Speaker 1: Apple unveils new products, including its fastest computer yet. Gas
Speaker 1: Buddy is kind of a privacy nightmare. The US is
Speaker 1: taking a closer look at Crypto Plus Your tech questions Answered.
Speaker 1: What's going on? I'm Rich Demiro and this is Rich
Speaker 1: on Tech, the podcast where I talk about the tech
Speaker 1: stuff I think you should know about. It's also the
Speaker 1: place where I answer the questions you send me. I'm
Speaker 1: the tech reporter at KTLA Channel five in Los Angeles.
Speaker 1: Welcome to the folks watching live on Instagram. So you know,
Speaker 1: every so often I am inspired to try something new
Speaker 1: and different, and of course today it backfired just a
Speaker 1: little bit because I went on Instagram and next thing,
Speaker 1: you know, everyone's saying on the live chat that, oh, Rich,
Speaker 1: I can't hear you your status key. And then of
Speaker 1: course I got to spend you know, ten fifteen minutes
Speaker 1: trying to figure out what's going on. What you know,
Speaker 1: is it the cable? Like you know, what's the setup?
Speaker 1: Because you know, not only does the Instagram app change
Speaker 1: every week, but also you know this setup, like I've
Speaker 1: got my setup here that I've actually now kind of
Speaker 1: kept in one place. But things just change, like technology
Speaker 1: changes every day and that is why I'm here. That
Speaker 1: is why I'm here for you. So lots going on
Speaker 1: in the week, lots going on in the world, continuing
Speaker 1: to watch the situation over in Ukraine, which is basically
Speaker 1: making me sick on a daily basis, So you know,
Speaker 1: thoughts to anyone that has any family in that region.
Speaker 1: I feel for you, and you know, I just feel
Speaker 1: for the world at large right now, because it just
Speaker 1: feels like we're in a very volatile situation that can
Speaker 1: change very quickly. And the unfortunate part is that we
Speaker 1: literally just came out of the worst two years ever
Speaker 1: in my lifetime with the pandemic, and now or hopping
Speaker 1: into a war that just seems to be very confusing.
Speaker 1: And you know, I mentioned this last week. I don't
Speaker 1: want to harp on it, but you know, the idea
Speaker 1: of all these people that have been displaced, not to
Speaker 1: mention people that have been hurt or killed, it's just unnecessary.
Speaker 1: We live in such an amazing world that we have
Speaker 1: access to more in our lives than we ever have
Speaker 1: at any time in our in my lifetime. I feel
Speaker 1: for you. I believe me, We're all feeling the same
Speaker 1: way right now, wondering what's going on, what's going to happen,
Speaker 1: feeling for the people over there and the world at large.
Speaker 1: So I just want to know that, let you know
Speaker 1: that I am thinking about that stuff. I know in
Speaker 1: my segment, I try to keep things pretty lighthearted and
Speaker 1: I try to give you the information you need. But
Speaker 1: I'm human. I'm reacting just like you are to things
Speaker 1: that are happening in this world. And so I don't
Speaker 1: want to go without mentioning that. But I will say
Speaker 1: that it is fascinating to me how quickly we have
Speaker 1: cut off Russia in so many different ways, all the
Speaker 1: different companies, from Amazon to FedEx, to Microsoft to Apple.
Speaker 1: And I understand that we're doing that for a reason,
Speaker 1: to send a message to their government and to their
Speaker 1: you know, their leaders that say, hey, look, you know,
Speaker 1: you're not going to have any of these amazing things
Speaker 1: that we have in our modern world. Uh. But at
Speaker 1: the same time, there's a lot of people that live
Speaker 1: in that country that probably don't support the war, and
Speaker 1: of course they are being penalized as well, and so
Speaker 1: it's really an unfortunate situation in so many ways. All Right,
Speaker 1: let's uh, let's get to the big news of the
Speaker 1: week other than, of course what's happening in the world.
Speaker 1: But Apple did hold their first event of the year,
Speaker 1: and it was a how can we say, yanner? I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't want to knock Apple, because you know, they're
Speaker 1: they're look, they're coming out with stuff, they're doing things.
Speaker 1: But the reality is this event was not their most exciting.
Speaker 1: And I have no doubt that this computer that they
Speaker 1: came out with is just phenomenal. But you know, ninety
Speaker 1: nine percent of people are not purchasing that computer. So
Speaker 1: most people when they're looking at Apple are looking at,
Speaker 1: you know, the iPhone. They're looking at maybe an iPad.
Speaker 1: But I mean, look, you bought an iPad. Like we
Speaker 1: just talked to Matt in the pre show on Instagram
Speaker 1: Live and he said that he had one of the
Speaker 1: original iPads he's replacing the screen on, So look how
Speaker 1: long that has lasted him. I get emails from people
Speaker 1: all the time, they're like, oh, I've got this going
Speaker 1: on with the iPad and this and that. I said, look,
Speaker 1: before you buy a new one, you know, start by
Speaker 1: refreshing the old one. Either do a factory reset, fix
Speaker 1: the crack whatever. Now, fixing a crack screen on an
Speaker 1: iPad is very expensive, as Matt realized, and so it's
Speaker 1: not necessarily a thing you want to do is spend
Speaker 1: you know, three four hundred bucks to replace a screen
Speaker 1: on an old gadget. But anyway, so a couple of
Speaker 1: things that Apple announced. Number one, I mean, they led
Speaker 1: with like an iPhone thirteen in green, and then an
Speaker 1: iPhone thirteen Pro and Alpine green. Come on, I mean,
Speaker 1: it's okay, that's cool, but like, is that really like
Speaker 1: big big news? No. Then they came out with an
Speaker 1: iPhone se three. Now this is actually pretty cool. This
Speaker 1: is their most inexpensive iPhone. It starts at four hundred
Speaker 1: and twenty nine dollars, which is actually a thirty dollars
Speaker 1: price increase. This phone used to be three ninety nine
Speaker 1: or the previous model. But the neat thing about this phone,
Speaker 1: number one, they redesigned it, which, okay, they updated the design.
Speaker 1: Now it's kind of like an iPhone eight design. But
Speaker 1: the cool thing about this phone is that they increased
Speaker 1: the battery life. It's got five G it's got a
Speaker 1: better camera. I'm not sure if they increased the water resistance.
Speaker 1: But the main thing is that it also has a
Speaker 1: home button, which is kind of nice if you're kind
Speaker 1: of old school and you still want that, not if
Speaker 1: there's anything wrong with that. But the main thing that
Speaker 1: they did was they put the same chip that's in
Speaker 1: the iPhone thirteen. They put that chip into this basic
Speaker 1: level iPhone, which I think is a huge win for Apple,
Speaker 1: and not just for Apple, but for people that buy
Speaker 1: this phone. You're buying this phone that's kind of like
Speaker 1: the entry level device, but you're getting the top of
Speaker 1: the line processor, which is pretty phenomenal. So this again
Speaker 1: four hundred and twenty nine dollars, available March eighteenth. If
Speaker 1: you like a home button, go with that phone. Otherwise,
Speaker 1: I personally would probably recommend the iPhone thirteen, And I've
Speaker 1: told people to skip the iPhone twelve at this point
Speaker 1: if you're purchasing a new phone, because that is the
Speaker 1: first time that Apple had five G on their devices,
Speaker 1: and the battery just not as strong. So the battery
Speaker 1: life on the iPhone twelve's not as good as what
Speaker 1: I've seen in the iPhone thirteen. Of course, on my
Speaker 1: iPhone thirteen, the battery has taken a huge hit. I'm
Speaker 1: running a beta version of the software, which I should
Speaker 1: probably exit because the battery is just so bad on
Speaker 1: my phone at this point, and I keep waiting for
Speaker 1: the new beta to get better, but it's just not.
Speaker 1: My battery just goes dead really fast. Let's see iPad
Speaker 1: Air with the M one processor again. The M one
Speaker 1: processor is Apple's top of the line, their own silicon
Speaker 1: that they've made, and so it's really fast. It's really amazing.
Speaker 1: But how many people are gonna run out and buy
Speaker 1: a six hundred dollars iPad. Not that many. If you're
Speaker 1: even considering an iPad, most people are probably getting the
Speaker 1: three hundred and twenty nine dollars model, which is perfectly fine.
Speaker 1: And if you're using an iPad for real like work work,
Speaker 1: I mean, this is probably good. But you know, Apple's
Speaker 1: just giving people options at this point. So this new
Speaker 1: iPad has a kind of an iPad pro style design.
Speaker 1: So this is the iPad Air. It's got that M
Speaker 1: one chip, The USB cport is twice as fast, it's
Speaker 1: got five g if you pay an extra two hundred
Speaker 1: and fifty dollars. Cellular used to be an extra hundred bucks.
Speaker 1: Now it's up to two fifty extra everything. I mean,
Speaker 1: I don't know if you're like me, but like every
Speaker 1: day I wake up and I check my email and
Speaker 1: like some kind of price has gone up, like whatever
Speaker 1: it is. It's like, oh, Netflix is a dollar more
Speaker 1: this month, Hulu's a dollar more this month. Oh your
Speaker 1: alarm system is three dollars more this month, You're I
Speaker 1: mean everything. I mean, it's just it's pretty wild. I
Speaker 1: think that because of inflation and all these different prices, Like, yes,
Speaker 1: like things cost more. But I also think that like
Speaker 1: pretty much every company is just jumping on the bandwagon
Speaker 1: and saying, oh yeah, let me let me raise rates too,
Speaker 1: because we can. Everyone just assumes prices are going to
Speaker 1: be more expensive. Right now, Let's see, it also got
Speaker 1: an improved twelve megapixel camera which supports center stage and uh,
Speaker 1: that's basically it all right, now, let's talk about Apple's
Speaker 1: Mac studio. So Apple came out with a new processor
Speaker 1: called the M one Ultra. They basically took two of
Speaker 1: their top of the line chips and mushed them together
Speaker 1: to create one mega chip. I mean, it just sounds
Speaker 1: like something out of like a sci fi horror movie, right,
Speaker 1: like they just put these two chips are like and
Speaker 1: it works. So this is like their fastest chip ever.
