[Music]
- There are ghosts in the machine.
Welcome to Primary Technology,
the show about the tech news that matters.
Apple might be working on robots.
We're gonna get into that plus iOS 17.5 beta
and some allusions to an Apple Pencil 3.
Google is out here killing even more of its services
like Google Podcasts,
have some thoughts about Google Incognito Mode
and Google Search.
And in our bonus episode today,
Jason and I are gonna argue about UI and UX design in apps.
This episode is brought to you by you,
those who support us directly.
I'm one of your hosts, Steven Robles.
And joining me again with fast internet,
colored light backgrounds.
It's a new era after just 15 episodes
of Primary Technology, Jason Aten.
How's it going, Jason?
It's good. I feel like, you know, you with your two gig internet and your fancy studio,
That's right.
the pressure just got to me. So yeah. Yeah. Yeah. What would, what's,
Yeah.
The peer pressure.
No, but it looks good.
And I think there's less delay
'cause of the internet speed.
I think we're even more in sync.
It's gonna be great.
When we argue about app UX design,
It's gonna be heated, it's gonna be great.
maybe a lightning round, but what Steven doesn't know is I'm actually just tapping into his
800 miles. 800 miles. Now we're gonna touch on the solar eclipse at the end of the episode,
internet. This ethernet cable that I ran goes all the way from Michigan to Florida. Yeah.
but are you in the totality trajectory? Or are you-- Oh, OK. Oh, I see. But you're gonna
Uh, we are not, it's, I mean, there's, I think, uh, you know, one square mile of
the Southeastern corner of Michigan, it might be like just north of Toledo.
We're a little farther north, but I think they, I think the estimated to be like
It's gonna be close, close.
97%, which I mean the difference between 97 and a hundred doesn't seem like it's
that much, I don't know.
Yeah, yeah, well, that's cool. We're gonna talk about that at the end
But we have a bunch of other news to cover before we do some five-star review shoutouts
Thank you to those who leaving us five-star reviews subscribing on YouTube
You can do all of that at the links in the podcast show notes, but surge cj 9 1
Thank you for your five-star review has some annoyances, which they might have updated their review
But also battery percentage off favorite iPhone model iPhone 4 4 s a couple battery percentage off people Jason
I just want you to know, okay?
Yeah.
Thank you, as it should be.
Woody1776, he gave all the things.
He said he uses Apple Maps, battery percentage on,
and he congratulated you on your Ethernet run in your backyard.
Like, Dell and Steyrwalt, battery percentage.
So we can do this podcast without delay.
Hm.
Easy ran.
SCOTI134SL41, battery percentage on.
Alvin B and B Benton, thank you for those five-star reviews.
And so, give us a five-star review in Apple Podcasts,
and we will give you a shout-out here at the top of the show.
Yeah, Woody's my man.
So let's jump into the news.
Apple had a few tidbits of news here.
There was not a software update.
For Vision OS, it's still just on 1.1, which came out a couple of weeks ago.
But they did add a new feature or opened it up, which is Spatial Persona.
I wanted to test this with Jason, but Jason still doesn't have an Apple Vision
Pro. That's okay. Still do not.
But now if you FaceTime with someone, you can do Share Play.
And instead of your digital persona being relegated to a little tile in the
Vision OS and in the Spatial Computing, it's now kind of a, uh, a disembodied
test of yourself where your head and hands are kind of floating around.
And if you do this, I saw a couple of examples of it.
I'm going to be trying with someone tomorrow.
You can actually interact with apps like collaboratively.
So if there's like a free form window open and you guys are whiteboarding,
some colleagues,
two people can actually scroll on the window over the FaceTime call through this
like collaborative Spatial Persona thing. It looks really cool.
people were making comparisons between this and like the meta workspace where it just
looks like kind of cartoony avatars in the same place, but this looks like kind
of cool. I'm excited to try it. I don't know. Should we, should we do a white
I still don't.
boarding session? I'm not trying to yet. Well, the, the fact that you could multiple
So you, you haven't done this yet, right?
people can interact with the same piece of content in spatial computing space seems
pretty cool. Like I think that would, you know, especially if you're like white
boarding and creative ideas or whatever, as far as just like a FaceTime call or
share playing something, I did see one video on social media where they were
invited some friends over to watch a movie, but by friends, they met their
spatial personas and they were like placed in the room while watching it. I have to,
I have to try it before I, before I judge it, I think. But.
'Cause, do you think it's better?
I don't know if the picture we're looking at right now with the disembodied
No, no, no. Here's, here's a video of it. This is on a nine to five mag and this
like, you know, shoulder up, you know, view doesn't,
I don't know that I feel like that's necessarily better.
video is provided by Apple to the various news outlets, but you can kind of see two
people floating around.
It's really just head in hands, but they're both interacting with this free-form window and moving stuff around together.
You know, I mean, it looks cool. I don't know if more interactive.
Huh.
I do I do feel like this is very sixth sense
Well, that's why I said ghosts in the machine, you know, ghosts in the machine does.
Well anyway, ghosts in the machine for this reason, and also the second news from Apple today is that Mark Gurman from Bloomberg said that Apple is exploring home robotics as the next big thing after their failed
I feel like your movie quote should have been I see dead people because that's exactly these look like ghosts. That's that's what
car project. And as far as home robotics, it seems like it's two things.
One, an actual robot that maybe follows you around your house, and then also a robot arm a la HomePod with a screen that might like move and follow you around, I guess, the kitchen if you're doing that.
So Apple robots, I mean, and this is something where Amazon, do you remember the name of their robot?
Amazon had the little Wally rolling around thing.
Was it Samsung?
That was Samsung, right? I think you're talking about the the ball you won or whatever there.
Yeah, like there was a little Samsung ball that would follow you around. There may have been one
from Amazon too because Amazon has made a bunch of things. I do remember Amazon had the drone that
would fly around your house and like video record your house and stuff like that. It was like a
Yeah, that was weird.
This was the, it was Amazon Astro.
surveillance drone that you've had inside your own house. Yeah. I don't know who did that, but...
Yeah, the Amazon Astro, which was very much a robot
that rolls around and has a screen.
MKBHD had a video on this too.
I think he had it in his studio.
And you can like ask it stuff and other things.
And I think it had a compartment where you could like
put stuff in, like maybe a half a gallon of milk
so it could follow you home with it or something.
But you know, and this is a quote unquote skunkworks project
According to German, I mean, it's very early days.
Much like the car project, might never even see the light of day, depending on how far along they get.
But, the screen on the arm with the HomePod, which is something we've heard rumoured for a long time,
I'm still hoping for that. I still want that.
Oh, you're talking about that. Okay. Yeah.
Yeah, I just I feel like you failed in the car. So the next
Logical thing was to create like something that follows you around your house, right?
I guess the autonomous driving part of it is probably easier when you're talking about a very small device
Going around your house when you put this in the notes. I thought like okay
Well, are they gonna make like vacuum cleaners or something and to me?
now ah still still
I'm like Apple's not gonna make a vacuum cleaner. They won't even make a Wi-Fi router, right?
We can't even get them to make a Wi-Fi router anymore
There's no way that they're gonna make that but I don't understand how
You know there was a in the
Bloomberg article on this. I think it's the one that you had linked. There's a graph of like the
percentage of
last year's revenue that each of these
Categories that have they've introduced in I guess the last 40 years how much it contributes to the revenue and obviously the iPhone is
Far and away the largest one
Nothing since then the iPad the Apple watch the AirPods comes even close and the reason they were working on a car is because it's you
know, a huge industry. There is some room for
consumption there because autonomous vehicles, nobody else is doing that despite what, you
know, some branding may tell you. So it does seem like that was a massive opportunity.
Same thing's true with healthcare. Honestly, Apple could make, you know, we're talking
about like a trillion dollar impact on these types of things. I don't really see like home
I mean, no, I guess it's kind of like the next step in anthropomorphizing large language
robots that follow you around the house and carry your beer as being the next big thing.
models, which, you know what I mean?
I don't know. Do you Steven?
That was, whoa, hold on, I have to process everything,
Like, you know, you got Chad GPT, you put Chad GPT or whatever Apple's large language
model that replaces Siri is, you put it in a robot that then follows you around so you
You can ask it, I don't know, when the solar eclipse--
I can tell you wherever you are, which admittedly doesn't really make much sense when you can just have home pods in different rooms and you could just ask them.
you just, okay, I got it, I'm with you now, yep.
Or an Apple watch on your wrist? Yeah. I don't-- I don't-- I imagine this is why it's experimental, but it is kind of where he's just trying it out, just trying robots.
Or an iPhone in your pocket, which you always have with you, yeah.
Which, you know, our friend, our mutual friend Nate from Movies on the Side and just a good friend, he sent me a tweet where someone was like,
I think we have AI doing.
The problem is, things like laundry has been optimized for a human being to do, to lift the clothes out of the washer, put it in the dryer, fold it with like hands, and that part of robotics and AI is like way better.
It skunk works, yes, it stinks.
And so we as humans could do the art and the music and graphic design, which I totally get.
And, you know, I responded.
