Vulgar Tech

We start off with a discussion about our now-smarter home. A lot happened in a week, and we now have a Smart Speaker (Amazon Echo), a Smart Thermostat (Nest 2.0), and a Smart Lock (Kwikset Kevo). We talk about the plusses and minuses of each, the actual usefulness of each, and some upcoming features announced for our Kevo smart lock. From there, we move on to a discussion of Android updates to non-Google devices, and why Samsung is the security guard in the hotel room when you hire a hooker (it makes more sense in context). We meant to just brush past a quick note about Star Wars hitting iTunes, but it turned into well over half the show being about Star Wars. If you hate Star Wars, I’d apologize, but you have no soul so it doesn’t really matter.

Our Amazon Echo arrived earlier than anticipated. After an initial estimate of April 24th, Mitcz got an email on Tuesday that it was on its way and would arrive Thursday. It arrived the following day (today).

So, as promised, we unboxed it here on this episode and ran “Alexa” through her paces. We even Periscope’d a good portion of the episode (including the actual unboxing). At 14:10, Mitcz accidentally makes a request to Alexa that not only elicits a hilarious response, but leads to us shouting all sorts of things at the Echo because of how she handles vulgar language.

Listen as Mitcz & Alex talk about the ups and downs of this new “Smart Speaker” device.

Quite a few tangents in this episode as we successfully test and broadcast with Periscope, and Mitcz explains why it didn’t work last time. Since his issues with Periscope were related to two-factor authentication, Mitcz rants about his frustration with companies not fully supporting the two-factor authentication they themselves developed (and explains WTF two-factor authentication means). Alex again accuses Mitcz of being an obsessed Apple fanatic, which Mitcz tries in vain to explain and define. We also talk about our love of boobs, and how they can heal the heaviest of hearts. The episode ends with news of the Apple Watch selling out in 6 hours, Mitcz explaining why not to buy one right now, and how wrong tech pundits tend to be in Apple predictions, and how much of a douchebag Steve Ballmer is.

Finally moving past “He Who Shall Not Be Named”, we get into a user-submitted suggestion of discussing Meerkat and Periscope and the drama that surrounds it. We even tried to use Periscope live on the air, and came to the conclusion that it’s too buggy to bother with and quite a load of crap. We also discuss the upcoming trend of computers-on-a-stick that can turn any TV into a computer with a simple HDMI port, and how that might change computing. Amazon’s new “Dash Button” service is discussed, and Mitcz gives pro tips on how to avoid phishing scams (and also WTF a phishing scam actually is).

As promised during last week’s episode, Mitcz finally watched CitizenFour and took copious notes. In this episode, Mitcz discusses the few issues he had with the documentary itself, does some fact-checking, runs a ridiculous math explanation on the numbers Edward Snowden used during the doc, and expresses his feelings about Snowden. Alex disagrees with Mitcz’s contention of Snowden’s actions at first, but gets dangerously close to actually agreeing with him towards the end.

This episode is 2 hours of basically just that discussion, so if you’re tired of hearing about the NSA, Snowden, the CitizenFour documentary, or internet security, then you’re gonna hate this. But, in all likelihood, there’s some new and interesting information and discussion here that you’ve probably not heard before.

Mitcz and Alex discuss a particularly embarrassing Safari bug as it relates to privacy browsing – aka “porn mode”, while Mitcz rants about some tech companies’ refusals to actually acknowledge that sometimes people just want to be filthy. The discussion evolves into discussions of blocking and flagging content on various websites, privacy implications, and the inside world of OKCupid moderation.

They also discuss Tesla’s upcoming “automated steering” (not a so-called”autopilot” mode), sensationalistic headlines, the future of cars, and Mitcz makes some bold predictions that he’s probably wrong about.