Justin Robert Young fills in for Tom, with guest Andrew Mayne. Walmart v Amazon is discussed.

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Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

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Show Notes

Today’s guests: Justin Robert Young fills in as host for Tom and Andrew Mayne joins!

Headlines: 

Apple’s Beats-based streaming music service will be renamed “Apple Music” and integrate deep social networking for artists, according to 9 to 5 mac. The service will allow artists to have pages so they can post samples, photos, video, concert information and content from other artists. iTunes users will have the ability to comment on and like posts from artists but won’t have user social network profiles like Ping. Apple Music will be introduced at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference Kickoff keynote on Monday, June 8th.

Meanwhile Rdio has launched a new premium tier allowing listeners to stream music on-demand. Rdio Select costs $3.99 per month and offers unlimited streaming radio without ads. You can stream up to 25 on-demand tracks per day or store them for offline playback. Plus you can swap out tracks for alternatives but you’re still limited to 25 streams or downloads per day. The new tier is available for users in the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India and South Africa. Other countries will be added in the future.

Wal-Mart challenges Amazon with unlimited shipping service for $50 per year. The service promises 70,000 items at launch and 3 day shipping. According to a company spokesman the program will be invite only initially and will evolve with feedback from early customers. Will this be a legitimite comeptitor to Amazon Prime? We pick apart that and more in the discussion section a little later on.

VentureBeat is reporting that Google has announced six new apps for its $35 streaming media stick: CBS All Access, HGTV, FOX Now, FXNOW, Pluto TV, and Haystack. Pluto TV curates over 100 channels of news, music, sports, web, and TV shows while Haystack presents trending TV news. You can get the apps from chromecast.com/apps.

Windows 10 Mobile’s latest build “10080” adds some important updates according to TechCrunch. The biggest is the first look of the Windows Store for mobile which will allow MS to deliver universal Office apps plus music, movies, and TV shows. Other features include an Xbox app, a music app, a new camera app and a video app.

Polygon reports Konami’s big focus moving forward will be mobile, not AAA games, according to a translated interview with the company’s new CEO Hideki Hayakawa.

Excited for the Mario themed Candy Crush knock off? Or Zelda enhanced Clash of Clans? Well you can hold on to your Rupees because according to Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata the venerable video game titan won’t obsess over trends to avoid ‘imitating’ other games as they venture into the mobile space. He adds “I don’t think we can realize what we aspire to by simply imitating a past success formula.”

The New York Times reports that reddit announced an update to its site-wide policies today that explicitly prohibits harassment against users. As of today, users who view or experience harassment will be able to email reddit moderators who can remove content and ban offenders from the site. reddit defines harassment as “continued actions” that would make someone “conclude that Reddit is not a safe platform to express their ideas.” The company said the number one reason reddit users do not recommend their site to others is to avoid exposing friends to hate and offensive content.

So it turns out thieves can bypass Apple Watch passcode to pair a stolen watch with their own phone. The Verge has compiled a bunch of reporting from 9 to 5 mac and iDownloadblog and concluded that the Apple Watch incredibly easy to steal. Because it’s very easy to reset an Apple Watch if you forget the password–just hold the side button until the menu with three options (power off, power reserve, and lock device) apears, then force touch that screen to unlock a hidden option to erase all content and settings. The watch has to be connected to its charger to activate the erase function. Which is exactly what a thief would do the moment he or she stole your Apple Watch. Time for an Activation Lock update, perhaps?

Biz Tech Africa reports that Safaricom a Kenyan mobile network operator has announced the launch of “The Big Box” a set top device that allows subscribers to watch TV and share broadband connectivity. The device will connect to Safaricoms 3G and 4G network and offer subscribers access to several high def TV channels as well as on demand video content. The device also services as a Wi-Fi hotspot for up to ten users. Subscribers have the option of several plans based on their needs.

Re/code is reporting that Sharp secured a $1.9 billion dollar bailout. Under the deal, main lenders Mizuho Bank and Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ will inject a combined 200 billion yen ($1.7 billion) in a debt-for-equity swap. In return for the funding, which will be used to repay debt and finance investments, Sharp will also sell its headquarters and said it might seek a partner for its TV business in North America and 5000 job cuts in its global workforce. Sharp posted an annual loss of 222 billion yen. This is Sharp’s 2nd bank led rescue in 3 years.

Engadget reports that Samsung Wallet will stop taking purchases on June 30th in anticipation of Samsung Pay, which is scheduled to arrive in September. Any reservations and tickets in Wallet will still be valid through partner apps, but coupons will not be available.

News From You:

Starfuryzeta wanted to make sure we saw that the US House of Representatives voted 338-88 for the US Freedom Act which rejects the NSA’s bulk collection of phone records. The vote heads to the Senate with support from the White House, intelligence agency leaders and the US federal appeals court. However, the Senate leadership wants to extend the existing language of the Patriot Act through 2020.

