 This is the Daily Tech news show for Thursday December 24th 2015 on Tom Merritt and I'm alone, but I'm not alone In fact, I have the entire year with me because this is our best of 2015 show Wait, what what it's Darren doing here. I thought I would be doing this alone just to myself. Mmm This is the first Daily Tech news show of 2015 And the show's now a year old I'm Tom Merritt happy new year and that's how 2015 began with DTNS contributor Darren Kitchen who showed up on his day off It was a fitting start for what turned out to be the year of the contributor You know welcome to 2015 every brand wants to be cool The the packets don't care and then Veronica you got sent the emoji English Dictionary The more people I know the more I love dogs Which is up dot dot dot two people up heart dog dog dog dog And I bet you Phil Spencer could produce a pretty good album I hope he has nothing else in common Gaming on mobile however much people say is the next big thing is Not as big as well It doesn't attract the gamers that enjoy gaming as a specific hobby It attracts gamers at that that do this as a pastime of sorts. I got to finish my laundry Really just tell us you have to wash your hair Len. Gee I like the meatloaf and fish fry excuse is better. You're losing your creativity as always the year in tech began at CES We actually are gonna have the three stages of CES on this show Got me avoiding it Molly on her way to it and Tim You wouldn't believe the lengths that Patrick Norton has gone to to help Jenny Josephson get this going Alive from CES, but you guys are there. Thank you so much. It's awesome It's It's a pleasure to watch you work tapes and tools and General tinkering involved it was insane our first new DTNS contributor of the year Patrick Beja had some strong things to say about the Internet of Things. I am really unimpressed by Samson's vision and the way they're selling it. It seems to me they're sort of doing things in a Futurologist way like they're showing us fancy videos with tomorrow is now and Tomorrow is beautiful in the future You will be able to sit on a chair that talks to your monitor the future They're selling us is really expensive and it's not simple and even stronger things to say about pretty much everything else if you take a step back Microsoft is in the media at least way more important than it was under Balmer and that's already in itself something that's really important We're hearing about Microsoft doing bold things that Some people have questions about them But I don't think anyone is saying this is completely ridiculous and he's gonna sink the company the next DTNS contributor Justin Robert Young showed that his intelligence was far from artificial when talking about artificial intelligence when you Read some of this and you talk about like making sure that this form of life is Subjugated and and docile You can't bring it close to human understanding without Thinking of other times where we have talked about human beings being subjugated and and docile and better for us And and not for themselves. Although what themselves would be is something that is unquantifiable right now, so it's it's fascinating but Really terrifying when when really smart people are kind of worried about this and and in the midst of Elon Musk having a huge Moment for his his SpaceX company the next tweet he writes about is Another pet issue for him, which is the danger of the coming AI Now the fascination is not we can save everything. It's what can we delete? You know snapchat is You know becomes popular at least in its initial offering because it because it is ephemeral I feel like there are a lot of assumptions that we made six months ago with this conversation Including let's go back to January when that first Verizon ruling came down and now all the headlines were Congratulations, welcome to the doomed internet the only person who can stand in the way of Total destruction now is this pawn lackey bought and sold a puppet commissioner in Tom Wheeler Is Tom Wheeler's future in the senator in the White House? I mean this is either he had this huge change of heart or he is a far more skilled Politician than any of us had really initially when we were calling him a puppet lackey sell-out suck up I had any concept of he is this is Frank Underwood level smart and I personally believe he'll be our president in a year and a half Because here's the problem is is you know, that wasn't the place at the time I can't just come on the Daily Tech news show You've entrusted me to show a different element of my personality that I don't really get a chance to do one a lot of Shows where I could dust off my degree from the SI Newhouse School of Public Communications located in Syracuse, New York But when when you really break it down what you got to focus on is the fact that Taylor Swift Okay writes a Tumblr right about Apple music So here we go Taylor Swift Apple music Taylor Swift Apple music and you think that that's a connection. Uh-uh, uh-uh It's on it. It's on a tumblr, right? What's tumble log? What what tumblr is with their own by Yahoo Marissa Meyer runs Yahoo What did Marissa Meyer do today Marissa Meyer went and said that they're gonna have their search in with JavaScript So now where does JavaScript get worked in you think that maybe it's just gonna be Marissa Meyer Taylor Swift got into a room and said hey How's this Apple music gonna thing go down me