1 00:00:04,200 --> 00:00:12,559 Speaker 1: Get in Touch with Technology was tex Stuff from dot com. 2 00:00:12,600 --> 00:00:16,239 Speaker 1: Hey there, everyone, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm Jonathan Strickland, 3 00:00:16,360 --> 00:00:19,600 Speaker 1: and I as actar, is joining us once again so 4 00:00:19,640 --> 00:00:23,439 Speaker 1: that we can continue our discussion about obsolete technology. The 5 00:00:24,000 --> 00:00:27,480 Speaker 1: list of obsolete tech that showed up on an article 6 00:00:27,680 --> 00:00:31,480 Speaker 1: that was that Web Designer depot. This was a listener request. 7 00:00:31,800 --> 00:00:34,319 Speaker 1: I asked, how are you doing? I'm doing very well. 8 00:00:34,320 --> 00:00:36,879 Speaker 1: How are you very well? It's almost as if we 9 00:00:36,960 --> 00:00:40,120 Speaker 1: didn't just stop recording a previous episode seconds ago and 10 00:00:40,159 --> 00:00:42,479 Speaker 1: started it up again, as it's almost just like that. 11 00:00:42,520 --> 00:00:45,200 Speaker 1: It's just yeah, I'm having a weird sense of deja vu. Yeah, 12 00:00:45,280 --> 00:00:50,320 Speaker 1: me too. Something. Maybe it's just the continuous voo since 13 00:00:50,360 --> 00:00:52,800 Speaker 1: it's not really deja At any rate. It is a 14 00:00:52,800 --> 00:00:54,240 Speaker 1: great band. I listened to them all the time. I 15 00:00:54,240 --> 00:00:56,960 Speaker 1: think they cover in excess. They are pretty good. Yeah, 16 00:00:57,000 --> 00:00:59,560 Speaker 1: I saw them on the voo. At any rate, we're 17 00:00:59,560 --> 00:01:03,080 Speaker 1: gonna be talking more about more obsolete technology. We had 18 00:01:03,120 --> 00:01:06,360 Speaker 1: a previous discussion where we went through list the list 19 00:01:06,640 --> 00:01:09,880 Speaker 1: item by item, and we started debating and discussing whether 20 00:01:09,959 --> 00:01:12,240 Speaker 1: or not the the things that were on there in 21 00:01:12,319 --> 00:01:15,600 Speaker 1: fact belong on a list of obsolete tech. Some of 22 00:01:15,640 --> 00:01:18,440 Speaker 1: them we certainly think do belong there, and some of 23 00:01:18,440 --> 00:01:21,160 Speaker 1: them we were a little you know, we questioned whether 24 00:01:21,240 --> 00:01:23,520 Speaker 1: or not they belonged on that list. So let's continue. 25 00:01:23,920 --> 00:01:27,600 Speaker 1: The first one for this episode is the idea of 26 00:01:27,640 --> 00:01:32,759 Speaker 1: a huge mainframe computer, which I think we can say 27 00:01:32,840 --> 00:01:36,800 Speaker 1: is pretty obsolete. Yeah, I'm just thinking like the idea 28 00:01:36,800 --> 00:01:40,040 Speaker 1: of one computer that's that large. Today you'd be thinking 29 00:01:40,080 --> 00:01:43,080 Speaker 1: of just server racks, lots and lots of servers and 30 00:01:43,080 --> 00:01:45,360 Speaker 1: they're acting as one computer. So if you want to 31 00:01:45,400 --> 00:01:47,960 Speaker 1: get technical, is it a well know, it is that 32 00:01:48,040 --> 00:01:49,800 Speaker 1: really a main frame? But it's a giant cluster of 33 00:01:49,800 --> 00:01:52,520 Speaker 1: a machine. Yeah, exactly like IBM S Watson is a 34 00:01:52,520 --> 00:01:55,880 Speaker 1: good example. It's got thousands of processors, and if you 35 00:01:55,920 --> 00:02:00,920 Speaker 1: ever look at the actual physical um compute, it's really 36 00:02:00,960 --> 00:02:03,800 Speaker 1: a collection of of server like computers that are all 37 00:02:03,800 --> 00:02:06,760 Speaker 1: network together that act as a single entity, like you 38 00:02:06,800 --> 00:02:10,680 Speaker 1: were saying, I asked, But it's not just one gigantic 39 00:02:10,760 --> 00:02:13,480 Speaker 1: machine that takes up the entire floor of a building. 40 00:02:13,919 --> 00:02:17,640 Speaker 1: You know, Back in those days, mainframes had components like 41 00:02:17,919 --> 00:02:22,400 Speaker 1: vacuum tubes that were necessary because the transistor hadn't been 42 00:02:22,480 --> 00:02:27,079 Speaker 1: invented or miniaturized yet, and today, in the era of miniaturization, 43 00:02:27,200 --> 00:02:32,320 Speaker 1: we no longer have to rely on those antiquated huge systems. Also, 44 00:02:32,560 --> 00:02:35,200 Speaker 1: like the old mainframe days, a lot of those machines 45 00:02:35,480 --> 00:02:39,640 Speaker 1: used a time sharing function, which, for the listeners out 46 00:02:39,639 --> 00:02:43,160 Speaker 1: there who aren't familiar with this type of computing, time 47 00:02:43,160 --> 00:02:47,520 Speaker 1: sharing essentially meant that there might be multiple terminals all 48 00:02:47,560 --> 00:02:51,120 Speaker 1: hooked up to the same computer, but at any given moment, 49 00:02:51,160 --> 00:02:54,360 Speaker 1: the computer would only be working on one set of 50 00:02:54,400 --> 00:02:59,280 Speaker 1: calculations for from one terminal, and everyone else would be waiting. However, 51 00:02:59,400 --> 00:03:02,120 Speaker 1: most computer as we're moving at such an incredible speed 52 00:03:02,680 --> 00:03:06,120 Speaker 1: that it almost felt like you were having you know, continuous, 53 00:03:06,160 --> 00:03:09,440 Speaker 1: a continuous experience as you worked on the the computer. 54 00:03:09,560 --> 00:03:13,400 Speaker 1: It didn't feel like you were actually only getting us 55 00:03:13,120 --> 00:03:16,600 Speaker 1: a segment of time each time, at least if it 56 00:03:16,639 --> 00:03:20,000 Speaker 1: was a significantly fast computer. So both of those things 57 00:03:20,000 --> 00:03:23,360 Speaker 1: are no longer really the case these days, so I 58 00:03:23,440 --> 00:03:27,120 Speaker 1: agree that it should be considered obsolete. Although we still 59 00:03:27,160 --> 00:03:31,240 Speaker 1: have huge computers like supercomputers are still obviously a thing, 60 00:03:32,000 --> 00:03:36,000 Speaker 1: and there's still a real drive for computer scientists to 61 00:03:36,120 --> 00:03:42,080 Speaker 1: make the next fastest computer. Yeah, but they're not typically 62 00:03:42,080 --> 00:03:47,480 Speaker 1: this one giant monolith, these clusters of machines that work together. 63 00:03:47,760 --> 00:03:50,320 Speaker 1: I do wish kind of that there could be one 64 00:03:50,360 --> 00:03:54,560 Speaker 1: that's just a giant monolithic computer. That's how they built it, 65 00:03:54,640 --> 00:03:57,440 Speaker 1: Like it was just this incredibly fast computer that's in 66 00:03:57,480 --> 00:04:00,360 Speaker 1: a single form factor, sort of like deep Lot in 67 00:04:00,640 --> 00:04:03,920 Speaker 1: the Hitchracker's Guide to the Galaxy. But wishing does not 68 00:04:04,080 --> 00:04:06,240 Speaker 1: make it so, So you're right, you should just buy 69 00:04:06,320 --> 00:04:09,600 Speaker 1: like thirty or forty servers and then put their parts 70 00:04:09,600 --> 00:04:12,520 Speaker 1: inside of a refrigerator and make your own main frame. 71 00:04:12,760 --> 00:04:14,960 Speaker 1: Just call it a mainframe. I might have to figure 72 00:04:14,960 --> 00:04:17,719 Speaker 1: out a really good cooling system. Perhaps I'll keep the 73 00:04:17,800 --> 00:04:21,640 Speaker 1: refrigerator working as a refrigerator in order to make sure 74 00:04:21,720 --> 00:04:24,400 Speaker 1: that the servers don't overheat. How's that not a thing yet? 75 00:04:24,520 --> 00:04:26,000 Speaker 1: If that's not a thing, that should be a thing, 76 00:04:26,560 --> 00:04:30,720 Speaker 1: A refrigerator that doubles as a server rack. Heck, yeah, 77 00:04:31,160 --> 00:04:36,839 Speaker 1: patent pending Strickland Actor Enterprises. You heard it from us first. 78 00:04:37,040 --> 00:04:40,640 Speaker 1: All right, Well, then we have typewriters. I as, do 79 00:04:40,680 --> 00:04:43,160 Speaker 1: you know what a typewriter is? I do know what 80 00:04:43,160 --> 00:04:45,599 Speaker 1: a typewriter is. It's that thing you'd use before you 81 00:04:45,640 --> 00:04:48,960 Speaker 1: had a word processor, And uh my dad would type 82 00:04:48,960 --> 00:04:50,760 Speaker 1: all the time. So I remember hearing that little flax 83 00:04:50,800 --> 00:04:53,400 Speaker 1: wax wax wax noise, which sounded more like a metal 84 00:04:53,480 --> 00:04:57,080 Speaker 1: key smacking a piece of rubber, that rubber roller. And 85 00:04:57,120 --> 00:05:00,240 Speaker 1: then when do you have the more automated version where 86 00:05:00,279 --> 00:05:02,040 Speaker 1: you can hit backspace And he would like remove the 87 00:05:02,040 --> 00:05:06,040 Speaker 1: whole word. That sound echoes in my mind. But yeah, 88 00:05:06,080 --> 00:05:08,640 Speaker 1: back back in the old days, the typewriter, that's the noise. 89 00:05:08,680 --> 00:05:10,960 Speaker 1: If you have an iPhone when you start typing on it, 90 00:05:11,240 --> 00:05:14,080 Speaker 1: that's the noise it's emulating. Yeah, you have no idea 91 00:05:14,120 --> 00:05:17,080 Speaker 1: what I'm talking to. Skewomorphism is what that's called, where 92 00:05:17,120 --> 00:05:20,360 Speaker 1: we take something that has been obsolete and apply it 93 00:05:20,400 --> 00:05:25,040 Speaker 1: to new technology just for really aesthetic purposes. Uh. Yeah. 94 00:05:25,080 --> 00:05:27,240 Speaker 1: The typewriter chases its roots all the way back to 95 00:05:27,279 --> 00:05:30,520 Speaker 1: the eighteenth century, all the way back to the seventeen hundreds. 96 00:05:30,560 --> 00:05:34,640 Speaker 1: But really you're talking about the eighteen hundreds before standardization 97 00:05:34,760 --> 00:05:38,080 Speaker 1: came in, and the early twentieth century before it really 98 00:05:38,120 --> 00:05:42,239 Speaker 1: became popular. So while there were predecessors to the modern 99 00:05:42,279 --> 00:05:44,679 Speaker 1: typewriter all the way back in the late seventeen hundreds, 100 00:05:44,880 --> 00:05:47,840 Speaker 1: it wasn't until the nineteen hundreds that we really selled 101 00:05:47,880 --> 00:05:51,560 Speaker 1: on a foreign factor that that was popular rised throughout 102 00:05:51,600 --> 00:05:55,960 Speaker 1: the world. And those early models were purely mechanical. UH 103 00:05:56,440 --> 00:05:59,040 Speaker 1: they worked. You know, you had a system of levers 104 00:05:59,120 --> 00:06:03,359 Speaker 1: and and uh a little pivot systems where you pressed 105 00:06:03,400 --> 00:06:06,400 Speaker 1: down a key and it would cause a a arm 106 00:06:06,560 --> 00:06:10,719 Speaker 1: holding a letter to come up strike a ribbon that 107 00:06:10,839 --> 00:06:14,279 Speaker 1: had ink on it against a piece of paper and 108 00:06:14,360 --> 00:06:17,040 Speaker 1: that would be what would leave the letter there. You 109 00:06:17,040 --> 00:06:19,919 Speaker 1: would also usually have a system where the ribbon itself 110 00:06:19,960 --> 00:06:23,479 Speaker 1: would get pulled by just a tiny amount, so that 111 00:06:23,520 --> 00:06:26,880 Speaker 1: way you wouldn't consistently be hitting the same part of 112 00:06:26,920 --> 00:06:29,560 Speaker 1: the ribbon. Obviously, if you did that, you would very 113 00:06:29,640 --> 00:06:32,920 Speaker 1: quickly run out of ink on that spot. Although there 114 00:06:32,960 --> 00:06:35,960 Speaker 1: were some typewriters where you had to actually physically reapply 115 00:06:36,080 --> 00:06:39,960 Speaker 1: ink to the ribbon. Um Also you had to worry 116 00:06:40,000 --> 00:06:43,839 Speaker 1: about those little typing arms getting tangled up with each 117 00:06:43,839 --> 00:06:46,320 Speaker 1: other and some of the older ones. I had a 118 00:06:46,320 --> 00:06:49,640 Speaker 1: an antique typewriter where that would happen. If you typed 119 00:06:50,000 --> 00:06:53,000 Speaker 1: faster than a certain speed, it would start to get 120 00:06:53,040 --> 00:06:57,560 Speaker 1: locked up, which was frustrating. Uh IBM would introduce sort 121 00:06:57,600 --> 00:07:00,520 Speaker 1: of the golf ball style typewriter. The and had all 122 00:07:00,520 --> 00:07:05,040 Speaker 1: the letters on a round structure, and that was the 123 00:07:05,080 --> 00:07:07,000 Speaker 1: one that had a very distinct sound when you were 124 00:07:07,040 --> 00:07:10,440 Speaker 1: type it just kind of um uh you know, the 125 00:07:11,000 --> 00:07:14,160 Speaker 1: clackty clack was replaced by a sort of sound as 126 00:07:14,200 --> 00:07:17,080 Speaker 1: you were typing with those. And word processors came along 127 00:07:17,760 --> 00:07:20,200 Speaker 1: a lot of typewriters and word processors were sort of 128 00:07:20,240 --> 00:07:25,080 Speaker 1: combo things. But word processors allowed you to, uh to 129 00:07:25,080 --> 00:07:29,440 Speaker 1: to create your documents uh in an electronic format before 130 00:07:30,120 --> 00:07:33,720 Speaker 1: converting it to a physical format. Um. I actually had 131 00:07:33,760 --> 00:07:36,880 Speaker 1: to use typewriters quite a bit in my early career 132 00:07:37,160 --> 00:07:42,160 Speaker 1: with a consulting firm because we had all these different 133 00:07:42,160 --> 00:07:46,200 Speaker 1: forms that we didn't have electronic versions for. We just 134 00:07:46,400 --> 00:07:48,760 Speaker 1: had physical forms and you had to put it through 135 00:07:49,000 --> 00:07:52,400 Speaker 1: into a typewriter and type things out on it. Uh. 136 00:07:52,520 --> 00:07:56,600 Speaker 1: Now you went to law school, right, I as, did 137 00:07:56,640 --> 00:08:00,560 Speaker 1: you ever have to use a typewriter in that respect? No? 138 00:08:00,960 --> 00:08:04,000 Speaker 1: But when in law schools like the let's see the 139 00:08:04,000 --> 00:08:07,520 Speaker 1: two thousands, so we had computers and printers and things 140 00:08:07,560 --> 00:08:10,560 Speaker 1: and the PDF. Uh we could always use a PDF 141 00:08:10,600 --> 00:08:12,280 Speaker 1: to fill out things. But yeah, I didn't have to 142 00:08:12,320 --> 00:08:14,480 Speaker 1: use it in school very often, but I do. You 143 00:08:14,560 --> 00:08:17,360 Speaker 1: just reminded me how if you wanted to spy on somebody, 144 00:08:17,400 --> 00:08:19,160 Speaker 1: you could just take the ribbon that was used and 145 00:08:19,200 --> 00:08:22,000 Speaker 1: you can read the words because it was it's clearly 146 00:08:22,000 --> 00:08:25,200 Speaker 1: printed on there. Because there's this ribbon of text, and 147 00:08:25,240 --> 00:08:27,559 Speaker 1: you can basically find anything you wanted to. I always 148 00:08:27,560 --> 00:08:29,880 Speaker 1: said that was really fascinating when he came to like 149 00:08:29,920 --> 00:08:33,000 Speaker 1: this evidence as being left behind constantly. Oh yeah, yeah. 150 00:08:33,040 --> 00:08:35,080 Speaker 1: If you were using a typewriter, then you were leaving 151 00:08:35,080 --> 00:08:37,400 Speaker 1: a record of exactly what you were typing. It would 152 00:08:37,400 --> 00:08:40,040 Speaker 1: also allow people to see what a terrible typist you were, 153 00:08:41,320 --> 00:08:44,280 Speaker 1: true and see all these mistakes that they they totally 154 00:08:44,360 --> 00:08:47,600 Speaker 1: hit that backspace button for this one. Uh yeah. The 155 00:08:47,600 --> 00:08:50,720 Speaker 1: backspace button often would use some sort of liquid paper 156 00:08:50,760 --> 00:08:53,560 Speaker 1: type substance in order to cover up whatever it was 157 00:08:53,640 --> 00:08:56,480 Speaker 1: you just type. Since you could type a new word 158 00:08:56,640 --> 00:09:01,800 Speaker 1: in its place, it wasn't exactly undetectable. You could always 159 00:09:01,800 --> 00:09:03,920 Speaker 1: tell when you would get a sheet of type paper 160 00:09:03,920 --> 00:09:05,880 Speaker 1: where someone had to hit the backspace quite a bit. 161 00:09:06,520 --> 00:09:07,760 Speaker 1: You can just peel it off if you wanted to 162 00:09:07,800 --> 00:09:10,000 Speaker 1: see the original letter. And the other thing was if 163 00:09:10,040 --> 00:09:14,040 Speaker 1: I remember right effectively the the type, I would remember 164 00:09:14,080 --> 00:09:16,880 Speaker 1: what you had just typed. So if you're going to, like, 165 00:09:16,960 --> 00:09:19,839 Speaker 1: let's say, do type to T by accident, just the 166 00:09:19,880 --> 00:09:21,959 Speaker 1: white ribbon would come up and the tea would hit again. 167 00:09:22,000 --> 00:09:25,360 Speaker 1: So you just had this perfect space T, the white 168 00:09:25,360 --> 00:09:28,320 Speaker 1: one over the black one. So it's pretty visible if 169 00:09:28,360 --> 00:09:31,400 Speaker 1: you knew what you're looking at. Yeah, So so not 170 00:09:31,400 --> 00:09:38,280 Speaker 1: not flawless. And eventually printers became inexpensive enough and computers 171 00:09:38,320 --> 00:09:43,360 Speaker 1: became popular enough that the typewriter largely disappeared. You can 172 00:09:43,360 --> 00:09:45,800 Speaker 1: still find it in some offices. I know that there are, 173 00:09:45,920 --> 00:09:49,080 Speaker 1: you know, medical facilities that still have typewriters. There's still 174 00:09:49,120 --> 00:09:52,800 Speaker 1: some companies like consulting firms or whatever. Any any company 175 00:09:52,840 --> 00:09:57,480 Speaker 1: that's using documentation where they don't necessarily keep an electronic 176 00:09:57,600 --> 00:10:00,600 Speaker 1: version on hand, they still have a typewriter, but they 177 00:10:00,640 --> 00:10:04,120 Speaker 1: tend to be the oddity these days, not something that 178 00:10:04,320 --> 00:10:09,000 Speaker 1: is commonly a you know, necessary piece of equipment in 179 00:10:09,040 --> 00:10:12,160 Speaker 1: your average office. So I agree that it belongs on 180 00:10:12,200 --> 00:10:14,520 Speaker 1: the obsolete list, at least here in the United States. 181 00:10:14,600 --> 00:10:16,320 Speaker 1: There are probably some other parts of the world where 182 00:10:16,320 --> 00:10:19,600 Speaker 1: typewriters are still a very important piece of technology, but 183 00:10:19,679 --> 00:10:23,000 Speaker 1: not so much. Here there's definitely obsolete. But again, one 184 00:10:23,000 --> 00:10:25,720 Speaker 1: of those another one of those fascinating pieces of machinery. 185 00:10:25,800 --> 00:10:28,079 Speaker 1: When you when you were talking about them being purely mechanical, 186 00:10:28,120 --> 00:10:29,840 Speaker 1: when you see the leavers moving, when you see the 187 00:10:30,000 --> 00:10:33,760 Speaker 1: arms hitting the ribbon, it's actually quite a feat of 188 00:10:33,800 --> 00:10:37,400 Speaker 1: engineering considering what it was. It's like this movable type setup. 189 00:10:37,440 --> 00:10:40,040 Speaker 1: It's like, so we're gonna have this easy way to 190 00:10:40,120 --> 00:10:43,160 Speaker 1: print if I just punch these keys. Just a cool 191 00:10:43,200 --> 00:10:45,560 Speaker 1: little bit of history. Yeah, I think it's It's one 192 00:10:45,600 --> 00:10:47,280 Speaker 1: of those things that kind of hearkens back to the 193 00:10:47,320 --> 00:10:50,360 Speaker 1: aesthetics of steam punk in a way. It's this idea 194 00:10:50,400 --> 00:10:57,199 Speaker 1: of intricate, purely mechanical technology where it doesn't have the 195 00:10:57,720 --> 00:11:01,400 Speaker 1: kind of sterile electronic approach. I think that's what a 196 00:11:01,480 --> 00:11:03,720 Speaker 1: lot of people, you know, why a lot of people 197 00:11:03,720 --> 00:11:06,240 Speaker 1: find steampunks so appealing is that it has this kind 198 00:11:06,240 --> 00:11:09,000 Speaker 1: of you know, the hall, the working moving pieces. It 199 00:11:09,040 --> 00:11:14,400 Speaker 1: gives it a character that that electronics tend to lack. So, uh, yeah, 200 00:11:14,440 --> 00:11:17,720 Speaker 1: I definitely agree with you there. How about the next one. 201 00:11:17,840 --> 00:11:23,360 Speaker 1: Dial up modems? Oh man, uh, definitely obsolete. And if 202 00:11:23,400 --> 00:11:26,559 Speaker 1: you're using a dial up modem, you probably want to upgrade, 203 00:11:26,800 --> 00:11:29,839 Speaker 1: is I hope you would? Because they are it can 204 00:11:29,880 --> 00:11:34,679 Speaker 1: be finicky I had I remember my bad modem. Yeah, 205 00:11:34,760 --> 00:11:37,800 Speaker 1: I had one of those, and I was I was 206 00:11:38,120 --> 00:11:40,480 Speaker 1: dialing into a o L back then was actually was 207 00:11:40,480 --> 00:11:43,040 Speaker 1: AOL because I remember they had like five phone numbers 208 00:11:43,080 --> 00:11:46,160 Speaker 1: for their servers. And then you dial in and hear 209 00:11:46,200 --> 00:11:48,200 Speaker 1: that noise, you connect, and then you're like, mom, no, 210 00:11:48,240 --> 00:11:50,680 Speaker 1: don't touch the phone. Don't know, mom, and then you'd 211 00:11:50,720 --> 00:11:53,560 Speaker 1: be disconnected. Right, those are the old days, And the 212 00:11:53,600 --> 00:11:55,440 Speaker 1: same thing happened to me whenever I would try and 213 00:11:55,480 --> 00:11:57,880 Speaker 1: call into BBS. Is to the point where I think 214 00:11:57,880 --> 00:12:01,000 Speaker 1: we finally got a separate phone line just for the computer, 215 00:12:01,200 --> 00:12:03,240 Speaker 1: so that way we didn't have to worry about it anymore. 216 00:12:03,800 --> 00:12:09,600 Speaker 1: But yeah, the dial up modems much slower data transfer 217 00:12:09,760 --> 00:12:13,840 Speaker 1: rates than any other format. Uh. And also that is 218 00:12:13,880 --> 00:12:18,280 Speaker 1: where that distinctive sound comes in, that weird statick e 219 00:12:19,240 --> 00:12:24,520 Speaker 1: uh pinging, buzzing noise that whenever I see it on 220 00:12:24,800 --> 00:12:29,440 Speaker 1: a movie or television show, I think, where when is 221 00:12:29,480 --> 00:12:32,360 Speaker 1: this supposed to be set? There was actually we talked 222 00:12:32,360 --> 00:12:34,920 Speaker 1: about in our last episode. UH. An episode of the 223 00:12:34,960 --> 00:12:40,119 Speaker 1: popular series Sleepy Hollow recently had characters access the Internet 224 00:12:40,320 --> 00:12:43,680 Speaker 1: through a dial up modem, and I thought, really, Sleepy 225 00:12:43,720 --> 00:12:47,000 Speaker 1: Hollow is I mean I realized they've got a an 226 00:12:47,000 --> 00:12:53,280 Speaker 1: eighteenth century, uh, former British Revolution soldier walking around, But 227 00:12:53,320 --> 00:12:55,880 Speaker 1: are they really that far behind the times where people 228 00:12:55,920 --> 00:12:59,440 Speaker 1: still have dial up? Um? But it does have that 229 00:12:59,480 --> 00:13:02,040 Speaker 1: distinctive sound. It's one of those that you can kind 230 00:13:02,080 --> 00:13:04,520 Speaker 1: of tell the generation someone belongs to, because if they 231 00:13:04,559 --> 00:13:08,559 Speaker 1: don't know what that sound is, then you know, all right, 232 00:13:08,600 --> 00:13:11,000 Speaker 1: So I can subtract ten years from the age I 233 00:13:11,040 --> 00:13:15,200 Speaker 1: thought you were because you never encountered this noise, whereas 234 00:13:15,520 --> 00:13:18,200 Speaker 1: those of us at a certain age are very familiar 235 00:13:18,200 --> 00:13:20,959 Speaker 1: with it. And it just hearkens back that time where 236 00:13:21,640 --> 00:13:24,240 Speaker 1: you know, you could connect to the to some sort 237 00:13:24,280 --> 00:13:27,600 Speaker 1: of network service and you would try and download things 238 00:13:27,600 --> 00:13:32,560 Speaker 1: and even a basic text document would take time to 239 00:13:32,679 --> 00:13:38,200 Speaker 1: access because the data transfer speeds were so