Speaker 1: Welcome to tech 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 You? Is time for the
Speaker 1: tech news for Tuesday, January eleven, twenty twenty two. And
Speaker 1: one of the big stories from last year was about
Speaker 1: how companies like Google and Apple are being challenged around
Speaker 1: the world for having effectively a closed off ecosystem when
Speaker 1: it comes to in app payments. The too long, didn't
Speaker 1: read version of that is that Google and Apple typically
Speaker 1: require app developers to use their in house payment systems
Speaker 1: for all customer purchases within an app. So we're talking
Speaker 1: about like virtual purpose purchases. This isn't the same rules
Speaker 1: don't apply if you're talking about things like rye haling
Speaker 1: or ordering a pizza like a real pizza. Anyway, this
Speaker 1: was something that video game studio Epic challenged with their
Speaker 1: game Fortnite when they gave gamers an opportunity to kind
Speaker 1: of circumvent these rules, and that led to all these
Speaker 1: different lawsuits they got filed between Epic and and notably Apple,
Speaker 1: but Google was also involved. Anyway, now you can actually
Speaker 1: choose a different payment option within apps than just the
Speaker 1: you know, in house payment option if you happen to
Speaker 1: live in South Korea. That is, because South Korea passed
Speaker 1: a law that bans app stores from forcing apps to
Speaker 1: use the stores payment system. Apple claims to already be
Speaker 1: in compliance with the law in South Korea, while Google
Speaker 1: said it was working on it. And at the heart
Speaker 1: of this is the concept of anti competitive practices. After all,
Speaker 1: if you tell folks that your system is the only
Speaker 1: game in town, well that's that's not competitive by definition.
Speaker 1: And so we've seen courts and governments around the world
Speaker 1: pushback against that practice. Now whether we'll see other countries
Speaker 1: follow South Korea's lead remains to be seen, but we
Speaker 1: have been seeing some movement in various court cases that
Speaker 1: are in theory at least forcing these companies to change
Speaker 1: their practices. In other Apple news, Bloomberg's Mark German recently
Speaker 1: blogged that Apple seems uninterested in the whole metaverse concept,
Speaker 1: more specifically in the company meta as in former Facebook
Speaker 1: Meta their vision for what the metaverse will be. And
Speaker 1: I think that's really interesting since Apple may actually unveil
Speaker 1: a mixed reality headset sometime this year. That not so
Speaker 1: secret project at Apple has been rumored for a few
Speaker 1: years now, and yet the company really hasn't acknowledged it publicly,
Speaker 1: at least not as far as I'm aware. This might
Speaker 1: be the year that changes all of that. According to German,
Speaker 1: it sounds like Apple's strategy is to take a more
Speaker 1: augmented reality versus virtual reality approach. Augmented reality is when
Speaker 1: you have a headset that allows you or some other
Speaker 1: method doesn't have to be a headset, but you have
Speaker 1: a technology that allows you to actually see the world
Speaker 1: around you, like the real world. You can see it,
Speaker 1: and then the system overlays digital information on top of
Speaker 1: your real world view. So it doesn't have to be
Speaker 1: a headset. It could be something like a smart window
Speaker 1: or just an app on your phone that can display
Speaker 1: information over your view of the real world. Um but
Speaker 1: the way I typically think of it as like a
Speaker 1: pair of glasses that could give you, say, directions as
Speaker 1: you make your way to a secret location to meet
Speaker 1: up with your undercover contact or whatever. Hi Jeff. Anyway,
Speaker 1: it sounds like Apple isn't on board with the metaverse
Speaker 1: approach and views VR as something that should be done
Speaker 1: as a sometimes activity, you know, like cookie monster now
Speaker 1: knows that cookies are just as sometimes food instead of
Speaker 1: like treating VR as a way where we should all
Speaker 1: interface with each other and the world around us through
Speaker 1: this metaverse thing. Now, I'm kind of on board with
Speaker 1: that idea, because I suspect if the metaverse really does
Speaker 1: become a thing, and I'm still very skeptical of that,
Speaker 1: I'm skeptical that will become something more than just little
Speaker 1: pockets of islands operated by single companies like Facebook. If
Speaker 1: it ever does become a big thing, I suspect I'm
Speaker 1: going to be the equivalent of a hermit and not
Speaker 1: be a participant in that ecosystem. That's just my guess.
