Speaker 1: Get in touch with technology with tech Stuff from how
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com. Hello again, everyone, and welcome to
Speaker 1: tech stuff. My name is Chris Poulette and I'm an
Speaker 1: editor at how stuff works dot com. Sitting here crushed
Speaker 1: me as always, his senior writer, Jonathan Strickland c is
Speaker 1: for cookie. That's good enough for me. And it was
Speaker 1: just a moment ago. Yes, I told Tyler I was
Speaker 1: ready to go. He was ready to hit record, and
Speaker 1: then took a big bite out of a cookie because
Speaker 1: that's professional, to be fair. That cookie was was looking
Speaker 1: at me funny and now it's not because it has
Speaker 1: no head, the snowman cookie. Yeah, holidays, and and saying
Speaker 1: that we are approaching the end of two thousand twelve. Um,
Speaker 1: it's it's been a different sort of year for tech.
Speaker 1: We decided to do a year wrap up in tech
Speaker 1: and um this year. I mean that's the kind of
Speaker 1: article that appears on virtually every website that has to
Speaker 1: do with anything. Um. You know, the news sites have
Speaker 1: this year, and news and the entertainment websites have the
Speaker 1: you know, the who got divorced, who got divorced, who
Speaker 1: who passed away? And those kinds of things. We all
Speaker 1: like reading these kinds of articles. Um, but um, you know,
Speaker 1: I've been going back through things. It seems like this
Speaker 1: year we didn't We had a lot of news, but
Speaker 1: there weren't these big, kind of monumental things that have
Speaker 1: happened like in years past, which is weird. See I
Speaker 1: look back at two thousand and twelve and I see
Speaker 1: some pretty major stories. I mean, things that I think
Speaker 1: of as having the potential to affect technology well into
Speaker 1: the future. But I mean you could argue that there
Speaker 1: was nothing as big as say Steve Jobs passing away
Speaker 1: that was such a huge story in two thousand eleven
Speaker 1: that you know, there wasn't anything of that sort of
Speaker 1: nothing that had that kind of spectacle around it, right,
Speaker 1: or or or things that were really fun in tech. Right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there weren't a couple of stories, but nothing again, nothing
Speaker 1: that was like, uh, the debut of a brand new
Speaker 1: technology that just blew everyone away, like you know again,
Speaker 1: like the iPad when it came out of Grant. Don't
Speaker 1: don't yell at me, people, I know the iPad wasn't
Speaker 1: brand new in the sense that tablet computers have been
Speaker 1: around since the nineties, but it was the first one
Speaker 1: to really kind of be a success in the consumer
Speaker 1: market or or even you know when the keep sticking
Speaker 1: with Apple, but they really are good at introducing form
Speaker 1: factors and making them work in the marketplace. But the iPhone,
Speaker 1: you know, that making that was the big news because
Speaker 1: it created the smartphone market in the consumer um world,
Speaker 1: in the in the Western hemisphere anyway. UM, I didn't
Speaker 1: really have any of that this year. UM. I was
Speaker 1: going to say that part of the reason why those
Speaker 1: were so successful as quote unquote big news story eas
Speaker 1: is partially because um, you know, the PR push behind it,
Speaker 1: and UM the impact that that had. I think that that,
Speaker 1: of course, UM escalated those particular stories for Apple. Apples
Speaker 1: talented it at at generating prum And we should point
Speaker 1: out so we are not We're not like trying to
Speaker 1: say that Apple is the greatest company ever. They just
Speaker 1: have a real success with this PR push that Chris
Speaker 1: is talking about. So I want to point that out
Speaker 1: because I used to be accused of having an anti
Speaker 1: Mac bias, and I don't want people saying that now
Speaker 1: I'm a pro Apple bias. It's not true. He really
Speaker 1: enjoyed that that reputation. I did for for a while.
Speaker 1: The one iTunes comment lasted me a good two years,
Speaker 1: two and a half years, something like that. But let's
Speaker 1: let's start off with talking about two thousand twelve and
Speaker 1: some of the big stories and some of the things
Speaker 1: that happened. UM. I was gonna start off by talking
Speaker 1: about c E S two thousand twelve because that sort
Speaker 1: of opens the year, especially within the first week or
Speaker 1: week and a half of January, and U C S
Speaker 1: two thousand twelve introduced several different technologies. Mostly it was
Speaker 1: a lot of incremental improvements on existing tech, So we
Speaker 1: saw a lot of super thin TVs, saw a few
Speaker 1: ultra high definition television sets being bandied about, mostly in
Speaker 1: the prototype stage. I expect that in two thousand thirteen
Speaker 1: will see a lot more of those at c E
Speaker 1: S UM. In fact, it would shock me to not
Speaker 1: see at least a dozen, you know, four K type
Speaker 1: sets at c E S and two thousand thirteen. But uh,
Speaker 1: those were general trends. Didn't see as much three D
Speaker 1: in two thousand and twelve as we had in years past.
