Apple launch event is a Prime Day to see new iPhones

get over the tech season right now. There is so much going on. Every company wants to send me stuff to test out, and I just have to hold them all back because I'm like, look, I gotta do just the stuff that I think my audience is interested in at this point, because there's just two watch, too many phones, too many gadgets, too many things, And you know, it's just one of these things where I am the editor, I'm the filter, and I do try to filter things down to just the stuff that I think is the

most interesting, the most compelling, and the most valuable. I'm not always right, but you know, I have to do my best because I only have so much time and placements on TV and on you know, the radio and anyway. So this week bunch of stuff arrived. But the Pixel four A is in the house, and I have already fallen in love with this device. It's a four hundred and ninety nine dollars phone. It's got that amazing Google camera on it. The other thing, so I'm playing with that.

I'm playing with the Pixel four A, comparing that against some of the other phones out there. The other thing that I've been playing with, the Google Chrome Cast TV is just awesome. I am absolutely loving this thing. It is so simple. And it occurred to me why this is so brilliant, because Google has basically done for streaming services what they've done for data on the Internet, so web pages. So they have gone through and they've scanned all the streaming services and they now have made this

major index on the back end. And so when you want to watch a Halloween movie, you just asked the Google assistant for Halloween movies and they will show you a whole bunch of them. You can narrow down to just kids movies, or just slasher movies or thriller movies, or you know, whatever you're into, and it's the same thing as searching on Google and it's like, okay, well here it is, and this is the movie you want. And by the way, it's on HBO Max. So brilliant,

so awesome. And it really just came to me this week as I was using it because I have found more to watch on Google chrome cast TV. I'm giving it the wrong name, by the way, it's Chrome cast with Google TV. I've found more to watch on that device in the past week than I ever have across any other device. Because the way most other streaming devices work is that they're all about the apps, and so it's like, oh, here's Hulu, here's to be TV, here's YouTube.

Google does not care about any of that. All they care about is content, and so it's a really interesting kind of flipping of the roles of these streaming devices because it feels like the Internet now. So you just search for what you want and boom, it's there, and then you'll figure out if you can stream it for free or not. But I thought that was really really neat.

So so that's the chrome Cast TV. Let's get into the first story of the week, which is Apple finally announced their iPhone event for October thirteenth, they sent out an invitation to journalists, including myself called time. Sorry that's the last one. This one said, Hi Comma Speed, Hi Comma Speed. And what is that tagline? You know? Apple always sends these things out in kind of a little way of giving you a hint as to what's to come. They're they're so cool over there, They're so creative, and

they are the best at what they do. Let's be honest, But this one is all about high speed, which is a nod to five G arriving on the iPhone for the first time. And if you've listened to this podcast for any length of time. If you haven't, welcome to the show. If you have, sorry, sorry that you have to deal with this show. But no, you'll love it, and so do I, and I appreciate you. But the five G networks are not all there yet, and so does that mean you shouldn't get a five G phone? No?

Does that mean you shouldn't be excited for a five G phone? No? In fact, I want to switch carriers just to go to five G. I'm on Verizon right now and I'm kind of looking at a move to AT and T or T mo O. Well, just because they have five G in a bigger way than Verizon. Verizon also is gonna have five G sometime this year, so I kind of holding out for what they have because I know it's going to be good. But anyway, I digress the what are we expecting from this event?

We're expecting apparently, according to nine to five Mac four different iPhones and iPhone twelve Mini and iPhone twelve six inch, iPhone Pro, iPhone Pro Max with the biggest screen, they're all gonna have O LED displays, and of course they're gonna be faster, they're gonna have better cameras, They're gonna already have iOS fourteen on them. So I mean, if you already have an iPhone with that, it's kind of

like you have the software. So I mean, you know, it's one of these things where it's it's gonna be exciting and no matter what, it's funny because whenever I cover Apple, what happens. I get all the haters coming out of the woodwork to you know, oh, well you do is cover Apple? Why youse such an Apple fanboy? And then I post something like the pixel four A five G A little first look on my Facebook and my Instagram and it is crickets. Nobody comments, nobody watches