Speaker 1: Over in Europe, Google is trying to sway EU Parliament
Speaker 1: members to ease off a bit on language contained in
Speaker 1: a proposed law called the Digital Markets Act or d
Speaker 1: m A. According to Javier Espinosa of The Financial Times,
Speaker 1: Google has spent buckets of cash on advertisements and action
Speaker 1: groups to convince lawmakers that placing regulations and restrictions on
Speaker 1: Google would be a really bad thing, particularly for small
Speaker 1: business owners. And one of the big factors in this
Speaker 1: law is the practice of promoting Google's own businesses within search.
Speaker 1: So you know how Google will serve up AD results
Speaker 1: as the first couple of entries on the search results page. Well,
Speaker 1: the issue here is that Google, according to the EU,
Speaker 1: tends to promote its own businesses above other businesses and
Speaker 1: thus gives itself preferential treatment in a marketplace that it controls.
Speaker 1: So think of it like this. Imagine that you go
Speaker 1: to a grocery store. I'm in the southeast. We'll call
Speaker 1: it Kroger, but you know it could be a g
Speaker 1: B or all these or whatever. You go into the Kroger,
Speaker 1: and all the Kroger brand items have prominent placement in
Speaker 1: all the different aisles, Like that's front and center. That's
Speaker 1: what you see, and all the other stuff from other
Speaker 1: companies is kind of hidden further back on shelves. That's
Speaker 1: kind of what the EU says Google has been doing.
Speaker 1: And it's something that another big tech company, namely Amazon,
Speaker 1: has been accused of doing. And even Apple has been
Speaker 1: lumped in here with the way Apple prioritizes its own
Speaker 1: products on devices like the iPhone. So the d m
Speaker 1: A law would potentially make it illegal for Google and
Speaker 1: other big tech companies that merit the consideration of being
Speaker 1: a quote unquote gatekeeper, it would make that that practice
Speaker 1: illegal for them. Now. I don't know how effective Google's
Speaker 1: lobbying campaign has been, but based off the people that
Speaker 1: Espinosa quotes in his piece and in the Financial Times,
Speaker 1: it sounds to me as though lawmakers are not really
Speaker 1: swayed by Google's arguments. Over Here in the United States,
Speaker 1: Google is getting called out for an internal project called
Speaker 1: Project Vivian, which was active from two thousand eighteen to
Speaker 1: two thousand twenty. So what was the project about? Well,
Speaker 1: according to the National Labor Relations Board or in l
Speaker 1: r B, the project was all about convincing Google employees
Speaker 1: that organizing and unionizing is you know, it's such a hassle,
Speaker 1: they shouldn't do it, Okay, Like, come on, folks, come on,
Speaker 1: let's all go to the cafe, get some pretzels. Okay. So,
Speaker 1: according to the n l RB, Google's director of Employment Law,
Speaker 1: a guy named Michael phil said, Project Vivian was designed
Speaker 1: quote to engage employees more positively and convince them that
Speaker 1: unions suck end quote Huh yeah, that sounds legit. And
Speaker 1: n l r B judge has ruled that Google must
Speaker 1: hand over one eighty internal documents related to Project Vivian,
Speaker 1: which up to now, Google has shown no intention of sharing.
Speaker 1: That might change with this judge's ruling remains to be seen.
Speaker 1: So what does Google have to say about this project. Well,
Speaker 1: mother Board reports that a Google spokesperson said, quote, the
Speaker 1: underlying case here has nothing to do with unionization. It's
Speaker 1: about employees breaching clear security protocols to access confidential information
Speaker 1: and systems inappropriately. End quote. I personally remained skeptical of that.
Speaker 1: Google has fired employees for those on those grounds. At
Speaker 1: least that's what the company has said. Sometimes the employees
Speaker 1: say no, it's because we were speaking out against practices
Speaker 1: that we viewed as being harmful or unfair or dangerous,
Speaker 1: and we got punished as a result when we were
Speaker 1: trying to get support for our point of view. So
Speaker 1: this is a continuation of issues that that originate several
Speaker 1: years back. So we'll have to keep an eye out
Speaker 1: to see how this continues. Now, I have a question
Speaker 1: for you. Have you ever had to go through the
Speaker 1: process of a job performance review. If so, you've probably
Speaker 1: encountered some kind of ratings system that explains that you
Speaker 1: are performing at or above or below expectations, But why
Speaker 1: have you just got kind of an overall rank compared
Speaker 1: to your fellow employees and no details? Like does that
Speaker 1: even sound practical? I mean, if you are told that
Speaker 1: you stink as an employee, but there's no elaboration, then
Speaker 1: how would anyone expect for you to improve? How could
Speaker 1: you take action to be a better employee if you
Speaker 1: don't know where the problems are. That's kind of at
Speaker 1: the heart of a situation that's brewing over at Amazon.