slow. Yeah, 240 00:13:38,200 --> 00:13:40,800 Speaker 1: and you basically back then, I mean you think animated 241 00:13:40,800 --> 00:13:45,000 Speaker 1: gifts were annoying. Now, back then it was forever for 242 00:13:45,040 --> 00:13:46,720 Speaker 1: them to load, and you would see like, you know, 243 00:13:46,720 --> 00:13:49,640 Speaker 1: Felix the cat going back and forth, and you knew, uh, 244 00:13:49,880 --> 00:13:52,760 Speaker 1: like the sites would be done by college students or 245 00:13:52,760 --> 00:13:54,760 Speaker 1: something because they have like the team one lines in 246 00:13:54,800 --> 00:13:57,160 Speaker 1: their dorms and you'd sign in to get to this 247 00:13:57,240 --> 00:13:59,600 Speaker 1: page because you want to really know everything about the Beatles, 248 00:13:59,640 --> 00:14:01,160 Speaker 1: because you know know anything about him yet, so you 249 00:14:01,200 --> 00:14:03,160 Speaker 1: want to read about him. And then you hear the 250 00:14:03,200 --> 00:14:07,360 Speaker 1: MIDI playing after about like what maybe my I'd say, 251 00:14:07,360 --> 00:14:09,640 Speaker 1: a good minute of loading and then this music scares 252 00:14:09,760 --> 00:14:12,040 Speaker 1: the heck out of you because you do not expect 253 00:14:12,080 --> 00:14:14,440 Speaker 1: it back then. Uh So, yeah, it was. It was 254 00:14:14,480 --> 00:14:17,480 Speaker 1: definitely a different world with dial up modems incredibly slow. 255 00:14:17,840 --> 00:14:21,400 Speaker 1: That one was fifty six k that was like the 256 00:14:21,480 --> 00:14:24,120 Speaker 1: fastest you could go on dial up, and it was like, 257 00:14:24,160 --> 00:14:28,840 Speaker 1: this is amazing that water than this. Yeah, that reminds 258 00:14:28,880 --> 00:14:32,520 Speaker 1: me of when everything back in those days where you 259 00:14:32,520 --> 00:14:34,440 Speaker 1: would look at the specs of a computer and you 260 00:14:34,480 --> 00:14:38,520 Speaker 1: would just say, man, this is way more than I need. 261 00:14:38,880 --> 00:14:43,160 Speaker 1: I will never require all the horsepower, slash, storage, slash 262 00:14:43,200 --> 00:14:46,680 Speaker 1: whatever that this machine has. It just kind of quate 263 00:14:46,720 --> 00:14:51,560 Speaker 1: because now my my my phone dwarfs all of those specs. 264 00:14:53,440 --> 00:14:57,000 Speaker 1: And speaking of storage, speaking of you know, data storage, 265 00:14:57,160 --> 00:15:00,760 Speaker 1: ZIP drives are on the list, which was a product 266 00:15:00,800 --> 00:15:06,240 Speaker 1: from a company called i Omega and zip drives, well, 267 00:15:06,280 --> 00:15:07,680 Speaker 1: first of all, I think we have to cover the 268 00:15:07,720 --> 00:15:10,960 Speaker 1: idea of floppy drives in the first place. Floppy drives 269 00:15:11,840 --> 00:15:14,920 Speaker 1: are different from hard drives, and that these were portable 270 00:15:15,000 --> 00:15:19,880 Speaker 1: storage media that used a magnetic storage to to save 271 00:15:20,000 --> 00:15:23,240 Speaker 1: your work on a computer, and you would end up 272 00:15:23,240 --> 00:15:25,720 Speaker 1: putting it into a drive and save your work, and 273 00:15:25,760 --> 00:15:27,720 Speaker 1: then you could take the disc out and go to 274 00:15:27,800 --> 00:15:30,680 Speaker 1: a different computer that had the exact same programs as 275 00:15:30,760 --> 00:15:34,280 Speaker 1: the first one and pull that work back up. Obviously, 276 00:15:34,320 --> 00:15:36,560 Speaker 1: if it didn't have the exact same programs as the 277 00:15:36,600 --> 00:15:39,480 Speaker 1: computer that you used in the first place, it didn't 278 00:15:39,520 --> 00:15:42,680 Speaker 1: do you any good to have the storage because there 279 00:15:42,760 --> 00:15:44,800 Speaker 1: wasn't an Internet yet for you to go and get 280 00:15:44,840 --> 00:15:49,160 Speaker 1: that program um. But zip drives were supposed to be 281 00:15:49,280 --> 00:15:53,040 Speaker 1: a solution because floppy drives had a limitation on how 282 00:15:53,120 --> 00:15:56,080 Speaker 1: much data they can hold. So for example, the three 283 00:15:56,080 --> 00:15:58,560 Speaker 1: and a half inch disc, which although it was a 284 00:15:58,600 --> 00:16:04,720 Speaker 1: floppy disc was uh in hard plastic five and it 285 00:16:04,760 --> 00:16:06,120 Speaker 1: was a five and a quarter that was the one 286 00:16:06,160 --> 00:16:11,360 Speaker 1: that was physically very floppy. Yes, uh this the floppy. 287 00:16:11,480 --> 00:16:14,480 Speaker 1: The term floppy really confused people. I remember my dad 288 00:16:14,560 --> 00:16:17,880 Speaker 1: coming home one day. He was teaching a word processing 289 00:16:17,960 --> 00:16:22,240 Speaker 1: course at college. He was he's a professor, and he 290 00:16:22,320 --> 00:16:24,840 Speaker 1: taught this word processing course and it was like an 291 00:16:24,960 --> 00:16:28,320 Speaker 1: adult education course, and he says, yeah, people just don't 292 00:16:28,360 --> 00:16:30,640 Speaker 1: get it. I was explained to everyone that the five 293 00:16:30,640 --> 00:16:33,440 Speaker 1: and a quarter inch discs were called floppy disks, and 294 00:16:33,480 --> 00:16:36,160 Speaker 1: one of my students immediately folded his in half and 295 00:16:36,240 --> 00:16:41,320 Speaker 1: put it into his pocket. Uh. Yeah, don't do that 296 00:16:41,600 --> 00:16:44,000 Speaker 1: is the moral of that story. But yeah, even the 297 00:16:44,000 --> 00:16:45,680 Speaker 1: three and a half inch disk, despite the fact that 298 00:16:45,760 --> 00:16:48,400 Speaker 1: was rigid, was in fact a floppy disk. It could 299 00:16:48,480 --> 00:16:52,160 Speaker 1: only hold one point four four megabytes. Later on you 300 00:16:52,200 --> 00:16:55,000 Speaker 1: could get some that could hold two point eight eight 301 00:16:55,040 --> 00:16:59,960 Speaker 1: megabytes megabytes. That's that was considered a lot of storage 302 00:17:00,120 --> 00:17:02,800 Speaker 1: back in the day. So it's like for for some 303 00:17:02,880 --> 00:17:05,000 Speaker 1: kind of framework reference, like I think an MP three 304 00:17:05,640 --> 00:17:07,240 Speaker 1: like two and a half minute song is at least 305 00:17:07,280 --> 00:17:10,359 Speaker 1: i'd say could be three to four megabytes. That's on 306 00:17:10,400 --> 00:17:14,920 Speaker 1: the small side. So that's one song could maybe fit, 307 00:17:15,119 --> 00:17:17,879 Speaker 1: or like maybe like thirty pictures if you were getting 308 00:17:17,920 --> 00:17:21,600 Speaker 1: JPEGs back then. Well, I recorded an hour long podcast 309 00:17:21,640 --> 00:17:24,879 Speaker 1: with a friend of mine last night, and it was 310 00:17:25,600 --> 00:17:28,600 Speaker 1: it was about a megabyte per minute, So that's about 311 00:17:28,600 --> 00:17:32,160 Speaker 1: a sixty megabyte UM file that came out of it. 312 00:17:32,520 --> 00:17:36,600 Speaker 1: So that would mean I would need somewhere around between 313 00:17:36,680 --> 00:17:38,959 Speaker 1: fifty and sixty three and a half inch discs. If 314 00:17:38,960 --> 00:17:42,840 Speaker 1: I were able to somehow divide that file up into 315 00:17:42,880 --> 00:17:46,960 Speaker 1: into equal chunks and be able to save it in 316 00:17:47,000 --> 00:17:49,439 Speaker 1: a meaningful way, it would take fifty to sixty of 317 00:17:49,440 --> 00:17:52,960 Speaker 1: these disks to do it. Now, zip discs were supposed 318 00:17:52,960 --> 00:17:55,840 Speaker 1: to be the next step. It was. It was a 319 00:17:55,840 --> 00:18:00,520 Speaker 1: a high storage medium compared to the three and a 320 00:18:00,600 --> 00:18:02,200 Speaker 1: half or five and a quarter five and a cord 321 00:18:02,240 --> 00:18:03,920 Speaker 1: could hold even less than a three and a half 322 00:18:03,960 --> 00:18:08,000 Speaker 1: could the zip discs could hold. Depending upon the type, 323 00:18:08,040 --> 00:18:13,680 Speaker 1: you had one fifty or seven hundred fifty megabytes, so 324 00:18:14,480 --> 00:18:18,560 Speaker 1: significantly more than what these other discs could have. But 325 00:18:19,280 --> 00:18:22,280 Speaker 1: it came out pretty late in the game, and there 326 00:18:22,359 --> 00:18:24,960 Speaker 1: was something else right on the horizon as the zip 327 00:18:25,040 --> 00:18:28,560 Speaker 1: drive came out that completely negated it, and that was 328 00:18:28,680 --> 00:18:34,159 Speaker 1: the rewriteable c D, the rewriteable compact disc. When combat 329 00:18:34,240 --> 00:18:37,240 Speaker 1: disks first came out, they were read only. I mean, 330 00:18:37,280 --> 00:18:39,920 Speaker 1: that was that. And there were a lot of reasons 331 00:18:39,960 --> 00:18:42,879 Speaker 1: for that, pretty much the same reasons you encounter for 332 00:18:43,040 --> 00:18:46,800 Speaker 1: any kind of medium when it first come out. The 333 00:18:47,200 --> 00:18:50,880 Speaker 1: established powers that be don't want you to be able 334 00:18:50,920 --> 00:18:53,320 Speaker 1: to write to that medium because they're afraid it means 335 00:18:53,320 --> 00:18:57,359 Speaker 1: you're gonna steal all their stuff, right, So same things 336 00:18:57,359 --> 00:19:00,480 Speaker 1: true with DVD s, same things true with Blu ray 337 00:19:00,520 --> 00:19:04,040 Speaker 1: samething's true with the even VCRs and the vhs. They 338 00:19:04,080 --> 00:19:07,840 Speaker 1: didn't want to allow that to be a writeable technology 339 00:19:07,960 --> 00:19:12,160 Speaker 1: for a really long time. So CDs when they did 340 00:19:12,160 --> 00:19:15,520 Speaker 1: come out, they were able to hold a lot more data. 341 00:19:15,560 --> 00:19:19,640 Speaker 1: They were actually eventually priced lower on a cost per 342 00:19:19,680 --> 00:19:23,280 Speaker 1: megabyte basis, and once you could have more data on 343 00:19:23,359 --> 00:19:26,840 Speaker 1: a CD at a lower cost than it would be 344 00:19:26,880 --> 00:19:31,200 Speaker 1: for a comparable number of ZIP discs, it was game over. Uh. 345 00:19:31,320 --> 00:19:33,639 Speaker 1: And what I thought was really funny is that PC 346 00:19:33,840 --> 00:19:38,800 Speaker 1: world named the zip disc the fifteen worst product of 347 00:19:38,840 --> 00:19:41,479 Speaker 1: all time in two thousand and six, but then in 348 00:19:41,520 --> 00:19:44,199 Speaker 1: two thousand seven, PC world said it was the twenty 349 00:19:44,240 --> 00:19:48,560 Speaker 1: third best tech product of all time. So what what 350 00:19:48,680 --> 00:19:50,439 Speaker 1: is it, I as, is the best or the worst? 