1
00:00:04,400 --> 00:00:07,800
Speaker 1: Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio.

2
00:00:12,160 --> 00:00:14,760
Speaker 1: Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host

3
00:00:14,840 --> 00:00:17,239
Speaker 1: job in Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart

4
00:00:17,320 --> 00:00:20,760
Speaker 1: Radio and love all Things tech. And I had a

5
00:00:20,800 --> 00:00:24,159
Speaker 1: listener send me a message via Twitter to handle for

6
00:00:24,200 --> 00:00:26,640
Speaker 1: the show. Is tech Stuff h s W in case

7
00:00:26,640 --> 00:00:29,080
Speaker 1: you ever want to do this? And they asked if

8
00:00:29,120 --> 00:00:33,760
Speaker 1: I thought perhaps tech TV, a once keybole channel that

9
00:00:33,920 --> 00:00:36,320
Speaker 1: is no more, if it could have survived in the

10
00:00:36,640 --> 00:00:39,520
Speaker 1: realm of streaming, And I thought this was a great

11
00:00:39,560 --> 00:00:43,520
Speaker 1: opportunity for me to bring on Tom Merritt onto the show.

12
00:00:44,080 --> 00:00:49,879
Speaker 1: Tom is um He's a podcaster extraordinaire. He's been a

13
00:00:49,960 --> 00:00:53,640
Speaker 1: voice in tech for a couple of decades. I first

14
00:00:53,680 --> 00:00:56,080
Speaker 1: became aware of his work when I started listening to

15
00:00:56,160 --> 00:00:59,880
Speaker 1: the Buzz out Loud podcast from c Net. This was

16
00:01:00,040 --> 00:01:03,080
Speaker 1: before I was ever a podcasters, before I even worked

17
00:01:03,080 --> 00:01:06,880
Speaker 1: at how Stuff Works dot com. So uh, that's when

18
00:01:06,880 --> 00:01:10,000
Speaker 1: I first became a fan of of his work. And

19
00:01:10,240 --> 00:01:12,520
Speaker 1: it was a pleasure having him on to talk about

20
00:01:12,560 --> 00:01:16,000
Speaker 1: tech TV and his insight. So let's listen to that

21
00:01:16,080 --> 00:01:22,440
Speaker 1: conversation right now. I am pleased to welcome longtime friend

22
00:01:22,720 --> 00:01:26,800
Speaker 1: of the show that's putting it lightly. Tom Merritt, whose

23
00:01:26,840 --> 00:01:29,600
Speaker 1: work was actually a lot of the work that that

24
00:01:29,680 --> 00:01:33,760
Speaker 1: inspired me before I got into podcasting. Uh so, Uh,

25
00:01:34,040 --> 00:01:36,120
Speaker 1: you know, Tom's been doing this for a while. He's

26
00:01:36,160 --> 00:01:39,640
Speaker 1: been working in not just what we used to call

27
00:01:39,760 --> 00:01:43,280
Speaker 1: new media, which is just media now, but also old media.

28
00:01:43,480 --> 00:01:46,400
Speaker 1: So you know, Tom's Tom's done at all. Tom, welcome

29
00:01:46,480 --> 00:01:49,520
Speaker 1: back to tech stuff. Ah, thank you for having me.

30
00:01:49,600 --> 00:01:52,480
Speaker 1: It's it's good to be back. For those who don't know. Uh,

31
00:01:52,560 --> 00:01:56,400
Speaker 1: I often joke that I heart media publishes about half

32
00:01:56,440 --> 00:01:59,920
Speaker 1: of all the podcasts that are out there. Tom hosts

33
00:02:00,080 --> 00:02:05,160
Speaker 1: or co hosts. The other hand, I do probably too many.

34
00:02:05,240 --> 00:02:07,480
Speaker 1: I don't know if it's quite that many, but yeah,

35
00:02:07,600 --> 00:02:09,600
Speaker 1: I do a lot, that's true. I don't know. I

36
00:02:09,600 --> 00:02:12,000
Speaker 1: would never describe it as too many. Tom. I just

37
00:02:12,120 --> 00:02:14,880
Speaker 1: say that, first of all, your time management skills have

38
00:02:14,960 --> 00:02:18,600
Speaker 1: got to be worlds better than my own. But the

39
00:02:18,639 --> 00:02:20,520
Speaker 1: reason why I asked you here obviously is that we

40
00:02:20,560 --> 00:02:23,079
Speaker 1: had this listener who wrote in and asked, in the

41
00:02:23,520 --> 00:02:27,160
Speaker 1: world of streaming, would something like tech TV be able

42
00:02:27,240 --> 00:02:31,400
Speaker 1: to have continued? Now. I've done an episode about tech

43
00:02:31,400 --> 00:02:33,720
Speaker 1: TV in the past, but it's great to talk to

44
00:02:33,760 --> 00:02:37,280
Speaker 1: someone who is actually there, at least for a while. So, Tom,

45
00:02:37,320 --> 00:02:39,799
Speaker 1: can you kind of for people who might not have

46
00:02:40,080 --> 00:02:43,120
Speaker 1: known about tech TV because maybe they're just never got

47
00:02:43,160 --> 00:02:46,320
Speaker 1: that channel, or perhaps they're on the younger side of

48
00:02:46,360 --> 00:02:48,799
Speaker 1: my listeners, can you kind of fillis in on what

49
00:02:48,840 --> 00:02:51,720
Speaker 1: that was all about. Tech TV, or z d t

50
00:02:51,919 --> 00:02:54,160
Speaker 1: V as it originally was called because it was owned

51
00:02:54,160 --> 00:02:58,079
Speaker 1: by Ziff Davis, the publisher of computer magazines, tech magazines

52
00:02:58,120 --> 00:03:03,280
Speaker 1: and websites UH as a cable television network that began

53
00:03:04,120 --> 00:03:07,920
Speaker 1: in the late nineties on cable to be devoted to

54
00:03:08,040 --> 00:03:12,320
Speaker 1: technology topics. Ziff's idea was, let's take the topics that

55
00:03:12,360 --> 00:03:16,760
Speaker 1: we cover in our publications and our websites UH and

56
00:03:17,160 --> 00:03:20,600
Speaker 1: put them on television. Let's make television versions of that UH.

57
00:03:20,639 --> 00:03:22,720
Speaker 1: In fact, it has its roots in a show called

58
00:03:22,919 --> 00:03:26,600
Speaker 1: the Site that was on MSNBC, which people may not

59
00:03:26,720 --> 00:03:30,440
Speaker 1: realize was originally Microsoft NBC. It was. It was a

60
00:03:30,480 --> 00:03:34,160
Speaker 1: combination of Microsoft and NBC that NBC eventually just took

61
00:03:34,160 --> 00:03:38,880
Speaker 1: over and never changed the name. Tech TV had shows

62
00:03:38,920 --> 00:03:41,680
Speaker 1: about helping how to, It had shows about technology news.