Speaker 1: Fastest desktop computer ever. The Max Studio kind of looks
Speaker 1: like a Mac Mini, but it's got a lot more power,
Speaker 1: a lot more ports, and it's let's see, it's got
Speaker 1: four thunderbolt four ports. Let's see an Ethernet port, two
Speaker 1: USBA ports, HDMI port, audio jack, and then on the
Speaker 1: front you've got two USB C ports and an SD
Speaker 1: card slot. This thing can also run eighteen simultaneous video
Speaker 1: streams at the same time. I joked on Twitter that
Speaker 1: I need more eyeballs just to like take advantage of
Speaker 1: the power of this computer. I mean, pretty pretty wild stuff.
Speaker 1: And they just said, you know, they went through all
Speaker 1: these stats saying how much faster it is compared to
Speaker 1: all their computers. And that's one thing I love about Apple.
Speaker 1: So they come out with these products, they say how
Speaker 1: great and how fantastic they are, and then the next
Speaker 1: year they come out and they literally just trash their
Speaker 1: old product. They say that thing, oh that was a
Speaker 1: heap of trash. This thing this is ten times faster
Speaker 1: than that that just came out last year. And so
Speaker 1: it's just I love how they do that, and yes,
Speaker 1: this stuff is still good. This is why I talk
Speaker 1: about this this thing with Apple where when you when
Speaker 1: you're looking to upgrade your Apple product, you almost want
Speaker 1: to buy it like the first day it comes out.
Speaker 1: And let me explain why. So every Apple product is
Speaker 1: on like this ticking time bomb clock of it's going
Speaker 1: to be upgraded in the next year. So when you
Speaker 1: buy the iPhone thirteen, right from the day you get it,
Speaker 1: the time is already ticking down to when the iPhone
Speaker 1: fourteen is going to come out and blow this thing
Speaker 1: out of the water. And so to get the real
Speaker 1: cutting edge use out of their devices, you basically have
Speaker 1: to buy them on the first day they're available so
Speaker 1: that you have that full year of sort of use
Speaker 1: before the new one comes out. And yours is old
Speaker 1: old uh you know, old news. I mean, it's kind
Speaker 1: of a joke, but that's the way I see it
Speaker 1: in my head. So this Max Studio computer is going
Speaker 1: to start at two thousand dollars using the M one
Speaker 1: max chip, and then the M one Ultra, which is
Speaker 1: their newest processor. That one's going to start at four
Speaker 1: thousand dollars. But wait, there's more. They also introduced a
Speaker 1: new monitor that is sixteen hundred dollars. This computer at
Speaker 1: four thousand dollars does not come with a monitor. So
Speaker 1: the Mac the studio display is this super high end
Speaker 1: monitor that has all kinds of stuff. It has its
Speaker 1: own chip built in, so it actually is powered by
Speaker 1: like the same chip that's in an iPhone. It's just
Speaker 1: that powerful because it does it has like a camera
Speaker 1: and speakers and all this stuff. So pretty wild stuff
Speaker 1: from Apple. Nothing that expensive. Sorry, nothing that I okay,
Speaker 1: not gonna say, not impressive. It was just you know,
Speaker 1: Apple comes out with so much stuff right now, and
Speaker 1: they come out with so much oh and people in
Speaker 1: the comments are commenting, that's the only five K panel.
Speaker 1: But Apple comes out with so many products nowadays, and
Speaker 1: they're appealing to so many different levels of products and
Speaker 1: people and price ranges that they have to release this
Speaker 1: stuff like it's the most exciting stuff ever. But realistically,
Speaker 1: when it's a green iPhone thirteen, it's like, Okay, that's cool.
Speaker 1: But at the same time, it's just you know, just
Speaker 1: giving people more options when they go into this and
Speaker 1: they say, oh, that's pretty cool. I can go for
Speaker 1: a green phone. Okay, very cool. All right, let's get
Speaker 1: to the first question of the show. Hey, good morning,
Speaker 1: Rich there's a joke on this show that people always
Speaker 1: say good morning Rich in their emails because literally they
Speaker 1: see me on TV on KTLA in the mornings and
Speaker 1: then they type, oh, I've got a question for that guy,
Speaker 1: and they type a question, and then that's why they
Speaker 1: say good morning Rich. So it's always good morning unless
Speaker 1: someone's really hipped to that and they're like a regular
Speaker 1: listener or follower, and then they say something else besides
Speaker 1: good morning, Good morning Rich. I've been a Samsung user
Speaker 1: forever and looking at switching to Apple. Never had an
Speaker 1: Apple product. I love photography. I carry a big camera
Speaker 1: for that. But I'm looking at the thirteen pro versus
Speaker 1: the one you mentioned on KTLA today. Oh, Samsung, use
Speaker 1: my phone for calendar calls, contacts and a bit of
Speaker 1: searching slash booking while traveling. Also looking at getting the
Speaker 1: Apple Watch, and I believe they link. Do you think
Speaker 1: the se will meet my needs? Stick to the thirteen
Speaker 1: pro or stay with the Samsung twenty two? Thank you?
Speaker 1: John in British Columbia, who someone I met someone from
Speaker 1: Canada the other day and they they you know, I
Speaker 1: of course, like you know, as an American that just
Speaker 1: has no understanding of a lot of I do have
Speaker 1: some understanding of. I've been to many places in the world,
Speaker 1: but like Canada is like this big, giant place I'm
Speaker 1: not fully understanding of. And they said, you know that
Speaker 1: they lived in somewhere in Canada, and I was like, oh,
Speaker 1: I've been to Toronto, and I think they were from
Speaker 1: what's the other big city, not Quebec, it was like
Speaker 1: another one, but anyway, it was nowhere near where she
Speaker 1: was from. And I was like, okay, and I kind
Speaker 1: of like just I sunk into the corner. Anyway, Okay,
Speaker 1: to answer your question, John, what would I say if
Speaker 1: you love photography? I think there are two phones for
Speaker 1: you right now. There's the iPhone thirteen Pro, which I
Speaker 1: think has the best camera and video camera that I've
Speaker 1: ever used on a smartphone. So you say you carry
Speaker 1: a big camera, if you're still going to carry that camera,
Speaker 1: maybe you don't need a phone that has such an
Speaker 1: amazing camera, but if you're trying to ditch that camera.
Speaker 1: So I know someone a family member that whenever they traveled,
Speaker 1: they would bring that big DSLR hanging around their neck
Speaker 1: take pictures with it. And I just said, look, why
Speaker 1: are you doing that anymore? No, what do you need
Speaker 1: to bring that for your picture that you're getting off
Speaker 1: that DSLR is not infinitely better than the picture that
Speaker 1: I'm gonna snap by just pulling my iPhone out of
Speaker 1: my pocket and taking a picture. And so that kind
Speaker 1: of resonated with them, and the next time they went
Speaker 1: on a trip, they just took their iPhone and they
Speaker 1: said it was amazing. They took great pictures. It didn't
Speaker 1: really impact their trip. They didn't have this big thing
Speaker 1: around their neck. And so it just kind of depends.
Speaker 1: If you're a big photographer. Of course, there's always going
Speaker 1: to be a place for a big DSLR that takes
Speaker 1: amazing pictures that you blow up and they look great
Speaker 1: on the wall. But if you're just taking snapshots on
Speaker 1: a vacation and quickly pointing and shooting, a smartphone is
Speaker 1: going to be just fine. Now, I think the se
Speaker 1: will meet your needs if you continue to carry that
Speaker 1: big camera, and if you want to switch the iPhone
Speaker 1: four hundred and twenty nine bucks, it's a good entree. Yes,
Speaker 1: the Apple Watch definitely links, although my Apple Watch, for
Speaker 1: some reason, even though I'm paying for the cellular, has
Speaker 1: not been working with the cellular connection, which is really annoying.
Speaker 1: So I gotta figure that out. But that requires going
Speaker 1: to a store, and I have no desire to go
Speaker 1: to a store and sit there and try to chat
Speaker 1: with someone about my watch. Last time has happened to me.
Speaker 1: I was on the phone for like an hour with
Speaker 1: the tech support person and I actually ended up figuring
Speaker 1: out how to do it. You know what, maybe I'll
Speaker 1: try that again, Uh okay, or stick with the Samsung
Speaker 1: S twenty two. I mean, if you the Samsung S
Speaker 1: twenty two lineup is really good, the camera's really good,
Speaker 1: I think you're gonna be happy with that. But if
Speaker 1: you want the Apple Watch, then you're gonna have to
Speaker 1: go with the iPhone. And that's just the bottom line. Now.
Speaker 1: When it comes to the iPhone, I would say you
Speaker 1: can go with the se but only if you're gonna
Speaker 1: continue to carry that camera around to take professional pictures.
Speaker 1: You can go with the iPhone thirteen Pro if you
Speaker 1: want to ditch that camera. The advantage of the Samsung
Speaker 1: S twenty two Ultra is that you're gonna get a
Speaker 1: ten times zoom on your camera. I think the Ultra
Speaker 1: takes really good pictures. I think the iPhone's just a
Speaker 1: little bit ahead in certain aspects, maybe when it comes
Speaker 1: to the video aspect, like iPhone video. And it's not
Speaker 1: just me that says this. I mean it's every professional
Speaker 1: I talk to in my industry. We just can't believe
Speaker 1: how good the video quality is off of the iPhone
Speaker 1: thirteen pro. I mean, it's truly just phenomenal that we
Speaker 1: can shoot video professional video for television on a smartphone
Speaker 1: and nobody knows the difference. I mean, yeah, if you
Speaker 1: use the wide angle you can tell, but it's really
Speaker 1: quite remarkable. So anyway, I think you'll be happy with
Speaker 1: any of these, but it depends, like I said, on
Speaker 1: exactly what your needs are. All right, let's talk about cryptocurrency.