The problem is things like laundry has been optimized for a human being to do, to lift the clothes out of the washer, put it in the dryer, fold it with like hands.
And that part of robotics and AI is, like, way--
like very far away, you know, actually having a humanoid-type robot to do humanoid-type tasks.
But yes, I agree. I would love if Apple made a robot that could
wash and dry and fold the clothes and put them away, but we're much farther away from that,
Yep.
unfortunately. That's right, unfortunately. Although, you know, I do feel like if you had
Yeah, I agree. I think we're much farther away from it.
a washer and dryer, like one of those, like, stackable ones, and, like, the washer was on top,
And then when the wash was done, it just kind of like opened a door and it.
Dryer than the dryer could just like close itself.
And I feel like, could we at least expedite that process?
So we'll keep doing our own laundry for awhile.
I don't know.
Oh, I'm see I'm behind on, uh, on laundry technology.
When I start a new podcast, laundry tech, primary laundry tech.com.
You can buy an all-in-one that will wash your clothes and then dry it in the same thing. Yeah
Just kidding.
Very nice.
Do you say niche or niche?
It's a very niche market, but they go go for it I
You say niche.
You said niche.
I think I say niche.
I don't know.
Is that a French word niche?
Said I said what did I don't know I just had niche niche
Yeah, primary language technology.
That'll be the next show.
Okay.
Uh, also new beta of iOS came out and all the software's, which is iOS 17.5,
I don't know - it's if there's a very small number of people who care
which seems like a big point update, uh, but not a lot of changes.
They brought back the color matching Apple podcast widget.
So it looks like that will maybe be coming back in 17.5.
It was in 17.4 beta, but then they removed it before the public release.
So that's coming.
And also apps will be downloadable in the EU with 17.5.
So that true sideloading you're thinking
You go to a company's website and it says download our app and it just goes onto your iPhone
That is in the EU with 17.5. Again. This is the first developer beta not public yet, but should be coming soon
Maybe this will coincide with the release of new iPads and we've been waiting for for a very long time
And there was also some code found in 17.5 a reader or a forum poster
I think in Mac rumors discovered that in the code there might be an allusion to a new Apple pencil
Gen 3 was actually be the the fourth model. You got the lightning pencil the gen 2 the USB-C version
And this would be the fourth one maybe with a new squeeze gesture, whatever that might mean, you know, you could tap that pencil, but
Don't you be squeezing but yeah, I
Mean you're you do the rubber pencil thing when you're in school. You're like they wiggle it
That's what I that's what I really need is a pencil I can squeeze yeah
No, no, you like wobble it. So it looks like the pencils made out of rubber. It's classic. Yes classic
The little grippy thing you put on it is what you're talking about
That's a new feature of the gen 4 pencil as well rumored. Yeah
Last Apple thing to yesterday
I don't know if you tried to use any of Apple services last night
But there was a bit of an outage and I think I had some pretty good jokes on social media about it
Yeah, yeah, okay
But anyway
There's a bunch of Apple services were down the App Store Apple TV plus
I had people on social media were like I was in the middle of watching a movie on Apple TV plus and it just died
Just froze or cut off or whatever. Yes. It was a massive outage. It's a resolve now
I'll put a link to the like
Status page you can check if you ever wondering if an Apple service is down or not
You can actually check the status page and I'll tell you all the stuff
But you know, I made some jokes like can someone at Apple Park turn it off and turn it back on again or
Apple tried to update the free iCloud storage tier to 10 gigabytes and it took everything down
I did hear about this, yeah.
They were better jokes as red, but I just I wanted to do a dramatic dramatic retailing for you
That's, that's good. Yes. Uh, there was one other thing, uh,
I don't know if you saw this while we're talking about Apple real quickly, um,
that alt store, right?
Which is one of the alternative app stores that's going to be launching in the
EU is going to allow developers to use Patreon to sell their apps and they're
going to do a thing where basically you can,
Uh-huh.
you can turn your app off when you get to a million downloads so that you can
Wow, pretty good.
avoid having to pay the core technology fee.
And so there's going to,
my reason for bringing it up is not to dive too far into that,
but I think we're about to see some very interesting things happening as
developers start to poke the boundaries of what they can do.
And we've already seen Apple say, this is what we're going to do.
And then developers have pushed back and they're like, okay,
we'll actually, we'll have to change that and do this instead. And I,
over there in the EU,
in the EU. Well, I know we have listeners in countries in the EU, because the podcast
I think you and I may need to like go record a podcast in Milan or something
like that, or, you know,
analytics, it's not very specific, but it'll tell you listeners in Germany or over here. Sorry, UK,
but you're not EU, Brexit and all that, I think. I don't think that's how that works. But if you're
in the EU and you listen or watch primary technology, this show, I've reached out,
leave us a five-star rating and review, and then you can tell us you're from the EU.
We can ask you some questions because it would be curious as these things happen where you
can download an app from a website, how seamless is that, and then here in the U.S., if you
work at a company that maybe distributes apps, there are actual enterprise mechanisms for
downloading an app from a website.
I actually do that with Riverside.
If I test a beta version of the Riverside app, we actually use the Microsoft App Center,
which lets you distribute apps.
On your iPhone, if you go to like settings,
you're going to be able to use the app as well.
You can also use the app in general developer mode.
You can actually like I get sent a link from the guys who develop our iOS app.
I load that link in Safari on my iPhone.
I hit download app and it just installs the app right from the website.
And so, you know,
this is a mechanism that exists here in the US too is just relegated to like
enterprise use cases and developers, stuff like that.
But I will say it's kind of cool just to be able to go to a website,
hit download, and then it installs your stuff.
actually do this at our
people and I, you know, make some download it, um, directly.
So yeah, interesting time.
find somewhere where we can go because I think it'd be kind of fun. So yeah.
Yeah. Stephen, if all of your iCloud stuff and Apple stuff stops working later today,
Is that what I just did?
Cause I'm, oh, that was top secret.
it's probably because of what you just described. I think that was top secret information you're
Shoot, shoot.
Well, speaking of top secret, by the way, Google and incognito mode.
That was a good, that was a good transition.
I, I, you teed that up.
I don't know if you did that on purpose, but that was pretty good.
not supposed to tell people about. I don't know.
Okay.
To take credit for it.
So this is kind of old news with
some new news that I just read for the first time yesterday.
I'm just going to take credit for it.
Apparently, if you were using Google Chrome, the very popular web browser,
I would say the number one web browser in the world.
If you were using incognito mode, you might have thought that your browsing
history and your data while you were in cognito mode was not being seen by
Google or not being collected.
Well, hate to break it to you, but that wasn't the case.
For years, even if you were in incognito mode, Google was, uh, at least
according to this article.
and others was hoovering up your data saving your search history all that data
it was basically keeping it out of your of web browsing history on your device
and from your Google account but Google themselves was actually still collecting
all of that data it says there's literally millions of people who have
quote-unquote potentially embarrassing data thinking they were using Google
incognito mode and the data was not being saved well it was but because of a
a 2020 class action lawsuit. Google is
actually going to be required to delete that data
that it collected on millions of users from when
they were in incognito mode. So that data I guess
will be going away. I just wanted to put this out
because I kind of wanted to like put Google on
blast just a little bit for this for Google
Podcasts and then later for Google search. I want
to talk in the personal tech area but this is one
of the reasons why I got a little like skittish
about using Google Chrome for certain use cases. I
used to run them in parallel like Safari and Google
mostly because there were some Chrome extensions
that like Squarespace used and it was just a little
easier to do it with Chrome. But I remember hearing
news about like Google passwords and stuff and so
I stopped saving my passwords in Google Chrome and
turn that off. And now I feel like this is just
another data point to say I don't know Google
sometimes does some weird things with their
products that is a little privacy concerning. I
I mean, if you think about it, Google decided they should have a web browser because their
entire business is based on getting people coming to their website to get search and
so they decided they should own part of that stack to make sure that they can't get pushed
aside.
If the only browser that's available is Edge, the default search engine for everyone was
going to be Bing.
If it's Safari, I mean obviously Google is the default search engine on Safari but part
of the reason is because Chrome is so popular that there's leverage there.
And go to the website.
Google it's weird because one of the things that Google does with Chrome is
it's just, it's this huge source of information for it because people are,
it is able to save this information.
And I, you asked me about this earlier and I realized I sent you a link.
I actually wrote about this lawsuit in 2021.
So I did know about it and I just,
it's been a long time that they finally settled it.
And so at the time people were suing because Google would,
You could use incognito mode and people think of incognito mode.
Right, the dark web browser.
As like using the Tor, you know, like the Tor browser, like where it's like,
yeah, well, it's like people think it's like completely encrypted.
You're completely private.
The same thing is generally true for other browsers that have a private mode.