63
00:03:41,680 --> 00:03:45,720
Speaker 1: It had shows about technology finance, video games, uh MP

64
00:03:45,880 --> 00:03:48,440
Speaker 1: three's and audio came along and a show about audio

65
00:03:48,960 --> 00:03:51,680
Speaker 1: was started. So all the tech topics you can think

66
00:03:51,680 --> 00:03:56,720
Speaker 1: of were there in two thousand. Uh, this is in

67
00:03:56,760 --> 00:04:00,560
Speaker 1: the earliest days. So the joke is that tech TV

68
00:04:01,120 --> 00:04:04,840
Speaker 1: covered the dot com boom and the dot com bust

69
00:04:05,120 --> 00:04:07,920
Speaker 1: and then got busted because it went away when it

70
00:04:07,960 --> 00:04:11,520
Speaker 1: was bought by Comcast, which merged it into the G

71
00:04:11,760 --> 00:04:15,240
Speaker 1: four network. And then of course we all know that,

72
00:04:15,720 --> 00:04:19,880
Speaker 1: uh the G four network had its own roller coaster story.

73
00:04:19,920 --> 00:04:22,960
Speaker 1: That the kind of roller coaster where you have one

74
00:04:23,040 --> 00:04:27,719
Speaker 1: big hill and then a real long flow down until

75
00:04:27,800 --> 00:04:31,200
Speaker 1: you just end up with cops three runs, yeah, towards

76
00:04:31,200 --> 00:04:34,599
Speaker 1: the end, although they're back trying to do a streaming version.

77
00:04:34,680 --> 00:04:38,719
Speaker 1: So but G four devoted to gaming, not technology. Tech

78
00:04:38,760 --> 00:04:41,799
Speaker 1: TV was devoted to broad technology. They had a gaming

79
00:04:41,800 --> 00:04:44,680
Speaker 1: show called x Play that was the only one of

80
00:04:44,680 --> 00:04:48,159
Speaker 1: the only things that survived over into the G four merger.

81
00:04:48,920 --> 00:04:52,080
Speaker 1: But but everything else was about various topics were right

82
00:04:52,160 --> 00:04:54,960
Speaker 1: and and you know, I watched tech TV back in

83
00:04:55,000 --> 00:04:57,440
Speaker 1: the day, and one of the things that really struck

84
00:04:57,480 --> 00:04:59,680
Speaker 1: me is that that was a channel that I mean

85
00:04:59,720 --> 00:05:02,760
Speaker 1: they were talking to like a lot of the shows,

86
00:05:02,760 --> 00:05:04,840
Speaker 1: we're talking to people who knew their stuff right. It

87
00:05:04,880 --> 00:05:08,360
Speaker 1: wasn't It wasn't necessarily like the kinds of things you

88
00:05:08,360 --> 00:05:10,880
Speaker 1: would see on say local news, where they might cover

89
00:05:10,920 --> 00:05:14,400
Speaker 1: a tech story where it's very superficial you don't really

90
00:05:14,440 --> 00:05:17,719
Speaker 1: dive into it. We were talking about shows where people

91
00:05:17,720 --> 00:05:23,279
Speaker 1: were calling in live or asking live questions about very

92
00:05:23,320 --> 00:05:26,240
Speaker 1: particular issues that they might be running into and like

93
00:05:26,400 --> 00:05:29,880
Speaker 1: solving them in real time. And I remember watching and

94
00:05:29,960 --> 00:05:32,880
Speaker 1: thinking like I can't, I can't imagine how much you

95
00:05:32,880 --> 00:05:35,680
Speaker 1: would need to know about these subjects in order to

96
00:05:35,720 --> 00:05:39,120
Speaker 1: be able to to do this effectively and still be

97
00:05:39,279 --> 00:05:43,920
Speaker 1: also personable on camera. Like that's that was the other

98
00:05:44,200 --> 00:05:46,240
Speaker 1: side of it is that obviously, you know, you don't

99
00:05:46,279 --> 00:05:49,880
Speaker 1: just want to have the ben Stein kind of approach

100
00:05:49,960 --> 00:05:53,240
Speaker 1: to delivery, or no one's gonna bother watching unless they

101
00:05:53,320 --> 00:05:55,680
Speaker 1: just happen to have a blue screen of death they

102
00:05:55,720 --> 00:06:00,599
Speaker 1: can't get rid of. Yeah. The most watched shows on

103
00:06:00,640 --> 00:06:04,040
Speaker 1: the network through most of its run were the live

104
00:06:04,200 --> 00:06:07,240
Speaker 1: call in shows hosted by Leolaporte, Call for Help and

105
00:06:07,279 --> 00:06:10,919
Speaker 1: the screensavers. Uh. Internally we referred to them as the

106
00:06:10,960 --> 00:06:13,320
Speaker 1: Tools and the Toys show. Call for Help was the

107
00:06:13,320 --> 00:06:16,279
Speaker 1: Tool show is very much focused on practicality. I need

108
00:06:16,320 --> 00:06:19,320
Speaker 1: help doing x, uh, you know, because I need to

109
00:06:19,320 --> 00:06:22,039
Speaker 1: get something done. Screensavers was more of the Toys show.

110
00:06:22,480 --> 00:06:24,680
Speaker 1: That's where you had more of the hacking and they're like,

111
00:06:24,720 --> 00:06:26,920
Speaker 1: what can I make things do? I I want to

112
00:06:26,960 --> 00:06:29,480
Speaker 1: try this, you know, help me out with that. And

113
00:06:29,560 --> 00:06:35,440
Speaker 1: they were live, which was unusual in many respects, including

114
00:06:35,480 --> 00:06:38,960
Speaker 1: the fact that it was, if not the first, certainly

115
00:06:39,000 --> 00:06:41,839
Speaker 1: one of the first television shows to have chat rooms

116
00:06:41,960 --> 00:06:46,160
Speaker 1: running on screen, so as you chatted uh during during

117
00:06:46,200 --> 00:06:48,400
Speaker 1: the show, your chats could show up on screen. There

118
00:06:48,480 --> 00:06:51,400
Speaker 1: was a slight delay for moderation just in case, but

119
00:06:51,400 --> 00:06:54,440
Speaker 1: but chat with screens was streamed onto the television and

120
00:06:54,520 --> 00:06:58,080
Speaker 1: you could call in on the net Cam network uh

121
00:06:58,240 --> 00:07:02,680
Speaker 1: in in seven when it launched, you could call in

122
00:07:02,680 --> 00:07:06,720
Speaker 1: with a netcam uh using see you see me uh,

123
00:07:06,760 --> 00:07:10,280
Speaker 1: and they would set you up and you could appear

124
00:07:10,520 --> 00:07:14,680
Speaker 1: on the show. Uh. And that was definitely something new

125
00:07:14,680 --> 00:07:16,760
Speaker 1: where the audience not only not just could call in

126
00:07:16,800 --> 00:07:19,760
Speaker 1: on the phone, which they could, but could actually have

127
00:07:19,880 --> 00:07:23,200
Speaker 1: a camera uh and and appear on the show with

128
00:07:23,240 --> 00:07:26,480
Speaker 1: a camera, something that even now is not done a lot.