Speaker 1: So a former employee named Pat mcgawe, who was a
Speaker 1: drone engineer at Amazon, quit the company last year. And
Speaker 1: why did he quit? Well, he was told he was
Speaker 1: one of the least effective members of his team. However,
Speaker 1: he says he wasn't given any actual useful information on
Speaker 1: what led managers to designate him as being one of
Speaker 1: the least effective members on this team. He is told
Speaker 1: he could either submit a thirty day plan to show
Speaker 1: how he would improve his performance, which again, it's pretty
Speaker 1: hard if you're not really told where your performance is
Speaker 1: lacking in the first place. Or he could leave the
Speaker 1: company with a severance package. So he took that option.
Speaker 1: Now he is scheduled to provide testimony in a lawmaking
Speaker 1: session in the state of Washington, that's where Amazon is headquartered.
Speaker 1: And this is all part of a bill that's kind
Speaker 1: of been in limbo for about a year. That bill,
Speaker 1: if it were signed into law, would require employers to
Speaker 1: provide their employees their personnel thoughts, their specific personnel files,
Speaker 1: something that Mega says that Amazon has refused to do
Speaker 1: for him. Uh. Now, of course this is not a
Speaker 1: law yet, and macgau's testimony is just part of the
Speaker 1: proceedings that will you know, in theory, convinced lawmakers whether
Speaker 1: or not the bill is merited merited or if they
Speaker 1: should just you know, abandon it. Now. If the bill
Speaker 1: does pass, it could mean we all see some pretty
Speaker 1: significant changes in HR practices in the state of Washington.
Speaker 1: As I understand it, Amazon has a mandate to managers
Speaker 1: where they have to designate a certain percentage of their
Speaker 1: direct reports as being least effective, right, you know, like
Speaker 1: the whole idea being Okay, Well, if you're looking at
Speaker 1: the performance of all your employees, some of them are
Speaker 1: going to be high performers, some of them are going
Speaker 1: to be typical, and some will be least effective, and
Speaker 1: Amazon apparently has specific percentages of people who have to
Speaker 1: fall into that, which seems like counterintuitive to me. If
Speaker 1: I had a big workforce underneath me and everybody is
Speaker 1: operating at essentially the same level, then that would mean
Speaker 1: that I would have to arbitrarily choose which employees fall
Speaker 1: into that percentage to merit being the least effective. I
Speaker 1: think that might be what's at the heart of this
Speaker 1: issue here. Well, we have some more stories to cover,
Speaker 1: but before we get to that, let's take a quick break.
Speaker 1: We're back in Japan. The company Panasonic announced it will
Speaker 1: offer a four day work week schedule for its employees
Speaker 1: as part of an effort to motivate its workforce and
Speaker 1: to attract new talent. There's been a lot in the
Speaker 1: news lately of the talent shortage. You've got a lot
Speaker 1: of folks who are making the decision to leave their
Speaker 1: jobs and demand better working conditions and better compensation and benefits.
Speaker 1: And many studies show that a reduced work week can
Speaker 1: actually boost productivity. And this is kind of in line
Speaker 1: with Parkinson's law, which isn't really a law, just like
Speaker 1: Moore's law isn't really a law. Instead, Parkinson's law is
Speaker 1: more of a humorous observation. It was made by Cyril
Speaker 1: Northcote Parkinson in the nineteen fifties, and the observation says
Speaker 1: work will expand to fill the time allotted for work. So,
Speaker 1: in other words, let's say you've got a project and
Speaker 1: you've figured out reasonably that this project should take about
Speaker 1: three days to complete when assigned to a team of
Speaker 1: five people. Right, that's what you have determined. And you
Speaker 1: get two different teams of five people, and the two
Speaker 1: teams are of roughly equal ability, and they have access
Speaker 1: to the same resources in order to complete the task.
