Speaker 1: Welcome to tex Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host,
Speaker 1: Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: And how the tech are Yet, it's time for the
Speaker 1: tech news for Tuesday, April twenty six, two thousand, twenty two.
Speaker 1: And after all the Twitter polls, the poison pills, and
Speaker 1: the posturing, that's a lot of alliteration, Elon Musk and
Speaker 1: Twitter's board of directors have come to an agreement for
Speaker 1: Musk to purchase Twitter. Now that deal isn't done yet.
Speaker 1: Shareholders have to agree on the acquisition and it also
Speaker 1: has to pass regulatory approval. But that being said, I
Speaker 1: think the general consensus is that there aren't gonna be
Speaker 1: any serious roadblocks in the way of this deal and
Speaker 1: it will in fact go through. It's a heck of
Speaker 1: a story. I anticipate this is going to be one
Speaker 1: of the really big stories when folks do retrospectives on
Speaker 1: you know, the most important tech news of two. Elon
Speaker 1: Musk has had a let's say controversial time on Twitter,
Speaker 1: using a platform to post stuff that got him into
Speaker 1: serious hot water with the SEC something that he protests
Speaker 1: and says was unmerited um. Musk has also had a
Speaker 1: bit of a dodgy past when it comes to following regulations,
Speaker 1: and he's been known to use Twitter to promote certain cryptocurrencies,
Speaker 1: which nearly always has had a massive effect and frequently
Speaker 1: a short term effect on that cryptocurrency's value, which has
Speaker 1: led some to accuse Musk of using his position to
Speaker 1: try and pump and then dump crypto in an effort
Speaker 1: to make a tidy profit at the expense of marks. Now,
Speaker 1: Musk has said he plans on overseeing some really big
Speaker 1: changes at Twitter, including authenticating every human on the platform
Speaker 1: and eliminating bots. He has also repeatedly called for Twitter
Speaker 1: to be a better steward of free speech, which has
Speaker 1: led some to think that Musk might reverse some big
Speaker 1: decisions like the lifelong ban on former President Donald Trump,
Speaker 1: and this has a lot of people concerned that Twitter's
Speaker 1: trend toward track cracking down on a misinformation and disinformation
Speaker 1: campaigns could be reversed. Free speech is a pretty tricky
Speaker 1: thing too, because you know, even the United States has
Speaker 1: limits on free speech. It's not absolute. For example, the
Speaker 1: United States Supreme Court has determined on numerous occasions that
Speaker 1: free speech does have boundaries, like libel and slander are
Speaker 1: two of those, so libel and slander don't count as
Speaker 1: free speech, and so there's concerned that Musk's interpretation of
Speaker 1: free speech might allow for rampant abuse on the platform.
Speaker 1: Musk has said that there will still be content moderation
Speaker 1: and that extreme tweets like those calling for physical violence
Speaker 1: against people, will not be allowed, so it sounds like
Speaker 1: there will be limitations there. He's also indicated that he
Speaker 1: intends Twitter to work within the laws of various countries,
Speaker 1: that he's not He's not advocating that Twitter flaunt uh
Speaker 1: laws around the world, and that could also mean that,
Speaker 1: you know, we're talking about free speech with limitations on
Speaker 1: Twitter as well as elsewhere. So a lot of people
Speaker 1: are kind of confused about this about where it's going
Speaker 1: to go. Honestly, it's far too early to say because
Speaker 1: we're not there yet. But a lot of people have
Speaker 1: said they are leaving the platform. Much fewer are actually leaving,
Speaker 1: So a lot of people are saying that's it, I'm moving,
Speaker 1: and then they stay where they are, which you know
Speaker 1: that happens every time we see a massive change in leadership,
Speaker 1: whether we're talking about a social platform or a country. Uh.
Speaker 1: Jack Dorsey, one of the co founders and the formers,
Speaker 1: the EO of Twitter, says that Musk is the quote
Speaker 1: singular solution I trust end quote. So there's definitely debate
Speaker 1: on whether or not Musk taking over Twitter is a
Speaker 1: good or bad thing. Now. I anticipate that I will
Speaker 1: maintain my tech stuff hsw Twitter feed for this show,
Speaker 1: but I have already sunset it, although not deactivated my
Speaker 1: personal account. By sunset, I just mean I logged out. Uh.