129
00:07:26,640 --> 00:07:28,600
Speaker 1: But now you're like, oh yeah, you could totally do

130
00:07:28,720 --> 00:07:30,720
Speaker 1: that it's all a matter of screening and and that

131
00:07:30,800 --> 00:07:32,560
Speaker 1: sort of thing. Back then, you you had to walk

132
00:07:32,600 --> 00:07:34,840
Speaker 1: people through it. So to your point about needing a

133
00:07:34,880 --> 00:07:39,000
Speaker 1: sophisticated audience, you needed an audience who was sophisticated enough

134
00:07:39,040 --> 00:07:41,400
Speaker 1: to be able to run software and set up a

135
00:07:41,800 --> 00:07:44,320
Speaker 1: web camera and all of that sort of thing. Yeah,

136
00:07:44,320 --> 00:07:48,640
Speaker 1: and I remember, you know, the heavily pixelated net cams

137
00:07:48,720 --> 00:07:54,800
Speaker 1: of the past dial up. That's right. It's pretty incredible

138
00:07:54,840 --> 00:07:56,600
Speaker 1: actually when you really think about it, that it was

139
00:07:56,640 --> 00:07:59,000
Speaker 1: even you guys even managed to do it that uh,

140
00:07:59,520 --> 00:08:03,280
Speaker 1: and that the audience was was a thriving part of it.

141
00:08:03,280 --> 00:08:05,720
Speaker 1: In fact, I would argue that a lot of that work.

142
00:08:05,880 --> 00:08:08,680
Speaker 1: I mean clearly we see that play out in other

143
00:08:08,720 --> 00:08:12,640
Speaker 1: platforms today. Right. Twitch would not be Twitch if it

144
00:08:12,720 --> 00:08:16,080
Speaker 1: were not for some of the things that were prototyped

145
00:08:16,120 --> 00:08:19,880
Speaker 1: and tested and proven to work with tech TV, where

146
00:08:19,920 --> 00:08:24,520
Speaker 1: you see things like audience engagement and that builds a community,

147
00:08:25,000 --> 00:08:27,640
Speaker 1: and that that's the sort of thing that ends up

148
00:08:27,760 --> 00:08:30,760
Speaker 1: giving a show life beyond you know, whatever the content

149
00:08:30,840 --> 00:08:33,800
Speaker 1: is that's on the screen. It's a thing that it

150
00:08:33,840 --> 00:08:37,760
Speaker 1: becomes a collaborative effort with the people on the show

151
00:08:37,800 --> 00:08:40,240
Speaker 1: and the audience. I mean, if you're doing a help show,

152
00:08:40,640 --> 00:08:42,800
Speaker 1: then you really don't have content unless you have an

153
00:08:42,800 --> 00:08:45,320
Speaker 1: audience to write in and ask for things or to

154
00:08:45,360 --> 00:08:48,120
Speaker 1: call in and ask for things. So I saw a

155
00:08:48,120 --> 00:08:51,400
Speaker 1: lot of things on tech TV that we're kind of

156
00:08:51,840 --> 00:08:56,400
Speaker 1: I would say, with presage, the the various elements that

157
00:08:56,440 --> 00:08:58,920
Speaker 1: we kind of take for granted in a lot of

158
00:08:59,040 --> 00:09:03,360
Speaker 1: online streaming UH services now, whether it's you know, YouTube

159
00:09:03,400 --> 00:09:06,760
Speaker 1: streaming or twitch streaming, things of that nature, a lot

160
00:09:06,840 --> 00:09:10,360
Speaker 1: of those have I think, kind of taken lessons that

161
00:09:10,400 --> 00:09:13,040
Speaker 1: were first learned back in the late nineties and early

162
00:09:13,080 --> 00:09:17,520
Speaker 1: two thousand's. Yeah, I often wonder what would have happened

163
00:09:17,640 --> 00:09:22,360
Speaker 1: if they had not sold tech TV to Comcast. UH.

164
00:09:22,520 --> 00:09:25,240
Speaker 1: Tech TV was sold by Ziff Davis to Paul Allen,

165
00:09:26,000 --> 00:09:29,960
Speaker 1: the co founder of Microsoft. His Vulcan Ventures ran it.

166
00:09:30,360 --> 00:09:34,520
Speaker 1: Then the dot com bust came along. Also, in my opinion,

167
00:09:35,960 --> 00:09:41,800
Speaker 1: both Vulcan's UH financial folks and Paul Allen got board

168
00:09:42,480 --> 00:09:47,000
Speaker 1: with tech TV because as of the day it was

169
00:09:47,040 --> 00:09:50,120
Speaker 1: sold to Comcast by Paul Allen, they were making money

170
00:09:50,160 --> 00:09:53,080
Speaker 1: internationally because they had international versions of the network UH

171
00:09:53,080 --> 00:09:56,280
Speaker 1: and syndication agreements. They were break even on the web,

172
00:09:56,360 --> 00:09:59,480
Speaker 1: which which I was was a part of, and they

173
00:09:59,480 --> 00:10:03,360
Speaker 1: were getting close to profitability on broadcast. It was the

174
00:10:03,360 --> 00:10:05,839
Speaker 1: wrong time to sell, in my opinion and a few

175
00:10:05,840 --> 00:10:10,600
Speaker 1: other people's opinion, because the show, the network was becoming viable.

176
00:10:10,920 --> 00:10:13,840
Speaker 1: What was valuable of it about it at the time

177
00:10:13,840 --> 00:10:17,559
Speaker 1: of the sale was that it was in fifty million homes.

178
00:10:17,600 --> 00:10:20,880
Speaker 1: Back then, you needed to be in at least sixty

179
00:10:20,960 --> 00:10:23,400
Speaker 1: seventy million homes to really make a go of it.

180
00:10:24,000 --> 00:10:28,200
Speaker 1: Uh So part of the theory behind selling was, well,

181
00:10:28,200 --> 00:10:31,480
Speaker 1: if you sell the Comcast, you get better distribution. But

182
00:10:31,559 --> 00:10:34,040
Speaker 1: one of the reasons Comcast wanted it was for those

183
00:10:34,080 --> 00:10:37,080
Speaker 1: fifty million homes that G four wasn't in. G four

184
00:10:37,120 --> 00:10:40,120
Speaker 1: was in thirteen million homes. Uh And so you merge

185
00:10:40,160 --> 00:10:42,839
Speaker 1: those two networks, which is what they did, and overnight

186
00:10:42,960 --> 00:10:45,920
Speaker 1: you're getting close to that viability number. Uh That number

187
00:10:45,920 --> 00:10:48,000
Speaker 1: is smaller now because there's a smaller number of homes,

188
00:10:48,040 --> 00:10:50,800
Speaker 1: but back then you you needed you needed to really

189
00:10:50,800 --> 00:10:53,160
Speaker 1: get in as many homes as possible. The other problem

190
00:10:53,160 --> 00:10:56,960
Speaker 1: with tech TV it was solo, so every other almost

191
00:10:57,120 --> 00:11:00,240
Speaker 1: every other cable network out there was on there because

192
00:11:00,240 --> 00:11:03,319
Speaker 1: it was part of a package. Right There was ESPN,

193
00:11:03,440 --> 00:11:06,160
Speaker 1: News because well, if you want ESPN, you gotta take

194
00:11:06,360 --> 00:11:09,280
Speaker 1: ESPN News. There was Bravo because well if you want MSNBC,

195
00:11:09,440 --> 00:11:12,640
Speaker 1: you gotta take Bravo. Uh. And and all of the

196
00:11:12,640 --> 00:11:16,480
Speaker 1: big companies had those kinds of arrangements. Even the h

197
00:11:16,520 --> 00:11:18,680
Speaker 1: G t V s were like, well, you want HDTV,

198
00:11:18,720 --> 00:11:21,120
Speaker 1: you gotta take d I Y Tech TV was it.

