MashTalk

The Mashable team is back from CES 2018, and we have lots of things to say about what impressed us, disappointed us, and just plain weirded us out. This year's show was filled with driverless cars, wall-sized TVs, and enough talking gadgets to fill, well, a convention hall. On this week's MashTalk we break down the show, pick our highlights and our lowlights, and try to grok some greater meaning.

Check out our top picks from the show.

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After it was revealed in late 2017 that Apple intentionally slows down the performance of older iPhones when their batteries deteriorate, people freaked. There were explanations, recriminations, apologies, lawsuits, and, finally, solutions. But in the wake of that specific controversy, a question arose: Does this happen to Android phones, too? For the most part, the answer seems to be no. While the nature of and Android ecosystem -- with its hundreds of manufacturers, all using different chips and software layers -- makes a comprehensive investigation difficult, there's evidence that suggest Android vendors slowing down older phones because of old batteries isn't a thing. For starters, several major companies, like Samsung and Motorola, declared that they simply don't do it. But there's a more reliable way to check, and that's by going to the same set of data that exposed the iPhone issue: Checking the benchmark scores of older Android phones to see if there are enough of them getting results that are significantly worse than the well-documented scores of a brand-new phone. Primate Labs, the company that created Geekbench, did exactly that."We focused on Samsung simply because they are the largest handset provider on Android, and we viewed this as a litmus test," explains John Poole, author of the original study that provided hard evidence of the iPhone slow-down problem. "We haven't seen any evidence of this widespread performance-limiting problem that has affected the Apple iPhones. It seems to be that this is a problem that is very unique to Apple." Poole joins MashTalk for an extended discussion on the iPhone slowdown problem, and why the issue doesn't appear to exist in that ecosystem. The first clue: Android phones have bigger batteries. But it's not the whole story. Follow John and Geekbench on Twitter. Follow MashTalk on Twitter, too.

If you did some online shopping this holiday season, chances are you bought something from Amazon. And if you did, you certainly saw a splash ad for the company's own devices, including one for the Fire TV Stick, whose price was slashed from the regular $39.99 to just $24.99.

I know I did. And when I saw the ad for the 17th or 18th time, even though I wasn't planning to buy the Stick (I already had a first-gen device, which lacks Alexa integration), I found myself clicking "Add to Cart." I wasn't the only one. Amazon says its customer bought 2.7x times as many Fire TV Sticks over the Black Friday shopping period than it did over the same period last year. It also claimed to have sold "millions" of Alexa-compatible devices. That's impressive. It also might make you wonder: How can any other purveyor of video streaming devices compete? Apple didn't help itself when it decided to offer its Apple TV 4K at a prohibitive price point, starting at $179. To be fair, the Apple TV 4K more directly competes with the new Fire TV box, but the price difference is still eye-popping -- you can buy a Fire TV today for just $54.99. Even if you look to streaming mainstay Roku, it's 4K Ultra streaming box sells for $89.99. Beware what you buy, though, since it might not be compatible with the services you want. Google made that abundantly clear recently by restricting YouTube from Amazon devices, and Amazon famously doesn't make its streaming apps Google Cast-compatible, meaning they don't work on Google Chromecast. It doesn't even offer any Chromecast or Apple TV in its store... or at least it didn't until this week. Will things get better among streaming competitors? How does Amazon get away with selling its devices so cheap? And what are the guiding principles for its Fire TV line? Scott Henson, Amazon's director of product management for Fire TV, swings by the MashTalk podcast to give some insights into Amazon's streaming-box plans as well as some thoughts on why how we're watching is almost as important as what we're watching. He also tackles the question: Will we ever see ads on Amazon video? (Note: This podcast was recorded before Amazon announced it would accept Google Chromecast and Apple TV back into its online store.)

