 Coming up on DTNS whether Netflix is actually in trouble or not. Do we want mixed robot made drinks and smart diapers? This is the Daily Tech News for Thursday, July 18th 2019 in Los Angeles. I'm Tom Merritt and from studio feline I'm Sarah Lane and From the outskirts of the LA County Empire. I am the shows producer Roger Chang we were just having a lovely reminiscence about chewing gum and Local brands of soda on our expanded show a good day Internet you can get that by becoming a member at patreon.com DTNS let's start this show with a few tech things you should know The European Commission has fined Qualcomm 242 million euros for blocking British phone software maker I sera which is now part of Nvidia from the market using predatory pricing about a decade ago This is Qualcomm second EU antitrust penalty. Now the company said it would appeal and that the fine is quote Unsupported by the law economic principles or market facts. Wow Slack sent emails to users. It believes were affected by a data breach back in 2015 when attackers gained access to its user profile database including their scrambled passwords However, the attackers inserted code that scraped plaintext passwords Slack said it recently was contacted through its bug bounty program about a list of allegedly compromised slack account passwords Which the company says is only about 1% of users, but they are contacting all users who haven't changed their password Since 2015 out of an abundance of caution. Yeah, I got that email as well And you know better safe than sorry right a few months after Instagram started testing a new design that hides The total number of likes on other users posts that they've received the company is expanding the test Originally, it was just based in Canada and the test is now rolling out to users in Ireland Italy Japan Brazil Australia and New Zealand Now to be clear users with this new design will still see that everyone liked their own photos and videos and have that total number But not anyone else's memory chip spot prices rose for the first time this year 15% for DRAM weak demand and oversupply are considered the major factors behind the rise But a curb on chip making material exports from Japan to South Korea that we talked about on the show before Could make the price increases worse the spot market makes up about 10% of the market It refers to immediate purchases versus long-term contracts But something to keep an eye on if you're thinking about building a computer for sure All right, let's talk a little bit more about Nasty apps on Google. Yeah, if you've not heard of stalker wear It doesn't really have anything to do with malware at least not on the surface Antivirus company Avast reports that it found seven stalker wear apps in the Google Play Store that had been installed more than 130,000 times so quite a few times Google has removed all seven apps of the last couple of days If you're not familiar with the concept of stalker wear the app tracks things like Location data and provides contact information call logs text messages very you know personal stuff They often build themselves as a way to track children or find lost phones But the descriptions if you dig down into some of these apps involve giveaways like catching cheaters Somebody who is spying on someone else for example They require access to the target's phone But once obtained a user who installed one of the seven apps would be prompted by the attacker to then install separate software And then delete the initial download which leaves no app icon and no real trace To indicate that this had happened and the spire had actually been installed. Yeah, this is this is nasty. So first of all Let's make it clear Apps that are meant to help track your children are fine Not not all of those apps are catching cheater apps These specifically you can tell because their descriptions are different than what the title says same with fine lost phone apps but the nasty part is that okay, you're in a combative relationship and Yet you still have enough trust that they're like, hey, can I use your phone? Right? I mean that is the situation where they just don't lock it and then go to the bathroom Yeah, yeah, exactly something like that So while the other person in the relationship has the phone they could go in install one of these apps Install the separate software have it sent to their email address and then delete the icon and the other person would never know It was there. It's really bad. Yeah, the folks from vast said listen This is just unethical stuff. These apps are you could use them for non nefarious reasons But that's not really what they're being used for and you know, we wanted to bring it to Google's attention and Google agreed Yeah, and Google has removed all seven apps. I guess they did like it in two phases They removed a few right away and and then took a while to look at the others to make sure that they were falling a foul Because they don't want to be removing a legitimate app that is for child protection or finding your phone, right? And and none of these qualified for that, right? Just just bad stuff a report from the Paulson Institute in Chicago says that while China leads the way in data depth and Access for use by AI the US has better data quality and Diversity you hear a lot of headlines out there saying China has the lead in AI Mostly based on the fact that it has a lot of data Because the government is more permissive in collecting it people give it up voluntarily in China more often as well So those two facts combined mean there's a lot of data available for companies to use China it does have a lead in the depth of data it has a lot of that is because there are 800 million Chinese users who have internet access and It it has a depth of access because there are high use of services like we chat Yeah, some of it is government surveillance Some of it is just people saying I use we chat for everything and therefore now they have access to all this information from Hundreds of millions of people. However, the US AI efforts are global So they're not limited to one country