Speaker 1: And the reason I'm not deleting that account isn't because
Speaker 1: I'm worried I'm gonna miss it. Instead, it's that I
Speaker 1: don't want to surrender my Twitter handle and have someone
Speaker 1: else take it over and then potentially post a lot
Speaker 1: of nasty stuff that could, you know, for for a
Speaker 1: casual follower, make them think that it was me. I
Speaker 1: don't want that to ever happen. Uh. Now, for the record,
Speaker 1: I don't think I'm really important enough for anyone to
Speaker 1: actually care about doing that, but I feel as a
Speaker 1: verified user it's probably for the best that I don't
Speaker 1: open up that possibility anyway. I also want to say
Speaker 1: to all of you that staying or leaving Twitter is
Speaker 1: a personal choice. If you love Twitter and you don't
Speaker 1: want to go and it's useful to you, those are
Speaker 1: all legitimate reasons, and I feel you should feel fine
Speaker 1: about staying on Twitter. That you know, I'm not my
Speaker 1: own choice doesn't reflect my opinion of how other people operate.
Speaker 1: But if you do feel uneasy and you want a skedaddle,
Speaker 1: that's fine too. Even if it's just temporary, that's fine.
Speaker 1: Don't let anyone dictate to you what you should or
Speaker 1: should not do. For me, this is something I feel
Speaker 1: I needed to do, both for myself as it can
Speaker 1: have an impact on my mental well being, and also
Speaker 1: because I genuinely feel that I won't be doing much
Speaker 1: good on Twitter. Arguably I haven't done much good up
Speaker 1: to this point, and I'm sure we'll have plenty more
Speaker 1: stories about this as time goes on. And that's enough
Speaker 1: for now, I think. But the Twitter conversation is absolutely
Speaker 1: dominating the tech news space right now. It's lucky that
Speaker 1: I was able to find a few other stories that
Speaker 1: we can touch on to. One is that Netflix employee
Speaker 1: morale is taking a serious hit. Now. This should come
Speaker 1: as no real surprise last week, Netflix began a serious
Speaker 1: slide in the stock market after reporting that the company
Speaker 1: had a net loss of two hundred thousand subscribers around
Speaker 1: the world in the first quarter of two thousand twenty two.
Speaker 1: For many at Netflix, this slide has had a massive
Speaker 1: personal impact, particularly people who are like in the executive level,
Speaker 1: folks who own shares and Netflix. Because Netflix, like a
Speaker 1: lot of tech companies, has rewarded employees with compensation in
Speaker 1: the form of shares. Well, folks who have shares are
Speaker 1: seeing their wealth decline every time the stock price takes
Speaker 1: another hit, so it's like you're losing money working for
Speaker 1: the company. The general caution that a lot of people
Speaker 1: feel about Netflix after its first decline since it launched.
Speaker 1: I mean, remember the earnings call we heard where we
Speaker 1: found out about the two decline that was the first
Speaker 1: decline in the history of Netflix. But apparently the same
Speaker 1: concern that we're seeing outside Netflix is prevalent within the
Speaker 1: ranks of Netflix itself. A lot of people are reportedly
Speaker 1: considering leaving the company before things get worse, particularly again
Speaker 1: at the executive and management levels. This is according to
Speaker 1: Bloomberg by the Way, which published an article about the
Speaker 1: whole ordeal. I still personally find this story a bit perplexing.
Speaker 1: It's hard for me to reconcile that a company that
Speaker 1: has been as monumentally successful as Netflix could be so
Speaker 1: fragile that it's first really bad quarter sends the message
Speaker 1: that the empire is on shaky ground. And here's the
Speaker 1: thing that really wrinkles my brain. As Troy would say,
Speaker 1: if enough people buy in to that perspective that Netflix
Speaker 1: is in really serious trouble, it can become a self
Speaker 1: fulfilling prophecy. Now, all that being said, it is clear
Speaker 1: that there are huge challenges for Netflix and for other
Speaker 1: streaming platforms. There's a limit to the audience out there.