Speaker 1: And you give team number one the three days to
Speaker 1: do it, but you tell team number two they get
Speaker 1: a full week to do it. Now, according to Parkinson's law,
Speaker 1: team one will take the full three days, but they'll
Speaker 1: get the job done. Team two will do the same job,
Speaker 1: have the same level of output, like the same level
Speaker 1: of of satisfaction with that job, but it will have
Speaker 1: taken them the full five days to do it. Now. Again,
Speaker 1: this was meant to be a humorous observation, but here's
Speaker 1: the thing, it kind of plays out that way for
Speaker 1: real zs. The Washington Post reported that when Microsoft experimented
Speaker 1: with a four day work week. Also in Japan, productivity
Speaker 1: actually increased by so assuming that it was a work
Speaker 1: week of five days a week and they were reduced
Speaker 1: it down to four, that means a reduction in time
Speaker 1: at the office needed at improvement in productivity, and by
Speaker 1: that logic, it means if we never came into work
Speaker 1: at all, we would be incredibly productive. All right, that's
Speaker 1: just an absurd joke, but there really are plenty of
Speaker 1: cases in which a reduced work week prompted better performance.
Speaker 1: And in an era where attracting talent is going to
Speaker 1: become even more competitive, it might be a key strategy
Speaker 1: for some companies to start shifting to a four day
Speaker 1: work week. Now does that mean we're going to see
Speaker 1: that practice adopted in other countries besides Japan, I don't know.
Speaker 1: In fact, I was shocked to learn that workers in
Speaker 1: the United States actually put in more hours on an
Speaker 1: average week then your typical worker does in Japan. I
Speaker 1: always just assumed that, you know, the Japanese culture was
Speaker 1: so work centric that people in Japan were working much
Speaker 1: longer hours than people in America. But apparently, uh the
Speaker 1: Organization for Economic Cooperation found otherwise listing the United States
Speaker 1: as number eleven for most hours worked on average, and
Speaker 1: Japan ranked all the way down at twenty six. So
Speaker 1: that shows me video game company Take two Interactive, which
Speaker 1: is famous for publishing games like Borderlands, BioShock, and Grand
Speaker 1: Theft Auto, has a hankering for farming. And by that
Speaker 1: I mean the company has announced it intends to acquire
Speaker 1: the mobile game company Zinga in a deal that edges
Speaker 1: real darn close to thirteen billion dollars billion with a B. Now,
Speaker 1: the transaction would actually not just be a cash transaction.
Speaker 1: It would also include many, many, many shares of Take
Speaker 1: Two's common stock. Zinga, in case you're not aware, is
Speaker 1: famous for a bunch of uber popular social and mobile
Speaker 1: games like Farmville, that one being the infamous one, and
Speaker 1: Words with Friends, among others. So if this deal moves
Speaker 1: forward and it's not challenged by shareholders or various regulatory bodies,
Speaker 1: it should all be wrapped up by early twenty three.
Speaker 1: And honestly, I totally see how this makes sense. I mean,
Speaker 1: look at a game like Grand Theft Auto five. That
Speaker 1: video game came out in September of two thousand thirteen,
Speaker 1: and nearly a decade later, g t A Online, which
Speaker 1: is a part of g t A five, continues to
Speaker 1: be a big money maker for the company now. In
Speaker 1: that sense, the game is a lot like a lot
Speaker 1: of mobile games, which operate kind of like a game
Speaker 1: as a service. Some mobile games allow players to play
Speaker 1: the game in return for watching ads, so they generate
Speaker 1: revenue through ad views and they just continue to do
Speaker 1: that for as long as there's a player base. Some
Speaker 1: of them allow players to purchase the game outright, and
Speaker 1: that way they can play it without ads, but you know,
Speaker 1: they've actually ponied up cash to buy the game. Uh.
Speaker 1: And a lot of mobile games use various incentives to
Speaker 1: convince players to fork over money a little bit at
Speaker 1: a time in order for the players to access certain
Speaker 1: in game options like the ability to play one more
Speaker 1: turn or get access to certain in game materials. In
Speaker 1: other words, we've been seeing a convergence in how game
Speaker 1: publishers do business, using games to be an ongoing revenue
Speaker 1: generator rather than the model where you develop and release
Speaker 1: a title and you you know, the title cells as
Speaker 1: well as it sells, and then you move on to
Speaker 1: develop the next title, or even moving on to develop
Speaker 1: DLC connected to that original title. That model, you know,
Speaker 1: the revenue comes in blasts when you release a new game,
Speaker 1: but you don't have that long tail of revenue the
Speaker 1: way you do with these ongoing experiences like in mobile games,
Speaker 1: and we've seen more and more video and computer games
Speaker 1: kind of adopt that model. The deal would give Take
Speaker 1: to a much larger footprint in the mobile marketing space.