199
00:11:21,440 --> 00:11:23,480
Speaker 1: They were on their own, so they kind of needed

200
00:11:23,720 --> 00:11:27,800
Speaker 1: something to get past that fifty million mark. If they

201
00:11:27,840 --> 00:11:31,720
Speaker 1: had stuck around, though, I wonder if they would have

202
00:11:32,480 --> 00:11:34,920
Speaker 1: gone the way of most cable networks, which is you

203
00:11:34,920 --> 00:11:38,040
Speaker 1: you keep broadening out your base until you're really no

204
00:11:38,120 --> 00:11:40,840
Speaker 1: longer about what you were originally about. We see that

205
00:11:40,880 --> 00:11:43,800
Speaker 1: with the History Channel, we see that with sci Fi, etcetera.

206
00:11:44,240 --> 00:11:49,400
Speaker 1: Or would they have split into multiple networks? Would would

207
00:11:49,440 --> 00:11:52,600
Speaker 1: they have been able to launch secondary networks maybe broaden

208
00:11:52,640 --> 00:11:55,640
Speaker 1: out the main network, but but have more specific networks

209
00:11:55,640 --> 00:11:57,120
Speaker 1: the way an h G t V, A, d I

210
00:11:57,280 --> 00:12:00,520
Speaker 1: Y food uh. And all of that happened as it was,

211
00:12:00,559 --> 00:12:02,800
Speaker 1: it got merged into G four, the tech went away.

212
00:12:03,040 --> 00:12:08,360
Speaker 1: And to to your original viewer question, I don't think

213
00:12:08,440 --> 00:12:11,320
Speaker 1: you could do it now because so much has changed.

214
00:12:12,120 --> 00:12:14,839
Speaker 1: You would you are doing it. Uh, and you kind

215
00:12:14,880 --> 00:12:18,520
Speaker 1: of alluded to that, like there's a YouTube or a

216
00:12:18,600 --> 00:12:23,760
Speaker 1: Twitch show for everything tech TV was doing, and the

217
00:12:24,040 --> 00:12:27,760
Speaker 1: entire internet is essentially tech TV in a way. There

218
00:12:27,760 --> 00:12:30,200
Speaker 1: are people doing help shows, there are people doing podcasts,

219
00:12:30,280 --> 00:12:33,920
Speaker 1: there are people doing uh streaming of games. All these

220
00:12:33,960 --> 00:12:38,320
Speaker 1: things that the tech TV was pioneering are just deragur right.

221
00:12:38,400 --> 00:12:41,160
Speaker 1: Twitch talks to its chat as as you stream all

222
00:12:41,200 --> 00:12:44,640
Speaker 1: the time. Uh. We had tech TV Radio where we

223
00:12:44,679 --> 00:12:48,000
Speaker 1: would uh, in addition to news, do sort of behind

224
00:12:48,080 --> 00:12:52,520
Speaker 1: the scenes shows about the shows on tech TV. Every

225
00:12:52,520 --> 00:12:55,560
Speaker 1: show has a behind the scenes podcast. Now. Uh, It's

226
00:12:55,800 --> 00:12:59,079
Speaker 1: it's just everything now. So I don't know if it

227
00:12:59,120 --> 00:13:01,520
Speaker 1: would make sense to try to bottle it all back

228
00:13:01,600 --> 00:13:04,599
Speaker 1: up into a niche network anymore because it's just so pervasive.

229
00:13:05,360 --> 00:13:07,960
Speaker 1: Tom and I have more to say about the tech

230
00:13:08,040 --> 00:13:12,160
Speaker 1: TV story and and streaming, but first let's take this

231
00:13:12,240 --> 00:13:22,160
Speaker 1: quick break. You've touched on a ton of things, like,

232
00:13:22,520 --> 00:13:24,320
Speaker 1: you know, I used to work you know this, I

233
00:13:24,400 --> 00:13:27,680
Speaker 1: used to work for Discovery Communications. Uh, I've worked for

234
00:13:27,720 --> 00:13:30,439
Speaker 1: the same company for you know, fourteen years. It's just

235
00:13:30,480 --> 00:13:33,200
Speaker 1: been owned by different people. So but when I was

236
00:13:33,440 --> 00:13:36,320
Speaker 1: working for Discovery, you know, we got to see the

237
00:13:36,360 --> 00:13:39,679
Speaker 1: full side of the whole carriage agreements, those agreements where

238
00:13:40,280 --> 00:13:44,600
Speaker 1: a cable company has like multiple channels in its network

239
00:13:44,760 --> 00:13:48,760
Speaker 1: and the there'll be one or two jewels that they

240
00:13:48,800 --> 00:13:52,600
Speaker 1: have that everyone wants, but because you know they have

241
00:13:53,040 --> 00:13:55,240
Speaker 1: the stuff that the customers want, they say, well, you

242
00:13:55,280 --> 00:13:57,960
Speaker 1: also have to take these other channels as well. I

243
00:13:57,960 --> 00:14:01,040
Speaker 1: think that that would have been probably the evolution we

244
00:14:01,040 --> 00:14:03,079
Speaker 1: would have seen with tech TV had it stuck around,

245
00:14:03,360 --> 00:14:05,720
Speaker 1: Because I was also going to bring up the point

246
00:14:05,760 --> 00:14:10,280
Speaker 1: about how you would start off with these cable channels

247
00:14:10,280 --> 00:14:16,400
Speaker 1: that would have very uh focused uh subject matter or topics,

248
00:14:16,520 --> 00:14:20,360
Speaker 1: or they would cater to a very specific audience, and

249
00:14:20,480 --> 00:14:25,120
Speaker 1: over time, because there's this need and old media to

250
00:14:25,200 --> 00:14:28,360
Speaker 1: continue to grow, Like that's how success is shown by

251
00:14:28,480 --> 00:14:31,280
Speaker 1: growth year over year. It's not it's not it's not

252
00:14:31,400 --> 00:14:33,680
Speaker 1: really revenue so much as how much did you grow

253
00:14:33,840 --> 00:14:37,440
Speaker 1: compared to last year. Uh. You can't continue to grow

254
00:14:37,560 --> 00:14:41,840
Speaker 1: if you are incredibly focused, something that tech stuff has

255
00:14:41,880 --> 00:14:46,560
Speaker 1: seen over the past, because like I have a great audience,

256
00:14:46,600 --> 00:14:49,720
Speaker 1: a wonderful audience, but it's not like you know, maybe

257
00:14:49,720 --> 00:14:51,920
Speaker 1: someone will tune into a specific episode if they think

258
00:14:51,960 --> 00:14:54,360
Speaker 1: it sounds interesting, but it's not the sort of thing

259
00:14:54,360 --> 00:14:58,520
Speaker 1: where I'm going to see explosive growth. Um at this stage,

260
00:14:58,640 --> 00:15:01,240
Speaker 1: it would be great if that happened. But that's the

261
00:15:01,280 --> 00:15:03,120
Speaker 1: sort of thing that I think a lot of cable

262
00:15:03,160 --> 00:15:06,040
Speaker 1: companies we're looking at and they said, let's broaden this out.