351 00:19:50,640 --> 00:19:53,360 Speaker 1: It was one of the best things that ever came 352 00:19:53,400 --> 00:19:56,440 Speaker 1: out for computing. And here's why. Right, Like you were saying, 353 00:19:56,680 --> 00:19:59,440 Speaker 1: we had these one point four four megabyte discs. When 354 00:19:59,480 --> 00:20:02,520 Speaker 1: I it in line to get Windows ninety five upgrade, 355 00:20:03,000 --> 00:20:07,080 Speaker 1: I had thirteen floppy disks given to me in this box, right, 356 00:20:07,680 --> 00:20:09,600 Speaker 1: and I was like, okay, I wish one day there 357 00:20:09,640 --> 00:20:12,600 Speaker 1: was the ability to have a lot of data on 358 00:20:12,640 --> 00:20:14,600 Speaker 1: a small disc, and the ZIF discs were about the 359 00:20:14,640 --> 00:20:17,600 Speaker 1: same size as the three and a half inch disc, 360 00:20:17,800 --> 00:20:20,960 Speaker 1: a little thicker when it came to the the I 361 00:20:20,960 --> 00:20:23,480 Speaker 1: guess the height dimension. I don't know. I want to 362 00:20:23,480 --> 00:20:27,879 Speaker 1: say that. So it was in a very familiar format. Uh, 363 00:20:28,000 --> 00:20:30,000 Speaker 1: there was. It was so popular to the point where 364 00:20:30,760 --> 00:20:35,879 Speaker 1: a number of computer manufacturers were including internal zipped drives 365 00:20:35,920 --> 00:20:38,919 Speaker 1: in their computers. There was this click of death that 366 00:20:38,920 --> 00:20:41,080 Speaker 1: would happen after a while. You just say this this click, 367 00:20:41,600 --> 00:20:44,400 Speaker 1: and you knew your disc was fried. It's over. You're 368 00:20:44,400 --> 00:20:47,639 Speaker 1: not getting anything out of this. One of the bigger 369 00:20:47,680 --> 00:20:51,679 Speaker 1: problems with CDs being writable and rewriteable was there was 370 00:20:51,720 --> 00:20:56,080 Speaker 1: this giant nightmare of C D R C D plus 371 00:20:56,080 --> 00:20:58,879 Speaker 1: are minus are like, there's like this plus and minus 372 00:20:59,000 --> 00:21:03,239 Speaker 1: r W. There wasn't enough of this bizarre incompatibility with 373 00:21:03,320 --> 00:21:07,399 Speaker 1: rewritable discs because you'd have a proper drive that matched 374 00:21:07,480 --> 00:21:11,480 Speaker 1: a proper disc, and unlike a ZIP disc, which only 375 00:21:11,520 --> 00:21:13,760 Speaker 1: fit in a ZIP drive, you could get the wrong 376 00:21:13,840 --> 00:21:17,639 Speaker 1: kind of optical media in the CD burners. So I 377 00:21:17,680 --> 00:21:20,560 Speaker 1: think that prolonged the life of the zip disc to 378 00:21:20,560 --> 00:21:23,200 Speaker 1: the point where two D fifty megabyte version and then 379 00:21:23,200 --> 00:21:26,159 Speaker 1: a seven D fifty megabyte version showed up. But in 380 00:21:26,200 --> 00:21:30,119 Speaker 1: the interim these things were pretty much everywhere. I remember, 381 00:21:30,119 --> 00:21:32,200 Speaker 1: like there was an actual use for the parallel port 382 00:21:32,280 --> 00:21:34,800 Speaker 1: that wasn't a printer. That was so excited about that, 383 00:21:35,880 --> 00:21:38,439 Speaker 1: Um it was. I thought it was a really great 384 00:21:38,480 --> 00:21:42,200 Speaker 1: way to have portable programs. I used to have. I 385 00:21:42,280 --> 00:21:46,080 Speaker 1: used to run like Claire's Office on it. Where's Clara's works? 386 00:21:46,640 --> 00:21:51,040 Speaker 1: Remember this program? I know of it. I never used it. Actually, 387 00:21:51,080 --> 00:21:54,119 Speaker 1: it was the zip disc was fast enough to run programs, 388 00:21:54,680 --> 00:21:56,919 Speaker 1: so in my limited hard drive space I would just 389 00:21:56,960 --> 00:22:01,120 Speaker 1: be swapping out disks zip discs with different programs way 390 00:22:01,240 --> 00:22:04,399 Speaker 1: back in the day before hard drive media, Like, I mean, 391 00:22:04,440 --> 00:22:06,639 Speaker 1: hard drives were really expensive back then, So this was 392 00:22:07,440 --> 00:22:10,680 Speaker 1: I think it was. It was pretty freaking awesome. Uh 393 00:22:10,720 --> 00:22:14,160 Speaker 1: I Omega probably wishes it had one, but CDR CDs 394 00:22:14,200 --> 00:22:16,960 Speaker 1: had to win because they were just so cheap. Technology 395 00:22:17,000 --> 00:22:21,000 Speaker 1: became so low cost. Well. I also one other thing 396 00:22:21,119 --> 00:22:24,200 Speaker 1: that I didn't think to mention when you were talking 397 00:22:24,240 --> 00:22:28,480 Speaker 1: about how the CD did have some drawbacks. The other one, 398 00:22:28,520 --> 00:22:32,640 Speaker 1: of course, was just the right speed. The early writeable 399 00:22:32,760 --> 00:22:36,320 Speaker 1: c D s, the right speed was pretty slow, and 400 00:22:36,400 --> 00:22:38,520 Speaker 1: so it would take a really long time to burn 401 00:22:38,560 --> 00:22:42,000 Speaker 1: a CD. And uh, I remember, like this could be 402 00:22:42,040 --> 00:22:44,880 Speaker 1: a big issue if you happened to be say let's 403 00:22:44,920 --> 00:22:47,600 Speaker 1: say that you are a musician and you wanted to 404 00:22:47,640 --> 00:22:50,160 Speaker 1: go ahead and just sort of produce just enough CDs 405 00:22:50,240 --> 00:22:52,720 Speaker 1: so you're gonna go play a show, and you want 406 00:22:52,720 --> 00:22:55,800 Speaker 1: to have something for people who like your music to 407 00:22:55,840 --> 00:22:58,919 Speaker 1: take home with them, and you wanna, you know, create 408 00:22:58,960 --> 00:23:01,920 Speaker 1: some copies of c d's. You know, it could take 409 00:23:01,960 --> 00:23:05,600 Speaker 1: a long time to burn a significant number and and 410 00:23:05,640 --> 00:23:08,240 Speaker 1: be even though the c D medium ended up getting 411 00:23:08,240 --> 00:23:10,840 Speaker 1: pretty cheap, the actual production of it could be a 412 00:23:10,880 --> 00:23:13,880 Speaker 1: real pain in the in the neck. So I think 413 00:23:13,880 --> 00:23:15,760 Speaker 1: that probably also helped for a while. It took a 414 00:23:15,760 --> 00:23:18,879 Speaker 1: while for those right speeds to get fast enough and 415 00:23:18,960 --> 00:23:23,200 Speaker 1: not be prohibitively expensive for it to be something effective. 416 00:23:23,240 --> 00:23:24,800 Speaker 1: Like if you had all the time in the world, sure, 417 00:23:24,840 --> 00:23:27,520 Speaker 1: it's no big deal, but if you wanted to produce 418 00:23:27,600 --> 00:23:29,240 Speaker 1: a lot of stuff in a short amount of time, 419 00:23:29,400 --> 00:23:32,640 Speaker 1: that was a that was a big drawback. Hilariously, UH 420 00:23:32,960 --> 00:23:37,040 Speaker 1: c ds and NED CD drives used to have likeliest 421 00:23:37,080 --> 00:23:40,320 Speaker 1: to boast giant graphics like four eight x read speed 422 00:23:40,400 --> 00:23:43,640 Speaker 1: and four x burn speed. I can't remember the last 423 00:23:43,640 --> 00:23:47,000 Speaker 1: time I've actually seen a drive that had any boastful 424 00:23:47,040 --> 00:23:49,439 Speaker 1: words on it, because they're almost optical media is so 425 00:23:49,840 --> 00:23:52,120 Speaker 1: dated that no one's using it because they got SD 426 00:23:52,200 --> 00:23:54,720 Speaker 1: cards and everything. It's just so it was such a 427 00:23:54,760 --> 00:23:58,280 Speaker 1: different world and houselow those things were burned just such 428 00:23:58,320 --> 00:24:00,159 Speaker 1: a long time ago. It is kind of funny to 429 00:24:00,240 --> 00:24:02,600 Speaker 1: think that, even though it's not on the list, optical 430 00:24:02,720 --> 00:24:07,000 Speaker 1: media could almost be on a warning system for this 431 00:24:07,200 --> 00:24:11,879 Speaker 1: because the solid state media has really taken over to 432 00:24:11,960 --> 00:24:15,120 Speaker 1: a large extent. Now that we've seen solid state prices 433 00:24:15,200 --> 00:24:17,119 Speaker 1: continue to drop, it they're still going to have to 434 00:24:17,200 --> 00:24:22,000 Speaker 1: drop for a solid state hard drive to be uh, 435 00:24:22,040 --> 00:24:24,359 Speaker 1: you know, to be something that the average person is 436 00:24:24,359 --> 00:24:26,400 Speaker 1: going to go and buy as opposed to a spinning 437 00:24:26,440 --> 00:24:30,760 Speaker 1: hard drive, because it does add a pretty significant chunk 438 00:24:30,760 --> 00:24:33,040 Speaker 1: of change to a bottom line price of a of 439 00:24:33,040 --> 00:24:35,000 Speaker 1: a machine. But when it gets to the point where 440 00:24:35,600 --> 00:24:39,360 Speaker 1: it's negligible, it'll be really interesting to see if optical 441 00:24:39,440 --> 00:24:43,280 Speaker 1: media sticks around, you know, how much longer it sticks around, 442 00:24:43,400 --> 00:24:45,520 Speaker 1: or if it ends up fading into you know joining 443 00:24:45,560 --> 00:24:50,239 Speaker 1: the same list. Um, how about tape drives. We just 444 00:24:50,280 --> 00:24:52,600 Speaker 1: talked about the zip drives. Let's go even further back, 445 00:24:52,640 --> 00:24:59,880 Speaker 1: shall we. I remember having an old computer that one 446 00:25:00,119 --> 00:25:03,919 Speaker 1: the accessories you could get was a cassette drive, Like 447 00:25:03,960 --> 00:25:06,040 Speaker 1: you could get a cassette drive that would allow you 448 00:25:06,119 --> 00:25:10,840 Speaker 1: to run programs from cassette or to save data onto cassette. 449 00:25:11,440 --> 00:25:15,639 Speaker 1: But we didn't have that because we had a even 450 00:25:15,760 --> 00:25:18,919 Speaker 1: newer technology, the five and a quarter inch disk drive. 451 00:25:19,600 --> 00:25:22,399 Speaker 1: But but that was definitely something that was part of 452 00:25:22,440 --> 00:25:26,240 Speaker 1: the home computer system for a while, where tape drives 453 00:25:26,280 --> 00:25:30,600 Speaker 1: that were either real to reel or cassette based depending 454 00:25:30,680 --> 00:25:33,120 Speaker 1: upon the model, although real too real was really something 455 00:25:33,160 --> 00:25:36,399 Speaker 1: you saw more in like research institutions and stuff, and 456 00:25:36,560 --> 00:25:39,359 Speaker 1: less for the home market. But I think it is 457 00:25:39,359 --> 00:25:43,480 Speaker 1: pretty safe to say that the tape drive is obsolete. Definitely, Absolutely. 458 00:25:43,680 --> 00:25:47,240 Speaker 1: The tape drive was a great way, very cheap back 459 00:25:47,320 --> 00:25:50,800 Speaker 1: up tapes were very low cost. He was incredibly slow, 460 00:25:51,080 --> 00:25:54,040 Speaker 1: but the capacities were just enormous. At one point it 461 00:25:54,080 --> 00:25:55,360 Speaker 1: was like the pretty much the only way you could 462 00:25:55,359 --> 00:25:57,640 Speaker 1: back up your real PC unless you wanted to break 463 00:25:57,640 --> 00:25:59,680 Speaker 1: it out, like you was saying, with lots and lots 464 00:25:59,680 --> 00:26:03,719 Speaker 1: of but definitely obsolete. I don't know anybody who is 465 00:26:03,800 --> 00:26:08,920 Speaker 1: actively backing up their company with tape drives. Yeah, the 466 00:26:08,920 --> 00:26:12,280 Speaker 1: the last company I worked for before health Stuff Works. 467 00:26:12,320 --> 00:26:16,359 Speaker 1: Actually no two companies back um many many years ago 468 00:26:17,160 --> 00:26:20,800 Speaker 1: they were using tape drives to do backups of their system. 