Speaker 1: Brought to you by Toyota. Let's go places. Welcome to
Speaker 1: Forward Thinking. Hey everyone, and welcome to Forward Thinking, the
Speaker 1: podcast that looks at the future and says, wind the
Speaker 1: nano bots up, wind them up, and wish them away.
Speaker 1: I'm Jonathan Strickland, I'm Lauren, and I'm Joe McCormick. All right,
Speaker 1: so we wanted today to talk about a crazy, wacky
Speaker 1: thing that happens every year that I've had inflicted upon
Speaker 1: me over the past several years, the Renaissance Festival. You know,
Speaker 1: that's not gonna be inflicted upon me this year, So
Speaker 1: that's I am free this year. I think that crazy
Speaker 1: and wacky in this case might be a terrible understatement. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: it all depends upon I guess it depends upon how
Speaker 1: jaded you are about the whole thing. Okay, first of all,
Speaker 1: we're talking about c S, which formerly was known as
Speaker 1: the Consumer Electronics Show, now known solely as c S. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so it's kind of like KFC yes or Prince Yes.
Speaker 1: So Prince was they was a symbol for a while
Speaker 1: and then came back to Prince again. He's just like
Speaker 1: pr in No, I don't even know. I don't even
Speaker 1: know I can't. I can't keep up with with the
Speaker 1: great one. We're talking now about c e S, which
Speaker 1: is a giant consumer uh conference. It's a show where
Speaker 1: manufacturers come out and show off the stuff that they've
Speaker 1: been building in order to attract vendors who want to
Speaker 1: carry the sort of stuff in either their stores or
Speaker 1: through online or whatever. So it's kind of like a
Speaker 1: direct manufacturer's attempt to show off all the cool things
Speaker 1: that they plan on releasing over the next twelve months
Speaker 1: or so. Sometimes you also see prototypes or proof of
Speaker 1: concept type things that are not meant for consumer use
Speaker 1: in the near future, but maybe two or three years
Speaker 1: down the line. Cool. So you're saying, once a year
Speaker 1: in Las Vegas installs the world's biggest nerd magnet. Kind
Speaker 1: of I mean me, I would argue that Comic Con
Speaker 1: is an even bigger nerd magnet in the sense that
Speaker 1: it's more nerdy like because a lot of the consumer
Speaker 1: electronic stuff is just pure business, right, So, so a
Speaker 1: lot of people have this view that CS is a
Speaker 1: place where you walk in and everything is like the Jetsons,
Speaker 1: and it's all magical and you get to try everything
Speaker 1: and you get to carry it all home. You walk
Speaker 1: in and everything is TVs. Yeah. The the way I
Speaker 1: describe it to people who have never been is, you
Speaker 1: know people who think, oh, that sounds like it's really cool.
Speaker 1: Like I understand what you're saying, and it's not that
Speaker 1: I don't see really cool things. But think of it
Speaker 1: this way. Imagine that you walk into the largest mall
Speaker 1: you have, shopping mall that you have ever been in, ever,
Speaker 1: and every single square foot of that mall is a
Speaker 1: radio shack, and it's your job to look at all
Speaker 1: the shelves at radio shack and check out the three
Speaker 1: or four cool things per you know, square foot or
Speaker 1: so and ignore everything else. And it's also Black Friday.
Speaker 1: So that's that's what the experience is like, because it's
Speaker 1: a it's a The most of of the booths are
Speaker 1: in the Las Vegas Convention Center, which has three point
Speaker 1: two million square feet of exhibition space, and most of
Speaker 1: that is taken up by booths at this at this
Speaker 1: convention and um so a lot of these vendors are
Speaker 1: offering similar products to each other. They're big competitors. So
Speaker 1: Sony and Panasonic and Sharp are all there, and so
Speaker 1: you're gonna see a lot of the same types of
Speaker 1: technology booth to booth, although the implementations will obviously be
Speaker 1: different depending upon which one you're at. So you're you're
Speaker 1: not just seeing like cool, crazy gadgets that you've never
Speaker 1: seen before. A lot of what's at this big convention
Speaker 1: is the sort of next iteration of a technology you're
Speaker 1: already familiar, a lot of prototypes. Yeah. Yeah, you'll see dishwashers,
Speaker 1: for example, or laundry machines. Laundry machines, yeah, or just
Speaker 1: more efficient ones. Where you're there, you're using far less
Speaker 1: energy than the previous generations did. So it's not that
Speaker 1: it's unimpressive or unimportant. It's just not the sort of
Speaker 1: thing you think of as like robot hands. Well, but
Speaker 1: I was going to say, you're also going to see
Speaker 1: some robot hands. Yeah, you do see some robot hands.
Speaker 1: There's that mixed in two, and that I think is
Speaker 1: the the allure that CS has for a lot of
Speaker 1: people is that there are things at c e S
Speaker 1: that are kind of outside the box, or they're they're
Speaker 1: either a brand new technology or it's a technology that
Speaker 1: combines other things that have never been combined before, and
Speaker 1: it blows your mind Oculus is Rift, for example, basically
Speaker 1: debuted at cs A couple of years ago. Yeah, I
Speaker 1: was so upset that I missed out on that. I
Speaker 1: got to see it at E three the following E three,
Speaker 1: but I didn't. I didn't see it when it's sort
Speaker 1: of debuted at c E S and after I left
Speaker 1: the show, I heard nothing but great things about it.
Speaker 1: But while I was at the show, no one told
Speaker 1: me about it. Well, but there's a lot to see,
Speaker 1: and you're also there with As of last year, there
Speaker 1: were seven hundred and fifty nine attendees UM, which you
Speaker 1: know there does security. They're top not okay, anytime you're
Speaker 1: talking about security in Las Vegas, top notch okay, I
Speaker 1: mean of that. But that's over attendees, over fifty exhibitors,
Speaker 1: seven thousand media, eight hundred speakers, all from a hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty different countries. And within those groups, by the way,
Speaker 1: you also have cast systems. It's not it's not a
Speaker 1: joke because in in media you've got the the media
Speaker 1: and then you have the bloggers, and there's a little
Speaker 1: bit of I won't say there's like true animosity, but
Speaker 1: there's some snootiness going on. I can't imagine that nerds
Speaker 1: get a little bit snooty sometimes. I mean, because there
Speaker 1: there are the the established media who are like, well,
Speaker 1: these aren't real journalists, and then there's the bloggers who
Speaker 1: are like, well, these people are working for a dead medium.
Speaker 1: So it's it's kind of interesting because I get I
Speaker 1: get kind of stuck between. I've always been put with
Speaker 1: the established media, which is kind of interesting because I've
Speaker 1: only had that experience. Yeah, so apparently apparently, at least
Speaker 1: in the past, our food has been better, the food
Speaker 1: that they provide, which by the way, goes really fast.
Speaker 1: Because if there's anything that will make a journalist run,
Speaker 1: it's the promise of a free lunch. So you get
Speaker 1: to hang out with the cool kids, but they put
Speaker 1: kick me signs on your back. Yeah, kind of Yeah.