What all that that means is that the browser itself won't save your history,
Right, and it won't cache or cookies won't save cache.
necessarily the browser, literally the browser. Yes. Yep. In, but the browser,
but that doesn't mean that anyone else in this, in the pipeline,
doesn't have access to that. So for example, it didn't used to be this way,
But at the time, because of this lawsuit--
Google changed the screen that appears because people would assume that if
they're using incognito mode that that meant that if they were at a work, you
know, using the work network that their employer wouldn't know what they were
looking for. But that's not true. Again, all of that data is still traveling
through the same pipes. So part of that was if you're typing in searches into
Google, Google would still be saving that information about you, right? Even if
you were using incognito mode. And so now they've agreed to delete that data
and they're trying to make it more clear. But the bottom line is this, private
incognito mode, all that means is that the piece of software, the actual browser,
doesn't save your history and do those things. You should just assume that
somewhere along the line, someone can still, you know, your ISP, for example, if
you use Comcast, Comcast knows everything that you're doing unless you're using a
VPN. And so just, just filter that into your brain as you're going through your
day and doing things. And I'm not even saying people are going to do nefarious
things. But for example, if you're at work and you're doing personal things,
Yes, yes. Correct, you know, it was interesting.
assume that someone at work could figure that out, right?
Like just assume that, and if, and if that's against your company's policy,
I was at podcast movement last week and I was talking to someone and I won't say what
country they grew up in or where they were or whatever, but I was talking to them and
in the country they grew up, VPNs are like a way of life because the country does not
allow certain internet activity by default and so everyone.
Everyone knows how to use a VPN and I find it interesting.
Here in the US, VPNs are a thing and I think it's more kind of in the nerd category when
someone's trying to like watch something that's on Netflix UK but not Netflix US.
But if the TikTok ban, which I'm not exactly sure where that is, I mean, I think it still
has to be voted on in the House, I believe, or in the Senate, right?
maybe don't do it while you're at work. So yeah.
Has not been taken with the Senate, right?
So we don't know what's happening there yet, but if something like TikTok were banned here
in the U.S. I feel like the U.S. would...
to catch up to some of these other countries that kind of just know what a VPN is by default.
And everyone, especially every high school and middle schooler, would be like,
"Oh, okay, so I just installed this VPN app and then I can use TikTok? No problem."
Well, it has not been taken up in the Senate yet.
And it would, yeah, just very quickly become ubiquitous, but...
Well, and that's actually a great example because for example, at the school where our
students attend the network, so if you're on their wifi, does not allow you to send images.
[laughing]
So you can't post to social media and you can't actually send text messages with an image.
So as a parent, if you can imagine if one of us is at a sporting event and we want to
[laughter]
send, like if I want to send a photo to my, I have to actually get on a VPN just to send
a message with a photo attached to it or to upload something to Instagram or something.
So I get, I mean, there are a lot of kids there cause I get a lot of text messages that
occasionally include things, you know, that I know that the network, I mean, you can always
Yeah, right. Yeah.
just disconnect from wifi if you're on a phone, but there are a lot of kids.
Let's say it's a good point.
I think there are a lot more kids who know how to use VPNs than we might think.
All right, a couple of the Google things.
Google finally killed Google Podcasts.
They announced this months ago and the date has now passed.
So Google Podcasts is gone.
David Pierce of The Verge has some strong feelings about that.
This is just indicative again of I think Google's habits.
If you are not familiar with the website killed by Google,
I highly recommend checking that out.
It will be in the show notes where I'm not sure who
operates this website.
But it is a running list of all the services and apps
and everything that Google has killed over the years.
Right now it's at 294, 294 things that Google has launched
and killed. It's pretty wild.
You probably have not even heard of some of these,
but Google Podcasts has been the latest casualty
in Google killing things off.
I think it is a shame.
One, I love podcasts.
I think more podcasts app for more people's preference
the better. The fact that this was like a default podcast
app built into Android was an overall positive thing, letting
people just say like, Oh, I just go to the Google podcasts app on
my phone that's already there. I want to send a podcast. There
are great alternatives pocket cast is on Android highly
recommend that I think you can get I don't know if Castro's on
Android. But there's there's other podcast apps. But the
reason why Google did this is because it's really trying to
push everyone, all of their Android users especially,
use the YouTube Music app for podcasts.
Now, I would be curious if we have any listeners
or viewers, which you can do both,
who listen or watch this show in YouTube Music.
We are in the YouTube Music app.
You can actually watch the show and listen to it.
That's actually, it was a huge topic
at the podcast conference I was at
because people don't really understand
how to get their show into YouTube Music
because it is a slightly laborious topic
if you're not posting full length videos already
on the YouTube channel.
There's this RSS import feature and all that kind of stuff.
But anyway, this wasn't really updated
often the Google Podcast app.
It didn't really seem like Google was putting
a ton of effort into it anyways,
but to have killed it is kind of a shame.
And again, just a little indicative
of some of their practices that,
I wanna talk about Google search actually in a second.
I'm not gonna save it for the end of the show
'cause I wanna talk about it in this Google section.
But I don't know, how did you feel about it?
Or I don't know if you read David's piece, but it's gone.
I did read David's piece at the Verge and I don't, so I don't really have never used
Sure, you know me too.
Google Podcasts because even on an Android device, if I'm going to listen, I do have
Pocket Casts on because I use Pocket Casts on my iPhone as well.
Also you can listen to almost any podcast on Spotify which is available on both platforms
as well.
So if you, you know, there are other Podcast options.
There are two things I think about this.
One, yes, the Killed by Google website, hilarious because when you scroll through it, first
Well, there will be a lot of things you had, no--
but there are also like a lot of things that essentially sound like they're all
There's like there was a chat there was like 10 different texting apps. I don't know are I don't know not Arlo
It was like uh do you want to talk about?
the same thing, which is part of Google's problem, right? Yeah. Yeah, Alo,
Hello, that's what
Yeah
but there's a whole bunch of different things on there. I mean, just if you were
to like do a find, you know, search for like the word YouTube, there's like
Oh, yeah
YouTube gaming, YouTube video, YouTube calling, like all these different things.
And I think part of what happened
at YouTube and I think that this is part of what David was saying in his
pieces. It's like, Google will start a thing. They get really excited about it.
They'll talk about how it's going to change the world.
And then another part of the company decides to do the same kind of thing.
And now you've got two products and it's like at one point they realize, well,
YouTube has a much bigger brand. We should push everyone to that.
And by the way, YouTube is the thing we can monetize, right?
Cause they're not making any money off Google podcasts. And at some point they're
just like, well, let's just push everybody. But YouTube music is not the same.
Like if the thing you wanted to do is sit down to listen to a podcast,
Right.
you don't think, Oh, I'll go to YouTube music.
Right.
You could watch this podcast on YouTube, right? You probably, you know,
if you're watching it, that's where you're watching it,
but you don't necessarily think, let me just open up YouTube music,
which I actually think, so it's funny to me every time I look at like the fact
that we have a YouTube premium subscription.
It actually shows up in the app store as a YouTube music subscription.
I'm like, Oh, technically we're subscribed to YouTube music.
And as a result, we're getting YouTube. I don't know. It is very confusing.
YouTube. I mean,
we've already established because I can never remember the name of any of the
Google devices in our house that Google is, except for the pixel,
Yeah. (laughs)
The Pixel's the only one I can tell you.
But this list just shows you that like sometimes trying a million different things doesn't
make a lot of sense.
Yeah.
And Google has this, the Google Reader to me is the classic example because that was
such a great service at the time when there were just not that many RSS readers and Google
just, I think was it 2011 maybe was just like, nope, we're done.
Yeah, right
We're just not doing this anymore.
And that wasn't because they were trying to get you to like use YouTube RSS feeds.
It was just like, well, we're just not going to do that.
In this case, I just think we just having a podcast app can't cost Google
I'm sure there was one person, like it wasn't updated pretty much ever, like I don't know.
that much, just like leave it alone.
Right.
But it's, it's essentially just an RSS reader.
That's true.
So it doesn't need to be, I mean, honestly, it doesn't have to
be updated that often.
All right, this is the conspiracy theory that we need to propagate.
It just, it was functional and it worked.
Yeah.
That's exactly right. Google hates RSS. That's a problem.
They hate RSS.
Google hates RSS, which, which honestly could be true.
I know.
Because if you subscribe to an RSS feed, you don't need Google to find the thing.
Exactly.
So maybe, I don't know.
This is honestly like.
I jokingly said conspiracy theory, but I do feel like Google reader now Google podcasts.
There actually are like hidden RSS feeds for YouTube channels which I use in different shortcuts.
But I could totally like Google does not make it easy to find that either like they don't
Oh.
No.
really want you to use that kind of stuff.
No.
So yeah, I think this is a valid theory.
No.
I hope someone writes a think piece on it.
No.
Google hates RSS.
I think that is actually the case.
So I have two thoughts.
One last thought on the podcast thing and maybe we could talk about Google search then
No.
because I think that also is really
related. I, I love podcasts.
I've listened to them for a long time.
I've looked at Spotify and how they integrate podcasts,
obviously YouTube music because we're on all the platforms.
I need to know what it looks like.
I do not think combining music listening and podcast listening in the same app
makes for a good user experience.
And this is going to be the theme of the show now this episode from now to the
end of the episode, because good user experience, good UI is important.
podcast is already immediately--
a lot of people are trying to get a lot of the feedback from the podcast. So, I'm going to go ahead and get started.