Speaker 1: I think the consumer reaction to three D has been lackluster,
Speaker 1: and so it's sort of has set that to the side.
Speaker 1: I mean, you still have a lot of television. They
Speaker 1: are three D capable, but that doesn't seem to be
Speaker 1: featured as a, you know, a killer feature anymore. But
Speaker 1: the there was a few things that came out in
Speaker 1: two thousand twelve at ces that caught attention. Ultra books
Speaker 1: debuted at ces UM. They have not really done that
Speaker 1: well in the market, but they are you know, high performance,
Speaker 1: sleek laptop computers and they have there's a very specific
Speaker 1: set of parameters that you have to follow in order
Speaker 1: to be considered an Ultra book. We actually did an
Speaker 1: episode on it, so we won't really dive into it,
Speaker 1: but those made kind of a splash at c S.
Speaker 1: I remember the Roku Streaming Stick was something that caught
Speaker 1: a lot of attention at this idea of a a
Speaker 1: USB like thumb drive sized device that was a Roku
Speaker 1: box essentially in that format, you would plug it into
Speaker 1: a USB port on a TV and it would give
Speaker 1: the television the Roku uh feature set, so you could
Speaker 1: watch streaming video over your over the Internet through your
Speaker 1: television and not have to hook up an actual set
Speaker 1: top box, which was kind of cool. And that's actually
Speaker 1: on sale now, so that that did come to market
Speaker 1: because sometimes we see things that sees that are awesome
Speaker 1: but never go anywhere. Um, And it seems like that
Speaker 1: is an form factor improvement, um, which which would in
Speaker 1: a way sort of exemplify what I was trying to
Speaker 1: say a minute ago, which is, um, you know, we'd
Speaker 1: had Roku devices out there. Um. This, you know, was
Speaker 1: a big improvement in in form factors. You know, much
Speaker 1: tinier than the box. You could plug it right into
Speaker 1: the side of the TV itself. Um, but you know,
Speaker 1: doesn't generate the same kind of story as a brand
Speaker 1: new O. MG, this is a really cool thing. You
Speaker 1: should check it out sort of news story, right right. Yeah,
Speaker 1: there wasn't anything that was so revolutionary as to uh
Speaker 1: to really become v Darling of c E S two
Speaker 1: thousand and twelve. There there weren't any technologies I can
Speaker 1: think of that were so uh buzzworthy as to capture
Speaker 1: everyone's attention. Uh. I think the coolest thing I saw
Speaker 1: there was the maker Butt replicator. You know, three D
Speaker 1: printers are awesome, and maker Butt creates a pretty compelling one.
Speaker 1: So yeah, now, UM, you know these devices, we talked
Speaker 1: about those a long time ago too. We discussed rapid prototyping.
Speaker 1: Three D printers aren't brand new, but Jonathan's right that
Speaker 1: the topic has come up quite a lot in the
Speaker 1: news in uh simply because um maker bought in some
Speaker 1: a handful of other companies have made them more I
Speaker 1: won't say affordable, I will say more affordable than they
Speaker 1: used to be. That the kind of thing too that
Speaker 1: has a form factor where you can PLoP it down
Speaker 1: on your very large desk and uh you know they're
Speaker 1: there's it's starting to make it possible to create your
Speaker 1: own uh stuff from scratch, and we'll introduce I think
Speaker 1: it's funny. I think we're sort of in between on
Speaker 1: that news cycle because now that we have three D
Speaker 1: stuff available to us to print, you know, in this context,
Speaker 1: um it's still kind of expensive. But now we're starting
Speaker 1: to see organizations um upset with the idea of three
Speaker 1: D printing because now you can go print your own
Speaker 1: things that maybe under copyright. And I think that will
Speaker 1: be the big story going forward. You'll see more of that.
Speaker 1: It's already started, but it's not really hit the mainstream news.
Speaker 1: Like I could see Ikea becoming a big um uh
Speaker 1: critic of this sort of technology, right because you could
Speaker 1: go and you could say, hey, I really love this
Speaker 1: design of this chair, but why would I buy this
Speaker 1: chair when I can just print it at home, or
Speaker 1: I can I can maybe even tweak this design a
Speaker 1: little bit, not so much that you know, you can't
Speaker 1: tell where it came from, but just a little bit
Speaker 1: like I just want to add this one little element
Speaker 1: to it. Yeah, that could definitely become a thing. Um
Speaker 1: So those were sort of the items we saw at
Speaker 1: CES two thousand twelve. Again, nothing that really jumped out,
Speaker 1: but uh, but some interesting improvements on stuff. I also
Speaker 1: had a great time at c S two thousand twelve
Speaker 1: because I got to hang out with some of my
Speaker 1: my yeah peers in the technology space, so folks like
Speaker 1: Tom Merritt and I his actar and um uh you know,
Speaker 1: uh Will Harris, and it was it was a great time.