Speaker 1: Right Even if you are able to sign up everyone
Speaker 1: who is interested, you eventually do stop getting new subscribers
Speaker 1: because there's no one to to sign up. And that's
Speaker 1: before you start taking into consideration the incredible competition in
Speaker 1: the space, because there's so many different streaming platforms out
Speaker 1: there now, and you know, obviously we're gonna probably see
Speaker 1: more before we start to see things shake out. In
Speaker 1: the long run, I don't think all of those streaming
Speaker 1: services are going to survive. Some of them will end
Speaker 1: up getting folded into others. Uh, or they might end
Speaker 1: up changing hands. We'll see. But I always assume Netflix
Speaker 1: would be one of the bedrock streaming services that would
Speaker 1: be around, and and it really established itself so in
Speaker 1: such a dominant position so early. Uh. But also it's
Speaker 1: too early to suggest that the company is really at
Speaker 1: the beginning of the end. This could be a blip
Speaker 1: in Netflix's history, a serious one, but one that the
Speaker 1: company fully recovers from. We just have to wait and see.
Speaker 1: The Verge reports that Apple has retained the services of
Speaker 1: a law firm called Littler Mendelssohn, widely known as a
Speaker 1: union busting law firm. This is the same firm that
Speaker 1: Starbucks hired in that company's efforts to counteract various union
Speaker 1: pushes throughout its stores, and this comes on the heels
Speaker 1: of an Atlanta Apple stores recent successful push to secure
Speaker 1: enough employee signatures to warrant a union election. The flagship
Speaker 1: Apple store in New York City is also in the
Speaker 1: process of gathering signatures in order to have the same
Speaker 1: kind of vote. And I am left to wonder if
Speaker 1: the hiring of law firms like this one ultimately ends
Speaker 1: up fueling the resolve of employees rather than discourages them.
Speaker 1: It's hard for me to say from the outside. I
Speaker 1: don't have an inside perspective of these things. It may
Speaker 1: well be that the efforts to organize our succeeding despite
Speaker 1: heavy opposition, rather than becoming energized by companies efforts to
Speaker 1: squash them. I honestly can't tell. But again, it's another
Speaker 1: indication that employees in the tech sector are really pushing
Speaker 1: back against the established status quo. We've got several more
Speaker 1: stories to go over before we get to those. Let's
Speaker 1: take a quick break. We're back and over in Japan.
Speaker 1: Apple is facing another battle, as is Google. Government report
Speaker 1: in Japan named Apple and Google as essentially a duopoly
Speaker 1: when it comes to the smartphone operating system market, and
Speaker 1: that's totally true. Google is way in the lead worldwide.
Speaker 1: Google has about a seventy percent of the smartphone operating
Speaker 1: system market share according to stat Counter. Apple is at
Speaker 1: a healthy twenty seven point five seven, which means that
Speaker 1: together Apple and and Google or you know, iOS and Android,
Speaker 1: make up about percent of the smartphone operating system market.
Speaker 1: Kind Of hard to argue against the duopoly when you
Speaker 1: have a figure like that. The government report expressed concern
Speaker 1: that this arrangement, this du woppoly creates an unfair marketplace
Speaker 1: for app developers and consumers alike, pointing out that it
Speaker 1: is common practice for Android phones to come pre installed
Speaker 1: with say the Chrome browser, or for Apple to favor Safari,
Speaker 1: and the report argues that this stifles competition from other
Speaker 1: browsers and and that it is actively discouraging users from
Speaker 1: installing other browsers besides the ones that come pre installed
Speaker 1: on the operating system. Further, the report argues that developers
Speaker 1: are forced into ecosystems in order to have their work
Speaker 1: accessible by people who use these smartphones, and that Apple
Speaker 1: and Google should allow developers and users to choose alternative
Speaker 1: app stores from the official ones on the platform. So,
Speaker 1: in other words, you should be able to go to
Speaker 1: other stores besides the Apple App Store and download apps
Speaker 1: for your iPhone. Now, this is pretty much the opposite
Speaker 1: of Apple's market strategy, and unsurprisingly, the company has protested
Speaker 1: the report, arguing that Apple faces fierce competition in every arena.
Speaker 1: And it remains to be seen what this report will
Speaker 1: actually lead to in Japan, but it marks another spot
Speaker 1: in the world where the big companies like Apple and
Speaker 1: Google are starting to face resistance from regulators, like serious resistance.
