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March 5, 2021 • 63 mins
Google ditches one popular type of user tracking; Best Buy unveils a senior safety app for the Apple Watch; details on the National Day of Unplugging; Paramount Plus is yet another streaming service; thoughts on the Chevy Bolt EUV; the first vehicle with Amazon Fire TV built-in; moving iCloud Photos to Google Photos.Listeners ask about running DOS games on an iPhone, finding the best antivirus protection software for devices, organizing files across various computers and tablets, rearranging apps on an iPhone screen, the different between various internet speeds and using an iPhone as a digital car key.Follow RichGoogle trackingBest Buy Apple Watch appNational Day of UnpluggingParamount PlusChevy Bolt EUVWagoneer Fire TViCloud Photos to Google PhotosDOS games on iPhoneBest AntivirusiPhone Digital Car KeyDownload KTLA+ to watch my TV segments on your TV!See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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Episode Transcript

Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:10):
Google ditches one level of tracking. Could you give up
your phone for a day? The first car with Amazon
Fire TV built in? Plus your tech questions answered? What's
going on? I'm Rich Damiro and this is Rich on Tech,
the podcast where I talk about the tech stuff I
think you should know about. It's also the place where

(00:31):
I answer the questions you send me and believe you
me yes, send them in. I am fielding questions all
day long on Instagram, on Facebook, on Twitter. Email is
like very popular. I guess that's because my Facebook page
is linked up to that, and I don't mind answering them.
I mean, it's just sometimes, you know, if you email me,

(00:53):
sometimes it could take a while. But that's why I
like this show. So this show is really the place
where I take kind of the questions I get that
I think apply to you know, more than one person.
You know. If you're like Rich, I need a you know,
a highly specific app to monitor you know, I don't
know whatever. It's like, Okay, now if I feel like

(01:14):
a lot of people need that app, fine, that's you know,
that's that's what I include in this show. That's kind
of what you know. The idea of this is is
that what you know, the questions I answer I'm seeing
over and over and I think that it can help
a bunch of people that listen. So, by the way,
I'm the tech reporter at KTLA Channel five in Los Angeles.
In case you're listening from a different city or a

(01:34):
different place, or maybe you know you saw my segment
on one of these stations that it's played on, because
it's not you know, most of the time people think
I'm just on KTLA, but we you know, I do
work for a big company. They have a bunch of
TV stations everywhere, and what I do is I just
send them my my segment, my report, and they send
it to all the stations, and the TV stations just

(01:55):
run it. So like this morning, you know, I saw
someone tagged me in like Mississippi they ran it, and
then in Honolulu where they ran it, which I thought
was so cool, and I think that deserves a visit, right,
don't I need to go there and see what's going on.
But it's one of these things where you know, people
just they don't realize that I'm oh. Las Vegas is
another one. But people don't realize that I'm in these

(02:16):
different places until they're traveling or a family member, or
they move and they're like, oh my gosh, I can
watch you in North Carolina. Wow, that's cool. So I
feel like the gears of progress are churning when it
comes to this whole pandemic in this vaccine. So that's
good news. I know people are getting it. Numbers are dropping.
That feels good. It feels like we're getting to a

(02:37):
place where we can all feel like this big sigh
of relief for not there just yet, but it's I
feel it we're getting there, and people are just feeling better.
I think we're seeing this like cloud being lifted off
of the world in a way. I mean, I still
think that there. You know, there's a lot that it's
going to take for us to go back. I was
looking at my pictures I just typed in on Google

(02:58):
Photos crowds, and oh my gosh, it's like, it's so
strange to look at a picture with all these people
in the background and you know, the Apple events and
all these you know, concerts that I went to, and
so it's probably gonna take a little bit of getting
used to to to do that, But I do think
we will get there. Someone told me the other day,

(03:18):
they you know, this whole vaccine thing. They said, oh,
I saw on social media that this person got a vaccine,
Now how did they get it? And I didn't get
it when I'm older and you know, they don't look
like they have any health issues or anything. And I said, well,
you know, you don't really know what's going on in
their lives. You know that if you have some sort
of issue, you don't always wear on your sleeve, right.

(03:38):
I mean, I see myself as a as a pretty
positive person in life. Yes, I have good days and
I have bad days, but for the most part, I
have prided myself on being positive and being a you know,
an inspiration for people to to, you know, with my
posts and what I say and how I do and
what I conduct myself. And I just feel like that's
kind of what I want to do. And you know,

(04:01):
you don't know from day to day what's happening in
my life, per se. I mean, sometimes I'll explain, you know,
when I feel like it's the time, but it's the
same thing with other people. You know, you just don't know.
And this is not just with health issues and the vaccine,
it's with anything. I mean, you may have people at
work that you know are a little grumpy and grumbly
and and you know, who knows what's happening in their

(04:23):
lives at home. And this happens over and over everywhere.
And I think with social media, we see this, you know,
polished version of people. We see them on vacation, We
see them having the best food, drinking the coolest drinks,
you know, hanging out with the coolest friends. And you
know that doesn't always tell you the full story. And
believe me, we all know that, but sometimes we forget.

(04:46):
So you know, it's kind of like we went on
a little mini you know, weekend get away a couple
of weeks ago, and you know, the kids were like,
you know, they all they want to do is play
their iPads. And I'm like, here we are in this
beautiful place, and you know, all you want to do
is play your iPad on the couch, Like come on.
And so I had to have a little you know
talk with them and explain to them and not so

(05:08):
uncertain terms that like, you know, this is what we're
doing and this is how we're doing it. And you
know I'm not going to sit there and you know,
put that on Instagram, you know, but it's something as
parents we've all had to do. And so again, you know,
on Instagram, you probably just saw the nice picture of
us hanging out as a family, which is fine because
that's the memory you want to have, right and that's
the thing that you want to strive towards. But the
reality is, you know, people get real. People are real.

(05:31):
We're all human and you know, we all have our
struggles and you know it's not a bad thing to
sometimes share those with other people because sometimes it just
feels good, you know. So anyway, that's about as uh
as uh what's My wife is a counselor so believe me,
I I hear about, you know, all these things a lot.
You know, she deals with a lot of issues with

(05:52):
people and stuff like that. So I am you know,
I hear about this stuff a lot. And it's it's
taken many years of her wearing me down to sort
of come to the realization that, you know, we're all
human and you just have to accept that and understand
that and life is a better place when you do that.
So anyway, that's it. That's my that's my talk for

(06:12):
this time around. But anyway, that's it. All right, let's
let's move into more techi techie stuff. Google. This is
a big announcement this week. It got a lot of headlines.
I think it was a little misconstrued in the headlines.
But what Google said is that they are going to
track us a little bit less, and they explained exactly why.