Speaker 1: You know, it's like every party I go to, every
Speaker 1: get together. It's not like I'm going to like major
Speaker 1: crazy parties, but you know what I mean, Like every
Speaker 1: get together where there's a couple people in a room,
Speaker 1: the conversation always turns to crypto. And maybe that's just
Speaker 1: because I'm always like asking people, are you into crypto?
Speaker 1: Do you have crypto? Do you got a position in crypto?
Speaker 1: I'm just curious, like what people know about it, what
Speaker 1: people want to know about it. And so it's one
Speaker 1: of these things that's top of mind. It's everywhere you
Speaker 1: hear about it. I mean, look here in Los Angeles
Speaker 1: the Staples Center is renamed Thecrypto dot Com Arena. I mean,
Speaker 1: this is wild. And so, you know, it's just one
Speaker 1: of these things that is it's taken off, but it
Speaker 1: is still very much in its infancy. And so with
Speaker 1: that all in mind, President Biden signed an executive order
Speaker 1: to say, we are going to check out what's going
Speaker 1: on with these cryptocurrencies because a couple things are happening.
Speaker 1: Number One, probably the biggest is that it's unregulated, and
Speaker 1: so the government typically has maybe a duty to make
Speaker 1: sure that consumers are not scammed by this kind of stuff,
Speaker 1: make sure that obviously they can collect taxes on these things.
Speaker 1: And so that's number one. So this I'll tell you
Speaker 1: what they're gonna do in this In this executive order,
Speaker 1: they're basically going to study cryptocurrency for a couple of months,
Speaker 1: present that to Congress and you know, the Senate. I'm
Speaker 1: guessing in some sort of uh, you know, however, however
Speaker 1: law stuff works. You know, However, however, the executive branch
Speaker 1: of the government works, but they're gonna present that to
Speaker 1: them and then they're gonna come up with like solutions,
Speaker 1: and the solutions are in six areas consumer protection. So again,
Speaker 1: they don't want people to be scammed by this stuff.
Speaker 1: Financial stability, like does having crypto in a big way
Speaker 1: somehow put the US at risk of financial collapse? Illicit activity,
Speaker 1: So they want to make sure people aren't using this
Speaker 1: for a legal activity. US competitiveness, like if every other
Speaker 1: country is using crypto and the US falls behind, that
Speaker 1: could be a problem financial inclusion and responsible innovation, and
Speaker 1: so you know, they want to make sure that everyone
Speaker 1: can have a hand in this if it's something that
Speaker 1: we should proceed with. Now, this is going to proceed
Speaker 1: no matter what I mean. This is not whether the
Speaker 1: US government blesses this or not. Cryptocurrency is here to stay.
Speaker 1: It is a it is a thing, and it's there's
Speaker 1: no denying some of the efficiencies of crypto. And there's
Speaker 1: also some debate as to whether it's better than what
Speaker 1: we already have, but in some ways it very much is.
Speaker 1: So the administrations also, and this is really interesting, they're
Speaker 1: also looking to this idea of a digital dollar. Now
Speaker 1: that is kind of scary because could you imagine your
Speaker 1: bank account at your current bank right now is all
Speaker 1: digital and it is linked to the government. Now, I
Speaker 1: get it. Government can freeze your assets, they can take
Speaker 1: your assets, they can you know, seize them whatever they
Speaker 1: want to do. I mean, it's the government. There's one
Speaker 1: thing we've realized in this world is that the government
Speaker 1: can pretty much do what they want. But when it's digital,
Speaker 1: it's that much easier. So imagine, oh, hey, Rich, we're
Speaker 1: looking into your finances. So in the meantime, we're just
Speaker 1: gonna freeze your your digital accounts for a minute here,
Speaker 1: a minute turns into a week whatever, and that's it.
Speaker 1: It's instantaneous. You know, right now you got to go
Speaker 1: through the bank. You gotta tell them. You gotta probably
Speaker 1: send them like some sort of you know, uh, I
Speaker 1: don't know whatever. They send them a letter. It's probably
Speaker 1: through the old mail. You have a stamp. We gotta
Speaker 1: we gotta send this to Rich's bank to uh to
Speaker 1: stop his funds. You got a stamp over the no stamp.
Speaker 1: It just used that government stamp that just kind of
Speaker 1: works for everything. It's all like free. But you know,
Speaker 1: when it's digital, it is it is kind of scary
Speaker 1: to have the digital dollar. But at the same time,
Speaker 1: you know, if that's what people are moving to, that's
Speaker 1: something that the US needs to have to be competitive
Speaker 1: with the rest of the world. I mean, China's looking
Speaker 1: into it. Actually their their report that they kind of
Speaker 1: came out with a preliminary report that said forty million
Speaker 1: people in America have bought or sold or traded crypto,
Speaker 1: and then they also said that one hundred countries are
Speaker 1: looking into the feasibility of digital money. So here's the
Speaker 1: other thing. Countries don't want to be They don't want
Speaker 1: to be swept. I guess what's the word. They don't
Speaker 1: want crypto to take off without them being a part
Speaker 1: of it, because that could be a problem for these countries.
Speaker 1: And you know, it's kind of like when you look
Speaker 1: at America, like who really runs like kind of the
Speaker 1: financial system. I mean, you've got big players like Visa, MasterCard, Chase,
Speaker 1: Bank of America, Wells Fargo, they all they all have
Speaker 1: a vested interest in not really helping crypto in its
Speaker 1: current form takeoff because guess what, they already have their
Speaker 1: own systems in place for moving money around and helping
Speaker 1: people have accounts. So they don't really want this stuff
Speaker 1: to happen the way it's happening. They want to say, like,
Speaker 1: hold on, uh, can we regulate that the way we
Speaker 1: regulate all of our banking systems, because guess what, you know,
Speaker 1: we have an ability to collect money and transfer fees
Speaker 1: and all this other stuff that you know, Crypto does
Speaker 1: have fees, but not in its purest form. You know,
Speaker 1: if you buy crypto through like a third party app, yeah,
Speaker 1: you're gonna have to pay some sort of fee on
Speaker 1: it to do that. But in its most pure form,
Speaker 1: you know, I believe you can just transfer money, you know,
Speaker 1: to someone else, a person, a person, and anywhere in
Speaker 1: the world, and by the way, instantly, and uh yeah.
Speaker 1: In the comments, Rob says digital money can be turned
Speaker 1: off too easily. Yeah, but I imagine that even even
Speaker 1: physical money. But the thing is, I guess at the
Speaker 1: end of the day, you could always have a little
Speaker 1: stockpile of physical money, like in case, you know, like
Speaker 1: I do believe that it's pretty smart to keep some
Speaker 1: cash around. Not that I do this, I should, and
Speaker 1: I actually did for a little bit. I had like
Speaker 1: a little stockpile of some money so that in case
Speaker 1: there was ever a natural disaster or whatever. You know,
Speaker 1: I could have that cash because I can tell you
Speaker 1: when I was covering hurricanes back in the day in
Speaker 1: my previous jobs, when a natural disaster happens, it is
Speaker 1: like all bets are off. Your credit card's not gonna work,
Speaker 1: You're not gonna be able to get gas. Nothing is
Speaker 1: going to work. The way you think you can't go
Speaker 1: to the grocery store to buy your water. I mean,
Speaker 1: we saw some of this during the pandemic, where you know,
Speaker 1: shelves were just sort of empty, right, and you just
Speaker 1: imagine like, oh, there would never be a time in
Speaker 1: America where I can't get the things that I want
Speaker 1: to get. Well, yeah, we all experienced that in the
Speaker 1: past year. It happened. And so with money, it's like, oh, well,
Speaker 1: if there's an earthquake, I'll just go to the ATM
Speaker 1: and get you know, get some cash out. Not gonna happen, Like,
Speaker 1: you're not gonna be able to go to the ATM
Speaker 1: and get cash out. They're not gonna work. So anyway,
Speaker 1: I used to have a little tiny pile of cash
Speaker 1: that I would keep as like a safety net in
Speaker 1: the house. And then of course life happens and you
Speaker 1: just like, oh, I gotta pay you know, this person here,
Speaker 1: I need, you know, some cash. I gotta pay this person.
Speaker 1: I gotta, you know, And then next thing you know,
Speaker 1: you're down to zero and I haven't restocked. So I
Speaker 1: should probably do that again. Anyway, I highly recommend having that.
Speaker 1: But the point is you can have that little paper
Speaker 1: stockpile that will work a cash is king, you know,
Speaker 1: especially in a natural disaster, if you needed someone to
Speaker 1: give you a ride somewhere, and you know, it goes
Speaker 1: down to kind of like you know, the basics. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they're gonna take a twenty our bill and get you
Speaker 1: where you need to go. All right, let's get to
Speaker 1: the next question from Susan. Susan says, I know you
Speaker 1: stay up with all the gadgets, and I have a
Speaker 1: question that I'm hoping you might be able to help with.
Speaker 1: Do you know why or have you heard anything about
Speaker 1: issues with the Facebook Live feature on portal. I purchased
Speaker 1: one for my adult daughter several months ago, and she
Speaker 1: used that feature for our business and was really happy
Speaker 1: about it. Suddenly the feature disappeared and tech support can
Speaker 1: only say it's not available any longer. Needless to say,
Speaker 1: we are a bit frustrated. I thought you might be
Speaker 1: able to shed some light or give us some suggestions.