Speaker 1: Over the last few years, that's been more integrated, so
Speaker 1: it's been less of a like, there's not so much
Speaker 1: of a stigma on the bloggers as blogging has become
Speaker 1: more and more important. But it's certainly one of those
Speaker 1: things where you it's kind of interesting. It's a microcosm
Speaker 1: of this weird world where old media and new media
Speaker 1: are trying to sort out what the future is going
Speaker 1: to be. Yeah, So I would think one of the
Speaker 1: coolest things about going to uh a conference like this
Speaker 1: or convention show, whatever you call it um would be
Speaker 1: to go through and obviously you can't see everything, but
Speaker 1: to walk through and see as much as you can
Speaker 1: and get these general impressions of Wow, I'm I'm witnessing trends, right,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm seeing what's hitting what's hitting the ground
Speaker 1: right now, and what's going to fall away really quick,
Speaker 1: and what's going to succeed. And I wonder if that
Speaker 1: helps train your intuitions for what kind of trends are
Speaker 1: just hype and what's actually going to have staying power.
Speaker 1: Like I bet you've seen lots of examples of things
Speaker 1: that were like it seemed kind of cool at the demonstration,
Speaker 1: but then disappears. Sure, yeah, I've seen both cases. Right,
Speaker 1: I've seen stuff where while I'm at c E S,
Speaker 1: I start seeing Usually it works in in a in
Speaker 1: a cycle that lasts about two or three years. Right,
Speaker 1: You'll go to a CS, there'll be a few implementations
Speaker 1: of something that's kind of cool and you look at
Speaker 1: and you're like, wow, that's so different from everything else,
Speaker 1: And then you know, you either see that it's got
Speaker 1: the potential to do great things, or maybe it's just
Speaker 1: a flash in the pan, like, oh, that was interesting,
Speaker 1: but nothing ever came of it. The next year, if
Speaker 1: it's one of those things that seems to have a
Speaker 1: little bit of traction at least in the minds of consumers,
Speaker 1: you'll suddenly see a lot more implementations of it, and
Speaker 1: now you're like, Okay, now this is a thing. The
Speaker 1: next year you'll see the refined implementations where you're thinking, now,
Speaker 1: this is something that I want. So it usually takes
Speaker 1: that three year cycle from first seeing it to really
Speaker 1: wanting it, and it doesn't always end up the really
Speaker 1: wanting it category. Sometimes sometimes companies will stick with a
Speaker 1: technology and sometimes a way longer than they probably should. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and there's one of those in particular I'll talk about.
Speaker 1: But let's talk about some of the winners first before
Speaker 1: we get into the ones that didn't didn't take off.
Speaker 1: So you're talking about stuff that has launched at CES
Speaker 1: previous years. Either it is launched at C E S
Speaker 1: or it had its first big marketing push at CS.
Speaker 1: In some cases, these products launched before the show itself started,
Speaker 1: but they were ones that you sees as the platform
Speaker 1: to get a lot of attention, so a lot like
Speaker 1: For example, last year was a big year for fitness
Speaker 1: trackers and activity trackers, which had started about a year
Speaker 1: or two before that. We've done an episode on those
Speaker 1: and I'm wearing one right now. Weirdly enough, got one
Speaker 1: for Christmas. Thanks cousins. It looks like it's a flex
Speaker 1: Is that a flex? Or Force? You got the nice one?
Speaker 1: Those are cousins who really love you, Chris and Jesse.
Speaker 1: You guys are the best. I mean, flex is nice too,
Speaker 1: but the Force is more expensive. I know because I
Speaker 1: wait to put him on a Terry amount on my Lovely.
Speaker 1: It's a cot amount and it's come out. I know
Speaker 1: because I priced them. I was looking at those as
Speaker 1: a possibility for gifts anyway. So fitness trackers big thing,
Speaker 1: big thing, and last year they were big the year before,
Speaker 1: but we're really big last year and we expect that
Speaker 1: that will continue inteen. Obviously, I'm not at c S yet,
Speaker 1: so I haven't seen them, but I expect to see
Speaker 1: lots of fitness devices like the Fitbit. That's that's one
Speaker 1: that a lot of people have heard of because it
Speaker 1: got a lot of buzz at CS and that's a
Speaker 1: great example of the technology that before CS, it was
Speaker 1: a very small market that was aware of activity trackers.
Speaker 1: You're talking about, you know, the athletes who are also
Speaker 1: early adopters, Right, it's a tiny niche because it's a
Speaker 1: niche of a niche. But now everyone's heard of these things,
Speaker 1: and people who may have never really been interested in
Speaker 1: it before because they just weren't very active, but they
Speaker 1: love things like all the data you can get back.
Speaker 1: Suddenly they're getting into more active lifestyles because of these technologies.
Speaker 1: Oh they've they've also of course, um, you know, I
Speaker 1: think what's really driving the fitness tracker trend right now
Speaker 1: is the fact that these things are much more stylish
Speaker 1: and wearable. And I mean most people don't even notice
Speaker 1: that I've got anything other than a bracelet on, and
Speaker 1: that's that's cool. Yeah, And and on top of that,
Speaker 1: they're adding other types of functionality, right, you know, it's
Speaker 1: it's not just a pedometer obviously, like a lot of
Speaker 1: these have multiple exactly how poorly I'm sleeping, that's great. Yeah, yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a big one. Sleep trackers. So but that's one example.
Speaker 1: E readers is another example, although you could argue that
Speaker 1: e readers is both a winner and a loser. UM.
Speaker 1: E readers were one of those things that that we're
Speaker 1: showing up at C E S before they really took off.
Speaker 1: I mean, Amazon cracked the code on that one when
Speaker 1: they introduced the Kindle, but not at c S. Not
Speaker 1: c S, No, Amazon did their own events, and some
Speaker 1: companies like to do that. You know, some companies decide
Speaker 1: that they don't want to compete with all the other
Speaker 1: announcements that come out at CES and so they just
Speaker 1: do their own things. So Apple is one of those.
Speaker 1: And now Microsoft is I mean until recently Microsoft was
Speaker 1: a big part of CS, but last year they pulled out.