(06:34):
But I think the headline was mainly, like a lot
of it was like Google is not going to search
track your searches, which not really true. They're still going
to track your searches. What they're doing is is they're
giving up on third party cookies, and so third party
cookies are okay. Let's let me give you example. So
you go to a website that sells socks and you

(06:57):
look at some socks, and then you move on and
you move on with your life. And now you go
over to you know, another website, you read an article
on a newspaper, website or whatever, and you see an
ad for those socks served up by Google and you're like,
how did they know? Well, they know because that website
tracked it using you know, double click or whatever you
know Google has, and that little tracking cookie now reports

(07:19):
back to Google. And then when you know, those sock
plays advertised. They said, we want to we want to
target people that already came to our website in the
last thirty days and boom, now their ad shows up
everywhere you go. And so that's really how third party
cookie tracking works, and I probably overly simplified it, but
that's kind of how I understand it to work. And

(07:39):
so what Google is saying is like, We're not really
going to do that anymore. Now what are they going
to do? Now? This is a big, you know, kind
of a problem for advertisers because they you know, a
lot of this sharing of information really helps to target
you with stuff. But what they did say is that
number one, they are not gonna come up with some
alter alternative to this, Like they're not going to band

(08:01):
together with the advertising agencies and come up with some alternative.
That was the big question. The other thing they're going
to do is they're still going to use their relationship
with you to target things to you. So what does
that mean If you search for socks on Amazon right
brightly colored socks, fun socks, cool socks, they can still
use that data to funnel into their advertising system. So

(08:25):
that when someone says we want to target people who
have looked at socks. They will still have that data
about you. Now, they may not know the specific website
you ended up visiting, or they may not share that
information to what sock website you've been to, but they
will know that you're a lover of socks, and so
that information will still be there. The videos that you

(08:45):
look up on YouTube, that will still feed into their information.
So they're still using what they call their first party
information to understand you better. And if you think about Google,
they've got a lot of first party information. I don't
think they're you using Gmail information anymore. Back when Gmail started,
the whole thing was that they would scan your email
and sell you ads against that. I don't believe they're

(09:08):
doing that anymore. I think that was a couple of
years ago. They switched. They said, you know what, we
already know enough about you. And that's what they're saying again,
we already know so much about you from the way
you use our products that we don't really need all
this extra data. Sure it'd be great, but they're trying
to be a good citizen, right And I say that
a little facetiously because they're trying to be a good
citizen in the fact that they'd rather do this on

(09:30):
their own than have the government come after them and say, uh,
you gotta do this, because they would rather steer the
ship than have the federal government or all these you know,
we saw it happen in Europe with privacy laws. They
would rather just kind of say, hey, we're gonna you know,
we're gonna be a little bit more like Apple, and
we're going to say we're so privacy centric that you
don't even need to worry about coming up with laws
for us, because we love privacy, we love protecting folks privacy.

(09:54):
And so I think that's part of what's going on here.
And I think part of it is that Google knows
they've got a lot of data on us, more more
so than probably anyone except for Facebook, And so you know,
that's that's kind of what's happening here, is it? And
the other side of it is that it actually makes
their advertising stronger because now it's like these third party

(10:15):
advertising systems may not have as much data as the
first party, which is like a Facebook or a Google.
What's the other one? Am I missing one? What is it? Facebook? Google?
Maybe Microsoft? I don't know, but that's it all right,
let us get to the first question of the day.
This question comes from Okay, this is an interesting one.

(10:39):
I said that I do. I said that I do
questions that are appeal to a lot of people. I
don't know if this does. Dear Rich, I'm wondering if
you know how to run DOS on iOS. I'm an
old school fan of a game called Begin Tactical Starship
Simulation on my computer, but I can't run it on
my iPhone ten? Is there an app that can unzip
and run it so it can be run on my
iPhone ten? My personal favorite is the one point eighty

(11:03):
five version. I can only find one point six y five.
Is there a way? I'd be grateful? Sincerely, Mark, So
I I don't know. I don't I don't think that
there is a way to uh, oh what happened here.
I think there's a way to run you know, DOS
on your iPhone with like an emulator, But as far

(11:23):
as installing a game on top of that, I don't
think that would be possible with the iPhone. But I
could be wrong, and so, uh maybe that's why I
want to do this question so I can mention it
on the podcast, and if if you know you're listening.
You're like, Rich, this is what I used to do this,
you know, tweet me at rich on tech and let
me know. I did find an app called power Dos
on uh on, you know, the app store. Let's see

(11:45):
dos on iPhone. So I mean, yeah, power dos comes up,
DOS two, I dos comes up, but I don't think
that it I just don't know if it comes with
uh oh, look at this, yes, look at this. It
looks like you can wow. Okay. This is an app

(12:07):
called I Dos DOS Box for iOS. Recently Apple approved
iTunes file sharing for I DOS, so you can put
your games in iCloud drive and launch from the files app.
So I think that this might work. Let's see one
of the comments from three years ago. So I don't know.
Check out I Dos DOS Box for iOS and is

(12:28):
it still on the app store. Indeed, it is play
classic DOS games, So I think that's it. I Dos too.
I'll put this in the links on the notes, but
that's I think that's going to do it. It sounds
like you just put the file that you have that
exc or would you say it was a ZIP file.
I don't know if it can unzip it, but maybe

(12:50):
depending on how you put it, but it sounds like
you put it in in your files in your iCloud
and boom. You can just do it. So let me
know if this works for you, because that's a mark.
That's an interesting question. So very cool. I you know,
I used to know all those doss commands when I
was a kid, like CD slash whatever was CD slash

(13:10):
dr you know, all those little oh when I was
such like a nerdy computer kid. I wasn't that nerdy,
Like I wasn't like programming my own stuff, but I
was definitely you know, like formatting drives and you know,
installing stuff, and I knew my way around tos to
a certain extent, and then you know, things change. Best
Buy is now offering an an Apple Watch app that

(13:34):
is basically kind of like a triple A on your wrist,
but for kind of like senior citizens. I mean, this
is for anyone, but it's kind of it's definitely aimed
at the seniors. It's called Lively and this is in
a company that they purchased. I think it was a
great call. Is the name of the company, and Lively

(13:54):
is uh is kind of their brand that they're using
for this app, and so you install the SAP on
the Apple Watch, and it does a couple things. It
can get you in touch with an urgent response agent
that can help out an emergency and non emergency situations.
They can even do things like if your car has trouble,
help you figure out, you know, how to get help. Now.

(14:15):
I was immediately going to dismiss this until I read
this line. And it also detects if you take a
fall and can you know, notify your family members or
they can call you to make sure you're okay. Now
you might be saying rich, you know Apple Watch already
has that built in. Well, kind of the way that
Apple Watch has it built in is it It just
basically calls nine one one if you don't respond within

(14:36):
sixty seconds after a hard fall, and it can text
I believe a couple family members to say you know
this happened, and your location. But this kind of takes
it a step further where it calls the user. Again,
this is for more like aimed at seniors that might
need a little bit more hand holding, a little bit
more assistance than sort of, you know, just the average
person like myself who might just be fine with the

(14:58):
fall detection right, So I was going to discount this
whole thing until I read this line. Best by Health
worked closely with Apple on this upcoming feature which is
coming soon, which is the first to use Apple's new
fall detection API to protect the health and safety of
users who've taken a hard fall. Now, I didn't realize
that this fall detection in the Apple Watches an API.