while JavaScript comes in and says I think that we need to make sure that all These indie artists get paid because I like to enjoy music that every here at a bar one day Okay, so JavaScript comes in and says that's what's gonna go down some Marissa Meyer goes back Taylor Swift She writes on a tumblr log next thing you know any cues halfway through a run runner and his phone goes off And he says what the hell's going on falls into the pool wakes up and says okay Let's go ahead and get Taylor Swift on Apple music. Oh my god Bravo, I like it and of course it wouldn't be a DTS Friday without the classic duo of Darren kitchen and Len Peralta Tom, do you know what happens when a packet with a TTL of 54 reaches that 54th hop? Yeah Do you know what happens? It's murder. It's like yes It is it is it's absolutely like I then it's like a great disturbance in the network as if millions of packets Suddenly cried out in terror and then we're suddenly silenced or dropped Yes, they just prop to the floor. I'll always remember the watching wrath of Khan and Just not believing that a character like spot could die And now we're reliving it for real. So I just thought it was very fitting for me to draw What I what I took out of that what I take out of this entire thing of course his last words his last tweet and then this image of Not really it's not Kirk, but it's just anybody actually it was it's supposed to be your hand Tom That's how I worked yourself in there, but But it says any any of us who are reaching out and you know, he's behind this glass Just kind of a poignant image For today's show So I just thought it was very fitting and all the while we got tantalizing hints about what DTS could be with a Full set of contributors like this discussion about Cuba with Veronica Belmont I mean, we've known about this for a while because we've heard about these things I called a picket they some and all the USB drives that are delivered each week to to Customers or to distributors where they basically plug in a bunch of TV shows movies Newspaper articles magazines pretty much any media you can think of from the outside world bring it into Cuba I think they probably someone has a connection a decent connection to the outside world who is then putting it on to a USB drive that is then being disseminated throughout the country Because internet is a major problem there, of course, we've had they do not have easy access to the outside internet Internet connections are available at cafes around the country, but it is very expensive people have been setting up Nodes internet nodes throughout the country now. This is not technically legal But the government kind of lets it slide a little bit because they have they self-regulate. It's especially Fascinating because they're making it happen on their own You know, they're not having the big support of a company like a Google or a Verizon or an AT&T None of that has happened yet though now that the sanctions have been taken away Hopefully that will start happening though a lot of people are gonna lose this source of income They have by creating these packet they seminars to to pass around information on or the people who are being paid to manage the Nodes as we climbed closer to our Scott and Veronica goal. We were joined by an amazing roster of DT and S guests Let's punch Monday in the face Because I used to hate unboxing videos and I still do but I hate I hate the Overproduced that's take 20 minutes to take something out of a box because of the plastic like I can't stay in those kind of videos But but but we we like like looking at other people take stuff up box It's a it's a real phenomena like yeah, it doesn't matter what it is if you got a good personality People just like you're seeing your experience. Well, you're un-boxing and subsequent stabbing of the Alexa was one of my And I think it is unfair to say that the telcos don't want free and open internet What they want is the freedom to put in their own Money-making opportunities in other words they invested into laying these lines and they want the right to make money off them However, they want they see themselves and this is what it comes down to they see themselves as an information service an information service Like a cable television company says we have information that a customer wants and we will dole out that information to the customers We deem appropriate and that is that is where the opposition is going to come they're gonna say the internet is not a Telecommunication service. It's an information service. I'm not sure I buy that Simply because the information isn't being provided by the telecommunication service It's being provided by lots of other people openly in other words a cable company doesn't create the channels But the cable company goes and makes deals and says okay We have these channels and we will now provide them in the case except in the case of Comcast where they own NBC Universal Right where they're providing it. So they're saying look we're information Well, and in the case of Time Warner as well, I mean you almost wonder was that the long game all along Was the long game to just go ahead and get into content so that they could be a little bit of both We need a lot of bandwidth, right? Like I just wrote a big story about virtual reality and the possibility of streaming virtual reality video to the home now Compression techniques are gonna get a lot