Speaker 1: But I'm looking forward to two thousand and thirteen to
Speaker 1: see what what news stuff will come out. Moving into
Speaker 1: actual some news stories in two thousand twelve, The first
Speaker 1: one I have is the raid on the on Kim
Speaker 1: dot COM's house in New Zealand, the I Got upload
Speaker 1: raid that was done as part of a joint effort
Speaker 1: between United States federal agents and New Zealand police officers,
Speaker 1: and we did the whole episode about Mega Upload. So
Speaker 1: again I won't go too far into this, but that
Speaker 1: was you know, that was a big deal. The idea
Speaker 1: of this international crackdown on someone who was accused of
Speaker 1: creating a service that is essentially, according at least according
Speaker 1: to the allegations, essentially designed to allow piracy uh of
Speaker 1: intellectual property, and that that was the main purpose of
Speaker 1: the site. Now whether or not that really is the
Speaker 1: main purpose of the site is completely debatable, but that's
Speaker 1: essentially the allegation and the rate made big news, I
Speaker 1: mean from for a good part of two thousand and twelve.
Speaker 1: It was a story that unraveled throughout the months of
Speaker 1: two thousand twelve where we learned that, uh, the agents
Speaker 1: acted without complete authorization. They didn't have all the paperwork
Speaker 1: necessary to conduct the raid that they did, so that
Speaker 1: caused some problems. Uh. There's also questions about whether or
Speaker 1: not it was even legal for the United States agents
Speaker 1: to get involved in something that was not a US
Speaker 1: centric matter. You're talking about a company that's based out
Speaker 1: of Hong Kong and a the leader of the company
Speaker 1: was a resident of New Zealand. So there were a
Speaker 1: lot of issues that came up about this, and this
Speaker 1: story has not concluded. It's still playing out, so it's
Speaker 1: gonna continue on into two thousand their team. Although I
Speaker 1: should say we are recording this at the beginning of
Speaker 1: December two thousand twelve, so technically there will be a
Speaker 1: month's worth of stuff that could potentially happen between when
Speaker 1: we record this and when it publishes, in which case
Speaker 1: we'll just say we were running long and we had
Speaker 1: to end our episode. Oh, I thought you were going
Speaker 1: to say that. We just didn't want to offer any
Speaker 1: spoiler alert. We knew about it, just in case some
Speaker 1: of you guys are pirating the episodes before we published them,
Speaker 1: which would be quite a feat. Please don't try. Actually,
Speaker 1: here's a here's an example of the very kind of
Speaker 1: thing that you're talking about, because, um, not long ago,
Speaker 1: we also recorded another big legal thing that affected the
Speaker 1: world of tech, which is UH famous tech um entrepreneur
Speaker 1: John McAfee being uh and a person of interest in
Speaker 1: a murder case in Belize where he's been living. Um
Speaker 1: he had been in in his in his parlance, he
Speaker 1: had been sort of harassed by the authorities because apparently
Speaker 1: they thought that he was into the manufacture of illegal drugs,
Speaker 1: which he says he wasn't. Uh and uh. When he
Speaker 1: saw the authorities approaching his home after a neighbor UM
Speaker 1: was found dead, UM not far from his property, not
Speaker 1: far from his property, UM, he thought the authorities were
Speaker 1: coming to at least at what he claims is that
Speaker 1: he thought that they were coming to harass him about
Speaker 1: drugs again, so he UM he high tailed it out
Speaker 1: of there, if you will. And UM has been on
Speaker 1: the run up until UM really right, not immediately, but
Speaker 1: in a couple of days before we recorded this, in
Speaker 1: between the time we recorded that podcast a few weeks
Speaker 1: ago and now he's been apprehended in Guatemala trying to
Speaker 1: enter the country illegally. UM. Of course, the police still say,
Speaker 1: as at the time we're recording this, that he's not
Speaker 1: wanted for the murder of this person. But is they
Speaker 1: want to ask him some questions. Is a person of interest?
Speaker 1: I mean he he had a history of disagreements with
Speaker 1: this neighbor. And UM also has in the past perhaps
Speaker 1: associated himself with people who are not on the up
Speaker 1: and up. There have been a few indicators that would
Speaker 1: make him a person of interest within the mean, just
Speaker 1: the fact that he lived near the guy was enough
Speaker 1: to make him a person of a person of interest.
Speaker 1: Plus the fact that the guy's body was found not
Speaker 1: far from McAfee's UH property makes him a person of
Speaker 1: interest at least as far as asking and finding out
Speaker 1: what really did happen. And yeah, we still don't know
Speaker 1: all the details on that one. Yeah, but of course
Speaker 1: this episode goes live, it may all be out in
Speaker 1: the open, but at the moment we don't know. Of course,
Speaker 1: I'm McAfee's name is still synonymous with UM virus protection.
Speaker 1: They they intel about the company some time ago, but
Speaker 1: they still use McAfee as the name for their their
Speaker 1: virus software. So UM the news reports coming out about
Speaker 1: him this year sort of brought the founder of that
Speaker 1: company back into UM, back into the public eye. And
Speaker 1: you know a lot of us had said, really, the
Speaker 1: guy who came up with the virus software is the
Speaker 1: guy who was a person of interest in this murder case.