Speaker 1: Yeah they ran the keynote for a long time, didn't so, uh,
Speaker 1: they are not part of it anymore. But the readers
Speaker 1: in general were huge. They we've seen a lot come
Speaker 1: and go, and then we've also seen a lot of
Speaker 1: tablets that have tried to take over the e reader
Speaker 1: space by incorporating that directly into the features that they
Speaker 1: talk about. UM and tablets again another huge category I
Speaker 1: think with the e reader and tablet thing, correct me
Speaker 1: if you feel different, but it seems to be there's
Speaker 1: a convergence going on where we might be trending away
Speaker 1: from things that are exclusively E readers just towards yeah,
Speaker 1: sort of the tablet that well, you can watch movie
Speaker 1: on it, but it also, uh, you can read just
Speaker 1: as well as any good E reader. We're certainly seeing
Speaker 1: that as the prices for tablets fall as well, right,
Speaker 1: because one of the differentiators, they're two big differentiators I
Speaker 1: think between e readers and tablets. One is, generally speaking,
Speaker 1: the price. Generally speaking, e readers are a couple hundred
Speaker 1: dollars cheaper than the comparable tablets. The second thing, and
Speaker 1: second thing is the battery life because a lot of
Speaker 1: the readers you use ink, which is much less power
Speaker 1: intensive then using a backlit screen. That's the way most
Speaker 1: tablets us. Right. It's just a magnetic switch, um every
Speaker 1: time you turn a page, and so you're only using
Speaker 1: electricity when you actually turn that page. Right, So, anytime
Speaker 1: you're displaying something on a e reader, it's not actually
Speaker 1: consuming energy unless there's also a light or something incorporated
Speaker 1: into the e reader. So, uh, for people who wanted
Speaker 1: to have a device where they could read for days
Speaker 1: on end, without having to recharge it. E readers also
Speaker 1: made sense. UH. As battery life gets better and tablets
Speaker 1: get more efficient at using the energy that is available
Speaker 1: to them, so that you know, the apps are not
Speaker 1: draining the battery within four hours of turning on the device,
Speaker 1: then we start to see the end the prices go down,
Speaker 1: We start to see those those differences disappear, and the
Speaker 1: functionality of the tablet becomes a much more attractive thing
Speaker 1: than you know, again the unitask or nature of the
Speaker 1: e reader. So I think we will continue to see
Speaker 1: e readers start start to fade as tablets continue to
Speaker 1: take over that space. UM. I don't know that they're
Speaker 1: ever going to completely go away, because for some people
Speaker 1: that's exactly the advice they want, But I don't think
Speaker 1: it will be as as a big and a market
Speaker 1: as it has been. UH. Also, processors, obviously, they tend
Speaker 1: to debut at c s or at least they tend
Speaker 1: to have the first public demonstrations like Intel. UH the
Speaker 1: Nehalem processor from a few years ago was a big one.
Speaker 1: That was all this multi threading UH technology that they
Speaker 1: had built into their processor, and since then they have
Speaker 1: built on that with the subsequent generations of processors. So
Speaker 1: if you go to Intel's booth, they'll have giant displays
Speaker 1: showing really complicated programs running at full speed, and they're like,
Speaker 1: this is all running off of one of our processors.
Speaker 1: This this shows that it's capable of doing this heavy
Speaker 1: graphics lifting without a second, very graphic chuck card. So
Speaker 1: you know that kind of stuff that that's big. Also,
Speaker 1: streaming media devices very big at c e S. That's
Speaker 1: where I first saw the Roku. Uh, and there are
Speaker 1: a lot of other ones that are similar to the
Speaker 1: Roku where they take content that's on the Internet and
Speaker 1: stream it to your television. We're starting to see TVs
Speaker 1: kind of take over that role themselves, a lot of
Speaker 1: smart TVs out there, but for a long time, smart
Speaker 1: TVs just weren't going anywhere at CES because they were
Speaker 1: so limited. It was like a couple of um widgets
Speaker 1: that would be on your screen that might show you
Speaker 1: what the weather is or something along those lines, and
Speaker 1: everyone was like, this is so limited, it doesn't make
Speaker 1: sense for me to pay an extra five dollars for
Speaker 1: those TV set when there's not really it's not doing
Speaker 1: much for me. Yeah, it seemed like that's something that
Speaker 1: probably had to wait on infrastructure to support it. Like now,
Speaker 1: you know, once you're smart TV can access Netflix or
Speaker 1: something like that, or Amazon or Hulu Plus or any
Speaker 1: of those type of services, and then till those apps
Speaker 1: got built out, right, Yeah, that seems like one of
Speaker 1: those interesting ways where PCs and computers actually played a
Speaker 1: good bridging role because people started watching streaming media on
Speaker 1: their computers and then through that they give you know,
Speaker 1: these companies could actually pay to build out what they
Speaker 1: were providing. I really credit Netflix for building that out
Speaker 1: because Netflix was incredibly proactive on getting onto every single
Speaker 1: device that possibly could mobile PCs also making sure they
Speaker 1: were on They started making apps for things like game consoles,
Speaker 1: so I mean, whether you had a Nintendo console, a
Speaker 1: Sony console, or a Microsoft console, you could get a
Speaker 1: Netflix app and watch Netflix. That was a brilliant strategy
Speaker 1: and it ended up being one that all the others
Speaker 1: started to follow. Rumor has it that this year some
Speaker 1: four K smart TV manufacturers are going to be announcing
Speaker 1: a partnership with Netflix at cs. It would not shock
Speaker 1: me at all, and you know that also will be
Speaker 1: interesting to see about the whole two K and four
Speaker 1: K TVs because there's very little content you can get
Speaker 1: that actually runs at those resolutions. The televisions are capable
Speaker 1: of showing these super ultra high resolution images, but if
Speaker 1: you don't have a source for those images, they don't
Speaker 1: do much good. Well, it seems like a thing that
Speaker 1: you buy, hoping enough other people will buy one, that
Speaker 1: they'll that somebody will make something to sell you. You
Speaker 1: just plug in your VHS, right, It'll either it it'll
Speaker 1: either be the next generation of you know, the next
Speaker 1: generation of home media, like a Blu ray drive or
Speaker 1: DVD play or something that is able to show it
Speaker 1: even greater resolution, or you have some incredible Internet connection
Speaker 1: allowing you to watch this content. I mean, it would
Speaker 1: have to be. Yeah, I'm wondering if it's really only
Speaker 1: in like Google's like Kansas City in Austin and that's it. Yeah.
Speaker 1: So no, I mean, I'm sure watching a VHS tape
Speaker 1: of Highlander to the Quickening on a four KTV would
Speaker 1: be pretty cool. I don't want you to talk for
Speaker 1: the rest of this episode. I think it would be
Speaker 1: cool to Joe or wait now, are you talking about
Speaker 1: the original cinematic version of the renegade version? No? No, no,
Speaker 1: the original before they cut out all of the hilarious,
Speaker 1: all the aliens, there could be only one alright. So
Speaker 1: uh and then finally, one of the last example I
Speaker 1: have on my notes is um oh lead displays or displays.