Speaker 1: I should add Take two does have mobile games in
Speaker 1: its portfolio, it's just that Zinga is really a giant
Speaker 1: name for mobile games, and presumably we would see more
Speaker 1: of Take two his properties get the mobile game treatment,
Speaker 1: and see a lot of related games coming out connected
Speaker 1: to things like Grand Theft, Auto and BioShock. This deal,
Speaker 1: assuming it moves forward, would be the largest video game
Speaker 1: acquisition deal in history. In fact, when Microsoft purchased Bethesda,
Speaker 1: the studio that's respond stable for the Elder Scrolls games,
Speaker 1: or as a lot of folks think of it, Skyrim
Speaker 1: UM and the Fallout games, that price tag was seven
Speaker 1: and a half billion dollars. And remember we're talking about
Speaker 1: Zinga being around thirteen billions. So yeah, this is a
Speaker 1: huge acquisition. One gadget that I think I talked about
Speaker 1: pretty early on last year was Razors Zefire mask, which
Speaker 1: they showed off at ce S twenty twenty one. Of
Speaker 1: course I didn't attend c e S one, but I
Speaker 1: remember seeing the mask being shown off, and I'm pretty
Speaker 1: sure I talked about it on tech stuff. Anyway, the
Speaker 1: mask looks a bit like the lower half of Darth
Speaker 1: Vader's mask, or maybe like one of the more futuristic
Speaker 1: Mortal Kombat Ninja masks. Uh. It has led lighting and
Speaker 1: it's got these little filtration events in it. Well. Originally,
Speaker 1: Razor was promoting the zeph Ear mask and the zeff
Speaker 1: ere Pro, which they unveiled at this past CS as
Speaker 1: masks that use filters that are of an IN grade
Speaker 1: in being the US standard for masks that filter out
Speaker 1: of tiny particles. So you know, they were saying it
Speaker 1: doesn't actually have an IN ninety five filter, but it
Speaker 1: has something that's comparable to an INN mask. However, now
Speaker 1: Razor appears to have walked that back. PC mag reports
Speaker 1: that Razor scrubbed references to in grade capabilities and its
Speaker 1: materials relating to the zef her Pro and switched over
Speaker 1: to the more vague descriptor of quote unquote air purification filters.
Speaker 1: The company released a tweet saying that quote the Razor
Speaker 1: Zephyr and those zef ere Pro are not medical devices, respirators,
Speaker 1: surgical masks, or personal protective equipped ppe and are not
Speaker 1: meant to be used in medical or clinical settings end quote. Now,
Speaker 1: Apparently an issue here is that while the mask has
Speaker 1: performed well in raisors internal tests and appears to show
Speaker 1: that it is equivalent to an IN nine mask, at
Speaker 1: least it appears to be, the technology has yet to
Speaker 1: be put through strenuous external tests. That is, experts need
Speaker 1: the chance to get their hands on the masks and
Speaker 1: determine if, in fact they actually meet the criteria to
Speaker 1: be considered in grade. So it doesn't necessarily mean that
Speaker 1: the masks aren't up to snuff. It just means that
Speaker 1: we can't be sure of it yet, and not being
Speaker 1: sure when it comes to equipment that you trust to
Speaker 1: provide protection against something like COVID, that's not really good enough. Now,
Speaker 1: my hope is that the external reviews will find that
Speaker 1: the zeph Your masks are effective and that they are
Speaker 1: in grade, and we can use that label and be
Speaker 1: confident in it. But we have to wait for the
Speaker 1: tests and the results of those tests to actually find out.