Speaker 1: That's very, very strange. Back at the very beginning of
Speaker 1: two thousand twelve, we had the Internet blackout Day, which
Speaker 1: was in relation to UH, to a couple of different
Speaker 1: proposed pieces of legislation and in the in Congress uh
Speaker 1: Sopa and Pippa, both of which were about protecting intellectual property,
Speaker 1: and critics of these pieces of legislation said that the
Speaker 1: the powers that were being given to the government far
Speaker 1: exceeded what was necessary to protect intellectual property, and in fact,
Speaker 1: potentially went well beyond what any country, any sovereign country,
Speaker 1: could do, because these these pieces of legislation specifically concerned
Speaker 1: themselves with intellectual property theft that happens outside the borders
Speaker 1: of the United States. So if you have let's say
Speaker 1: you're you're are a United States company, and you are
Speaker 1: you're an owner of a lot of intellectual property. So
Speaker 1: let's say you're a movie studio, because that's a good example.
Speaker 1: So you're a United States movie studio and you're concerned
Speaker 1: because your movies are being pirated and uploaded onto servers
Speaker 1: that are in China, and you know, how do you
Speaker 1: how do you pursue a complaint against that It's in
Speaker 1: a different country. Uh, the country may or may not
Speaker 1: be sympathetic at all toward the intellectual property rights holder.
Speaker 1: They may not care, or they may not They may
Speaker 1: have other concerns that are so great as that they
Speaker 1: cannot dedicate time to that problem. So sopen people were
Speaker 1: really about trying to find ways to cut off access
Speaker 1: to sites like that, essentially to to shut down the
Speaker 1: pathways that people could use to get to sites that
Speaker 1: were alleged to have piracy on them pirated material on them.
Speaker 1: But the problem is this could really cause issues with
Speaker 1: the way the Internet works and how how you navigate places. Also,
Speaker 1: it raised questions of well, what happens if the the
Speaker 1: data there was not violating intellectual property? I mean, where's
Speaker 1: where is the protection for innocence out there? How many
Speaker 1: innocent websites could get shut down or not necessarily even
Speaker 1: shut down, just the access itself would be blocked to
Speaker 1: anyone in the United States. Beyond that, people who were
Speaker 1: critics of this these pieces of legislation pointed out that
Speaker 1: there were ways around it that anyone who was determined
Speaker 1: to get at that material could do so using a
Speaker 1: couple of different workarounds, some of which were really really simple.
Speaker 1: And so the argument was that this legislation could do
Speaker 1: more harm than than good, and ultimately it won't protect
Speaker 1: the intellectual property rights holders the way it's intended to,
Speaker 1: So it doesn't work and it would break stuff. Therefore
Speaker 1: it's bad, And a lot of websites ended up having
Speaker 1: a policy where in January two thousand twelve, they had
Speaker 1: UM they would do a blackout where if you visited
Speaker 1: the site, you would either get a message just saying
Speaker 1: that the site was completely offline as part of a
Speaker 1: protest against this legislation, or it would be a landing
Speaker 1: page that would give you a little information about the
Speaker 1: legislation and then you have to click through to get
Speaker 1: to the real site. But UM, it was a big deal,
Speaker 1: and the legislation ultimately was withdrawn after after receiving heaps
Speaker 1: of criticism, although I don't expect that to just mean
Speaker 1: that the issue itself will go away, particularly since the
Speaker 1: people who were responsible for the legislation are many of
Speaker 1: whom are still in Congress. After the elections. They were
Speaker 1: either either they were not up for re election and
Speaker 1: so there's still serving their terms, or several of them
Speaker 1: were reelected. So it could very well be that we'll
Speaker 1: just see a different version of the same sort of
Speaker 1: um legislation passed through Congress again. Yeah, and another uh
Speaker 1: sort of political um. It's sort of political bent to
Speaker 1: the to the tech world this year it happened outside
Speaker 1: the United States and again recently as of the time
Speaker 1: we're recording this UM. You know, there's there's been a
Speaker 1: big armed conflict this year in Syria and UM just
Speaker 1: not too long ago. UM. I guess about a week
Speaker 1: or so before we record this UM, the entire Internet
Speaker 1: was cut off to Syria or or mostly cut off.
Speaker 1: And UH it's still UM at least according to my research.
Speaker 1: It's still somewhat unclear UM as to the cause of that,
Speaker 1: whether the government actually had it shut off, or whether
Speaker 1: there was some kind of UM the government actually claims
Speaker 1: or that UM that rebels Syrian rebels had UM cut
Speaker 1: off access to the Internet, although it seems that some organizations,
Speaker 1: probably the governmental organizations, still had access to the country's
Speaker 1: UM Internet connection. UH, it was actually cut off, not
Speaker 1: not for very long period of time, only for for
Speaker 1: a few days. UM. But you know, it's one of
Speaker 1: those things where people were wondering whether or not UM
Speaker 1: both sides in that conflict would be able to tell
Speaker 1: their story via the Internet. I mean, that's been been
Speaker 1: pretty common over the past few years, the ability for
Speaker 1: UM people who are UH speaking out against the government
Speaker 1: in their countries to be able to use Twitter and
Speaker 1: other social media to to communicate their ideas, to communicate
Speaker 1: the beliefs, to organize protests. Um, of course that's some
Speaker 1: that's been very common, especially with the Arab Spring upper
Speaker 1: I think. So that wasn't this year really but actually
Speaker 1: still that that kind of activity is still going on
Speaker 1: in in Egypt as of the time when recording this too.
