speaker 1: Eight eight eight rich one O one eight eight eight
Speaker 1: seven four to two four one zero one. Rich on
Speaker 1: tech dot tv is the website. If you were listening
Speaker 1: to the interview with Brett, I got everything you mentioned
Speaker 1: linked up on the website rich on tech dot tv.
Speaker 1: Let's go to Kathy in Los Angeles. Kathy, welcome to show.
Speaker 9: Rich. Hi are you.
Speaker 2: I'm doing fantastic. Thank you for asking.
Speaker 9: Okay, here's my question. I am a reseller on eBay, posh, CRAIGSLISTA.
Speaker 9: I have a lot of clothing items with tags, the
Speaker 9: original tags A lot of them have, especially from Macy's.
Speaker 9: In order to return the items, there is a sticker
Speaker 9: with a barcode. Yes, and if you don't have that
Speaker 9: sticker with the barcode, it looks like you can't return it.
Speaker 2: Correct.
Speaker 9: Well, my question is if I sell the item to somebody,
Speaker 9: can they access that credit card information?
Speaker 1: Oh that's a great question. So those little barcodes, let's see.
Speaker 1: So the Macy's barcodes, I'm gonna see if there's anything
Speaker 1: documented about what's on those What info do they hold?
Speaker 1: So I think that barcode what I think it does?
Speaker 1: I know they started this to combat theft and you know,
Speaker 1: fraudulent returns and things like that, So I think that
Speaker 1: barcode links up that item to a particular receipt, and
Speaker 1: I think that's all it does. But I don't think
Speaker 1: that's that barcode specifically holds any information that you could
Speaker 1: scan to see it. Now, you could get a barcode
Speaker 1: scanning app on your But the thing is what that
Speaker 1: does is it's just going to give you it doesn't
Speaker 1: don't they have a number listed on the barcode underneath it?
Speaker 9: You mean like a bunch of numbers.
Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, So I think what it's doing is it's
Speaker 1: just it's just that barcode is just giving those numbers.
Speaker 1: That's all it's doing. Now, if you were if you
Speaker 1: had access to Macy's database, you could pop those numbers
Speaker 1: into a database and then see what Macy's has connected
Speaker 1: to that. But the average person does not have access
Speaker 1: to that.
Speaker 9: So so anyway, if I sell it to somebody in
Speaker 9: another state when there's a Macy's, they go they can
Speaker 9: take it to Macy's and go, hi, I would like
Speaker 9: to return this. Would they be able to return it
Speaker 9: without physical receipts?
Speaker 1: Well, I don't know does Macy's allow you to do that?
Speaker 1: Because I think that they basically did. So when you
Speaker 1: go to Macy's.
Speaker 5: Have you.
Speaker 1: I haven't returned to Macy's in a while. But basically,
Speaker 1: do they just scan that little barcode on the clothing.
Speaker 2: And that's it? Yep, and it brings up everything? Now,
Speaker 2: why would you?
Speaker 1: Okay, So if that's the case, maybe you just don't
Speaker 1: include these barcodes.
Speaker 2: On the on the No.
Speaker 9: No, I just removed like four today, I thought, because
Speaker 9: I'm really LERI of barcodes. Which leads me to another question.
Speaker 9: Because I buy a lot on Amazon and the box
Speaker 9: is the banks, there are tons of barcodes. Yes, I
Speaker 9: rip off my address, but there's still all these bar codes.
Speaker 9: Should I rip everything off or cover it?
Speaker 5: Uh?
Speaker 9: No?
Speaker 2: I don't think you need to anything. That is.
Speaker 1: It is a great question as well, because I often
Speaker 1: wonder this when I reuse a box from Amazon. So
Speaker 1: a lot of those barcodes are just internal to their
Speaker 1: system and so they're not going to have any personal
Speaker 1: identifiable information that links them to you. The main thing
Speaker 1: that might link them to you is if there is
Speaker 1: a tracking number on there from a major tracking company
Speaker 1: like a UPS or a FedEx.
Speaker 2: But you know Amazon doesn't love their own stuff really Yeah?
Speaker 1: Well ah, well yeah, so I would take those off
Speaker 1: because what you could do is, now here's the thing.
Speaker 1: It may not show your address, but it may show
Speaker 1: where it was delivered. So let's say you live in
Speaker 1: you know, you said you live in LA. Let's say
Speaker 1: you lived in a very specific city that this package
Speaker 1: was delivered to. It would say that name of that
Speaker 1: city if someone popped in that tracking number, so that
Speaker 1: you know. And I think it's good that you're you're
Speaker 1: aware of all these different things, because yes, we should
Speaker 1: be questioning this stuff and making sure that if you're
Speaker 1: reusing something or you're, you know, sending something to someone,
Speaker 1: you know, even something as simple as a picture from
Speaker 1: your smartphone, it may include your GPS information in there.
Speaker 1: So you have to think about these things as you
Speaker 1: do this stuff.
Speaker 9: What do you mean a picture like if I take
Speaker 9: a picture for eBay, can somebody actually find information about
Speaker 9: the photo?
Speaker 1: Theoretically, but eBay and many of the social media sites
Speaker 1: they strip that what's called exif data exif they strip that,
Speaker 1: they strip that information.
Speaker 2: Hold on, let me, I'm getting a website here. Oh
Speaker 2: my god, what's that? What I mean?
Speaker 9: It's like, for example, which is even worse, Craigslist. If
Speaker 9: i'm selling locally, yes, or offer up, and there's the
Speaker 9: photos I take. Somebody can actually kind of research.
Speaker 2: Okay, yeah, so I'm looking I'm looking here.
Speaker 1: Uh okay, so yes, So Craigslist does strip the exift data.
Speaker 1: So here's what I would do. So I would there's
Speaker 1: a there's a great website called Jeffrey's Exift Viewer, And
Speaker 1: I know it's a it's a weird name, but it's
Speaker 1: a super simple website. And you can take an image
Speaker 1: either a file or a URL. You can pop it
Speaker 1: into this website and it will tell you if the
Speaker 1: image data is in that website, and so you can.