Speaker 1: And we've got another story about the shaky world of
Speaker 1: n f t s. All right, So quick reminder, and
Speaker 1: n f T is a non fungible token, which really
Speaker 1: means it's a digital seartificate showing ownership of some sort
Speaker 1: of digital asset, and it is tracked on a blockchain
Speaker 1: of some sort so that there is a clear uh
Speaker 1: chain of transactions so you can trace who owned it
Speaker 1: at what point and who currently owns that digital asset.
Speaker 1: As far as what that asset is, it could be
Speaker 1: a line of code, it could be a piece of
Speaker 1: digital art, it could be an item within a video game,
Speaker 1: or pretty much anything else that's digital. And n f
Speaker 1: t s have been put through the wringer after a
Speaker 1: chaotic hype cycle that had its fair share of speculation, scams,
Speaker 1: and other shenanigans, and The Verge reports that a hacker
Speaker 1: has managed to steal n f t s, estimated to
Speaker 1: be worth millions of dollars, using one really tricky method
Speaker 1: and one super easy method. Now, the tricky part was
Speaker 1: that the hacker was able to gain access to the
Speaker 1: official Instagram account for the board Ape Yacht Club or
Speaker 1: b A y C. That's one of the entities that
Speaker 1: is famed for minting n f T s of digital art,
Speaker 1: and folks have been speculating ridiculous amounts of money on
Speaker 1: these pieces of art like this is the kind of
Speaker 1: stuff that got people a bit wary of n f
Speaker 1: T s in the first place, when they look at
Speaker 1: the art and they say, wait, how much money are
Speaker 1: people spending for a digital certificate showing ownership of this thing?
Speaker 1: And uh, we actually don't know how the hacker managed
Speaker 1: to get access of that Instagram account. As of the
Speaker 1: recording of this podcast, the b A y C says
Speaker 1: that it had activated two factor authentication on its Instagram account,
Speaker 1: so it should have been impossible for anyone not in
Speaker 1: possession of whatever that second factor was to be able
Speaker 1: to get access to the account. Maybe it was an
Speaker 1: inside job, but the hacker then used the official account
Speaker 1: to send out a fishing link that, if followed, would
Speaker 1: prompt n f T holders to interact with that link,
Speaker 1: and the link would lead the hacker to joint crypto
Speaker 1: tokens right out of those users wallets. So, in other words,
Speaker 1: folks got a link from what they assumed to be
Speaker 1: a trusted source. They got it from the official b
Speaker 1: A y C Instagram account, which should be trustworthy, and
Speaker 1: they ended up getting robbed because of that. Now, the
Speaker 1: hacker convinced folks to follow follow the fishing link by
Speaker 1: leaning on one of the most reliable techniques in the
Speaker 1: history of humans, which is counting on greed. So the
Speaker 1: link proclaimed to be an air drop of tokens, and
Speaker 1: if folks joined and they connected their wallets to the link,
Speaker 1: they were supposedly going to be showered with what amounts
Speaker 1: to be free money, really free digital assets which could
Speaker 1: later be sold or auctioned off for money, and folks
Speaker 1: love the idea of free money, so there were a
Speaker 1: lot of takers. Open C famous crypto exchange, has subsequently
Speaker 1: banned the hackers wallet address on that platform, but it
Speaker 1: is still visible on other platforms. No word yet on
Speaker 1: how or if those who are affected by this theft
Speaker 1: will be compensated. The Register reports that the Department of
Speaker 1: Homeland Security, after initiating a hack DHS program in which
Speaker 1: the department invited hackers to look for vulnerabilities and exploits
Speaker 1: in the homeland securities systems, discovered that its systems are
Speaker 1: far from secure. The four fifty security researchers who took
Speaker 1: part in this event uncovered one hundred twenty two vulnerabilities,
Speaker 1: seven of which they deemed to be critical. That's pretty
Speaker 1: darned bad, but it really illustrates how these events are
Speaker 1: critical for organizations, government or otherwise offering bug bounties. That
Speaker 1: is a payment to people who uncover and subsequently report
Speaker 1: vulnerabilities and systems. That gives organizations a chance to patch
Speaker 1: those holes and prevent actual black hat hackers from exploiting
Speaker 1: those vulnerabilities. I find it, frankly a little scary that
Speaker 1: a department that has, let's face it, a checkered past,
Speaker 1: had so many critical vulnerabilities and its various systems, But
Speaker 1: I am glad that the department is taking steps to
Speaker 1: address that in a responsible way. Penetration testing is a
Speaker 1: pretty big deal, and I might need to get my
Speaker 1: friend Shannon Morris back on the show to talk about
Speaker 1: how that process typically works. She's an expert in that
Speaker 1: field and I am not. The White House has urged
Speaker 1: Congress to pass legislation that would allow more law enforcement
Speaker 1: agencies in the United States access to drone tracking systems Now,
Speaker 1: to be clear, this isn't about those agencies operating drones
Speaker 1: in an effort to track citizens or identify suspects. Instead,
Speaker 1: this is about giving those agencies the ability to detect
Speaker 1: and track the drones themselves, presumably in an effort to
Speaker 1: counteract crime and terrorism efforts that rely on drone technology. Now,
Speaker 1: this is not yet a law. It's just a suggestion
Speaker 1: to Congress, and it marks the continuation of the U.