better and so on and so forth But that's a big video super big video if a truly unexpected use case comes along like Multi, you know dozens of gigabyte-sized virtual reality files that people suddenly can't live without on Facebook We want the ability to say hey Facebook. You need to you need to pay us a little extra for that when you think about it You just you spent you know pretty much I'm sure 99% of the folks that listen to this show and any podcast tech show are the support the Administrators for their families and their friends and you tell them don't open emails that you don't trust Don't just give away your password don't change your password update your machines And it just doesn't it's really starting to realize that it doesn't matter anymore because they're just a you're being attacked from Everywhere from stuff that you can't even control It's being attacked. I'm glad to see Microsoft taking some steps They've been traditionally so bad that it's a good sign I've got a good friend who's in a wheelchair and has accessibility problems from a from a mobility standpoint And when when Windows 8 came out it was completely and entirely inaccessible to him where Windows 7 was accessible to him He makes his living on Windows and and they had all these references still to things like the start button So they very clearly didn't even look at the accessibility features before putting out Windows 8 What has happened as a result of the technology in our lives and I hear a lot of people say well It's ruined your local your friendships and I realize for me it has fallen into three categories categories Because of the technology I have friends. I wouldn't have if it were for the internet I would not be friends with Tom Merritt if it were for the internet, right? And then in May our contributor roster was complete Joining me today in his first time as an official co-contributor co-conspirator and Co-awesome guy mr. Scott Johnson to the frog pants network I could not be happier to be here. Thank you so much and huge. Thanks to the patrons who made it possible Join me today in her first day as a newly minted DTNs contributor co-host of Sorton laser and regional parallel parking champion Veronica Belmont Hello, I'm excellent tower you Tom. I am well. We did it Or they did it actually we didn't do anything they the bosses did it I think that there's definitely still Situational use for emojis. I think that you know We're not going to be writing novels in emoji for real other than to be like a cute kind of kitschy thing Not at least in the next 10 to 20 years. I hope not the current emoji state You know that the way emojis are now maybe you know calm 358 Not you know gum 7 or 8 if it can have a keyboard at this point It's going to have emoji and we're standardizing them and we're adding to them all the time and I think that's that's a good thing I think it's good to have that common language set across all different types of technology But it is it makes you laugh and it's kind of cheesy because they are so cutesy and they are so You know, they're they're meant to be fun But so people don't take them seriously But I think there are a lot of interesting implications on what it can mean for language down the line with the drone thing I feel like we're going to get more amateur Drone photography taking place in these previously unpopulated areas where bears perhaps You know kind of go to chill out So, you know just a reminder if you have a drone and there's a fire burning nearby Land your drone. Just land your drone. Hold on. I'm gonna say it one more time If you are flying your drone near a wildfire Land your drone and just for the heck of it call the fire department You know if you see a fire with your drone land the drone call the fire department Let the professionals handle it You don't need photos of the fire more than the firefighters need to put the fire out There's no equity when it comes to user experience and there can't be is there also It's also impossible to say that someone might really like the way Facebook does their interface and people might really like the way Google Plus do does and then and the never the twain shall meet so because I could be a web designer and make a really crappy user Experience and somebody else makes a better one and pulls in my feeds and content from there It's impossible for me to do much about it except build a better experience So what we have here is a big 900 pound gorilla with an experience people are used to and that they hang around in a lot And then you go over to I don't know New York Times or somebody who's Maybe that's not a terrible experience But it's certainly not the same and they're less comfortable with it and they don't want to go out to it Wait for it to load and everything else as a user makes perfect sense as Publishers and and and aggregators and sites and news organizations. That's where it gets a little bit hairy So I gave you an example earlier I think I still stand by I've thought about it a bit since we talked and that is this But when steam came on the scene in the in the early odds and said here's what we're gonna do here at Valve We have this idea. We're gonna unify gaming experiences on PCs where right now it's just kind of scattershot and all over the place and The same fears were expressed. Oh, no You won't be be visiting my site where we built a site to support our game instead You're gonna