Byteside: tech + digital culture

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Pentanet has grown rapidly in just four years, though it's still only available in Perth. But in our chat with Founder Stephen Cornish we learn why perfecting one of the world's most advanced wireless mesh network technologies in one city is the best way to prepare it for wider deployment in future. We also talk about the origins on Pentanet, his love for League of Legends, the potential of an Australian esports hub in Perth to get better connections to Asian servers, and what GeForce Now cloud services mean for the future of every digital experience we have.

Cornish is building local but thinking global. Fascinating insights abound.

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Feeling a little sad because the Tokyo Olympics finished last week? I am too. With so much of life in lockdown right now we had a great timezone match up here in Australia to enjoy the event, and while there was no one in the stands it was great to see it happen in the midst of such a tough time for the world.

In good news, you won't have to wait much longer for your next hit of Olympics action because the Beijing 2022 Winter Games is actually just months away – it kicks off February 4.

And this week on Byteside we're talking to one of the Irish athletes preparing for those winter games in one of the craziest sports ever conceived. Brendan Doyle is an Irish skeleton racer – that's the one where they throw themselves face first down the high-speed ice track.

I'm speaking to Brendan because it turns out that virtual reality headsets are actually a fantastic way to practice and visualise tracks when you're not on the actual track. So in this chat we talk about his choice of sport, his arrival at using VR gear to help up his game, and how having a headset for training offers other benefits to his routine.

You can go find him yourself online too, he's @facedoyle on Twitter and slidingirish.com is his home on the web.

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If you've been watching the Olympics at the moment you may well be feeling inspired to get fit or get into a sport, but the pandemic is also still out there so gyms aren't as attractive as they have been and team sports also pose their challenges right now. In that sense it seems like a great time for home cycling – a sport you can experience on a bike in your own home. But if you want to make it compelling, you need some kind of smart tech or video game idea to guide and motivate you.

You can see where I'm going with this, can't you. Yes, Zwift has carved out a patch in this space as a video game experience that is all about cycling and doesn't take the fitness class approach to exercise in the home.

Today I catch up with Wes Sulzberger, the Country Manager for Zwift in Australia and New Zealand, to find out a lot more about the thinking behind Zwift and the video game / exercise hybrid sim experience it offers. Wes actually joined the company from a background in professional cycling, so we talk about his own journey of discovering and accepting that indoor cycling can feel rewarding.

We spoke ahead of the Olympics, while the Tour de France was still in full swing, and shortly after Zwift had run a series of Olympic Virtual Series events in the build up to the Tokyo Games.

I ask a lot of questions to try to tease out as clear an understanding as possible about what Zwift really is and how the experience works. I'm sure the proof is in the pudding, but hopefully this helps paint the picture of how Zwift balances the entertainment of a video game with a true riding simulation for those eager to focus on the fitness experience.

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The most obvious part of the work from home era has been the need to stare at webcams while wearing headsets to hear and be heard as clearly as possible. These are the tools we've either put up with in their most basic form directly through our built-in laptop parts or we've hunted for upgrades – and often found stores sold out of anything at all.

Today I'm talking to Andy Hurt, Managing Director of Poly ANZ, about his company's perspective on this shift in our needs. Poly has over half a century of pedigree in business-grade AV conferencing tools – it made the communications headsets worn by the Apollo 11 crew when it landed on the moon. When office life was the norm you probably used their equipment in a conference room or as a headset if you take lots of calls each day.

Poly has had a lot of change in its own business over recent years, not just as the pandemic has seen it increase its availability of hardware designed for work from home users. The company used to be known as Plantronics, and in 2018 acquired Polycom before changing its name in 2019.

I'll stop there, because I kick off the conversation with Andy by asking for his version of how Poly has evolved in recent years. Let's jump in there and let him explain the rest.

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Steve Cottam is the CEO of Antstream Arcade, and I caught up with Steve for Byteside to talk about the origins of his plan to launch an independent game streaming service and all the ways they're adding features to make playing classic games through the Antstream platform feel that little bit extra.

Check out Antstream Arcade via https://www.antstream.com/

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If you're hearing this, you're in the right place. We're consolidating our wider shows about games and technology into the One True Byteside podcast, so we'll have lots more interview shows appearing here going forward alongside our episodes with journalist friends discussing the news and weirdness of any given week.

If you need to find us in a specific app, or want to share Byteside details with a friend, here's all the details.

Pocket Casts: https://pca.st/itunes/1482077503

Overcast: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/overcast-podcast-player/id888422857

Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/podcast/id1482077503

Google Podcasts: https://podcasts.google.com/feed/aHR0cHM6Ly9mZWVkcy5hY2FzdC5jb20vcHVibGljL3Nob3dzLzA0NzA5ZTVkLWU0ZTQtNDk0Ny1hYmNmLTYyZDM3MmIyZTFiNg

Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/43tUBmO4DknkGbd4Hw9dlb

RSS: https://rss.acast.com/byteside

And get loads more written content at byteside.com.

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Seamus has Nic Healey back as a guest host this week to discuss the Gravitas Glory esports beer, Nic's desperation in still trying to get his hands on a PlayStation 5, and our thoughts on whether we're really enjoying the Loki series on Disney+ or just in love with its aesthetic.

Plus we count down some of the shows we're really excited about coming soon, including the Alien series being led by Noah Hawley, Good Omens Season 2, Succession Season 3, and Ted Lasso S2.

As mentioned in this episode, we're consolidating the Byteside podcasts into this main show going forward, so if you're subscribed to Byteside then there's nothing else you need to do! If you've been following the rest of our shows but not Byteside then it's a great time to subscribe for all our regular interviews with great minds across games and technology.

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