Speaker 1: Why gas station is a dangerous place to use your
Speaker 1: credit card. Instagram combats bullying in a unique way. Ten
Speaker 1: best gadgets of the last ten years, and your tech
Speaker 1: questions Answered. What's going on? I'm Rich Dmiro. This is
Speaker 1: Rich on Tech, the show where I talk about the
Speaker 1: tech stuff that I think you should know about. Plus
Speaker 1: I answer all the questions that you send me. But
Speaker 1: I will say, for the first time in several weeks,
Speaker 1: your questions are actually less than the CES emails I'm getting,
Speaker 1: which is just insane all time high. Welcome producer Megan
Speaker 1: to the show.
Speaker 2: What's Up? What's going on?
Speaker 1: The holidays? That's what's going on? Like our little holiday music. Yeah,
Speaker 1: all right, we'll get that out of there. Lots to
Speaker 1: talk about in this show. I will start by talking
Speaker 1: about upgrading my mom's setup because I was in New
Speaker 1: Jersey and whenever I go home to New Jersey, I
Speaker 1: basically spend a day with my dad and a day
Speaker 1: with my mom upgrading all their stuff. Because it's kind
Speaker 1: of what tech nerds do when they go home. It's
Speaker 1: a very common thing. And so for my mom, she's
Speaker 1: going to go over all the things I did because
Speaker 1: it was crazy. It was one day, but everything changed
Speaker 1: for her. And this is the thing. You know my mom,
Speaker 1: she rolls with this stuff. And this is the beauty
Speaker 1: of technology is that it doesn't have to be super complicated.
Speaker 1: Everything that I do when I set up my friends
Speaker 1: and family with tech is I want to make it
Speaker 1: not so complicated so that they can enjoy it and
Speaker 1: understand it and just love it and not have to
Speaker 1: be figuring out fifteen different remotes and this, how do
Speaker 1: I switch to this input in this and that. So
Speaker 1: first thing I did, I basically upgraded my mom's fire
Speaker 1: TV stick. She had an old Amazon Fire TV stick,
Speaker 1: not the four K version, and so I actually had
Speaker 1: given her a four K Fire TV stick, like I
Speaker 1: think it was over the summer for like her birthday,
Speaker 1: and I was like, oh, here, you need an upgrade.
Speaker 1: And she never set it up. Of course she didn't
Speaker 1: because she doesn't set things up herself. So I get home,
Speaker 1: I see this thing on the table and I'm like, Mom,
Speaker 1: can we set this up? So we set that up
Speaker 1: and I'm using her old firestick and wow, it was
Speaker 1: so slow. She's like, well, this thing always has problems.
Speaker 1: I'm like, yeah, I can see why, because it's so slow.
Speaker 1: It was ridiculous. So I got the four K one
Speaker 1: worked so much better, logged her into different apps. Then
Speaker 1: I'm looking at her at and T TV. I'm like, hey,
Speaker 1: let me see your bill, your credit card bill for
Speaker 1: this at and T direct TV now whatever it used
Speaker 1: to be called. And she shows me your bill. It's
Speaker 1: sixty five bucks a month. I'm like, sixty five bucks
Speaker 1: a month. How many channels are you watching? She only
Speaker 1: watches one out there in New York, it's like ABC seven.
Speaker 1: And so I'm like, well, you know you're paying like
Speaker 1: sixty five dollars a month for all these different channels
Speaker 1: that you don't watch. It's like, well, sometimes watch Food Network.
Speaker 1: I'm like, can you do without it? Because we can
Speaker 1: save you sixty bucks a month. So it's like yeah,
Speaker 1: I'm all right. So we cancel that, and so DirecTV
Speaker 1: eighten T now whatever's gone. But now she doesn't have
Speaker 1: a local channel. So I look up low Cast. I
Speaker 1: remember we talked about this, This is the app that
Speaker 1: lets you get your local channels. Oh OK, A lot
Speaker 1: of people have written in with mixed reactions to how
Speaker 1: good it is. But anyway, so I set her up
Speaker 1: with that low cast dot org is the website. Plus
Speaker 1: they have an app that lets you get your local channels.
Speaker 1: Even in LA. You can get KTLA on there. I
Speaker 1: don't know how long it's gonna last, and it's not illegal,
Speaker 1: but they're operating as some sort of a gray zone
Speaker 1: that the broadcasters are kind of fighting it, so who knows,
Speaker 1: but it works for now. And I set her up
Speaker 1: with that and to get rid of all the kind
Speaker 1: of clutter on the screen, like they kind of bombarred
Speaker 1: you every fifteen minutes with like an AD or something.
Speaker 1: You pay five bucks a month. So I was like,
Speaker 1: all right, for five bucks a month, are you willing
Speaker 1: to pay that? She's like sure, So we did that.
Speaker 1: Then we were on a roll. I said, well, now
Speaker 1: you've got a four K fire stick, do you want
Speaker 1: to upgrade your TV? And she's like sure. I said,
Speaker 1: four KTVs are so cheap. So we found one of
Speaker 1: Best Buy TCL five series. It was three hundred and
Speaker 1: twenty nine dollars and I was like, for three hundred
Speaker 1: twenty nine dollars for four KTV. By the way, way
Speaker 1: bigger fifty yes, she had a forty two, so fifty
Speaker 1: five and by the way, forty two with like these
Speaker 1: giant bezels, you know, the black bar around the screen.
Speaker 1: So we go to best Buy. We order it online,
Speaker 1: pick up in store. I gave her my five dollars
Speaker 1: best Buy rewards card five dollars off. So we do that.
Speaker 1: We come home, we set it all up, the TV
Speaker 1: so light. I can carry it by myself up the
Speaker 1: stairs into our place and you know, set it all ye,
Speaker 1: So we do that. Her TV looks fantastic. So all
Speaker 1: that's done. Then I upgrade her computer. I bought her
Speaker 1: computer a couple of years ago, and so I upgraded
Speaker 1: that to another computer that I had given her, like
Speaker 1: one of my old ones. Yeah, and she never really
Speaker 1: set it up again. So I got that all set up.
Speaker 2: This is fun for you. This is fun for you.
Speaker 1: Love doing this, Like this is like if I could
Speaker 1: do this every day. Yeah, well it'll probably be a job,
Speaker 1: so probably not, but I do it is fun because
Speaker 1: it's like things could be interesting and different. So we
Speaker 1: do the computer and then with the old computer. She
Speaker 1: had two of her old computers sitting there from the
Speaker 1: last two times I upgraded over the past decade because
Speaker 1: I was like, mom, we'll figure this out. So I'm like,
Speaker 1: all right, you know what, we're getting rid of these
Speaker 1: right now? So I research online. It turns out that
Speaker 1: at best Buy they charge you to like recycle a monitor,
Speaker 1: it's like twenty five bucks. But at Staples they'll take
Speaker 1: anything with no fee. So we drove her to Staples,
Speaker 1: brought the computer to the old computer and the old monitor,
Speaker 1: and we recycled there and that was good. I also
Speaker 1: gave her a Google Home Hub. This was one of
Speaker 1: her Christmas gifts, so I got her like the little one.