Spsheridan sent us the The Verge report that the Wolfram search tool can now identify any item in an uploaded picture. According to creator Stephen Wolfram, “It won’t always get it right, but most of the time I think it does remarkably well.” The Wolfram Language Image Identification Project was fed “a few tens of millions” of images to learn, including tricky images of a cat in a spacesuit, a sloth in a party hat, and Chewbacca. When given an image of Tom Merritt, the image identifier pronounced that he is a person.

Discussion Section Links:  

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/05/13/us-wal-mart-stores-shipping-idUSKBN0NY2NK20150513

http://news.walmart.com/news-archive/2014/10/15/walmart-ceo-outlines-growth-strategy-at-annual-meeting-for-the-investment-community

 

Pick of the Day:

Messages: 

Alex Hanna writes:

Howdy Justin, Andrew Jennie, Roger and crew (too numerous to mention),

I’ve got a pick for you, it’s a website that’s been around for a year or so but arguably has increased in usefulness over time.

https://haveibeenpwned.com/

It is a very simple site that does one VERY helpful thing, it scans through known data breaches for an email or username that you enter. Why is this helpful? As the saying goes, knowing is half the battle. If you see that your information has been compromised on a website, you can change your password or take other similar actions to re-secure your information.

The site also has some good info on large data breaches that have been in the news if you want the pants scarred off of you. I hope this helps people be more secure!

Yesterday Tom and Scott discussed the announcement of a new Ultra Blu-Ray format which supports 4k video. Joshua Gardner wrote in about that “unspecified audio format” they mentioned:

Just an FYI, the reason the audio format is unspecified is because there is an audio war going on. Dolby is fighting for Dolby Atmos which involves the traditional seven speaker setup plus a subwoofer but also adds two speakers into the ceiling for additional height. Dolby has stated this sound format is expandable to as many speakers as you wish, although, they have stated that most audio will be mastered to support a maximum of twelve speakers plus a subwoofer (discreet channels) requiring the receiver to create additional audio channels for anything over twelve channels.

DTS has yet to announce a sound format but should very soon.

One of the primary differences between DTS and Dolby Digital is DTS uses uncompressed audio (which consumes more disk space) vs Dolby Digital which sacrifices a fraction of audio quality and frequency response both on the upper and lower end to use about one quarter of the required space. It should be noted that most people do not have high enough end equipment to hear the difference.

=====

Friday’s guest: It’s Producers Choice with DTNS contributor Darren Kitchen and artist-in-residence Len Peralta

Scott Johnson joins the show to talk about Facebook’s attempt to host major news stories inside its mobile app. Is it trying to eat the Internet after all?

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A special thanks to all our supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here or giving 5 cents a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke, sebgonz and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Show Notes

Today’s guests: Scott Johnson

Headlines: 

Facebook announced a new tool called Instant Articles that it hopes will encourage publishers to host their articles on Facebook. The new product reduces the average load time of an article and incorporates interactive features like the ability to zoom in and explore high resolution images by tilting the phone, and the ability to like and comment on individual parts of an article in-line. Publishers can either sell ads themselves and keep all the money or let Facebook do it and share revenue. Tracking can be done through ComScore and other analytics tools. Facebook is working with nine launch partners for Instant Articles: The New York Times, National Geographic, BuzzFeed, NBC, The Atlantic, The Guardian, BBC News, Spiegel and Bild.

(more…)

Patrick Beja joins the show to discuss the ad tech Verizon is buying with AOL and what it plans to do with its content publications.

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Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

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A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke, sebgonz and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today’s guests: Patrick Beja

 

Headlines: 

Verizon announced today it has signed an agreement to buy AOL for $50 a share an estimated value of $4.4 billion AOL will become a wholly-owned subsidiary of Verizon. Verizon CEO Lowell McAdam said AOL’s “advertising platform provides a key tool for us to develop future revenue streams.” AOL CEO Tim Armstrong, who will stay on as the subsidiary’s leader, said the combination “creates a unique and scaled mobile and OTT media platform for creators, consumers and advertisers.” The deal is expected to be completed this summer.

The Verge reports that Skype Translator is now available for anyone with a Windows 8 or Windows 10 PC to try.  The software can translate English, Spanish, Italian, and Mandarin in real time, converting the original language into either text or audio.

The Verge reports on a new drone called Lily that you can throw into the air and ignore as it films whatever you’re doing. You have to strap a small GPS tracker to your wrist and then Lily uses computer vision technology to recognize its owner. The tracking device also records audio that syncs to the video, shot in 1080p at 60 frames per second. It can also shoot 12-megapixel stills. Oh and its waterproof to IP67. What it doesn’t have is avoidance detection, so you should only use it in wide open spaces. The device goes on sale today for pre-order at $499, a discount from the planned $999 retail price.