(15:20):
That's pretty amazing, And what that means is that developers
can build their apps on top of this fall detection,
so eventually, not just you don't have to just use
Apple's fall detection or Apple's system for fall detection. So
this means that a startup can come with can come
up with a better way of doing the fall detection,
maybe not the algorithm, but a better way of encompassing

(15:43):
what happens after that fall, whether it connects you directly
to someone or you know, in this case, you know
their agents. So I think that's pretty cool. And that's
why I mentioned this because it's not just like a
quote unquote dumb app that's on the iPhone that's trying
to replicate what Apple's doing. It's it's deeply integrated into
the Apple Watch. And I love when I see stuff

(16:03):
like that because it means that it opens up options
for people. It's not just one thing. It's not just
Apple solution. Apple's saying, hey, we came up with this
solution as a start, but you know, you if you
can come up with something better, by all means, here's
kind of like the insides of what we did, and
you can play around with them and rearrange them and
make them work for you. And I just love that idea.

(16:25):
So again it's called lively. Here's the downside. It you know,
obviously requires an Apple Watch, but the plan that I
saw looks like it costs about thirty dollars a month,
which you know, I think to get the full benefit
of this, you'd probably want an Apple Watch cellular that
has you know, the calling in it. So that's another
ten dollars a month, plus a slightly more expensive Apple Watch.

(16:46):
So now you're talking forty dollars a month for this feature.
I think my my family members are worth it. I
don't know, I mean, but a lot of seniors on
fixed incomes. It's it's you know, it's expensive, that's pricey,
and you know, eventually I would like to get my
mom an Apple Watch with this feature, maybe not the
lively one, maybe just the fall detection because to me,

(17:07):
like I have it on my watch and it just
feels like a little guardian protecting you. Right. The other day,
I was playing with my kids in the Oh, gosh,
I just thought of another story. I was playing my
kids in the backyard and you know, we were just
rough housing, and I whatever, it triggered the fall detection
on the watch, and I said, I'm okay, you know
it's fine, but I will tell you. Okay. So I

(17:29):
was out on a run with my kid. We were
doing what we call bike run, where he goes on
the bike and I run with him. And I've ran forever.
I've run for many many years, and I feel like
I'm at a really good place with the running situation
because at this point, all I need is my Apple Watch,
which has music and cellular and fitness tracking on it,
as well as the AirPods, which you know, with those
two things, I can just run without anything else. And

(17:51):
it feels so amazing, you know, because I remember the
days of running through the years with like a tape
player and you know, a CD player and then a
mini disc player and an MP three player and then
the iPhone strapped your arm. You know, wired headphones. Now
it's wireless. So we've seen this big evolution. And now,
of course with cellular it means that you know wherever
I am. If there's an emergency while I'm running, I

(18:13):
can get the help I need. Now. I was running
along Merry Old Way, no big deal, and all of
a sudden, I'm not kidding, I tripped in a way
that I have never ever tripped in a run ever,
and it was a you know, Los Angeles gotta love
the uneven sidewalks that I don't think the city takes
care of. I think it's on the homeowner to take

(18:34):
care of. Anyway, that's a whole nother thing. But anyway,
you know, the sidewalk was a little uneven and I
just missed whatever my brain did, it miscalculated the where
I should land, and I hit the sidewalk instead of
the higher part of the sidewalk, instead of the lower part,
which was like an inch lower, you know, I mean
an inch away, and the sidewalk was pretty high, and

(18:55):
so I don't know, whatever this was was enough for
me with the momentum I was doing to literally I
projected forward, so hard and so fast and so with
such an uncertainty that has never happened to me. And
it was one of those things where I felt myself
in a slow motion stumble where I would have landed
on my face. I was able to get my balance

(19:16):
and maybe because I run a lot and I have
a little bit more stability or whatever, I don't know,
whatever did something saved me. And if not, I'm not kidding,
I would have probably bashed my face into the ground.
And so again the reason I tell you this story
is not so you feel sorry for me. I mean,
definitely I was shaken up and my kid was like,
oh my gosh, like he saw me, you know, wow.

(19:39):
But I had the Apple Watch, and I said, this
would have been one of those moments if my kid
wasn't with me and I had the Apple Watch on
and I actually did not recover from that fall or
that stumble, I should say, this would have been a
time when the Apple Watch probably would have sprung into
action action and called nine one one for me, and
I probably would have needed it. So anyway, I like
stuff like this. I think it's it's very important and

(20:01):
I feel like we're going to see I mean, Google
or sorry. Apple is really ahead on this, but I
think we're going to see much more, you know, where
our electronics that we carry on our body are going
to help us in these situations. And by the way,
I mentioned this on the Pixel phone on my Facebook page.
Pixel has a feature called crash Detection, where your phone

(20:24):
will detect if it's in a car crash and send help.
And so I think if you have a Pixel which
I know is only a few of you, sign up,
you know, definitely open up that's called the safety app.
Open that up and get that going. I think that
Samsung really needs to step this up and get a
safety app on their phone, and I think that Apple
should do the same on the iPhone. So if these

(20:46):
phones detect, you know, they have all these sensors on them,
they detect a sudden impact, they need to spring into
action and help us. The Apple Watch is a good start,
but I don't think you should have to have an
Apple Watch for that to happen because many more people
are carrying phone. M mmmmmm, all right, let's get to

(21:06):
another question. Joanne says, uh, hey, Rich, you've been so
kind with your recommendations. I'm wondering if I can bother
you with a question. We've been using e set as
our virus protection company for the last decade and we're delighted. However,
they're no longer offering protection with computers running Windows seven.
I've got two computers doing this. I know there are
millions of people who use Windows seven. I'm wondering if

(21:28):
you'd be so kind if you have any suggestions for
a company who would cover us with Windows seven machines.
My husband is scouring the web as we speak for leads,
but we would trust your recommendation for the best out
there above any reviews on the net. Thank you, Joanne.
So Joanne, I you know, to be honest, I don't
really use virus protection on my Mac, so I can't

(21:52):
and I don't really have a Windows I mean I
do have a Windows computer for my kid. But again,
I think for most people with Windows ten, I think
Windows Defender is going to be just fine. But the
website that I like that has the ratings of this
stuff is avdash test dot org. Av dash test dot org,

(22:12):
and they test these things all the time, and so
if you look at their website, which for default shows
up in German for me, but you can just press
English and you'll get it in English. But uh, you know,
they've got all the different virus protection for computers for
you know, Android, and you know they break it out
by Android, Mac and Windows, so they've got home users companies,