Speaker 1: S government's increased concern about drones and drone operation. One
Speaker 1: story that I missed in one was the f a
Speaker 1: a S new drone rules that require any new drones
Speaker 1: sold in the United States to broadcast the drone operators
Speaker 1: physical location. And that kind of makes sense in some scenarios,
Speaker 1: like say there's a person who's operating a drone that's
Speaker 1: in a restricted area which could pose as a threat.
Speaker 1: Even if the person didn't intend to do that, it
Speaker 1: could be critically important to track that person down and
Speaker 1: be able to stop that person or to you know,
Speaker 1: tell that person what's going on so that they can
Speaker 1: move the drown out of the restricted area, because drones
Speaker 1: could pose a threat to things like aircraft, for example. However,
Speaker 1: this capability The idea of being able to track an
Speaker 1: operator's physical location also has some troubling consequences. For instance,
Speaker 1: during the Black Lives Matter protests in some folks were
Speaker 1: using drones to keep an eye on police activity, and
Speaker 1: it doesn't take much of a stretch of the imagination
Speaker 1: to assume that a law enforcement agency that was under
Speaker 1: citizens surveillance might use the drones broadcasting of the operator's
Speaker 1: physical location to track down and stop that operator. So
Speaker 1: it really does go both ways here, and it also
Speaker 1: raises the point that drone tracking technology now is effectively
Speaker 1: operator tracking technology, right if you're talking about a drone
Speaker 1: that was purchased legally in the United States after this
Speaker 1: f a A rule came into effect, then you could say, well, yeah,
Speaker 1: it's important to track the drones, but we also have
Speaker 1: to remember that this could be abused so that police
Speaker 1: could track the operators. It's not even necessarily about the
Speaker 1: technology in that respect. It's more again a kind of
Speaker 1: citizen surveillance. So there are definitely some you know, dark
Speaker 1: consequences to this as well. A UK watchdog called the
Speaker 1: Competition and Markets Authority may soon have some new powers
Speaker 1: when it comes to holding companies accountable for fake reviews
Speaker 1: posted on sites websites, So we're talking about user generated
Speaker 1: reviews for the most part, and the practice of certain
Speaker 1: entities like shady product companies or sometimes the PR firms
Speaker 1: hired to promote those products of either posting directly or
Speaker 1: hiring people to post positive fake reviews in an effort
Speaker 1: to market their goods. UH. The proposals in the UK
Speaker 1: suggest making it quote clearly illegal end quote to hire
Speaker 1: someone to write or host fake reviews, and if found guilty,
Speaker 1: the c m A could find the responsible party, presumably
Speaker 1: either the site that's hosting the reviews or the people
Speaker 1: who are hiring people to post fake reviews up to
Speaker 1: ten percent of their global turnover. This will create a
Speaker 1: new responsibility for sites that host reviews, namely that they
Speaker 1: need to have practices in place to be reasonably certain
Speaker 1: that the reviews posted on the site are legitimate. So presumably,
Speaker 1: if a website shows that it has taken reasonable action
Speaker 1: to guard against fake reviews, the c m A won't
Speaker 1: levy finds on that site should some fake reviews slip through. UM,
Speaker 1: I'm guessing that there's going to be uh a grace
Speaker 1: period where if a site is alerted to a fake review,
Speaker 1: it has the opportunity to remove it before um any
Speaker 1: kind of consideration would fall on it. In addition, the
Speaker 1: UK government is looking to make it easier for consumers
Speaker 1: to cancel subscriptions should they not want a service any longer.