ReCode reports Google’s Android One program for affordable smartphones added Turkey as its seventh country.  General Mobile will produce the devices starting around US$260. Android One devices are normally supposed to sell for around $100 but electronics in Turkey generally have higher prices.

Taiwanese fabless semiconductor company MediaTek is prepping the launch of a 10-core chip called Helio X20 according to Engadget. The chip is a 20nm “tri-cluster” design consisting of two 2.5GHz Cortex-A72 cores, four 2GHz Cortex-A53 cores and four 1.4GHz Cortex-A53 cores. While all ten cores can run simultaneously MediaTek General Manger of International Corporate Sales, Finbarr Moynihan said the chip’s software will pick the ideal cluster to use depending on power and processing needs. The first commercial device using the chip will arrive in consumer devices by the end of the year at the earliest.

ZDNet reports that Samsung has unveiled a new line of chips for Internet of Things devices, called the Artik. Artik One is the size of a ladybug with a 9-axis motion sensor, Bluetooth Low Energy support.
Artik Five is the size of a 25-cent coin with a video decoder and encoder. And Artik 10 comes with an HD encoder and decoder, 5.1 audio meant for home servers and personal clouds. Samsung also has established an open source-based developer platform and starter kit, which will become available immediately.

TechCrunch reports Aliyun, Alibaba’s cloud computing unit announced a joint-venture with Dubai’s Meraas, to create apps, cloud architecture and big data tools for clients. The venture will be located in Dubai and serve the wider region. According to IDC, spending on ICT products and services in the Middle East and Africa will exceed $270 billion in 2015.

News From You:

Spsheridan sent us this story from 9 to 5 Google that following a Reddit AMA on government surveillance, Google admitted that while Hangouts conversations are encrypted, it does not use end-to-end encryption. That means Google can tap into sessions when it receives a government court order to do so. Google’s Transparency Report reveals it has received 26 US government wiretap requests from the beginning of 2013 to the middle of last year. The company did not identify how many of these, if any, were for Hangouts.

Drtolbert submitted the Engadget story that Warner Music Group announced today it made more money in Q2 from streaming licenses than it did from digital downloads. Streaming revenue rose 33% while digital sales rose 7%.

Habichuelacondulce sent us the Gizmodo report that researchers at MIT have solved one of the great artistic condundrums of our time. Sort of. A group of scientists led by YiChang Shih have developed an algorithm that can extract and automatically remove reflections in an image, like when you take a shot of something through a window. The catch is that the window has to be double-paned or very thick. Gizmodo helpfully points out that in addition to Adobe Photoshop, the military might also benefit from the algorithm, to help robots look through windows and not get confused by their own reflection.

 

Discussion Section Links:  

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/verizon-to-acquire-aol-300081541.html

http://techcrunch.com/2015/05/12/verizon-aol-4-4b/?ncid=rss

http://recode.net/2015/05/12/verizon-buys-aol-for-4-4-billion/

http://thenextweb.com/insider/2015/05/12/verizons-deal-to-buy-aol-will-make-life-uncomfortable-for-techcrunch-and-engadget/

http://arstechnica.com/business/2015/05/verizon-buying-aol-for-4-4-billion-calls-it-a-digital-trailblazer/

http://adage.com/article/media/ad-tech-is-king-verizon-aol/298574/

http://fortune.com/2015/05/12/verizon-aol-content-advertising/

http://recode.net/2015/05/12/aol-in-talks-to-spin-off-huffpost-as-part-of-acquisition-deal/

http://www.dailydot.com/politics/verizon-sugarstring-us-surveillance-net-neutrality/

 

Pick of the Day:

Devulu writes:

I wanted to share the following website with your listeners.

https://www.whynopadlock.com/

When creating a HTTPS secure website one sometimes needs to troubleshoot why Chrome or Firefox do not display the lock icon usually associated with HTTPS.

The usual culprits are external elements which are being loaded over HTTP, so https://www.whynopadlock.com/ helps you check for those elements and fix them.

Messages: 

Alastair Mitchell from Edinburgh, Scotland:

Just wanted to contributed to the discussion on wearables from yesterday’s episode (2490).

The majority of wearables on the market just now are focussed on people losing weight but if you’re someone like myself who needs to gain weight they are quite unhelpful. Because my focus is to gaining weight I mostly do weight training at the gym rather than cardio which wearables right now can’t track well.

I played with a Fitbit for a month or two but that was purely for geek reasons and the information I got from it was interesting but not beneficial for myself.

A wearable which focuses on overall health rather than losing weight would be really interesting to me but I’m not sure how many others want such a device.
Great show, makes my bus to work much shorter.