go to this Unified one place this platform you're gonna get our game there and we're gonna have to give a share to them Those guys and you're never gonna come to see us again and it's bad for publishers It's bad for everybody and players turns out complete opposite happened PC's never seen so much growth largely in part because of what valve did with with steam and its continued success I've got the actual line Scott It was we're working closely with valve to make Windows 10 the best platform for VR gaming Okay, so that's their turn. That's their terminology and that's a thing to say I suppose But did anyone in their right mind anywhere on this planet think that we wouldn't be able to run The Vive or the Oculus Rift or any other PC focused Device on a Windows machine like I understand it's 10 and I understand them saying well We want it to be the best it can be and that's a lot of PR talk But that was like announcing that We want an announce today that every HP laser printer you buy is gonna have drivers and windows Like of course, it's gonna work. We had a blast at Nerdtacular and Dragon Con I will translate all the time because people send me messages on Twitter, and I don't know what they mean I'm learning a lot of language that way Encryption and security concerns were topics that recurred early and often on DTNS in 2015 Even if everybody agreed, okay, we'll have a backdoor for legitimate governments to look in with a warrant You know at certain times that backdoor Will be exploited by people that you don't want to explain what I cannot abide is the disregard for Fundamental freedoms that the ministry of the the minister of the interior is showing here and I think what it Shows is that? he does Realize that there is an issue with the law because he understands as that that people would care if they they knew that If they realized that all of this constitutes an infringement on fundamental freedoms So he's saying no fundamental freedoms are okay It's just privacy that we're touching and you know He's trying to have his cake and eat it too. Yeah, if he was saying We need to attack fundamental freedoms in order to be safe At least we could have an honest debate and I would be okay with that and if people still choose to agree with the law then Fine not fine, but you know I wouldn't be as outraged as I am right now the Apple watch and the coming of virtual reality were recurring topics, too It's always a possibility You know people predict doom and gloom for each new product and in each time Apple proves is wrong I do think this will do well, but I think it will follow a fairly slow trajectory In fact, I think the trajectory will probably be similar to the original iPhone Because this is the kind of thing that people are going to need to see see other people using before they really think That this fits in their lives and it was pretty much the same way with With the iPhone because people had smartphones before and people saw them They were clunky and they have styluses and you know, you wore them clipped on your belt and nobody wanted that So but then when people started to see the iPhone floating around this or say oh, this is this is a very different sort of thing But you know this year I think it'll be a pretty niche thing. I think it'll be pretty limited sales To me the interesting thing is that we are on the cusp of another real push For VR and it took 30 years to get here, right? Because the last time we saw this happen There was this expectation that VR was going to be the the next Iteration of computing that it was going to become the way we would interact with computers moving forward That's why if you watch those movies from the 90s It always had people being put into a virtual representation of the computer like hackers Are actually going through a physical maze and encountering a skull and crossbones. Oh, that's a firewall If only viruses were so easy to see Little little nasty objects on the screen, but exactly But but there was that thing where where we had this idea of what the experience was going to be like And then if you actually went out and pursued the experience You saw what a huge gap there was between our expectations and what we could truly deliver So basically the simulation I did was just you know, I put on the headset and the gloves so I can you know do this whole bit and see astronaut hands and it's kind of like being picked up by the scruffy neck really and They just flew me around the International Space Station And so, you know, I can kind of look down and look how there's there's the earth and over my shoulder I can look far back in the distance and there's the moon Yeah, what are the graphics like like? What does it actually look like through that thing? Does it look like the best video game ever or does it look like when you're looking at the blue marble? It's it's you know the way that I put it so and I put this in the story Um, I mean it it's not like a hundred percent photoreal, but it's so close You can really just suspend, you know believe for a second and they actually have this poster That's like outside of the lab That's like very large and it's sort of this you know this image of the earth and part of the space station and So the public affairs officer I was with was telling me that you know It took him a really long time to realize that that wasn't a photo And I just had this moment where I was looking at