I've been trying to surface shows that it thinks you might like in the Apple Podcasts app, but on a whole, finding a new podcast that you would like to hear is difficult.
And muddying that experience with the entire music library of YouTube music and Spotify, I don't think it's great for podcast creators or podcast listeners.
Again, like it's-- I'm in there. I go to Spotify to see what the podcasts look like in the--
they're in YouTube music, and it is not as seamless as having a dedicated podcast app. That is my opinion.
I also think Apple should bring Apple Podcasts to Android. They already have Apple Music. You can download Apple Music on Android. You can sign up.
I know Apple's doing that probably for the services, revenue, and all that kind of stuff. But do that for Apple Podcasts, too, because there's lots of Apple Podcast subscriptions.
You can subscribe to this show directly in Apple Podcasts. I would love for that to be an option for users on Amazon.
And I think, as you can look on my YouTube channel, that the Apple Podcasts is actually a good podcast listening app. It has improved a lot in the last couple of years.
Pocketcast is also great. Don't get me wrong. You can use that, too.
But I think it would be valuable for Apple Podcasts to be on Android for the sake of the subscriptions and just having another good ad.
There's now a hole. Google Podcasts is not on Android anymore. I think it is a hole that could be filled with the Apple Podcasts app.
And that's me being passionate about podcasts.
Yeah.
Well, and here's the thing well, I was just looking through that killed by Google list
You know, they they killed off
Ready?
[laughs]
Not that long ago. They killed off like stadia, which is basically like an RSS feed for games, right? Essentially
Yeah.
I mean, it's not exactly but like they're killing all of these things
but if you look at the strategy, it's really interesting because wasn't it like 2019 when Apple took iTunes, which was
Right, right, right, right, right.
Probably it's top one of its top three brands right iTunes is a thing
Everyone knew what iTunes was and I don't know anybody who didn't like
Generally love iTunes is like what there's a lot of nostalgia attached to the fact that like, oh I could just have all my music
But they split it into music
TV, Apple TV, yeah.
Podcasts and TV, right? Yeah, and they don't monetize app podcasts. I mean they do have ads
But the subscriptions, they take a cut of the subscriptions.
I guess their search ads and Apple podcast maybe but other than that, it's not like
Yeah.
Well, that's true. You're right. They do do that
Right, right.
But like they don't you don't have to pay to use the service
There's no service of Apple Podcasts like there is
>> Correct.
Apple TV Plus or Apple Music or whatever and granted Apple's position on Podcasts
Right
has always been sort of like the Switzerland of podcasts or whatever like they've always
just been that we'll make it happen kind of thing but it is a very interesting difference
between those two strategies where Google is constantly trying to throw a bunch of things
against the wall as soon as one of them sticks is trying to figure out when the how do I
Heh, right.
incorporate this into the area where we're making money right and I just think like you
know I very I don't I do like the podcast app I don't use it for various reasons anymore
I tried for a while it's gotten way better there are just a couple things that I couldn't
live without that I really liked about podcast but the point is Apple's making a very good
podcast app it's never gonna go anywhere and it doesn't need to be you know this would
be like if Apple was like oh we have a music app we have a TV let's just make them all
part of one in Spotify does that obviously but it I it is it is my brain breaks every
time I go in and I'm like oh wait in order to search just music or pockets there's like
Exactly. Yeah. It's ironic that, as you mentioned, how Apple moved from the master app of iTunes
like a small little bubble tag that you have to like.
and broke them out, and now YouTube and Spotify are doing the opposite and trying to integrate
them all, being that Apple has been in the game for much longer than both of them when
it comes to music and podcasts. I think Apple, if there's a reason why Apple is making them
Like that is the weirdest interface. What's I don't know. I agree with you.
- Right.
because... (laughs)
Yeah, well, and there's probably somebody
who would give us the obvious pushback,
>> Sure, sure.
which is they charge for Apple Music.
>> Right.
There's a subscription there.
They charge for Apple TV Plus.
There's a different subscription there.
Like you mentioned, there are subscriptions
for various podcasts.
If they were all in one app, it would be harder
for them to monetize them individually.
I get that.
I understand that, but the point is they are not trying
to take the Apple TV Plus app and cram other random things.
I don't know.
I think it's a mistake for Google.
Obviously, Google knows way better than us
how many people were using it.
The problem with big companies like this
is you could have, I don't know,
a million super passionate fans
for your Google Podcast app,
- Yeah, it doesn't mean much.
but on the scale of a company like Google,
that's just not big enough, right?
Yeah.
Because they have, what, two billion Gmail users.
Yeah, that's true.
So it's like, who's still working
on that stupid million user app over there, right?
That is true.
But at the same time, it's like,
actually, those people really liked it
and we're getting a lot of value from.
Right.
I will, one counterpoint to the fact of, like,
Apple's not shoving things in other things,
the Apple TV app, especially on, like, physical Apple TVs,
ever since I downloaded the Apple Sports app
shows a couple teams to follow,
just so I could actually test the Sports app.
It has totally ruined my up-next queue in Apple TV,
because now every time I turn on any Apple TV,
my up-next queue is, like, shoved down,
and whatever sports games are currently playing,
or ones to follow, now take over.
Like, it takes over, like, the top part
when you're on, like, the home screen part,
and then when it's just the up-next, like, list,
it just shoves whatever games from the teams
that I follow in that list, and I'll be honest,
I don't like that, and I'm not exactly sure how to stop it.
I don't know if I have to go, like,
unfavor the teams, or, I don't know.
So, like, sports, as a whole, I do feel like
has been kind of shoved into Apple TV,
and I understand they're trying to make the push MLB
Friday Night Baseball, they have Major League Soccer.
I understand they're trying to push certain things,
but that experience, I find, has not been great recently.
It couldn't have been costing you anything, just leave it alone.
So, yeah.
[I'm not sure what he said here]
Yeah I agree at least at least you don't actually watch sports because what I
thought you were going to say is that if you're watching sports like in YouTube
TV and you're watching a live sporting event the Apple TV will also always pop
Yes. I'm literally watching it.
up in the corner you know close game between Golden State and you know the
Spurs you know like I was yes it is I'm I see it I'm watching it right now why
Yeah, that's it. All right, so I want to talk about Google Search itself because I have
are you trying to get me to switch to this game that I'm already watching that
to me is the best.
some thoughts about it. But before we do, I just want to take a moment and thank those
who support the show directly. The show is brought to you by you, which, number one,
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you at free version, meaning this section is cut out. And also you get bonus episodes every week.
Jason and I, I don't know if we're going to argue about UX design or talk about travel gear.
We might do both, but we want to talk about that. And you'll listen, you get access to
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subscribe to the YouTube channel. We're about to hit 600 subscribers. The goal is a thousand.
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[snort]
we'd like to hit a thousand, but go subscribe youtube.com/at primary tech show and support
[snort]
the show because we love doing it and we appreciate your support. Google search.
[huff]
There was a recent decoder episode with Eli Patel and he talked about Google search. It
it was a very good episode. We I don't know if we covered
it on this podcast, or if it was actually before we launched
the show. But Google did have a deal recently with Reddit. And
it was going to correct me if I'm wrong, Jason, train Google
Gemini, their large language model on Reddit content to help
serve results. Is that accurate? That's pretty much what it was.
Yeah, that's pretty much, yeah, it's like a $60 million deal for them to use Reddit's
Right. So you know, I listened to this episode, I knew that was
part of, like, in the background of what was going on.
And so I have Google search set as my default search engine,
like many people do on my iPhone, on the web, and in so far, like in Safari.
And I have found, I'm curious your anecdotal experience.
I have found also that Google search has become less useful overall.
I find that 80 ish percent of my searches will have a Reddit result,
like a link to Reddit as a result from my query as like the first result under
the sponsored ones. So you got like, you know,
three or four sponsored search results. That's Google ads.
And then I see like a Reddit post and a Quora post.
Quora is like the online community, you know, question, answering, whatever.
And I get this a lot, even when I'm searching for like data,
like actual data, you know, that I want.
I find news is a little different. Like, you know, when the Francis Scott Key
bridge collapsed in Maryland, which very tragic, you know,
So if you search for that, that's typically
at the top, and, you know, you see a video,
obviously it's going to put YouTube results up there at the top.
When it comes to just like general knowledge or questions about something,
honestly, this is going to come into our UX discussion. I had Googled,
how do I link text in the Notion iPhone app? I had Googled it.
And the results I got, the first two results were from Reddit and Quora,
neither of which gave me the answer I was looking for, for the record.
content in its large language model, yes.
yeah you should have just you should have just texted me dude I answered your
And it was, and someone, because I finally complained about it on social media,
which is the faster way to get the best answer, apparently.
And someone did tell me that's how you do it. But listen,
question in five seconds
If only you knew someone with a tech podcast, Stephen, who could have answered the question
I know you probably knew. I was, I was like, well,
for you?
Alright.
[sigh]
[laughing]
we're going to talk about that later. Don't get me going on it yet. Okay.
Alright.