Speaker 1: Now here's the thing. Not every website strips this information,
Speaker 1: which is why it's best to do it on your
Speaker 1: own before you post these things, because it could be
Speaker 1: embedded in there. So look, Kathy, I don't want to
Speaker 1: scare you. I think you're you're doing okay, and most
Speaker 1: people are not. You know, most people are good people
Speaker 1: that are buying this stuff, and it's fine, but I
Speaker 1: would be aware of this. And so if I were you,
Speaker 1: before you upload your pictures anywhere, I would just use
Speaker 1: a simple tool to strip the exit data. And I
Speaker 1: you know, I have a tool that I use that
Speaker 1: I do that with every time TENI fy T, I
Speaker 1: n I f y.
Speaker 2: You can use that.
Speaker 9: I've got it.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'm gonna put it all on the website. I'll
Speaker 1: put everything on the website. So great questions, Kathy, really
Speaker 1: appreciate it. Really, you know, you got to think about
Speaker 1: this stuff. Privacy is very important, especially in the digital world.
Speaker 1: It is very easy to share this stuff, and once
Speaker 1: it's out there, it's tough to take back. This is
Speaker 1: rich on Tech. Welcome back to rich on Tech. Rich
Speaker 1: DeMuro here hanging out with you, talking technology at Triple
Speaker 1: eight rich one oh one eight eight eight seven four
Speaker 1: two four one zero one. All right, So before the
Speaker 1: break we were talking about EXIF data, and I feel
Speaker 1: like I need to talk about it a little bit
Speaker 1: more just to help you understand what this is. So
Speaker 1: and then we'll get to the calls, I promise. But basically,
Speaker 1: when you take a picture, your phone puts information into
Speaker 1: that picture, including GPS location of where that picture was taken. Now,
Speaker 1: typically when you share that picture, that information is embedded
Speaker 1: in the file and someone that knows what they're doing
Speaker 1: could see where that image is on a map. So
Speaker 1: let me give you an example. You post you're selling
Speaker 1: a car, and you post a picture of your car
Speaker 1: and your driveway on some form on the web. Well,
Speaker 1: someone could theoretically download that picture, pop it into a viewer,
Speaker 1: and see exactly the GPS coordinates of where that picture
Speaker 1: was taken.
Speaker 2: This This happens all the time.
Speaker 5: You know.
Speaker 1: There's been many documented cases where celebrities post something and
Speaker 1: someone that's smart goes in and says, hey, you know
Speaker 1: you're sharing your address too. Now, many of because they've
Speaker 1: gotten hip to this, many of the major sharing platforms
Speaker 1: like an X, like a threads, like a Facebook, they
Speaker 1: typically strip this data out of these pictures when you
Speaker 1: upload them. They keep it and of course they use
Speaker 1: it for their own benefits, which is they can tell
Speaker 1: exactly where you're uploading this picture from or where you
Speaker 1: took this picture, and they slice and dice that data
Speaker 1: in a million different ways and use it for all
Speaker 1: kinds of stuff.
Speaker 2: But that's besides the point.
Speaker 1: But they make it so that that picture doesn't have
Speaker 1: that metadata if you download it. So if I go
Speaker 1: on Facebook and download five random pictures from people that
Speaker 1: posted them, there shouldn't be location information in those pictures.
Speaker 2: So you're safe in that way.
Speaker 1: But I would argue that you probably want to remove
Speaker 1: this data no matter what you want it in your
Speaker 1: pictures because it helps you see your pictures on a
Speaker 1: map and search for where you took pictures and things
Speaker 1: like this. But if you're sharing them outside of your phone,
Speaker 1: you probably want to get rid of this. Now, if
Speaker 1: you look at the iPhone, when you go to share
Speaker 1: a picture with someone, there's actually an option up at
Speaker 1: the top that says do you want to include the
Speaker 1: location data? So if you look at it right at
Speaker 1: the top, when you go share, it says location is included,
Speaker 1: and you can tap options and you can turn that off.
Speaker 1: And so that picture, when you share it with someone,
Speaker 1: wherever you're sharing it, where they're uploading it, whatever you're doing,
Speaker 1: that location data will not be embedded into that picture.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna check on Android and see if it's got
Speaker 1: it on there. Let's go to the gallery on the Samsung.
Speaker 1: Here's a picture I just took. Let's go share, and
Speaker 1: I see up at the top it says one image options.
Speaker 1: Tap the options and there it is include location data.
Speaker 1: So turn that off if you don't want your location included.
Speaker 1: How is this helpful. Let's say you meet someone online
Speaker 1: and you're chatting with them, they say, hey, send me
Speaker 1: a picture. You can take the location data off that picture.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's really like you probably never even noticed
Speaker 1: this was an option when you're sharing photos, but now
Speaker 1: that I told you about it, you'll notice. Now there's
Speaker 1: a couple websites I mentioned Jeffrey's Eggs if you were
Speaker 1: clearly that is no longer being updated. So I've found
Speaker 1: some new ones that do something very similar. So if
Speaker 1: you want to take a picture that you've gotten, just
Speaker 1: take any photo from your library, download it and pop
Speaker 1: it into this website and see what happens.
Speaker 2: Exif editor dot io.
Speaker 1: As soon as you upload that picture, it will show
Speaker 1: you on a GPS map where that picture was taken
Speaker 1: if the information is in there, and then it gives
Speaker 1: you an option to scrub that metadata as well. Jimple
Speaker 1: jimpl dot com. You can drag and drop a picture
Speaker 1: in there, or you can take a URL from a
Speaker 1: website photo and put it in there and you can
Speaker 1: see if the person left the metadata in there. And
Speaker 1: I'm not telling you this to be nefarious. I'm telling
Speaker 1: this to you because you need to know about this.
Speaker 1: This is really important stuff.
Speaker 5: Now.
Speaker 1: If you want to get rid of the metadata on
Speaker 1: your pictures, I told you the two ways to do
Speaker 1: it when you're sharing a picture on your iPhone or
Speaker 1: you're Android. There are also apps on your iPhone and
Speaker 1: Android that will help you remove this data from your pictures.