Speaker 1: I figure for the moment, it's good to look at
Speaker 1: them as like a really cool costume piece, um, and
Speaker 1: you know you're not planning on actually putting it to
Speaker 1: the test by wearing it in, say, like a crowded
Speaker 1: convention hall filled with people from all over the world,
Speaker 1: like I don't know, c E s. And instead when
Speaker 1: you go to something like that, First of all, I
Speaker 1: don't think you should go to something like that at all,
Speaker 1: But if you do have to go to it, use
Speaker 1: an in ninety five or K and mask like a
Speaker 1: real one and just save the the razor stuff for later. Okay,
Speaker 1: we've got a couple more stories before we conclude, and
Speaker 1: we're gonna take another quick break, all right. In some
Speaker 1: sad podcasting, Spotify has shut down its in house podcasting
Speaker 1: studio called Studio four. Now, first of all, you might
Speaker 1: wonder why was its in house studio called Studio four.
Speaker 1: Why did it have that name? Well, before Spotify had
Speaker 1: established its own podcasting studio, it had actually gone out
Speaker 1: and acquired other podcasting networks, namely Gimlet, The Wringer, and podcast.
Speaker 1: So those were the first three podcasting studios that Spotify owned,
Speaker 1: and then they made their own and called it Studio four,
Speaker 1: So it was really the fourth studio owned by Spotify.
Speaker 1: According to the Verge, folks at Studio for, we're perhaps
Speaker 1: feeling a little bit demoralized. Well before the company decided
Speaker 1: to give the studio the acts, uh, there were allegations
Speaker 1: that Spotify had lifted projects that were supposed to be
Speaker 1: Studio four podcasts but then assigned those to one of
Speaker 1: the other studios. So think of it like you're at
Speaker 1: a brainstorming meeting and you come up with a brilliant
Speaker 1: idea and you share it, and your boss says, that's
Speaker 1: a great idea, I'm gonna give it to Susie, and
Speaker 1: you're you're they're saying, but I'm I'm not Susie, and
Speaker 1: I'm the one who came up with the idea, and
Speaker 1: you're just shut out. That's kind of what the Studio
Speaker 1: for folks were saying was sort of happening to them. Also,
Speaker 1: it sounds like Studio four employees were frustrated that their
Speaker 1: work received little to no press or promotion, while some
Speaker 1: of the projects coming out of the other studios got
Speaker 1: a lot of attention. The affected employees are either going
Speaker 1: to be reassigned to other departments within Spotify or they're
Speaker 1: gonna get laid off. I'm hoping that everyone lands on
Speaker 1: their feet. Also, I remember reading that they were a
Speaker 1: little you know, upset and even just the name of
Speaker 1: the studio because it gives no sense of identity or direction,
Speaker 1: and they said it made them feel like they were leftovers,
Speaker 1: which is not a good feeling to have. I've been
Speaker 1: there myself, and that is not fun. So I'm sure
Speaker 1: that they will all find good spots to be in,
Speaker 1: whether it's at Spotify or somewhere else. My hope is
Speaker 1: that their talent will be well used in in an
Speaker 1: area that appreciates them. Uh. But yeah, that stinks. I
Speaker 1: hate to see it, even though I mean full disclosure.
Speaker 1: We can look at Spotify as being a competitor to
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio, particularly in the podcast space. But I
Speaker 1: don't want to see anyone like just lose their job
Speaker 1: or have their whole studio shut down. That's no, that's
Speaker 1: no bueno. Finally, in China, and Experimental Nuclear Fusion Facility
Speaker 1: has set a new record sustaining a fusion reaction for
Speaker 1: more than seventeen minutes Now, fusion is the process that
Speaker 1: stars go through as they produce energy, as the you know,
Speaker 1: classic song why does the Sunshine? Perhaps best known by
Speaker 1: the they Might Be Giants cover of that song. It
Speaker 1: originally appeared on a science album in the nineteen fifties,
Speaker 1: But they Might Be Giants really made it famous. That
Speaker 1: song says, quote, the Sun is a mass of incandescent gas,
Speaker 1: a gigantic nuclear furnace where hydrogen is built into helium
Speaker 1: at a temperature of millions of degrees end quote. Now
Speaker 1: there's some scientific errors in that song, which actually They
Speaker 1: Might Be Giants addressed in a a new version of
Speaker 1: the song called the Sun is a miasthma of incandescent plasma,
Speaker 1: So they got it covered. But anyway, what we're talking
Speaker 1: about here is the fusion process of taking hydrogen atoms
Speaker 1: in fusing them to make a helium adom, which is
Speaker 1: a reaction that also releases a tremendous amount of energy.
