Tech Brew Ride Home

Latest Episodes:

Fri. 01/03 - What To Expect From CES Jan 03, 2020

Show notes

Google’s AI has a medical breakthrough, Apple raids HBO for maybe it’s biggest name, Instagram seems to be plateauing by one metric—going gangbusters in another, what to expect from CES and, of course, the Weekend Longreads Suggestions.

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A.I. Is Learning to Read Mammograms (NYTimes)
Apple Deal Returns Former HBO Boss Richard Plepler to Spotlight (NYTimes)
HERE’S WHAT’S NEXT FOR GADGETS IN 2020 (The Verge)
Snapchat quietly acquired AI Factory, the company behind its new Cameos feature, for $166M (TechCrunch)
Instagram User Growth in the US Will Drop to Single Digits For the First Time (eMarketer)

Weekend Longreads Suggestions:

How to lose a monopoly: Microsoft, IBM and anti-trust (Benedict Evans)
Windows: Facing the New Decade (2010–2020) (Steven Sinofsky)
Ghosts in the Clouds: Inside China’s Major Corporate Hack (WSJ)
'Shattered': Inside the secret battle to save America's undercover spies in the digital age (Yahoo News)
This time, for sure! Ars Technica’s 2020 Deathwatch (Ars Technica)

Thu. 01/02 - A Grand Unified Theory of the Google Civil War Jan 02, 2020

Show notes

Dell kicks off CES season with two new laptops, Imagination Technologies is back in Apple’s good graces, the IRS is finally sticking it to tax prep software firms, and a grand unified theory of the Google Civil War.

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Dell’s latest XPS 13 has a new design with a bigger display and Ice Lake chips (The Verge)
Dell debuts 5G-ready Latitude 9510 laptop, adds iOS mirroring to PCs (VentureBeat)
Apple restores Imagination GPU chip agreement after public dispute and employee poaching (9to5Mac)
IRS Reforms Free File Program, Drops Agreement Not to Compete With TurboTax (ProPublica)
I Was Google’s Head of International Relations. Here’s Why I Left. (Ross LaJeunesse/Medium)
Google veterans: The company has become ‘unrecognizable’ (CNBC)

Mon. 12/30 - The Chinese GPS Is Nigh Dec 30, 2019

Show notes

A major internet of things data leak, China is about to turn on its GPS competitor, would you like to star in a bitmoji TV show, a look back at the year in unicorns and is the VC gravy train over for us consumers, at least?

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IoT vendor Wyze confirms server leak (ZDNet)
China decouples from US in space with 2020 'GPS' completion (Nikkei Asian Review)
SPOTIFY TO SUSPEND POLITICAL ADS IN 2020 (AdAge)
Snapchat will launch Bitmoji TV, a personalized cartoon show (TechCrunch)
The New Unicorns Of 2019 (Crunchbase News)
Israel doubles number of unicorns in 2019 (Globes)
Tech Startups Face New Investor Mandate: Profits Over Discounts (WSJ)

Fri. 12/27 - All Hail Baby Yoda! Dec 27, 2019

Show notes

A late holiday gift for YouTube creators, an important new rule for drone operators, to what degree has the Chinese government enabled Huawei’s success, and of course, the weekend longreads suggestions.

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Weekend Longreads Suggestions:

Where Are the Tech Zillionaires? San Francisco Faces the I.P.O. Fizzle (NYTimes)
Netflix was the best-performing stock of the decade, delivering a more than 4,000% return (CNBC)
11 Lessons from the Success of Disney+ (MatthewBall.vc)
Tuvalu is a tiny island nation of 11,000 people. It’s cashing in thanks to Twitch. (WSJ)
How Atari took on Apple in the 1980s home PC wars (Fast Company)
THE 84 BIGGEST FLOPS, FAILS, AND DEAD DREAMS OF THE DECADE IN TECH (The Verge)

Thu. 12/26 - "Peace. Out." - Travis Kalanick Dec 26, 2019

Show notes

Travis Kalanick has cut all ties with Uber, Sling does indeed have streaming pricing power, livestreams are the new telethons, YouTube considered doing the right thing but passed, and is Catalyst fundamentally flawed?

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Travis Kalanick severs all ties with Uber, departing board and selling all his shares (CNBC)
Sling TV gets more expensive, raises cheapest subscription price to $30 (The Verge)
Pyka and its autonomous, electric crop-spraying drone land $11M seed round (TechCrunch)
Pentagon tells military personnel not to use at-home DNA kits (NBC News)
Livestreams are the new telethons, and they’re raising millions for charities (Washington Post)
Inside YouTube’s Year of Responsibility (Bloomberg)
Catalyst and Cohesion (WormsandViruses.com)
Catalyst, Two Months In (Daring Fireball)

Mon. 12/23 - A New Competitor For Tesla? Dec 23, 2019

Show notes

The Government says ToTok is a full on spying app, TikTok wants to distance itself from allegations that it might be a spying app, out of nowhere, could Rivian be Tesla’s biggest competitor, and what does it mean if Travis Kalanick sells all of his Uber stock?