Speaker 1: I mentioned this in an earlier tech stuff News episode.
Speaker 1: I'm sure all of you had some sort of experience
Speaker 1: where you were put through a wild goose chase in
Speaker 1: an effort to cancel a subscription. Now, personally, I think
Speaker 1: these are good steps, assuming that the enforcement is reasonable
Speaker 1: and fair, which admittedly is much easier said than done.
Speaker 1: We have a couple more news stories to get through
Speaker 1: before we get to those, Let's take another quick break.
Speaker 1: Several years ago, I wrote an article for how stuff
Speaker 1: works dot com about how the large had drawn Collider works,
Speaker 1: And at the time of me writing that article, the
Speaker 1: LHC had not yet graduated to full power experiments. Didn't
Speaker 1: stop people from speculating on what the LHC would find
Speaker 1: or potential calamity it might cause once it goes into power.
Speaker 1: But yeah, I wrote the article on that, and then
Speaker 1: it got up to doing full power experiments. But then
Speaker 1: over the last three years, the LHC has been pretty quiet.
Speaker 1: Scientists did initiate some pilot particle beams around the facility
Speaker 1: in October twenty twenty one, but otherwise it's been offline. Now.
Speaker 1: The purpose for that multi year hiatus was well, there's
Speaker 1: it was manifold. There were quite a few One big
Speaker 1: one was that there was a massive upgrade to the LHC,
Speaker 1: and there were also repairs and maintenance to the facility.
Speaker 1: And now it's back baby. Last week the LHC sent
Speaker 1: out opposing beams of protons at an injection energy of
Speaker 1: four fifty billion electron volts. All right, now, let's do
Speaker 1: a quick rundown in case none of this is making
Speaker 1: any sense to you. The Large Hadron Collider is a
Speaker 1: particle accelerator, so it uses extremely powerful electromagnets to both
Speaker 1: propel and direct opposing beams of particles such as protons,
Speaker 1: but it could be other stuff too, so that these
Speaker 1: particles collide at specific points along the pathway. Now located
Speaker 1: at these specific points are a selection of different experiments.
Speaker 1: These experiments focus on different elements of particle science, so
Speaker 1: the collisions create scenarios that are otherwise impossible for us
Speaker 1: to replicate. On Earth, including the formation of teeny tiny
Speaker 1: black holes that last for a fraction of a fraction
Speaker 1: of a second. That black hole thing is one of
Speaker 1: the things that trips some people out, But it's really
Speaker 1: important to note that the energy of these black holes
Speaker 1: is such that they cannot last. It is less than
Speaker 1: a gnat's beating of its wings once like it's it's tiny, tiny,
Speaker 1: tiny amounts of energy, and they're gone before you can
Speaker 1: even be aware that they were there without the use
Speaker 1: of incredibly sensitive equipment, so they blip out of existence
Speaker 1: almost as quickly as they appear. Anyway, the science done
Speaker 1: at the LHC is expanding our understanding of how the
Speaker 1: universe works. You know, how energy and how matter work,
Speaker 1: and it's gone a long way to proving or disproving
Speaker 1: various hypotheses in physics. And just because the facility wasn't
Speaker 1: actively blasting particles around for three years and some change
Speaker 1: doesn't mean that a lot of important science wasn't going on.
Speaker 1: Quite the opposite, in fact, see one of the really
Speaker 1: big challenges of these experiments is that the collisions generate
Speaker 1: a truly tremendous amount of data, and it's a full
Speaker 1: time gig just combing through all the information and making
Speaker 1: sense of it. So, while the facility was effectively offline
Speaker 1: as far as generating new experiments, there were countless scientists
Speaker 1: examining the information that we're create was created through the
Speaker 1: previous years of collisions. Now, in what is being called
Speaker 1: Run three of the LHC, we're gonna see two new experiments,
Speaker 1: one called S and D at LHC and another called Phaser.