Speaker 1: I don't have a good recommendation for that right now,
Speaker 1: but on the web there's a website called priv metapriv
Speaker 1: meta dot com, and I like this one because it
Speaker 1: can be done completely offline, So you can turn the
Speaker 1: Internet off on your computer and you can still remove
Speaker 1: the metadata from a photo. And so you can just
Speaker 1: drag a photo in there and press removed metadata. It
Speaker 1: will download that picture immediately without the metadata. So I
Speaker 1: would say, at the very least, if you're sharing pictures
Speaker 1: to a major website, just put them through this first,
Speaker 1: so that the website doesn't have access to that metadata,
Speaker 1: and then the person downloading it doesn't have access either.
Speaker 1: The only little caveat to this, because I remove metadata
Speaker 1: from iphotos all the time, is that sometimes if it
Speaker 1: strips the metadata, it strips more than the location photo
Speaker 1: maybe turned upside down or something, because inside that metadata
Speaker 1: it also tells the computer, Hey, the person took the
Speaker 1: photo this way like this was this is the right
Speaker 1: way up. So sometimes you may have to rotate your photos.
Speaker 1: You'll notice that will happen from time to time. Anyway,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna put this all on the website. Rich on
Speaker 1: tech Dot TV again, episode one thirty four. You just
Speaker 1: gave me a great idea for a TV segment, so
Speaker 1: I will be doing a TV segment on this soon
Speaker 1: as well. It's one of those things that I take
Speaker 1: for granted, and I think a lot of techies take
Speaker 1: for granted. But people average person just doesn't realize how
Speaker 1: much information is embedded in a photo when they send
Speaker 1: it to someone else. So it's very good to know
Speaker 1: that information. All right, Let's uh, let's see here. Let's
Speaker 1: see here. Sue is in Long Beach. Sue, you're on
Speaker 1: with Rich. Sounds like more privacy question, Huh.
Speaker 10: Yes. The last color that just called was asking about
Speaker 10: farcodes and all that, and I've always wondered and someone
Speaker 10: told me once because traveling, occasionally you stay in a
Speaker 10: hotel and the path the card that you use as
Speaker 10: your key, that I always take them home because someone said,
Speaker 10: don't leave them in the room because there's all your
Speaker 10: information is embedded in that card. Is that true?
Speaker 2: No? Not true?
Speaker 1: That is that is false. Here's the deal. So let's
Speaker 1: let's just say, let's just say you're Marriott, right, would
Speaker 1: you put all of your guests personal information, including their
Speaker 1: credit card, on this thing that can be lost, stolen,
Speaker 1: easily taken, whatever.
Speaker 2: No, you would not. So is there information on these cards? Absolutely?
Speaker 2: Is it anything that links you to anyone else? No?
Speaker 2: Or your credit card information? No?
Speaker 1: So I I do not worry about these cards. You know,
Speaker 1: these major hotel chains definitely think about this stuff in advance.
Speaker 1: In fact, the reason why we have these cards is
Speaker 1: because if you look at them, your your room number
Speaker 1: is not listed on that card for a reason, because
Speaker 1: think about it, if you found that card, you know,
Speaker 1: laying by the pool, what would you do. The first
Speaker 1: thing some would do is go to that room and
Speaker 1: steal everything in it. So there's no personal information, personally
Speaker 1: identifiable personally identifiable information. So what might be you know,
Speaker 1: there might be exceptions to this, Like in the old days,
Speaker 1: there was a magnetic strip on a lot of these.
Speaker 1: Now most of them are RFID, so there used to
Speaker 1: be a magnetic strip that may have contained information, So
Speaker 1: I'm saying, so am I saying that you can never
Speaker 1: find information on these cards? No, But the modern hotels
Speaker 1: that are using these tap cards, most of them are
Speaker 1: programmed in a way to protect your personal information and
Speaker 1: your credit card. So I don't think there's any reason
Speaker 1: to worry about leaving them. But I personally, you know,
Speaker 1: sometimes I'll take one home if I think they're cool.
Speaker 1: That's the only reason. But I will also, you know,
Speaker 1: you can give it to the front desk, and that
Speaker 1: way you ensure to a much higher degree that if
Speaker 1: there was anything on these cards, it's not going to
Speaker 1: land in the wrong hands.
Speaker 2: That make you feel better.
Speaker 10: Yes, thank you very much for confirming that for me.
Speaker 2: Yeah, absolutely, Sue.
Speaker 1: I'm actually quite impressed with these cards because they somehow
Speaker 1: I don't when I go to a hotel. I'm impressed
Speaker 1: that these things even work, and they somehow program them
Speaker 1: to only work for a certain period of time. So
Speaker 1: if you get like late checkout for a hotel room,
Speaker 1: which I often we'll ask for, they have to reprogram
Speaker 1: your cards because your card is typically going to stop
Speaker 1: working at eleven am. Now, every hotel is different.
Speaker 2: Don't you know. Come, you know, emailing me.
Speaker 1: If rich I was able to open my door at
Speaker 1: eleven oh five, Okay, you may be able to do
Speaker 1: that once in a while.
Speaker 2: I'm not sure.
Speaker 1: But the thing is, all of these hotels, modern hotels,
Speaker 1: using modern key card systems. You know, they're always thinking
Speaker 1: about the privacy and security of their guests, and so
Speaker 1: it is in their best interest to make sure that
Speaker 1: they are not encoding your credit card number, your name,
Speaker 1: your room number on those cards. Can it happen sure?
Speaker 1: Did it happen in the back in the past. Maybe,
Speaker 1: But again I think that most of these cards just
Speaker 1: include some sort of you know, token or exchange number
Speaker 1: that just basically the system looks that up to see
Speaker 1: if it can unlock that door. Now, if you had
Speaker 1: access to their back end system, like I said, with
Speaker 1: the Macy's barcode, could you get more information perhaps? But
Speaker 1: you know, for me, what you know, it's interesting with
Speaker 1: hotels because I'm always thinking about privacy and security always.
Speaker 2: I mean, I'm not kidding.
Speaker 1: I picked up my kid from school early yesterday and
Speaker 1: my school called me to make sure the person picking
Speaker 1: them up was okay. And I said, you know, as
Speaker 1: my mom picking up my kid, and they called me
Speaker 1: and said, we're sorry, mister Demiro, we have to confirm
Speaker 1: that it's you allowing this person to pick up your kid,
Speaker 1: and I said, yes, it is me. They said, okay,
Speaker 1: thank you for that verbal okay, And when my mom
Speaker 1: and kid got back into the car, I said, okay,
Speaker 1: Now here's how I think as a tech person. Here's okay,
Speaker 1: let's say you are going nefariously to pick up some
Speaker 1: random kid at a school, maybe you're trying to kidnap them, whatever.