Rich from Lovely Cleveland:

Your discussion on the issue of interpreting the info provided by wearables left out one player. Microsoft is making an interesting push to be the service that will work cross platform to cull and interpret all of your health data. They support their Health app and Band across all the major OSes, and seem more interested in people feeding the data in than forcing people to exclusively buy into their platform (although I’m sure they wouldn’t mind if you did). Their service is still nascent, so we’ll see if Microsoft lives up to their lofty goals, but I like what they are proposing better than the device lock-in that a lot of wearable makers seem to be forcing (although I guess by being cross-platform it makes it easier for MS to lock you into their service, but at least it feels like a bigger gilded cage).

Heather from Charleston, SC:

Your conversation with Veronica and Ron on Monday got me thinking about how I’ve benefited from fitness tracking. I recently started on a new medication, and one of the potential side effects is an increased resting heart rate. Since I have heart rate data for several months back, I was able to look at the new data, see a significant increase over average, and then have a conversation with my doctor on how to proceed. Without that trend, it would have been harder to determine if there was a meaningful change.

Russell writes:

On yesterday’s show you were discussing that 14% of Zappos staff took an exit package based on the new management approach. We look at statistics like that as a part of the analysis that we do for our work and wanted to offer some perspective on that number. According to Gallup’s ‘State of the American Workplace’ report from 2013 30% of the workforce is actively engaged and inspired at work, 52% are present but not fully engaged and 18% are actively disengaged and looking to make a change. The 14% at Zappos seen in this context might actually be a positive and given the factors associated with career path, etc. this number might actually be low. As always, there are many forces that impact things like this so this is just some conjecture based on some recent statistics.

Great to hear Veronica on her first ‘regular’ appearance last night.

Thanks for all that you do!

Bill Strait writes:

I just wanted to clarify a few points about the blockchain getting more buzz than bitcoin. The Bitcoin Blockchain is the world’s most secure public ledger. Why? Because it has the most hashing power of any distributed computer in the world. This hashing power isn’t coming from volunteers, it’s coming from bitcoin miners. Miners secure the network in exchange for bitcoin. If bitcoin becomes worthless, the miners go away. Without numerous geographically dispersed miners the blockchain is no longer secure. You cannot separate Bitcoin from it’s blockchain, but you can make other blockchains that compete with it for miners. If someone wants to put together a proposal for a Dollar Blockchain I’m all ears. For now, I’m going where the hash rate is.

=====

Wednesday’s guest:  Scott Johnson

 

Veronica Belmont and +Ron Richards are on to talk about the benefits and risks of tracking everything you do. Can all that data really be useful?

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A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke, sebgonz and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today’s guests: Ron Richards and Veronica Belmont

Headlines: 

Engadget reports Google has stopped accepting public contributions to their Map Maker service following a prank. Map Maker relies on “Google reviewers” and trusted users to moderate contributions. Since the prank, Google switched temporarily to manual checks from in-house teams but that led to a backlog of user submitted edits forcing Goggle to suspend new submissions entirely as of May 12th. Google says its temporary situation until it comes up with an improved moderation system,

The curated iOS app called NYT Now has dropped its $8 a month subscription fee and gone ad-supported. The app is targeted at younger readers and features selected stories from the New York Times as well as other sources around the Web. The newspaper’s main apps still carry a fee of $15-$35 a month.

TechCrunch reports Microsoft announced investments in three undersea cable projects. The New Cross Pacific Cable Network will connect China, South Korea, Taiwan and Japan with the US via Hillsboro, OR. A deal with Hibernia will offer faster connectivity between Canada, Ireland and the UK. The Hibernia Express Cable, launchign in September is the first new transatlantic cable in 12 years and will handle up to 10 Tbps per cable pair. And Microsoft is the first customer of AcquaComms upcoming AEConnect cable between Shirly, NY and the west coast of Ireland.

The Wall Street Journal notes that Nasdaq OMX Group is starting a pilot project to use a blockchain to verify transactions in its Nasdaq Private Market. The blockchain is the public ledger system used to verify Bitcoin transactions. Trading among pre-IPO companies in the private market currently, is often done by hand.

Next Thing Co. based in Oakland CA, is planning to build a $9 computer called Chip according to Fortune. The machine is built around a 1GHz ARM processor from Allwinner Technology in China, 512MB of RAM and 4GB of storage. It comes with Wi-Fi and Bluetooth connectivity to be save costs integrated video is a composite video port. However a VGA or HDMI adapter add-on is available for $10 and $15. The Chip is available from Next Thing’s Kickstarter which has raised close to a million dollars in 5 days. Well past its $50,000 goal.

CNET reports on a virtual reality theme park called The Void being built in Pleasant Grove, Utah, north of Provo. Starting sometime in 2016 visitors in groups of up to 10 can enter one of seven 60×60 foot rooms, put on VR headsets, and wander around a world that lets them feel real bark and metal under their fingertips, and interact with other players in realtime. Creator Ken Bretschneider designed the park and the headsets and hopes to work with outside gaming studios to create new experiences every three months.