Speaker 1: I want to get her the big one, but I
Speaker 1: was like, she really got a video chat? Probably not,
Speaker 1: so got her the little one. And the thing that
Speaker 1: she loves about this is the pictures. So it's basically
Speaker 1: a picture frame. It's now called the Google Nest Hub,
Speaker 1: but it shows your pictures when you're not using it,
Speaker 1: and she loves her pictures blah blah blah. So we
Speaker 1: did that and now she's got her pictures on this
Speaker 1: little thing. And finally I gave her my old pixel
Speaker 1: because I upgraded to the iPhone, so I gave her
Speaker 1: my old Pixel three Excel that I bought, and she
Speaker 1: still wanted to stick with a pixel. She's had a
Speaker 1: pixel now for I think two years three, okay, and
Speaker 1: she really likes it and she loves her pictures from it.
Speaker 2: She was a new woman.
Speaker 1: Yeah, so she got a new phone. And by the way,
Speaker 1: the phone is bigger because it's the Excel. She used
Speaker 1: to have the regular one.
Speaker 2: Okay.
Speaker 1: So anyway, my point is she is hooked up. Oh
Speaker 1: and it's basically all hand me downs for me. But
Speaker 1: still it's new to her for the most part.
Speaker 2: You treat your tech nicely too, It's not like it's
Speaker 2: all dinged up. It's exactly pretty much brand new.
Speaker 1: Yes. So anyway, so she is loving all her new
Speaker 1: stuff and transferring everything and setting it all up was
Speaker 1: not that tough and it was really fun. And the
Speaker 1: reason I tell this story is because if my mom
Speaker 1: can deal with all this new technology and one day
Speaker 1: it's basically a tech makeover, you can deal with it too.
Speaker 1: You can figure it out. This stuff is not complicated.
Speaker 1: It gets easier and easier every year. Next time I
Speaker 1: go home, I'm gonna set her up with some smart
Speaker 1: plugs because I think that she'd really like the idea
Speaker 1: of turning on and off lights around ther house with
Speaker 1: just her voice. Oh yeah, and also setting some of
Speaker 1: those on timers, because right now she's like walking through
Speaker 1: the house turning things on and off, and I feel
Speaker 1: like she'd probably really enjoy having some of these on timers.
Speaker 1: I also think she'd really enjoy a chrome Cast that
Speaker 1: would show her pictures on the big screen when she's
Speaker 1: not using her TV. Also, so I've been doing that
Speaker 1: at my house. I come home and I now say, h, Google,
Speaker 1: turn on the living room chrome cast and if you
Speaker 1: just do that, it'll turn on your TV, switch to
Speaker 1: the chrome Cast input and just display your pictures as
Speaker 1: a screen saver, which is really nice because your TV,
Speaker 1: if it's sitting there with a dark screen, it's kind
Speaker 1: of useless. So I've been doing that. The only problem
Speaker 1: is when I want to switch back to fire TV,
Speaker 1: I have to like use the input button on the remote,
Speaker 1: which is kind of annoying. So I'm trying to figure that.
Speaker 1: I don't know if you can add your own pictures
Speaker 1: to Roku. Last I checked, I don't think you can. Natively,
Speaker 1: there might be a third party app that lets you
Speaker 1: do it, and you know, Google or Sorry, the Amazon
Speaker 1: fire Stick lets you do it, but you have to
Speaker 1: upload your pictures to Amazon and so that means curating them,
Speaker 1: whereas Google just does it for you, and then Apple
Speaker 1: same thing. You can do it, but you have to
Speaker 1: curate your pictures and it's kind of a anyway. All right,
Speaker 1: So now you heard my story. Let's get one of
Speaker 1: the questions.
Speaker 2: Okayat Megan, So this first question comes from and Alon.
Speaker 2: She says, I need your advice. Can you please let
Speaker 2: me know the difference between a chromebook and laptop. I'm
Speaker 2: planning on buying these for my daughters, ages twelve and
Speaker 2: nine years old. I'm not looking for any fancy stuff,
Speaker 2: basically for homework and for them to log into their
Speaker 2: applications from school for extra reading and mathwork. And then
Speaker 2: she asks which device should I buy for each girl
Speaker 2: for depending on their ages. My twelve year old is
Speaker 2: a seventh grader and my nine year old is a
Speaker 2: fourth grader.
Speaker 1: Okay, so first question, the difference between a Chromebook and Windows.
Speaker 1: The main difference between a Chromebook and Windows is that
Speaker 1: Chrome runs the Chrome operating system, which if you've ever
Speaker 1: used the Chrome web browser online, it's basically that, but
Speaker 1: as an entire operating system. So it does have a
Speaker 1: desktop and things like that, but primarily When you think
Speaker 1: of a chromebook, think of it as you are on
Speaker 1: the web doing work. Now I can get ninety nine
Speaker 1: point nine percent of my work done on the web,
Speaker 1: which includes resizing photos, checking my email, watching YouTube, uploading pictures,
Speaker 1: uploading videos. What else did I miss surfing the web?
Speaker 1: The things I can't do mail, email, spreadsheets, making documents,
Speaker 1: google docs, typing up documents. The thing I can't do
Speaker 1: is basically edit video. And that's it. So if your
Speaker 1: daughters are they both daughters? Did she say yes? So
Speaker 1: if your daughters are only doing things primarily, I think
Speaker 1: the delineation is this, do your daughters need to download
Speaker 1: any sort of specialty apps for their use? So if
Speaker 1: there's a special let's say they're a scientist and they
Speaker 1: need a special science app that you need to download
Speaker 1: to a computer and run it, the chromebook will not
Speaker 1: run that app because it's generally a Windows app. Okay,
Speaker 1: So that's the main thing to keep in mind. But
Speaker 1: otherwise I would say, talk to your kids and see
Speaker 1: if they use like, ask them, hey, what apps do
Speaker 1: you use? Like what? Don't use the word apps? Use
Speaker 1: programs because apps think you think of phone, So program
Speaker 1: is like on my computer right now, I have like
Speaker 1: ever note is a program. Now you can run that
Speaker 1: in totally in the web, but it works better as
Speaker 1: a native app. I've got my Reminders that's a MacApp,
Speaker 1: so I use that, you know, on the computer, But
Speaker 1: ninety nine percent of what you want to do for
Speaker 1: the average person is available on a chromebook, so I'd
Speaker 1: recommend going with those. The benefits of a Chromebook are security,
Speaker 1: so there's really no viruses for them. Software updates are automatic,
Speaker 1: and they're really fast, and they're kind of invisible. It
Speaker 1: happens when you kind of restart the computer and that's it.
Speaker 2: What about like a MacBook Air.
Speaker 1: The problem is if she's deciding between a Chromebook, it's
Speaker 1: usually a MacBook Air starts at about one thousand bucks.
Speaker 1: So I thought, like the.
Speaker 2: Really small one was cheaper, but maybe it might be
Speaker 2: it maybe six ninety nine.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but I don't think so, I think that it
Speaker 1: let me let me go one that's.
Speaker 2: Like twelve inch screen, I think, or even smaller.
Speaker 1: There's well, let's say MacBook Air. So you've got a
Speaker 1: MacBook Air and the cheapest MacBook Air that I see
Speaker 1: on the website is one ninety nine. Yeah, So when
Speaker 1: you're talking ninety nine percent of the people that email
Speaker 1: me about a computer, Mac is not even in the
Speaker 1: picture because you're only looking at a Mac if you
Speaker 1: need to do something specific when it comes to audio video,
Speaker 1: or you love your iPhone so much you just feel
Speaker 1: like a Mac would be the perfect compliment. Otherwise, most
Speaker 1: people that I'm talking to are not going with a Mac,
Speaker 1: and they're going like, I'm talking average person who's just
Speaker 1: doing web surfing stuff. And in fact, I love the Mac.