Speaker 1: Here's how that would work.
Speaker 2: You would have this.
Speaker 1: You would hijack the person's phone number, right, so you
Speaker 1: have the person's control of their cell phone. Now you've
Speaker 1: got the person's cell phone in your command. And then
Speaker 1: the school calls you to say, hey, is this okay,
Speaker 1: we're calling the parent. You've now voice cloned that parent's voice.
Speaker 1: And when they call that phone, you say, yes, I'm
Speaker 1: the parent, it's okay, they can take my kid. This
Speaker 1: is the stuff I think about. This is the stuff
Speaker 1: we are up against. And you may be laughing, you
Speaker 1: may be saying, oh, that's out of that's wild, but no,
Speaker 1: there are people thinking about this stuff. So you as
Speaker 1: a as a consumer, as an average person, as a
Speaker 1: person that's just out there living your life, you have
Speaker 1: to always think about the potential of fraud, of security issues,
Speaker 1: of privacy issues, no matter what. Now that may sound
Speaker 1: far fetched, but this is happening on a daily basis.
Speaker 1: Maybe not with kids, but with all kinds of voice.
Speaker 1: People are out there trying to figure out ways to
Speaker 1: scam us every day, especially using new technology. So just
Speaker 1: I guess my bigger point with the hotel is anytime
Speaker 1: I go to the front desk to say like, hey,
Speaker 1: can I get a new key or a key mate,
Speaker 1: or can I get into my room if the housekeeping
Speaker 1: is outside, I always want them to either ask for
Speaker 1: my ID or somehow confirm that that is my room
Speaker 1: without just letting me in, because that.
Speaker 2: Would be a major security issue.
Speaker 1: Eighty eight Rich one on one eighty eight seven four
Speaker 1: to two, four one zero one. This is Rich on Tech.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to rich on Tech. Rich Demiro here hanging
Speaker 1: out with you, talking technology. Triple eight rich one oh
Speaker 1: one eighty eight eight seven four to two four to
Speaker 1: one zero one. Uh, Sandford is in Santa Barbara. You're
Speaker 1: on with Rich Hi.
Speaker 5: Rich, you know I've been listening to you since day one.
Speaker 5: For you to replace my mentor unbelievable. You're wonderful.
Speaker 2: No, how do you?
Speaker 5: How do you get this job? Uh? Well, I mean you,
Speaker 5: you reference you, you reference your mother constantly. It's wonderful.
Speaker 5: I I you know I have some problem. Is I
Speaker 5: hope you can help me? I? No, no, I know.
Speaker 5: I'm dying of three cancers, one reoccurring recently. But the
Speaker 5: UCLA got the worst treatment. It was horror. The whole thing.
Speaker 5: My whole life is based around one thing, me being entertained.
Speaker 5: When I'm lying in hospitals and nursing homes staring at
Speaker 5: the ceiling, I need to be have a projector. That
Speaker 5: is so simple that I just say that. Just I
Speaker 5: just flip the switch and it goes on and I
Speaker 5: can see everything I want to see above me while
Speaker 5: I lie there, complete.
Speaker 10: Disarray.
Speaker 5: It's just it's just horrible.
Speaker 2: Well, I'm sorry to hear that, but I hope you're
Speaker 2: getting well.
Speaker 5: And no, no, no, there's no way out of this.
Speaker 5: You have three cancers and five other life threatening medical conditions.
Speaker 5: You're not getting out of this. This is inevitable. I've
Speaker 5: I'm currently speaking to you on a motoroller is E
Speaker 5: four that has a instant projector on it, but something
Speaker 5: old garbage. I need a projector that is direct Wi
Speaker 5: Fi to whatever phone I have in my hand. I
Speaker 5: don't need an app to go through. I don't need it.
Speaker 5: I just need it just to turn it on and
Speaker 5: it says this projector right over here it is goes
Speaker 5: Wi Fi to my phone and I just hit it
Speaker 5: and it's on.
Speaker 1: Well, okay, Well, first off, I'm happy to be here
Speaker 1: for you. I'm glad that you like to listen and
Speaker 1: appreciate this show. That really means a lot to me,
Speaker 1: more than you think, or more than you know, I
Speaker 1: should say.
Speaker 5: So, are you able to call me off the air?
Speaker 11: Yeah?
Speaker 1: Well, well we can get Kim to get your info
Speaker 1: and we can do that.
Speaker 5: But I want to tell you something really cute. I
Speaker 5: when I was born in nineteen fifty one, my birth
Speaker 5: certificate says on it father's occupation, and it says radio
Speaker 5: announcer at where That's right kfi?
Speaker 2: Really absolutely Who is he?
Speaker 5: Well, you wouldn't know him. His name is Red Row
Speaker 5: and he was one of the very first announcers to
Speaker 5: do commercials live and then he went to television. He
Speaker 5: started morning talk show television on CBS. Oh wow, it's.
Speaker 2: So cool. Long history with radios, that's amazing.
Speaker 5: But as I listened to you and do you reference
Speaker 5: your mother and thinks I just go this guy WHOA.
Speaker 5: I like how you talked to the last collar and
Speaker 5: spoke of things that could be It was wonderful about
Speaker 5: things that you know, people don't think of, about staff
Speaker 5: taking in this and that. That's great. Man.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well, I'm usually a very positive person, but I
Speaker 1: do think my mind, you know, I'm always thinking in
Speaker 1: that that aspect of what could go wrong here? What
Speaker 1: is the what is the implication of anything, especially when
Speaker 1: it comes.
Speaker 5: To tel I'm sure you'll get over that eventually.
Speaker 1: So let's let's talk about what you're what you're calling
Speaker 1: in for. This idea of uh a projector that you
Speaker 1: can connect your phone now, I think it's.
Speaker 5: A small like a little TV thing that projects to
Speaker 5: wherever I wanted to do and it just needs to
Speaker 5: go direct Wi Fi. I don't need the apps in between.