(22:35):
and then you know mobile. Now iPhone, we've already been
through this. You don't really need it for iPhone, so
don't worry about it. Android. I probably would recommend it,
although I hate the persistent notification that has to have
on there to be able to do real, real time
scans mac os. I mean, that's up to you. If
you feel like you're clicking a lot of random links,
go ahead. I don't think you need it. But you know,

(22:55):
we are seeing more instances of things happening on the Mac,
and honestly, we always talk about viruses, but I think
malware is way bigger of a problem. I'm talking these
browser extensions, these apps that are similar sounding to the
ones that I recommend, and people go and they Google
and they download some random app that's totally malware. That
I think is much more of an issue for people

(23:18):
than say a virus. You know, we think of this
virus that's gonna weasel its way into the innerds of
our computer and ruin everything. But honestly, the malware is
the stuff that affects us on a day to day basis,
and it's just annoying. With the pop ups and the
redirection of our web search history and the incessant notifications
on our computer. That is what I think is much

(23:39):
bigger of a problem. So I recommend malware bites for
those scans. But anyway, so Windows virus protection, if I'm
looking at this, the top three that they recommend. The
first one is called on lab Ahn lab I have
not heard of that one, but they like it. But
the two that I do like that are next are
a VAST and AVG. And a vast has free antivirus.

(24:02):
I would go with that. Let me just confirm that
a Vast actually has a version for Windows seven. It
may not because you're saying Windows seven. A lot of
these companies have ditched support because Windows seven is not
really you know, a big it's not really out there anymore. Okay,

(24:24):
So let's see. Let's go to Windows and let's see
also available for PC. Okay, I'm looking and let's see
system requirements. Gotta scroll all the way down. Oh, interesting,
they answer the question. They answer the question about Windows Defender.

(24:47):
Can I just use Windows Defender? And it says Windows
Defender exists to protect your PC if you don't have
anything else. It was not designed to be your long
term AV solution. Okay, all right, so now this says
Windows ten. Oh okay, yep, Windows seven compatible. So there
you go. So there you go. Of asked free antivirus,
go ahead, download it. That's what I recommend it. It's free,

(25:09):
it's easy, and people seem to like it. All right,
could you do without your smartphone or any screen for
twenty four hours? I am going to try this. I
challenge you to try it as well. This is gonna
be tough National Day of Unplugging. Did the story on
KTLA today happened sundown Friday March fifth to sundown Saturday,

(25:29):
March sixth, So even if you're listening to this past
that time, which some of you may be, you know,
you can still try this on your own. I mean,
it doesn't have to be the day that you know
it happens, but anyway, this is the day that is happening,
and I'm gonna try it. I am going to put
my phone in this little sleeping bag. They gave me,
and see if I can stay off my phone for

(25:49):
twenty four hours. And the idea behind this is, you know,
we know that that social media number one, and our
phones have led to number one incessant scrolling, right, whether
it's you or your spouse or your friends. When you
have a free moment in your life, what do you do.
You take your phone out of your pocket, and you

(26:10):
start scrolling, and you look around, and you go and
And it's funny because notifications started as a way to
kind of train us to get back into these apps,
even when we stopped using them, you know, even when
we kind of put the phone down. But I mean,
I'm sure you realize, as I have realized, doesn't necessarily
take a notification for me to check Facebook. So here's

(26:32):
my little routine. I open my phone, I go Gmail,
I go Instagram, I go to probably Twitter first, then Instagram,
then Facebook. And it's a cycle, cycle, cycle, cycle, cycle, cycle, cycle, cycle, cycle,
doesn't matter if there's a notification or not. Now I've got,
you know, eight hundred thousand followers on Facebook, one hundred
thousand on Instagram, and you know a couple hundred on Twitter,

(26:53):
maybe more. But you know, so I'm getting you know,
there's always something like it's a slot machine. There's always
something interesting for me to look at. Right, There's always
a comment coming in, there's always a message coming in,
there's always a reply coming into something I've posted. So
I get that. I am in a position that you
know is tricky because you know, I'm there's always something new,

(27:17):
and so I'm always being rewarded with that little hit
a dopamine when I open my phone. Now, for you,
it may be a little bit different because you may
not have all those things coming in, but the problem
is still the same. You know, you're checking it for
your Instagram stories and you know, see what people posted
and whatever. So no matter what, we all have a problem,
and our phones are just this this constant you know,

(27:40):
I call it the slot machine. It's this constant source
of a little bit of like little little push up.
You know, you go, you see that message, you see
that reply, you see that post, and it just kind
of your brain feels good for a second. And so
this National Day of Unplugging is just something that kind
of it started actually many many years ago in two

(28:02):
thousand and nine, and you know they've been doing ever
since so twenty four hours, try to give up your phone.
I'm gonna try to do it. And they, you know,
in our segment on KTLA, we talked about all the
ways to kind of help you get through this mental
breakdown that you're going to eventually have because your phone
is like literally your lifeline. And so you know, they say,

(28:25):
it's kind of plan your day, plan a hike. You know,
I said, don't worry about taking pictures for the day,
because you know, for me, it's always like, well, I
have an Apple Watch, which is fine, but I need
my phone for pictures. Well that camera. Why do you
think they keep getting better? It's because, oh, it continues
to latch you onto your phone. I know, I get
fired up about this stuff because I love technology. You

(28:47):
know that you're listening to a person whose name is
rich on Tech, right. I love technology, but I also
see the impact it has had in our lives in
a very negative way. When I go out to dinner
and I see couples on their phones at the table,
which you know, I'm talking about years ago, back when
you know, in the before days. But you know, when

(29:07):
you sit there at a dinner and people are just
looking at their phones, and the kids are all zombies.
I call them iPad zombies. It's really sad to me,
and there's a place for it. And of course, you
know I'm not perfect. Believe me, I do the same
thing I you know, not on my dinners. Believe me,
not on my dinners. I do when I am at
dinner and with friends. Most of the time I am.

(29:28):
I am very cognizant of having my phone away. Now.
I am on my phone a lot, probably more than
a lot of people. In fact, let's just take a
look at what my screen time is averaging. Let's see
how do I go settings? I need to put that
thing back on my phone. Okay, screen time for me, okay, ready,
daily average three out four hours a day. That's a lot.