Speaker 1: I think that the Mac is amazing. Do I recommend
Speaker 1: it for everyone? Because no, you probably don't need it.
Speaker 1: If you can save money, like just surfing the web
Speaker 1: on a chromebook, go ahead and get the Chromebook. And
Speaker 1: it also has a lot of advantages for software. You
Speaker 1: don't have to think about updates, you to think about
Speaker 1: apps and things like that. So for most people, I
Speaker 1: would say a Chromebook is the way to go. And
Speaker 1: when people are looking at laptops and chromebooks, I always
Speaker 1: recommend Costco because they generally only have one to two selections,
Speaker 1: so it's very easy and they're always better than what
Speaker 1: you find anywhere else. So let's say they had the
Speaker 1: same exact chromebook at Costco that they do at Best Buy.
Speaker 1: The one at Costco will be a little bit cheaper
Speaker 1: and the specs will be a little bit better. It's
Speaker 1: always like that. It's the way Costco cuts their deals
Speaker 1: with these retailers or these manufacturers.
Speaker 2: I should say love Costco?
Speaker 1: Yes, so do I love that place. Gas stations are
Speaker 1: the most dangerous place to use your credit card, and
Speaker 1: not just credit card, but debit card, anything that has
Speaker 1: the Visa or MasterCard logo on it, or American Express whatever.
Speaker 1: And according to Visa, they have said that hackers are
Speaker 1: not even using skimmers anymore. We've always heard about skimmers,
Speaker 1: which is a physical device that hackers install over the
Speaker 1: card reader and steal your number. They don't bother with
Speaker 1: that anymore because people are kind hiped to that if
Speaker 1: you see some big old thing on the scanner, you're
Speaker 1: gonna be like, I'm not using that. What they do
Speaker 1: is they hack the gas station software and once inside,
Speaker 1: all they have to do is scrape all the card
Speaker 1: numbers that are flown through that software when you scan
Speaker 1: your card at the pump. And the reason why Visa's
Speaker 1: warning about this is because it's basically in their best
Speaker 1: interest to have these gas stations upgrade to the chip
Speaker 1: and pin And if you've noticed, every retailer now pretty
Speaker 1: much has chip and pin so which chip Most of
Speaker 1: the time they're chip so, which means you pop your
Speaker 1: you insert your credit card in, you don't swipe it anymore.
Speaker 2: My favorite is the tap.
Speaker 1: Tap is the best.
Speaker 2: Tap is the best.
Speaker 1: And a lot of retailers have tap as well. And
Speaker 1: I would say the last holdout that I go to,
Speaker 1: I think is Ralph's that does not have LAP. They're
Speaker 1: trying to use their own, like Kroger. Kroger's so big
Speaker 1: that they can use their own like Walmart. Actually, Walmart
Speaker 1: and Kroger are the last two holdouts.
Speaker 2: They have their own version.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they have their own thing. It's like a QR
Speaker 1: code you scan because think about it, when you tap
Speaker 1: your credit card on that device, they have to pay
Speaker 1: a little percentage to that credit card company for that
Speaker 1: ability to take that card. So the reason they don't
Speaker 1: want to do that is because with their system, if
Speaker 1: they use like you know, Walmart Pay or whatever, yeah,
Speaker 1: it doesn't cost them as much. So if you think
Speaker 1: about a billion transactions in a year or however many
Speaker 1: they do, even a penny per transaction is a lot
Speaker 1: of money.
Speaker 2: But do you think people will decide to not go there?
Speaker 1: No. No, Every time I go to Ralph's, I'm like,
Speaker 1: when are you going to take it? Was a while
Speaker 1: they wouldn't even take the chip. So, but the tap
Speaker 1: is so I've gotten so used to the tap and
Speaker 1: in fact, so okay, let me just go through a
Speaker 1: little bit more of this story. So the hackers are
Speaker 1: getting these numbers because they're they're exposed when you swipe
Speaker 1: your card, your actual card number that's printed on the
Speaker 1: front of the card is being transmitted over the internets
Speaker 1: when you dip your card, when you pop it into
Speaker 1: that slot. As a chip, it's creating a one time
Speaker 1: number that is transmitted. So if someone, let's say, you
Speaker 1: got my number, you can't do anything with it because
Speaker 1: that number only lasted. It's a one time number. It's
Speaker 1: disposable for all intents and purposes. So this is why
Speaker 1: we switch over to the chip because it's much more secure.
Speaker 1: And Visa saying that gas stations the reason why they're
Speaker 1: so dangerous is because they are the last place that
Speaker 1: does not have chip. Everyone else has chip now and
Speaker 1: I'm not talking mobile payment chip. Chip is still chip
Speaker 1: and dip. It sounds like something you would have it
Speaker 1: you're a fourth at your your super Bowl part. So
Speaker 1: my recommendation on this with a gas station, and I've
Speaker 1: found this to be true with myself, find a gas
Speaker 1: station that uses tap and it's very tough to find.
Speaker 1: I find in the Los Angeles area. Arco is really
Speaker 1: good at having tap to pay, so is Chevron. That's it.
Speaker 1: The rest of the gas stations they don't. They all
Speaker 1: have this still the swipe where it's actually insert, but
Speaker 1: it's not really a chip. It's still it's a swipe
Speaker 1: insert kind of thing, you know what I mean. I
Speaker 1: think it's not a true chip anyway. So that's my
Speaker 1: advice because when you use tap to pay or use
Speaker 1: your chip, or if you even tap your credit card,
Speaker 1: A lot of these credit cards, if you look on
Speaker 1: the back, they have a little wireless symbol. Your credit
Speaker 1: card is actually taped to pay enabled, so you can
Speaker 1: actually physically a lot of the Chase cards you can
Speaker 1: tap to pay. Yeah. Yeah, and so that's the cards
Speaker 1: that I got.
Speaker 2: Works.
Speaker 1: Yeah, So my advice, use the tap to pay your
Speaker 1: gas station. It's I would say, I was trying to
Speaker 1: find a good app to recommend that you can look
Speaker 1: at to see where a tap to pay gas station
Speaker 1: is near you and I the only app I found.
Speaker 1: I didn't really it wasn't very good. It was kind
Speaker 1: of like, let's see so I had deleted off my phone.
Speaker 1: I think I did. Yeah, I did. It was so
Speaker 1: bad I didn't even keep it on here Gas Buddy, No,
Speaker 1: I don't think gas Buddy shows it may but I don't.
Speaker 1: I don't. I have to look at that. In the meantime,
Speaker 1: while I look that up, you go through your next question.
Speaker 2: Okay, so our next question comes from Diane. The subject
Speaker 2: is new phone phobia. My husband and I need to
Speaker 2: upgrade our cell phones. We're not tech savvy, So which
Speaker 2: do you recommend? The iPhone or an Android phone. We
Speaker 2: like to talk, text, take pictures and share stuff with family.
Speaker 2: Did I mention we're over fifty eight years of age?
Speaker 2: Technology challenged? I thought that was a sweet.
Speaker 1: Okay, I like that. That's nice. I would recommend probably.
Speaker 1: I know. I know everyone that's listening is gonna say, oh,
Speaker 1: Rich is gonna say the iPhone right.
Speaker 2: Here's why I don't know what you're gonna say.
Speaker 1: Here's why I say the iPhone. Okay, because number one,
Speaker 1: she said she wants to text with friends and family, right, yes, okay,
Speaker 1: I'm guessing if she's like a lot of Americans, her
Speaker 1: family and friends have iPhones. Okay, So that means that
Speaker 1: you have I Message and you probably want to be
Speaker 1: able to send things easily, quickly, share photos, videos, all
Speaker 1: that good stuff. That's why I would recommend the iPhone.