TechCrunch reports IDC’s numbers show China’s smartphone market fell 4% year over year in Q1. It;s the first time smartphone shipments decreased in the country since 2006. IDC suggests excessive inventory might have been the cause. IDC still tracked 98.8 million shipments in China. Apple led the way with 14.7% market share followed by Xiaomi Huawei, Samsung and Lenovo in that order.

Ars Technica reports former Castlevania producer Koji Igarashi launched a Kickstarter Monday for a game called Bloodstained Ritual of the Night. Igarashi was the longest-running producer on the Castlevania series but left Konami last year. The game will be available as a digital download for backers who give $28 or more.

The Verge reports that the Orange Klif, a 3G phone running Firefox OS, is on sale this week for customers of the Orange network in Senegal and Madagascar. The phone costs around $40 US. This follows on the heels of Firefox OS phones shipping in South Africa earlier this year.

News From You:

habichuelacondulce sent us this Verge story on the FCC’s dismissal of a petition to delay the implementation of the Open Internet order submitted by a group consisting of AT&T, CenturyLink, USTelecom, and CTIA. This was the top vote getter on the subreddit today. The FCC stated that its classification of broadband Internet as a telecommunications service falls within its authority and consistent with Supreme Court precedent.

starfuryzeta shared the Huffington Post writeup of the AP report that a source says four of the fifty self driving cars in use in the state of the California have gotten into accidents since September. Three of the accidents happened to a Google Lexus SUV and the other to a car operated by Delphi Automotive. Both companies say the accidents were minor and the self-driving cars were not at fault. Two accidents happened while the cars were in self-driving mode.

michsineath submitted the Slate story about Zappos’s experiment with a management style called Holacracy. The organizational theory replaces titles and managers with a system of tactical and governance meetings. The project began in 2013 but in March CEO Tony Hsieh announced the system would apply to all employees and anyone who was dissatisfied with the decision would be offered severance. 210 employees, about 14% of the company, took the payout.

Discussion Section Links:  

http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/national/2015/05/09/the-revolution-will-be-digitized/

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-05-07/rising-cyber-attacks-costing-health-system-6-billion-annually

http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/national/2015/04/04/tech-titans-latest-project-defy-death/

http://quantifiedself.com/

http://www.webcitation.org/66TEHdz4d

Pick of the Day:

Lisa Boban (Co-Executive Producer) – Whiting Indiana

I’ve been a subscriber to Rhapsody for over 10 years. I joined when they were literally the only legal game in town. My requirements were simple: a legal music service to keep my teenagers from stealing music.

But over the years their service has been an excellent resource for my musician husband who needs to be able to find specific tracks. Their back catalog is amazing, and the new stuff appears to be there. Their apps on both IOS and Android are great. And for $15 per month we can stream or download music for offline listening. Every time I look at another services, the available choices don’t come close to the functionality I get from Rhapsody.

I realize that Rhapsody has a bad reputation amongst the Technorati. But if you’re looking for a service, I think it deserves at least a look.

Messages: 

Someone who works for a cable company wrote in and pointed out that when a cable company gives its customers a $20 credit for being late to an appointment, it often charges the $20 to the technician.

The worker writes:

They are listed as WorkForce Not Utilized.

Its been told to us that anytime we run late to a job the company takes the $20 hit from the cable company. Thus, the cable company has eliminated any profit loss.

The only way for the charge to not be passed on to us to make sure our dispatcher is notified and has contacted the customer and noted that account 30mins or more before the end of the scheduled timeframe.

It’s Alan from Moncton New Brunswick, where winter just ended
Long time listener (since the first TNT), first time writer and future boss (I’m in the tell everyone I know category ATM )

Regarding self driving trucks,I’d like to give a ‘four cast’
I think that future ‘truck operators’ will be ‘driving’ multiply trucks (three would be a good number.)

I see one operator in charge of these trucks in convoy. Having the ‘unmanned’ trucks following the ‘manned’ truck.
If they run into any mechanical issue the operator could deal with it (tire issues, etc), making decisions on route and maintenance (fueling, etc)
I’d also see the operator being able to switch to any unmanned trucks controls from his seat, that way he could take over to direct it to specific spot for fueling or parking.

Would be perfect for long haul highway routes from terminal to terminal. It would be like a ‘land train’ if we have self driving truck, doing ‘follow the leader’ should be child’s play

Would solve multiple issues about manpower in that industry and getting loads where needed.

=====

Tuesday’s guest:  Patrick Beja

Justin Young joins the show to talk about the death of the free tier in streaming music services. Plus Len Peralta is in while his spaghetti cooks, to draw an awesome picture about the show.

MP3

Using a Screen Reader? click here

Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.

Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.

A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.

If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!

Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!

Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!

Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke, sebgonz and scottierowland on the subreddit

Show Notes

Today’s guests: Justin Robert Young and Len Peralta

Headlines: 

Nokia may or may not WANT to sell its HERE mapping division but plenty of folks are interested in buying it. Reuters reports its sources say Daimler, BMW and Audi formed a consortium to submit an indicative bid for the division. The New York Times sources say Uber submitted a bid worth $3 billion. Book value for the HERE mapping division is about €2 billion.

Does web surfing make you hungry? You’re in luck. According to The Verge Google has integrated a “Place and order” option when you search for nearby restaurants. The option lets you choose from various services and complete the order on the services website. The first 6 delivery providers in the US are Seamless, Grubhub, Eat24, Delivery.com, BeyondMenu and MyPizza.com. Google hopes to add more providers in the future.

Reuters has revealed that Alibaba is in talks to buy 20% of Indian smartphone maker Micromax Informatics. The deal would help Alibaba expand into the world’s 3rd largest smartphone market. Alibaba, like many companies would like to get a foothold in the INdian market.

9 to 5 Google reports that starting today, Friday, owners of Samsung Galaxy S6 and S6 edge can order the Gear VR Innovator Edition online for $199 via the Samsung store or BestBuy.com. The headset won’t be in Best Buy retail outlets until May 15th.

Fast Company writes up the new app called Thred from SimCity creator Will Wright. It’s a slideshow app. Or a storytelling app. Or a social network. Depending on who you ask. Wright called it an app for making “multi-image creations for anything from web comics, to logging your tropical vacation, to useful how-tos,” BAsically you take up to 30 images and choose to use any filters, borders or overlays. You can follow people favorite their threds and leave comments. You can also add links and location markers. Thred is available today on iOS in the US.

Nintendo notes that its first smartphone title will come out later this year with four more promised by March 2017. So five apps in two years. Nintendo President and CEO Satoru Iwata says that’s not a small number because they intend to make every app a hit. He said “If we did not aim to achieve a significant result, it would be meaningless for us to do it at all.”

The Wall Street Journal reports that Russia and China have signed an agreement not to conduct cyber-attacks against each other as well as jointly counteract technology that may “destabilize the internal political and socio-economic atmosphere,” ”disturb public order” or “interfere with the internal affairs of the state.” The deal includes information sharing between law enforcement, exchange technologies and ensure security of information infrastructure.

Biztechafrica reports MTN Nigeria had made all Nigerian apps free until May 31 for its customers. The APPtitude campaign requires users to text the word APP to 131. App developers who want their app featured in the MTN portal should visit cp.nexva.com/r/mtn

News From You:

MANAGEMIKE submitted the top subreddit post from Ars Technica. This one gioes out to the chip lovers in the audience. Yesterday, at the AMD Financial Analyst Day CEO Lisa Su said the company will shift from being a bargain chip maker to focusing on high-performance. Among the announcements, Zen will be AMD’s sole CPU microarchitecture, launching at the high end first with a new series of FX chips. Al desktop CPU’s will use the new AM4 socket which introduces DDR4 support. That ends Project Skybridge. ARM-based OPteron A1100 serve chips will finally ship. And a new flagship GPU with high bandwidth memory will launch later this quarter.

Habichuelacondulce pointed out the Wall Street Journal article on CBS earnings, which dropped 195. But CEO Les Moonves always has something interesting to say. This time he mentioned the company will roll out an Internet-delivered version of the Showtime premium TV channel “in the coming months.”

Discussion Section Links:  

http://www.cnet.com/news/spotifys-revenue-soars-but-growth-comes-at-a-cost-report-says/

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/05/08/us-spotify-results-idUSKBN0NT12120150508

http://www.cnet.com/news/taylor-swift-wont-let-the-players-play-on-spotify/

http://recode.net/2015/05/08/apples-new-music-service-will-push-paid-subscriptions-with-free-samples/

http://www.theverge.com/2015/5/4/8540935/apple-labels-spotify-streaming

http://www.forbes.com/sites/billrosenblatt/2015/03/21/new-riaa-revenue-figures-show-an-illusion-of-stability/

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/after-flat-year-for-music-industry-labels-look-to-streaming/article23956580/

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/mediatechnologyandtelecoms/11535355/Digital-music-revenues-overtake-physical-sales-for-the-first-time.html

 

Pick of the Day:

Rich from Lovely Cleveland:

The pick of Tubes reminded me of an excellent book I think your audience would enjoy. Dreaming in Code: Two Dozen Programmers, Three Years, 4,732 Bugs, and One Quest for Transcendent Software by Scott Rosenberg is a fantastic book that gives a really approachable glance into the world of software development. It covers Mitch Kapor’s attempt to create a dynamic calendar app called Chandler in the mid-2000s. As someone with no background in development or coding, it gave me some great perspective on what needs to go into creating the software I take for granted. Its kind of a layman’s The Mythical Man Month.