Speaker 1: Thanks for your time, have a great day, sincerely, Susan. Susan,
Speaker 1: you have experienced what we what I call on this
Speaker 1: show as the short attention span of tech companies, and
Speaker 1: this is a problem across so much tech. So the
Speaker 1: Facebook Portal is a device that is either it comes
Speaker 1: in a couple different forms. It's basically a video chat
Speaker 1: device that is like a screen, or it sits on
Speaker 1: top of your TV, or it's a They made one
Speaker 1: that looked like a picture frame at one point. But
Speaker 1: the bottom line is it's a screen with a camera
Speaker 1: that allows you to either video chat with other people,
Speaker 1: go on Facebook Live like you said your daughter did,
Speaker 1: or of course just use it to do other things
Speaker 1: Facebook oriented things and other stuff too. I think they
Speaker 1: had other stuff built in. Now the portal never really
Speaker 1: took off in a big way. So you've got Amazon's devices,
Speaker 1: You've got Google Home devices are those are probably two
Speaker 1: of the biggest and Facebook this came out at a
Speaker 1: time when when I'm still Facebook is just really in
Speaker 1: the crosshairs of the privacy kind of watchdogs, and people said, no,
Speaker 1: I'm not putting a Facebook a Facebook device with a
Speaker 1: camera and a microphone in my house, and so a
Speaker 1: lot of people didn't. Now, you see, none of that
Speaker 1: matters to you because you purchased this for your daughter.
Speaker 1: So you want to know why this feature went away.
Speaker 1: And sure enough, I did a little research on the
Speaker 1: Facebook Live feature on the portal, and the page that
Speaker 1: used to describe how great this feature was is mysteriously
Speaker 1: vanished off the internet. And so, yeah, they probably got
Speaker 1: rid of it in a software update because no one
Speaker 1: was using it, or not enough people were using it,
Speaker 1: and they didn't want to support it anymore. And so
Speaker 1: what do you do in this case? You can't bring
Speaker 1: it back. It's too late. You can't. You can't add
Speaker 1: the feature on your own, so you're kind of out
Speaker 1: of luck. And this is a this is I've talked
Speaker 1: about this on the show before, but there are companies
Speaker 1: that are worse at this than others, and I'd say
Speaker 1: Facebook is a pretty big offender. Facebook. You know, their
Speaker 1: motto has been for a long time, act fast and
Speaker 1: break things. I think something to that extent. But the
Speaker 1: reality is they come out with stuff and if it
Speaker 1: doesn't work. It's like throwing spaghetti at the wall. You know,
Speaker 1: I'm Italian and that's what we used to do to
Speaker 1: try to see if the swetti was ready. I know
Speaker 1: it's a weird thing, but it's like the idea is
Speaker 1: they would throw a bunch of stuff at the wall
Speaker 1: and if it's stuck, sure we'll keep it, and if
Speaker 1: it didn't, they just move on. So just this week
Speaker 1: we heard that Instagram got rid of IGTV, which they
Speaker 1: made a huge deal of when it came out, and
Speaker 1: now it's just Instagram Video and now they're all into
Speaker 1: reels And how long are they gonna be into reels
Speaker 1: until either people stop watching them or doesn't work anymore,
Speaker 1: and then they give up on those. But TikTok's so
Speaker 1: popular that probably won't happen. But there's not much you
Speaker 1: can do. And so there are some companies that are
Speaker 1: a little bit better at this than others, like Apple,
Speaker 1: I think comes out with stuff at a slower cadence
Speaker 1: and doesn't necessarily get rid of things very quickly. And
Speaker 1: then the other the other company that does a lot
Speaker 1: of stuff, they throw a lot of stuff, as Samsung,
Speaker 1: but I feel like in recent years they have definitely
Speaker 1: kind of streamlined things a little bit and they've made things.
Speaker 1: It's just a little bit more like, Okay, we're not
Speaker 1: gonna like they They actually never came out with this
Speaker 1: one speaker, this h it was like the Bixby home speaker.
Speaker 1: They showed it off at a show and they just
Speaker 1: never came out with it and that was it. It's
Speaker 1: just like they didn't. Now they come out with a
Speaker 1: lot of other stuff. But I feel like Samsung is like,
Speaker 1: you kind of know that they're coming out with the foldables,
Speaker 1: They're already on like the third generation of those. You
Speaker 1: know they're coming out with their Galaxy lineup, and you
Speaker 1: know they're now coming out with the H the A lineup,
Speaker 1: which is like their more budget lineup, And so they're
Speaker 1: pretty consistent. Google very inconsistent. Google is like, oh my gosh.
Speaker 1: They are just like, hey, we'll give you anything, and
Speaker 1: uh oh okay, it didn't work. Okay, let's just does
Speaker 1: just not do that anymore. So this is just the
Speaker 1: reality of these tech companies. It happens, and there's not
Speaker 1: much you can do about it. So sorry, Susan, but
Speaker 1: that's just what's going on. Thanks for the question. All
Speaker 1: right now. Have you noticed, let me ask you this,
Speaker 1: have you noticed that gas prices have gone up where
Speaker 1: you are? It's so funny because I live in California,
Speaker 1: and the gas prices here are just wildly, wildly astronomically
Speaker 1: like mind boggling high. And it's just California. Everything is very,
Speaker 1: very expensive. And when you live in California, you kind
Speaker 1: of forget just how expensive things are until you go
Speaker 1: to another place. Now, if you're going to a resort
Speaker 1: in like Hawaii, or like a resort town, or you know,
Speaker 1: a big hotel somewhere, yeah, you don't really realize. But
Speaker 1: it's when you go to like regular places in America,
Speaker 1: like all the other cities in between Los Angeles and
Speaker 1: New York, you realize that what what not? Everything is
Speaker 1: eight dollars for a bottle of water? Where was I?
Speaker 1: I was in Santa Barbara and my wife and I
Speaker 1: for we were in a hotel and are we didn't
Speaker 1: have any water and there was no water. There was
Speaker 1: no water around, like no seven eleven or anything like that,
Speaker 1: and so we just had to keep walking until we
Speaker 1: found a bottle of water, and so, you know, and
Speaker 1: it was just getting frustrat eating because we couldn't find it.
Speaker 1: I was like, all right, fine, whatever. So we went
Speaker 1: into this little like winery place that I was like,
Speaker 1: I bet you they have a bottle of water here,
Speaker 1: and so I pick out two bottles of water from
Speaker 1: the refrigerator and I'm like, how much could this possibly be?
Speaker 1: You know, like five dollars each. No, the water was
Speaker 1: twelve dollars a bottle, twelve dollars. So this this woman,
Speaker 1: you know, this person working there, rings me up and
Speaker 1: it's like she's like twenty four dollars, you know, plus
Speaker 1: tax I'm just like what, but we needed the water
Speaker 1: and what are you gonna do? And so we bought
Speaker 1: the water for twelve dollars and my wife and I
Speaker 1: were just joking that this. We're like, I think the
Speaker 1: wine that you're selling here by the glass is cheaper
Speaker 1: than twelve dollars, but it probably wasn't. But anyway, what
Speaker 1: was my point? Oh, yeah, you just have to kind
Speaker 1: of pay for stuff and you just take for granted.
Speaker 1: Like I'm continually there's a couple of cities, Los Angeles,
Speaker 1: Hawaii and Las Vegas. I'm continually surprised by the prices
Speaker 1: that people will charge for things. It just like every
Speaker 1: time I think I've heard it all, I'm like, oh, okay,
Speaker 1: twelve dollars for a bottle. Oh no, that's fifteen. Oh okay,
Speaker 1: there you go. Uh but gas I digress. So gas
Speaker 1: Buddy is an app that a lot of people are
Speaker 1: using to try to find cheaper gas prices, which I
Speaker 1: totally understand you should be at this point. It used
Speaker 1: to be when gas was like, you know, ten fifteen
Speaker 1: cents difference, Like, okay, not that big of a deal,
Speaker 1: but at this point, with gas pushing like seven dollars
Speaker 1: here in California, you gotta go in your neighborhood and
Speaker 1: find the cheapest gas, and so you just got to
Speaker 1: do it. So if I look at gas Buddy, So,
Speaker 1: gas Buddy is basically this app that you know, they
Speaker 1: get the information from the gas stations or whatever, and
Speaker 1: they they tell you how much gas is and so great,
Speaker 1: very convenient, very nice. But the thing that gas Buddy
Speaker 1: is doing on the back end, and this is according
Speaker 1: to an article from Wirecutter, is that, of course they're
Speaker 1: collecting a whole bunch of data on you. And the
Speaker 1: reality is that a lot of people are saying where
Speaker 1: their location is, their exact location. It's tracking you all
Speaker 1: the time, and then they sell that information to third
Speaker 1: party data brokers. So just a scenario. You ever wonder
Speaker 1: why you get so many of these random calls? Where
Speaker 1: do people get your phone number? Yeah, a lot of
Speaker 1: times it's through spammers and scammers, but a lot of
Speaker 1: times it's also just you're giving it up to one
Speaker 1: company you didn't read their privacy policy, and they're selling
Speaker 1: it to other companies, and that's just what happens. So
Speaker 1: with gas Buddy, it's kind of like this thing that
Speaker 1: they say that if there is no price, you are
Speaker 1: the product. So if you're getting something for free, your
Speaker 1: data is what they're making money off of. And if
Speaker 1: you want to know exactly how much, according to this article,
Speaker 1: they were selling location data for nine dollars and fifty
Speaker 1: cents per one thousand users. And they have a lot
Speaker 1: of users. They have millions of users, so it's you know,
Speaker 1: they've got a lot of this data, and they've got
Speaker 1: data of where people are driving, where people are going.
Speaker 1: They've got their name, they've got their address, they've got
Speaker 1: their email, they've got all kinds of information that you
Speaker 1: just give up to this app because it says, hey,
Speaker 1: will you sign up with us? And you say sure,
Speaker 1: but they put the skip sign up in little gray
Speaker 1: lettering in the corner. So whenever you're using an app,
Speaker 1: by the way, whenever you sign up for an app,
Speaker 1: always always, always look for the option to skip signing
Speaker 1: up for an account if you don't need one. A
Speaker 1: lot of times skip if there's like a big box
Speaker 1: in the middle of the app that says please sign in.
Speaker 1: There's sometimes a little X or a little skip that's
Speaker 1: just kind of grayed out and in the corner. We
Speaker 1: call that a dark pattern in the industry, and it's
Speaker 1: basically it's a pattern that you say, well, this windows
Speaker 1: in front of me. There's no way to skip it.