Speaker 1: Um but um, but yeah, that was that was a
Speaker 1: big story this year. That also happened in Libya where
Speaker 1: the Libyan uh internet access was was cut off to
Speaker 1: some degree. Um. It wasn't as uh colorful or actually
Speaker 1: funny as the woman in two thousand eleven who cut
Speaker 1: off internet access to Georgia and Armenia because she was
Speaker 1: find she found a cable and wanted to sell the
Speaker 1: copper in the cable, so she cut it and cut
Speaker 1: off web access to the entire country. But apparently she
Speaker 1: she had never heard of the Worldwide Web. Um, so
Speaker 1: that's no one else over there ditt either. Um but yeah,
Speaker 1: but that that is a conflict that appears to be
Speaker 1: uh politically motivated as well. And staying in the world
Speaker 1: of politics, of course, in the United States, we had
Speaker 1: our our presidential election and that ended up the social
Speaker 1: networking ended up playing a big part of that election.
Speaker 1: And UM not a big surprise. I mean, we've we've
Speaker 1: seen that in the previous elections as well, but it wasn't.
Speaker 1: Again one of those uh stories that kind of UM
Speaker 1: caused some amusement in that Uh. The Democratic Party had
Speaker 1: their approach to managing social media and the Internet and
Speaker 1: communication as far as communicating out to supporters, you know,
Speaker 1: ways to to uh get get out the word for
Speaker 1: people to vote, and the Republican had Republicans had their
Speaker 1: side as well, which famously did not work so great
Speaker 1: a couple of times. UM. As a matter of fact,
Speaker 1: the Republicans tool, which was nicknamed Orca um crashed on
Speaker 1: the election day. And both both tools were had had
Speaker 1: similar purposes, they went about it in different ways. Orca
Speaker 1: and and Narwhale, which is the Democrats uh software tool
Speaker 1: that they used, we're both designed to get people out
Speaker 1: there and get people to vote, um, but they went
Speaker 1: about it in different ways. Rumor has it that the
Speaker 1: Republicans chose Orca as the nickname for their tool because
Speaker 1: they had already heard of Narwhale and Orca's prey on
Speaker 1: Normal's it's a whale eat whale world. Orcas are not
Speaker 1: technically whales. A whale of a tale to tell your
Speaker 1: lad a whale of a tale or two. But um,
Speaker 1: actually that's sort of a fascinating story. Is is the
Speaker 1: tale the two software tools? But yeah, it's it's obvious
Speaker 1: now that um, politics in at least in the United
Speaker 1: States has been forever changed by social media and networked communication, uh,
Speaker 1: mobile communication and you know, things like text messaging and
Speaker 1: the ability to communicate to get the vote out. Um,
Speaker 1: I don't think you will see another unplugged election, at
Speaker 1: least not unless the world of NBC's revolution happens upon us.
Speaker 1: The internet. I think Twitter has played such a big role.
Speaker 1: I mean just just even if it's not a direct role,
Speaker 1: whenever any event happened, it seemed like the part of
Speaker 1: the story that would cover this would be how Twitter
Speaker 1: reacted to that event, Like, within you know, x amount
Speaker 1: of time, over one million tweets went out about this
Speaker 1: particular thing, that kind of thing. So we heard about
Speaker 1: that a lot with the election, but also about the
Speaker 1: Olympics in two thousand and twelve. The Internet played a
Speaker 1: big role with the the access to the Olympics. Um,
Speaker 1: I know that I was not alone in doing something
Speaker 1: naughty in that I watched the streaming of the opening
Speaker 1: ceremonies live via the Internet by finding a link that
Speaker 1: let me do that, because otherwise I was going to
Speaker 1: have to wait and I didn't want to because it
Speaker 1: was a slow day at work and I was hearing
Speaker 1: about Mr Bean on the Olympics and I said I
Speaker 1: have to see this. So anyway, it was entitlement, that's
Speaker 1: all me. But but anyway, yeah, the the Internet played
Speaker 1: a big role in our access to the Olympics. Again
Speaker 1: Twitter did it gave athletes and and outlet where they
Speaker 1: could communicate directly with people who were supporting them. Uh,
Speaker 1: so we see that that it's playing a larger and
Speaker 1: larger role in big events. This is really I don't
Speaker 1: think it comes as a surprise to anyone. It's just
Speaker 1: one of those things where it's in another indicator of
Speaker 1: how our world is changing, and that we are gradually
Speaker 1: moving toward more and more of an online world when
Speaker 1: it comes to these big real world events. UM, and
Speaker 1: relying less on traditional forms of media. Now, that doesn't
Speaker 1: mean that the online world outweighs those traditional forms of media.