263
00:15:06,080 --> 00:15:07,840
Speaker 1: I mean, the one the flagship that I always think

264
00:15:07,840 --> 00:15:10,440
Speaker 1: of as MTV, because there's the cliche joke of do

265
00:15:10,480 --> 00:15:14,480
Speaker 1: you remember when they used to show music videos? Um,

266
00:15:14,480 --> 00:15:17,240
Speaker 1: which you know, and I make that joke, and meanwhile,

267
00:15:17,440 --> 00:15:19,840
Speaker 1: Bob Pittman's my boss. I should be real careful about

268
00:15:20,440 --> 00:15:24,280
Speaker 1: jokes about MTV. But yeah, it's it's but that's that's

269
00:15:24,280 --> 00:15:26,720
Speaker 1: the sort of that's the sort of train. And now

270
00:15:26,760 --> 00:15:30,960
Speaker 1: that we have these these streaming services that allow for

271
00:15:31,560 --> 00:15:35,640
Speaker 1: much more narrowly focused content where you can find your

272
00:15:35,680 --> 00:15:37,960
Speaker 1: audience and you can have that level of engagement, I

273
00:15:38,000 --> 00:15:40,440
Speaker 1: think that ends up making up a lot for the

274
00:15:40,480 --> 00:15:43,360
Speaker 1: fact that it doesn't necessarily work as well in the

275
00:15:43,400 --> 00:15:46,520
Speaker 1: cable world because it is really hard to build that

276
00:15:46,640 --> 00:15:50,240
Speaker 1: sort of structure that supports the community. I know a

277
00:15:50,320 --> 00:15:53,280
Speaker 1: lot of cable companies have tried that, where they try

278
00:15:53,320 --> 00:15:58,680
Speaker 1: to marry whatever cable content is up on screen with

279
00:15:59,040 --> 00:16:02,040
Speaker 1: a website that's built out, but that doesn't it's not

280
00:16:02,160 --> 00:16:08,600
Speaker 1: necessarily uh, something that that works organically, and it's really

281
00:16:08,600 --> 00:16:11,280
Speaker 1: hard to drive people to a different screen when you

282
00:16:11,320 --> 00:16:15,120
Speaker 1: have them on one. Um. So I think I think that,

283
00:16:15,720 --> 00:16:19,960
Speaker 1: you know, to the listeners question, Yeah, we're we're seeing

284
00:16:20,080 --> 00:16:25,280
Speaker 1: plenty of programming out there that is touching on all

285
00:16:25,320 --> 00:16:28,360
Speaker 1: the elements that tech tv touched on, but it's just

286
00:16:28,440 --> 00:16:32,560
Speaker 1: not it's just not tech tv. UM. I'm guessing that

287
00:16:32,640 --> 00:16:37,280
Speaker 1: was probably the resurgence of G four that really brought

288
00:16:37,320 --> 00:16:39,960
Speaker 1: that question up, and that in case that case is

289
00:16:40,000 --> 00:16:43,440
Speaker 1: a little bit different too. It's again it's um, it's

290
00:16:43,480 --> 00:16:48,640
Speaker 1: again catering to the gaming community, but with the exception

291
00:16:48,680 --> 00:16:51,600
Speaker 1: of stuff like x play, you're not seeing a lot

292
00:16:51,680 --> 00:16:57,240
Speaker 1: of the classic G four properties come back in full swing. Yeah,

293
00:16:57,280 --> 00:16:59,080
Speaker 1: it does. It does delight me that x play is

294
00:16:59,240 --> 00:17:01,920
Speaker 1: still around in some form. It was originally called game

295
00:17:01,960 --> 00:17:05,159
Speaker 1: Spot TV because If Davis owned a magazine called game Spot,

296
00:17:05,520 --> 00:17:08,360
Speaker 1: but it was hosted by Adam Sessler uh, and then

297
00:17:08,359 --> 00:17:12,639
Speaker 1: it became extended Play once as IF sold the company

298
00:17:12,640 --> 00:17:15,640
Speaker 1: because they didn't want to use the ZIF name anymore. Uh.

299
00:17:15,680 --> 00:17:18,280
Speaker 1: And then at one point they decided to try to

300
00:17:18,320 --> 00:17:22,080
Speaker 1: make it edgier. So they dropped the tended and just

301
00:17:22,160 --> 00:17:25,760
Speaker 1: made it explay. Uh and and it's been that ever said,

302
00:17:25,800 --> 00:17:28,480
Speaker 1: So that is a launch show from z D t

303
00:17:28,600 --> 00:17:32,320
Speaker 1: V that under three different names has survived, which I

304
00:17:32,400 --> 00:17:37,119
Speaker 1: kind of love. But yeah, when you think about starting

305
00:17:37,119 --> 00:17:39,760
Speaker 1: a cable network now, well who would start a cable

306
00:17:39,800 --> 00:17:43,720
Speaker 1: network now? Like, who wants a cable network? What you

307
00:17:43,840 --> 00:17:50,760
Speaker 1: see now are uh packages of content? Right. I think

308
00:17:50,800 --> 00:17:55,440
Speaker 1: the future of ESPN will be a slow uh moving

309
00:17:55,600 --> 00:18:00,080
Speaker 1: from ESPN the cable network first to e s p

310
00:18:00,240 --> 00:18:03,040
Speaker 1: N the app. ESPN plus is their their their back

311
00:18:03,080 --> 00:18:06,280
Speaker 1: door to escape and survive into. You'll see more and

312
00:18:06,320 --> 00:18:09,480
Speaker 1: more things go there. You see all the networks doing this,

313
00:18:09,520 --> 00:18:15,639
Speaker 1: Paramount plus, Peacock, Disney plus. Uh. Instead of launching channels,

314
00:18:15,680 --> 00:18:19,360
Speaker 1: they're launching services that package all their content together. So

315
00:18:19,960 --> 00:18:22,159
Speaker 1: kind of going back to that idea that Ziff Davis

316
00:18:22,160 --> 00:18:24,600
Speaker 1: originally launched the network as a companion to their magazines

317
00:18:24,640 --> 00:18:28,400
Speaker 1: and websites. I wonder if there is a company that

318
00:18:28,600 --> 00:18:31,920
Speaker 1: could create some kind of streaming service, might have to

319
00:18:31,960 --> 00:18:35,639
Speaker 1: be free ad supported rather than subscription based, but could

320
00:18:36,080 --> 00:18:39,679
Speaker 1: a c net could as if Davis could, uh, you know,

321
00:18:39,800 --> 00:18:44,920
Speaker 1: a vox UH create an app that has the equivalent

322
00:18:44,960 --> 00:18:47,520
Speaker 1: of a tech TV in it, where it's got shows

323
00:18:47,560 --> 00:18:50,760
Speaker 1: that you can tap into, and then the resources of

324
00:18:50,760 --> 00:18:54,520
Speaker 1: of the publications involved in there. If there were a

325
00:18:54,600 --> 00:18:56,920
Speaker 1: return of a tech TV kind of thing, that that's

326
00:18:56,920 --> 00:18:59,800
Speaker 1: the only way I can imagine it taking place, I think.