[sigh]
Because there's a, there's a mini rant about that. But I have all the, yeah,
I have found like Neil on Dakota was saying, and just,
I think anecdotal experience that Google search,
we're getting and as far as like the quality of results and maybe usefulness.
And I'm not going to say I'm looking forward to this change,
but I am curious if the AI powered future of Google search and maybe even the
AI powered future of using things like spotlight and Siri on Apple devices,
if we now need that because of the changes in Google search and also the huge
wave of AI generated content, which is not good content,
but because of that SEO-optimized AI-generated content
it's now everywhere, it also muddies up
where internet searches like that
so I don't know, what's been your experience
using this kind of stuff?
[sigh]
Yeah, well, first of all, I think that it's, I think Google search has gotten worse in
some obvious ways, right?
Like it used to be that you'd see one sponsored post above the 10 blue links.
Right.
So many.
And now there are times when you have to scroll all the way down below the fold before you
get past the, that Google's just getting greedy.
That's one thing.
So I think it's objectively, yes, Google search is getting worse.
I think part of the problem that when people say is Google search getting worse, what they
Sure.
are really experiencing is that the internet is just.
The internet is full of garbage because people are trying to figure out how can they rank for Google search even if the thing but they're not trying to do that in an effort to answer people's questions. They're trying to do that in an effort to capture traffic so that they can then sell you ads and that kind of stuff. It's just a traffic source for monetization. So the incentives are just completely wonky, right? There was a time when you could search for things and you might find the one person's niche niche. What do we decide? I don't know the their blog.
Not Nietzsche. Nietzsche is somebody else. This is just Nietzsche.
and we decide, I don't know, they're blogs.
Right.
It's about their hyper focused blog on whatever the topic is.
Yes.
And you could be like, oh, that's the thing.
Yeah.
And I think that was one of the things that they were talking about in the
decoder episode.
Yeah.
I was, I think Mia Soto, who is like their platform reporter,
replaced Casey Newton, I think, um, they were just talking about like these
really small publications who do a really good job of answering certain types
of questions that it's so much harder for them to surface those results.
And I, so I think that it's a function.
of the internet has just turned into a complete wasteland.
It's absolutely going to get worse with AI, 100% because the friction, you no longer have
to pay a person to crank out all of this stuff.
You can just pump it out of a computer to just to do that.
But I think it's super unfortunate because I was looking through my history real quick
here because there were some searches that I had done recently where there was zero chance
[laughs]
I was going to get a good answer, like absolutely no answers whatsoever that were useful.
I'm telling you there was, you know, tons and tons and tons of
links to sites that are just maybe tangentially related to the topic I was looking for, but
absolutely we're not going to try to give you an answer.
The best example of this is like search for any recipe and you have to read a 1600 word
Oh, forget about it. Yeah.
blog post about how exciting it is to make this food before you get to the recipe.
How the person's a great grandmother started this recipe in Italy or what.
SEO.
And that's because, yeah, and it's because Google for a long time has incentivized longer
Right. Right. More search terms. Yeah.
content as being more authoritative.
Write a bunch of nonsense garbage.
And it's like, no, no, no, really what I wanted was a white page with, you know, 150
Just bullet points. I just wanted a bullet point list. Yeah
words and those words should be one cup sugar, three cups flour, whatever.
Like just, I just want a recipe.
Yeah.
And so it, uh, so I don't know that that is like Google as a search engine necessarily
During that episode, they really put a CNET on blast, which I found interesting.
getting worse because it's the results that it is returning, I think are lower quality, but I
I was a long time follower of CNET.
I'll still watch some of their videos sometimes when they come up on YouTube.
Brian Tong, he used to be at CNET, did the Apple bite.
I was following him at that point.
But they talked about how CNET now basically has an entire division generating content
like today's mortgage interest rates so that
think that's because that is what the internet has become.
they have an article every single day this way trying to game the Google search to be one of the top results on just random stuff
and they'll have articles that are like the best mattress or whatever or like the price of green beans out of just like random stuff I
don't know if some of it is AI generated now if not I'm sure it would be soon because it'd be way cheaper to do that but that kind of
practice even from a quote-unquote at least previously reputable news source is muddying the news source of things that you can't
in the waters of the internet where something like Google search not only is Google changing Google search to be less useful but now the
amount of stuff to sift through in that search term is it's just becoming untenable to surface the good results and so I think it is it is a
combination of both I have two thoughts maybe AI powered search will help I don't know that almost feels like trying to put out fire with
more fire. Maybe it's possible. I don't know. But just the whole
also like I think of companies like wire cutter, which for a
time, if listeners and viewers remember wire cutter, like if
you ever wanted to buy a product, whether it was a toaster
oven, a vacuum, a TV, you just go to the wire cutter. And you
just you search and you get one thing and that was the wire
cutter stick when it first came out was like, we're gonna say
buy this one product. This is the vacuum to get you don't have
to think about anything else. If you want the best vacuum, this
is it. And now it was purchased by the New York Times. And now
basically suggest like 18 different products. And they're
like, well, if you're talking about shag carpet, and maybe
there's a place for that. But it's missing that just give me
the answer. And as we all become more time constrained, I think
that that would actually be a more valuable proposition to
say here's the one thing rather than here's all the things. So
we'll see I'm not optimistic about AI fixing it. But maybe AI
search will at some point. The second thing though, and this is
my more optimistic take is
I am optimistic about the creator economy in this new era of AI-generated garbage and search losing
its effectiveness. Because I do think people are going to be less trusting of their search results
and even websites whose whole shtick is to recommend things I think is going to be less valuable.
I do think people will start moving a little bit towards who is the person whose voice that I trust
in this area. When it comes to like home theater, there's a
I forget the YouTube channel. I don't know if it's digital
trends or something. There's a guy that talks about home
theater stuff that when the HomePod or Sonos comes out, I
want to hear what he says. MKBHD is another prime example, like
when it's a phone, or a laptop or whatever, a car, I actually
want to hear what MKBHD has to says about it. And so as we move
into this new era, I do, I'm more optimistic about the
creator economy and more of this like personality driven basis.
like, I'm thankful that some people see me as like the
smart home person. And there's several smart home people that
are amazing at it, Shane Watley, other channels that
people trust for those kind of recommendations. And so I think
there's going to be even more need for that style of reviews
and recommendations. And so I think that's going to be great,
at least for the next few years. But it is just going to make, I
just want to know how to link text and notion a lot. The
answer is a lot harder to find, unless you ask your podcast
Yep. Every single day.
co host, but I don't know. That would have been my
Yeah. Yeah. That would have been your smart move, but I was,
I was trying to find, I was just like, it's weird.
You can go to your search history and I was just looking through the things,
[Laughter]
which is it's just weird for a lot of reasons, but it's like,
why was I searching for that? You know,
what building did Kurt Vonnegut senior design that was later rotated? I don't,
[Laughter]
Nice!
I don't know why I was looking for that, but,
Niche! Niche!
but there was a real thing that I was trying to figure out. But, um, I was,
I was, what is a soup?
Why was I looking for all of these things?
Were you having a conversation with your kids about his cereal soup?
Anyway, it was for a different podcast.
Okay, fair.
Actually I, we were having a conversation with adults about his cereal soup and
[I'm not sure what he said here]
it's not because you don't cook the cereal in the debate.
[I'm not sure what he said here]
And it doesn't matter.
We're not going to go there this time, but I was trying to find a thing.
It's like, what is the best thing for this?
And all you could find are these like buying guides from places like CNET and
in gadget and whatever, and not a single one of them actually addressed the
All right.
question because every single one of the answers they gave you was an affiliate
find a way to cram the like thing into the, you know, the answers like, Oh no,
no, we, we know that what you really want is the answer should be like use.
Like, I don't even know.
I wish I could find what it was because it was so blatantly and Google is
actually surfacing those things as the best answer, but no one who's looking
[Laughing]
for it is wanting to sign up for Salesforce or like whatever it's like, I
don't, that's not what I was asking for.
I just wanted to know, like, is there a way to, you know, what I don't even know,
but it's just, that is the.
Yeah. Right.
A function of where I actually think that is on Google because it
shouldn't even be looking at that information and being like, yes,
Yeah. So I'm, I'm optimistic about the creator economy.
I'm less optimistic about how useful this is.
And this is why I am actually kind of excited about the humane AI pin,
this is a good answer for it.
Oh boy.
which I sh which I should be getting in like a week.
They said April 11th was the delivery date,
but honestly for something like just simple queries,
I don't know if I'm going to ask it for like product recommendations,
but I'm just looking for a simple answer about something.
Maybe it's history, whatever.
I am curious if this AI powered little device is going to be able to offer a more useful,
hopefully accurate answer for my queries, then even Google search, which seems like
a wild time when you're looking for better alternatives than Google search.
I mean, it's just, I don't know, Halcyon days when Google search was just like there was
no competition.
Oh my goodness.
And now to see it just kind of slowly degrade, I mean, it's just wild.
It's wild.
[laughs]
Killed by Google.
Google search.
Yeah.
No, just kidding.
Anyway, all right, let us know what you think about the Google search and everyone's tangential experience.