Speaker 1: So when I first went to c S, I think
Speaker 1: it was two thousand eight was the first year that
Speaker 1: I went. When I went to cs that year, I
Speaker 1: remember seeing an O L E ed display and I
Speaker 1: think it was so nis booth and it was an
Speaker 1: amazing eleven inch display. Yeah. And so now we're getting
Speaker 1: to the point where we're finally seeing this kind of
Speaker 1: technology built into full size televisions. But you know, and
Speaker 1: it's it's much more power efficient. Uh, you get a
Speaker 1: great picture. But the manufacturing processes had not been refined
Speaker 1: back in two thousand and eight. There's been work done
Speaker 1: every year since. And also that a little leven inch
Speaker 1: screen would have been something like, you know, three grand. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so the price has also gone down as those manufacturing
Speaker 1: processes have refined over time. So, okay, so these are
Speaker 1: all examples of of big winners from previous shows. Let's
Speaker 1: get some shot in freud in here. Okay, what what
Speaker 1: has totally failed? The big one? That's the first one
Speaker 1: on my notes is I think everyone would agree in
Speaker 1: this room would agree three D three three D televisions
Speaker 1: and three D displays is my shot in Freud Button
Speaker 1: because I hate three D. I've been on the record
Speaker 1: about this on this show before. I hate three D movies.
Speaker 1: I hate it. I just it just doesn't I don't
Speaker 1: like it at all. And then the and the expense
Speaker 1: for consumer piece of equipment is just well, it's not
Speaker 1: just expense too, it's also the thought of extra equipment, right,
Speaker 1: because unless you have glasses free and I'll get to that,
Speaker 1: but unless you have glasses free, then you have to
Speaker 1: keep track of three D glasses. And if they are
Speaker 1: active glasses, then you also have to recharge them. You know,
Speaker 1: if you have a passive system. Those are polarized lenses.
Speaker 1: The lights polarized in such a way so that one
Speaker 1: I gets one set of images, the other I gets
Speaker 1: the other seven images, and then your brain combines them
Speaker 1: to create that three D effect, right, I mean, yeah,
Speaker 1: this is a mean, I mean, that's fact and a
Speaker 1: migraine exactly. This is assuming people want to watch three
Speaker 1: D in their homes day after day anyway, which I'm
Speaker 1: not sure they do. But see, I think that's the
Speaker 1: wrong way to look at this because the three D
Speaker 1: television isn't meant to suggest that all content displayed on
Speaker 1: that television is going to be in its three D capable.
Speaker 1: It's three D capable, meaning that for specific times, like
Speaker 1: let's say you're going to have a uh you, it's
Speaker 1: just you. You are you are a curmudgeon, and you
Speaker 1: don't like other people, but you love the super Bowl,
Speaker 1: and you want to watch the super Bowl in three
Speaker 1: D so that you can get this immersive experience. And really,
Speaker 1: and you know that sports is a big deal with
Speaker 1: three D. If you've ever seen any footage of a
Speaker 1: sports event shot in three D, I guarantee you I
Speaker 1: mean is phenomenal. It is gorgeous stuff. I've seen the
Speaker 1: demo tapes where they've shot things like ball games or
Speaker 1: the Olympics, or in one case, a w w E
Speaker 1: wrestling event in three D, and in all cases it
Speaker 1: actually was really breathtaking. It felt like you were at
Speaker 1: that place. But you you know, other things like a
Speaker 1: cooking show, you might not want to see in three D.
Speaker 1: You might there's no reason for it to be in
Speaker 1: three D. You don't need to see Emerald threatening you
Speaker 1: with a knife and shouting bam over and over again.
Speaker 1: You want for that? That the two D experience, Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's just the whole show. He just well, you know,
Speaker 1: he records multiple episodes in one day, so if you
Speaker 1: catch whatever one was shot last, he's a little punchy
Speaker 1: on nipping at the cooking sherry. Um, just kidding. I'm
Speaker 1: not suggesting that in role actually does that. But at
Speaker 1: any rate, we want you to go making any celebrity
Speaker 1: chef enemies or no, Okay, I mean I'm I like eating.
Speaker 1: So the point being that three I think saying that
Speaker 1: at you know, you'd have to wear these glasses for
Speaker 1: anything you would want to watch on your on your
Speaker 1: television is misleading. However, I don't think there's that many
Speaker 1: people who want to, you know, they don't feel like
Speaker 1: the three D experience is compelling enough or something that
Speaker 1: they would use frequently enough to justify going out and
Speaker 1: purchasing a three D television, unless it just happens to
Speaker 1: already be three D capable on top of all the
Speaker 1: features that the person actually is looking for. Uh so,
Speaker 1: what's the deal with glasses free? So glasses free tends
Speaker 1: to use this technology where it's similar to a lenticular display.
Speaker 1: The the technology to split the image into two is
Speaker 1: actually on the screen itself. So, uh, your your left
Speaker 1: eye is getting one set of images. You're right eye
Speaker 1: gets the other set of images. And it looks like
Speaker 1: stuff can emerge from the television. It actually looks like
Speaker 1: stuff can come out of the screen at you. So
Speaker 1: I've never tried this, but my guess is at the
Speaker 1: current state, it's very easy for it to look horrible.
Speaker 1: It actually can look great, but it tends to be
Speaker 1: You have to be standing at the right move You
Speaker 1: can move around a little bit, but if you if
Speaker 1: you all right, So imagine that there are Imagine that
Speaker 1: that the television is at the center of half of
Speaker 1: a pie. Okay, so or not the center, but like
Speaker 1: the the the edge of the half pie, a center
Speaker 1: of half, the edge of half of a pie. Joe.
Speaker 1: So take a pie, cut it in half. Put a
Speaker 1: television flat up against the flat half of that pie. Okay,
Speaker 1: Now the rest of that pie is cut into wedges
Speaker 1: that I'll point towards the center of that television. You
Speaker 1: understand what I'm saying. Okay, So when you get to
Speaker 1: the outer edge of that pie. If you're standing in
Speaker 1: the middle of any of those slices, everything's fine. But
Speaker 1: if you walk sideways so that you cross between the
Speaker 1: barrier of one slice and another, then you pass over
Speaker 1: this this point that's not good for you to be
Speaker 1: at for a glasses free display, and everything looks wonky
Speaker 1: and you start feeling sick, dear stomach until you move
Speaker 1: to the center of the next piece of pie, in
Speaker 1: which case everything's okay again. So there are viewing angles
Speaker 1: that are ideal, and if you cross between those viewing
Speaker 1: angles then you get a terrible experience that looks awful,
Speaker 1: like you went from oh, this is kind of a cool,
Speaker 1: interesting experience to HP Lovecraft has invaded my television and
Speaker 1: the old ones are out to get me. So um, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's not a pleasant experience. Uh So they are limited.
