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.

Why you hate video conferencing, with guest Polycom CEO Mary McDowell

MashTalk is a weekly podcast from Mashable's Tech team. Christina Warren, Lance Ulanoff and Pete Pachal recap and analyze the biggest news in the tech world.

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For GoPro, things are looking up.

 

After a tumultuous couple of years — which saw the action-camera company enter and then leave the drone business, get squeezed harder by increasingly competitive smartphone cameras, and ride a steady wave of criticism of its product line — GoPro appears to have found its footing with the well-received Hero 7 Black camera and a return to profitability.

 

At the center of the company’s renewal is founder Nick Woodman. Woodman joined MashTalk to talk about what it’s been like to be CEO through such a roller-coaster time. After promising expeditions into media, drones, and 360 video didn’t work out as planned, he’s discarded unrealistic visions for tighter focus. The new GoPro may be less ambitious, but it’s much more confident about what it can offer: high-quality action cameras with a compelling mix of features, value, and usability.


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How GoPro rebooted itself, with guest CEO Nick Woodman

Ten years ago, Indiegogo launched the modern era of crowdfunding by creating a place where anyone could pitch their idea, product, or creative endeavor to the entire world, asking for the funds to make it reality. Today there are no shortage of crowdfunding sites, and even though Indiegogo isn’t as large as rival Kickstarter, it’s still tremendously influential, offering entrepreneurs not just a funding platform, but also support beyond their campaigns, with tools to ease the transition from concept to launch.

 

Indiegogo has always had a more worldwide audience than its peers, and now current CEO David Mandelbrot wants to take things further with more outreach to inventors in China as he leads the venture-funded company to profitability. Mandelbrot joined Mashable’s MashTalk podcast to talk about how crowdfunding has evolved since in the past decade, how the company approaches quality control, and what he thinks of Indiegogo’s “anything goes” reputation.


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The future of crowdfunding, with guest Indiegogo CEO David Mandelbrot

Want live TV over the internet? Today you have several options, including Hulu, YouTube TV, PlayStation Vue, and more. It’s hard to remember, though, but there was a time when there were virtually no options for consumers who wanted to cut the cord. Sure, services like Netflix and Vudu provided plenty of titles via on demand, but current content was scattered across myriad websites and services, and it didn’t do a good job of replicating the TV experience.

 

Then Sling TV came along. Launched by satellite powerhouse Dish Network in January 2015, Sling TV wasn’t the first over-the-top (OTT) video service, but it was the first to get it right, both in terms of user experience and offerings. It made deals to package several popular TV channels live over the internet, including — crucially — ESPN. Since then it’s expanded in terms of both content and features, now offering dozens of channels, a cloud DVR, and even its own streaming box, the AirTV Player.

 

One of the key people behind the service is Jimshade Chaudhari, Sling TV’s vice president of product marketing and management. Chaudhari dropped by Mashable’s MashTalk podcast for a to dive deep into the state of internet TV, discussing how Sling differentiates from the now-crowded playing field, whether we’ll ever get rid of program guides, and why everything isn’t just on demand already?


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Why we’ll never get rid of program guides, with guest Sling TV’s Jimshade Chaudhari

What does ‘time well spent’ mean for games like ‘Candy Crush?’

 

If you own a smartphone, chances are you know Candy Crush and maybe even the game’s latest incarnation, Candy Crush Friends Saga. What you may not know is the story behind the franchise: How an Italian entrepreneur put all his cash on the line as a co-founder of King, the company behind the game, in the early 2000s, with an idea of how to re-invent gaming for the online world.

 

That person is Riccardo Zacconi. He’s guided the company through the many phases online gaming (desktop, Facebook, mobile, and more), taking King public and eventually selling it to gaming giant Activision Blizzard in 2015. In this episode of MashTalk, Zacconi talks about that journey, his thoughts on Mark Zuckerberg, and what the future holds for mobile gaming now that people are starting to question all the time they’re spending on their devices playing games like, well, Candy Crush.


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The secret to Candy Crush's success, with guest King CEO Riccardo Zacconi

In case you missed it, the robots are here. No, not the apocalyptic hordes of artificially intelligent machines that some believe are destined to enslave or eradicate us (hello, Boston Dynamics!), but the everyday devices and companions that are rapidly becoming commonplace. After decades of lofty sci-fi-inspired promises, robots like iRobot's Roomba vacuums and the many iterations of the Sony Aibo robodog are slowly carving out their places in our domestic lives. Even Amazon's Alexa is arguably a disembodied robot. A new entry into the field is Anki's Vector. Vector is a small tabletop robot with big features. First and foremost, unlike other "robots" like those from Sphero or even WowWee, Vector doesn't need a smartphone to control it. It's fully autonomous and loaded with sensors, enabling it to interact with and learn from its environment from the get-go. Vector is another milestone for Anki, a company that's had one of the most interesting stories in tech. Unknown to the world before its splash launch at Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) in 2013, the robotics company has come out with several products, including intelligent toy race cars and a previous, more limited robot, Cozmo. Where does the robustly funded company go next? And when will it move its robotics business into something more capable (i.e. not a toy). Anki CEO Boris Sofman dropped by Mashable's MashTalk podcast this week to give us the full story of his young company, why it's so focused on the "personality" of its robots, and what he sees in the future for domestic robots and AI.

Why you hate video conferencing, with guest Polycom CEO Mary McDowell

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