like a lot of the China databases are that gives US companies access to a greater range of languages ethnicities cultures and Nationalities so that's going to give you a higher quality Because you have more room for error control and more diversity in the kind of data You have yeah I mean that was my first question when I when I when I first was digging into the story was well How does the US have more diversity? But it's true if if if if China and apps that are that are Somewhat walled garden Chinese apps that have a lot of data, but still are one region specifically then You think like well, I mean wouldn't the US be the same, but no I mean it's the apps are used by far more folks and so you do get that diversity Yeah, this is this is just a good note to have when you're hearing the discussions of the AI race It's not as simple as China has more data. So China's ahead Both countries governments are doing a lot to try to boost their AI development and I you know China's going to have to change a lot of its practices if it wants to get access to data outside of its country and and the US is going to be battling headwinds of access because Especially in Western countries in Europe in the United States There's a push to limit access to user data right now. So both countries have the challenges Both countries also have babies Yes, they do and here's where I'm going with that Pampers announced its new Lumie all-in-one connected diaper system With two activity sensors for the diapers a Logitech camera Wi-Fi baby monitor and also a companion app Lumie's sensor detects and monitors a wider more visible blue strip on the outside of specially made diapers to detect Wetness now these aren't the only smart diapers the Monit smart sensor diaper In Korea can be attached to any diaper So kind of has a leg up so to speak the baby cam measures temperature and humidity and serves as a hub for the activity Sensor it is very much a smart diaper the app takes all this data to then view activity trends because babies are active Let's be honest no price on the system yet But it will include two packs of diapers when it launches in the autumn and you can sign up for pre-orders now Yeah tracking baby activity is a huge trend among parents right now as a way to sort of measure health And and and sort of track infant progress You know as far as their diet nutrition and all kinds of things like that So this is a move by Pampers to try to get in on that action a little bit by measuring it It doesn't do weight some of these like diaper changing pads will do will like weigh the baby every time you lay it down and stuff like that But it is trying to collect that data and put it in an app make it easy for for parents to see Obviously the one that that everybody is going to be interested in is oh is it's gonna tell me when the diaper needs changing So I don't have to guess but it doesn't tell you when it's dirty only when it's wet so Sometimes does mean dirty I'm specifically using dirty to mean more than just wet it's not gonna tell you that you're still gonna have to use the sniff test Sometimes wet and dirty or not me chilly. Oh sure sure. No, no, no, absolutely But I'm just saying you're only gonna get the wet part of it and yeah, there's always all the information You need well, you know when we're in Roger and and Tom and I were at CES earlier this year And there have been stuff like this in the past But we did notice there there was definitely a surge in baby monitoring smart cribs, you know and and and And you know cameras that were specifically meant for checking in on your baby and and could give you more data than just like Oh, is my baby asleep or is it a way kind of thing? So I don't know Roger if you feel like this is something that is useful or just a little bit of a marketing scheme I mean I don't want to poo poo any of the The stuff that they're doing the data is very valuable However, in a lot of these instances to to get the data you need to strap something to the diaper or you need to Set them in a specific place And after around five or six months your kid starts booking it all over the place. They're very they're very um boisterous and so You know when you're changing diapers, you may not remember to stick the sensor back on or you might not remember to Put them in a specific place because you're half awake just trying to keep up Yeah, um, and again, it's not that this information isn't useful. I'm just wondering In a long term with with thousands of people using this Like there are times where we don't even put clothes on my kid because it's just like, you know They're gonna wet their diaper again, and I'm gonna have to change it Might as well just leave it off And then make things because there's a point where you just I mean you especially you have two kids You just kind of like well, whatever makes things the smoothest What you're saying is is the trouble of remembering to put the sensor on might that be something that Or remembering to put them in a specific location, you know, like I don't know that this requires a specific location For the cameras and stuff. I mean like, you know, do I There are times where I've changed my kid on my lap or I've just changed it on the chair Where's the most convenient and not necessarily the most Well, the the camera part isn't about the wetness detection the camera part is when you've put her put her down in the crib Yeah, it's letting you do the baby monitor thing. I think that's No, that's like but even with the diapers It's like, you know, my kid will my kid is gonna cry when her diaper's full Like this is the thing to get a full night's sleep and if she sleeps through it Great her diaper's super full in the morning. I'll take it off and I'll swap it But if we don't have to change it in the middle of the night and it's not given diaper rash leave it on Well, I think it's kind of like, okay Do we wear activity monitors on our own rests at night to to gain some data about how we slept and maybe, you know, how our rim sleep Was and see how many times we turned over But when you're talking about babies