Speaker 2: I need to be well.
Speaker 1: Here's here's the issue I'm I'm thinking of with direct
Speaker 1: Wi Fi. So most of these apps that you want
Speaker 1: to that you want to mirror to, they don't necessarily
Speaker 1: like the idea of their content being mirrored, you know,
Speaker 1: without their approval. So a lot of the apps, especially
Speaker 1: when it comes to projectors, they want to be casted
Speaker 1: if if that's the you know, if the the projector
Speaker 1: supports casting. So a couple of ways you can go here.
Speaker 1: Number one, I think the best projector if you want
Speaker 1: something that's small. Nebula makes a projector called the Capsule,
Speaker 1: which is really incredible.
Speaker 2: It's the size of a soda can.
Speaker 1: It's super simple and it's easy and it's got good
Speaker 1: software and so you can use that, but I don't
Speaker 1: know if you're gonna be able to actually cast to
Speaker 1: it versus or sorry a Wi Fi direct versus casting.
Speaker 1: So I'm looking at their page to see if they support. Yeah,
Speaker 1: mostly Chrome cast. You know, Netflix cannot be Chrome cast
Speaker 1: or mirrored, but you can, okay, So it does say
Speaker 1: you can mirror Android device to the projector, so you
Speaker 1: can do that. Now, it depends what app will allow that,
Speaker 1: that's for sure. It's it's going to depend on apps,
Speaker 1: but you've got that option. So that's number one. The
Speaker 1: other brand I like is x Jimmy x g I
Speaker 1: m I and they make some portable projectors. They're not
Speaker 1: as small, but they make one called the Mogo which
Speaker 1: is really nice as well, and they do have casting there.
Speaker 1: So the other thing Sanford that I would say to
Speaker 1: look into is X reel that X real glasses.
Speaker 2: You can just put on.
Speaker 1: You can be sitting in any position and see something
Speaker 1: projected above you and those connect write to your phone,
Speaker 1: no intermediary apps, so that might be the way to go.
Speaker 1: Thanks so much for the call today. I really appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Eighty to eight rich one oh one. This is rich
Speaker 1: on Tech. Welcome back to rich On Tech. David Lombard
Speaker 1: is founder of the Laptop Elf Project and he is
Speaker 1: here to talk about the best ways to securely, erase, recycle,
Speaker 1: or donate your old Mac or PC.
Speaker 2: David, welcome to the show.
Speaker 11: Thank you, Rich appreciate the invite. Good to see you again.
Speaker 1: Yes, we did a story for KTLA on TV a
Speaker 1: couple of years ago and you've been doing this ever since.
Speaker 1: So you've got tell me what the Laptop Elf Project is.
Speaker 11: So there's a couple of us volunteers, doctor Leo and me.
Speaker 12: We collect unwanted working laptops, small desktops and tablets. We
Speaker 12: wipe and refurbish them and give them to public school
Speaker 12: teachers and to nonprofits that help low income families and individuals.
Speaker 12: I'm almost twenty five hundred units donated so far.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, that's amazing.
Speaker 1: And so you take these computers, people think, oh, this
Speaker 1: computer is no good anymore, but you're like, no, no, no,
Speaker 1: it's still good.
Speaker 2: How long do you think a computer can actually last?
Speaker 12: So for most average users using email some web stuff,
Speaker 12: probably five to ten years, depending upon when they buy
Speaker 12: it during the operating system cycle. Now for heavy users
Speaker 12: like gamers, people who do video editing or something like that,
Speaker 12: their hardware is going to age out in probably three
Speaker 12: to five years, even less, because the demands of that
Speaker 12: work is.
Speaker 11: Going up there. And if you're doing AI, you.
Speaker 12: May need a new computer every year because the demands
Speaker 12: of that field is really really growing.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 1: What about this whole thing with Windows ten. I know
Speaker 1: people are worried about the Windows ten security up dates
Speaker 1: are ending in October. I know Microsoft said they're going
Speaker 1: to give like an extra year for that if you
Speaker 1: sign up, But what's the deal with that?
Speaker 12: So yeah, so Windows ten has been out there for
Speaker 12: about ten years. A lot of people we're able to
Speaker 12: update their Windows seven or eight computer to Windows ten,
Speaker 12: but the door is closing this October. They are offering
Speaker 12: an option to extend it for a year, but that's
Speaker 12: just kicking the can down the street. So what we're
Speaker 12: doing is we want to We're helping people understand how
Speaker 12: they can wipe their computers, eliminate all the data, all
Speaker 12: the programs, so they can then give those computers away.
Speaker 12: We have the laptop our project. We'd love to have them,
Speaker 12: or they can give them to another charity, or they
Speaker 12: can take them to e waste if they're not working.
Speaker 12: But the key thing is get your data and programs.
Speaker 2: Off of that device.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's the thing that I think a lot of
Speaker 1: people are very worried about because we have a lot
Speaker 1: of information on these computers.
Speaker 2: So what is the process?
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, if it's if you have a
Speaker 1: newer computer, it's a lot easier than the older computers.
Speaker 2: Right, Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 12: So Windows ten and eleven have built in processes to
Speaker 12: erase and reset a computer. I mean, very quickly, go
Speaker 12: to settings, go to recovery, look for reset, and make
Speaker 12: sure you delete all files and clean the drive.
Speaker 11: It's a very quick process to get to that point.
Speaker 12: It'll probably take overnight, maybe a bit longer to completely
Speaker 12: clean the computer. That's Windows ten eleven. Windows eight process
Speaker 12: is similar. I've stepped it out. You can go to
Speaker 12: my Laptop lf project Facebook page and see the details
Speaker 12: on it. Newer macs also have the same thing built
Speaker 12: into them. You can either go into a system properties
Speaker 12: and look for the option to transfer or reset a computer.
Speaker 12: On older Max, you simply shut down the computer, hold
Speaker 12: down the command and higher key power it back up.
Speaker 12: Hold those key down till the Apple logo appears. Then
Speaker 12: you can get into recovery and erase your drive. Windows
Speaker 12: seven is a bit of a problem. They did not
Speaker 12: include a Windows tool to erase the drive. Some manufacturers did.