Speaker 1: Sometimes you can close out the app and that will
Speaker 1: skip it. Other times there's a little tiny skip button
Speaker 1: that you can't really see or you know, there's just
Speaker 1: various ways of doing it. So always try to skip
Speaker 1: creating an account if you can. And then when you're
Speaker 1: creating your account, be very very mindful about the information
Speaker 1: that you're giving up to that company, because chances are
Speaker 1: that information will be packaged up and sold and sent
Speaker 1: somewhere else, and so just be aware of that. So
Speaker 1: for instance, I keep a Google Voice number that I
Speaker 1: will give out more freely because I don't care if
Speaker 1: a lot of people get it, because it's not something
Speaker 1: that is ringing my phone all the time. So if
Speaker 1: it's a company that I'm signing up for, I'll most
Speaker 1: of the time give them that phone number. So when
Speaker 1: I was doing all the loyalty cards and stuff for
Speaker 1: you know, like roufs and things, it's like I would
Speaker 1: give them that number because I know it's it's going
Speaker 1: to different places. And here's the other thing. And I've
Speaker 1: talked about this before, but when you sign up for
Speaker 1: a website, that information goes into a data warehouse that
Speaker 1: then combines it with other information. So imagine there's a
Speaker 1: couple databases one, two, three, four, five, six seven. This
Speaker 1: one has your email address, this one has your phone number,
Speaker 1: this one has your name, this one has your address.
Speaker 1: What they do is they merge them all together based
Speaker 1: on signals. So if you use the same email address,
Speaker 1: and on one account you gave your email and phone number,
Speaker 1: and on another you gave your email and your physical address,
Speaker 1: they just merge that all together and now they have
Speaker 1: a complete look of who you are, where you're going,
Speaker 1: where you're shopping, how you're spending your money, when you
Speaker 1: do things, how you do things, the websites you're looking at.
Speaker 1: I mean, it just goes on and on and on.
Speaker 1: Data data, data, data is huge, huge business. Believe me,
Speaker 1: how do you think Google's in business? Data? One hundred
Speaker 1: percent data business. I mean, every single thing that Google
Speaker 1: does is based on data. They love data, they have
Speaker 1: so much of it on us anyway. And then now, yeah,
Speaker 1: the way that they're using the data is that they
Speaker 1: don't sell it directly, but they will sell against that data.
Speaker 1: And that's another thing is that you know your data
Speaker 1: might be private, but they're still selling against it. And
Speaker 1: so when they say, oh, we know this person, this person,
Speaker 1: this person is into hot wheels, they can then sell
Speaker 1: hot wheels ads against that, even though they didn't give
Speaker 1: up your name and information. So you have to think
Speaker 1: about how this stuff works. Okay, so long story short
Speaker 1: on gas Buddy. Two things that you should probably do.
Speaker 1: The number one, don't sign up for the drive the
Speaker 1: drives feature unless you want all your information given away
Speaker 1: to third party companies. And then you can go in
Speaker 1: on your location settings. You only want to give them
Speaker 1: location every time. So only when you are using the
Speaker 1: app do you want to have them giving them the
Speaker 1: ability to use your location? And this is the thing
Speaker 1: that you can do with every app. Ninety nine percent
Speaker 1: of the time, when I first get that notification that says,
Speaker 1: you know, can you use my location, I'll say just
Speaker 1: this one time, and then if I really love the app,
Speaker 1: maybe I'll give them more access later down the road.
Speaker 1: The other thing you can do is turn off the
Speaker 1: location privacy. There's like a little toggling in these settings
Speaker 1: that basically says, can we sell your information? A four square?
Speaker 1: And it's just turned on by default, So you want
Speaker 1: to go in and turn that off, just to you know,
Speaker 1: protect yourself a little little bit more. All right, let's
Speaker 1: get to the next question. Steve says, Hey, Rich, virtually
Speaker 1: all major banks can be set to notify users of
Speaker 1: any charges. I set mine to notify me of any
Speaker 1: charge of one cent or more. This includes any attempts,
Speaker 1: so I see it all. Of course. Two factor on
Speaker 1: top is safeguard. If you agree or disagree, let me know.
Speaker 1: If you agree, please let your vast audience know. Thanks Rich,
Speaker 1: best regard, Steve, the one and only mister Gadget. Wow
Speaker 1: mister Gadget is listening. Cool, thanks, mister Gadget. I think
Speaker 1: I met Steve once at an event. You know, it's
Speaker 1: been like two years since we've had these tech events,
Speaker 1: so I haven't seen a lot of people. But yes,
Speaker 1: I one hundred percent agree with this. For sure you should.
Speaker 1: So my credit card was stolen a couple of weeks ago,
Speaker 1: and it was I think I told the story, but
Speaker 1: basically I used it at a restaurant and within ten
Speaker 1: minutes I had gotten a text from my bank saying
Speaker 1: that my card was stolen. It was used at a
Speaker 1: gas station in like Iowa or something, and I was
Speaker 1: like what that wasn't me At first I thought the
Speaker 1: the text message was bogus. I was like, what, There's
Speaker 1: no way, I'm not I'm not in Iowa, Like how
Speaker 1: is my card being used there? And so I've talked
Speaker 1: about this on my podcasts before, but I have a
Speaker 1: rule if my card I'm not a huge credit card person,
Speaker 1: but if my card, I do carry one. If my
Speaker 1: card is leaving my hand, if someone else is taking
Speaker 1: my card, I give them my credit card. If I
Speaker 1: am doing the transaction myself, I will use tap to pay,
Speaker 1: or I will use the chip in my debit card,
Speaker 1: and the reason for that is I like to spend
Speaker 1: cash so that I don't overspend, and so it just
Speaker 1: helps me with the budgeting. But with a credit card,
Speaker 1: I definitely make sure that I use that for transactions
Speaker 1: that are unprotected, so that means online transactions where your
Speaker 1: card number is just going out into the world, or
Speaker 1: of course any transaction where they're swiping my card, because
Speaker 1: a swipe is pretty much the worst thing that they
Speaker 1: can do to your card at this point, because your
Speaker 1: number is unencrypted, it is out there, it is just
Speaker 1: totally ripe for the taking. And so you always, at
Speaker 1: the very minimum, no matter how you're paying, whether it's
Speaker 1: debit or credit, you always want to use the chip,
Speaker 1: always want to use chip tap to pay. Even better,
Speaker 1: Chip and tap to pay are actually quite the same
Speaker 1: when it comes to security and privacy. But my number
Speaker 1: one Tap to pay, number two is chip. Number three
Speaker 1: is do not use the swipe ever, never ever swipe
Speaker 1: your card. In fact, I will ask, especially smaller merchants,
Speaker 1: I'll be like, are you swiping my card? And when
Speaker 1: they say they're swiping it, I say, oh, hold on,
Speaker 1: let me don't take my debit card. Here, take my
Speaker 1: credit card. So if you have to swipe, if you
Speaker 1: must swipe, use your credit card, because at least that
Speaker 1: gives you a little bit of protection if your card
Speaker 1: is stolen. In the case that mine was a couple
Speaker 1: weeks ago, right when I was using it. So I
Speaker 1: don't know if the waiter took a picture of my
Speaker 1: card and sent it off into the internet, or maybe
Speaker 1: it was just totally unrelated, but it happens. It still
Speaker 1: happens on a daily basis. So anyway, what Steve is
Speaker 1: talking about is I think we were talking about the
Speaker 1: Do I talk about this later? Yeah, I guess I'll
Speaker 1: just talk about this now. But I think he was
Speaker 1: talking about the whole Zell fraud thing, because people are
Speaker 1: using these cash apps like cash and Venmo and PayPal
Speaker 1: and Zell thinking that they're protected for unauthorized transactions. But
Speaker 1: when it's a cash transaction like that, it's a lot
Speaker 1: tougher to get your money back, and especially with Zel.
Speaker 1: So I agree. I have I have it turned on
Speaker 1: on my account where I do get a notification when
Speaker 1: my card is used, and so most of the time
Speaker 1: it's fine, it's like, oh, good to know, but you
Speaker 1: can also a lot of banks let you turn on
Speaker 1: and off your card. They let you set certain parameters
Speaker 1: like no international transactions. So look into your bank and see,
Speaker 1: you know what they allow you to do and what
Speaker 1: kind of notifications you can get. Now, I get it
Speaker 1: with a credit card. I always think that that's better
Speaker 1: than the debit card because when the debit card is hacked,
Speaker 1: your money's gone and now you have to fight your
Speaker 1: bank for your own money. When a credit card is hacked,
Speaker 1: you're like, okay, you guys, let me know when you
Speaker 1: figure that out, because I'm not paying that bill. And
Speaker 1: what can they do. I mean, it's like their money
Speaker 1: that they've already given, and so it's just a it's
Speaker 1: just a little bit more of a you know, a
Speaker 1: relief when something happens to your credit card than it
Speaker 1: debit card. And so I understand why people gravitate towards
Speaker 1: credit cards because it puts that little buffer zone between
Speaker 1: them and their money. And I totally understand that. And
Speaker 1: so that's that. Let's talk about Zell now, because there's
Speaker 1: a big article in the New York Times about how
Speaker 1: Zell has a lot of fraud because it's built into
Speaker 1: bank accounts. So what happened was all of the big
Speaker 1: banks like Bank of America, Chase, Wells Fargo, they all said,
Speaker 1: wait a second, how what's going on with PayPal and
Speaker 1: Venmo and cash app, Like all these people are using
Speaker 1: this to transfer money and they're going around our systems
Speaker 1: and they're not having to pay for it, and so whoa, whoa,
Speaker 1: we should be in on this. And so they came
Speaker 1: up with something called Zel and they built it into
Speaker 1: your bank account. And that's great because I actually prefer
Speaker 1: Zell because it's a really easy transfer where it goes
Speaker 1: from my account to your account and there's no middleman
Speaker 1: and so it just the money just appears in your account.