(29:50):
That's four hours a day is a lot. I think
that's a lot to be staring at my phone. So
let's see. My kids are kids daily average are two
hours a day. So and I you know that's that's
not including their laptops though, that includes their iPad. That
includes their iPad. So yeah, two hours a day. But
I severely limit their time on there, not severely, but

(30:12):
I mean they you know, they do have time on there,
but you know, Look, this is one of those things
that I think as we evolve as a tech centric world,
we are gonna we are gonna come to a realization
with all the stuff that it's good and it's bad.
And I think that tech is amazing. I think the
way it connects people is amazing. This stuff, what technology

(30:32):
has done in our lives is just mind boggling, and
the benefits are so there. But there are some downsides
that I think, especially as the younger folks come up
through this world and post every single thing that happens
in their lives in real time, and you know, I
just that that's gonna have an impact that is not
a very positive impact. So as long as we're aware

(30:55):
of this stuff and you try it out, I think,
you know, I think it's a good thing to just
just be aware of. So all right, let's get to
the next question. By the way, you can check out
my little sleeping bag on my Instagram at rich on Tech,
my little National Day of Unplugging sleeping bag for my phone.
I might need to lock it up to really not

(31:16):
use it. Craig says, Hey, rich I'm in the mac
universe with an iMac, a MacBook an iPad in an iPhone. Wow,
how do you suggest I set up my file system?
I have many folders for all of my various interest
in work categories and many subfolders. I have most folders
in my home folder, with some shared to other devices.
With Dropbox in iCloud Drive, I don't really use the

(31:37):
documents folder, at least on purpose me either. I also
have a lot of folders or aliases on my desktop.
It's a bit unwieldy. What do you suggest? Thank you,
Greg Greig, This is a good question. I'll tell you
what I do, and you can you know, you can
kind of follow along or you know, do whatever you like.
So a couple of things. I use Google Drive, I
use Dropbox, and I use iCloud Drive, and then I

(32:00):
that's basically it. I try to keep everything in the cloud.
So no matter what, if I'm you know, doing anything
on my computer, it's it's sync to the cloud. Now.
The only exception to that is I believe my desktop
on my computer it used to be sync to iCloud drive.
I don't think it is anymore. Let me say no,
it's not. So there's a way to do that where

(32:21):
you can set it up. I personally would recommend it.
I don't know why I actually have it turned off.
I forgot about that. I think I turned it off
because I use my desktop as kind of a respite
from the cloud. So if I have like a big
file that I don't really want to sync to the cloud,
or I'm just like, you know, I'm doing a lot
of video stuff, you know, if I just want to
have like a file in transition, right, so I will

(32:42):
just keep it on my desktop and it's not going
up to the file the cloud for like thirty seconds
and then coming back down. You know, it's just there.
But you know, you have to forget, have to remember
not to put anything important there. So that's how I
use my desktop. I agree the document's folder. Things only
go in there if it's a mistake, if like an
app synks to it by itself. But what I do
is on my sidebar on my finder, I just keep

(33:05):
my most popular folder. So I've got my Google Drive,
you know some of the folders that I go in
and out of all the time. Like I've got this
folder on my drop box called shared with Rich and
that's the folder that I use to exchange stuff with
my camera. Person you know, for editing, and then I
keep all of my KTLA stuff in there so it's
all you know, organized. And then I, you know, once

(33:27):
I'm inside my folders, I keep it all very organized.
And what I found that works really well is just
set up a new year for every year. So Google
Drive twenty twenty one. Inside twenty twenty one is where
all of my files live. So when I get a
bank statement from my bank, I make a new folder
that is called you know, you know, Bank of America,

(33:48):
and I put it inside the twenty twenty one and
I drag and dropped it into there. When my kid
brings home a piece of art from school that I scan,
I scan it in and put you know, Parker's artwork
inside the twenty twenty one folder. And I feel like
future rich will enjoy that, because when I need to
find something, I don't think i'd want one giant folder

(34:09):
called Bank of America with everything I've ever gotten from
Bank of America in there. It makes a little bit
more sense for me anyway to break it out by year. Now,
when it comes to iCloud drive again, that's kind of
a transitory folder as well, so I keep you know,
some stuff in there, but it's mostly, you know, just
quick things that I need to access on my iPhone

(34:31):
and if I want anything, you know a little bit
more longer term. I have this new folder called iOS
Transfer and that enables me to use Google Drive with
both an Android and an iOS device. So iCloud Drive
snks really nicely with you know, the iPhone, but then
if you go to Android you can't find that stuff.

(34:51):
So I've started a new folder called iOS Transfer, which,
by the way, if you install Google Drive or I
think any of these like Dropbox, you can go on
your files folder on your on your iPhone or iPad
and under locations you can add the locations from these folders,

(35:12):
so you can add like a drop Box folder, you
can add a Google Drive folder. I think one Drive
is supported, so Apple has done a really good job
of blending in our I guess, building in support for
one Drive and Google Drive, and it's really quite slick.
So I know iCloud Drive. Everyone has iOS products and

(35:35):
Apple products is familiar with, but you can almost get
that same level of functionality that drag and drop from
your desktop to to your iPad or your iPhone if
you just install the app for like say Dropbox or
Google Drive, and then when you go in to your
iCloud locations, you can add a new location, which is
like you know, an iCloud or a Google Drive location

(35:57):
or whatever. So it's pretty slick, and I know it's
a long answer for how I do it. Look, you know,
I think it's the most important thing is to just
come up with a system, and it's your system, and
that's it, and that's the main thing. Now, don't ask
me how much stuff I have in there that's not organized,
because you know, before I came up with my nice
yearly system, I think it was twenty twenty, no, twenty

(36:21):
nineteen maybe, and so before I came up with that,
I kind of was all over the place. And so
I'm still going through and actually organizing my Google Drive
and getting all that stuff organized. Oh, twenty seventeen is
when I started the year thing. Ah, that's been that's
been quite a while. Twenty seventeen, twenty eighteen, twenty nineteen,
twenty twenty, twenty twenty one. And I also share that

(36:42):
that folder with my wife so she can access everything
in there as well, which is really cool. So good question,
Thanks for asking, And let's move on to the next story,
which is yet another streaming service. Why why as yet
another streaming service, Mount Plus is launching to replace CBS

(37:03):
All Access. I'm not gonna do too much on this,
but ten dollars a month, add free, six dollars a
month with advertising, and yeah, what do you get? You
get all the brands from you know, Viacom, SO, CBS, MTV, Beet,
Comedy Central, Nickelodeon, Paramount Network plus, Paramount Pictures. So Paramount

(37:24):
Pictures was a big holdout with some of the like
movies anywhere, like some of this stuff. So you know,
Paramount Pictures probably has a lot of movies on this thing.
I actually need to try this out. So what do
you do? You? Oh, the one big show that's not
on here is Yellowstone, which I know a lot of
people will find surprising. It's on Peacock. I guess they
cut that deal before Paramount Plus was going to be

(37:46):
a thing, and maybe before they knew not Peacock, but
Yellowstone was going to be such a hit. It's like
one of these things where Paramount Plus like, ah, we
could have built our entire, you know, our entire streaming
marketing plan off a Yellowstone, you know, and what do
they have now? SpongeBob is the big thing I've seen
them advertise, and some other you know, like what SpongeBob

(38:07):
the news? You know some of these shows they have
and the original shows. I guess they have Star Trek stuff.
But it seems like it's a pretty solid streaming service.
You get a lot of stuff for your money. But
I don't know if I'll subscribe to this. I'll definitely
try it right now. They're giving you one month free,
and after March it's only gonna be a one week trial,
so I would try to get the free now and