Speaker 1: That's not the case. There's still plenty of people watching
Speaker 1: TV or or reading about it in in other traditional
Speaker 1: forms of media. Uh, it's not like the scales have tipped.
Speaker 1: It's just that we're seeing a growing uh uh reliance
Speaker 1: on the online world. Yeah, and and uh there was
Speaker 1: a big story actually as the Olympics were going on
Speaker 1: here in the United States about the TV channel. The
Speaker 1: story was in the United States. The Olympics weren't going
Speaker 1: on here. Okay, good point. I said that a little funny. Yes,
Speaker 1: there was a big story in the United States about
Speaker 1: the Olympics in Britain because um, you know, they were
Speaker 1: several hours ahead of us in in the the time,
Speaker 1: and just like British, I think there's so big their
Speaker 1: tea in there, five hour advanced time from here, even
Speaker 1: more of a difference on the West coast. Um. But yeah,
Speaker 1: the the the availability of information, the the fact that
Speaker 1: this information of scores and outcomes of events, news stories,
Speaker 1: you know, somebody might get hurt or um you know
Speaker 1: the the bad mitten Gate story of this summer, Um,
Speaker 1: look it up. Um. Oh yeah, it really was a thing.
Speaker 1: These stories were coming out over the internet in channels
Speaker 1: that we all look to every day and in places
Speaker 1: that we look every day, and we're thinking, you know,
Speaker 1: why do we have to wait until prime time here
Speaker 1: in the United States? How why do we have to
Speaker 1: wait until evening? Defined out these things? And the thing
Speaker 1: is it's sort of I think it was a lot
Speaker 1: of a lot of noise really because people still tune
Speaker 1: into those broadcasts. Um. But it it highlighted a couple
Speaker 1: of things. One, uh, it highlighted just how much difference
Speaker 1: in time there really is between the times that when
Speaker 1: it's someplace that is vastly different in time, like um
Speaker 1: uh than the next Winter Olympics will be in Russia,
Speaker 1: So there's going to be an even bigger time difference
Speaker 1: for those of us here in the United States who
Speaker 1: are going to be following those events. Um. And they go, well,
Speaker 1: we can get this in real time. Why don't we
Speaker 1: have to wait until TV? Well, the thing is, you
Speaker 1: you don't um. And people still wanted to see those
Speaker 1: those things on TV, but it also pointed out the
Speaker 1: things that they weren't showing, and people started to question
Speaker 1: the network that that carries those events, saying why didn't
Speaker 1: you show this story or how come you're focused on
Speaker 1: this one game when you know this other one meant
Speaker 1: so much to the outcome of the medals um And
Speaker 1: the answer is, you know, they're showing they can't show
Speaker 1: everything without you know, basically turning it into a twenty
Speaker 1: four hour Olympics channel. And even then there's so much
Speaker 1: going on that you can't so it's sort of um
Speaker 1: it was. It was a big thing for a while
Speaker 1: among some people to say, well, they are not showing
Speaker 1: the whole thing, and they're not showing it in real time.
Speaker 1: But I think in the end it's sort of proved
Speaker 1: that the people who really want that information are going
Speaker 1: to go get it anyway online, and the people who
Speaker 1: really want to see it packaged and a nice, neat
Speaker 1: format with a little human interest stuff are still going
Speaker 1: to watch the traditional broadcasts on TV. But it was
Speaker 1: interesting to see how much the the technology has pervaded
Speaker 1: our lives to where we sort of expect everything in
Speaker 1: in full ready when we are What I thought was
Speaker 1: interesting also is that it gave options, uh not necessarily
Speaker 1: options that were sanctioned by you know, whatever entity was
Speaker 1: in charge of broadcasting the Olympics in any given country,
Speaker 1: but it gave options that some of US found very valuable.
Speaker 1: For example, you could watch the opening ceremonies without any commentary. Yes,
Speaker 1: so you didn't have either in the case of the
Speaker 1: UK commentators like people talking about stuff that you know
Speaker 1: or or interrupting something that you found interesting, or in
Speaker 1: the case of US commentators, people who don't understand the
Speaker 1: references that are being made and are showing their national
Speaker 1: ignorance of things that I actually know about being an
Speaker 1: anglophile and ticking me off, are using there's some commentary there,
Speaker 1: Are you using that soapbox or a little bit um? Yeah? No,
Speaker 1: I mean, but but that was kind of an interesting
Speaker 1: thing too. Is that the idea that you don't have
Speaker 1: to consume this particular type of of well not even
Speaker 1: just entertainment, but this particularly particular content in one way,
Speaker 1: like there's only one way that you can get this stuff,
Speaker 1: and there's only one form that you're going to see
Speaker 1: it in the idea that you suddenly could have access
Speaker 1: to streams of this content that would be totally different
Speaker 1: from what you would get on TV. It was really interesting. No,
Speaker 1: of course that's not gonna apply to every single kind
Speaker 1: of content that's out there, but for something like a
Speaker 1: sports event where you may not want commentary, you may
Speaker 1: just want to watch the the event itself and that's it.