469 00:26:20,880 --> 00:26:24,439 Speaker 1: Then I expect that these days they used a totally 470 00:26:24,440 --> 00:26:29,280 Speaker 1: different methodology. And we've seen a lot of different technologies 471 00:26:29,320 --> 00:26:32,119 Speaker 1: come into play that have replaced the tape drive. Just 472 00:26:32,560 --> 00:26:38,320 Speaker 1: cloud storage being able to essentially outsource your backups to 473 00:26:38,680 --> 00:26:41,639 Speaker 1: some sort of large company like like Amazon is a 474 00:26:41,680 --> 00:26:45,040 Speaker 1: great example where you could have your backup stored in 475 00:26:45,080 --> 00:26:48,160 Speaker 1: the cloud. Uh. Thus, even if you had some sort 476 00:26:48,200 --> 00:26:52,240 Speaker 1: of catastrophic failure of the equipment in your office, you 477 00:26:52,240 --> 00:26:54,840 Speaker 1: could still have access to the data that that equipment 478 00:26:54,840 --> 00:26:58,240 Speaker 1: had generated. Um. You know that that is pretty much 479 00:26:58,760 --> 00:27:03,679 Speaker 1: negated the need or any sort of tape deck h 480 00:27:03,880 --> 00:27:07,560 Speaker 1: And as for the home market, obviously there's not really 481 00:27:07,560 --> 00:27:09,960 Speaker 1: any point to it anymore. In fact, that this also 482 00:27:10,040 --> 00:27:14,560 Speaker 1: illustrates something else and another issue with obsolete technology, which 483 00:27:14,640 --> 00:27:18,280 Speaker 1: is that the stuff that we create one day is 484 00:27:18,320 --> 00:27:20,680 Speaker 1: not going to be accessible to us because we will 485 00:27:20,720 --> 00:27:23,880 Speaker 1: no longer be relying on those same methods to produce 486 00:27:24,040 --> 00:27:26,720 Speaker 1: the the work, to save the work, and to access 487 00:27:26,760 --> 00:27:29,359 Speaker 1: the work. And this is a real issue. This is 488 00:27:29,400 --> 00:27:31,679 Speaker 1: one of those things that people talk about when they say, 489 00:27:31,920 --> 00:27:34,879 Speaker 1: you can't just assume that a hundred years into the 490 00:27:34,880 --> 00:27:37,760 Speaker 1: future will have the same sort of access to the 491 00:27:37,800 --> 00:27:40,840 Speaker 1: stuff we're creating today, because the technology will be significantly 492 00:27:40,880 --> 00:27:45,199 Speaker 1: different and will either be incompatible or the media that 493 00:27:45,240 --> 00:27:49,240 Speaker 1: we're using today won't last long enough for that data 494 00:27:49,280 --> 00:27:52,680 Speaker 1: to be accessible into the future. That's really an actual 495 00:27:53,240 --> 00:27:57,720 Speaker 1: problem that engineers and scientists and researchers look into. How 496 00:27:57,760 --> 00:28:02,200 Speaker 1: do you ensure that we have a continuation of our 497 00:28:02,240 --> 00:28:06,040 Speaker 1: our knowledge from one media to the next, or one 498 00:28:06,080 --> 00:28:08,960 Speaker 1: medium to the next. I should say um, because you 499 00:28:09,000 --> 00:28:13,040 Speaker 1: never know what will be inaccessible tomorrow. Well, thankfully, because 500 00:28:13,040 --> 00:28:16,879 Speaker 1: of the great historical documentary saved by the Bell, we 501 00:28:17,040 --> 00:28:20,679 Speaker 1: know that if you bury a VHS yearbook and you 502 00:28:20,760 --> 00:28:23,280 Speaker 1: leave it there for twenty five years, there will be 503 00:28:23,320 --> 00:28:27,800 Speaker 1: a VCR in the principle's office later on to watch it. 504 00:28:27,880 --> 00:28:30,520 Speaker 1: So that that problem has been solved. Jonathan oh Well, 505 00:28:30,680 --> 00:28:33,640 Speaker 1: I am happy to hear that Zack has a looked 506 00:28:33,640 --> 00:28:36,160 Speaker 1: out for us. It was Zach right. Well, well, Zach 507 00:28:36,240 --> 00:28:39,560 Speaker 1: was on the VHS tape the future future blonde kid 508 00:28:39,560 --> 00:28:41,520 Speaker 1: who looked just like Zach in the same set of 509 00:28:41,640 --> 00:28:45,640 Speaker 1: racially diverse group of friends there. Uh. They also were 510 00:28:45,760 --> 00:28:50,200 Speaker 1: very very happy that the same principle had a VCR attached. 511 00:28:50,400 --> 00:28:52,560 Speaker 1: You're totally right there. If you're going to leave, this 512 00:28:52,640 --> 00:28:55,040 Speaker 1: is just here's here's a tip that nobody ever needs. 513 00:28:55,120 --> 00:28:57,400 Speaker 1: If you're gonna leave something in a time capsule, make 514 00:28:57,400 --> 00:29:00,400 Speaker 1: sure you have the reader of the media of llable 515 00:29:00,640 --> 00:29:05,160 Speaker 1: with instructions with all the cables, because otherwise it's kind 516 00:29:05,200 --> 00:29:07,680 Speaker 1: of pointless. This just reminds me of my tape drive, 517 00:29:07,920 --> 00:29:10,760 Speaker 1: which was also made by Omega, that I wanted to 518 00:29:10,840 --> 00:29:12,960 Speaker 1: use it later on, where I had to get a 519 00:29:13,400 --> 00:29:17,240 Speaker 1: I want to say, scuzzy to USB adapter because yeah, 520 00:29:17,280 --> 00:29:20,640 Speaker 1: you just because I needed the data. Not really, I 521 00:29:20,680 --> 00:29:22,440 Speaker 1: didn't really need the data, but I thought I did 522 00:29:22,480 --> 00:29:26,680 Speaker 1: back then, So there you go. Okay, Well, how about 523 00:29:26,960 --> 00:29:34,640 Speaker 1: slide projectors, Yeah, that's absolutely I mean, who's getting slides made? Right? 524 00:29:34,800 --> 00:29:37,480 Speaker 1: Where would you go to process it? There? I'm sure 525 00:29:37,480 --> 00:29:40,240 Speaker 1: there are only a few places in the United States 526 00:29:40,240 --> 00:29:44,320 Speaker 1: where that are actually still processing film for slides. I mean, 527 00:29:44,360 --> 00:29:48,000 Speaker 1: you know, digital projection is so common. I mean, we 528 00:29:48,120 --> 00:29:50,680 Speaker 1: we've one of the things we've seen at the past 529 00:29:50,680 --> 00:29:53,920 Speaker 1: few c s s are these pico projectors where you 530 00:29:53,920 --> 00:29:57,080 Speaker 1: can just have a projector that fits inside your pocket 531 00:29:57,120 --> 00:30:00,120 Speaker 1: and you take it out and connected to even something 532 00:30:00,200 --> 00:30:03,240 Speaker 1: like a smartphone and be able to project a large 533 00:30:03,240 --> 00:30:06,200 Speaker 1: screen version of whatever it is you want to see. 534 00:30:06,680 --> 00:30:09,600 Speaker 1: There's very little reason why you would need a slide 535 00:30:09,600 --> 00:30:12,520 Speaker 1: projector unless you were doing it as really like an 536 00:30:12,640 --> 00:30:16,760 Speaker 1: art installation, like it's your specifically doing it as part 537 00:30:16,840 --> 00:30:19,840 Speaker 1: of the experience of whatever it is you're trying to convey. 538 00:30:21,200 --> 00:30:23,400 Speaker 1: Another one of those great devices. Again, watch mad Men 539 00:30:23,440 --> 00:30:25,080 Speaker 1: if you want to see basically a lot of this 540 00:30:25,120 --> 00:30:27,200 Speaker 1: stuff we talked about in these two episodes. If you 541 00:30:27,200 --> 00:30:29,200 Speaker 1: watch mad Men, you're gonna see a lot of these, 542 00:30:29,640 --> 00:30:31,760 Speaker 1: a lot of like what's the typewriter look like? What 543 00:30:31,800 --> 00:30:35,040 Speaker 1: does this sound like? Yeah, it's slide projector. One of 544 00:30:35,080 --> 00:30:37,480 Speaker 1: the best episodes of mad Men called the Carousel. But 545 00:30:38,240 --> 00:30:40,000 Speaker 1: I always wanted one of these things when I was 546 00:30:40,040 --> 00:30:42,959 Speaker 1: a kid because to the projectors in general fascinated me 547 00:30:43,000 --> 00:30:45,000 Speaker 1: when I was a kid, because of this idea of 548 00:30:45,040 --> 00:30:48,160 Speaker 1: having an unlimited screen size, because all you needed was 549 00:30:48,160 --> 00:30:50,720 Speaker 1: this one box and it wasn't that big and it 550 00:30:50,840 --> 00:30:53,080 Speaker 1: wasn't that heavy because we had CRT s back then, 551 00:30:53,720 --> 00:30:56,280 Speaker 1: uh that you can project this giant image, but then 552 00:30:56,320 --> 00:31:00,280 Speaker 1: you'd always have the in the horrifying slide shows this 553 00:31:00,360 --> 00:31:04,200 Speaker 1: is our family vacation, which now takes place over Facebook 554 00:31:04,800 --> 00:31:08,360 Speaker 1: or on somebody just showing you their pictures on their phone, like, hey, 555 00:31:08,480 --> 00:31:11,520 Speaker 1: here's the eight six pictures I took what I visited, 556 00:31:11,560 --> 00:31:15,320 Speaker 1: the uh, the salt quarry exactly here, here are pictures. 557 00:31:15,400 --> 00:31:19,080 Speaker 1: I'm not gonna necessarily give you context, or I will 558 00:31:19,120 --> 00:31:22,160 Speaker 1: give you more context than you ever wanted to know, 559 00:31:22,840 --> 00:31:24,840 Speaker 1: and I expect you to sit here and be prisoner 560 00:31:24,920 --> 00:31:27,120 Speaker 1: until I'm done. It was a lot easier with slide 561 00:31:27,120 --> 00:31:29,600 Speaker 1: projectors really because it was just impolite to stand up 562 00:31:29,640 --> 00:31:34,320 Speaker 1: off someone's couch and say I'm leaving now, but or 563 00:31:34,360 --> 00:31:36,800 Speaker 1: you'd have the image projected on you. That's the worst part, 564 00:31:36,920 --> 00:31:39,440 Speaker 1: right right. Yeah. The other thing about slide projectors, I 565 00:31:39,440 --> 00:31:43,840 Speaker 1: remember two things really. The carousel slides there were. This 566 00:31:43,960 --> 00:31:46,200 Speaker 1: just takes me back to my elementary school days because 567 00:31:46,200 --> 00:31:49,880 Speaker 1: that's what we would use to look at, like science slides. 568 00:31:50,600 --> 00:31:54,560 Speaker 1: I remember tons of classes where we used a slide projector, 569 00:31:55,160 --> 00:31:58,280 Speaker 1: and I remember the carouselfs were prone to two things. 570 00:31:58,800 --> 00:32:01,040 Speaker 1: One was that you would have actually have a slide 571 00:32:01,040 --> 00:32:05,280 Speaker 1: get jammed, so it would stop the entire presentation while 572 00:32:05,720 --> 00:32:09,680 Speaker 1: the teacher tried to fix the jam, and often that 573 00:32:09,720 --> 00:32:12,520 Speaker 1: would even mean removing the carousel, which would require us 574 00:32:12,560 --> 00:32:16,280 Speaker 1: to again find our way back to the proper slide 575 00:32:16,320 --> 00:32:19,120 Speaker 1: so that we could continue on our journey of education. 576 00:32:20,640 --> 00:32:23,320 Speaker 1: And the second was that invariably at least one slide 577 00:32:23,360 --> 00:32:27,080 Speaker 1: would be loaded either backwards or upside down, so you 578 00:32:27,120 --> 00:32:31,640 Speaker 1: would either get text that was flipped or you would 579 00:32:31,680 --> 00:32:34,240 Speaker 1: more likely see something from the point of view of 580 00:32:34,240 --> 00:32:38,520 Speaker 1: someone in Australia. And uh, while that definitely added levity 581 00:32:38,600 --> 00:32:41,840 Speaker 1: to the classroom, it certainly wasn't the most effective means 582 00:32:41,840 --> 00:32:47,160 Speaker 1: of getting information across the students. Extremely extremely antiquated and 583 00:32:47,480 --> 00:32:51,840 Speaker 1: definitely obsolete. Yes, however, I will say that that backwards 584 00:32:52,240 --> 00:32:55,840 Speaker 1: image we still see a remnant of that today with 585 00:32:55,920 --> 00:33:00,760 Speaker 1: people who take selfies using a phone where it flips 586 00:33:00,800 --> 00:33:03,920 Speaker 1: the image so it acts like a mirror, and then 587 00:33:03,920 --> 00:33:06,960 Speaker 1: you end up getting these backwards T shirts and things. 588 00:33:07,040 --> 00:33:09,680 Speaker 1: I saw a lot of that. We're recording this the 589 00:33:09,760 --> 00:33:12,360 Speaker 1: same week in the United States as there was an election. 590 00:33:12,440 --> 00:33:15,120 Speaker 1: So I saw a lot of my friends post selfies 591 00:33:15,280 --> 00:33:19,040 Speaker 1: of them wearing the I have voted uh sticker, But 592 00:33:19,200 --> 00:33:22,480 Speaker 1: the sticker was backwards because we were using that specific 593 00:33:22,560 --> 00:33:25,280 Speaker 1: mode to take the photo. So I'm glad that that 594 00:33:25,400 --> 00:33:28,080 Speaker 1: still lives. Like, even if it's not a physical slide, 595 00:33:28,120 --> 00:33:31,560 Speaker 1: we can still send people images that have been flipped 596 00:33:31,560 --> 00:33:33,840 Speaker 1: a d eighty degrees. Yeah, we have. We have the 597 00:33:33,840 --> 00:33:36,120 Speaker 1: equivalent of jammed images. It's like when a slide doesn't 598 00:33:36,160 --> 00:33:38,160 Speaker 1: load in the slide show, when you're trying to go 599 00:33:38,880 --> 00:33:40,760 Speaker 1: in Facebook and you're going into the next image, like, 600 00:33:40,800 --> 00:33:44,160 Speaker 1: why isn't it a loading jammed? It's yeah, and then 601 00:33:44,200 --> 00:33:46,760 Speaker 1: you have to click on the picture or whatever. Yeah, 602 00:33:46,880 --> 00:33:49,560 Speaker 1: you're right. Our our lives are still just as miserable. 