Speaker 12: But there are some free apps out there that you
Speaker 12: can use to completely erase your drive. And one of
Speaker 12: the ones that I have seen, I have not used myself,
Speaker 12: but has good reviews, is called disc whipe.
Speaker 11: It's from discwipe dot org.
Speaker 12: It's free, it looks like it has a great reputation,
Speaker 12: good reviews from PCMag.
Speaker 11: And other places.
Speaker 2: Okay, so disc wipe that's a good one.
Speaker 1: And then the older Max that could be a little tricky, right,
Speaker 1: like if you're if you're not like very savvy on
Speaker 1: the computer, or do you think someone could figure out
Speaker 1: how to do that?
Speaker 12: They can figure out how to do it. And here's
Speaker 12: the great thing about Max. No matter how long you've
Speaker 12: had your Mac, whether you bought it, knew, or was
Speaker 12: given to you, you can call Apple support and they're
Speaker 12: very excellent. Telephone support can stick you through the process
Speaker 12: of erasing and resetting your Mac. That's something that's not
Speaker 12: available with Windows machines unless you're paying for a premium
Speaker 12: service plan.
Speaker 2: Oh wow, good to know.
Speaker 1: Okay, so if you're trying to do it, they will
Speaker 1: walk you through that process, even on an older computer
Speaker 1: without paying anything.
Speaker 11: Heads.
Speaker 2: Okay, so you do this every day.
Speaker 1: Do you run into any issues with getting these things
Speaker 1: wiped clean?
Speaker 11: Yeah?
Speaker 12: So there are some. So typically the machines were given.
Speaker 12: First of all, we do not log into a machine
Speaker 12: that we're given. We don't want any passwords, we don't
Speaker 12: see the data. So there are some tools that we
Speaker 12: can use to boot up the machine. One of them
Speaker 12: that is called dban dB AN and that wipes the
Speaker 12: hard drive by overriding the hard drive with random ones
Speaker 12: and zeros. Some machines are just very stubborn and they
Speaker 12: just won't boot to that. So what we can do,
Speaker 12: and you can do this with older machines too, simply
Speaker 12: open up the case and pull out the hard drive.
Speaker 12: You need some small screwdrivers. But once you've done that,
Speaker 12: what we do then is we will electronically wipe that
Speaker 12: drive using bench software we like many tool Partition Wizard,
Speaker 12: or if you don't have anything like that, you've got
Speaker 12: a ballpen hammer, well there's the old ballpin hammer approach.
Speaker 12: Take it out, prop it against the wall, and give
Speaker 12: it a few good whacks. Pretty much take care of
Speaker 12: any disk drive. Heart Desktop drives are really sturdy, so
Speaker 12: just focus on beating up the interface in the electronics.
Speaker 12: But you can always physically destroy a draw destroy a
Speaker 12: drive if you can't electronically wipe it.
Speaker 1: You can also if you don't feel comfortable doing that,
Speaker 1: and by the way, wear glasses and the protective stuff.
Speaker 1: But if you don't feel comfortable doing that, you can
Speaker 1: also take it to a There are recycling like e
Speaker 1: waste facilities like you mentioned that have like disc shredders.
Speaker 1: And I watched this process and it was it was wild,
Speaker 1: and this drive goes in, it comes out as just
Speaker 1: little tiny pieces of shredder stuff, like almost like a
Speaker 1: paper shredder.
Speaker 11: Yeah, that's cool.
Speaker 12: That's like NSA level data destruction. You know, nothing that's
Speaker 12: going to be poured from that drive.
Speaker 1: Ever again, would you ever recommend Okay, because I know
Speaker 1: we and we're going to get into this where you
Speaker 1: can take devices like let's say you can't boot your
Speaker 1: computer up. Let's say it's so old that you can't
Speaker 1: wipe the data and you're not comfortable taking the drive out.
Speaker 1: Would you recommend let's say you brought this to a
Speaker 1: recycling center, wuld you ever recommend taking taking it there
Speaker 1: without wiping it or taking your data off.
Speaker 12: So the thing is, unless you know the recycling center
Speaker 12: uses a process like you described Rich, if you like,
Speaker 12: take it to a staple store or to a Best
Speaker 12: Buy or to La County's had your just ways dispose
Speaker 12: a facility up by the up your lax, They're just
Speaker 12: going to throw that into a stack of devices to
Speaker 12: be parted out or shredded for metals. So you don't
Speaker 12: really know for sure that it's going to get you
Speaker 12: know it's going to get wiped if you have critical
Speaker 12: data on their income tax forums business information. Candidly, it'd
Speaker 12: be worth it to take it to a commercial shop.
Speaker 12: It's not going to cost a whole lot of money
Speaker 12: for them to open up the case, take that hard
Speaker 12: drive out, and then they can either electronically shred.
Speaker 11: It or physically destroy it. Yeah, but your data, your
Speaker 11: data is too valuable to risk it going into unknown hands.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: I mean, what I'm hearing is that there are lots
Speaker 1: of options for getting this done, and if you don't
Speaker 1: know how to do it, there are some places that
Speaker 1: can help for sure, So recite donate, Like how do
Speaker 1: you know you said these computers can last for you know, uh,
Speaker 1: up to nine years, let's say, depending on you know
Speaker 1: your usage. So when do you recycle or donate?
Speaker 12: So so, obviously the one key thing if you notice
Speaker 12: that your laptop has a bulging case or the seams
Speaker 12: on the laptop are starting to come apart, that's the
Speaker 12: time to take immediate action. That computer's battery is bulging
Speaker 12: and could potentially explode or catch fire. That's an immediate
Speaker 12: call to take that to a either repair shop or
Speaker 12: take it to e waste. Typically, what's going to the
Speaker 12: triggers for getting a new computer. For knowing it's time
Speaker 12: is you're no longer getting security updates. So if you've
Speaker 12: got Windows ten, you're going to stop this October. If
Speaker 12: you're running a Mac, you're running Moderay, you're not getting
Speaker 12: you're not getting updates anymore, and even Venturable start getting updates.
Speaker 12: So if you stop getting security updates, that's the time
Speaker 12: you need to buy a new computer, and then look
Speaker 12: at what's the best thing to do with over if
Speaker 12: you're all going to still functional again. Laptop Elf Project
Speaker 12: would love to have it o their charities will take it.