(38:33):
then they're also going to do a five dollars a
month based here that is supported by advertising, but removes
your local CBS live live stream. So if you like that,
They've got Fraser on there, They've got rug Rats. If
you have CBS all Access, your CBS all Access apps
are meant to switch automatically update to switch to Paramount

(38:55):
Plus and you can sign in with your CBS all
Access credentials, so they made that easy. But this is
a you know, this isn't a sea of streaming services.
Disney plus, HBO Max, Apple TV plus, Peacock, Discovery Plus.
There's a lot to subscribe to. I'm subscribed to a
lot of these things. This, by the way, I'm going
off of a c neet article. Can I just say

(39:18):
cnet dot com has really up their game? So c
net was was owned I used to work there, by
the way, you may remember that some of you, but
CBS bought c net, and I feel like the quality
took a little nose dive. And the reason for that
is that CBS, this giant company, they didn't really understand

(39:40):
what to do with cnet, and there was all these
competitors that came up that were just much more digital
centric and much more kind of nimble than this big
giant CBS owned c net, and so cnet kind of,
you know, it was it was kind of like a
boat being tossed around in the waves. I feel like,
I don't this is not any insider info. This is
just a way I saw it. And then, you know,

(40:02):
c neet kind of struggled to compete against even someone
like an MKBHD who's like, you know, a YouTuber that
does his own thing. You know, his videos are killing
what you know c net would do. And now I
feel like they've kind of hit their stride a little
bit more. They were actually purchased by a company I

(40:23):
think it's called Red Ventures, and they own the Point
Sky and they own a whole bunch of other properties
like digital. It's a very digital first products, right or
company or portfolio, I should say. And so now I
feel like what I've seen on the homepage on c net,
I feel like they're really starting to kill it and
they're really starting to hit their stride of they get it,

(40:44):
they get what they are now. They're a website that
people go to to get information. It's not just tech stuff.
It's like almost like an enthusiast website of like stuff
that tech people like myself might be into. So you know,
you're talking cars, even COVID nineteen, information, how to articles,
money articles, health articles, smart home deals. So I think

(41:08):
they're doing a really good job and I'm starting to
see a lot more stuff that when I look at
their website, I'm like, Okay, I want to read this.
I want to I'm digging this, and so I it's
you know, it's a daily stop for me. And I
think that they're just doing a lot more now. I
think the synergy with the you know, marketing backing that
they have with the points guy and that company read

(41:29):
you know, red Ventures is huge because they are a
kind of an affiliate marketing company. So I think that
they are going to see a lot of synergy with
that because you read an article about this thing and
then you buy it on Amazon or wherever, and I
think that's that's going to do really well for them.
So anyway, seen a nice job. And I'm not just
saying that because I used to work there, you know,

(41:51):
I really do and I know a lot of the
people there. But I do think they are doing a
really nice job. So let's get to the next question.
Dana says, Hey, Richie helped me with a question a
while back. Wow, trend here, I'm hoping you have the
answer to this. I picked up my iPhone earlier this
morning to see the apps wiggling and the little X

(42:12):
sign on them. I clicked the home button and thought
all was well, But now I realized that I deleted
one of my apps on my first screen, and I
don't know which one it was. Is there a way
to detect the last app that was deleted? Thank you, Dana, Dana,
I don't know of a way to detect the last
item deleted. But I will say I think if the

(42:32):
app was on your home screen, you should be able
to figure out which app it was pretty quickly in
the next couple of days because you probably used it
a lot, right, I mean, that's my advice. Now, this
is the reason my mom has an Android, and this
is the reason why I use a feature that locks
down the home screen. And on a lot of these phones,

(42:53):
like the Samsung phones have it built in I think
LG and a lot of these third party app you
know app what are they call them launchers? They have
it built in where you can lock down the home screen.
So if you're setting up a phone for a loved
one that's an Android, look into that feature where you
can lock down their home screen once you set it
up on iPhone. I'll be honest, iPhone gets a total

(43:16):
from me. What I did. I got so frustrated with
the iPhone and their system. By the way, it's been
the same system to rearrange apps on the iPhone since
day one, and it has not gotten even a millimeter
better in ten years or however many years the iPhone
has been around thirteen years now, fourteen years. It is terrible.

(43:36):
I in fact a dread trying to rearrange apps on
the iPhone because it is so horrible. And now with widgets,
god forbid. You try to try out a new widget,
it rearranges everything and messes you up. So Apple needs
to come up with a way where you can save
a home screen profile so that you can then change

(43:58):
that home screen, rearrange things, and then just go back
to what you had. Say I want to go back
to my old profile, you know that, and save. Maybe
you want to save a couple of these, kind of
like the way you can have a couple faces on
the Apple Watch. So what I did was on the iPhone.
I've actually declared bankruptcy on the iPhone. I have now
just one home screen and the rest of my home

(44:19):
screens are all gone. And I now just use the
app library and pull down to search because that's all
I can do. I don't want to deal with these
apps moving around in a bunch of different places every
time I try a new app out. I just don't.
And so that's what I do now, and you know,
there you go. So that's I feel like sometimes I'm

(44:41):
very angry on this podcast with my views, but at
the same time, it's just so frustrating when you know,
like I said, as a person who is involved in
this stuff every day and understands like what's happening, fine,
I get it. And if it's frustrating for me, I
can't imagine how frustrating it is for the average end
you who is just trying to like make it through
life and you know, do this stuff and it's just like, ugh,

(45:06):
you're like a salmon swimming upstream. But maybe they do
it pretty well, so maybe it's not a salmon. Maybe
it's like a I don't know, a guppy, like a
goldfish that's trying to swim upstream because they probably have
much much tougher time. All Right. I mentioned this in
the intro the I'm not gonna, you know, go into
this too much. I always say that Wagoneer from Jeep

(45:28):
this is an upcoming car. It is gonna be the
first to have fire TV for auto. And at first
when I saw this, I was like, what a fire
TV in your car? Like that doesn't seem dangerous on
the home screen right on the central dashboard screen. So
here's the deal. Grand Wagoneer and the Wagoneer are gonna
make their debut on March eleventh, they're gonna be the

(45:50):
first to have Amazon Fire TV for Auto, which gives
you access to apps, movies, shows, and alexa. And so
what this does is you can start to show on
your TV at home and it will sink the location
of where you're at to your car. And at first
I thought this sounded, like I said, very dangerous. But
at the same time, they say that this is for

(46:12):
passengers only, so the passenger and the backseat folks can
watch this stuff and the driver can't see the screen
unless the vehicle is in park, and then the driver
can also join in on the fire TV magic. So
I don't know, it's kind of cool. I think it's
kind of weird. But at the same time, we're definitely,
you know, we're seeing more and more of the slow

(46:33):
march towards autonomous cars, and I think we're just seeing
more entertainment in cars, more streaming services, and I think
that they've probably you know, gone to great lines to
make sure that the driver is not distracted by this.
My big question is if the passenger is listening to something.
I assume they have to use Bluetooth headphones so that
they don't, you know, the drivers want to be listening

(46:54):
to like SpongeBob SquarePants playing on you know, the new
Paramount All Access while he's driving or she and you know, so,
how does that work now with our kids? You know,
in the back seat they're just on their iPads. We're like,
can you blaze put your headphones on so mom and
dad don't have to listen to this. And I also
feel like it's sad if my wife was just watching
a show while I'm driving, maybe on a long road trip.