But did you have any final thoughts before we go to?
Oh yeah.
No, not yet.
OK, let's do a semi lightning round here.
We were never we were never good at lightning rounds, but we're going to try Spotify is raising its prices.
Yeah, I think I've said all of my my thought
Hmm
It's going to be raising one to two dollars depending on the market will be happening here in the U.S.
as well. I think I already know the answer, but do you use Spotify or Apple music?
>> Huh?
So we use both at our house actually.
And I tried to cancel Spotify this week and we realized that it was actually a
service.
It was probably the service that the most people in our house use the most
Interesting. Apple music. Right. I was gonna say you're
often. And so we are going to keep paying for Spotify.
probably an Apple one service.
I tried to switch people over to Apple music because we already get that.
I have, well,
You
[pop]
I have two subscriptions to Apple music because our Verizon gives it to us for
free. And then the Apple one bundle includes it. Don't yeah. Anyway,
it's anyway. So, um, but that's, but there are some things that,
well actually one of the big ones is that Spotify makes it easier.
And actually my daughter was telling me this for her to listen to music that
would be otherwise unavailable because it's like marked explicit or something
like that, where it serves up automatically, the non-explicit version,
Yes, yes.
whereas Apple music is harder to like, it just won't play stuff. So, so anyway,
that none of that made sense to me except for good.
I'm glad you're not listening to the super.
What's the music?
So I guess we'll keep bank for Spotify.
Um, I did want to before we, I want to know what, what you guys use at your house.
So I'm sure I probably know the answer.
[Laughter]
It's increasing the price because it has to cover the costs of audio books, but
it's like, who cares?
Stop shoving more things into things.
Why are you putting audio books into Spotify?
Just, and then making me pay more money.
Now, I guess there was something about how, if you want the basic tier that
doesn't have the audio box books you may be able to stay.
Yeah don't do that, don't do that, sure, yeah.
But it's like, why are you just making this more confusing for a thing that who
cares? First of all, like I'm, I'm a writer, you know, audio book, great.
I got no beef with that, but like audible, good app. Like you can get that.
Like there is a, there is a thing for that.
I don't think Spotify needs to try to cram away. And again,
it's the same thing as what the problem with Google.
Everyone is just trying to figure out ways to monetize and grow and do all this,
which whatever that's capitalism. I'm all for it. Like if we can,
we would love to have six sponsors every single episode.
I'm not, I'm not, don't get me wrong,
but I it's like you decided to add audio books,
something that I don't think anybody cares about.
And now you're going to charge everyone more because those are expensive.
Yes, strange
Like what, what user experience anyway. So what do you use?
Do you use the audio books feature of Spotify or do you just listen to music and
Apple music and I actually do audiobooks in Apple books just because it's just I'm gonna be using Apple devices for a long time
Apple music? Okay.
Hmm.
I think and the Apple books
Experience is pretty good and it syncs across all my Apple devices and it's easy and they I can share them with my family easily
So yeah, we use Apple music Apple books. I will say my son has Spotify
But this reason only when he wanted to make a video or when he was making podcasts
Sometimes he wanted to use music from a song and the Apple music app if you screen record while music is playing
The recording is just blank like it obviously doesn't let you record that
Apparently you can play music in Spotify
Do a screen recording and it will record the music and he would then take that screen recording strip the audio out
Take that into a video editor and do all this stuff and honestly
that level of resourcefulness I'm all for it. Go for it.
Hmm.
I do think that's the kind of thing again
You're not supposed to say that. I know someone's probably gonna close it.
You're not supposed to say in a podcast because someone is now going to close that loop
If Spotify, if you're there for Spotify, just forget, I mean,
neuralize you. Just forget the last 30 seconds. Just forget it.
You ruined it for everyone Steven
But that's the only reason why they will sometimes use Spotify.
Although that clean explicit thing is real though.
Yeah
It is hard sometimes to find the clean version of a song,
even if it actually does exist in Apple music. It's hard to find for sure.
Yeah
Yeah, yep
Also, the TikTokification of the Internet.
Which I don't think is a positive thing, but Facebook is testing a new full screen video player that is basically another TikTok clone.
You know, Facebook is a little bit like Google, whereas there should be a killed by Facebook website. Maybe one exists. I'm not sure.
But I get it. Experimenting like this. A lot of apps are trying this because of the popularity of TikTok.
Probably also trying to prepare for if TikTok gets banned in the U.S. that maybe everyone will hopefully flock to Facebook, which I don't think would happen.
But I don't know. I don't like the TikTokification of the Internet. I don't think we need a bunch of clones.
Facebook, I don't know if you remember, Jason, Facebook said it was going to be a podcast player at one point.
And Facebook actually made it where you could ingest RSS into your Facebook page and you could listen to podcasts.
And it was the worst podcast listening experience you could ever have. I actually made a whole video about it on my channel.
[I'm not sure what he said here]
Yeah, remember when Facebook told all the news organizations that they should just pivot
to video and so they all spent a lot of money building studios and hiring all these video
journalists and then Facebook was like, "Nevermind," and now they're all going bankrupt.
Also buzzfeed
So I don't know that anyone, yeah, that's what I'm saying, they're all going bankrupt.
So I'm not sure that anybody should listen to that.
What's weird about this, I thought about this a lot because I'm trying to figure out what
is the crossover of people who are into TikTok and also still use Facebook.
And it actually, I didn't necessarily know this because I think of TikTok as being my
teenagers, but it also, from my understanding, the second largest population of people using
TikTok are people like my parents' age.
They just scroll through stuff and they also use Facebook.
So maybe this actually makes sense because my thought was if TikTok goes away, everybody's
just going to use Instagram Reels.
We're at.
They've already solved this problem, but there's probably a lot of people who actually use
Instagram Reels, who aren't using Instagram Reels.
They are just using the blue app.
And so maybe this makes sense, but the format of the video, actually there's a really funny
piece, point in this story.
I think it's in this particular story where, yeah, you can turn your phone.
[laughing]
They're just reinventing Quibi, right?
That's all it is.
You can turn your phone and it just automatically rotates for you.
It's like, "They just reinvented Quibi.
This is great."
But I think that this is a symptom of what TikTok has done, set aside the algorithm,
which it's the most effective algorithm
now. It is the best at dialing in what people want. People constantly, I mean,
every day I see someone is like, no, no, no, their algorithm's terrible.
Look what's in my for you page. I'm like,
Yeah, if you're not proud of it, don't share it.
you shouldn't share that because it is,
you should just reset your account and start over if you think there's a problem
because anyway,
but I think that it is conditioning people to have such a short attention span
at things that it is sort of like the tick tockification of the internet.
Isn't just about like scrolling vertical video.
Like you have two seconds in that that's in,
that's the attention span people have to decide. And I think there was this,
I think it was maybe an interview with Mr. Beast talking about this and how like
YouTube creators have gone down this, like that's the,
Retention editing is what they call it.
the way that videos are being edited. You know, they're like two second. Yeah,
yeah, there you go. Yeah. And so like that is the tick tockification of the
internet. And I think that that is the thing that at some point I don't know how
Which to that point, MrBeast and other creators on YouTube
actually are saying that it is shifting back,
at least on the YouTube platform,
away from retention editing and people actually finding
just kind of really transparent, authentic videos.
You actually interviewed him, but Ali Abdaal,
who recently wrote a book on productivity,
you know, you look at some of his videos
and it is not retention editing.
And retention editing means like you're changing
what's on screen every second and a half.
it is extremely just like, you know, the visual
far we can push that before people's brains just like start to melt out of their
is constantly, yeah, yeah, yeah, it's all that stuff.
And so there is a response actually away from that now,
at least on YouTube, not necessarily on TikTok just yet.
I also feel like TikTok shot themselves in the foot
with a TikTok shop.
I don't know if you scroll TikTok, I do follow,
I do scroll TikTok, at least once a day.
And there was just a wave of where every other video
was someone promoting something from the TikTok shop.
And it really degraded that experience as well,
which, you know, it's just amazing to me,
Like how many platforms?
Like I understand profitability, trying to make money doing this stuff,
but ruining the core competency of your platform for the sake of a few more dollars.
I know we just talked about Google, talked about TikTok.
I don't know.
It's a fascinating time.
I guess it's grasping at straws maybe just trying to figure out the next stage of growth.
Lots of loud noises and bright lights and cuts and stuff, yeah.
Well, there was a time when Instagram moved the post button,
Yes.
which was bottom center and put the shopping button there because they knew
that that's the point where people tap the most and they wanted to control what
they got to. They were trying to capitalize on that motor memory.
And they eventually had to change it back because people are like,
Yeah. Yeah, right, they did, yeah.
this is terrible. I did not,
I came to Instagram to look at people's cats, not to buy some influencer's
So anyway, it's the Internet.
shoes, right? Like, and they had to eventually change it back.
Very quickly, META is now requiring an age verification
to use the META VR headset.
to.
I don't know, what is the age? Is it, oh, 13 to 17.
Yeah. Yeah.
So they're going to adjust the experience based on the age of the person.