Speaker 1: That's good. But the problem is the transactions are not
Speaker 1: as protected as you think. In fact, they may not
Speaker 1: be protected at all unless it was fully unless someone
Speaker 1: hacked into your account and started doing a Zell transaction.
Speaker 1: What the New York Times is saying is that if
Speaker 1: you are tricked into doing a Zell transfer to someone,
Speaker 1: let's say you get a text message, and this is
Speaker 1: how it works. Typically I put this on my Instagram,
Speaker 1: by the way, So let's say you get a text
Speaker 1: that says, hey did you just transfer one thousand dollars
Speaker 1: via Zel to this person. Press one for yes, two
Speaker 1: for no, and you press one and next thing you know,
Speaker 1: you get a phone call from your quote unquote bank
Speaker 1: and they say, uh, okay, we need to verify this
Speaker 1: so we can take care of this really quickly quick.
Speaker 1: What's your username for your bank? What's your banking user name?
Speaker 1: And yes, I get it. Not everyone will fall for that,
Speaker 1: but some people would, and a lot of people do.
Speaker 1: And they say, oh, it's you know, it's rich on
Speaker 1: Tech And they say, okay, great, we just sent you
Speaker 1: a text message with a confirmation code. Please give us
Speaker 1: that code. And you give them that code, thinking you're
Speaker 1: confirming you are who you are. And by the way,
Speaker 1: legitimate companies do this. So, for example, Hilton, when I
Speaker 1: call up Hilton to do anything with my account, they say, okay,
Speaker 1: we just sent you a text message. Read us that
Speaker 1: text message. Verizon does something similar, and so these companies
Speaker 1: do that, and this is what these scammers prey upon.
Speaker 1: They are basically social engineering the legitimate systems that these
Speaker 1: companies have put in place to protect us, and by
Speaker 1: reverse social engineering them, they use these little systems against us.
Speaker 1: So you've already been trained to know that. When you
Speaker 1: get that confirmation code in your text, it's like, Okay,
Speaker 1: my bank is confirming what I thought, like this is
Speaker 1: this is a security code. But when they're asking for it,
Speaker 1: what they're actually doing is they're doing a quick password reset,
Speaker 1: and that little code is that one time code that
Speaker 1: has been texted texted to your account to actually assist
Speaker 1: in that password reset, and then they type in that
Speaker 1: code and now they can put in their own password,
Speaker 1: and now they have control of your account. All this
Speaker 1: is happening in real time while you're on the phone
Speaker 1: with this report representative who's trying to just keep you
Speaker 1: on the phone longer and longer to talk about the problem.
Speaker 1: And next thing you know, you're being cleared out of
Speaker 1: your money. Now there are limits on Zeal so that
Speaker 1: you can't be fully cleaned out in one day, but
Speaker 1: it's still a lot more money than you want to
Speaker 1: lose from your account. So what the New York Times
Speaker 1: thesis was is that they're saying that when people are
Speaker 1: tricked into doing a Zell transfer, like if I just
Speaker 1: trick you into a zel transfer and that money goes
Speaker 1: into your bank and then you call and you say, hey, wait,
Speaker 1: I didn't authorize that. They say, but yes, you did.
Speaker 1: You actually did authorize it. You made the transaction. We
Speaker 1: can't just because you got tricked into it doesn't mean
Speaker 1: that we're on the hook for it. And the problem is,
Speaker 1: unlike a credit card, this is actual cash, this is
Speaker 1: real money. So the way a credit card works, if
Speaker 1: I own a business, my credit card company only, like
Speaker 1: if I accept credit cards, the credit card company only
Speaker 1: pays me out once a month, right, I mean, maybe
Speaker 1: quicker if it's some of these new things like Square
Speaker 1: and of course some of these other systems. But there's
Speaker 1: always this ongoing like balance that you have with a
Speaker 1: credit card company, Like they might owe you one thousand dollars,
Speaker 1: they might owe you five hundred dollars. And when someone
Speaker 1: does what's called a charge back and they say, hey,
Speaker 1: I dispute this charge, what a credit card company does
Speaker 1: while they investigate is they will just hold that money.
Speaker 1: They will withhold that money from the business. So they say,
Speaker 1: we know we owe you six hundred dollars, but we're
Speaker 1: actually not going to give you that money right now
Speaker 1: because someone is disputing the fact that you charge them
Speaker 1: six hundred dollars, and we need to look into that
Speaker 1: to make sure that before we release this money to
Speaker 1: you that this is a legitimate transaction. So that's why
Speaker 1: when zell goes through, and it goes through really fast
Speaker 1: and it's cash and someone can withdraw that from the ATM,
Speaker 1: that money's gone in an instant and so this stuff,
Speaker 1: these scammers have gotten very, very smart about how to
Speaker 1: do this. According to this New York Times article, eighteen
Speaker 1: million Americans were defrauded through scams involving digital wallets and
Speaker 1: person of person payments. So when you say how could
Speaker 1: this happen? How could this happen to someone? You are smart.
Speaker 1: You're a smart person. You're listening to a podcast from
Speaker 1: a tech person on Instagram. You're ahead of the curve.
Speaker 1: There are so many people out there who are not
Speaker 1: doing this. They're not educating themselves. They might be a
Speaker 1: little bit older, they might be a little less tech savvy,
Speaker 1: and that is the problem. It's not a problem for them.
Speaker 1: They're just regular people and they're not keeping up on
Speaker 1: all this stuff. I have to keep up on all
Speaker 1: this stuff. When I read this Zealscam, I said, uh,
Speaker 1: that's brilliant. But what I have thought of that. Personally,
Speaker 1: maybe not, but I am critical of anything that arrives
Speaker 1: in my inbox. Any text message I get, I have
Speaker 1: to sit there and analyze is this real? Is this
Speaker 1: a scam? Is this going to somehow defraud me? I
Speaker 1: get people that forward me messages all the time, and
Speaker 1: I have to kind of analyze them and figure out
Speaker 1: if it's fraudulent or not. And it's Believe me, these
Speaker 1: scam artists work on numbers. They work on large numbers
Speaker 1: of people. Not every single person that's sitting there, you know,
Speaker 1: in the world is one hundred percent up on every
Speaker 1: single scam. And so, as someone just said in the chat,
Speaker 1: it's a problem keeping up with the scammers. Absolutely, it's
Speaker 1: their job to figure out how to scam us. It's
Speaker 1: our job to go to work, raise kids, make a living,
Speaker 1: you know, have a little time off, whatever. It's their
Speaker 1: job to just take our hard earned money from us.
Speaker 1: And so, believe me, they are going to try to
Speaker 1: do that all the time, and they will try new ways,
Speaker 1: and as technology evolves, they just continue to find new
Speaker 1: ways to exploit it, and they will continue. This is
Speaker 1: not going to end ever, believe me. And this is
Speaker 1: one reason I know, I'm very high on the security
Speaker 1: stuff because it's just so it's such a problem that
Speaker 1: it's just it makes me so angry that people still
Speaker 1: fall for this stuff, and smart people. I've had smart,
Speaker 1: smart people call me up in near tears saying that
Speaker 1: they believe they fell for a scam. And it happens
Speaker 1: to the smartest people out there. It's just that these people,
Speaker 1: like I said, it's a full time job to scam us,
Speaker 1: and so they get really good at their jobs. Okay,
Speaker 1: but my point is number one, be critical of every
Speaker 1: and don't just you know, I know what you're listening
Speaker 1: and you understand, and you're sitting here on a tech podcast.
Speaker 1: But you've got to tell your friends and family this stuff.
Speaker 1: That's what you need to do. That's your job is
Speaker 1: to tell friends and family about the things that you're
Speaker 1: hearing about so that they know when they come across it,
Speaker 1: they go, wait, huh, that is weird. I did get
Speaker 1: that message from Zell that said, did you authorize this?
Speaker 1: And I actually ignored it because I didn't even know
Speaker 1: that I, you know, use Zell. And so you just
Speaker 1: have to be able to tell your friends and family
Speaker 1: about this stuff and just make sure that you know
Speaker 1: you're not gonna be able to protect everyone, but you know,
Speaker 1: getting this stuff out there in a bigger way. This
Speaker 1: why I talk about it on TV. This why I
Speaker 1: talk about it here. That's why I do this stuff
Speaker 1: because I do like if I can just save one
Speaker 1: person from getting scammed or from doing a raw deal
Speaker 1: or whatever, you know, I feel good and that's a
Speaker 1: good thing. So anyway, Number one, be critical of any
Speaker 1: messaging that you get. Number two, don't click links that
Speaker 1: you know you're curious what the link brings you to,
Speaker 1: just don't do it. Number three, if something's too good
Speaker 1: to be true, it really is. I get emails all
Speaker 1: the time from people saying, rich, this is this computer's
Speaker 1: half the price that it is on Apple's website, Like
Speaker 1: should I buy it? I'm like, no, it's a scam,
Speaker 1: like come on. And then the other thing is two
Speaker 1: factor authentication. I can't speak highly enough of two factor authentication.