Speaker 1: Then it was a it was a nice option to have,
Speaker 1: and uh that I think is something that could be
Speaker 1: very valuable in the future. Now in this case, again
Speaker 1: it wasn't something that was necessarily sanctioned, but I could
Speaker 1: see that easily becoming like an option, like like you know,
Speaker 1: you could can you imagine you just you go to
Speaker 1: let's say it's a website or a portal of some
Speaker 1: sort that you could access even on your television, and
Speaker 1: there'd be an option there click with commentary or without commentary,
Speaker 1: And for something like the opening ceremonies of of the Olympic,
Speaker 1: that could be a total game changer for the people
Speaker 1: watching it. I think that would be a really cool
Speaker 1: feature to have for the next Olympics. Is you know
Speaker 1: something along those lines, or do you want to have
Speaker 1: the you know, the commentary from a particular country to
Speaker 1: be the one that accompanies the footage, and uh, you know,
Speaker 1: that would be I think a pretty cool thing to
Speaker 1: have at your disposal. Because we've got plenty of people
Speaker 1: in every country, there are plenty of people from other
Speaker 1: parts of the world who might want to watch a
Speaker 1: sporting event with the people providing commentary speaking in their
Speaker 1: native language. I think that would be a really neat
Speaker 1: thing to do, and it's uh uh, you know, it's
Speaker 1: within the realm of possibility. So I'm hoping that we
Speaker 1: see that trend become an official trend, something that is
Speaker 1: sanctioned and isn't just you know, left up to people
Speaker 1: who are clever who have discovered a feed that doesn't
Speaker 1: have anything attached to it and then they broadcasted on
Speaker 1: Twitter or Facebook or whatever. Um. Speaking of Facebook, big
Speaker 1: year for Facebook. Yes, they bought a little company called
Speaker 1: Instagram for one billion dollars. Yes they did. And they
Speaker 1: also had a little I p O. Yes, initial an
Speaker 1: initial public offering of stock. They got to the point
Speaker 1: in size they actually reached a billion customers worldwide and
Speaker 1: still growing. Um of where some of those are the
Speaker 1: same people, but I won't tell Facebook if you don't. Um. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they they got to the point where they had enough
Speaker 1: cloud where they were really kind of had their backs
Speaker 1: to the wall and were forced to release a stock
Speaker 1: offering and become a public company. Yeah. They wait, once
Speaker 1: your company reaches a certain size and has a certain
Speaker 1: number of stakeholders. Uh. In the United States, you are
Speaker 1: required to have a public offering. You can't you can't
Speaker 1: main tained that indefinitely once you reach a certain size
Speaker 1: and you have a certain number of stakeholders. And Facebook
Speaker 1: was pretty much at that point. So there wasn't a
Speaker 1: whole lot of choice in whether or not it would
Speaker 1: hold an ip O. It just came down to win yes, yes.
Speaker 1: And so before this happened, before they went public, there
Speaker 1: was a lot of hype as there would be around
Speaker 1: a company as pivotal as as Facebook. Um. Of course
Speaker 1: there was the famous dot com bubble and the late
Speaker 1: es UM and UH, people sort of discussed this, Hey,
Speaker 1: this is a big deal. You know, tech companies haven't
Speaker 1: had this kind of flashy public offering on the scale
Speaker 1: of of a company like Facebook in years really um
Speaker 1: and you know, there there have been some exceptions to
Speaker 1: to the public offerings, but this was a big thing
Speaker 1: um before. However, then they actually went public and the
Speaker 1: stock sort of took off fish and then didn't and
Speaker 1: then started to drop it having trouble as right now,
Speaker 1: there's a bit of controversy in that or controversy for
Speaker 1: my friends in England I was going to say, you're
Speaker 1: an anglophile. Um, But anyway, there was some contriversy. Controversy
Speaker 1: in the in the sense that uh that Facebook had
Speaker 1: you know, it's it's essentially it had a call that
Speaker 1: talked about its financials and then updated debt. I came
Speaker 1: out that Facebook found out it wasn't going to hit
Speaker 1: the numbers that it had projected, which would in turn
Speaker 1: affect the value of the company. That information made its
Speaker 1: way out to a certain group of essentially investment groups.
Speaker 1: Is really banks, really is what it got to financial institutions.