Speaker 11: So there's life remaining in those computers.
Speaker 12: We have software we can put on to extend the
Speaker 12: usable life for those donated computers for teachers and for nonprofits.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's I'm guessing you're referring to the Chrome os flex,
Speaker 1: which basically turns like any laptop into a Chrome book,
Speaker 1: which is what a lot of the schools use. So
Speaker 1: even if it's not powerful enough to run like Windows
Speaker 1: or Mac at this point, or the security updates aren't there,
Speaker 1: it can still run that Chrome, which is based like
Speaker 1: a web browser based program.
Speaker 2: Okay, so you like.
Speaker 1: Best Buy, you like Staples, obviously you can donate to
Speaker 1: Laptop Elf if you're in the LA area, there's other
Speaker 1: There's other nonprofits too wherever you live that I'm sure
Speaker 1: would take these. Tell me about some of your favorite
Speaker 1: tools and websites. You mentioned a couple of them, but
Speaker 1: tell me some of the others.
Speaker 12: So for our rook bench's some that we use all
Speaker 12: the time. One is called Crystal disc Info. It's available
Speaker 12: from Crystal dot info, and basically it gives you a
Speaker 12: computer tool where you can get the smart values off
Speaker 12: of the hard drive and that tells you that the
Speaker 12: hard drives condition green, yellow, or red, operating temperature. It
Speaker 12: tells you if there's too many bad sectors. So it's
Speaker 12: a very good tool to assess whether or not that
Speaker 12: hard drive is good, is getting weak it needs to
Speaker 12: be replaced, or is definitely critical and you could lose
Speaker 12: your data. So that's one favorite for everyday use. I
Speaker 12: use for Internet speed, I use speed dot cloudfare dot
Speaker 12: dot com. At speed dot cloudflare dot com you get
Speaker 12: upload and download speed, latency jitter. It's a very handy
Speaker 12: tool to check your internet connection. Now on my workshop machine,
Speaker 12: I have many tool Partition Wizard and what we use
Speaker 12: that for if there's a machine that we can't erase
Speaker 12: the hard drive by booting onto it, we'll pull the
Speaker 12: hard drive connected to that workshop machine and many tool
Speaker 12: partition Wizard will do that process of overriding ones and
Speaker 12: zeros over the entire hard drive that in from is unretrievable.
Speaker 11: I mentioned d ban dB a n dot org.
Speaker 12: It's a free tool if you set it up on
Speaker 12: a flopping on excuse me, a USB drive using a
Speaker 12: rufous or another burner, and then you boot the d
Speaker 12: ban and it overwrites the drive entirely. Speaking of tools,
Speaker 12: a lot of machines that run Windows ten are not
Speaker 12: eligible for the for the Microsoft sanctioned Windows eleven upgrade,
Speaker 12: but if you use a rufous tool and the Windows
Speaker 12: eleven also you can download. We've had great success and
Speaker 12: installing Windows eleven on many machines not otherwise eligible for
Speaker 12: the Windows ten upgrade. It bypasses the TPM two point
Speaker 12: zero requirement, it bypasses the requirement for Microsoft account and
Speaker 12: it also by it also significantly loosens the requirement for
Speaker 12: RAM and for processors. So we've had great success in
Speaker 12: using that tool to boost some Windows ten machines up
Speaker 12: to Windows eleven.
Speaker 1: Great information, Uh, David Lombard, it is with the Laptopelfproject.
Speaker 1: It's Facebook dot com slash the Laptop Elf Project. David,
Speaker 1: you said you've done twenty five hundred computers. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know you're doing this as a nonprofit. Is what
Speaker 1: is fun about this for you? What do you like
Speaker 1: about all this?
Speaker 3: Well?
Speaker 12: I mean, of course, doctor Leo and I are tinkerers.
Speaker 12: We love to play with technology. We've been doing it
Speaker 12: for I mean for me, I bought my first computer
Speaker 12: in nineteen eighty two. But the real joy comes from
Speaker 12: talking to the teachers and the nonprofits. One of the
Speaker 12: teachers I gave a very nice Windows eleven laptop two.
Speaker 12: One of his students took that laptop all the way
Speaker 12: through Window of ten, all the way through high school
Speaker 12: and into college, and she would not have otherwise been
Speaker 12: able to get a laptop of that quality. So, I mean,
Speaker 12: the feedback and the teachers and nonprofits is really what
Speaker 12: brings the joy to this.
Speaker 1: Love it all right, We're gonna leave it there. Facebook
Speaker 1: dot com slash the Laptop Elf Project. David Lombard, thanks
Speaker 1: so much for joining me today. Really appreciate it. Get
Speaker 1: those computers wiped, get them cleaned up, get them donated, recycled.
Speaker 1: You've got lots of options. I'll link up all the
Speaker 1: things that he mentioned on my website. Richontech dot tv
Speaker 1: coming up, we're going to open up the feedbag.
Speaker 5: Thank you, rich Rick.
Speaker 1: Welcome back to rich on Tech. A couple of items
Speaker 1: to get to before we open the feedbag as promised.
Speaker 1: First off, remember National Public Data. This was the website
Speaker 1: that was hacked in twenty twenty four. They leaked billions
Speaker 1: of records, including social security numbers. Well, now the site
Speaker 1: is back under new ownership as a quote free people
Speaker 1: search engine.
Speaker 2: So what does that mean.
Speaker 1: While it's got a whole bunch of information about you
Speaker 1: in there, so you probably want to opt out of this.
Speaker 1: So go to National Public Data search for your name,
Speaker 1: copy your profile URL, and you can paste it into
Speaker 1: the website's opt out form. Now I got an email
Speaker 1: from some of this said, hey, I tried to do
Speaker 1: this and it's not working there. I'll be slammed because
Speaker 1: basically every website is recommending that you remove your data
Speaker 1: at this point, so maybe wait until things settle down
Speaker 1: over the next week, next week or so. Surprisingly, my
Speaker 1: information was not in there, so I was not able
Speaker 1: to remove it, but I did find a bunch of
Speaker 1: other people I know, so yeah, I would get that
Speaker 1: out of there. Google Flights has a new Flight Deals.