Speaker 1: I know that the scammers are using it to scam us,
Speaker 1: but you still have to use it. And if you're
Speaker 1: using weak passwords, get a password manager please. I know
Speaker 1: it's a lot of work to use these things, but
Speaker 1: do not use the same password across various accounts. Please
Speaker 1: don't ever, don't ever use the same password twice ever,
Speaker 1: I mean ever, ever, ever, in fact, you answer those
Speaker 1: questions that say, you know, what's your your mother's maiden
Speaker 1: name or your first pets name, don't even give the
Speaker 1: real answers. How many of your friends know the answer
Speaker 1: to your mother's maiden name and your your pet's name
Speaker 1: and where you went to college? Don't ever do that
Speaker 1: use a fake answer, and don't. In fact, what I
Speaker 1: do is I actually use a password generator to generate
Speaker 1: a sixteen a sixteen character random string, and then I
Speaker 1: put that in there. And so there's no way when
Speaker 1: someone asks like what my hometown or my you know,
Speaker 1: city I grew up in, it's like sixteen random characters,
Speaker 1: I have to go into a program and figure out
Speaker 1: what that is and copy and paste it. Because even
Speaker 1: I don't know the answers to my own questions. So,
Speaker 1: and now I'm not saying you have to be that
Speaker 1: that you know wild about it, but definitely just think
Speaker 1: about this stuff, you know what I mean? And hey,
Speaker 1: miss Carter on Instagram is saying she uses last pass,
Speaker 1: and Janet says, I appreciate all your info. It might
Speaker 1: be new for some individuals. Absolutely, and yeah, Google knows
Speaker 1: the answer. Someone just commented and Coco says, I would
Speaker 1: forget that password if it was random. Yes, that's why
Speaker 1: you have to use the password manager to put that
Speaker 1: in there. So believe me, you know it's you just
Speaker 1: have to be very aware of this stuff because it's
Speaker 1: just it's sad, Like you sit there and it's like,
Speaker 1: it's funny when I even when I'm posting stuff about
Speaker 1: the scams, I'm like, come on, really, like who's gonna
Speaker 1: fall for this? But I get the text and the
Speaker 1: emails and the messages just start flowing in from people
Speaker 1: that have a story. Yep, that was my mom, Yep,
Speaker 1: that was my dad, Yep that was me, Yep that
Speaker 1: was my nephew. And believe me, this stuff does happen.
Speaker 1: You don't have eighteen million people that are affected by
Speaker 1: this in the US and no one knows someone that
Speaker 1: was affected. Believe me, people are affected, all right, mister Gadget,
Speaker 1: You really got me going on that one. Okay, Tesla
Speaker 1: Tesla increasing the price of their cars once again. So
Speaker 1: as you know, if you listen to me on this podcast,
Speaker 1: you know that I purchased a Tesla last year. I
Speaker 1: personally love it. It has been amazing and it came
Speaker 1: at the right time, especially with the gas prices and everything.
Speaker 1: I understand that electric cars are not for everyone. I
Speaker 1: understand that we are not at a place in America
Speaker 1: where electric cars are easy to acquire, operate own. But yet,
Speaker 1: you know, if you look at California, it's obviously one
Speaker 1: of the biggest states for electric cars, and of course
Speaker 1: Tesla as well. But it's also like when you look
Speaker 1: at the top five cars in California, like the Tesla,
Speaker 1: I think the Why is almost overtaking the top car,
Speaker 1: which I think is the Honda Civic. But don't quote
Speaker 1: me on that. I know it's like the Accord is
Speaker 1: in there or the Camera, and then the Civic is
Speaker 1: in there, and the Model three and the Model Why
Speaker 1: and another car. But I mean it's pretty wild. But anyway,
Speaker 1: I love the Tesla. It's been amazing. But the price
Speaker 1: since I purchased it has gone up so much that
Speaker 1: even I would have to think twice about purchasing at
Speaker 1: this point. So let me just tell you about the
Speaker 1: price increase. So they raised the prices one more time
Speaker 1: by one thousand dollars. That's because nickel prices are surging,
Speaker 1: so the price of making the batteries is going up.
Speaker 1: In this electric article says in twenty twenty one, Tesla
Speaker 1: made so many price increases they've lost count. It's true
Speaker 1: even when I was purchasing. I mean, just in the
Speaker 1: couple weeks after I purchased my car, the price I
Speaker 1: think went up three times. So the prices are now
Speaker 1: as follows. The Model three Long Range went up by
Speaker 1: one thousand dollars. It is now fifty two thousand dollars.
Speaker 1: The Model Why went up by one thousand dollars, and
Speaker 1: it has gone up ten thousand dollars in the past
Speaker 1: twelve months. And so I don't know they didn't give
Speaker 1: the price to the Model Why. But it's just But
Speaker 1: here's the thing. I mean, all cars are just expensive
Speaker 1: right now. If you if you do not need to
Speaker 1: switch cars, now, is not the time to buy a
Speaker 1: car electric or not electric. I know. Well, this is
Speaker 1: the reason why this all comes up, and a lot
Speaker 1: of people were talking about electrics is I did a
Speaker 1: story on KTLA about is it time to switch to
Speaker 1: an EV? And my thought was because everyone always asked
Speaker 1: me like, oh, you know, you save so much money
Speaker 1: on gas. But here's what I've realized in purchasing my car,
Speaker 1: is that number one, if you already have a car
Speaker 1: that is already working for you the gas Let's say
Speaker 1: your car is paid that would be you know, the
Speaker 1: best scenario. If your car is paid for. Gas is expensive,
Speaker 1: but it's just a small part of that operating cost,
Speaker 1: or it is the probably the biggest part of the
Speaker 1: operating cost for the year. But when you're buying a
Speaker 1: new car, it's always going to be more expensive to
Speaker 1: acquire something new because now you're talking, you have a
Speaker 1: new payment or you have a new amount that you're spending,
Speaker 1: and it's going to be more than your old car
Speaker 1: no matter what. And then just something as simple as
Speaker 1: installing an electric charger at home, which is probably you know,
Speaker 1: two thousand dollars. That's gas for a year. Now, maybe
Speaker 1: at the new prices, gas for a year's three thousand.
Speaker 1: But the reality is it's it's not just like, oh,
Speaker 1: you switched to a let your car, you save money, yes,
Speaker 1: right now, if you're charged. If you're comparing just one
Speaker 1: thing and that is charging versus gasing up, it's always
Speaker 1: cheaper to charge. It's just it just is. Electricity is
Speaker 1: cheaper than gas. But when you look at the overall
Speaker 1: cost of the car, if you're talking about buying a
Speaker 1: Tesla for forty eight thousand dollars or fifty one thousand
Speaker 1: dollars or a Model Y for sixty thousand, you can
Speaker 1: get into a set of gas wheels for like twenty
Speaker 1: five grand. And so you're talking that twenty five thousand
Speaker 1: dollars spread to get that electric car that will pay
Speaker 1: for gas for many, many years. Now, I'm not advocating
Speaker 1: one way or the other. I'm not here to convince
Speaker 1: you to buy an electric car. I'm not here to
Speaker 1: say gas is good. I think the whole gas thing is,
Speaker 1: you know, it's tough on our environment. It's tough that
Speaker 1: we're you know, it's a it's a you know, we
Speaker 1: look at what's happening in the world. I mean, it's whatever.
Speaker 1: There's I'm not getting into the political stuff about the
Speaker 1: gas versus electric or just gas in general. But the
Speaker 1: reality is buying an electric car today is more expensive
Speaker 1: than acquiring a gas car. That is why we're seeing
Speaker 1: all of these incentives and rebates. Because the government and
Speaker 1: other industries have to subsidize the price of the car
Speaker 1: to make it somewhat feasible for people to want to
Speaker 1: buy it. But once you're in it, yes, it's a
Speaker 1: lot cheaper. I mean, the maintenance is simple. You can
Speaker 1: charge up for free to a lot of places, and
Speaker 1: it is cheaper to actually charge. But anyway, my point is,
Speaker 1: you know, I'm just following this whole ev stuff since
Speaker 1: now I'm kind of vested in it. I really think
Speaker 1: it's fascinating. California and the US at large are on
Speaker 1: this march towards electrification, and you know, I even asked
Speaker 1: the person that installed my electric car charger. I said, hey, look,
Speaker 1: do you think the grid, like if everyone switched to
Speaker 1: this kuld our electric grid in California support everyone charging
Speaker 1: their car? And they said absolutely not, And so we can't.
Speaker 1: You know, you can't have everyone switch over today. That
Speaker 1: would not work. I mean, it would just take down
Speaker 1: the entire system. But as we gradually get people on
Speaker 1: and things change and there's more places to charge, there's
Speaker 1: more options. Right now, according to the person I interviewed
Speaker 1: in my story, there's like forty cars that you can
Speaker 1: get that are electric. Last year that was half that number.
Speaker 1: Next year it's gonna be double that number. So we're
Speaker 1: seeing more and more options. Tesla right now is the
Speaker 1: name that every single person knows. They have the best
Speaker 1: charging infrastructure. But these other car companies are coming up quick,
Speaker 1: believe me, and they're coming up with some pretty good
Speaker 1: deals too. If I didn't get the Tesla, I would
Speaker 1: have gotten the Volkswagen ID four because I just fell
Speaker 1: in love with that car. Fantastic car. They're doing it
Speaker 1: at a great deal. They've got good lease deals, they've
Speaker 1: got good purchase deals. You get the incentives, but it's
Speaker 1: one of these things that you know it's gonna take
Speaker 1: a while for everything. So anyway, Okay, where am I at?
Speaker 1: Here we go? Oh my gosh, I can't believe the
Speaker 1: show's gone this long, Mike says, do I have to
Speaker 1: buy a new iMac? I can't find any way to
Speaker 1: update to a newer OS. Thanks. Oh and interesting. Okay,
Speaker 1: so I see it came from one I guess some
Speaker 1: people share their accounts. I guess because sometimes I get
Speaker 1: an email and it comes from one person, but it's
Speaker 1: they sign it another Okay. Twenty four, twenty fourteen, iMac
Speaker 1: with l Capitan and they want to update it to
Speaker 1: Mac os Monterey. So this happens a lot. And what
Speaker 1: you have to do is you have to go onto
Speaker 1: Apple's website and at the bottom of the page that
Speaker 1: lists the operating system, it'll tell you which computers are supported.
Speaker 1: And if I go to their web page, I'm looking
Speaker 1: at this, he said, or she said. They have a
Speaker 1: twenty fourteen iMac, So I'm looking at iMac and it
Speaker 1: says late twenty fifteen and later are supported. So that
Speaker 1: means that your Mac cannot run the latest version of
Speaker 1: the software, which means it's either you have to stick
Speaker 1: to your old software or it's probably time for a
Speaker 1: new one if you're trying to if you're trying to
Speaker 1: run the latest software. And the reason why you want
Speaker 1: to run the latest software is to for the security
Speaker 1: that it offers, although Apple is getting better about separating
Speaker 1: security updates from the core system updates. And so you know,
Speaker 1: if the computer's working for you, you're pretty good with your security,
Speaker 1: it should be fine. But yes, your computer has been
Speaker 1: phased out from the support system that Apple will give you.