So there's not necessarily a minimum age for using the device, but for example,
if you're a 13 to 17 year old,
like you want people won't be able to find your profile if they're searching
through other people's profiles and stuff like that.
And so they're going to control it.
The reason I thought that the story was interesting is that, you know,
drunk
Congress dragged a bunch of the social media companies,
drug that we'll see the.
No, that's true. I dragged it right here, right dragged. Yeah
Problem is Congress did not drug them because that,
so I was like trying to figure out what the right form of that verb was.
They dragged them in front of Congress to pressure them about how they're going
to get all, you know, cause in theory,
you're not supposed to have a social media account in this country until you're
like 13, but obviously like that's really hard to enforce and the platforms,
especially meta because they don't want to be responsible for it are saying that
it should be Apple and Google because they control the app stores.
Theoretically, it would be a lot easier to set the age on a device.
That would determine whether or not you can download a certain app.
Obviously there's ways around that.
I thought it was interesting that the meta is admitting that in this case,
like they're having to do that kind of control.
And maybe this actually makes their argument because this is a hardware thing.
All right.
Right?
They are saying that you have to verify your age using this headset on the
hardware level,
and that will determine the kind of experience that you will have.
Because I think that, you know, you and I are both parents, our older daughter,
our daughters are both teenagers. You know,
[laughing]
they use apps. You know,
They use apps.
it's real hard to keep a teenager from using Instagram if you try, you know,
and, and, and so I think what meta is acknowledging,
and I think we should all acknowledge is like teenagers are way more resourceful
than we are. You and I are very tech savvy.
Teenagers are not necessarily more tech savvy. They're just resourceful.
resource on it. Yes. Exploit it to the end. It's amazing. Yeah.
They will find a little tiny crack and then they will just figure a way to wiggle
through it. Eventually the tenacity is just mind blowing.
If a teenager wants a thing, they'll figure out how to make it happen.
This seems like meta is what they're trying to do is they're trying to add a
layer of protection.
It just gets weird when you have to start like verifying age because like that
article mentioned that if you accidentally put in the wrong age,
the only way to verify your age now will be to like upload your driver's license.
I just don't think we want to live in a world where using internet platforms and
Yeah, I know. I actually ran into this because my middle son wanted to have a YouTube channel where he like streamed video games
So I was like, yeah, we could do that
I don't know if you know want you like engaging with all the comments, but we can at least let you know
I'll let you stream and there's that 13 plus
Age limit for Google accounts
So I couldn't like create a Google account for him with a YouTube channel to stream
I had to like create a channel under my thing. Anyway, it does get a little messy
But Apple Vision Pro Apple says actually don't even like it's not
for people under 13. Apple is just straight up like, and even
services requires you to upload your driver's license.
like the lenses like won't even move close enough, I think for
some ages for it to work. So anyway, I'm going to skip to our
Yeah, right, right.
the solar eclipse so then we can get to personal tech. Monday,
Perfect, perfect.
April 8, we have a total solar eclipse happening. It'll be
visible here in the US along a trajectory. I think it's like,
let's see, down like tech like Texas, like Dallas, Texas will
[kiss]
rock Arkansas through Indianapolis and then all the
way through Buffalo. Jason's near totality. I think I'm going
to get like, what 70 50% maybe. But yeah, solar eclipse near
[gasp]
I'm getting a t-shirt that just says near totality and people will have no idea
what that means. But yeah,
I think they were saying we should be like 97% where we live in Michigan.
So that's great. We'll probably try to, you know, uh,
so weird Easter gift, but at Easter I think my mom handed out eclipse glasses to
Nice! That's fun! That's fun!
everyone so that everyone could see it. Yeah. So we have those,
we're prepared for it. I'm excited to take, like, I think it,
Although we're supposed to have
a lot of people talking about like well this is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.
Want to get photos. I did just want to say you know as someone who was ran up in a previous life,
was a professional photographer. You know your iPhone is probably not going to do a great job
of getting a photo of this. You really have to be using either an SLR or mirrorless camera. If
you're going to do that, I recommend that you go on Amazon and you buy a solar filter, right? You
You know, because, I mean this sincerely.
Can you have your camera? Yeah.
You're going to fry the inside of your computer if you don't I mean of your phone of your camera if you don't there
There's actually a great YouTube video where someone did this
I think 2017 was the last total solar eclipse and they just set it up on a tripod
And they just pointed it at the Sun and it took like a minute and started smoking
Wow.
Like that camera because you know, you stick a 200 millimeter, you know lens on the front of that thing and it's just amplifying
Right, the glass.
What's coming into it? Yeah, it's just amplifying it and it's it will destroy your you know, your device
Definitely don't if you're if you ever like an S
Right. Right.
L R for example, do not look through the viewfinder because that is a straight path in you know
Of that magnified if you're using a mirrorless you can look at the screen because that's just a screen representation
But I just wanted to throw that there spend 35 bucks get yourself a solar filter stick it on the front of your lens
And if anyone is still wondering about the flatness or roundness of the Earth, actually
that's lunar eclipse, I think.
You'll have a much better experience take trying to take a photo of it and don't look directly at the Sun
Well, you never know.
I was like, is anybody still wondering about that?
You never know.
But anyway, yeah, I was actually, I think the one in 2017, the totality was close to
Florida maybe, but we all went outside and like, it's pretty kind of weird experience
where it just kind of gets dark in the middle of the day.
I don't know.
They're like, "Oh, this is like all those disaster movies I like."
They're like watching.
This is what's happening.
That is true.
You know, I found this random podcast about Antarctica.
There's like these two scientists and they talk about Antarctica and how it's like living
down there.
It's like living in Alaska six months of the year.
I find that fascinating.
Like, yeah.
Yeah, yeah
Amazing.
For a personal tech, let's talk about a travel tech because you almost traveled to the Adobe
All right
I
Conference, right, exactly, right, right.
Travel back and forth between my bedroom in my bathroom because I got a little sick
But I was supposed to go a little farther than that it but it did not work out and I'm really by Tuesday last week
I was so thankful that I did not that I was not in a hotel room in Vegas
I was gonna say, [LAUGH] there's half the people in Vegas.
Although they were probably probably would have been very prepared for the condition that I was in they probably see that very often
calling calling room service for Gatorade and Red Bull
probably would have been totally normal.
We know we've dealt with this before, but so you almost traveled.
They would have been like, yep, we know what's wrong.
I did travel to podcast movement in Los Angeles and so that was a lot of fun.
And I'll share, they're basically like two pieces of tech.
First of all, I'll just mention, listen, Apple Vision Pro, okay?
I know everyone's gonna wonder.
You know, it's cool when traveling, you know.
Watching a movie or whatever.
I didn't take it out once in the hotel because when I get back to my hotel room,
I usually like do a little bit of work and whatever.
And it's just the friction of getting it all out.
The waterfield travel case was great with it. As far as like compactness,
it fit in my backpack, which I also use the waterfield backpack.
They have not sponsored the show. I have no affiliate links.
[laughter]
I just really like water. There you go. There you go. Um, so anyway,
you know, Apple vision pros cool when traveling is probably the best use case
for it, but I don't know.
It's still really big and heavy.
It took up a lot of room in my bag, I just want to say.
Hey, I got a Waterfield gear bag right here, so we should talk to them.
Yeah. So the premise of this is we're just going to talk real quickly about the stuff that we take
That's right, thank you, yes.
with us when we're traveling, right? The tech that we take with us. Okay. I don't know if
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
I'll start with this.
I don't know if we want to go back and forth or what,
but charger wise,
I recently got this Qi 2 charger from Anker,
we made that clear or not. We just started talking about it. I just thought I would clarify. So yeah.
and this I find is, has been the best yet.
I still love the MagSafe Duo
for the thinness and lightness,
but you know, it's old, it's lightning.
USB-C here on the side, opens up like this,
charge your phone on here, Qi 2 15 watt charging,
AirPods can charge on this back thing,
and then an Apple Watch charger, boom,
flips out right there at the bottom,
charge three devices in one, USB-C.
This is my go-to travel charger now, and it was great, boom.
Okay.
Yeah, there you go, it's good.
[Sneezes]
That's yeah. Yeah, I actually still use the magsafe duo. It's still my favorite piece of travel tech even though it uses lightning
It's fine. I have a have one lightning cable and you know, it's great about it is I only use it for one thing
>> But now, do you have AirPods Max?
Yeah, it's literally the only lightning device. I carry anymore. I
>> I see, yeah, well.
Don't have AirPods Max. I
Mean I did at one point but I I much prefer
Thanks.
These Bowers and Wilkins PX sevens for over the ear headphones when I'm traveling
They're not quite as like not quite as seamless.
This is the whole experience with using the AirPods Max, but they do pair to two devices,
which is great.
When it comes to headphones, AirPods Pro 2, amazing, used those during the entire trip,
actually brought my AirPods Max just in case I didn't use them once.
You can have them paired to your computer and your phone and they switch back and forth.
I never took them out.
Oh, that's right.
You were right.
Because we recorded podcasts last week, I was in the hotel room, it was the only wired
headphones I had.