603 00:33:49,560 --> 00:33:55,080 Speaker 1: It's just we've got a different means of producing the problems. Now, Um, 604 00:33:55,560 --> 00:33:58,040 Speaker 1: we've already talked about floppy disks, so we'll skip that one. 605 00:33:58,160 --> 00:34:02,760 Speaker 1: But the Polaroid cameras made up the last item on 606 00:34:02,800 --> 00:34:06,800 Speaker 1: the original list. And Uh, if you're talking about cameras 607 00:34:06,800 --> 00:34:09,680 Speaker 1: that are made by Polaroid, that's misleading because that company 608 00:34:09,760 --> 00:34:13,640 Speaker 1: is still making cameras. They're still making digital cameras. They're 609 00:34:13,640 --> 00:34:17,160 Speaker 1: even still making instant film cameras, are at least what 610 00:34:17,200 --> 00:34:19,880 Speaker 1: they call instant film cameras. Some of those instant film 611 00:34:19,920 --> 00:34:24,600 Speaker 1: cameras are technically not instant film. It's a digital camera 612 00:34:24,800 --> 00:34:28,000 Speaker 1: with its own printer, so it prints the image as 613 00:34:28,040 --> 00:34:32,080 Speaker 1: opposed to captures it on film that then develops. Uh. 614 00:34:32,280 --> 00:34:34,279 Speaker 1: But they do still have an instant film camera called 615 00:34:34,280 --> 00:34:37,440 Speaker 1: the p I C the Pick three hundred that takes 616 00:34:37,520 --> 00:34:42,200 Speaker 1: instant film. So it's actually still a thing. And in fact, 617 00:34:42,239 --> 00:34:44,320 Speaker 1: I think the reason why this is on the obsolete 618 00:34:44,360 --> 00:34:46,600 Speaker 1: list is that for a long time it looked like 619 00:34:46,640 --> 00:34:48,920 Speaker 1: Polaroid was just going to get out of that game entirely. 620 00:34:49,000 --> 00:34:53,440 Speaker 1: But the nostalgia for the instant film photo demanded that 621 00:34:53,520 --> 00:34:56,799 Speaker 1: there be a product to fulfill that desire. So this 622 00:34:56,880 --> 00:34:59,640 Speaker 1: is an example of something that people weren't ready to 623 00:34:59,719 --> 00:35:02,760 Speaker 1: let love. I think, yeah, I think this might be 624 00:35:02,960 --> 00:35:06,040 Speaker 1: with the turntables kind of thing that like this is 625 00:35:06,200 --> 00:35:08,799 Speaker 1: this still exists. There's a set number of people want 626 00:35:08,840 --> 00:35:13,879 Speaker 1: to use this. There's a very long documentary on Polaroid's 627 00:35:13,880 --> 00:35:16,759 Speaker 1: final years. I believe it's on Netflix currently, which I 628 00:35:16,840 --> 00:35:21,200 Speaker 1: tried to watch, but the amount of sentimentality was so great. Uh, 629 00:35:21,480 --> 00:35:24,800 Speaker 1: so much emotion of people crying because people are printing 630 00:35:24,800 --> 00:35:27,359 Speaker 1: out pictures. I had to turn it off. But when 631 00:35:27,400 --> 00:35:30,520 Speaker 1: it comes to Polaro cameras, I loved it when I 632 00:35:30,560 --> 00:35:31,920 Speaker 1: was a kid, and you know, you would try to 633 00:35:31,960 --> 00:35:34,360 Speaker 1: shake the thing and you try to see the image developed. 634 00:35:34,360 --> 00:35:36,840 Speaker 1: That was a really cool idea. And then when you 635 00:35:36,880 --> 00:35:39,040 Speaker 1: find out the science behind and how it works, how 636 00:35:39,120 --> 00:35:42,080 Speaker 1: this this thing was being developed right in this this box, 637 00:35:42,920 --> 00:35:45,680 Speaker 1: that was insane because it just seemed like, oh wait, 638 00:35:45,719 --> 00:35:47,360 Speaker 1: that's how it stuff, that's how it works. It's not 639 00:35:47,400 --> 00:35:50,160 Speaker 1: a big deal. But to know more about it as 640 00:35:50,160 --> 00:35:53,240 Speaker 1: I'm older, it's pretty cool. But do you see yourself 641 00:35:53,280 --> 00:35:57,320 Speaker 1: going out and buying a Polaroid instant film camera instant 642 00:35:57,360 --> 00:36:00,000 Speaker 1: camera because it's not film. I I don't see myself 643 00:36:00,080 --> 00:36:03,360 Speaker 1: going out and buying any cameras at all anymore. Because 644 00:36:03,400 --> 00:36:05,400 Speaker 1: now I've gotten to the point where I used to 645 00:36:05,440 --> 00:36:07,960 Speaker 1: be one of those guys who I like the standalone 646 00:36:08,000 --> 00:36:11,760 Speaker 1: devices that were dedicated to doing one thing because usually 647 00:36:11,760 --> 00:36:15,640 Speaker 1: they did that one thing really really well. And the 648 00:36:15,840 --> 00:36:19,359 Speaker 1: stuff like smartphones could do lots of stuff, but they 649 00:36:19,400 --> 00:36:21,960 Speaker 1: didn't tend to do all of it really well. It 650 00:36:22,080 --> 00:36:25,840 Speaker 1: just did it okay. But now smartphones, either the smartphones 651 00:36:25,880 --> 00:36:27,960 Speaker 1: have gotten to a level of quality that I am 652 00:36:28,000 --> 00:36:31,839 Speaker 1: now happy with, or my standards have dropped enough where 653 00:36:31,880 --> 00:36:36,280 Speaker 1: I don't care anymore. But either way, it's the same destination. Now, 654 00:36:36,600 --> 00:36:41,840 Speaker 1: a smartphone for me acts as everything. It's my camera, 655 00:36:42,040 --> 00:36:45,480 Speaker 1: it's my MP three player, It's the way I access 656 00:36:45,560 --> 00:36:50,040 Speaker 1: streaming media. It's the way I text people or interact 657 00:36:50,080 --> 00:36:53,520 Speaker 1: with social media. Once in a blue moon, it's the 658 00:36:53,520 --> 00:36:57,120 Speaker 1: way I talk to someone because I hardly ever make 659 00:36:57,160 --> 00:37:01,440 Speaker 1: phone calls anymore. But yeah, so I don't see myself 660 00:37:01,440 --> 00:37:03,880 Speaker 1: going out and getting an instant film camera. How about you? 661 00:37:03,880 --> 00:37:06,920 Speaker 1: Are you? Are you nostalgic enough where that's something you 662 00:37:06,920 --> 00:37:09,239 Speaker 1: you need to have in your life. I am. I'm 663 00:37:09,280 --> 00:37:11,520 Speaker 1: probably more likely to find a way to hack a 664 00:37:11,600 --> 00:37:14,319 Speaker 1: Kindled for it to display my images on like a 665 00:37:14,960 --> 00:37:18,160 Speaker 1: on like a loop. Then I would be a candidate 666 00:37:18,160 --> 00:37:20,800 Speaker 1: to get a Polaroid instant camera, because for me, the 667 00:37:21,120 --> 00:37:25,760 Speaker 1: coolest thing about printed photography is that requires no power source. 668 00:37:26,320 --> 00:37:29,160 Speaker 1: It doesn't glow at night when you leave the room 669 00:37:29,200 --> 00:37:32,799 Speaker 1: like a digital picture frame. So but I'm probably gonna 670 00:37:32,840 --> 00:37:35,080 Speaker 1: hack together a solution of a digital picture frame that 671 00:37:35,160 --> 00:37:38,920 Speaker 1: uses the inc then I would probably get this polaroid thing. 672 00:37:38,960 --> 00:37:41,759 Speaker 1: I'm not going to bother with instant film because it's 673 00:37:41,760 --> 00:37:45,600 Speaker 1: just not it's not it's just I'm not that sentimental 674 00:37:45,640 --> 00:37:47,440 Speaker 1: when it comes to that. Well. Plus, I mean you 675 00:37:47,440 --> 00:37:50,279 Speaker 1: would have to go on and buy refills of it, right, 676 00:37:50,320 --> 00:37:52,600 Speaker 1: I mean that's the other thing is that you can't 677 00:37:52,680 --> 00:37:55,360 Speaker 1: just offload the pictures and then make space that you 678 00:37:55,400 --> 00:37:58,920 Speaker 1: can take more pictures. You actually have to physically replace 679 00:37:59,760 --> 00:38:04,160 Speaker 1: the uh, the medium because it runs out. So that's 680 00:38:04,200 --> 00:38:07,160 Speaker 1: also a hassle. And like you can't you just can't 681 00:38:07,160 --> 00:38:10,680 Speaker 1: shoot a thousand photos. Like however, you can't like like 682 00:38:10,800 --> 00:38:13,200 Speaker 1: you're not have a burst mode on Polaroid. Okay, there's 683 00:38:13,200 --> 00:38:15,879 Speaker 1: no burst mode. You take the shot once and then 684 00:38:15,920 --> 00:38:17,759 Speaker 1: it spits it out and you better you have to wait, 685 00:38:18,400 --> 00:38:21,279 Speaker 1: So you better make sure whatever subject you have, which 686 00:38:21,280 --> 00:38:24,160 Speaker 1: better be a bowl of fruit that's not moving, that's 687 00:38:24,200 --> 00:38:26,840 Speaker 1: gonna be fine or very still subject because it's not 688 00:38:26,920 --> 00:38:31,040 Speaker 1: exactly like that friendly unless your dog sits nicely and 689 00:38:31,200 --> 00:38:35,200 Speaker 1: is trained not like mine, or or you Also, you 690 00:38:35,200 --> 00:38:38,279 Speaker 1: should know you do not have to shake it on 691 00:38:38,440 --> 00:38:41,400 Speaker 1: like the song. You do not need to shake a 692 00:38:41,480 --> 00:38:46,320 Speaker 1: polaroid picture. Let's develop that great hymn. I remember that. Yeah, Well, 693 00:38:46,400 --> 00:38:48,960 Speaker 1: that wraps up the list that was online. We have 694 00:38:49,040 --> 00:38:50,880 Speaker 1: a few more that we were just going to mention, 695 00:38:51,280 --> 00:38:54,480 Speaker 1: uh from our own experience. My first one was the 696 00:38:54,560 --> 00:38:58,759 Speaker 1: capacitance electronic disk. Did you did you ever see these? 697 00:38:58,800 --> 00:39:00,759 Speaker 1: Do you know what this is? I looked it up 698 00:39:00,800 --> 00:39:03,040 Speaker 1: because I saw it on your list of things and 699 00:39:03,280 --> 00:39:07,200 Speaker 1: I actually have seen them. Turns out they look like 700 00:39:07,520 --> 00:39:12,040 Speaker 1: giant floppy disks. Yeah, yeah, they I thought of them 701 00:39:12,040 --> 00:39:16,439 Speaker 1: as being about the size of a vinyl album record cover, right, 702 00:39:16,520 --> 00:39:19,840 Speaker 1: except made out of a semi rigid plastic um and 703 00:39:19,880 --> 00:39:22,120 Speaker 1: there was actually a disc on the inside of it 704 00:39:22,160 --> 00:39:24,200 Speaker 1: that you didn't see because it would it would get 705 00:39:24,239 --> 00:39:29,000 Speaker 1: pulled out when you put the whole case into like 706 00:39:29,040 --> 00:39:31,840 Speaker 1: it's essentially a cartridge into a player, and then it 707 00:39:31,840 --> 00:39:34,160 Speaker 1: would remove the disk and play it. It's called a 708 00:39:34,160 --> 00:39:38,240 Speaker 1: capacitance electronic disc because it actually had a physical needle 709 00:39:39,000 --> 00:39:43,399 Speaker 1: that would read the disk through electronic capacitance. So it's 710 00:39:43,480 --> 00:39:46,880 Speaker 1: kind of in between a vinyl album that uses a 711 00:39:46,880 --> 00:39:50,680 Speaker 1: physical needle and a laser disc, which uses an optical 712 00:39:50,760 --> 00:39:53,799 Speaker 1: laser to read information. It was kind of like in 713 00:39:53,840 --> 00:39:57,200 Speaker 1: between those. It was less expensive than the laser disc. 714 00:39:57,600 --> 00:40:01,120 Speaker 1: It's also less expensive, I think, than VHS tapes were originally, 715 00:40:01,560 --> 00:40:03,759 Speaker 1: but you couldn't write to them. You can only read. 716 00:40:03,800 --> 00:40:10,200 Speaker 1: It was read only, and each side of a capacitans 717 00:40:10,200 --> 00:40:13,120 Speaker 1: electronic disc could hold about an hour's worth of material. 