Speaker 1: And I tell people this a lot. When they email me,
Speaker 1: they say, hey, do I need a new iPhone. If
Speaker 1: your iPhone is working for you and it's still supported
Speaker 1: by the latest software, then keep it. Keep it as
Speaker 1: long as you can until you're so frustrated with it
Speaker 1: you want to throw it out the window because it's
Speaker 1: running so slow. All right, let's get to one more
Speaker 1: story here. Peloton. I know this is kind of a
Speaker 1: smaller thing, but I know a lot of people do
Speaker 1: have Pelotons, or they're into it whatever they want one.
Speaker 1: But Peloton now is skipping the middle man, and now
Speaker 1: you can use the Peloton app for Apple Watch to
Speaker 1: track your workout on the bike. And that's really not
Speaker 1: just a bike but also the the treadmill. So what so,
Speaker 1: I guess in the past what has happened is that
Speaker 1: if you had the bike, well, I don't know how
Speaker 1: it works. I don't have a Peloton. I have a
Speaker 1: third party bike that I use with the Peloton app.
Speaker 1: But the way I have to do it is that basically,
Speaker 1: when I get on the Peloton, I have to start
Speaker 1: an Apple Watch. If you know, it's just a workout
Speaker 1: on my watch, and that will record me independently of
Speaker 1: what the app is saying. So the app might say
Speaker 1: you did one thing, but the watch says you did
Speaker 1: another I don't know how the bike worked in the past,
Speaker 1: but basically what they're saying is now you don't have
Speaker 1: to open up a third party workout on your Apple
Speaker 1: Watch to record that that workout on the Peloton to
Speaker 1: count towards your rings and things. So now it will
Speaker 1: get all of these stats directly from your Apple Watch
Speaker 1: and then send them into Apple Fitness. You know where
Speaker 1: you see your rings closing. So long story short, it's
Speaker 1: just a cleaner setup when you have a Peloton in
Speaker 1: an Apple Watch. So you can now connect your Apple
Speaker 1: Watch with the Peloton app on the watch to your
Speaker 1: health app on iPhone and you know your workouts are
Speaker 1: are I'm really struggling with this one. It's just tracked
Speaker 1: in a more direct way. So if if before the
Speaker 1: bike was tracking your workout, it may not have had
Speaker 1: the metrics that your Apple Watch has. Your Apple Watch
Speaker 1: has built in heart rate, it's got other sensors that
Speaker 1: it is constantly using to monitor you. Yes, the Peloton
Speaker 1: bike might have had its own sort of like algorithm
Speaker 1: for figuring out how much calories and things that thought
Speaker 1: you burned, but now it will be directly working with
Speaker 1: your Apple Watch to take that data from the sensors
Speaker 1: and put it right into your health app and so
Speaker 1: that you can see exactly what you did. And it's
Speaker 1: just like I said, it's just a much cleaner, cleaner setup.
Speaker 1: So I don't think I have time for one more question.
Speaker 1: Let's see here. Uh, okay, I'll do one more question.
Speaker 1: Since yeah, we'll see. Sally asks, I'm having balanced problems.
Speaker 1: I'm thinking of getting an Apple Watch. Since she's asking
Speaker 1: about the Apple Watch. Am I going to have to
Speaker 1: get data service like for a cell phone for the
Speaker 1: fall feature to work correctly? Thanks? So, Sally, that's a
Speaker 1: great question, and it's a very complicated answer. So the
Speaker 1: short answer is the Apple Watch fall detection will work,
Speaker 1: but it may not be able to actually dial nine
Speaker 1: to one one or for help unless your phone is
Speaker 1: nearby or unless you have cellular on your phone on
Speaker 1: your Apple Watch. So it gets kind of complicated. So
Speaker 1: the way that the fall detection works is it's built
Speaker 1: into your Apple Watch. Apple Watch fall detection, I have
Speaker 1: to see they I think it was the Apple Watch
Speaker 1: four that they introduced this on. When did they do this?
Speaker 1: Let's se yep, look at that? Man, what a good
Speaker 1: memory Apple Watch series four and later, and also Apple
Speaker 1: Watch se. If you're watched it texts a hard fall,
Speaker 1: it will attempt to dial nine on one. If your
Speaker 1: phone is nearby, it will use the cellular connection on
Speaker 1: your watch on your phone to put that call through
Speaker 1: and get you emergency help. I've had this activate a
Speaker 1: couple of times, so I'm wrestling with the kids. It
Speaker 1: actually activated the other day. I was doing something like
Speaker 1: a workout or something, and I don't know what either.
Speaker 1: I don't know. It's just activated and I said, no,
Speaker 1: I'm fine, but so okay. So again, if it detects
Speaker 1: a hard fall, it will attempt to connect your Apple
Speaker 1: Watch to your Apple your iPhone and it will call
Speaker 1: nine on one and it will send your location and
Speaker 1: it will get you help, and it will also text
Speaker 1: your contacts that you've identified as your emergency contact saying, hey,
Speaker 1: look this happened, you know, you know, get help or whatever.
Speaker 1: If you have a cellular version of the Apple Watch,
Speaker 1: it will be able to dial nine one one no
Speaker 1: matter what wherever you are, whatever you're doing, even if
Speaker 1: your iPhone is not nearby, because you have that cellular connection.
Speaker 1: Your Apple Watch has a connection to the Internet. All
Speaker 1: on its own, and it will call nine one one.
Speaker 1: Now here's where it gets a little interesting. Even if
Speaker 1: you have a cellular Apple Watch, without cellular connected like
Speaker 1: an active data service like ten ten dollars a month,
Speaker 1: you're not paying that to your provider. It should still
Speaker 1: dial nine one one if you have a hard fall,
Speaker 1: because the way that phones and cellular connections are set up,
Speaker 1: they will continue to dial nine one one no matter what.
Speaker 1: You do not need a data plan to dial nine
Speaker 1: one one. Now I'm looking at Apple's information about the
Speaker 1: Apple Watch, and it doesn't say specifically that you have
Speaker 1: to have a data plan to have the watch dial
Speaker 1: nine one. So I would not rely on this information.
Speaker 1: I'm telling you right now without without confirming it with
Speaker 1: your your carrier and or Apple. But the reality is
Speaker 1: typically if you take any old cell phone that is
Speaker 1: just laying around in America, it will dial nine one one,
Speaker 1: even if there's no data plan associated or cellular plan
Speaker 1: associated with that phone. And they did that on purpose
Speaker 1: because they want people to be able to call for
Speaker 1: help in America. So that's the way it works. That
Speaker 1: may work that way in other countries. I just don't know.
Speaker 1: Now with the Apple Watch. It's kind of its own
Speaker 1: little thing. But I think because it still has a
Speaker 1: cellular plan or it's still as cellular antenna built in,
Speaker 1: it would still do that. I'm just not sure. I'm
Speaker 1: having trouble with my Apple Watch right now. It's not
Speaker 1: using the cellular plan that's that's assigned to it. I
Speaker 1: don't know what the problem is, but so mine. I
Speaker 1: went for a run the other day and typically I
Speaker 1: just roam with my watch, and the first song that
Speaker 1: I was playing stopped playing and that was it. It
Speaker 1: like couldn't pull the next song because it had no
Speaker 1: cellular connectivity. And that's how I realized that my cellular
Speaker 1: wasn't working. Apple Watch is really it's so tricky because
Speaker 1: the Apple Watch it's so slick, the integration with the iPhone.
Speaker 1: It never really tells you when it's using cellular, when
Speaker 1: it's using Wi Fi, when it's using your phone. It's
Speaker 1: using a combination of those things to communicate and always
Speaker 1: try to have a connection, and it's always trying to
Speaker 1: use the least power hungry connection and always the cheapest connection.
Speaker 1: So even if you have cellular on your Apple Watch
Speaker 1: and your phone is always nearby, it's always going to
Speaker 1: route through your phone cellular connection and not its own
Speaker 1: cellular connection. So you may be paying ten dollars a
Speaker 1: month and never actually need to use cellular because your
Speaker 1: phone is always nearby. Not something that Apple widely advertises,
Speaker 1: but it's something. It is a delineation, and I tell
Speaker 1: people the only reason you ever need a cellular plan
Speaker 1: on an Apple Watch is if you are with your
Speaker 1: Apple Watch without your phone. So if you're like me
Speaker 1: and you're running without your phone, that's when you want
Speaker 1: the cellular so that you can access either music or emergency,
Speaker 1: call someone whatever when necessary. All right, So, oh, that
Speaker 1: sound means it is the end of the show. If
Speaker 1: you are on the Instagram Live, stick around after the
Speaker 1: show ends. I'll hang out and talk to you for
Speaker 1: a bit. But otherwise guess what that's gonna do it
Speaker 1: for this episode of the show. If you'd like to
Speaker 1: submit a question for me to answer, you can go
Speaker 1: to my Facebook page, Facebook dot com, slash rich on Tech,
Speaker 1: hit the big blue send email button, or just go
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Speaker 1: write a quick line about what you like about this
Speaker 1: show to help other people understand why they should listen.
Speaker 1: You can find me on all social media at rich
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Speaker 1: you can download the free KTLA plus app on Apple TV, fireTV,
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Speaker 1: and you can watch all of my TV segments on demand.
Speaker 1: I guarantee you they are a lot of fun. You
Speaker 1: will learn something. Thanks for watching those. My name is
Speaker 1: rich Demiro. Thanks so much for listening. There are so
Speaker 1: many ways you can spend an hour of your time.
Speaker 1: I do appreciate you spending it right here with me.
Speaker 1: I'll talk to you real soon.