Speaker 1: It's also easier because when you run into a problem,
Speaker 1: you can ask a friend versus an Android, where a
Speaker 1: lot of people put their shoulders up and they're like,
Speaker 1: I don't know. So that's another reason for the iPhone.
Speaker 1: You've got the Apple Store, so if you really have,
Speaker 1: you know, you want to really take it to the
Speaker 1: next level, you can take some classes there about how
Speaker 1: to use your phone. There's also this book, what's the
Speaker 1: book book? Did someone write an iPhone book?
Speaker 2: There's an iPhone book? Oh my gosh, what is it called?
Speaker 1: One iPhone? That one? Yeah?
Speaker 2: That one?
Speaker 1: Yea. Who's the author on that? So you've got that?
Speaker 2: It seems like Tom Demiro, it's very similar, yeah, Tom, Tom.
Speaker 1: So so you've got the book. You can get one
Speaker 1: hundred and one iPhone Tips and Tricks I just feel like,
Speaker 1: and I love Android, don't get me wrong, you know,
Speaker 1: I love it. Yeah, yeah, I don't. I always want
Speaker 1: to switch to Android.
Speaker 2: You're no, you there's like a good six months of
Speaker 2: the year where you're on Android, and you're like, I
Speaker 2: don't want to go back to the iPhone and buy
Speaker 2: the next iPhone? Yes, well yeah you should.
Speaker 1: So, and it is great and it's you know, it's
Speaker 1: one of these things. Plus you have a lot of
Speaker 1: selections of phones you can go in. You've got a
Speaker 1: lot of choice. Yeah, And I just feel like, if
Speaker 1: you want to phone your you're fifty eight, if you
Speaker 1: want a phone that lasts, you know, a good three years,
Speaker 1: I would say, just go go with an iPhone. Go
Speaker 1: with the iPhone eleven. Yeah, go with the ten R
Speaker 1: if you're if they don't even sell that anymore, I
Speaker 1: don't think, but iPhone, Go with the iPhone eleven and
Speaker 1: just that'll last you three years. You'll be great, you know,
Speaker 1: three years, if not more.
Speaker 2: I feel like forever.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it could last you four years. Yeah, yeah, my
Speaker 1: dad is still on the Uh what did he have,
Speaker 1: like the success? Maybe my dad.
Speaker 2: Had the five for like up until a month ago.
Speaker 1: You can keep these things for a long time. Yeah,
Speaker 1: let's put it this way. The latest version of iOS
Speaker 1: is iOS thirteen. It still works on the iPhone six s,
Speaker 1: which I remember the iPhone's success when that came out,
Speaker 1: and that had to be Let's see how many years
Speaker 1: ago was that. That was twenty fifteen. You're talking four years.
Speaker 2: Okay, all has a success. Plus, that's pretty good time
Speaker 2: for HERD update.
Speaker 1: Okay, let's talk about Instagram. They're doing something interesting to
Speaker 1: try to combat bullying. When you type a caption on
Speaker 1: your photo and it's considered offensive by their AI, they
Speaker 1: are going to say, excuse me, do you really want
Speaker 1: to say that? And we've talked about this before. They've
Speaker 1: done this with comments in the past. I call it
Speaker 1: the Taylor Swift filter because she basically was the one
Speaker 1: who asked to do this. Apparently, Oh did she?
Speaker 2: Yeah? Because I guess show doesn't have like she turns
Speaker 2: all of that.
Speaker 1: I know that's why, because she didn't like the mean comments. Yeah, so,
Speaker 1: and I get it. It's it's the Internet is a
Speaker 1: is a rough place. You don't you know, you put
Speaker 1: yourself out there when you put a Now, if you're
Speaker 1: just posting stuff with friends, and family generally, you're not
Speaker 1: gonna I mean, are your friends really gonna be that? Like,
Speaker 1: al yeah, I hope they're not. I mean, but if
Speaker 1: you're in the public, if you're in the public, and
Speaker 1: a lot of people do bully public figures because they figure,
Speaker 1: I don't know this person, like I could just say
Speaker 1: whatever I want, you know, model Supermodel posts like a
Speaker 1: picture and they're like, oh, you're too fat, like yeah,
Speaker 1: and people do it right, and they do it just
Speaker 1: to be like mean yeah, and you know, it's it's
Speaker 1: really bad on YouTube. YouTube meets to license this technology
Speaker 1: from Instagram. I I always call Instagram like Disneyland. It's
Speaker 1: like the Disneyland of the Internet because it really is
Speaker 1: like happy. They block all the hashtags that are bad.
Speaker 1: You know, you try to type in a bad hashtag
Speaker 1: on Instagram, I don't try it, Okay, well do you try.
Speaker 1: I've tried, yeah, and there and it comes up nothing.
Speaker 1: They say that this hashtag that was a couple of
Speaker 1: years ago where they started doing that, And they even
Speaker 1: do it where they find trending because people get around it.
Speaker 1: So people pick a hashtag to do something dirty with
Speaker 1: or something bad with, and Instagram will pick up on
Speaker 1: it and they'll block it. They'll say like these tags
Speaker 1: have been registered as offensive or something. So anyway, my
Speaker 1: point is, ye, and I remember this whole thing happened.
Speaker 1: This actually happened a couple of years ago by a
Speaker 1: viewer unbeknownst to me. She said, my son is finding
Speaker 1: these really inappropriate pictures on Instagram. And I was like,
Speaker 1: there's no inappropriate pictures on Instagram. Sure enough, I did
Speaker 1: a main main hashtag that she sent me. It was
Speaker 1: like I don't know, ice cream or something, yeah, whatever
Speaker 1: it was, it was something very like simple, and sure enough,
Speaker 1: the pictures that came up were filled with terrible stuff.
Speaker 1: And so I was like, wow, I had no idea.
Speaker 1: And so this is when I kind of realized that
Speaker 1: Instagram is doing that. And then they after that was
Speaker 1: like probably six months later that they said, oh, we're
Speaker 1: going to start filtering hashit. Anyway, so now they're doing comments.
Speaker 1: So when you type a comment, it will say can
Speaker 1: you please reconsider this because it might be mean, And
Speaker 1: it's AI that's figuring out if it's mean or not.
Speaker 1: So you say eat a burger to who's adi? So
Speaker 1: if you say eat a burger to her and maybe
Speaker 1: like Megan, do you really want to say that?
Speaker 2: But it would I feel like eat a burger that's
Speaker 2: not right, as like an AI wouldn't pick that up
Speaker 2: as oh.
Speaker 1: You don't know it may or like you need a burger,
Speaker 1: Yeah you need a burger. That could be mean.
Speaker 2: That could be mean.
Speaker 1: Or how about like I bet you put your mayo
Speaker 1: on the side.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I bet you take the bun off and just
Speaker 2: eat the meat.
Speaker 1: I bet you eat that protein style.
Speaker 2: Yeah, those are good.
Speaker 1: That lettus wrap, Yeah, I would do that just.
Speaker 2: Just for a healthy lunch in and out.
Speaker 1: It's it's much lighter. Yeah, you can well done? Yeah, exactly,
Speaker 1: have well done. Okay, so that's what Instagram is doing.
Speaker 2: Okay. This next question comes from your Facebook, which is
Speaker 2: Facebook dot com. Slash rich On Chris asks, Hey, rich
Speaker 2: is there a digital picture frame that can be linked
Speaker 2: to your iPhone? I feel like we've answered this a
Speaker 2: couple times, but I.