Got a smartphone? Then you must also have a wireless plan, and if you live in the U.S., chances are it's with one of the big four — Verizon, AT&T, T-Mobile, or Sprint. However, there are a bunch of other carriers you may have seen around, carriers with names like Cricket, Jolt, metroPCS, and Virgin. These are MVNOs, or mobile virtual network operators, and they exist by leasing spectrum from the major carriers. They're also often a better deal, thanks to selectively targeting demographics and relying heavily on Wi-Fi to support the network. One of those MVNOs is Republic Wireless. Founded in 2010, it made a name for itself in the following years by putting Wi-Fi calling on the map. Thanks to a Wi-Fi-centered strategy, Republic was able to offer incredibly cheap deals, which had the potential to cut big money off a wireless bill — a Mashable editor actually saved over $150 every month by switching. The big catch: The phones that actually worked on Republic was very limited; notably, it didn't — and still doesn't — offer the iPhone. After quietly expanding the number of phones that are compatible with its network, Republic Wireless is making noise again. It's just announced two new hardware products that will debut in early 2018: a phone with no screen that looks more like a panic button, and its own smart speaker. On this week's MashTalk, Republic Wireless co-founder and CEO Chris Chuang explained who the products are for: families. The screenless phone, called Relay, functions as both a kid tracker and a way to communicate directly with them. The single button directly calls the parent, and it's equipped with GPS so the parent can check the kid's location anytime. The device also provides access to Google Assistant, so the kid can ask questions and get answers without bothering mom or dad (and yes there are parental controls for what information the Assistant can surface). The smart speaker is called Anywhere HQ, and it's also equipped with Google Assistant. It looks like any other wireless speaker, but if you pick it up off its (heavy) charging cradle and look at the bottom you'll see all the buttons for a cordless phone. The big difference is that it's a phone that works with your smartphone's phone number, and it also works over the 4G LTE network -- so you can take it anywhere. If this all sounds great to you, but you're still not psyched to jump to a carrier without the iPhone, Chuang has some good news for you: On the podcast he reveals Republic Wireless will offer an iPhone in 2018. He just didn't say which one. Follow Republic Wireless on Twitter. Follow Pete, Ray, and MashTalk on Twitter, too.

The video conference is one of the least-liked parts of modern office culture. Despite the plethora of video conferencing services -- Google Hangouts, BlueJeans, Highfive, Skype, FaceTime, and dozens more -- the first five minutes of every meeting tends to be a series of fruitless attempts to get everyone's audio working correctly. And even when it does, dropped connections, poorly timed muting/unmuting, and quiet talkers often ruin the flow. The truth is video conferencing is hard. Layering random internet services on top of ad hoc equipment on top of users with virtually no training means you get a grab-bag of results. Sure there are sleek corporate systems, but their cost often puts them out of range of most startups. Will things get better for video conferencing? Or will Gen Z need to get used to the facepalm-setups millennials (and others) have endured for years? On this week's MashTalk, Mary McDowell, the CEO of video conferencing mainstay Polycom joins the podcast to talk about the real reason your office is so bad at video conferencing, the future of meetings, and whether telepresence robots are a thing. Follow Mary on Twitter.

Is hardware really that hard? OnePlus pointed to the borderline-cliché catchphrase, "Hardware is hard" at its event on Thursday to launch the OnePlus 5T. But the company's own product release schedule appears to belie the saying, with the 5T coming a mere five months after its predecessor, the OnePlus 5. However, if you look at OnePlus' ambitious launch timeline and conclude the opposite -- that hardware is easy -- you'd be jumping to the wrong conclusion. The China-based company has simply gotten really good at leveraging its natural advantages (for instance, its proximity to prototype facilities in Shenzhen) to fuel its nimbleness. OnePlus also earns its reputation as a bold upstart. It doesn't think in the same new-flagship-every-year-on-the-dot terms as bigger brands like Samsung, and LG. The company just ships phones when they're ready, and the "T" suffix it has attached to its second-gen releases is an unsubtle dig at Apple's "S" upgrades. Still, are they going too fast, even for an upstart? Like other mobile manufacturers, OnePlus has had some serious software issues over the past several months. First, it was reported OnePlus phones were harvesting data on customers in questionable ways, and then there was the "Engineer Mode" discovery -- a potential backdoor for hackers who got a hold of your device. OnePlus Head of Marketing Kyle Kiang (pronounced "jung") drops in on the MashTalk podcast to set the record straight on those incidents, explain why the OnePlus 5T is coming so hot on the heels of the OnePlus 5, and reveal how he is able to tell the OnePlus story at a company that does very little traditional marketing.