in many cases the babies will precede the data anyway Like the kid's already crying like she's up that and this stuff is pretty pricey Like yeah around around six seven months, you know, there's a whole set of metrics, you know If you've never had a kid you you don't realize how fast they grow Like you think like uh that our adults don't love, you know, you might gain weight a little bit But once you've grown you've grown with kids There's a growth spurt growth spurt growth spurt and then I'm I'm tossing out the crib next month because she's too big for it All right, folks if you have thoughts on this feedback at daily tech news show dot com Meanwhile amp pruit brought to our attention The story that amster dam is pausing approval of new data centers until the end of the year in order to adjust the city's policies Because amster dam thinks it probably has more data centers than any other major city in the world Part of that is due to low taxes. There's also cheap electricity sustainable electricity And the city worries that it is putting too much strain on its power networks As well as affecting the property market property values in amster dam are going through the roof Amster dam is in fact home to about a third of the data centers in europe So it's no joke. There's a lot of data centers. There are a lot of companies google microsoft, etc Etc. Etc. I have data centers in the amster dam area The government wants to give municipalities more control over location And making sure that new construction fits in as little space as possible as well as blends in architecturally And while data centers run on 80 green energy, amster dam wants to do more And wants to set requirements that data centers make residual heat available for free So that people in amster dam can use that for heating their homes or other green energy uses Something that a lot of the data centers are doing voluntarily already and a lot of the data centers are upset about this pause Because they wanted to put some more data centers in development existing data centers being developed will be allowed to continue They're just putting a pause on approving the new ones, but you know companies don't like that First of all, god bless the dutch Second of all the fact that amster dam is home to about a third of all of europe's data centers If you haven't been to amster dam recently, wonderful town Not that big That is that is that is a high concentration of data centers in in one place So I can definitely see where the city's like hold on a second Might you know, we might have been giving a few more incentives and we have to rethink this I happen to have a friend who writes for Newspaper a local newspaper in the netherlands and I said, you know Is this something that you know people are up in arms about and she said Most of the most of the public is not talking about this So, you know, it's definitely still more of a tech story and might might be getting a little bit more attention in other places such as here But uh, but yeah, I wonder where Okay, if amster dam puts a clamp town on the the the very Very attractive situation that data centers have enjoyed thus far. Who's the next city? Well, I I tried to look up some stats on that It seems like germany is is a home to a lot of these data centers. So so maybe somewhere like Or somewhere uh in germany, but but yeah, it doesn't sound I I don't think amster dam is clamping down I think what's happening is amster is like amster dam saying look we love getting all these data centers But it's starting to become a problem So we just need to put a pause for the rest of the year and figure it out how to make it not a problem We're not going to take away the tax incentives. We're not going to charge more for our electricity But we are we do want to put in some requirements that keep amster dam livable and I think that probably makes sense There's a trickle happening and they want to stop a flood They have a lot of experience with that sort of thing Imagine if san francisco was like, hey We need we need to maybe you know, not keep this flood of data centers going on and make sure that they blend in architecturally, you just wouldn't hear that I mean, I I I actually think I could imagine that in san francisco But what would happen here is they just go to san osa. I'd be like, I'll see you later. So yeah, right exactly Uh, let's talk about food at food tech live at ces mentioned ces a little bit earlier on the show We also saw several automatic drink makers They are exactly what they sound like bar sys 2.0 is one of those drink makers launching adding bluetooth For up to three devices at a time and some machine learning to help drinks consistent making drinks consistent Bar sys 2.0 will be available on july 22nd for $1,500. So not super cheap probably not going to put it in your home But might be better targeted at bars that want to save money on those bartenders with a heavy hand And you know keep things consistent drink works home bar sales for $299. That's another option. But the question is Do people care whether a drink is made by a machine or a human? Yeah, I mean $299 a lot for me to spend to make this at home. I'm definitely not spending $1,500 So that's got to be a restaurant thing. Yeah, um, I I don't know how y'all feel. I don't mind in some cases if my drink is made by a machine It depends on what I'm ordering if I want a gin and fresco then I just say, you know, it's made by a machine. That's fine Uh, I'd rather have it made by my friend Dave because he's good at it. But you know, it's not complicated However, if I'm like, ooh, uh, I know this bar where they just make the perfect Manhattan I mean theoretically a robot could mix it the same way, but I don't know if I Maybe I'm silly enough to trust it It's all about proportions and the amount of of mixing in the order of ingredients. I guess a robot could do this Yeah, it's all about portion control having Having received a number of restaurant magazines when you're in a restaurant industry You get magazines whether you signed up for them or not because they just want you to read