Speaker 1: The information got to them. Facebook apparently, uh communicated information
Speaker 1: to a select number of financial institutions, which then could
Speaker 1: make the decision to you know, sell off all that
Speaker 1: stock at a higher value than what the company was
Speaker 1: actually worth based upon this new updated information. However, that
Speaker 1: same info, that key critical info about the value of Facebook,
Speaker 1: did not get communicated to a broader audience of investors,
Speaker 1: which meant that there were people who were buying up
Speaker 1: Facebook stock assuming that the stock price reflected the actual
Speaker 1: value of the company. And once that information started to
Speaker 1: become public, then there was this big uproar about it
Speaker 1: being an unethical business. Practice. Now, I should state this
Speaker 1: is not illegal what Facebook did as far as I
Speaker 1: can tell, there's nothing illegal about it, but it is
Speaker 1: some people would call it unethical. Yeah. Basically, UM, I
Speaker 1: think this sort of hedges on on what is known
Speaker 1: as insider trading UM, where somebody who is on on
Speaker 1: the inside, if you will, knows something about a company
Speaker 1: before the company announces it to the public, and they
Speaker 1: make stock trades based on that. And UM, basically this
Speaker 1: this is you know, this makes people think that there
Speaker 1: is something like that going on. UM, and that is
Speaker 1: what is in legal terms known as a no no. Yeah.
Speaker 1: I have to consult a lawyer, but I think that
Speaker 1: a no no is pretty much Yeah, I'm pretty sure. Uh.
Speaker 1: And Facebook was not, of course, the only coming to
Speaker 1: have some pretty big changes happen, uh you know with
Speaker 1: without going public. That was a big change for Facebook,
Speaker 1: and H well, it'll be interesting to see how that
Speaker 1: plays out, whether or not the company can kind of
Speaker 1: get out of the doldrums. There have been some some
Speaker 1: statements that perhaps the web advertising market is going to
Speaker 1: um continue to to decline in importance and therefore the
Speaker 1: chief revenue stream for Facebook is going to kind of
Speaker 1: uh not not go away and not even not make money,
Speaker 1: but it just won't make as much money as quickly
Speaker 1: as traditionally had been the case. And therefore that will
Speaker 1: affect the value of Facebook. And that's why the stock
Speaker 1: price may not change much. Unless Facebook finds a new
Speaker 1: way of generating revenue UH or if the web advertising
Speaker 1: market turns around somehow, that could dramatically impact Facebook's value
Speaker 1: as well. So the stock price is not it's not
Speaker 1: a guarantee that's going to stay where it's at, but
Speaker 1: it is, you know, an ongoing story. As far as
Speaker 1: other companies go, we saw some pretty big changes of
Speaker 1: I mean, Yahoo had a year of changes. In January,
Speaker 1: Scott Thompson became the interim CEO. UH. He announced that
Speaker 1: they were going to be massive layoffs. UM. He made
Speaker 1: some decisions that were pretty dramatic. And then there was
Speaker 1: another controversy. UH. There's another controversy with Thompson's background. It
Speaker 1: came out that his executive bio had some information in
Speaker 1: it that was what we would call not entirely accurate
Speaker 1: or made up. UM. But he he had on his
Speaker 1: bios some information about UH degrees that he did not
Speaker 1: actually hold, like computer science. Yeah, and so this ended
Speaker 1: up prompting some shareholders in Yahoo to call for Thompson's resignation,
Speaker 1: saying that you know it was he's misrepresenting himself, it's
Speaker 1: a bad fit for the company, it's bad pr for
Speaker 1: the company. He needs to get out. And he did resign,
Speaker 1: and uh Yeahoo brought on Marissa Meyer, formerly of Google,
Speaker 1: one of the earliest female employees at Google, the first
Speaker 1: engineer at female engineer at Google, uh to come in
Speaker 1: and become the new CEO. And that was a huge story.
Speaker 1: People who were very pessimistic about Yahoo's chances in two
Speaker 1: thousand twelve began to hedge their bets a bit. And
Speaker 1: I'm not saying that people were saying, oh, well, now
Speaker 1: Yahoo is definitely saved, but there was more optimism around
Speaker 1: the company than I had seen in the last few years. Also,
Speaker 1: she actually has a degree in computer science. Also, this
Speaker 1: story will come into play in our next episode when
Speaker 1: we talk about the results of our predictions for two
Speaker 1: thousand twelve, because she ruined our predictions for Yahoo. So
Speaker 1: we shake our fist at Meyer. All right, Okay, So
Speaker 1: it turns out that Chris and I talked way more
Speaker 1: about two thousand twelve than we expected, so we are
Speaker 1: actually split think this epic long episode into two manageable episodes.
Speaker 1: You're welcome. So this concludes part one. Chris, I think
Speaker 1: you'll agree that this was the prudent choice. Yep, Okay,
Speaker 1: thank you. That was just to prude that Chris is
Speaker 1: in fact in the studio. I'm not doing this by myself.
Speaker 1: So we're going to wrap this up. If you guys
Speaker 1: have any suggestions for future episodes of tech Stuff, please
Speaker 1: write us. Our email address is tech stuff at Discovery
Speaker 1: dot com, or let's know on Facebook or Twitter are
Speaker 1: handled There is tech stuff hs W and Chris and
Speaker 1: I will talk to you again really soon for more
Speaker 1: on this and thousands of other topics. Is it how
Speaker 1: stuff works dot com