Speaker 1: Feel like it too, but I think I'll just go
Speaker 1: over the too. It is. Okay, So everyone, this is
Speaker 1: really funny because this holiday season, for some reason, I'm
Speaker 1: getting more of the digital picture frame question than ever before.
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's a I don't know if
Speaker 1: someone's a lot of times these companies are advertising on
Speaker 1: Instagram and Facebook, and that's why people email me because
Speaker 1: they're seeing this ad over and over. So I'll just
Speaker 1: throw out two recommendations. The first is nix Play and
Speaker 1: I X P L A Y. They make some of
Speaker 1: the best frames out there. I've tested these in the past.
Speaker 1: They work really well, they do what you want, and
Speaker 1: you know, they're pretty simple. It's a picture frame that's digital.
Speaker 1: You can send stuff from your your phone to the frame.
Speaker 1: You can send stuff to your loved ones frames if
Speaker 1: they have it set up that way. It works, and
Speaker 1: it's you know, they have cloud frames. They have ones
Speaker 1: that you can plug the USB into the back. However
Speaker 1: you want to do it, they'll Nixplay will do that.
Speaker 1: The thing that I personally like better is, well, there's
Speaker 1: another way you can do it. Well, there's a third
Speaker 1: way I'll tell you in a second. But the other
Speaker 1: way you can do it is I really like the
Speaker 1: Google Nest Hub and the Google Nest Hub. I get it.
Speaker 1: It's a smart speaker. It's listening. It's evil because it's
Speaker 1: Google listening in your house with a microphone and potentially
Speaker 1: a camera. If you get the big version. But let's
Speaker 1: be honest, we all have those things in our home.
Speaker 1: So it's like, come on, what are you gonna do.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: But the best part about that is if you're using
Speaker 1: Google Photos already, it curates the best photos. Not it
Speaker 1: doesn't always do the best job. Sometimes, Like my mom
Speaker 1: she sells stuff on like Facebook, Marketplace, and like a
Speaker 1: couple of like her old pairs of shoes showed up.
Speaker 1: She's like, I thought you said these were curated. I
Speaker 1: was like, well, it's not always right.
Speaker 2: It's like all selfies.
Speaker 1: Clearly you took a good picture of those shoes, because
Speaker 1: Google's ai wreck, you know, identified it as a good picture.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: And so you can also do things like so when
Speaker 1: my kid, when it was my kid's birthday, you can
Speaker 1: say I only want to show pictures of a certain face.
Speaker 1: So on one of my albums, I have just like
Speaker 1: the family, so I say like Lindsay rich Tanner Parker,
Speaker 1: and it can automatically just show pictures that involve those faces.
Speaker 1: So you can do a lot of stuff. Or you
Speaker 1: can say I just want sunsets, so all my sunset pictures,
Speaker 1: or you can say just pictures in Hawaii or you
Speaker 1: can do a combination of whatever you want. And that's
Speaker 1: why I think the Google nest Hub is the best
Speaker 1: way to go because it's so flexible and you can
Speaker 1: change your pictures at a moment's notice. Yeah, like I said,
Speaker 1: when we had the birthday party at my house, I
Speaker 1: changed all the digital displays to show just Tanner first
Speaker 1: Birthday's amazing. Nobody noticed, but I was hoping one person
Speaker 1: might be like, oh, he's yeah anyway, But to me,
Speaker 1: I smiled, They probably thought.
Speaker 2: You spent hours putting it together. I'm like, oh, poor guy.
Speaker 1: Yeah, what a loser. The only other thing I would
Speaker 1: recommend is if you have like an old iPad around,
Speaker 1: you could probably work that into a frame and you
Speaker 1: could probably just put some pictures on there and set
Speaker 1: it as a slide show or whatever. And I'm sure
Speaker 1: there's apps out there that you can use as well.
Speaker 1: So cool, cool question. Let's talk about the ten best
Speaker 1: gadgets of the twenty tens. You know, we're rounding on
Speaker 1: a decade here, Megan, it's almost twenty twenty, So top
Speaker 1: ten gadgets to the twenty tens. I'm not going to
Speaker 1: talk about this too much because I actually talked about
Speaker 1: this at length in another podcast, my friend Brian Tong's podcast,
Speaker 1: the Apple Bits XL. So if you want to hear
Speaker 1: us discuss all these gadgets of the last decade, check
Speaker 1: out Apple Bits XL with Brian Tongue. He's my pal
Speaker 1: from when I worked at c net and we talked
Speaker 1: about this. Your helm, yeah, actually lives close by to me.
Speaker 1: We never see each other. We're always like, oh, we
Speaker 1: got to hang out, and we only see each other
Speaker 1: like out and about at events. We're like, we got
Speaker 1: to hang out. We never do. So one of these days,
Speaker 1: one of these days we will. Apple iPad that was
Speaker 1: one of the top ten Tesla model s that was
Speaker 1: a big game changer. Raspberry Pie do you know that one?
Speaker 2: You meanke food?
Speaker 1: Now, this is a little tiny computer that you can
Speaker 1: like make into anything you want. So it's good for
Speaker 1: like tinkers and you know nerds. Yeah, you can do
Speaker 1: a lot with it. So it's only like twenty five bucks,
Speaker 1: So that's really cool. Google Chrome Cast twenty thirteen. I
Speaker 1: can't believe it's been six years since that came out.
Speaker 1: That was life changing, like to me when I saw this,
Speaker 1: because streaming devices were really expensive before Chrome cast, and
Speaker 1: when the first one came out, I think it was
Speaker 1: like thirty five or fifty bucks. It was like, well, wait,
Speaker 1: what what is it now? I think it's thirty five maybe,
Speaker 1: but don't forget. Now you have the Roku sticks and
Speaker 1: you've got the Amazon sticks that are so cheap that
Speaker 1: like everyone assumed streaming can be cheap, but back then
Speaker 1: it wasn't. No, you had like Apple TV, Apple TV yeah,
Speaker 1: and that was like two hundred bucks. Yea. I think
Speaker 1: now it's like now it's still two hundred.
Speaker 2: It's still still the same.
Speaker 1: Dji Phantom, this is the drone. Yeah, okay, Amazon Echo
Speaker 1: and twenty fourteen that was life. That was game changing.
Speaker 1: I've never been a big Echo user, but it was
Speaker 1: a lot of people like it.
Speaker 2: I feel like she doesn't hear me, right.
Speaker 1: She does better than Siri, that's for sure. Yeah. Google's
Speaker 1: good though, Yes, Google's amazing. Apple Watch twenty fifteen, that
Speaker 1: was game changing. You're still wanting one, I know.
Speaker 2: Noticing trend.
Speaker 1: There's only three Apple products? Oh but still air Pods
Speaker 1: twenty sixteen. Nintendo Switch in twenty seventeen, which I know
Speaker 1: you're not a gamer, but that was a big one because.
Speaker 2: This might be the decade, though twenty twenty might be
Speaker 2: my gaming might be.
Speaker 1: Your gaming years. And then the Xbox Adaptive Controller in
Speaker 1: twenty eighteen. This is for gamers with physical limitations disabilities,
Speaker 1: and it lets them play Xbox as well, which is
Speaker 1: really cool. So cool again, if you want to hear
Speaker 1: me discuss all the top ten gadgets of the twenty tens.
Speaker 1: Oh those are according to Time dot Com. By the way,
Speaker 1: those were not my list. Okay, Apple bits XL check
Speaker 1: out the podcast by Brian Tong. I have a.