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It Seemed Like a Popular Chat App. It’s Secretly a Spy Tool. (NYTimes)
U.S. Navy bans TikTok from government-issued mobile devices (Reuters)
DraftKings going public via reverse merger (Axios)
Rivian adds $1.3 billion in funding for its electric utility and adventure vehicles (TechCrunch)
Uber Co-Founder Travis Kalanick Cuts Stake in Company by More Than 90% (WSJ)
Boeing Starliner Lands in New Mexico After Clock Error Prompts Early Return (NYTimes)
Starliner makes a safe landing—now NASA faces some big decisions (Ars Technica)

Fri. 12/20 - Now Apple Joins The Space Race? Dec 20, 2019

Show notes

Does Apple have a secret team to do an end run around telecom carriers, Google buys a game studio, IAC buys Care.com, Ripple is an interesting raise, and of course, the weekend longreads suggestions.

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Booknotesapp.com (or on iPhone and Android)

Links:

Apple Has Secret Team Working on Satellites to Beam Data to Devices (Bloomberg)
Google buys triple-A game dev Typhoon Studio to beef up Stadia (VentureBeat)
Care.com shares surge after Barry Diller’s IAC agrees to buy online caregiver marketplace (CNBC)
Ripple Raises $200 Million as Part of Bid for XRP Adoption (Fortune)
Robocall fines rise to $10,000 per call under newly passed law (The Verge)
Labels & Publishers Win $1 Billion Piracy Lawsuit Against Cox Communications (Billboard)

The Booknotesapp.com Weekend Longreads Suggestions:

SoftBank Vision Fund Employees Depict a Culture of Recklessness (Bloomberg Businessweek)
Shopify: A StarCraft Inspired Business Strategy (Non-GAAP Thoughts)
IKEA 2.0 (The Verge)
State of the Stream 2019: Platform Wars, the New King of Streaming, Most Watched Game and More! (Stream Elements)
Meet the Mad Scientist Who Wrote the Book on How to Hunt Hackers (Wired)
I created my own deepfake—it took two weeks and cost $552 (Ars Technica)
The 100 Memes That Defined The 2010s (Buzzfeed News)

Thu. 12/19 - What If Apple Owned James Bond? Dec 19, 2019

Show notes

That big NYTimes piece about location data, is Facebook taking another run at creating its own OS, is Apple considering buying James Bond, is Spotify building a social graph, and do e-athletes need gaming socks?

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Twelve Million Phones, One Dataset, Zero Privacy (NYTimes)
Facebook will bar posts, ads that spread disinformation about the U.S. Census (Washington Post)
To Control Its Destiny, Facebook Bets Big on Hardware (The Information)
Apple Held Preliminary Talks With Pac-12 Conference, MGM (WSJ)
Spotify prototypes Tastebuds to revive social music discovery (TechCrunch)
A milestone: Earthquake early warning system sends first public alert to smartphones in California (Los Angeles Times)
TiVo to Merge With Entertainment-Tech Firm Xperi in $3 Billion Deal (Variety)
Puma’s first ‘active gaming footwear’ is a sock (Engadget)

Wed. 12/18 - Did Google Almost "Rage Quit" the Cloud? Dec 18, 2019

Show notes

Everyone comes together to create a smart-home standard, did Google consider walking away from its cloud business, the last holdout comes to streaming, Gary Larson stops holding out on the web and the math behind that gift-wrapping video.

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Apple, Google and Amazon are cooperating to make your home gadgets talk to each other (CNBC)
We Tested Ring’s Security. It’s Awful (Motherboard)
Google Brass Set 2023 as Deadline to Beat Amazon, Microsoft in Cloud (The Information)
Cord cutters, you can finally stream your PBS stations online – on YouTube TV (USA Today)
Virtual product placement is coming for TV and movies and Ryff has raised cash to put it there (TechCrunch)
Far Side creator Gary Larson launches website with promise of new work (The Guardian)
A Letter From Gary Larson (TheFarSide.com)
The Internet Is Losing Its Mind Over This Gift-Wrapping Trick. Here's the Secret. (Popular Mechanics)
The Gift Wrapping Video

Tue. 12/17 - Alexa Is A Hit, But Is It A Business? Dec 17, 2019

Show notes

More reported casualties in the Google Civil War, more strife between Amazon and FedEx, can Amazon turn Alexa into a healthy ecosystem, developers: get busy on Edge extensions, and the top apps of the decade have one big thing in common.

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