Apple's catchphrase, "Think different" is so well-known, that it's not often used in its original context, more often pulled out as an ironic dig when the company does something users don't like (eliminating a certain jack comes to mind). In the case of the iPhone X, though, the irony disappears. Users will definitely need to think differently as they encounter an iPhone with no home button, a front camera that can scan your face, and a "notch" — all firsts for the iPhone. The iPhone X doesn't just have new features; it has a whole new way of interacting with the device. Will owners get used to the new features quickly, or will they be a continual source of frustration? To answer that question, the MashTalk podcast spoke with two of the only people outside of Apple who have used the device for more than a week: Mashable Chief Correspondent Lance Ulanoff and BuzzFeed Personal Technology Reporter Nicole Nguyen. Both Lance and Nicole were part of the first group of tech reviewers to get their hands on the iPhone X, using them for a whole week before publishing extensivereviews. They've both now been using the phone for 10 days, and are probably two of the only people outside of Apple who can say with authority whether the iPhone's new paradigm is something you'll love or hate. Besides telling us everything you want to know about what it's like to use the iPhone X, Nicole and Lance let us peek behind the curtain at Apple's process of seeding phones to reviewers, which was a whole different ballgame this time around. They also have some surprising thoughts on whether this iPhone really earns its $1,000 price tag. Follow Nicole on Twitter. Follow Lance, Pete, and MashTalk, too.

As it has evolved from digital storefront to ecommerce empire, Amazon built up a lot of trust over the years. Now it's testing the limits of that trust with Amazon Key. It's a simple enough concept, which really solves a problem: The main thing Amazon does is deliver packages to your door, but there's always the question of what happens when you're not home? In many cases, that package may find a different home if it doesn't get through your door right away. Amazon Key, which includes a smart lock and security camera, will let the delivery person in your front door and let you keep an eye on them -- from wherever you are. In cities, where lots of people live in apartments, the idea has a lot of merit. It also has a lot of connotations Amazon would like to avoid. The company is already a presence in many households through its Echo devices and Alexa voice assistant, and Amazon Key feels like a bridge too far. It also speaks to just how much we're willing to allow tech companies to encroach into our lives in places we'd never trust the government. In this week's MashTalk podcast, the Mashable team unpacks what Amazon Key means for the company and tech in general, and answer the question: Is it worth the tradeoff? We also discuss the company's now-bloated line of Echo devices. But is this really fragmentation, and even if it is, does it even matter for a voice-powered device like the Echo? Finally, we reveal the gadget you should definitely get this holiday season. And -- surprise -- it's from Amazon. Follow @mashtalk on Twitter.

What does Google know about hardware that no one else does? If you said software, you're almost right. What Google likes to think is its secret sauce is artificial intelligence, which manifests in its consumer products as the Google Assistant. The Assistant was front and center during the company's big hardware event earlier this month. From the new Pixel 2 phones to the Home Mini and Home Max smart speakers to the insanely powerful Pixelbook laptop, Google pointed to its command, "OK, Google" again and again as a key way to interact with its devices and get information. Nowhere was the power of AI more clear than in the Pixel Buds earphones, a set of wireless headphones that can translate spoken language on the fly. AI is also a big selling point of Clips, the camera that Google intends to be a kind of intelligent life logger: You set it down on the a shelf or floor, and it will smartly capture only the moments that matter to you. Are all these smarts compelling or creepy? And even if it's the former, is having a smart AI enough for Google to actually move these products on store shelves? And what's good (Miley)? Those are the questions Mashable's Tech Team tackles in the latest MashTalk. Tech Reporter Karissa Bell, who got to try out Google's new suite of products, joins the podcast alongside Tech Correspondent Raymond Wong and Chief Correspondent Lance Ulanoff. Follow MashTalk on Twitter.

Another day, another data breach. That would definitely be an apt catch phrase for 2017, with major, high-profile hacks or breaches coming with disturbing regularity. Equifax and HBO were all hit hard, and the WannaCry ransomware crippled infrastructure around the globe. Even Instagram wasn't spared. With every breach, another refrain is typically heard: That it was preventable. If only the people in charge had invested more in cybersecurity, or updated their systems, or simply weren't incompetent, then the hack never would have happened. Yet those same people often face little or no direct consequences. Some people want to change that, and one of them is Todd Thibodeaux, CEO of CompTIA, a technology association that promotes standards and helps guide the IT industry. Thibodeaux thinks, when it comes to poor network security, accountability for private companies needs to happen at the highest level: the board of directors. Joining the show this week, Thibodeaux goes into detail how such an approach would work and shares his thoughts on why it feels like breaches and hacking -- especially ransomware -- have taken a sharp rise. He also takes a minute to clarify that there actually is a framework for cybersecurity standards that any company can use, but clearly not nearly enough do. Follow MashTalk on Twitter.