Speaker 2: Question, my own question, what was your favorite product from
Speaker 2: the twenty ten I'll be.
Speaker 1: Honest, I think it's the Pixel. I'm surprised. I'm surprised
Speaker 1: that was not on there. I would say either the
Speaker 1: Pixel or Google Assistant.
Speaker 2: People just overlook Google.
Speaker 1: Well, I think so there was one. There was Chrome Cast,
Speaker 1: but I think that or you know, Google Photos, those
Speaker 1: were not products but I and Google Assistant. But favorite
Speaker 1: I think the Pixel was. I mean, for for when
Speaker 1: it came out, it was the best photos I had
Speaker 1: ever seen on a smartphone with such a simple camera.
Speaker 1: And I think this year, you know, I carry the
Speaker 1: iPhone eleven Pro Max and I really truly think that
Speaker 1: that's a great overall device. If I had my way,
Speaker 1: i'd probably carry the Pixel if I wasn't if I
Speaker 1: was not creating well, if I was not creating content
Speaker 1: for social media, Yeah, because the iPhone and also the apps,
Speaker 1: because Android just doesn't have the apps that the iPhone does.
Speaker 1: But I love the smarts of the Android platform and
Speaker 1: especially Google and especially the Pixel. So that's uh, you know,
Speaker 1: that's that's the difference.
Speaker 2: Yeah, so cool. All right. This next question comes from Kristen.
Speaker 2: She wrote on your Facebook, Hi, Rich, I just got
Speaker 2: my first iPad. It's the iPad Pro and I'm terrified
Speaker 2: of one of my cats breaking it. What is the
Speaker 2: best protective case for it and how? And does the
Speaker 2: protective paper like film actually protect as well as the
Speaker 2: glass does thinks you know, I.
Speaker 1: Fell in love with a cat when I was home.
Speaker 1: I'm not a big cat person, but my brother gave
Speaker 1: my mom a cat, little tiny kitten, and I will
Speaker 1: say I was like, Okay, I might get one of
Speaker 1: these if it stayed that small.
Speaker 2: If you're not allergic, you should I'm not allergic. I
Speaker 2: wish I could have.
Speaker 1: It was really cute. It like crawl up on you
Speaker 1: while you're watching like TV, and just like ball up
Speaker 1: on your lap. And I'm not used to that because
Speaker 1: I don't have like any animals. Yeah, so it was
Speaker 1: I do have kids.
Speaker 2: Are your kids allergic to cats? Uh?
Speaker 1: Probably because one of them has like some allergy kind
Speaker 1: of stuff, so probably, but evenly wants a dog. But anyway,
Speaker 1: so I understand the cat thing because basically, these cats
Speaker 1: are tiny tyrants around the house. They play with everything,
Speaker 1: they get into everything, they knock things over, they scratch things.
Speaker 1: And if you have an iPad sitting there, she says,
Speaker 1: her first iPad on the edge of the table, and
Speaker 1: you just leave it there, Boom, it's dead. It's gonna
Speaker 1: fall off because this cat's gonna claw it, and you
Speaker 1: know it's gonna go off the side. I would recommend,
Speaker 1: and this is what I've had on my kid's iPads
Speaker 1: for four years now, the otter Box. And they make
Speaker 1: an iPad case that is one hundred percent inclusive of
Speaker 1: the iPad, so it goes on the back and then
Speaker 1: it also has a thing a cover for the screen,
Speaker 1: and they make several cases, but I would go with one.
Speaker 1: It depends what was her name again? Diane. Her name
Speaker 1: was shoot Kristin, So I would say Kristin that if
Speaker 1: you think you're gonna be responsible enough, you can get
Speaker 1: a case that doesn't necessarily cover the front like the screen.
Speaker 1: But she specifically mentioned the screen, so I would probably
Speaker 1: get an otter Box case that covers the screen and
Speaker 1: it encloses your entire your entire iPad. Now with that said,
Speaker 1: your iPad, it's going to be a lot bigger than normal.
Speaker 1: It's gonna be a little bit heavier, but it's for
Speaker 1: most people that's fine. And outer Box has a lot
Speaker 1: of different cases, so you can see, like maybe you
Speaker 1: want one Defender is kind of like the main one
Speaker 1: that's the biggest one, that's going to be pretty thick,
Speaker 1: but you can get other ones like a symmetry case.
Speaker 1: Let's see what else do they have in Alpha that's
Speaker 1: a screen chector. But I would say just look what
Speaker 1: they have. But that's the company i'd recommend is autter Box.
Speaker 1: So good question. That's protected my kids iPad for many
Speaker 1: years until my kids threw up on his iPad the
Speaker 1: case and so I had to take it off. So
Speaker 1: my kid's actually gone caseless for about three months. Now,
Speaker 1: I need to buy. In fact, I need to buy
Speaker 1: a new case for him. It's been in my Amazon
Speaker 1: shopping cuts. But it was gross because it was like
Speaker 1: the throw up got like, you know, in like under
Speaker 1: the screen and I had to like clean the whole thing,
Speaker 1: and like it was so gross. I just wanted to
Speaker 1: trash it.
Speaker 2: Why did he aim onto the iPad?
Speaker 1: I know, right, all I wanted to do was throughout
Speaker 1: the iPad. I was like, I just want to toss
Speaker 1: this thing in the trash because it's got you know,
Speaker 1: barf on it. But I did not. I saved itw
Speaker 1: AIRTV two is now available. This is AIRTV is kind
Speaker 1: of an offshoot of Sling TV, and they say it's
Speaker 1: a cord cutting brand dedicated to meeting the growing consumer
Speaker 1: demand for over the air products and services. AIRTV two
Speaker 1: is a new Wi Fi enabled network tuner. A lot
Speaker 1: of times what happens is you get these streaming services
Speaker 1: and you have to somehow figure out how to get
Speaker 1: all your channels. Like, for instance, the TV station I
Speaker 1: work for KTLA is not currently on any of the
Speaker 1: streaming services. So when you get something like YouTube TV
Speaker 1: or Sling TV, all of a sudden, you're like wait,
Speaker 1: where's my local channel five? You don't have it, then
Speaker 1: you have to go and get an antenna. And you
Speaker 1: can get an antenna, and now you have to figure
Speaker 1: out how to integrate that into your streaming setup, which
Speaker 1: means do you put it on a separate input on
Speaker 1: your TV? Do you get a box that integrates it?
Speaker 1: Like for me, I have something called Amazon fireTV Recast
Speaker 1: which integrates into my fireTV okay, which means I don't
Speaker 1: have to switch in puts to go to my antenna.
Speaker 1: So if I want something on regular TV, I just
Speaker 1: go to my grid on my fire TV. But there
Speaker 1: it gets complicated because if you're just hooking up an
Speaker 1: antenna to your TV, now you have to switch to
Speaker 1: that antenna input to watch anything on there, which most people,
Speaker 1: if you're cord cutting, you're streaming everything else, And then
Speaker 1: I get switch inputs. It's a big pain in the
Speaker 1: you know what. So you don't want to do that.