Messages: 

Alan writes:

Congestion-based data limits brings back the days of “free night time and weekend minutes” on cell phone service. Except the congestion time is probably the diametric opposite of phone service. And if more carriers start billing based on congestion in a big way, I think they will have to do something like time-based rates so that people can have some idea of whether or not their data use is counting against their cap. And like phone service, I expect it will be a temporary solution until more bandwidth is built out. My guess is that carriers were betting on living with the current system of caps during the wait, since it makes them more money, and the industry consensus seems to be that the time-based billing was confusing to customers.

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Monday’s guest:  Ron Richards and Veronica Belmont

 

 

Tim Stevens joins the show and we’ll talk about Tesla. Is it overhyped? Are the cars exciting? And is that Powerwall battery really any good for anyone?

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Show Notes

Today’s guests: Tim Stevens

Headlines: 

The Next Web reports that Yahoo has overhauled its Flickr photo app for the web, mobile and desktop. New features include an intelligent search tool, improved coordination with its mobile apps, and a bulk uploader that allows the user to send as many as a half million photos into the cloud to take advantage of that free terabyte of photo storage.

The Globe and Mail reports Canada’s House of Commons passed Bill C-51, an antiterrorism act. If it passes the Senate and receives royal assent, the law would allow police to make preventive arrests, broaden the no-fly list, ease transfer of information on citizens between federal agencies as well as new surveillance abilities for intelligence agencies. The bill is expected to become law by June.

Ars Technica reports AT&T has changed its its LTE throttling policy for customers with unlimited data. Previously once a customer used more than 5GB in a month experienced reduced speeds for the remainder of the month. Jon Brodkin at Ars points out the policy deatiled on AT&T’s website has changed that to customers who use more than 5GB of data “may experience reduced speeds when using data services at times and in areas that are experiencing network congestion.” AT&T is facing a lawsuit from the US Federal Trade Commission.

Kantar Worldpanel has several reports out on the phone market. Phablets claimed 21% of US smartphone sales in Q1 tripling the marketshare form a year ago. The iPhone 6+ led the way with 44% of phablets sold. Overall in smartphones, Android gained 0.2 points to 58.1% of the US market. LG made the biggest jump going from 7.4% a year ago to 10.8%. In Europe’s big 5 markets, Android dropped 3.1 points but maintained its leading share at 68.4%. iOS grew 1.8 points to 20.3%. And in urban China Apple grew its lead from 179% to 26.1%.

Microsoft has backed up statements made its developer Jerry Nixon during the Ignite Conference this week. Nixon said “Right now we’re releasing Windows 10, and because Windows 10 is the last version of Windows, we’re all still working on Windows 10.” A company spokesperson told the Verge that while it wasn’t speaking to future branding, Nixon’s comments “are reflective of the way Windows will be delivered as a service.”

News From You:

The top vote-getter in the subreddit today was submitted by phredd. Ars Technica reports that US FCC chairman Tom Wheeler went into the National Cable & Telecommunications Association (NCTA) conference in Chicago and told his audience “more competition would be better,” and “History proves that absent competition, a predominant position in the market such as yours creates economic incentives to use that market power to protect your traditional business in a way that is ultimately harmful to consumers.” He also said: “Often people say to me, ‘I know you won’t do anything crazy, but what about those who follow you?’ My response is, I take you at your word to protect an open Internet, but what about those that follow you?’” According to the LA Times, Wheeler received “a frosty reception” at the gathering.

habichuelacondulce sent us the Business Insider report that after bumping its head against a brick for a few years Nintendo has earned some gold coins. The company reported its first annual operating profit since 2011, slightly ahead of analysts estimates. Profit of 24.8 billion yen ($207.6 million) beat the company’s forecast of 20 billion yen as well as the average estimate of 23.8 billion yen. Reduced costs offset the impact of slowing revenue growth. Nintendo forecasts operating profit of 50 billion yen for the year started April 1.

and BOL’s own gknee sent us the news from Wired that Nintendo has teamed up with Universal Parks & Resorts to build Nintendo-themed attractions in Universal’s parks, “creating spectacular, dedicated experiences based on Nintendo’s wildly popular games, characters and worlds.” So we’ll all be able to bump our heads against the bricks and have gold coins fall out. Of our pockets.

spsheridan submitted the Reuters story that the 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan said the Patriot Act did not authorize the National Security Agency to collect Americans’ calling records in bulk. Circuit Judge Gerard Lynch called the extent of the collection staggering and wrote that such expansive collection should “be preceded by substantial debate, and expressed in unmistakable language. There is no evidence of such a debate.” The court declined.” The court declined to halt the program as the relevant part of the Patriot Act, Section 215 expires on June 1st.

magoojc posted the Verge article noting Google’s I/O conference schedule made specific mention of Android M, the first official mention of the next version of Android. That session has since been removed from the schedule. Google’s I/O keynote led by Sundar Pichai kicks off May 28th at 12:30PM.