Speaker 1: These are going to look into everything from physics that
Speaker 1: go beyond the standard model of physics to the production
Speaker 1: of anti matter. Maybe it will help us understand why
Speaker 1: our universe had a tiny bit more matter than it
Speaker 1: had antimatter. That's that's why we've got stuff. If there
Speaker 1: had been equal amounts, then they would have annihilated each
Speaker 1: other completely and the universe would be empty. But it's
Speaker 1: not why. Maybe this experiment will help us learn anyway.
Speaker 1: I love learning about the LHC, though admittedly the stuff
Speaker 1: is way over my head. China has announced that it
Speaker 1: is going to launch a space mission sometime in the
Speaker 1: next four years in order to send a spacecraft that
Speaker 1: will collide with an asteroid on purpose to test a
Speaker 1: potential asteroid deflection system. This is similar to a NASA
Speaker 1: mission that was launched in November of last year. That
Speaker 1: mission has sent to spacecraft to collide with Dimorphos, a
Speaker 1: small asteroid that orbits a larger one called Didimus. Dimorphos
Speaker 1: isn't on a collision course with Earth, so the NASA
Speaker 1: mission is really just more of a proof of concept
Speaker 1: to see if we can actually affect an asteroid's flight
Speaker 1: path by hitting it kind of like a billiard ball,
Speaker 1: which will happen later this year in September, I believe,
Speaker 1: is when it's scheduled to have that collision. Now. NASA's
Speaker 1: project is called the Double Asteroid Redirection Test or DART,
Speaker 1: and China's test sounds like it's going to be pretty similar,
Speaker 1: though the country has not yet chosen which asteroid it
Speaker 1: will target for its own test, and asteroids certainly pose
Speaker 1: a potential threat. The Earth has been hit before and
Speaker 1: totally transformed by asteroids in the past, so this is
Speaker 1: another step towards the identification, tracking, and deflection of space
Speaker 1: objects that could otherwise pose catastrophic danger to life on Earth.
Speaker 1: It's uh, it's something we definitely need, and it's it's
Speaker 1: kind of cool to think we're getting there. I never
Speaker 1: thought we were gonna, you know, try and deflect asteroids
Speaker 1: by whacking them, you know, sort of the percussive maintenance
Speaker 1: approach to asteroid deflection. There were a lot of people
Speaker 1: discussing things like using a spacecraft to create become kind
Speaker 1: of like a tug boat and using the gravitational attraction
Speaker 1: between the asteroid and spacecraft itself to deflect the path.
Speaker 1: But obviously for that to work, you have to go much, much,
Speaker 1: much further out in order to affect an asteroid's path
Speaker 1: before it gets too close to the Earth. Deflection might
Speaker 1: be more effective with the percussive method for asteroids that
Speaker 1: are a little closer in. We'll have to see. And finally,
Speaker 1: for those of you who are eagerly anticipating the animated
Speaker 1: Super Mario Brothers movie this holiday season, I have some
Speaker 1: bad news. The movie has been delayed until April seven
Speaker 1: in North America and April in Japan. This is the
Speaker 1: film that controversially cast Chris Pratt as the voice of Mario. Anyway,
Speaker 1: Nintendo didn't give any details about why there is going
Speaker 1: to be this delay, but there could be a lot
Speaker 1: of different reasons, including production delays due to COVID, but
Speaker 1: we do know we will not be getting the Mario
Speaker 1: film until next year. But no worries. You can still
Speaker 1: hunt down and watch the classic nine three live action
Speaker 1: movie starring Bob Hoskins as Mario, John Legozamo as Luigi,
Speaker 1: and Dennis Hopper as Bowser. I've only ever seen that
Speaker 1: once and it was like a fever dream. But I've
Speaker 1: heard more and more folks recently, mostly in the millennial generation,
Speaker 1: talk about it being entertaining. Not good, mind you, but entertaining.
Speaker 1: Dear mileage may vary. And that's it for this episode
Speaker 1: of tech stuff News. If you have suggestions for topics
Speaker 1: I should cover on tech Stuff, feel free to keep
Speaker 1: reaching out to me on Twitter with the handled text
Speaker 1: stuff h SW That Twitter handle is not going anywhere.
Speaker 1: I will continue to maintain it and check it, so
Speaker 1: reach out there and I'll talk to you again really soon. YEA.
Speaker 1: Tech Stuff is an I Heart Radio production. For more
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