Speaker 1: They you can't have a seamless experience where you are
Speaker 1: able to pass left to right or right to left
Speaker 1: in front of your television and still have that three
Speaker 1: D effect go on without feeling unless you don't mind
Speaker 1: glimpsing the color out of space. Right. There are also
Speaker 1: some three D televisions that convert two D to three
Speaker 1: D I don't really care for those either, because to me,
Speaker 1: instead of it making kind of a well rounded three
Speaker 1: D image, it looks like you're looking at a series
Speaker 1: of cardboard cutouts, some of which are closer to you
Speaker 1: and some are further away, so everyone looks like they're flat,
Speaker 1: but some of the flat people are closer to you
Speaker 1: than other flat people. So I don't find those very
Speaker 1: thing shows Yeah, at any rate, lots of companies have
Speaker 1: pushed three D, and I can see why perhaps they
Speaker 1: have not um successfully pushed this technology. It's one of
Speaker 1: those things that a lot of people have argued that
Speaker 1: the the manufacturers are trying to force upon an unwilling
Speaker 1: consumer market. So it's people who just don't care about it,
Speaker 1: or they don't want it, or they don't feel like
Speaker 1: it's really well implemented, or maybe it's well implemented, but
Speaker 1: the content just isn't there to justify it. So you've
Speaker 1: got a lot of people who are um who just
Speaker 1: don't care about this technology, and yet they're being told
Speaker 1: over and over you should care because look how amazing
Speaker 1: this is, and and it just hasn't really caught on
Speaker 1: with a lot of the consumer market. So that's something
Speaker 1: we see year over year that just has not really
Speaker 1: taken off despite multiple efforts, and I started seeing lots
Speaker 1: of three D displays probably in two thousand nine, and
Speaker 1: every year since last year the emphasis had backed off
Speaker 1: a bit, but two thousand nine, ten and eleven, UH,
Speaker 1: definitely three D was a big deal. So you expect
Speaker 1: to see even less three D this year. I expect
Speaker 1: that it will be incorporated into a lot more sets,
Speaker 1: but it won't be a feature that's being touted as
Speaker 1: one of the main ones. But that I expect. I
Speaker 1: will see more ultra high definition televisions this year, like
Speaker 1: a lot more two K and four K sets, and
Speaker 1: fewer sets that are that are promoted as a three
Speaker 1: D television. They'll still have it, they just won't that
Speaker 1: won't necessarily be the the top selling feature of those sets.
Speaker 1: US still going strong last year were those tablet laptop hybrids. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there are a lot of them. I mean, I just
Speaker 1: don't understand. I don't think a lot of them have
Speaker 1: done well on the market. But there that's that was
Speaker 1: a big thing at CES last year was that you
Speaker 1: would see these UH laptops where you could either detach
Speaker 1: the screen entirely or fold the screen back on the
Speaker 1: laptop and turn it into a fairly thick tablet. I've
Speaker 1: seen those. They looked like something I didn't want to
Speaker 1: have in my hands. Yeah, I mean, I like the
Speaker 1: idea of it, but again, it ends up making like
Speaker 1: you you end up looking like you're carrying the world's
Speaker 1: clunkiest tablet if it's one that folds back on itself, right,
Speaker 1: because you know, we're now used to Apple defining what
Speaker 1: a tablet is supposed to look like. Whether you love
Speaker 1: Apple products or you don't, They're aesthetic has really dominated
Speaker 1: that market, and so you know, Apple has gotten to
Speaker 1: the point where, especially with like the the the iPad air,
Speaker 1: where it's super thin and sleek, comparing that to a
Speaker 1: device that has a full keyboard folded underneath it, you know,
Speaker 1: you can't help but look clunky in comparison. Uh. There
Speaker 1: was one that I loved. I wish I could remember.
Speaker 1: I think it was a Lenovo computer. There's one I
Speaker 1: loved before this this trend took off that looked like
Speaker 1: a regular laptop had kind of this this colorful plastic
Speaker 1: back on it, and you could pop the screen off
Speaker 1: the laptop entirely and not only would it convert into
Speaker 1: a tablet. It would switch operating systems, so when it
Speaker 1: was plugged down, it ran I think originally it might
Speaker 1: have ran it was either Windows Vista or Windows seven.
Speaker 1: It was several years ago. I think it might have
Speaker 1: been Windows seven, so it ran Windows seven, and if
Speaker 1: you popped it out, it ran Linux. So it would
Speaker 1: actually switch operating systems from one to the other in
Speaker 1: order to be able to save power and run different apps.
Speaker 1: But it also was going to have technology in it
Speaker 1: that would allow you if you were watching something, say
Speaker 1: in a Windows based format on your computer, and then
Speaker 1: you pop the the screen out so you can take
Speaker 1: it on the go, it would open a comparable program
Speaker 1: so that you could continue watching whatever it was you
Speaker 1: were watching and pick up exactly where you left off.
Speaker 1: And this was a time where no one was really
Speaker 1: doing that yet, and I thought it was an incredible idea.
Speaker 1: And it never made it to market in the United States.
Speaker 1: I think they sold the tablet version of it in China,
Speaker 1: but not the full laptop detatchable version. So that's another example. Um,
Speaker 1: do you guys remember netbooks? Oh? Yeah, I well I
Speaker 1: I technically still have a netbook somewhere I don't think
Speaker 1: I've turned it on in a few years. But do
Speaker 1: you remember netbooks Joe little babies? Yeah, tiny little laptops
Speaker 1: that barely did anything. Yeah, I mean generally, I guess
Speaker 1: the smaller version of an already accepted thing is considered cute. Well,
Speaker 1: I mean for me, it was a weight issue and
Speaker 1: only really needing to like get on online and yeah
Speaker 1: and and run Microsoft word. A lot of the basic
Speaker 1: features that Netflix is our netbooks cover not Netflix, but
Speaker 1: a lot of the basic features that netbooks covered are
Speaker 1: now taken care of by tablets, so the tablet market
Speaker 1: is pretty much destroyed. Also, laptops have gotten light enough
Speaker 1: that I mean for me it really was like a
Speaker 1: like a I can't carry around a ten pound laptop comfortably,
Speaker 1: so understandably. Now, I think the philosophy behind the netbook,
Speaker 1: even if that's not a very successful technology on its own,
Speaker 1: that philosophy of people are going to be doing more
Speaker 1: and more on the Internet. You're gonna need less power
Speaker 1: for native apps. Yeah, that I think that is truly
Speaker 1: the future you're computing. But the format though is now
Speaker 1: like I said, tablet, But yeah, I agree entirely. Like
Speaker 1: the the idea of let's put the heavy lifting off
Speaker 1: the let's take the burden off the computer and put
Speaker 1: it onto the cloud. I mean, obviously that makes sense
Speaker 1: because we've seen that carry on, Like even the upcoming
Speaker 1: consoles or the consoles that just came out, the PS
Speaker 1: four and the and the Xbox one, both of them
Speaker 1: have put a lot of the work onto cloud based
Speaker 1: services so that you don't have to rely so much
Speaker 1: on whatever the device itself can do. Um and they're
Speaker 1: still powerful devices, but they also are leveraging the Internet,
Speaker 1: so we're gonna see that a lot more. But yeah, again,
Speaker 1: the netbook form factor was just one that I don't
Speaker 1: I think ultimately people found to be uh limited, Like
Speaker 1: it didn't give enough of a benefit over a tablet,
Speaker 1: and it was not terribly comfortable to use. If you
Speaker 1: ever used a netbook, like one of the really small ones,
Speaker 1: it's pretty cramped to type on them for more than
Speaker 1: a couple of minutes. So, uh, you know, I mentioned
Speaker 1: tablet laptop hybrids and netbooks. Another specific product that didn't
Speaker 1: do so well was the Microsoft Surface tablet, which you
Speaker 1: know that was that was one of those things that
Speaker 1: people were thinking that maybe Microsoft could really make up
Speaker 1: some ground between uh it and Apple with this, with
Speaker 1: this Windows eight based tablet named after the same device
Speaker 1: that they had, a giant table device that they had
Speaker 1: shown off at c S a few years before. But yeah,
Speaker 1: you know it still has never really taken off. Yeah,
Speaker 1: we talked about Windows eight and tech Stuff and about
Speaker 1: some of the downers of that story. So if you
Speaker 1: want to hear more, listen to our two thirteen year
Speaker 1: and review episodes over at tech Stuff. The Palm Pre
Speaker 1: a famous example of a device. Yea, the Palm Pre
Speaker 1: is a little bit of prey for the media. I guess. Well, see,
Speaker 1: here's the thing is that when it came out, when
Speaker 1: when they showed it off at CES, yeah we all thought,
Speaker 1: oh wow, this is a viable editor to the iPhone.