327
00:19:00,119 --> 00:19:02,760
Speaker 1: And one of the other reasons why I'm so glad

328
00:19:02,760 --> 00:19:06,199
Speaker 1: you're on the show, Tom is that I knew that

329
00:19:06,240 --> 00:19:08,119
Speaker 1: you would be the perfect person to talk to about this,

330
00:19:08,240 --> 00:19:11,439
Speaker 1: not just because of your tech TV history, but of

331
00:19:11,480 --> 00:19:15,560
Speaker 1: course you also co hosted a show called Chord Killers

332
00:19:16,040 --> 00:19:21,000
Speaker 1: where you talk about stuff like the cable industry and

333
00:19:21,080 --> 00:19:24,800
Speaker 1: streaming services, and I mean, you'll go into all sorts

334
00:19:24,800 --> 00:19:28,639
Speaker 1: of different uh stories on those topics. But you know

335
00:19:28,720 --> 00:19:33,760
Speaker 1: you've I remember listening to Chord Killers ages ago where

336
00:19:33,800 --> 00:19:37,680
Speaker 1: we were just starting to have those conversations of um,

337
00:19:37,720 --> 00:19:41,720
Speaker 1: you know, cord cutting becoming like a trend and UH

338
00:19:41,800 --> 00:19:45,320
Speaker 1: and now that you have this era of all these

339
00:19:45,320 --> 00:19:50,440
Speaker 1: different streaming platforms that are available, UH, now the conversation

340
00:19:50,840 --> 00:19:54,639
Speaker 1: tends to revolve around which ones do I subscribe to

341
00:19:54,720 --> 00:19:58,040
Speaker 1: and which ones can I afford to? Not to what

342
00:19:58,640 --> 00:20:01,720
Speaker 1: content am I willing to miss? Out on that's what

343
00:20:01,760 --> 00:20:04,960
Speaker 1: the conversation becomes. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. Uh. We used to

344
00:20:05,040 --> 00:20:07,240
Speaker 1: joke Brian Brushwood, my my co host on Court Killers,

345
00:20:07,240 --> 00:20:09,080
Speaker 1: and I used to joke that we started to show

346
00:20:09,119 --> 00:20:12,560
Speaker 1: about tablets before the iPad came out, basically uh, and

347
00:20:12,640 --> 00:20:16,080
Speaker 1: but we we stuck around long enough that it paid off,

348
00:20:16,119 --> 00:20:19,720
Speaker 1: because Yeah, we have shifted over the years from how

349
00:20:19,720 --> 00:20:22,960
Speaker 1: could you possibly do this? To uh, what do you

350
00:20:23,000 --> 00:20:27,359
Speaker 1: watch and how do you decide? Yeah, no, it's that's

351
00:20:27,480 --> 00:20:29,679
Speaker 1: that's the conversation I end up having. I have another

352
00:20:29,720 --> 00:20:32,359
Speaker 1: show called Large nerd Dron Collider with a friend of

353
00:20:32,359 --> 00:20:34,480
Speaker 1: mine and that ends up being our conversation all the

354
00:20:34,480 --> 00:20:37,679
Speaker 1: time where she'll say, oh, did you see this new

355
00:20:37,720 --> 00:20:39,879
Speaker 1: show on Hulu? And I said, oh, that's it's one

356
00:20:39,920 --> 00:20:44,560
Speaker 1: of the ones I canceled. So it's because it's just

357
00:20:44,600 --> 00:20:47,000
Speaker 1: hard to keep up with them all. But but yeah,

358
00:20:47,000 --> 00:20:49,480
Speaker 1: I think I think this was exactly what my listener

359
00:20:49,560 --> 00:20:51,760
Speaker 1: was really looking for, was to kind of get that

360
00:20:51,840 --> 00:20:55,040
Speaker 1: insight and um, yeah, it's a totally different world now

361
00:20:55,600 --> 00:20:59,359
Speaker 1: with the different ways of approaching I think the fact

362
00:20:59,400 --> 00:21:02,080
Speaker 1: that you know that there are these platforms out there

363
00:21:02,119 --> 00:21:04,520
Speaker 1: finding an audience still continues to be one of the

364
00:21:04,560 --> 00:21:09,160
Speaker 1: most challenging aspects for any content creator out there. But

365
00:21:09,400 --> 00:21:13,000
Speaker 1: if you are someone who wants to do something where

366
00:21:13,040 --> 00:21:15,600
Speaker 1: you're you know, you launch a Twitch channel where you're

367
00:21:15,640 --> 00:21:19,480
Speaker 1: helping people with tech problems, I think there are opportunities

368
00:21:19,520 --> 00:21:21,720
Speaker 1: out there. The question you need to be able to

369
00:21:21,760 --> 00:21:26,760
Speaker 1: define what success is to you and maybe set some expectations,

370
00:21:27,160 --> 00:21:31,000
Speaker 1: because it's not like you're necessarily going to see uh,

371
00:21:31,400 --> 00:21:33,879
Speaker 1: monumental success right out of the gate, or even you know,

372
00:21:33,960 --> 00:21:36,719
Speaker 1: you may not see monumental success at all. But if

373
00:21:36,720 --> 00:21:40,480
Speaker 1: it's something that you derive pleasure from and and it's

374
00:21:40,520 --> 00:21:43,400
Speaker 1: not pulling too much of your attention away from other

375
00:21:43,440 --> 00:21:45,080
Speaker 1: things that you need to do, I think it's a

376
00:21:45,119 --> 00:21:49,200
Speaker 1: great thing to pursue. Um and and to your point,

377
00:21:49,240 --> 00:21:51,920
Speaker 1: well with court killers, if you stick around long enough,

378
00:21:51,960 --> 00:21:55,480
Speaker 1: you might become relevant. Yeah, right, just just stang in there.

379
00:21:56,320 --> 00:21:58,040
Speaker 1: The good news is you don't need to be in

380
00:21:58,400 --> 00:22:02,200
Speaker 1: eight million homes to to be successful. Right that It's

381
00:22:02,280 --> 00:22:04,560
Speaker 1: it's hard to get an audience, but at least you

382
00:22:04,600 --> 00:22:07,240
Speaker 1: don't have to get as big of an audience as

383
00:22:07,280 --> 00:22:09,960
Speaker 1: you used to have to do to to have some success. Yeah,

384
00:22:09,960 --> 00:22:12,639
Speaker 1: you don't have to. You don't have to find the

385
00:22:12,680 --> 00:22:16,280
Speaker 1: money people, right, the people who will put forward whatever

386
00:22:16,320 --> 00:22:18,960
Speaker 1: the capital is in order for you to have all

387
00:22:19,000 --> 00:22:21,960
Speaker 1: the stuff and and the the equipment you need to

388
00:22:22,000 --> 00:22:25,560
Speaker 1: be able to get into something like that is not

389
00:22:26,080 --> 00:22:29,399
Speaker 1: I mean, it's it's still an expense. But there are

390
00:22:29,440 --> 00:22:32,159
Speaker 1: a lot of computers that are coming out now that

391
00:22:32,280 --> 00:22:35,320
Speaker 1: have the basic stuff that you would need right away

392
00:22:35,320 --> 00:22:39,960
Speaker 1: that can produce good enough results where if you're if

393
00:22:39,960 --> 00:22:42,400
Speaker 1: the content you put out is really good, people will

394
00:22:42,400 --> 00:22:46,720
Speaker 1: watch it. Obviously, you know, it's it's hard to judge

395
00:22:46,760 --> 00:22:50,280
Speaker 1: that because you always think about the standouts that have

396
00:22:50,760 --> 00:22:54,320
Speaker 1: the super high quality webcam or or they're using a

397
00:22:54,680 --> 00:22:57,919
Speaker 1: you know, a very expensive camera and lighting set up

398
00:22:58,000 --> 00:23:00,880
Speaker 1: and green screen, and they have the mixers and all

399
00:23:00,920 --> 00:23:03,400
Speaker 1: that kind of stuff. But you know, those are those

400
00:23:03,440 --> 00:23:05,280
Speaker 1: are things that you can worry about later on down

401
00:23:05,280 --> 00:23:09,600
Speaker 1: the road. Um, Tom, thank you so much for joining

402
00:23:09,600 --> 00:23:13,479
Speaker 1: the show and and having a little walk down memory

403
00:23:13,560 --> 00:23:16,440
Speaker 1: lane with me. Is been a real pleasure. Well, thank you.