718 00:40:13,680 --> 00:40:15,960 Speaker 1: So you would watch a movie and halfway through the 719 00:40:15,960 --> 00:40:19,480 Speaker 1: film it would stop, and you'd have to eject the cartridge, 720 00:40:19,840 --> 00:40:22,000 Speaker 1: flip it over, and put it back in to watch 721 00:40:22,040 --> 00:40:25,600 Speaker 1: the rest of it. To this day, I can remember 722 00:40:25,680 --> 00:40:29,840 Speaker 1: precisely where our copy of Indiana Jones and the Raiders 723 00:40:29,880 --> 00:40:34,160 Speaker 1: of the Lost Arc stopped. It stopped right after Sala 724 00:40:34,320 --> 00:40:38,600 Speaker 1: says they're digging in the wrong place. Then the video 725 00:40:38,600 --> 00:40:41,440 Speaker 1: would stop. I'd have to turn the disc over and 726 00:40:41,440 --> 00:40:44,799 Speaker 1: and watch the rest of Raiders. So it left a 727 00:40:44,880 --> 00:40:48,200 Speaker 1: lasting impression on me. Ultimately, it did not succeed in 728 00:40:48,200 --> 00:40:51,040 Speaker 1: the market. It went obsolute pretty quickly. In fact, you 729 00:40:51,120 --> 00:40:54,920 Speaker 1: might even argue that the word obsolete isn't accurate because 730 00:40:54,920 --> 00:40:58,680 Speaker 1: it never rose to prominence. So perhaps obsolete is giving 731 00:40:58,719 --> 00:41:00,799 Speaker 1: it too much credit. But I have a soft spot 732 00:41:00,840 --> 00:41:04,719 Speaker 1: in my heart for that particular piece of technology. I 733 00:41:04,719 --> 00:41:08,160 Speaker 1: haven't had the same experience as you so, I I 734 00:41:08,400 --> 00:41:12,160 Speaker 1: don't know how that would be growing up, well, uh, 735 00:41:12,440 --> 00:41:15,279 Speaker 1: it was a magical time, I as. Uh. As for 736 00:41:15,400 --> 00:41:18,759 Speaker 1: other types of obsolete technology, I'm just gonna lump a 737 00:41:18,760 --> 00:41:20,839 Speaker 1: bunch of these together and mention the ones that kind 738 00:41:20,840 --> 00:41:23,920 Speaker 1: of thought sort of might fit obsolete, Like a lot 739 00:41:23,920 --> 00:41:26,360 Speaker 1: of those ports, like the parallel ports you were mentioning, 740 00:41:26,360 --> 00:41:28,680 Speaker 1: I as a lot of those have largely been rendered 741 00:41:28,680 --> 00:41:33,919 Speaker 1: obsolete by USB ports. USB has really taken over, and 742 00:41:34,000 --> 00:41:36,839 Speaker 1: so we don't really necessarily need all those other ones 743 00:41:37,120 --> 00:41:39,239 Speaker 1: these days. In fact, it's been a lot of time 744 00:41:39,280 --> 00:41:41,960 Speaker 1: since I've bought any technology that required me to plug 745 00:41:42,719 --> 00:41:45,720 Speaker 1: something else in. It's almost all, you know, just plug 746 00:41:45,760 --> 00:41:48,160 Speaker 1: and play with the USB these days. There still are 747 00:41:48,239 --> 00:41:50,240 Speaker 1: some out there. It's not I don't mean to suggest 748 00:41:50,280 --> 00:41:53,960 Speaker 1: that they're all uh USB, that's not the case, but 749 00:41:54,239 --> 00:41:58,120 Speaker 1: a large number of them are answering machines. Also, because 750 00:41:58,160 --> 00:42:01,560 Speaker 1: now we've got things like digital voice mail. UH MP 751 00:42:01,680 --> 00:42:05,160 Speaker 1: three players I think are fading away because again we 752 00:42:05,239 --> 00:42:08,240 Speaker 1: have devices like smartphones that allow us to either stream 753 00:42:08,320 --> 00:42:11,400 Speaker 1: music or store it natively on a device, so there's 754 00:42:11,480 --> 00:42:16,040 Speaker 1: less need for a dedicated MP three player. UM. The 755 00:42:16,080 --> 00:42:19,799 Speaker 1: analog television broadcasts. We mentioned that in the last episode 756 00:42:20,000 --> 00:42:24,160 Speaker 1: that transition from analog to digital because a huge headache. 757 00:42:24,160 --> 00:42:25,759 Speaker 1: Back in two thousand nine, there was a lot of 758 00:42:25,800 --> 00:42:27,879 Speaker 1: confusion about whether or not you would still be able 759 00:42:27,920 --> 00:42:30,880 Speaker 1: to watch TV and who needed to have a an 760 00:42:30,920 --> 00:42:34,200 Speaker 1: adapter and who didn't need to have an adapter. Uh 761 00:42:34,239 --> 00:42:37,239 Speaker 1: were you covering technology back at that time? Yeah, I was, 762 00:42:37,360 --> 00:42:40,400 Speaker 1: and I was very into this back then, and I 763 00:42:40,440 --> 00:42:43,640 Speaker 1: believe it got delayed for a lot of months, maybe 764 00:42:43,640 --> 00:42:45,680 Speaker 1: even a year. I can't remember how long the delay was, 765 00:42:46,239 --> 00:42:49,239 Speaker 1: but I would. I found it just amazing that people 766 00:42:49,239 --> 00:42:52,640 Speaker 1: were confused because the amount of advertising that was done 767 00:42:53,360 --> 00:42:56,399 Speaker 1: about this transition, this change that's gonna happen, It's going 768 00:42:56,440 --> 00:42:58,439 Speaker 1: to happen. It was like, it's gonna be the set 769 00:42:58,520 --> 00:43:00,400 Speaker 1: date and it was pushed off by three So you 770 00:43:00,400 --> 00:43:02,400 Speaker 1: should have been up to date at that point, but 771 00:43:02,520 --> 00:43:05,360 Speaker 1: you weren't. A lot of people weren't. Um. I just 772 00:43:05,360 --> 00:43:07,279 Speaker 1: couldn't believe how many people were left in the dark. 773 00:43:07,560 --> 00:43:10,600 Speaker 1: On top of that, the transition caused so many issues 774 00:43:10,600 --> 00:43:13,440 Speaker 1: when it came to just being able to receive a signal, 775 00:43:13,480 --> 00:43:16,160 Speaker 1: because when it was analog, if you were far enough away, 776 00:43:16,400 --> 00:43:18,880 Speaker 1: you'd get a signal, but it'd be very weak and 777 00:43:18,920 --> 00:43:21,000 Speaker 1: you get kind of snowy kind of stuff going on, 778 00:43:21,040 --> 00:43:23,280 Speaker 1: a lot of ghost thing going on with the images. 779 00:43:23,480 --> 00:43:25,960 Speaker 1: So but you would get something, but with the transition, 780 00:43:26,239 --> 00:43:29,440 Speaker 1: you either got the signal or you've got nothing. And 781 00:43:29,560 --> 00:43:33,680 Speaker 1: so the the blacked out version of this added to 782 00:43:33,719 --> 00:43:36,560 Speaker 1: the fact that these waves didn't travel as far through 783 00:43:36,600 --> 00:43:40,760 Speaker 1: buildings that it was a huge problem for a while. 784 00:43:41,160 --> 00:43:44,200 Speaker 1: It seems like with the with the years have gone by, 785 00:43:44,560 --> 00:43:47,239 Speaker 1: a lot of that's been alleviated by different positioning of 786 00:43:47,280 --> 00:43:50,200 Speaker 1: towers and things so that you can get a place 787 00:43:50,239 --> 00:43:52,520 Speaker 1: like New York City where I am, you can still 788 00:43:52,560 --> 00:43:55,319 Speaker 1: get signal because for a while, if you were like 789 00:43:55,360 --> 00:43:57,040 Speaker 1: on the wrong side of the building, you were not 790 00:43:57,080 --> 00:44:00,759 Speaker 1: getting like fox, and that's been now fixed. So it 791 00:44:00,880 --> 00:44:04,759 Speaker 1: was it was a very interesting time that I thought 792 00:44:04,800 --> 00:44:06,440 Speaker 1: would have gone a lot worse. I think the government 793 00:44:06,440 --> 00:44:08,120 Speaker 1: had this program as well where you could get a 794 00:44:08,120 --> 00:44:10,320 Speaker 1: converter box for a set, and I think it was 795 00:44:10,360 --> 00:44:12,680 Speaker 1: like fifty less than that if you wanted to steal 796 00:44:12,760 --> 00:44:15,759 Speaker 1: use your old TV and um. It was. It was 797 00:44:15,800 --> 00:44:17,040 Speaker 1: an interesting time and I don't think a lot of 798 00:44:17,080 --> 00:44:19,520 Speaker 1: people remember anymore because it's a lot of people were 799 00:44:19,560 --> 00:44:21,960 Speaker 1: on cable at that point, so it didn't affect them 800 00:44:22,000 --> 00:44:26,760 Speaker 1: directly because they were still using their boxes, right. I uh. 801 00:44:26,880 --> 00:44:30,880 Speaker 1: I remember covering this as well and seeing the confusion 802 00:44:30,920 --> 00:44:32,880 Speaker 1: that was around it. One of our first Tech Stuff 803 00:44:32,920 --> 00:44:36,960 Speaker 1: podcasts was about this very topic. Chris Poulette and I 804 00:44:37,040 --> 00:44:39,320 Speaker 1: did a topic about it to talk about who needed 805 00:44:39,320 --> 00:44:41,320 Speaker 1: it and who didn't, because there was a lot of confusion. 806 00:44:41,840 --> 00:44:44,239 Speaker 1: Even for people who just had cable television. They were 807 00:44:44,239 --> 00:44:46,840 Speaker 1: wondering if they needed to have some sort of converter box, 808 00:44:47,239 --> 00:44:49,560 Speaker 1: and there were there were some manufacturers that were kind 809 00:44:49,560 --> 00:44:52,640 Speaker 1: of preying on ignorance at the time too, in order 810 00:44:52,680 --> 00:44:56,560 Speaker 1: to sell devices that weren't needed to customers who who 811 00:44:56,640 --> 00:45:00,080 Speaker 1: were fine where they were. But I'm glad that I 812 00:45:00,120 --> 00:45:02,520 Speaker 1: finally went through. Also, it's an interesting entry on the 813 00:45:02,560 --> 00:45:05,479 Speaker 1: list because unlike a lot of the other ones where 814 00:45:05,520 --> 00:45:08,200 Speaker 1: the obsolescence came about as just the fact that people 815 00:45:08,200 --> 00:45:11,920 Speaker 1: moved on to other technologies, this one was a forced obsolescence. 816 00:45:11,920 --> 00:45:13,880 Speaker 1: There was no choice in the matter. It wasn't that 817 00:45:13,920 --> 00:45:17,000 Speaker 1: people necessarily moved on to something else. It was that 818 00:45:17,000 --> 00:45:20,200 Speaker 1: that thing no longer was supported. Yeah, that was It 819 00:45:20,239 --> 00:45:22,800 Speaker 1: was a good time now we got not nice beautiful 820 00:45:23,280 --> 00:45:26,200 Speaker 1: multi caast channels. You can get to four point one, 821 00:45:26,280 --> 00:45:28,279 Speaker 1: four point two, all these other things. We have all 822 00:45:28,280 --> 00:45:31,120 Speaker 1: the airwaves freed up for things like wireless communication, which 823 00:45:31,120 --> 00:45:34,200 Speaker 1: makes it a lot nicer. Right, and then you have 824 00:45:34,640 --> 00:45:37,480 Speaker 1: your own entry down here too. Right. Yeah, it's my 825 00:45:37,760 --> 00:45:42,719 Speaker 1: favorite piece of obstlity technology is the UMPC. This was 826 00:45:42,760 --> 00:45:46,160 Speaker 1: an initiative by Microsoft and I believe it Intel at 827 00:45:46,160 --> 00:45:49,279 Speaker 1: the time. It was a geez. I don't remember how 828 00:45:49,280 --> 00:45:51,040 Speaker 1: many years ago it was, but it was a while ago. 829 00:45:51,080 --> 00:45:53,959 Speaker 1: I'd say at least maybe eight years ago. The UMPC 830 00:45:54,400 --> 00:45:57,600 Speaker 1: was the Ultramobile PC. It was a tiny, full fledged 831 00:45:57,600 --> 00:46:00,200 Speaker 1: computer that was about the size of a Sega game 832 00:46:00,200 --> 00:46:02,040 Speaker 1: gear if you if you want to actually have a 833 00:46:02,040 --> 00:46:05,600 Speaker 1: size comparison, or think of a really really fat seven 834 00:46:05,600 --> 00:46:08,560 Speaker 1: inch tablet, because it was a pretty hefty device and 835 00:46:08,640 --> 00:46:11,440 Speaker 1: you have this touch screen in the middle. Some devices 836 00:46:11,719 --> 00:46:14,759 Speaker 1: gopsed to have on screen keyboards only where you could 837 00:46:14,760 --> 00:46:18,080 Speaker 1: just tap and you'd get like the semi circular keys 838 00:46:18,440 --> 00:46:20,760 Speaker 1: on the left and right so you can do thumb typing, 839 00:46:21,000 --> 00:46:22,840 Speaker 1: or you get a more traditional keyboard that would come 840 00:46:22,920 --> 00:46:25,399 Speaker 1: up kind of like a tablet today has or phone has, 841 00:46:25,880 --> 00:46:28,040 Speaker 1: and this was way ahead of its time because they 842 00:46:28,040 --> 00:46:32,600 Speaker 1: were cramming in like pretty much laptop processors in these 843 00:46:32,640 --> 00:46:36,879 Speaker 1: devices with like a six inch screen with a full 844 00:46:36,960 --> 00:46:39,320 Speaker 1: operating system, and so you would get like two or 845 00:46:39,360 --> 00:46:41,279 Speaker 1: three hours of battery life and it was about a 846 00:46:41,320 --> 00:46:44,719 Speaker 1: grand or so. So it's very expensive. And for me, 847 00:46:44,800 --> 00:46:46,640 Speaker 1: I've always had this dream of being able to just 848 00:46:46,800 --> 00:46:49,839 Speaker 1: have one device, one computer that I can carry with 849 00:46:49,880 --> 00:46:53,960 Speaker 1: me anywhere I go and then crazily enough like come 850 00:46:54,000 --> 00:46:55,680 Speaker 1: home and dock it. And that's what the thing is 851 00:46:55,680 --> 00:46:57,759 Speaker 1: supposed to be. And it didn't take off because of 852 00:46:57,800 --> 00:46:59,799 Speaker 1: a lot of the things I mentioned, the battery life, 853 00:46:59,800 --> 00:47:02,719 Speaker 1: the price, and it's just it's just couldn't do it. 854 00:47:03,120 --> 00:47:06,320 Speaker 1: Did you have experiences with you and PCs? I, uh, 855 00:47:06,440 --> 00:47:11,080 Speaker 1: only only tangentially. I never owned one. I had read 856 00:47:11,120 --> 00:47:14,160 Speaker 1: a lot of the drawbacks and I never got into it. 857 00:47:14,200 --> 00:47:17,120 Speaker 1: They were also really expensive, um, and so they were 858 00:47:17,160 --> 00:47:19,680 Speaker 1: kind of out of my price range. They were there 859 00:47:19,680 --> 00:47:22,840 Speaker 1: were enough drawbacks where I couldn't see them being that useful. 