Speaker 1: People still weren't sure about Android. When Palm Pre came out,
Speaker 1: Android was very young and it looked like engineers had
Speaker 1: built it and uh and the iPhone was the sleek,
Speaker 1: sexy kind of operating system and device all rolled into one.
Speaker 1: Palm Pre comes out and people are saying, this looks
Speaker 1: like it could actually go toe to toe with the iPhone.
Speaker 1: But it took six months from when they showed it
Speaker 1: off at CS to when it finally came to market.
Speaker 1: Six months is a long time. Android made up a
Speaker 1: lot of ground in those six months. The iPhone had
Speaker 1: really solidified itself in those six months, and the Palm
Speaker 1: Prex never could catch on. It never got the traction.
Speaker 1: So while it was a big hit at CS, it
Speaker 1: ultimately didn't succeed in the market and eventually Palm shut down. Uh.
Speaker 1: And you know, it was one of those things where
Speaker 1: Palm was betting everything on this device in the new
Speaker 1: operating system, the web OS, which was a Linux based
Speaker 1: operating system. Uh, and it just didn't pay off in
Speaker 1: the long run, unfortunately. And then the last one I
Speaker 1: have on here, it was actually the same year that
Speaker 1: the Palm Prex was shown off, there was this LG
Speaker 1: smartphone watch thing. It was a watch, there was also
Speaker 1: a cell phone and had a little touch screen display.
Speaker 1: You weren't allowed to touch it. They only they had like, uh,
Speaker 1: they had representatives who would wear it and show it off,
Speaker 1: but you weren't allowed to actually touch it. This is
Speaker 1: a lot of you would you would if it if
Speaker 1: it actually made it to market, you would be able
Speaker 1: to touch it because it was in prototype form, right,
Speaker 1: they didn't want they didn't want people to play with
Speaker 1: it and then discover that the features that were showing
Speaker 1: on the screen weren't actually implemented yet. That kind of thing,
Speaker 1: and it never came out in the US, and it
Speaker 1: was a little bit ahead of its time. I think
Speaker 1: I think that you know, well, actually, let's let's talk
Speaker 1: about what we're expecting to see. Yeah, alright, Well, clearly
Speaker 1: there's all the different you know, iteration stuff that we
Speaker 1: talked about before, the technologies that are improving generation over generations.
Speaker 1: So we're gonna see a lot of ultra high definition television,
Speaker 1: so you're gonna see a lot of interconnected appliances things
Speaker 1: like that. But I think for the purposes of this show,
Speaker 1: we like to look at the stuff that's really shaping
Speaker 1: the future. Sometimes it can be some mundane stuff, but
Speaker 1: we wanted to look at some of the crazier kind
Speaker 1: of stuff we've already covered and forward thinking. Right, So
Speaker 1: one of the things I want to point out is
Speaker 1: that some of these appliances and things that might seem
Speaker 1: a little bit mundane start to become really cool when
Speaker 1: you consider that you might have an entire household of
Speaker 1: things like this all interacting, and that's what we talked
Speaker 1: about in our very first episode, the one about the
Speaker 1: Internet of things. Yeah, and we're going to see a
Speaker 1: lot more of those sort of things, not just uh,
Speaker 1: I mean, we've already seen companies come out with their
Speaker 1: own appliances that all work within a single ecosystem, which
Speaker 1: is good, but not so great as the consumer being
Speaker 1: able to mix and match anything he or she wants,
Speaker 1: right right. Also, you know in the kind of case
Speaker 1: where Jonathan, I think that you're an Android user and
Speaker 1: your wife uses Apple. Yeah, so if we were to say,
Speaker 1: let's say that we were to get devices that specifically
Speaker 1: worked with one but did not work with the other,
Speaker 1: that would not be terribly useful for us, or it
Speaker 1: would put one of you in a pis terrifying. I
Speaker 1: do occasionally like to use my app that lets me
Speaker 1: see if my living room lights are on with my
Speaker 1: wife is home and I'm away, and then if they're on,
Speaker 1: I like to dem them and make her wonder what's
Speaker 1: going on. Um. She has done the same to me,
Speaker 1: by the way, she has turned the lights out on
Speaker 1: me while she was away, and I was thinking, like,
Speaker 1: do we lose power? No, the television still going what's
Speaker 1: going on? Then the flights are flickering, like, oh my
Speaker 1: wife is deciding to mess with me. So but the
Speaker 1: Internet of Things, I think it's gonna be huge this
Speaker 1: year at C E S. I think we're going to
Speaker 1: see a lot of things that are not specifically implemented
Speaker 1: into end devices yet. I've already seen a lot of
Speaker 1: buzz about manufacturers who are going to bring out, uh
Speaker 1: Internet connected sensors that could be put into other products
Speaker 1: down the line, but they're just showing off what these
Speaker 1: sensors are capable of doing, and the kind of data
Speaker 1: they generate, and the software on the back end that
Speaker 1: allows you to actually look at the data in a
Speaker 1: meaningful way. In fact, big data is also going to
Speaker 1: be highly represented at CES, I think this year. Yeah,
Speaker 1: so that's one one element. I'm sure I'll see tons
Speaker 1: of How about three D printing, Yeah, that's huge. I
Speaker 1: mean maker Bot always has a presence there. The very
Speaker 1: first time I ever saw a three D printer was
Speaker 1: a C E S. I think it was C E
Speaker 1: S two thousand and eight. I think it was a
Speaker 1: maker Butt And uh so you're gonna see a lot
Speaker 1: more three D printing, not just from them, but from
Speaker 1: multiple companies. There's there's one that I looked at that
Speaker 1: looks like they're going to have a cool combination of
Speaker 1: a virtual reality implementation and a three D printer where
Speaker 1: you could design something in a virtual space and then
Speaker 1: print it out for real. So suddenly, you know, you
Speaker 1: can figure out exactly what shape you want in this
Speaker 1: virtual environment and then get that shape printed for real
Speaker 1: zs so you really get that. So I means I
Speaker 1: could finally have my hand drawn lopsided sword of Death
Speaker 1: that I always drew when I was like, you know,
Speaker 1: when I was like twelve. I can't draw to save
Speaker 1: my life, So it would look like a twelve year
Speaker 1: old who cannot draw built this thing. I could end
Speaker 1: up with one of those after many, many, many hours
Speaker 1: of printing. Actually, what I would suggest if you're going
Speaker 1: to print a plastic weapon is to create a brand
Speaker 1: new AX for the podcast and Mystical Acts has seen
Speaker 1: better days has but you know, with with the application
Speaker 1: of some superglue, I think it's doing okay. So moving
Speaker 1: on another thing, I know I'll see a lot of
Speaker 1: our what they're calling wearables now you know this. These
Speaker 1: were like the activity trackers, the smart watches, things that
Speaker 1: are computers in some form or another that you wear
Speaker 1: as opposed to holding in your pocket or on your
Speaker 1: in your hands or whatever. Um So, a lot of
Speaker 1: them are going to be implementations of stuff we've already seen,
Speaker 1: things like smart watches, and there are vague rumors that
Speaker 1: Apple and or Google might premiere a watch or or
Speaker 1: show a prototype watch. It would it would shock me
Speaker 1: beyond belief if Apple did it. If Apple didn't, they
Speaker 1: would do it in such a way where it would
Speaker 1: be like a quiet buzz whereas there's just someone who
Speaker 1: isn't identified as an Apple representative wearing a super cool
Speaker 1: watching than people are like, is that it is? That
Speaker 1: it because Apples just they don't play with the CS
Speaker 1: their own Google Google is kind of the same way.