Discussion Section Links:  

http://arstechnica.com/business/2015/05/tesla-already-has-38000-reservations-for-the-powerwall-but-use-case-is-narrow/

http://arstechnica.com/cars/2015/05/tesla-model-3-to-be-shown-in-march-2016/

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-05-06/tesla-s-new-battery-doesn-t-work-that-well-with-solar

Pick of the Day:

Sand Sailor Writes:

I really love your show, and noticed that you’ve been talking a lot about VR and AR hardware, but I haven’t heard you mention the DAQRI Smart helmet yet. This is a pretty awesome industrial product, and word on the street is they’re going to be starting BETA programs with some Fortune 100 companies very, very soon. I’d be interested to get your take on this and their industrial focus.

Messages: 

Matthew Martian writes:

Regarding these discussion of self driving trucks in show 2487.
I have been driving truck over the road for 5 years now podcast and audiobooks are what make the long drives enjoyable. In running this trucking company it has been almost impossible to find good drivers for more than 10 years. A majority of truck drivers are reaching or have surpassed retirement age and a looking to quit in the next few years. From this perspective self driving trucks cannot get here soon enough. I hope to see that laws will allow the automated systems to do the simple interstate and highway driving out side of the big cities. With that we can make trucking far more efficient since current laws do not let trucks drive for more than 11 hours without a 10 hour break. That is one reason why truckers work such odd hours. New semi tractors run $130,000-150,000 so if a self driving truck could be purchased for $220,000 or less that makes it a viable option even to us smaller trucking companies who cannot find drivers to hire for $100,000 a year.

Russell writes:

Thinking a bit about the self-driving trucks and it might open a whole new possibility for drivers turned ‘monitors’. The scenario of having a second income stream while on the truck working on any number of things from computer based work to small product assembly could change the characteristics of the job overall making it less sedentary and mundane. It could be a job that could be attractive to people who are working on startup type projects (app development, coding, etc.) or writers and artists. Probably a lot of other scenarios there as well but overall seems like a really good thing at a lot of levels.

Rich from Lovely Cleveland compares the coming VR wars to the game console wars where the perception was more important than the specs. He writes:

“I think we could see the same mentality shape up with the VR competition between the Vive and Oculus Rift, with the seemingly interminable lead time of the Rift working against it as being “delayed”, even though I don’t believe the actual consumer release date was ever moved back. Add in the good will that Valve still enjoys, and the initial narrative seems to favor the Vive right now (obviously if there is a huge price delta or dearth of games on the Vive this would change).

But Sony may have the ace in the hole with Project Morpheus in terms of price. Even if the headset is equal in price to its competitors, if Sony can put out a $600 bundle for the entire package (ps4 and headset), that’s probably the baseline price for a PC needed to power the Rift or Vive. Sony could benefit from the same enthusiasm that made the Wii successful (hopefully with more long term success). Of course long term it comes down to user experience and games, I think whoever can make for great group experiences will ultimately come out victorious.”

Martin writes:

On your conversation from yesterday about all of the VR headsets coming out and who would be the winner. The answer is simple Unity is the clear winner as well as the key to which headset will get good content. Currently creating a VR experience is changing out the first person camera in Unity to the SDK that you are looking to support. So as long as the makers of VR headsets make that experience easy for developer they will be supported, if the do not then it will be a lot harder to get good content in those platforms.

Mike Calvo Opinionated Ranter and #BlindCrossfitter writes:

“A great example of this are the stickers in FB Messenger, Line, Whatsapp, and others. A novice user doesn’t know the difference between a labeled Emoji and an unlabeled sticker or picture. This makes it rather challenging when a blind person and a sighted person are first meeting online and maybe flirting.

…for example, some of the FB stickers are labeled with alt tags for me to know what they are when sending them, but, for some strange reason, when a person sends me a sticker …I have no idea as to what it is because all my screenreader says is the word “sticker”

…it is important that the developer and graphics author communities understand that these platforms don’t just interpret these Emojis and stickers without the alt tag included by the content’s creator.

Just wanted to clarify to the listeners and suggest that if perhaps you are part of the dev teams of one of the above mentioned chat platforms, perhaps you can encourage the use of alt tags on all graphics but especially Emoji and stickers.”

Drill Sgt Jason Nicholson in already hot as hell Georgia writes:

On Tuesday you talked about portable EEG devices, and controlling tech with your thoughts. In fact you mentioned using you concentration to control the Jedi training ball. Well, it’s already a thing, or rather it was. Back in 2012 they released this gemhttp://www.hammacher.com/Product/Default.aspx?sku=76966 All the fun, none of the blaster scars. Batteries, helmet with blast shield, and Jedi master not included. Oh, and here’s the promo video.https://youtu.be/hbsCsIfyvXc

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Friday’s guest:  Darren Kitchen and Len Peralta