the ads but all of them Number number one or two item in their in their in their advertising is portion control How do I maintain portion control because that is 50% of your business? If you can keep you're not saying what makes a good drink is portion control. You're saying what the appeal Robot bartender. Yes is the restaurant owner having control over how much liquor is being used in each Basically so that the bartender doesn't make a drink too strong. Yeah So and you know, they even had I don't know if you ever when you go to a bar you look at the tip They have those pourers there's a little ball in there that limits how much you comes out with each pour because that was something That someone came up with in the 60s for portion control So this is where I see this being most effective is restaurants who don't want an actual bar But still want to serve something more than just beer But not necessarily like we have a huge selection of wine. You just want a cocktail with you know your lunch Uh, like my like I know people or some people are inclined to do I I am not a big mixed drink drinker So mixology I understand and I'm using air quotes because that's just the term that you hear a lot I know that that that is a real skill and it matters and yeah, I would never say Oh, well people who are super skilled should just be replaced by robots because it's all you know a matter of just, you know Liquid and making sure that your your portions are are correct and then you get the perfect cocktail However, I personally would not care if a robot or a person made my drink Sure, the bartender Dave if I like the guy, you know, give him a tip You know, happy to happy to chat at the bar for a second, but otherwise this makes perfect sense I think the robots are pretty good listeners, too Although the best bartender they don't argue with you the best bartenders are the ones that keep the conversation going That I've seen at least from the I've had some bad bartenders. Yeah, you could tell Roger doesn't drink If you want to get all the tech headlines each day in about five minutes Be sure to subscribe to daily tech headlines.com. All right, yesterday We mentioned that netflix reported it added 2.7 million subscribers last quarter about half of the five million it expected In the united states it lost 130,000 subscribers the first drop in subscribers since 2011 Which was back when it split dvds and streaming apart The company noted it saw it missed its forecast by wider margins in areas with price increases So they're saying it looks like price increase Definitely had an impact on uh us missing our forecast Netflix also says its original content in q2 drove less growth than it had anticipated And it's still hopeful for next quarter netflix expects to add 7 million subscribers in q3 They expect to bounce back and add 800 000 subscribers in the u.s And netflix also announced it plans to introduce a lower cost mobile only plan in india Within the next three months if that happens within q3 then that could help boost some numbers in india Which is a huge potential market Uh for netflix, but I was like I was looking at What they released in q2 versus q3 and their argument I know this is all spin on netflix's part, but that just because it's spin doesn't mean it's necessarily untrue And their q2 hits are not nearly as appealing as their q3 hits and q2 Dead to me had 30 million viewers When they see us the avid du verne Film 25 million the perfect date had 48 million and always be my maybe had 32 million Now a lot of you are probably saying what are those again? I think I remember the avid du verne thing, but the other three Maybe maybe not here's what's coming up a coming quarter stranger things season three Is in this quarter The final season of orange is the new black ozark season three jerry seinfelds comedians and cars getting coffee the dark crystal age of resistance As well as the comedy specials from aziz and sorry whitney comings katharine ryan Original films include the irishman from martin scores sazy And movie six underground directed by michael bay starring ryan reynolds So I don't think q2 and q3 even compare as far as original content goes Yeah, and I think that there is and tom and roger and I were talking about this before the show The the narrative of well netflix is about to lose a lot of people who just watch it to watch reruns pretty much because those reruns are going to go to um NBC universal and warner and disney fox's new upcoming as fawd services And that's true It that will happen in some capacity, but it does seem like q2 was a little bit of a Yeah, I mean I I watched always be my maybe a good movie But it was it was a little bit of a lull in the content spike that you see coming up in q3 I mean stranger things alone. That's that's it's a big deal for a lot of folks The q2 stuff was good stuff that probably kept you as a netflix subscriber if you liked it The q3 stuff is the kind of stuff that could bring people back to netflix. Yeah You know what I really want to watch that dark crystal I can absolutely see that and netflix says that when it drops its catalog content Like stuff like friends it sees members shift to other content rather than drop subscriptions People have been saying this since stars left netflix years ago that oh when they lose their third party Their subscriptions are going to go down and it never has so just be you know Stop clock is right twice a day right just because this is the time where a threatened Departure of content that hasn't actually happened Was at the same time as a subscriber dip. I don't match those two up First of all the content's still there. Why would you cancel your subscription when it hasn't even disappeared yet? I don't think most people pay attention enough to to think that far ahead If they were going to cancel they'd cancel when it disappeared and netflix says You know people have been saying this about us for a long time Which is why we started doing original content generally people just find something else to watch And the keen for netflix is do they have that something else? And