Speaker 1: Google doesn't tend to have its own presence at CS,
Speaker 1: but occasionally they'll partner with some other vendor that uses
Speaker 1: Google in its products, and so that's a possibility. Um
Speaker 1: I think that we're gonna see wearables that come in
Speaker 1: other form factors besides smart watches and activity trackers. For example,
Speaker 1: I'm hearing buzz about little cameras that you can wear
Speaker 1: in various ways that could be used mostly for security forces.
Speaker 1: So while it's not a consumer product in the sense
Speaker 1: that knows people would go out and buy one, it
Speaker 1: could be something that ends up being implemented into UH
Speaker 1: the standard gear that a police officer has UM or
Speaker 1: a first responder, So that's a possibility. There may be
Speaker 1: some that are actually more consumer oriented, which again brings
Speaker 1: up the whole question about privacy. Right, We've talked about
Speaker 1: that before, but it's essentially you know, Google Glass is
Speaker 1: a good example like that, and I hear that lots
Speaker 1: of competitors to Google Glass are going to be out
Speaker 1: in force. Yeah, I've seen that. I've seen quite a
Speaker 1: few press releases about various implementations of smart glasses, whether
Speaker 1: they are UH glasses that have a full display as
Speaker 1: opposed to Google Glass, which has the display that's elevated
Speaker 1: in in in one corner. Um, there's some that might
Speaker 1: have augmented reality additional uses there. There may there's some
Speaker 1: that may have some virtual reality uses as well. I
Speaker 1: haven't booked any meetings with anyone yet, but I'm still
Speaker 1: I'm still my schedule is still in flexible format right now. UM.
Speaker 1: I heard that Sony is working on a VR headset
Speaker 1: similar to the Oculus Rift or in competition with Oculus
Speaker 1: Rift U for the PS four that it makes sense, uh,
Speaker 1: from why I understand the any the development for Oculus
Speaker 1: Rift for consoles is kind of on the back burner.
Speaker 1: They're really concentrating on PCs right now, so for consoles
Speaker 1: to remain relevant so that they don't run, you know,
Speaker 1: it makes sense for Sony to look into that directly
Speaker 1: because don't want if you're Sony, you don't want necessarily
Speaker 1: the PC market to pick up on all the gamers
Speaker 1: and then you see your your market share for PS
Speaker 1: four dwindle. So if you're able to be to create
Speaker 1: something that works as well as the Oculus riff but
Speaker 1: for the Sony platform, that makes perfect sense. Um. I
Speaker 1: don't know that they'll show that off there, if this
Speaker 1: would be the place to do it. Yeah, and one
Speaker 1: of the Sony big wakes, it's going to be one
Speaker 1: of the keynote speakers. So yeah, And they always have
Speaker 1: a big invitation only press event on the opening day,
Speaker 1: like the press day, which is the Monday. Yeah. I
Speaker 1: have not been invited to that, so I might be
Speaker 1: reading about it later. That's honestly at this point when
Speaker 1: I look at Monday schedule, UM, Monday is the one
Speaker 1: day where I'm booked from I think eight am till
Speaker 1: ten pm, so I don't necessarily need to add to it. UM.
Speaker 1: Also robots, I expect to see lots of robots. I
Speaker 1: remember when I first saw the parrot, a r drone,
Speaker 1: which was one that you could control with a smartphone
Speaker 1: UM and had a camera on and everything, and it
Speaker 1: was it was really that was super cool. That was
Speaker 1: one of those devices that was not like everything else
Speaker 1: on the floor, so you paid attention to it because
Speaker 1: it's really interesting, and that their presence has grown year
Speaker 1: over year. Well, now we're starting to see lots of
Speaker 1: different companies come out with various types of robots, including
Speaker 1: flying robots. There's yeah, quad rotors, maybe some six or
Speaker 1: eight rotors as well. Yeah, I'm hoping, I'm hoping. So
Speaker 1: there's a there's one company in particular that as they're
Speaker 1: designing these these flying robots specifically for the film industry,
Speaker 1: they're building high definition cameras into the robots so that
Speaker 1: you can use these to shoot films. So instead of
Speaker 1: using a crane shot, you might use a robot shot.
Speaker 1: That I mean that sounds amazing. And also I just
Speaker 1: had this moment of complete clenching fear for that extremely
Speaker 1: expensive camera that you're mounting on this. I mean, I'm sure,
Speaker 1: I'm sure that the robot would be very reliable. I'm
Speaker 1: pretty sure they're not gonna put a phantom or a
Speaker 1: red camera on there. But I was also imagining the
Speaker 1: kind of stability you'd really need to be able to
Speaker 1: count on, Like I imagine this is a lot of rotors.
Speaker 1: Maybe maybe if you connected to some kind of steadycam
Speaker 1: equipment so that it could kind of auto correct. Also,
Speaker 1: also there are there are stabilization software that can take
Speaker 1: a lot of the jitter out as well, So I
Speaker 1: think with a combination of all of those things you
Speaker 1: could you can make it a pretty smooth experience. So,
Speaker 1: I mean, i'll see for sure we're there. That's one
Speaker 1: of the things I plan on checking out. There's a
Speaker 1: whole section at CS is. Most of CS is just
Speaker 1: kind of a crazy. It seems like chaotic, Like there's
Speaker 1: no rhyme or reason to the way booths are laid out.