Speaker 1: So this new AIRTV too is a Wi Fi enabled
Speaker 1: network tuner. And the beauty of this thing, it's kind
Speaker 1: of like my fireTV recast. You put it in the
Speaker 1: spot in your house that has the best reception, so
Speaker 1: that may not be near your TV, which in the
Speaker 1: case of my mom's house, I did try an antenna there,
Speaker 1: she didn't get reception near her TV. I didn't have
Speaker 1: time to relocate and do this whole setup with her,
Speaker 1: you know antenna. So you put this little box where
Speaker 1: you get a signal and then the box uses Wi
Speaker 1: Fi to connect that to your TV. And in the
Speaker 1: case of this device, it actually it actually streams your
Speaker 1: local channels right into the TV app, and the Sling
Speaker 1: TV app pretty much works with most of the fire
Speaker 1: sticks and the Roku devices. So I know it sounds
Speaker 1: overly complicated, but the bottom line is you connect an
Speaker 1: antenna to this device, the device connects your Wi Fi network.
Speaker 1: You can now watch your local channels on the same
Speaker 1: screen that you get all your other streaming content on.
Speaker 1: So you can watch Netflix and then you can say, oh,
Speaker 1: I want to go to my channel five. You just
Speaker 1: bring up the Sling TV app and Channel five will
Speaker 1: be in there. So and it's free, by the way,
Speaker 1: once you pay there's you know, once you pay the
Speaker 1: ninety nine bucks to buy this thing, there's no subscription. Yeah,
Speaker 1: people forget that Free TV has a lot of stuff.
Speaker 1: This also has a DVR. If you connect a hard
Speaker 1: drive to it. And let's see what else is there
Speaker 1: that's about it. I mean you can watch things out
Speaker 1: of your house. You can watch on Roku, Amazon, Fire,
Speaker 1: tv iOS, and Android devices. That's a lot. That is
Speaker 1: a lot, and it's available for ninety nine ninety nine
Speaker 1: And yeah, I mean that's all you need to know
Speaker 1: about that. It's pretty cool. So sling dot com slash
Speaker 1: AIRTV offer, or you can just go to airtv dot net.
Speaker 1: If you purchase an AIRTV two on airtv dot net,
Speaker 1: you'll get a twenty five dollars Sling TV credit. You
Speaker 1: do not need a Sling TV subscription, by the way,
Speaker 1: to use that AIRTV So if you just want to
Speaker 1: start out with your your local channels, you can do that.
Speaker 1: Then you can always add a subscription later. All right,
Speaker 1: I've spoken enough Megan.
Speaker 2: Okay, So this next question comes from Lyle.
Speaker 1: Wait, uh oh what happened to Lyle? Oh?
Speaker 2: Sorry? Sorry, sorry, I'm just I'm going through my email.
Speaker 1: I was a private text.
Speaker 2: No no, no, no, I just I have your response
Speaker 2: to Lyle. Okay, okay, So the next question comes from Lyle.
Speaker 2: What can you recommend to block all these intrusive advertising advertisements?
Speaker 2: On Android phones.
Speaker 1: Oh I love this, love this question. You're gonna get
Speaker 1: some real insider info right here we go, because this
Speaker 1: is something that I have not really spoken about in
Speaker 1: a big way because I feel like it's a little
Speaker 1: bit complicated for most people. But if you have Okay,
Speaker 1: So there's a couple of ways to block ads. I
Speaker 1: asked this person if they were on Android ten because
Speaker 1: that makes a difference on Android how easy it is
Speaker 1: to block It is so easy to block ads on Android.
Speaker 1: I almost feel bad giving out this trick because it's
Speaker 1: so easy. It's scary. Do I give it out? Okay?
Speaker 2: Kidding?
Speaker 1: So on iOS, you know that you can add these
Speaker 1: things called content blockers to Safari. Do you have one
Speaker 1: of these installed? So if you add a content blocker there, well,
Speaker 1: I don't really use Safari, but still right, and that's
Speaker 1: the problem if you use what you use Chrome? Yeah, yes,
Speaker 1: so do I So I don't use, you know, a
Speaker 1: content blocker on Chrome on the Android. On the iOS side, anyway,
Speaker 1: if you're on iOS, you can download something called a
Speaker 1: content blocker, and what that does is it integrates into
Speaker 1: Safari and blocks all your ads as you're surfing. It
Speaker 1: only works on Safari doesn't work on other apps and
Speaker 1: other things, but that's an easy way to block ads
Speaker 1: just when you're surfing the web on Safari. On Android,
Speaker 1: the easiest way that I know of is in Android ten.
Speaker 1: All you have to do is change one setting. Okay,
Speaker 1: so I'll tell you where to go. You go into
Speaker 1: settings on your phone, you go into network and Internet,
Speaker 1: you go to Advanced, and then you go to something
Speaker 1: called private DNS. And DNS is how the internet or
Speaker 1: your phone looks up things on the Internet. So when
Speaker 1: you search for something, it goes to a DNS and
Speaker 1: it kind of sees like, okay, everything has an address
Speaker 1: on the world on the internet.
Speaker 2: Basically we are you going to say worldwide.
Speaker 1: So everything has an address there, and so the DNS
Speaker 1: helps you what's called resolve that address. So when you
Speaker 1: type in Yahoo dot com, it actually has a little
Speaker 1: number associated with it in the background, and that DNS
Speaker 1: server helps resolve that find it. So what this does, Okay,
Speaker 1: Then when you go to private DNS, what you're saying
Speaker 1: is you're saying, use this DNS host to figure out
Speaker 1: the addresses, and once you go through that, it will
Speaker 1: block all the ADS that comes through that connection. So
Speaker 1: what you want to do is change private DNS two
Speaker 1: dns dot adguard dot com and ad Guard is a
Speaker 1: big company that does all these ad blocking services. And now,
Speaker 1: when I talk about ads, obviously a lot of people
Speaker 1: make money off of that. So if you're thinking about
Speaker 1: blocking ads, you always want to take a step back
Speaker 1: and think, am I hurting people's ability to feed their children?
Speaker 1: So just keep that in mind and you're fine with that,
Speaker 1: and WHOA A lot of times these are what I
Speaker 1: call nuisance ads. So this will actually help in a
Speaker 1: lot of these things. And this is why I have
Speaker 1: no problem recommending this. A lot of times you go
Speaker 1: to a website and you get blocked in by some
Speaker 1: sort of really obnoxious AD that is popping up on
Speaker 1: your screen a thousand times saying you want a gift card,
Speaker 1: or you want an Amazon prize or you're the tenth
Speaker 1: winner and you can't get out of it. And that's
Speaker 1: why I say, sure, go ahead and use this, because
Speaker 1: you're blocking malicious stuff as well, and that's what a
Speaker 1: lot of people run up against anyway. So you type
Speaker 1: in DNS dot adguard dot com into this little box
Speaker 1: under private DNA and boom, it's all your ads on
Speaker 1: your phone are blocked. Now, not every AD is going
Speaker 1: to be blocked. A lot of times it's a cat
Speaker 1: and mouse game between the big ad companies and services
Speaker 1: like this. So sometimes you might be like, hey, Rich,
Speaker 1: I'm still seeing ads. Can't get rid of them all. Like,
Speaker 1: if you're browsing, you know, Twitter, you'll probably still see
Speaker 1: Twitter ads. A lot of times. You can't get around
Speaker 1: some of the ads, but especially the nuisance ads, like
Speaker 1: the really annoying ones, you'll get rid of. And that's
Speaker 1: the easiest way to do it. Now, if you ever
Speaker 1: lyle have a problem where you can't load a website
Speaker 1: or you can't connect to a Wi Fi network, you
Speaker 1: can just go ahead and turn this off and when
Speaker 1: you're done with that network or you're done with that website,
Speaker 1: you can turn it back on. But that's kind of
Speaker 1: like the deal. And you know, that's some real insider info.