860 00:47:23,600 --> 00:47:25,600 Speaker 1: I liked where it was going, and I thought that 861 00:47:25,600 --> 00:47:29,400 Speaker 1: that was gonna be an entire like line of technology 862 00:47:29,480 --> 00:47:33,239 Speaker 1: that we would see improve over time and continual continue 863 00:47:33,280 --> 00:47:37,440 Speaker 1: to take advantage of things like mantorization, battery improvement, that 864 00:47:37,480 --> 00:47:39,319 Speaker 1: sort of stuff. I really thought that's where things were 865 00:47:39,320 --> 00:47:42,000 Speaker 1: going to head, and then sort of I think cloud 866 00:47:42,040 --> 00:47:46,799 Speaker 1: computing took a lot of the the need for that out. 867 00:47:47,000 --> 00:47:50,120 Speaker 1: You know, as as you started to offload the actual 868 00:47:50,160 --> 00:47:55,120 Speaker 1: processing onto other UH platforms, you didn't need to have 869 00:47:55,160 --> 00:47:57,160 Speaker 1: a device that could do it itself. You had all 870 00:47:57,200 --> 00:47:59,040 Speaker 1: these other things that could do the work for you. 871 00:47:59,040 --> 00:48:01,040 Speaker 1: You just need a device to be able to access 872 00:48:01,080 --> 00:48:04,040 Speaker 1: that stuff. And so I think that was a large 873 00:48:04,080 --> 00:48:06,560 Speaker 1: part of why this never really took off. It wasn't 874 00:48:06,600 --> 00:48:10,280 Speaker 1: just the drawbacks, which I think you could eventually engineer 875 00:48:10,360 --> 00:48:13,440 Speaker 1: your way around, or at least try and create as 876 00:48:13,640 --> 00:48:16,560 Speaker 1: efficient a system as possible so that it was still useful. 877 00:48:17,200 --> 00:48:20,719 Speaker 1: It was that it largely became mood. I still I 878 00:48:20,719 --> 00:48:22,960 Speaker 1: think the drawbacks were just gigantic when it came to 879 00:48:23,120 --> 00:48:26,720 Speaker 1: using a it was a full fledged desktop operating system 880 00:48:26,719 --> 00:48:30,239 Speaker 1: that you're using on a very small screen, so it 881 00:48:30,280 --> 00:48:33,560 Speaker 1: wasn't exactly optimized. I know, Windows XP they did have 882 00:48:33,600 --> 00:48:35,719 Speaker 1: a tablet edition that's I believe was running on the 883 00:48:35,760 --> 00:48:39,600 Speaker 1: number of these devices, so it was capable of being 884 00:48:39,640 --> 00:48:42,040 Speaker 1: worked with with the stylus, but a lot of the 885 00:48:42,080 --> 00:48:44,120 Speaker 1: work you would want to do on a desktop computer 886 00:48:44,320 --> 00:48:45,960 Speaker 1: you wouldn't want to do on a device like this. 887 00:48:46,480 --> 00:48:48,520 Speaker 1: And like you're saying, with the engineering, we've seen a 888 00:48:48,520 --> 00:48:52,399 Speaker 1: lot of things happen where like smartphones now are optimized 889 00:48:52,480 --> 00:48:55,439 Speaker 1: applications that made those things seem like they were going 890 00:48:55,960 --> 00:48:59,320 Speaker 1: they would move fast, and if you had a desktop 891 00:48:59,360 --> 00:49:02,640 Speaker 1: computer versus a UMPC, you would know what it was 892 00:49:02,680 --> 00:49:05,080 Speaker 1: like for this application to run fast. And there was 893 00:49:05,120 --> 00:49:07,080 Speaker 1: a lot of pain when it came to this idea 894 00:49:07,120 --> 00:49:10,600 Speaker 1: of trying to be productive on this small device. I 895 00:49:10,600 --> 00:49:14,000 Speaker 1: think the smartphone is the successor in some kind of 896 00:49:14,000 --> 00:49:18,400 Speaker 1: way to the UMPC because it does prettty much everything 897 00:49:18,480 --> 00:49:21,080 Speaker 1: you want, and with the larger screens that are happening 898 00:49:21,080 --> 00:49:24,560 Speaker 1: and multitasking on Android phones, like I mean actual like 899 00:49:24,600 --> 00:49:28,640 Speaker 1: windowed multitasking, that's so close to this thing that I 900 00:49:28,680 --> 00:49:31,320 Speaker 1: wanted where you can compare it with the Bluetooth keyboard 901 00:49:31,360 --> 00:49:32,719 Speaker 1: and you can just prop this up and you can 902 00:49:32,800 --> 00:49:35,839 Speaker 1: use it as a full fledged machine. Uh. But yeah, 903 00:49:35,840 --> 00:49:40,000 Speaker 1: the UNPC was one of Microsoft's early initiatives that failed. 904 00:49:40,680 --> 00:49:42,480 Speaker 1: They were ahead of a lot of things, including tablet 905 00:49:42,600 --> 00:49:46,320 Speaker 1: PC's the first gen of that was really awesome. But yeah, Microsoft, 906 00:49:46,400 --> 00:49:50,520 Speaker 1: whatever they're doing, pay attention to them, because the way ahead, 907 00:49:50,880 --> 00:49:52,719 Speaker 1: pay attention to them. And then wait a couple of 908 00:49:52,800 --> 00:49:54,520 Speaker 1: years for Apple to do it and then go out 909 00:49:54,560 --> 00:49:56,960 Speaker 1: and buy it exactly and then Microsoft try to copy 910 00:49:56,960 --> 00:49:59,440 Speaker 1: it again. But then again there is this. As we're 911 00:49:59,480 --> 00:50:01,600 Speaker 1: recording this, there's a lot of news about Windows ten 912 00:50:01,719 --> 00:50:04,360 Speaker 1: and basically you're gonna have a full flas desktop operating 913 00:50:04,360 --> 00:50:06,319 Speaker 1: system in your phone and Windows phone and the apps 914 00:50:06,360 --> 00:50:09,640 Speaker 1: are gonna run cross platform. So maybe I will get 915 00:50:09,680 --> 00:50:12,840 Speaker 1: my wish where where I can just dock a phone 916 00:50:13,440 --> 00:50:15,840 Speaker 1: and use it as a computer, although I don't know 917 00:50:15,840 --> 00:50:17,879 Speaker 1: if I need to do that anymore. Now we we've 918 00:50:17,920 --> 00:50:22,319 Speaker 1: seen we've seen some implementations of that technology over the 919 00:50:22,360 --> 00:50:25,239 Speaker 1: last few years of people trying to do that, and 920 00:50:25,280 --> 00:50:27,600 Speaker 1: each of them were you know, you could see where 921 00:50:27,600 --> 00:50:31,640 Speaker 1: the promise was, but it never quite clicked properly. I 922 00:50:31,719 --> 00:50:35,480 Speaker 1: remember seeing the the smartphones that were uh, you know, 923 00:50:35,520 --> 00:50:37,400 Speaker 1: you would plug it into a docking station and you 924 00:50:37,400 --> 00:50:43,279 Speaker 1: could even uh have a larger display running so that 925 00:50:43,360 --> 00:50:45,279 Speaker 1: you you could look at a larger display, use a 926 00:50:45,600 --> 00:50:48,480 Speaker 1: separate keyboard. But it's all running off the processor of 927 00:50:48,520 --> 00:50:51,839 Speaker 1: the smartphone. But you know, we never got to an 928 00:50:51,880 --> 00:50:56,440 Speaker 1: implementation that really met the needs and the price point 929 00:50:56,560 --> 00:51:00,560 Speaker 1: for the consumer, so maybe we'll see it. That was 930 00:51:00,600 --> 00:51:02,320 Speaker 1: the Motoral Matrix. I think that was like one of 931 00:51:02,360 --> 00:51:05,840 Speaker 1: the first ones that that allowed this. Yeah, and I remember, 932 00:51:05,920 --> 00:51:08,920 Speaker 1: like I was drooling over a patent application that Apple 933 00:51:08,960 --> 00:51:12,120 Speaker 1: had where you could just pop an iPod into your 934 00:51:12,200 --> 00:51:14,799 Speaker 1: computer and that would make it your computer like a 935 00:51:14,800 --> 00:51:18,360 Speaker 1: giant cartridge. I'm like, that's brilliant, But that never happened obviously, 936 00:51:18,600 --> 00:51:21,360 Speaker 1: So it's these The future for me is kind of 937 00:51:21,400 --> 00:51:23,560 Speaker 1: like what do your talk about everything being cloud based, 938 00:51:23,840 --> 00:51:26,320 Speaker 1: being able to log in and have all your settings, 939 00:51:26,360 --> 00:51:30,120 Speaker 1: kind of like a chromebook experience. That's getting closer to 940 00:51:30,440 --> 00:51:32,920 Speaker 1: this kind of every computers your computer, as opposed to 941 00:51:32,960 --> 00:51:37,760 Speaker 1: I carry my little device, right Yeah, yeah, I agree. Well, 942 00:51:38,040 --> 00:51:42,520 Speaker 1: this was a great discussion about technology that doesn't matter anymore. 943 00:51:43,040 --> 00:51:46,759 Speaker 1: I'm glad that we could have this conversation. I S 944 00:51:47,040 --> 00:51:49,239 Speaker 1: For all of my fans out there who want to 945 00:51:49,360 --> 00:51:51,839 Speaker 1: follow the stuff you do, where do they find you? 946 00:51:52,320 --> 00:51:55,080 Speaker 1: I suggest Twitter dot com, slash I S that's I 947 00:51:55,360 --> 00:51:58,479 Speaker 1: y a z as in Zebra. I got on Twitter early, 948 00:51:58,600 --> 00:52:01,399 Speaker 1: so I still have that use your name, even though 949 00:52:01,440 --> 00:52:04,520 Speaker 1: there's a very famous musician who goes by the same name, 950 00:52:04,560 --> 00:52:06,719 Speaker 1: and if you're writing to him and you you're just 951 00:52:06,760 --> 00:52:08,759 Speaker 1: hearing this podcast and you find out there's another i As. 952 00:52:09,200 --> 00:52:12,399 Speaker 1: I had the name first, and h that's that's that's 953 00:52:12,400 --> 00:52:14,160 Speaker 1: a stage name born by the way, so it's even 954 00:52:14,200 --> 00:52:16,160 Speaker 1: weirder that he picked it. So they want to follow 955 00:52:16,160 --> 00:52:17,840 Speaker 1: me in my ramblings. Go to Twitter. We're go to 956 00:52:17,840 --> 00:52:20,640 Speaker 1: see that dot com. I do stuff there. It's kind 957 00:52:20,640 --> 00:52:23,080 Speaker 1: of a well known place seeing that dot com. Lots 958 00:52:23,080 --> 00:52:26,840 Speaker 1: of product reviews and how twos and news all in 959 00:52:26,920 --> 00:52:30,480 Speaker 1: one fantastic site. Thank you so much, i As, and 960 00:52:30,560 --> 00:52:33,080 Speaker 1: thank you guys for listening. If you want to get 961 00:52:33,120 --> 00:52:34,960 Speaker 1: in touch with me, let me know what sort of 962 00:52:34,960 --> 00:52:37,120 Speaker 1: topics you want me to cover in the future, if 963 00:52:37,120 --> 00:52:38,920 Speaker 1: there are any guests you want me to have on 964 00:52:39,000 --> 00:52:41,759 Speaker 1: the show, or just anything along those lines. Send me 965 00:52:41,800 --> 00:52:44,680 Speaker 1: a message. My email is tech Stuff at how stuff 966 00:52:44,680 --> 00:52:48,040 Speaker 1: works dot com. Drop me a line on Facebook, Twitter, 967 00:52:48,200 --> 00:52:50,239 Speaker 1: or Tumbler. The handle at all three of those is 968 00:52:50,360 --> 00:52:53,440 Speaker 1: text stuff H s W. And we'll talk to you 969 00:52:53,480 --> 00:53:01,000 Speaker 1: again really soon for more on this and thousands of 970 00:53:01,040 --> 00:53:12,520 Speaker 1: other topics, is it how stuff works? Dot com, m