Speaker 1: When you walk in, they just they take up the
Speaker 1: space that they take up, and that's it. So you
Speaker 1: might have to booths next to each other that are
Speaker 1: completely unrelated. One might have all these kind of crazy
Speaker 1: televisions and cameras in it, and the other one has like, uh,
Speaker 1: just a you know, remote control cars and lower end electronics.
Speaker 1: But they also sees in the past few years have
Speaker 1: been trying to group together some of the more emerging
Speaker 1: technologies in an effort to get them more visibility, because
Speaker 1: otherwise they tend to get lost because they usually are
Speaker 1: smaller startup companies that can get easily lost between these
Speaker 1: enormous booths like Sony and Panasonic or or you know
Speaker 1: those kind of companies. So they have one area called
Speaker 1: Eureka Park, which is all of their little startups that
Speaker 1: are really kind of crazy innovative companies, and they also
Speaker 1: have a robot section where a lot of the robot
Speaker 1: technology is gathered together. Some companies opt to go for
Speaker 1: just a space on the main show floor, but others
Speaker 1: will go and being part of these smaller groups because
Speaker 1: it means that they tend to get wider um attention
Speaker 1: from the media and from vendors. So I also expect
Speaker 1: to see a lot of different implementations of user control interfaces,
Speaker 1: so the the connects really opened this up quite a
Speaker 1: bit with the success that they've had, at least the
Speaker 1: the success especially among the hacker community for Connect. But
Speaker 1: I expect we'll see more gesture controls, more voice control,
Speaker 1: and eye tracking. I got. I got to play with
Speaker 1: one of those a couple of years ago. They sat
Speaker 1: me down. They had like an Asteroids type game part
Speaker 1: Asteroids part um was it a missile command um, and
Speaker 1: so it would track your eyes and you would have
Speaker 1: to stare at the stuff you wanted to blow up
Speaker 1: on the screen so that you could keep your your
Speaker 1: little spaceship safe. And it worked really well. And they
Speaker 1: also showed it off for things like reading web pages
Speaker 1: where when your eyes would get towards the end of
Speaker 1: the web page, it would just very smoothly scroll up
Speaker 1: and your eyes would just follow it up and then
Speaker 1: it would stop scrolling once your eyes lifted at a
Speaker 1: certain level, so you can continue to read stuff like that.
Speaker 1: So I expect we'll see a lot of innovation there too.
Speaker 1: One thing that I'm really excited that I think is
Speaker 1: going to show up in spades is steam box or
Speaker 1: boxes or boxing. Uh so, yeah, so you know, you know,
Speaker 1: it's interesting. I don't know Valve has an actual established
Speaker 1: space at c e S. There might be other companies
Speaker 1: that are building boxes that are specifically meant to run
Speaker 1: the steam os. I don't know that I'm going to
Speaker 1: see any of the official steam box as well, and
Speaker 1: there it's possible, but that that that is by the way,
Speaker 1: it's estimated to be a hundred and fifty thou dollar
Speaker 1: minimum to set up a booth. And that's minimum, I mean,
Speaker 1: that's you know, which is why a lot of these companies.
Speaker 1: What they'll do instead is they'll rent out a suite
Speaker 1: in a hotel and then they invite people to come
Speaker 1: by the suite and check stuff out. It also makes
Speaker 1: sense for some companies, like audio companies that want to
Speaker 1: show off their audio equipment. Well, C e S is
Speaker 1: really loud, so if you want to show off your
Speaker 1: audio equipment and really show the fidelity of your audio equipment,
Speaker 1: you kind of have to find a space that's quieter.
Speaker 1: So a lot of them will use suites so that
Speaker 1: they can show the stuff off. Um. I'm also psyched
Speaker 1: about some various car technologies that I think are going
Speaker 1: to show up at the show. Yeah, I'm sure it's
Speaker 1: gonna be there'll be a lot of driver assist technologies.
Speaker 1: And also i'll alternate the fuel technology. You're going to
Speaker 1: be looking into some fuel cell stuff, literally looking into
Speaker 1: fuel cells hopefully. Yeah, yeah, that'll be a lot of fun.
Speaker 1: I'm actually really looking forward to that. I find the
Speaker 1: fuel cell technology to be pretty awesome, So yeah, there's
Speaker 1: always going to be that kind of stuff too. There's
Speaker 1: actually um technically the show comes out while I'm at
Speaker 1: c E S, which means that the NDA should be
Speaker 1: lifted by then. Well, let's just say that there is
Speaker 1: a car company that has invited me to see their
Speaker 1: particular vehicle, which has a very sunny disposition. It's probably
Speaker 1: about as much as I can as specific as I
Speaker 1: can get. It's solar powered. There's a solar powered car
Speaker 1: that I'm gonna see anyway. What Yeah, there's a solar
Speaker 1: power car that's gonna be on display. It's ees. Are
Speaker 1: you gonna get in trouble for saying this? No? No,
Speaker 1: because it'll be it'll be public by the time this
Speaker 1: episode goes live because everyone will have seen it. Then.
Speaker 1: It's in the middle of the North Hall, which is
Speaker 1: where most of the car and automotive technologies, like all
Speaker 1: the cars area stuff. Almost all of it is in
Speaker 1: the North Hall, so it's one of the noisiest places.
Speaker 1: That's also by the way where they put all the
Speaker 1: media booths. So like Revision three, they'll be in the
Speaker 1: back of the North Hall again, I think. So I'm
Speaker 1: looking forward to seeing my Revision three buddies while I'm there.
Speaker 1: That's that'll be fun because those are distant coworkers that
Speaker 1: we never see otherwise. So yeah, yeah, I'm excited about
Speaker 1: hearing what you see. I hope you bring me lots
Speaker 1: of junks. I avoid swag usually because I don't like
Speaker 1: to pack it all up at the end of the trip.
Speaker 1: But I I've also already promised Josh Clark and I
Speaker 1: have a long standing agreement that I have to bring
Speaker 1: him back at least one T shirt he will never
Speaker 1: wear per trip, so I've got to find one of those. Well,
Speaker 1: So I hope you find out what the future is
Speaker 1: going to be, like, Okay, come back and report it
Speaker 1: to us and then it will be in the past.
Speaker 1: But all right, yeah, and then we will share all
Speaker 1: the secrets of days to come. Sounds good, that's you know,
Speaker 1: that's kind of our job description. So we're gonna wrap
Speaker 1: this up. Guys. If you have enjoyed the show, even
Speaker 1: if you haven't, I don't care. You're gonna have to
Speaker 1: do this now. You are required by law to go
Speaker 1: to f W thinking dot com. It's our website. That's
Speaker 1: where we've got all the podcasts, the blog posts, articles,
Speaker 1: things like that really cool information. If you haven't checked
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Speaker 1: really soon. For more on this topic in the future
Speaker 1: of technology, visit forward thinking dot com brought to you
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