(47:16):
But it's just kind of like, again, we're getting into
this thing of like everyone's doing their own thing, everyone's
on their own pace. At this point. It used to
be in the world everyone was at almost the same
place right when it came to You would watch the
Friends finale on the Friday night or Thursday night, and
you would watch the Seinfeldt finale and we all talked
about the next day. But now every single person in

(47:38):
the world is at their own pace, even couples. So
you may be watching a show side by side with
your wife, but she's two episodes ahead of you and
you have to wait to discuss it, or your people,
your friends at work. So it's this really weird society
that we're getting into where we're all at like a
it's like a marathon that we're all just like at
a different stride and we come together certain times. I

(48:00):
think there's these big events like the super Bowl, and
you know, it used to be like the Emmys or
the most it the Oscars, but now even that stuff
people just aren't watching. You know. It's like live sporting
events are pretty much the only place where we're all
on the same page, you know, these live events, these
shared experiences, concerts and all this stuff. And I think
that's why we're seeing more and more of an interest

(48:22):
in this kind of stuff because we're we're longing for
that human connection and some of these things are enabling that. Yes,
you can, you know, have a watch party on Huglo,
but is that really the same now? I get it.
It's fun, and it's it's a good replacement for some
of these things that you just couldn't do before. But
you know, at the same time, I think we're all
longing for that shared experience. While I'm on the the

(48:48):
conversation of cars, let me tell you about the Chevy
Bolt EUV I test drove this last week and I
gotta say, I'm really digging the electric cars. I think
I'm just gonna go all in and purchase an electric
car because I just see the writing on the wall.
Volvo announced this week that they are going all electric
by twenty thirty, and I'm just seeing more and more

(49:10):
electric cars, and I know Tesla is the big one.
That's the one I just assumed i'd get, like the
Model three after driving the Chevy Bolt EUV. Honestly, there's
a lot I like about this car, and it probably
would be one of my choices. So what is the
Bolt EUV. It's kind of like the Chevy Bolt, but
it's a little bit bigger. It gets two hundred and

(49:30):
fifty miles to the gallon to the charge. It doesn't
have the fastest DC charging, so a lot of people
don't like that. I think it only goes up to
like level two charging. So I don't quote me on
that because I'm not an expert in the charging stuff,
but I think that's what the deal is with this.
It doesn't have the new GM Ultium, which is like
their new platform that's going to be like amazing for

(49:50):
electric cars. It's got like lighter batteries, you know, more
efficient all that good stuff, but you know, it's thirty
four thousand bucks. And the big thing that I think
is going to be a problem for this car is
that it does not get that seventy five hundred dollars
rebate even though it's a new car model. GM has
kind of eclipsed there two hundred thousand cars they can

(50:11):
sell with that, you know, with that whole situation, So
I think that's a problem. I read an article where
the government was looking to revise that law to make
it so that, you know, as these companies come out
with new car models, maybe they still will capture that
seventy five hundred dollars rebate. So I say this all
because me as a purchaser of a car, I may

(50:33):
look at something like the Volkswagen ID four, which I
also test drove this week, and I'll share some more
thoughts about that next week or when I do the
story on KTLA. But that car I really really liked,
and the difference is the Okay, So the Chevy Bolt
EUV has the super Cruise feature, which I just love
and I would want on my car. Doesn't change lanes,

(50:55):
but it drives for you basically hands free, which is
really interesting, but it doesn't have the credit and then
the ID four. I'll be honest, when I drove that around,
I can't believe how many people looked at the car
and we're like, oh my gosh, what is that? What
is that? What is that? Because nobody ever seen it before,
and so that really appeals to me, is to you know,

(51:17):
and plus you get that seventy five hundred dollars credit,
so you know, and it gets about the same two
hundred and fifty miles on a charge, but it also
has this the DC Fast Charging, which gives it a
slight advantage there. So I think these cars are going
to be battling it out. They're both an alternative to
the Tesla model Why, which my wife saw on the
road and she said, nope, I don't like that, so

(51:38):
don't get that. And I kind of agree. I'm not
a huge fan of the Why. I mean, it's cute,
but it's I think the three for me is just like,
I don't know, it just speaks to me more than
the Why. But uh, you know, anyway, so we'll see
what happens. I don't know. I don't think I'm gonna
get it anytime soon, Like today, or tomorrow or this
year even but I think maybe you know, definitely the

(51:59):
next car will well, I think it's going to be
electric for sure. Let's see here. Okay Francis via Instagram
at Richon Tech. How does Frontier one fifty one to
fifty Internet compare to Spectrum Internet. I've always been confused,
and I'm thinking about switching my cable and internet, but

(52:20):
I do not want to sacrifice my speed with all
the remote things we are currently doing. Great question, So
here's the deal. The biggest difference between the Frontier one
fifty one fifty, and it's very smart that you you
put that the one fifty one fifty versus Spectrum is
going to be the upload speed. So Frontier the upload
and download are going to be the same, which means

(52:42):
whether you're uploading or downloading something, your speed is going
to be consistent with Spectrum. They advertise just their download speed,
which the default is two hundred, but their upload speed
does not change. It's i think capped like thirty five.
So that means that when you upload stuff, it's gonna
to take longer than it would for you to download something.

(53:03):
And that's very highly simplified, but the reality is none
of this matters. None of the speed matters. If you
are simply streaming stuff on Netflix. If you're just streaming shows,
it's all going to be fine. But if you are,
you know, uploading and downloading large files, that's when the
difference might be clear. And so for me at home,

(53:24):
I have a thousand up and a thousand down and
when I upload or download it's very fast. When I
had Spectrum, it wasn't as fast for the upload. And
even when I was considering changing to Spectrum for the
they offer a one thousand, it was still capped at
like I forget what the upload was, but it wasn't
very fast. And so you kind of, Francis just need

(53:47):
to decide do you want upload download being consistent the same,
like you upload a lot of stuff and download a
lot of stuff, or you just stream and you'd be
fine with Spectrum. So the other thing is that Spectrum
is going to be slightly fast on the download because
it's two hundred for their basic versus one p fifty. Now,
I don't think that's going to be a huge difference,
but it just kind of depends what you need. So

(54:09):
that's the main thing these companies don't really like to
advertise their upload speed unless they are doing I don't
know if the word is asynchronous where it's like the same,
but you know, if they do the same, which a
lot of these fiber companies do, they like to put
that in your face because it sounds much better because
they know that Spectrum's not doing that, and some of