it and I just I got really close up to it And I was like oh my god, that's not a photo, you know So it's sharp. It's really sharp getting our weekly contributors met We could start to book special guests like Dr. Lisa Zhang Do you also speed up the process of getting the data because you're you're making the request for the data And because it doesn't have to go let's say to a server in Japan To get it because that's where the file is Sitting on a server that you've had to call through the browser instead You're saying oh a copy of this an exact copy of this or this exact file is somewhere in texas It's much closer in a server that's more, you know closer to your network Therefore it's going to pull from the closest one Are we saving bandwidth as well as as well as increasing the speed at which we get our data back You are exactly right. Yes, there's a savings in multiple friends So we leave the freedom like I said to the network to decide And uh, this reduced the complexity Reduced resource consumption as well as increase the security Now I agree with you Reading about this and information centric networking Which was van jakemsen who's working on name data networking his his theorization His famous speech a few years ago that makes me think that if it's not this it's something very like this or something that comes out of this That helps us figure out how to solve I mean we didn't even get into it, but there are implications on net neutrality that make it less of an issue There's obviously the things about security that we talked about so I I will be following this as well And I know uh, there's folks out there who have the skills to contribute to this And I encourage you to do so named data dot net now I don't do a lot of high-end cinematography using drones. Um, you know, they're definitely Heavy lifters that you can put red cameras on or DSLRs But my so so from photography stuff, that's mostly what I do. But what I do have here Is some of the drones that I've built which are used for different purposes. So this is a combat drone Which is basically a a quadcopter that um Is made that has a you know a relatively indestructible shell and this is used for dog fighting So at maker fair, you know, there's there's a bunch of guys who who put together an event where two drones enter a cage And then one drone essentially leaves Like airplane airplane dog fight just so everybody correct. Yes, not a fence. There's no most Yeah, most of our listeners are on audio. So it was a quadcopter with four Uh propellers on it. Yeah, right. No no animals are kennels dog. Right. Right. There's no right exactly aerial dog fighting kind of like robot wars in the air Okay, it's never saying eddie is the michael vick of He is definitely not we got one more contributor this year the man who takes the tech news and makes it thoroughly Disreputable in the best possible way mic range with the weekly tech views blog posts on saturday even made a book out of it Everybody got quiet Oh, sorry all the fun people left It's just us regulars now. No, this is grumps I'm gonna get grump No, I speak for myself only in tom. Yeah, that's fine If rogers are optimists we're all in a lot of fucking trouble. Oh, are we still live? I'm sorry. Yes, we are Wait a minute. Boom goes the dynamite headshot That's rather insulting It wouldn't be a best of show without a little bit of the post show where we pick the show titles and generally blow off steam Wow, I in it. Good show you guys. What should we call it? That was a great show. What should we call it? Great show. What should we call it? So really darth vader brings out the poetry in our chat room because we have I find your lack of wi-fi disturbing And my favorite this is too long, but connect to me and we can rule the internet as father and son Oh connect to me and we can rule the internet as quiet as server Yeah, oh my god minor minor edit. Woo come on. I am your wife father I know that is amazing Lenin, I am your statue. Okay. Yeah come to the wi-fi side come to the wi-fi side The thing is like I don't just pick the one with the most votes I combine like votes and as a tiebreaker on the ones we like So just like artificially inflating the number of votes isn't going to help you. No, this is a meritocracy not a democracy It's a merit merit Yeah, it's a merit. It's not changarchism either I mean if you want to come to a house to kill that spider, that would be awesome But don't do you have a car because you get right here. Oh, well then yes Text me or text me your address. I'm not even joking about this What I'm thinking we do is we take one of those glazed doughnuts and then we hooked like four rotors to it And then we fly it Then we crash it Crash it into my mouth crash. Yes omg Actually, what if all of the propellers like what if the propellers were made out of like sugar, right? And then like it lands and it's like it's you know forget the drone delivery What if the drone delivery is the edible and actually, you know what? I feel like we could just do away with the expensive electronics because it's going to make it more As long as we make the sound when we pick up our coffee cup and go I feel like the the rc model community is missing out because typically we're using things like carbon fiber But it's it's not as good. I actually have a pole in my house, but that's because my wife is polish It's absolutely we didn't even go racial I mean, I