404
00:23:16,800 --> 00:23:18,520
Speaker 1: One of the one of the things I try not

405
00:23:18,640 --> 00:23:21,280
Speaker 1: to bore my friends with is is endless stories about

406
00:23:21,320 --> 00:23:23,800
Speaker 1: tech TV. So I appreciate your giving me a chance

407
00:23:23,840 --> 00:23:26,879
Speaker 1: to have a purpose to bore people about tech TV.

408
00:23:27,400 --> 00:23:29,359
Speaker 1: It wasn't boring at all. And I mean, if you

409
00:23:29,440 --> 00:23:32,480
Speaker 1: ever find yourself with like thirty seconds of extra time

410
00:23:32,480 --> 00:23:34,280
Speaker 1: in the day, I mean you could always just launch

411
00:23:34,320 --> 00:23:39,800
Speaker 1: another old Stories from Tech TV podcast, right have would

412
00:23:39,840 --> 00:23:43,800
Speaker 1: be like a Patreon only thing. Sure, sure, yeah, there's

413
00:23:43,800 --> 00:23:50,159
Speaker 1: an idea there. I would like to apologize everyone in

414
00:23:50,200 --> 00:23:53,119
Speaker 1: Tom's life who was just saying we're just trying to

415
00:23:53,160 --> 00:24:00,879
Speaker 1: have but again, I really appreciate it. And if you

416
00:24:01,240 --> 00:24:05,480
Speaker 1: out there listening to this, if you haven't gone to

417
00:24:05,760 --> 00:24:09,960
Speaker 1: explore all the different podcasts that Tom does, I highly

418
00:24:10,000 --> 00:24:12,159
Speaker 1: recommend you check them out. Tom, which ones would you

419
00:24:12,240 --> 00:24:16,680
Speaker 1: suggest people listen to besides all of them? Yeah, folks

420
00:24:16,680 --> 00:24:18,960
Speaker 1: who listen to tech stuff probably would appreciate Daily Tech

421
00:24:19,040 --> 00:24:23,240
Speaker 1: News show, which is all about technology news. Uh. There's

422
00:24:23,280 --> 00:24:25,359
Speaker 1: also Sort and Laser, which is about science fiction and

423
00:24:25,400 --> 00:24:28,199
Speaker 1: fantasy books. There's Cord Killers. As you mentioned. All my

424
00:24:28,200 --> 00:24:30,920
Speaker 1: shows are at tom Erett dot com. Uh. And and

425
00:24:30,960 --> 00:24:32,560
Speaker 1: I want to put in a plug for for some

426
00:24:32,600 --> 00:24:36,120
Speaker 1: shows that I just sort of help get going. Uh.

427
00:24:36,160 --> 00:24:38,560
Speaker 1: There's one called Barbecue and Tech Chris Ashley and Rod

428
00:24:38,560 --> 00:24:42,239
Speaker 1: Simmons just to to tech executives talking about how much

429
00:24:42,240 --> 00:24:44,440
Speaker 1: they love barbecue in the intersection of the two worlds

430
00:24:44,760 --> 00:24:48,280
Speaker 1: and the tech John, Rob Dunwood and and friends. Uh,

431
00:24:48,320 --> 00:24:51,200
Speaker 1: talking about tech from a black perspective. Look for those

432
00:24:51,200 --> 00:24:53,919
Speaker 1: as well. That's fantastic. Yeah, And if you listen to

433
00:24:53,920 --> 00:24:56,520
Speaker 1: Tom shows, you're gonna hear other voices that you'll be

434
00:24:56,600 --> 00:24:59,080
Speaker 1: familiar with. People I've had on on tech stuff in

435
00:24:59,080 --> 00:25:02,840
Speaker 1: the past. Shannon Morse has been on your shows many times. UM,

436
00:25:03,040 --> 00:25:06,880
Speaker 1: wonderful friend of the podcast as well. So thanks again, Tom.

437
00:25:06,920 --> 00:25:10,120
Speaker 1: Let's not let's not make it like, you know, two

438
00:25:10,240 --> 00:25:13,600
Speaker 1: or three more years before we talk again. Agreed. We

439
00:25:13,680 --> 00:25:15,600
Speaker 1: have a bit more to say, or at least I

440
00:25:15,680 --> 00:25:18,360
Speaker 1: have a bit more to say after we take this

441
00:25:18,520 --> 00:25:29,560
Speaker 1: quick break. Okay, let's talk a bit about G four

442
00:25:29,680 --> 00:25:33,879
Speaker 1: TV and by lett sounds just me because Tom's already

443
00:25:33,960 --> 00:25:36,399
Speaker 1: he's gone. Thanks Tom, that's great for him to be

444
00:25:36,440 --> 00:25:38,520
Speaker 1: on the show. Yeah, let's talk about G four TV

445
00:25:38,640 --> 00:25:41,480
Speaker 1: for a second. So in the episode I did where

446
00:25:41,520 --> 00:25:45,199
Speaker 1: I mentioned G four TV was coming back, that was

447
00:25:45,280 --> 00:25:49,320
Speaker 1: back when the group of people trying to resuscitate G

448
00:25:49,480 --> 00:25:54,840
Speaker 1: four TV were mainly focusing on streaming events, specials, a

449
00:25:54,880 --> 00:25:59,640
Speaker 1: lot of retrospectives, that kind of thing. But after more

450
00:25:59,680 --> 00:26:02,119
Speaker 1: than the year of that kind of stuff going on,

451
00:26:02,280 --> 00:26:06,280
Speaker 1: G four was actually able to establish itself as a

452
00:26:06,359 --> 00:26:11,359
Speaker 1: linear television channel. That happened on November six of this year.

453
00:26:12,240 --> 00:26:15,960
Speaker 1: And uh, linear TV, in case you're not familiar with

454
00:26:16,000 --> 00:26:19,879
Speaker 1: that term, it essentially just is old school television. It

455
00:26:19,920 --> 00:26:24,639
Speaker 1: means that programming is running on its schedule and you

456
00:26:24,720 --> 00:26:27,760
Speaker 1: see whatever is playing when you tune in. It's what

457
00:26:28,160 --> 00:26:31,000
Speaker 1: Tom was talking about when you mentioned the paramount plus stuff.

458
00:26:31,520 --> 00:26:35,879
Speaker 1: Linear TV is uh that just that unbroken stream of programming.