Speaker 1: This is an AI tool, so instead of like putting
Speaker 1: in all your dates and filters and this and that,
Speaker 1: you just describe your ideal trip. So for example, week
Speaker 1: long trip this winter to a city with great food,
Speaker 1: or ten day ski trip with fresh powder. AI understands.
Speaker 1: It looks through all of Google's data for airlines and
Speaker 1: booking sites and it will tell you what it thinks
Speaker 1: would be great.
Speaker 2: So this is in beta.
Speaker 1: It's not available to everyone just yet, but it's at
Speaker 1: Google dot com, slash travel, slash flights, slash deals.
Speaker 2: I'll put the link on the website.
Speaker 1: Not available for me just yet because it's rolling out,
Speaker 1: so you may not have access right away. There's a
Speaker 1: new app called Cassette. This is really neat. It's only
Speaker 1: for iPhone, but it plays random clips from your iPhone videos,
Speaker 1: kind of like the idea of popping a VHS tape
Speaker 1: into the player and you don't really know what's on
Speaker 1: that tape and so it just kind of pops up
Speaker 1: a moment. So just install the app. It goes through
Speaker 1: your videos on your iPhone. You press one of the
Speaker 1: VHS tapes it shows and it brings like a little
Speaker 1: clip from that that video. It's really cool, it's fun.
Speaker 1: It's free. If you want to select specific clips, you
Speaker 1: can pay eight dollars. But this is just an independent
Speaker 1: app from an independent developer, and it's just fun.
Speaker 2: I had a lot of fun with it.
Speaker 1: Cassette C A S S E T T Again, I'll
Speaker 1: put a link on the website.
Speaker 2: And also retro camp Snap.
Speaker 1: They make these cool cameras that have no playback on them,
Speaker 1: no screens, kind of like a point and shoot camera.
Speaker 1: They now have a digital video camera inspired by the
Speaker 1: classic Super eight camera CS eight. There's no playback on it,
Speaker 1: there's no deleting. You just shoot video and then you
Speaker 1: can enjoy it late. It's one hundred and fifty dollars
Speaker 1: usually two hundred shipping in mid September. You can choose
Speaker 1: from various aspect ratios. Got five vintage inspired filters, and
Speaker 1: it's got the trigger that you pull and you get
Speaker 1: one clip off of that. Built in mic for audio.
Speaker 1: It's got retro looking battery and memory meters. Comes with
Speaker 1: a little bit of internal memory. You can expand it
Speaker 1: with more USBC. And this is not for everyone. It's
Speaker 1: just someone who might might have had one of these
Speaker 1: in the past and want something that's kind of fun.
Speaker 1: Someone that's a creator wants to do something different. But
Speaker 1: it's all about distraction free, screen free video recording, just
Speaker 1: like their camp snap camera, which I love because you
Speaker 1: take it. It's almost like an old school disposable camera.
Speaker 1: You just take pictures on it and then you plug
Speaker 1: it into your computer and you can seal those pictures.
Speaker 1: Then all right, time for the feedback. These are the emails,
Speaker 1: the comments, and the questions I get from you. If
Speaker 1: you want to submit yours, go to richon tech dot
Speaker 1: tv hit Contact. Diane from Lapuente writes in my daughter
Speaker 1: was crocheting a pair of Knights gauntlets for a costume
Speaker 1: and posted her progress online. A woman reached out wanting
Speaker 1: to buy a pair, then claimed she had accidentally sent
Speaker 1: over five hundred dollars and needed a refund. Without checking
Speaker 1: your bank account, my daughter followed instructions from a man
Speaker 1: posing as PayPal support, who convinced her to send three
Speaker 1: hundred dollars. He was trying to get the rest when
Speaker 1: I walked in and ended the call. We later found
Speaker 1: the money had been moved through cash app to buy bitcoin.
Speaker 1: Her bank would not help and cash app said the
Speaker 1: money was gone. I hope you'll share this again to
Speaker 1: warn younger people about the scam. Thank you, Diane. That's
Speaker 1: the thing. People think it's just old people that are scammed. No,
Speaker 1: it's actually a lot of young people because they are
Speaker 1: not hipped to the scams. So keep in mind it's
Speaker 1: a lot of people getting scammed, not just old or young.
Speaker 1: Jay writes in from Hot Springs. Microsoft Edge has a
Speaker 1: built in scareware blocker designed to stop those fake full
Speaker 1: screen pop ups claiming your computers infected and telling you
Speaker 1: to call a number or download software. It uses machine
Speaker 1: learning to detect these scam pages and show you a
Speaker 1: warning it's not on by default. To enable it, open Edge,
Speaker 1: go to Settings, Privacy, Search and Services, then toggle on
Speaker 1: enable AI to block malware. What a cool feature. I mean,
Speaker 1: you have to be using Edge, but turn that on
Speaker 1: for sure. Jony and Carmel, I appreciate your recommendation for
Speaker 1: the robo rock rechargeable wet dry vacuum cleaner. For almost
Speaker 1: a year, I looked at similar floor cleaners and read
Speaker 1: all the reviews but didn't make the leap. But on
Speaker 1: Prime Day about the one. You recommend it and we
Speaker 1: love it. We have hardwood floors and a hairy white
Speaker 1: golden retriever. I don't think my floors have ever been cleaner.
Speaker 1: It's so easy to use. Thanks for making life a
Speaker 1: little easier. I love that robo rock. It is a
Speaker 1: fantastic device. Kathy writes in I listen to your podcast
Speaker 1: every time I get in my car, sometimes more than once,
Speaker 1: because they're so full of information. I'm a seven year
Speaker 1: old woman who's always loved technology. I even had one
Speaker 1: of the first iPads before most people heard of them.
Speaker 1: I may not grasp as much as I used to,
Speaker 1: but I'll keep learning as long as I can. I
Speaker 1: just love your podcast and how you make tech easy
Speaker 1: to understand. Kathy, you get the award for making my day.
Speaker 2: Thank you.
Speaker 1: You can find links everything I mentioned on the website.
Speaker 1: Rich on tech dot tv next week we'll talk all
Speaker 1: things Google pixel. Thank you so much for listening. My
Speaker 1: name is rich Demiro. I will talk to you real soon.