What's Tech?

By The VergeSociety & Culture News Technology Arts Tech News

What's Tech? episodes

January 12, 2016 What is Tumblr?
Tumblr was the first social media platform to feel irrelevant. I'm young enough to have blogged my way through high school, but old enough for my blogging to be unusual. I used Xanga, and then LiveJournal. When Facebook launched, I traded both platforms, and decided I'd communicate my goings-on by updating my favorite movies and TV shows.
In the late 2000s, Tumblr felt to me like a flavorless combination of Twitter's relentless personal updates and the curatorial blogging of Boing Boing and, at that time, the Gawker Network. Like I said, I didn't get it — I mostly used the service as a static homepage to host my portfolio.
I've come around to Tumblr, largely thanks to people like my colleague Kaitlyn Tiffany, who have pointed me to its most bizarre and spectacular corners. In this podcast, she compares Tumblr to a nicer Reddit, an astute point, and a succinct description of something I'd want in my life. It only took seven years.
24 min
January 05, 2016 What is CES?
The Verge's Dieter Bohn shares the history of the Consumer Electronics Show, or CES, which is taking place this week in Las Vegas, Nevada.
33 min
December 29, 2015 What is a hoverboard?
The Verge tested Lexus' hoverboard in August. Thanks to science and a considerable promotional budget, the car maker's hoverboard actually hovered above the earth — as its name suggested. The experience was the culmination of a shared pop culture dream dating back to Michael J. Fox's faithful special effects-aided ride in Back to the Future Part II. It felt perversely historic.
Somehow, only a couple months later, the creation of an actual working hoverboard has been overshadowed by a trendy namesake that doesn't hover at all — though on occasion, it has been reported to burst into flames.
Maybe you are so enticed by the modern hoverboard, which looks like a miniature Segway without hand supports, that you're considering buying one in the new year. Or maybe you find the rideable and its misnomer dumbfounding, and a dangerous nuisance that impedes your morning commute. Whatever either case, I've invited The Verge's Sean O'Kane to tell us about the history of the hoverboard, and speculate on whether it will capture the public's interest for decades like its predecessor of the same name.
31 min
December 15, 2015 What is Windows 10?
Last week, I wrote about Microsoft's plan to bring Xbox One and Windows 10 closer together. I've been wondering what this future might look like. I know a good deal about Microsoft's video game consoles, but Windows remains a bit of a mystery.
I switched to Apple laptops in high school, and only recently welcomed a Windows PC into my home exclusively for gaming. But more and more, I'm tempted to switch back to Windows for my work computer. It seems less fussy, prone to viruses, and bland than it did in the early 2000s.
For this week's episode, I invited The Verge's Tom Warren to explain the history of Windows and what makes Windows 10 unique.
29 min
December 08, 2015 What is an internet router?
When I joined The Verge, many of my peers from the video games press congratulated me on a lifetime of writing about internet routers. I laughed at their silly joke. How much, I thought, is there to really say about an internet router?
If only my naive self of 2014 had known the truth, that routers evoke a passion among the citizens of the internet like few pieces of technology. I thought people cared about console wars, then I witnessed a debate about the benefits of Netgear's Nighthawk line.
Frankly, I get it now. As my internet connection speed has increased in the past half-decade, having an internet router that allows my Wi-Fi to make the most of said speed seems obvious. What isn't always obvious is knowing which router to buy.
I've invited my pal Dan Seifert to explain internet routers and provide some guidance. I recommend you listen to this episode before visiting the in-laws this holiday, so you can give them the gift that keeps giving: a router that doesn't suck.
28 min
December 01, 2015 What is Fallout?
On a recent Sunday afternoon, you may have noticed Brutus — Fox's NFL mascot — wearing a new set of protective armor. This costume wasn't promoting a nonprofit initiative meant to distract from professional football's abundance of PR debacles, nor was it celebrating Thanksgiving or Christmas. It was an ad for a video game: Fallout 4.
As your pupils dilated and the molten cheese dribbled from your pizza roll, you likely found yourself in one of two camps: the camp that recognizes the Fallout brand and feels the sudden, stinging pang to buy this video game; or the camp more or less unfamiliar with the brand, but probably hears it referenced in sentences like, "You know, I haven't seen my girlfriend since she bought Fallout 4," or, "My husband doesn't sleep, and I blame Fallout 4."
In either case, you probably slurped the string of cheese-like substance back to your lips, saving your favorite sports jersey from a trip to the dry cleaner, and found yourself in need of more information, not just about Fallout 4 but the rest of the franchise and other games like it. That's why I've invited my lactose-intolerant friend, Product Hunt Editorial Director Russ Frushtick for this week's episode of What's Tech? I know Russ Frushtick, and let me tell you, Russ Frushtick knows Fallout 4.
20 min
November 24, 2015 What is an internet meme?
I remember my first meme. I was in my grade school computer lab — this was a time when computers were still novel, not mandatory. My fifth grade teacher was explaining email to our classroom, and how she could use it to talk with a friend in another country about what happened on this week's episode of Friends. Presumably Friends didn't air in said country. After an awkwardly long explanation of what Friends is to a couple dozen 11-year-olds, my teacher decided to show us something more our speed on the internet: the dancing baby. Then she showed us the dancing baby, but wearing a birthday hat. Then she loaded the dancing baby and a bouncing ball.
That was my first contact with a meme, and the day I fell in love with the GIF. While the basic principle of the GIF has remained the same, though, memes have become more prominent and stranger features of society, both online and offline. To explain internet memes, I invited my friend, The Verge's senior reporter Adi Robertson to the show.
20 min
November 11, 2015 What is the quantified self?
I have tried various health trackers, and they always wind up buried in the bottom drawer of my dresser. I should love the pursuit of a quantified self. I like data; I want to be healthier; I enjoy new technology, even when it's fussy and doesn't really work. But for whatever reason, trackers just leave me feeling guilty at best and competitive with friends and family at worse. I shouldn't be competing, I should be collaborating! We all should be better!
This week, I invited The Verge's Science Editor Elizabeth Lopatto to tell me about the history of the quantified self, and why tracking every step might not be as healthy as it sounds.
26 min
November 04, 2015 What is alien life?
More recently, discussions of extraterrestrial life have become mainstream. Brilliant minds like Stephen Hawking and Neil deGrasse Tyson have made headlines with their thoughts on how humans should or shouldn't make contact. This week, I invited my friend and colleague Loren Grush to explain how science thinks about alien life. It's a bit spooky, like a Halloween-ish episode, airing just a few days late for the horror holiday.
25 min
October 28, 2015 What is Minecraft?
This week Microsoft released Halo 5, the latest installment of its most iconic exclusive for Xbox consoles. The adventures of Master Chief and his console cohorts, however, pale beneath the popularity of the stories created by players in the universe of Minecraft. Designed largely by a single gamer maker and purchased for billions of dollars by the software giant, Minecraft has the potential to be the Super Mario of a generation, not in how it plays but what it represents for an entire culture of video game lovers.
We'll see over a dozen big name video game releases this fall, but I thought we should take a look at the game that thrives all year long. I invited Polygon's Minecraft devotee Charlie Hall to update me on the game's past, present, and future.
30 min

About What's Tech?

From the publisher's feed

Enjoy the archives of this retired, award-winning series from Christopher Thomas Plante and The Verge that explained technology bit by bit. The series finale aired December 6th, 2016, shortly before…