459
00:26:35,960 --> 00:26:38,359
Speaker 1: So it's not on demand. It's not the way like

460
00:26:38,440 --> 00:26:42,359
Speaker 1: a lot of streaming services are typically set up today. Um,

461
00:26:42,400 --> 00:26:45,920
Speaker 1: but yeah, it's uh, we're getting some stuff back again,

462
00:26:45,960 --> 00:26:49,360
Speaker 1: attack of the Show and ex play, uh and other

463
00:26:49,440 --> 00:26:53,640
Speaker 1: stuff as well. So it shows that G four, despite

464
00:26:53,680 --> 00:26:59,440
Speaker 1: the fact that it had that kind of painful uh decline,

465
00:26:59,600 --> 00:27:04,320
Speaker 1: which ultimately uh meant that it turned into the Esquire Channel,

466
00:27:04,920 --> 00:27:08,960
Speaker 1: has managed to Claude's way back. And Uh, I don't

467
00:27:09,040 --> 00:27:12,800
Speaker 1: mean to to say that in a way that's you know,

468
00:27:13,720 --> 00:27:17,040
Speaker 1: uh talking down what they've done. I think it's pretty

469
00:27:17,119 --> 00:27:23,560
Speaker 1: phenomenal and I think it's fantastic that gamers can have

470
00:27:23,760 --> 00:27:27,200
Speaker 1: this kind of content available to them, still not tech TV.

471
00:27:27,920 --> 00:27:31,600
Speaker 1: That part has not returned along with the G four

472
00:27:31,680 --> 00:27:35,720
Speaker 1: TV stuff. However, as Tom was saying, a lot of

473
00:27:35,720 --> 00:27:38,920
Speaker 1: the content that you would find on tech TV, a

474
00:27:38,960 --> 00:27:43,160
Speaker 1: lot of that stuff has been distributed across thousands of channels.

475
00:27:43,600 --> 00:27:46,679
Speaker 1: You know, you have everything from people doing deep dives

476
00:27:46,680 --> 00:27:50,439
Speaker 1: into technology where they're getting really technical. They just assume

477
00:27:50,600 --> 00:27:54,080
Speaker 1: from the get go that you have a strong based

478
00:27:54,200 --> 00:27:58,360
Speaker 1: understanding of technology before they even get started to stuff

479
00:27:58,480 --> 00:28:01,199
Speaker 1: more like what my podcast is, where I would say

480
00:28:01,359 --> 00:28:05,640
Speaker 1: I I take a more general knowledge approach where I'm

481
00:28:05,640 --> 00:28:10,440
Speaker 1: not assuming anyone has that deep level of understanding, largely

482
00:28:10,440 --> 00:28:13,480
Speaker 1: because that's where I come from. I'm I've tell people

483
00:28:13,520 --> 00:28:16,040
Speaker 1: all the time. I studied English literature in college. I

484
00:28:16,080 --> 00:28:20,640
Speaker 1: had no intention of becoming a tech podcaster out of college,

485
00:28:20,680 --> 00:28:25,880
Speaker 1: but kind of fortunately gravitated toward it after after more

486
00:28:25,920 --> 00:28:29,280
Speaker 1: than a decade of flailing around in the uh in

487
00:28:29,320 --> 00:28:32,880
Speaker 1: the real world. And so I go at this from

488
00:28:32,960 --> 00:28:35,639
Speaker 1: the perspective of, let me do this as if I

489
00:28:35,680 --> 00:28:38,680
Speaker 1: were listening the idea of, all right, let's establish the

490
00:28:38,720 --> 00:28:43,480
Speaker 1: foundation before we start diving into the nitty gritty. So yeah,

491
00:28:43,720 --> 00:28:48,200
Speaker 1: the tech TV model as it stood would probably be

492
00:28:48,320 --> 00:28:52,280
Speaker 1: very different in streaming, I would say, but because we

493
00:28:52,400 --> 00:28:56,200
Speaker 1: do have lots of stuff out there that is similar

494
00:28:56,320 --> 00:28:58,720
Speaker 1: to tech TV. In fact, you know, you've got Leo

495
00:28:58,800 --> 00:29:02,480
Speaker 1: Report's Twitter network, you've got the Daily Tech News show

496
00:29:02,720 --> 00:29:05,720
Speaker 1: with Tom Merritt, You've got stuff like tech stuff, You've

497
00:29:05,720 --> 00:29:12,240
Speaker 1: got numerous podcasts and video streams. I think that it's

498
00:29:12,280 --> 00:29:14,920
Speaker 1: actually a much more rich world when it comes to

499
00:29:14,960 --> 00:29:18,880
Speaker 1: that sort of content, Um, and a lot of these

500
00:29:19,000 --> 00:29:25,520
Speaker 1: endeavors can survive on a much smaller audience base than

501
00:29:25,560 --> 00:29:28,640
Speaker 1: what you would see with a cable channel, right, like

502
00:29:28,720 --> 00:29:32,840
Speaker 1: you have to hit certain big, big numbers with cable

503
00:29:32,920 --> 00:29:35,120
Speaker 1: channels in order for that cable channel to be profitable

504
00:29:35,120 --> 00:29:39,080
Speaker 1: because it's expensive to run those. The operations that we

505
00:29:39,120 --> 00:29:41,920
Speaker 1: see on the Internet tend to be slightly smaller in scale,

506
00:29:42,480 --> 00:29:46,520
Speaker 1: sometimes dramatically smaller in scale, so they don't have the

507
00:29:46,600 --> 00:29:50,440
Speaker 1: same overhead costs that a cable channel would have. So

508
00:29:50,520 --> 00:29:54,120
Speaker 1: in that sense, Um, you know, it may be that

509
00:29:54,320 --> 00:29:58,640
Speaker 1: the output isn't as flashy as it could be if

510
00:29:58,640 --> 00:30:01,040
Speaker 1: it were a cable channel, but I think it's just

511
00:30:01,160 --> 00:30:04,800
Speaker 1: as relevant. So thanks again for sending in that question

512
00:30:05,080 --> 00:30:08,880
Speaker 1: about tech TV and whether it would survive on streaming.

513
00:30:09,400 --> 00:30:11,440
Speaker 1: It was fantastic to be able to catch up with

514
00:30:11,480 --> 00:30:14,880
Speaker 1: tom uh. It sounds like I might be popping onto

515
00:30:15,000 --> 00:30:17,800
Speaker 1: daily tech news show sometime in the new year, so

516
00:30:18,280 --> 00:30:20,360
Speaker 1: if you listen to that show you might hear my

517
00:30:20,520 --> 00:30:22,800
Speaker 1: voice on it. I apologize ahead of time for that.

518
00:30:23,760 --> 00:30:25,840
Speaker 1: In the meantime, if any of you out there have

519
00:30:25,920 --> 00:30:29,080
Speaker 1: suggestions for topics I should cover on episodes of tech Stuff,

520
00:30:29,080 --> 00:30:31,600
Speaker 1: maybe you've got a company I would you would like

521
00:30:31,640 --> 00:30:34,200
Speaker 1: me to talk about, or a specific technology, or maybe

522
00:30:34,200 --> 00:30:38,280
Speaker 1: a trend in tech um maybe sort of a perspective

523
00:30:38,400 --> 00:30:42,240
Speaker 1: on historical aspects of technology, any of those things. Let

524
00:30:42,280 --> 00:30:45,760
Speaker 1: me know. Send me a message via Twitter again. The

525
00:30:45,840 --> 00:30:48,680
Speaker 1: handle for the show is tech Stuff H s W

526
00:30:49,400 --> 00:30:58,040
Speaker 1: and I'll talk to you again really soon. Tech Stuff

527
00:30:58,120 --> 00:31:01,320
Speaker 1: is an I Heart Radio production. For more podcasts from

528
00:31:01,320 --> 00:31:05,080
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,

529
00:31:05,200 --> 00:31:11,760
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows. H