I had to use the adapter.
So, you were right.
I used it once to record a podcast.
Otherwise, I did not, but ...
Right.
You did one when we recorded. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yep. Yeah. I only really use over-the-ear headphones
on the plane and usually only if it's more than a three-hour flight. It's nice. The batteries
usually last a little bit longer and I really like AirPods. I don't know why I'm touching my
ear. I don't have AirPods Pro and I usually do though, but I really like AirPods Pro for
just about everything but I don't
especially like if you're gonna sleep
I hate the idea the thought of waking up and having it be gone
I will say for my AirPods Pro 2, which I took, these are the USB-C versions.
I did get, and I've used these before, the comply foam tips.
Like I don't I'm never gonna find it again. So the over-the-ear headphones are great
These are, they do, if you're watching, youtube.com/atprimarytechshow.
Those look like little ducks sitting in there, honestly.
The comply foam is like earplug material where you can squish it down and then it expands.
I find this never like it never feels loose in my
It keeps the AirPods Pro 2 in my ear and I never worry about them falling out and so comply foam tips for AirPods Pro
Those are winners. I enjoy that very much
[laughter]
Umm.
great so what what gear what do you pack all of your little do you have like a
gear go bag that you put everything yeah where the tuck oh you have the peak
This is the peak design gear bag. I love it
You open it up and it has like three like separate compartments and I have you know, keep the chargers
design one I hate it
I keep the cables that little like USB-C to USB-A adapters in there peak design was awesome
It also has like a little front pouch over here
Which I'll keep little things in the front pocket. The peak design one is awesome and it's compact
[gasp]
What what?
What are you talking about little look look look how thin this is?
No, it's not. It's terrible. It's not compact at all. It's so,
Look at this. It squishes down. I
it is so thick.
Got some cables and charger in here. So the other thing is I
Do you have anything in it?
Look at how thin this one is.
mean this
I'm it does look nice. That looks nice. But here's the thing
This is the waterfield bag and it is so perfect.
so it all depends on what chargers you put in it and
The chargers I usually take with me are like these ultra slim like this is an anchors slim charger
And then the other charger I bring which I bring way too many chargers
I only used like one or two
Aaaah...
Charging bricks, but I bring a bunch of them the Nomad if you're gonna get
One-slim charger this Nomad it's six. This is 60 watts and it has two
[Cough]
USB-C ports on the bottom 60 watts to USB-C. Look how thin that is
This is this is the travel charger to get I really I really enjoy this one. It is
Now see
So that one I have a no. Yeah, see I have another anchor one
See, I have a nomad one too, but it is not thin, and it's 135 watts.
Which is thicker it's more wattage it has two
USB-C ports. This was actually the one I used more often. Oh, I don't know why I think I just kept it
130 watts, yeah.
Oh, this one is also nice for international travel because it actually comes with the international plugs and you can take the plug in and out
And so I use this when I went to Israel last year and that's a nice nice little feature
I have that and
[whoosh]
The other thing I was gonna show I have all these little cord tacos from Andar
This is nice to keep little cables nicely organized
Did you use any of these Cored Tacos?
The Cored Tacos.
I've never heard that phrase before, a cord taco. No, I don't have any of those,
In the bag.
but that's because I keep them all. They each have one little spot in this bag where they all
Ah, yeah.
Okay.
I'll have to look at that.
belong. But I do have the international anchor charger that you were just talking about. I don't
I don't know where it...
Yeah.
it is but I do I do use one I have and I have I also have the non international version of that
Yeah, the other thing I'll say when it comes to batteries,
cuz I was at a conference, and your phone battery just dies at a conference.
It's just like one of the laws of physics.
And so, this is the Anker G2 MagSafe battery pack.
So you can actually just slap this on the back of your phone and
you get 15 watt charging from this battery pack.
It also has a screen on the side, which you can see the current percentage
of the battery right here.
It's a little thick, but it is.
Which is this is my main travel charger because it is actually nice and compact and and small and yeah
but if you're gonna be at a conference, 10,000.
4,000 milliamp hours, so it'll charge your phone like one in a portion's time.
So this is cool. Plus you can also connect directly the USB-C to a device to charge, but the one I really enjoy,
That's a chunky boy!
and I use a couple times, the Anchor Prime.
This thing is not small or compact, but it has
two USB-C and one USB-A port. I never use the USB-A, but I use these. It can charge up to 100 watts,
So I can plug my MacBook Pro into this battery and charge my MacBook Pro.
Even under full load and this thing is just if you never want to have to think
about battery life ever you get one of these and it's great.
Oh my gosh.
Really oh that's a good deal this I have a whole video on it I'll link the video
Also, that's on sale right now at Amazon for $90 bucks.
in the show notes but this and they have smaller versions of this too like if you
want to get like a half-size version because you don't need this much
milliamp hours you can get the smaller versions too but this guy.
Yeah.
I think of that as the strip search charger,
'cause when you walk through the TSA with that thing,
Yes, but this does, this is,
there's pretty much a guarantee you're about to get accosted.
but I just,
Hold on, hold on, yes, but.
Well, these are the things we just live with nowadays.
I just want to say it is right under the FAA
regulation, uh, battery that you can take. So this is,
It's yes.
It is, but it is not under the FAA regulation of looks like a bomb.
it is pretty heavy too. I will, I will say a quick story.
It still passes the, this looks like a bomb.
Yeah.
When I was working for a travel company,
I would do photography and video for them.
I was flying out of Tel Aviv one time.
I had like multiple spinning hard drives and like lots of camera gear and stuff.
I was searched for a full hour and a half. I had to take every single cable,
every single device out of my bag. They had to walk me directly to the gate.
Otherwise I would have missed the flight.
But back in the day when it was all spinning discs and all stuff,
they, they thought I was packing back then. But anyway,
- Yeah.
would anything else travel gear that you take that you have?
That does look nice, yeah.
Well, I would just, cause I do really, I genuinely do like the waterfield, uh, bag.
It's very nice.
It's pretty slim.
It has enough room for me to throw things in.
I have one of these up because I prefer to travel with the MacBook Air.
So I've got one of these little, these are, this is a lifesaver because you just, it plugs
into the two.
You can charge.
It's got HDMI, you know, you get a couple of USB-A ports, an SD card, all the things
I have one of those too, from Hyper, but you can still use it with your Mac if you want.
you have on a MacBook Pro that you don't get on, get in a MacBook Air.
Oh, that's the Hyper, that's the one designed for the iPad Pro, which I, which I, which
I also have one of those too.
There you go. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah. [laughs]
So yeah, this is a Kickstarter.
This is the only Kickstarter I think I've ever participated in except for the, uh, whatever
Stephen Hackett's, you know, Apple calendar thing.
So, but I, the reason I keep talking about this is I have tried to switch away from this
bag many times.
I have one of the Peak Design bags, right?
And I hate it.
And I have one of the Bellroy bags, and I hated this one last.
The only problem with this one is this doesn't do as good of a job of keeping
Separating, yeah.
Yeah, I want pockets.
everything where you put it, right? It's it's kind of like loose and stuff and so
it's I really I really wanted to like this one. I really really did but I just
every time I just keep going back to this good old faithful water field. It's
so well made but it also it's like it's big enough to keep everything but it
also just it's pretty slim and fits into my backpack pretty nicely. So I also
Also, last thing I'll say is I travel with these...
Really? Well, my headphones are not going to let me reach it, but I actually use the
these are the most affordable and fast USB hard drives you could find and I if you if you need a little bit of extra storage while you're traveling these things run circles around like the Samsung T5 or T7 or whatever and they're like half the price so don't throw that out there.
OWC Envoy Pro Mini, which is, it looks like a USB stick flash drive, but it's actually
like pro-grade SSD speeds and it has a USB-C and USB-A connector. I use it because I can
record ProRes video directly to this from my iPhone because it is fast enough for that.
This is what it looks like. It's literally the size of a USB stick, but you can get it
[click]
in a one terabyte version and it is pretty sweet. Yeah, my Mac Studio. Some people, yeah,
This is the one that you showed a picture of plugged into the back of your Mac studio and the
cap was off and it looked like you had like a umbilical cord thing going on like that is some
there's some people commenting like, "Why do you have a switch blade stabbing your Mac
Studio?" or whatever. Right, right, right.
seriously high-tech. I didn't know like if it was like one of those hardware dongles like you
No, no, no, it's a good USB stick. You know, one terabyte. I'll put a link to that too.
know they meet like a hardware encryption key plugged in as well like wow what is he doing.
That's great.
But anyway, let us know if you have some travel tech that we missed, we've covered on a future
show. We're going to go to a bonus episode and Jason's going to yell at me for not knowing
how to use my iPhone. So, man. Yeah, subscribe so you can hear Jason lambast me on it. But
Thank you.
I'm going to teach Stephen how to use an iPhone.
if you can't subscribe, give us a five star rating and review an Apple podcast. Go subscribe
to youtube.com/atprimarytechshow. And of course, we would appreciate it if you support the
show directly. All the links are in the show notes below. Thanks for listening. Thanks
for watching. We'll catch you next time.
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