Speaker 1: But like I said, a lot of people that I
Speaker 1: see browsing the web, they're coming up against some pretty
Speaker 1: bad stuff that they can't really figure out how to
Speaker 1: exit the browser. It's scare tactics. You know, you've got
Speaker 1: these things that say you won hundred dollar Amazon gift card.
Speaker 1: You fill out these forms, it's all garbage, and so
Speaker 1: you know, if this can help protect one person from
Speaker 1: getting scammed into something, then hey, it's worth it. There
Speaker 1: you go. Okay, finally, let me close the show with this.
Speaker 1: We did a fun story for KTLA on some of
Speaker 1: the cool ways you can interact with Santa this time
Speaker 1: of the year. And I'll just start with the smart speaker.
Speaker 1: So if you're on a Google Smart speaker, you can say,
Speaker 1: h Google, Call Santa and you'll get connected to the
Speaker 1: North Pole and they play this fun little game with
Speaker 1: Santa where you kind of pick some things. It's like
Speaker 1: a choose your own adventure almost. That's kind of fun.
Speaker 1: On Amazon Echo, if you want to directly call Santa
Speaker 1: using you know what rhymes with abexa, you actually have
Speaker 1: to go into the Alexa app first and enable the
Speaker 1: call Santa skill. And there's a bunch of them, but
Speaker 1: look for the one that says Amazon dot Com above it.
Speaker 1: There's a whole bunch of call Santa skills. You probably
Speaker 1: want the official one from Amazon. Enable that in the
Speaker 1: app first. Then you can go to your Alexa or
Speaker 1: your ex device and say, hey, call Sanna. So that's
Speaker 1: one on Siri on the iPhone. Don't even bother. She
Speaker 1: just gives you some like she really just plays some
Speaker 1: games with you, Like she's like, oh, flap your hands
Speaker 1: five times and say ho ho not come on, come on,
Speaker 1: Apple's Apple. Let's make something fun. Other things to do
Speaker 1: check out Santa Tracker dot Google dot com. This is
Speaker 1: where you can see a countdown to Christmas along with
Speaker 1: fun games and there's some cool apps as well. So
Speaker 1: on the iPhone, there's an app called Catch Santa ar.
Speaker 1: This uses the augmented reality feature of the iPhone where
Speaker 1: you can aim your video camera at your Christmas tree
Speaker 1: and catch Santa sneaking by present. It's really cool and
Speaker 1: you can record it and you can send it to friends,
Speaker 1: put on Instagram, be like, hey, we caught Santa in
Speaker 1: the act.
Speaker 2: Your kids look.
Speaker 1: Caught Santa and that was really cool. The other app
Speaker 1: is called Capture the Magic, and Capture the Magic is
Speaker 1: an app for iPhone and Android and they let you
Speaker 1: superimpose Santa, Snowman and all kinds of stuff on any
Speaker 1: scene so you can have some real fun with that.
Speaker 1: You can put Santa in your pictures and we did
Speaker 1: this at a holiday party a couple of years ago.
Speaker 1: I can't remember the name of the app, but it
Speaker 1: was very similar. But we had so much fun, like
Speaker 1: taking pictures in front of the tree like with Sanna,
Speaker 1: and all the people at the party were like cracking up,
Speaker 1: so it was really cool. We put them on Instagram
Speaker 1: party trick and again that one's called Capture the Magic.
Speaker 1: And of course you know about Norrad where you can
Speaker 1: track Sanna on Christmas Eve. Yeah, so again a lot
Speaker 1: of fun you can have with the kids during this
Speaker 1: time of the year. I was looking for something with
Speaker 1: Elf on the shelf. Are you familiar with that? Yeah,
Speaker 1: so that's like the new thing, right And do they
Speaker 1: have a tech? I'm sure they do, but I didn't
Speaker 1: really look it up. So anyway, those are kind of
Speaker 1: some fun things you can do with Santa this time
Speaker 1: of the year. So there you have it. It's always fun,
Speaker 1: have a great holiday. We are this is the last
Speaker 1: show of the year of twenty nineteen. We are going
Speaker 1: to start the year off. I think there's one show
Speaker 1: before we go to Seat. Yes, so we'll do one
Speaker 1: show at the beginning of the year and then we
Speaker 1: go to CS and at CS have a fun thing
Speaker 1: planned for the show, so we're gonna be recording it
Speaker 1: on the scene, but in kind of a fun location.
Speaker 1: So I've got that going on. Follow me on Instagram.
Speaker 1: I am at rich on Tech. That's where I'm doing
Speaker 1: almost all of my posts these days. So at rich
Speaker 1: on Tech. If you see my stuff, you know it
Speaker 1: takes me a bit to do these things. So if
Speaker 1: you see it, the least you could do is like it,
Speaker 1: oh yeah, or share it or comment or comment. I mean,
Speaker 1: just just throw me a bone. Follow, follow, share with
Speaker 1: your friends. I really I'm getting into this thing. I
Speaker 1: really like sending posts to friends that It's great.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: The only problem is when people send me posts and
Speaker 1: their private and I'm like, I can't look at that.
Speaker 2: Yeah private, follow it.
Speaker 1: But I think that's a growth hacked tacktic is right, Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then I have to go there and follow that.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I get it.
Speaker 1: I never do. I say, can you screenshot this and
Speaker 1: send it to me?
Speaker 2: Oh? My friends are like, no, you have to follow
Speaker 2: that account?
Speaker 1: Interesting? Okay, Megan's funny. How can people find you.
Speaker 2: A I'm on Twitter at producer Megan?
Speaker 1: Okay, okay, what nothing? That's it. My book is one
Speaker 1: hundred and one iPhone tips and tricks. By the time
Speaker 1: you listen to this, it's probably too late to get
Speaker 1: it in time for the holidays. But if you got
Speaker 1: an Amazon gift card for Christmas or Hankah or Kwanza
Speaker 1: or what else is there? Remember the OC it was
Speaker 1: Christmas Quantica.
Speaker 2: Oh no, I never watched that episode.
Speaker 1: Or Christmas. No Christmas, ch Christma Christmas. I think it
Speaker 1: was Christmas. Cop Yeah, that was pretty funny. I'm dating
Speaker 1: myself now, Seth Cohen. Yes, So if you got a
Speaker 1: gift card, you can buy the book now. It's a
Speaker 1: great gift and or I guess, gift to yourself, I
Speaker 1: should say, and that's going to do it. I think
Speaker 1: that's it for the show. We had a great time
Speaker 1: talking all things.
Speaker 2: Tech tech twenty nineteen.
Speaker 1: Are you have any Are you going to start in
Speaker 1: your resolutions for twenty twenty Megan.
Speaker 2: Oh no, I need to make some though.
Speaker 1: I need to make them too. I'm gonna be off
Speaker 1: my phone more. I'm gonna be more present. That's my
Speaker 1: oh quick story, mindful. The problem with being present. I
Speaker 1: tried doing this when I went home to New Jersey.
Speaker 1: No one else is doing everyone's present, so everyone else
Speaker 1: is not present, but you should just.
Speaker 2: Be that person that's like, you're not present. You're not Yeah,
Speaker 2: gotta start the trend.
Speaker 1: Be present. Just be present with your family and friends
Speaker 1: this holiday season. Take the Instagram pictures, then put down
Speaker 1: the phone. Yes, all right, Yes, have a great day.
Speaker 1: Rich on tech dot TV, thanks so much for listening
Speaker 1: to the podcast. We will see you next year. Bye.