if you look at q2 Not they didn't have it as much as they will in q3 And that's going to happen with with any service That that that that just is what netflix's q2 was and I think that yeah, it's it's interesting that At least for myself There are times where especially when i'm talking about content like let's talk about the office right or friends Which which are very very popular on netflix Most of the time that is Nostalgic watching because people have already seen the show and they just kind of want to have it on And there have been times in the past where i'm like, you know, maybe i'm on hulu or a netflix or or some similar service Where i'm like, where'd it go? I don't know i'll just watch something else because it's kind of background stuff Now i'm not saying that you're not going to netflix to watch friends specifically because you might be doing that but I think that the the company has a point that In many cases, you're just sort of looking to put something on And you're going to find something else that is in the catalog You know i take it back I guess the office did leave but i don't think it left till late in the quarter if not in q3 So again, I don't think that has as big an impact as people think a bigger deal is choice People are deciding. You know what? I i'm not watching that much on netflix now Maybe i'll stop it down and watch hulu. Maybe i'll watch prime video. Maybe i'll watch playstation view Maybe i'll watch cbs all access. Maybe i won't watch anything. Maybe i'll just buy some stuff and rent it Maybe i'll play some video games. I mean this market is getting saturated And it would be unthinkable for netflix not to see any kind of impact from that They also say that they saw a bigger advance in subscriptions in q1 than they expected and maybe that impacted q2 That's possible as well. I I think People just they always want to jump the gun and say this is it. This is finally the time that netflix is crashing If we see them miss their expectations again next quarter, then it's time to say, okay Maybe they are doing something wrong and I will always be looking at their originals to be like are their originals compelling enough Maybe the dark crystal ends up not being that good. I I don't think it will but you know If if we have a series of like orange is the new black wasn't that great dark crystal was a disappointment Then you might start seeing people dropping off more often, but I think it's going to be more about the originals than the library content Well, thanks everybody who participates in our subreddit There are lots of cord cutting stories there and other tech news as well You can be one of those people by submitting a story and voting on others and bringing them to our attention at daily tech New show dot reddit.com or also on facebook join our group if you haven't already facebook.com slash groups slash daily tech New show. All right, let's check out the mailbag We got an email from nick who said I heard your podcast yesterday And that would have been Wednesday's show a thought I'd chime in on the amazon choice discussion When you see amazon choice when you're when you're when you're searching for a product on amazon Nick says I've sold them for over five years There are two types of amazon choice number one Certain categories such as networking that amazon will bid out to top vendors in the space to hit certain price points They'll have them compete against each other to find the best value for a particular price band They don't validate that it actually works best Just that the specs and price line up with what they want number two amazon will algorithmically Generate an amazon's choice for almost every search that you make It's decided based on a combination of run rate reviews return rates and a variety of other factors With that said they do tend to lean towards the cheap option Which is almost always an amazon basic option as well So there is an algorithm trying to generate the amazon choice based on what they think is the best choice But then they in certain cases Just sell it. So it's not always the same thing. That's annoying. Uh, I don't like that Thank you nick though for the insight. Yeah And in a screenshot of open sky the app from alphabet subsidiary wing designed to serve as air traffic control for drones Uh, if you look the uh red means no fly at all in the app Orange means fly with conditions The condition to be aware that there is a private helipad nearby For instance, uh, so you don't want to stray too far into that You don't want to stray into that space. You want to be aware that that's nearby. So there's limits So thank you for for for opening that up michael and sending us the screenshot. That's awesome. Yeah at the same time I looked at it and I was like, oh my gosh There's a lot of information here. I'd be afraid to fly at jones. Yeah, exactly. Yeah Uh, this is why uh, joe the pilot uh said just let them all crash into each other and stay out of my way while I'm flying my plane Right as long as you don't crash in my backyard It's a boy from me. Old man yells a chair Uh, thanks everybody including our patrons because you know what you rock Yes, they do. Thank you for supporting us Uh, Keith walmack is among the many fine people who've supported this show directly for five years or more Join keith at patreon.com slash dts and tell us what you think of the show We want your opinion if you haven't taken our survey already. Uh, it helps us improve the show It's just a few questions about like well, if we changed this would you hate it? Would you love it? Would you care daily tech news show dot com slash survey? Hey, did you guys hear the good word? We have an email address that email address is feedback at daily tech news show dot com and we want to hear from you We're also live monday through friday if you can join us live That would be great for 30 p.m. Eastern 20 30 utc Put it on your calendar and find out more at daily tech news show dot com slash live back tomorrow with patrick norton talk to you then This show is part of the frog pants network Get more at frog pants dot com