don't know why you guys have the kids poles. My wife's awesome It was the second week of the show or and I do I demand I demand a 60% stock and you gave it to us And I'm rich All the thousands hundreds of dollars insurance you are paying me actually thank you I have to have stretch goals for Veronica's because uh Lamar's gold plated By the way, I'm going almost walking by the way, did you see that while this was all going on? No, because I'm editing. I'm not seeing I'm missing her first steps Hmm. I know can you imagine if ellie walks for the first time on this show live it would be like the truman show Our track that's Oh star trek four. I just rewatched four the other day. It's the best movie Oh, so we can fight about that too. No, no, no, it's not the worst sky Worst time travel is going to check five is the worst. Okay, you're right Giant five for bed. I'm sorry six. I wait. No wait five is the is where they go find god, right? Oh, is that I thought that was No, six is okay. I need my baby. This is good. Well, someone asked you if you're gone. You say yes The worst part the worst part though and come on roger. You gotta agree with me here You can't be shot around the sun and turn time backwards. I'll agree with you there You put you know what that's the thing though that that actually established that whole thing for the rest of the star trek universe So if they've done it since then Worst was red matter. You know, what's fake going faster than the speed of light in the ship that looks vaguely like a vulture But it's possible It's a warp bubble roger. So the shape of the ship doesn't matter Yeah, it doesn't actually it doesn't matter if you go in the dilithium crystal interact with the answer So this is the thing I don't understand about the slingshot around the sun We could go back in time. We go faster, but you're already going faster when you hit warp speed, right? Is it warp one? Yeah, but then you add speed No, but you're going faster through normal space not through warped space Well, so it's very important to mention and this is a big problem. That's a that whole movie featured Not one enterprise ship. It was all the Vulcan ship. That's it It's not a vulcan It's a Romulan or Romulan. No, it's bird of prey, right? Cling on bird of prey. Yeah. I'm also another thing to keep in mind fictional I can still do most of the Animaniacs. It's like United States, Canada, Mexico and Panama I hate you to make up Peru Republic of Dominican Cuba, Caribbean, Haiti, El Salvador too. See like it's all what you learned Don't you hope somebody too Washington out of Jefferson Madison Monroe Adams Jackson Van Buren Harrison Tyler poke Taylor film or Pierce Buchanan Lincoln Johnson Grant Hayes Garfield Arthur Cleveland Harrison McKinley Roosevelt Taft Wilson Harding Hoover Coolidge Roosevelt Truman Eisenhower Kennedy Johnson Nixon Ford Because I learned it in 76 Nobody came after Ford After Ford I could do it, but I have to think I mean Ford Carter Reagan Bush Clinton Bush Obama Wow, that's that's impressive. Oh shoot. I meant to watch it in 3D wait Those are so cool Are they you like these? I was I saw Eileen Uh, I like I like those the bb-8 brand. Yeah Well, so they had captain phasma kylo Ren storm trooper and bb-8 Did you see in 3d? It's the only light side of so I went for bb-8 I think that's good Do you saw it and see you saw it in 3d then? Yeah, what do you think in 3d 3d or 2d or does it matter? Uh, it I don't think this movie in any way changes what your opinion of 3d versus 2d is normally, okay Yes, it was like should I see nine max 3d? Like can you see it nine max without 3d? Yeah, I mean if you like 3d then you should probably see it in 3d But if you normally are like I don't really care about 3d. There's nothing here that would change that Also, is it it's hard to cry into 3d glasses? Oh, I can cry anywhere anytime any glasses any hat You just need to get better crying. I've been trying to like, um, manage how much I'm gonna cry in the opening by listening to the repeated Star Wars opening game like all right. Here's here's the one thing I will say Here's one thing Oh So that was 2015 the year of the contributor and we couldn't have done it without Your contributions. That was the most important part. Thank you for your emails your voicemails your medical minutes your tech and trades Your patreon support your PayPal contributions and just generally being the best audience That we could possibly ever hope for you're the smartest most supportive audience in podcasting And we couldn't do it without you extra special. Thanks go to rich straffolino and phil shane They logged this whole year and found all these great clips for us huge Thanks to brice castillo for editing this and of course never ending Thanks to my producer jenny josephson for the blood sweat and tears that went into organizing all of this That is it for 2015's best of our email addresses feedback at daily tech news show.com You can call us 51259 daily Although we won't answer the phone until after the first of the year catch the show live Monday through friday After the first of the year at 4 30 p.m. Eastern on alpha geek radio dot com and diamond club dot tv and visit our website At daily tech news show dot com back on the next show with our quarterly analyst check in talk to you then This show is part of the frog pants network get more at frog pants dot com Hope you have enjoyed this bro