Speaker 1: Now in the Sun, this process continues because you've got
Speaker 1: intent heat and the incredible gravitational forces at play, and
Speaker 1: that sustains the reaction. Here on Earth, it's we can't
Speaker 1: really replicate that situation, right, We can't create a gravitational
Speaker 1: force akin to the core of the sun. So we
Speaker 1: have to use really powerful magnetic fields to control, contain,
Speaker 1: and create superheated plasma. There are lasers involved. It is awesome. Anyway,
Speaker 1: if we could get nuclear fusion to work in such
Speaker 1: a way that we are generating more energy than it
Speaker 1: required to initiate and maintain the reaction, we would be
Speaker 1: sitting pretty And that's because nuclear fusion doesn't have the
Speaker 1: same drawbacks as nuclear fission. That's how nuclear power plants
Speaker 1: that are producing energy that generates electricity, that's how they work.
Speaker 1: They work through fission, not fusion. They are splitting atoms,
Speaker 1: not fusing them. And with fusion, you're not dealing with
Speaker 1: dangerous rate acted materials like uranium. Uh, they're not dealing
Speaker 1: with dangerous radioactive wastes that have an incredibly long half life. Uh.
Speaker 1: You don't have to figure out where you're gonna store
Speaker 1: all that stuff, which gets around that political issue of
Speaker 1: where do we store nuclear waste. Nobody wants it anywhere
Speaker 1: close to them, so it becomes a real challenge and
Speaker 1: you could potentially harvest your quote unquote fuel from ocean
Speaker 1: water while generating plenty of energy for everyone, but we're
Speaker 1: not there yet. So far, the systems we built required
Speaker 1: more energy to produce and maintain a reaction than we
Speaker 1: get out of the reaction. But each of these experiments
Speaker 1: is a step toward really nailing it. The facility in
Speaker 1: China created a superheated plasma that reached around one six
Speaker 1: million degrees fahrenheit. For reference, the core of the Sun
Speaker 1: only gets up to about twenty seven million degrees fahrenheit,
Speaker 1: so it's positively chilly compared to the artificial sun that
Speaker 1: the Chinese facility created. Scientists plan to use the knowledge
Speaker 1: they gain from these experiments to make the next generation
Speaker 1: of experimental facilities work even better. Right now, engineers and
Speaker 1: scientists around the world are working together on a facility
Speaker 1: called the International Thermonuclear Experimental Reactor or either I t
Speaker 1: e ER. That project actually was first proposed way back
Speaker 1: in Construction didn't start until two thousand seven. Um it's
Speaker 1: still going on today. It's not fully built out, because
Speaker 1: I mean, these are like the most complicated technologies that
Speaker 1: we've ever worked on. I mean, it's it's like the
Speaker 1: Large Hadron collider was that before, and now either kind
Speaker 1: of takes that title. As as we speak. The planned
Speaker 1: first achievement of lasma has been projected to five so
Speaker 1: we're still a couple of years out from even producing
Speaker 1: plasma at Eider, and then the planned start of full
Speaker 1: operation would be a decade later. And this is still
Speaker 1: in the pathway of creating nuclear fusion as a way
Speaker 1: of practically generating electricity if we're really looking down a line,
Speaker 1: so even in we're not talking about a nuclear fusion
Speaker 1: plant that's producing electricity on a practical scale. Uh. In fact,
Speaker 1: there are already places that are looking at successors to Eider,
Speaker 1: and we ain't even got started doing science at Eider yet. Anyway,
Speaker 1: here's hoping all this work leads to a transformational solution
Speaker 1: for our energy requirements. It would be a huge, huge
Speaker 1: scientific achievement if we can nail nuclear fusion and make
Speaker 1: it practical here on Earth. Okay, that wraps up the
Speaker 1: news stories for Tuesday, January eleven, twenty you. I hope
Speaker 1: all of you are well. If you have any suggestions
Speaker 1: for topics I should tackle on tech Stuff in the future,
Speaker 1: feel free to reach out to me on Twitter. The
Speaker 1: handle for the show is text stuff h s W
Speaker 1: and I'll talk to you again. Really sick Y tech
Speaker 1: Stuff is an I Heart Radio production. For more podcasts
Speaker 1: from My Heart Radio, visit the i heart Radio app,
Speaker 1: Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.