(54:31):
these cable companies are not doing that. But for ninety
nine percent of people, that doesn't necessarily matter because most
people are just streaming their stuff and they're not really
uploading large video files like myself every single day, and
so it's not that big of a deal. Now with
working from home, yes, you're right, a lot of us
have have put a little bit of that monocle on

(54:51):
the speeds that we have at home, and we're saying,
what are we getting up and down? I want to know.
So that's a good question, and it's something that I
think people should look into. All right, I think I
have time for like one more, maybe two more things,
all right. Apple has a new tool that lets you
transfer your iCloud photos to Google Photos. This is according
to nine to five Mac, and it's kind of like

(55:12):
one of these data portability features remember what I talked
about earlier, where these tech companies want to be seen as,
you know, very open and very customer centric or I
should say consumer centric. You know, they're not just trying
to gobble up all your data and keep it and
make it so it's really tough for you to move
somewhere else, which you know some of them do to

(55:33):
some extent. But this is a great new feature. If
you want to ditch iCloud photos and go to Google
Photos Boom, you can do it. So all you have
to do is basically log into privacy dot Apple dot
com and you click the thing that says transfer your
iCloud photos and videos, and it will do it within
three to seven days according to this article, and you

(55:55):
get all of your photos and videos copied over. Now.
According to this article, says that smart albums, live photos,
and some raw files will not transfer over, but they
say it looks like a still version of your live
photos will transfer over. So I think that's a deal
breaker for me because I want my live photos and
when I upload directly from my iPhone to Google, I

(56:18):
do get that live photos, So I'm not sure why
they're not transferring that over. And maybe this needs some
more investigation, but that would be a deal breaker for me.
But I think it's cool that you can transfer and
I actually think here's where I see this could be
really interesting and maybe someone can build a tool like this.
But you know, Google Photos. Right now, all my photos

(56:40):
are sort of locked in there, and it's a lot
to you know, get them out because I've got such
a large collection. But I do think it would be
interesting to transfer them to a service that would dedupe
these photos and kind of organize them in a way
that maybe Google Photos doesn't. And let's say I can
one click, boom, everything's transferred over to this new service
called photo Genie, and they go through it. You know,

(57:02):
of course fits very private. That would be the main thing.
They go through it. They say, okay, rich, here's all
your duplicates, here's your biggest files, here's all they slice
and dices in a way that Google Photos does not.
And next thing, you know, then they say, okay, now
we're done. We can transfer back. And by the way,
this whole process costs me, you know, a one time
fee of nine ninety nine and they say, boom, now

(57:23):
we're going to transfer everything back to your Google Photos
and it's all going to be cleaned up and perfect.
That would be pretty cool. So this is an idea.
Why you know why I like this idea of data
portability is that it gives us more options. And as
you've heard on this podcast over and over, I like
when people have options. And that's just one other good option.
All right, Brianna Final question Brianna Versus via Instagram. Hey, Rich,

(57:48):
I'm hoping you can help me out. I just got
the twenty twenty one Honda Accord. I see that Apple
has a key feature that can be added to the
wallet app. What I need help with is trying to
find out if my car is compatible. I'm not sure
sure where to search. I've checked with the dealership and
nobody there was able to give me an answer. They
weren't even aware of the feature. How do I find
out if my car is compatible? Also, I've Google search,

(58:10):
but nothing is coming up. I've also being searched. Not
just kidding, she didn't say that. Hoping you can help.
If not, thanks anyway, big fan of yours. Let's see,
so you're talking about the digital key feature on Apple
on the iPhone, which they showed off at WWDC, and

(58:32):
they showed it off with a BMW, and as far
as I know, I think BMW is the only car
that is compatible. I think we're going to see a
lot more cars compatible with this, but right now I
do not believe that your Honda Cord is compatible. But
it's funny you sent this to me because I when

(58:54):
I was test driving the Bolt and the Volkswagen this week,
I was thinking, oh my gosh, how cool would it
be to have a car that takes advantage of your
iPhone as a key. One less thing for me to carry,
one less thing for me to worry about. And yes,
there's like a whole thing of like, oh my gosh,

(59:14):
am I gonna it's my phone? Not going to be
charged whatever? Like I don't care. I would just rather
have it on my phone. In fact, I did a
story with a company called open Path, I think it
was last week, and this is something that seems like
a no brainer to me as well. But they work
to put your key card for your work on your iPhone.
Now your company has to subscribe to this thing, and

(59:34):
of course you know it has to be set up
that way. But you know, I've carried around my key
card for KTLA for ten years now, and I always think, like,
why can't my wallet on my iPhone just do this?
And I asked the guy, the CEO, James Siegel, and
I said, or is it Jamie Sorry open Path? Open
Path CEO Seagual, sorry if if I got your name wrong. Jane, Yeah,

(01:00:00):
James Siegal. So I asked him, I said, hey, what
does it use in my little you know, my card?
Is it RFI D or is it NFC? And I
guess the card uses RFI D, which I don't think
is on the iPhone, so I don't know anyway, So
his system uses a whole combination of things to make
it work. Its magic, and I imagine these car keys

(01:00:20):
in the wallet do the same thing. But I can't wait.
I mean, I am totally on board with the UH,
with the idea of using my iPhone as a Let's see,
there's a digital key consortium. Is that how you say it? Consortium? Consortium?
So let's see who's on board and we'll see. This
will give us a little idea of who is going

(01:00:42):
to be a part of this in the future. So
let's see where are the companies. Come on, where are
the companies? Here we go, Apple BMW, General Motors, Honda, Hyundai, LG, Panasonic, Samsung,
and Volkswagen. So the good news is we are going
to see BMW's IT, General Motors have IT, Honda, Hyundai, Volkswagen,

(01:01:04):
and even Samsung phones support this as well on LG phone,
So we are gonna see a lot of these of
these digital keys in the future. I cannot wait. In fact,
you know what, maybe I'll wait to buy my car
until this happens, because I really think that's a key feature.
When I bought my last car, car play and uh

(01:01:24):
and Android Auto was a key feature it had to have,
And so I think with my next car, it's going
to have to be the the digital key. Let's hear
how you say consortium consortium not consortium consortium. There you go.
So you learn something new every week on this podcast,
Well I do mostly how to pronounce stuff. Oh, there

(01:01:48):
it is. That's the music that means. That's gonna do
it for this episode of the show. If you would
like to submit a question for me to answer, two
ways to do that. Go to Rich on tech dot
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(01:02:10):
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(01:02:32):
the tech section and watch all of my TV segments
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segments as they air on TV. I love that. My
sister just did it and for the first time I
think she's ever seen me on TV. Her and her
son were watching me and they were just cracking up.
They finally get my sense of humor. My name is

(01:02:55):
rich Dimiro. Thanks so much for listening. I know there
are so many ways you can spend an hour of
your time, so I really appreciate you spending it with me.
Stay safe, I will talk to you real soon.
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