the video, so I don't really understand it. Where are all the Samsung lovers? Where all the Android lovers? When I post something about Android, they're not there. They don't say anything. So say something when I post the Android stuff or the non Apple stuff. So I know that's your care. But when I post the iPhone video on next week, not that I have an iPhone, but if I get one or whatever I do with the iPhone, I know it's gonna be popular. So you know, give

me a break. I mean, I do. I cover whatever is out there that I think most people should know about. And I think that people should know about the Pixel four A five G. When I had the Samsung the Friends and Family Edition or whatever it's called, the Fan Edition, I talked all about that and I got a lot of you know, I got some feedback on it. But again, if it's iPhone, it's oh, it just blows up and everyone wants to know. So I get it. iPhone's very popular.

But I do try to cover a wide spance of stuff. Is that a word spance spans? Let's see, no spans. I don't I don't think spans. No, there's no way spans is a word. No, I don't think so. Uh okay, So anyway, the iPhone event is happening on October thirteenth, ten am Pacific. You can watch it online, you can watch it on all the different you know channels, you know YouTube, all that good stuff, or you know, an

Apple device. But uh, the basic thing is going to be new iPhones, and then of course there's the rumors about everything else. You know, new AirPods over the earheadphones, air tag trackers, which you know, we've heard about these things for like three years now, a new Apple TV perhaps, and of course maybe an update on the Apple Silicon for you know, the new Mac computers maybe what else? What are they saying? You know, It's one of these

things where you never know with Apple. I mean, obviously the iPhone is the most popular thing that they've got, but they use these opportunities to kind of give us other other things as well. So I will be watching that, I will be covering that, and I'm excited, to be honest, to be one hundred percent honest, I am more excited for the Pixel five than I am the iPhone twelve. I'll be honest, I think the iPhone is an amazing

piece of machinery and I love, love, love it. But I'm getting a little bored, and so I've already had iPhone iOS fourteen on my phone. But when I look at the pixel software, I feel like it just it's doing more interesting things for me versus the iPhone, which it kind of does what the iPhone has been doing. It's amazing, it works. I love how it integrates with the AirPods and the Apple Watch and the iPhone and

my messages on my computer. But at the same time, I feel like I've been doing that for a while now, So I don't know. I feel like maybe I'm ready for a change. I don't know if I can handle it, though, because every time I use an Android, I'm always like I'm always feeling like sad about my iPhone. So I don't know. Maybe these are just my problems. Maybe this is just my internal monologue. Let's get some questions, let's get some other people's problems, right opp Hugo says, I

need your help asap. I have an iPhone ten and money wise, well, I don't want to do an upgrade just yet. I've got at and T. I have insurance on my phone. All of a sudden, it looks like the battery or something got really big inside my phone and it popped open. I'm afraid of charging it or answering calls it might explode. I checked AT and T insurance for replacement shows I have to pay two hundred and fifty dollars. I understand if it's my fault or

I dropped it or I broke it. But do you know if I can dispute this two fifty or something else for something I didn't do. HUGO, do not pay the two fifty. In fact, do not pass go. Do not go to AT and T on this, go directly to Apple. It's an iPhone ten, which has been you know, a couple of years. But Apple is is pretty particular

about batteries. They kind of carve out special circumstances for batteries on the phone, and so I do believe that if you bring this into an Apple store, they will replace the battery for you at a very re reasonable price. And they may not even replace the battery. They may just give you a new phone or a refurbished phone. But that is the first thing that I would do before you go through your insurance because unless you did something to this phone to make this battery pop like this,

which I don't think you did. I think the battery is just faulty, and they're going to know that, they're gonna figure it out, and they're going to give you a reasonable replacement, something in the under one hundred dollars. I think the out of battery replacement is something like eighty bucks. So I would go right to the Apple store, make an appointment online with the genius, and again, you

are kind of onto something. I would not make calls or use this phone right now, and definitely don't charge it because when those batteries start to pop, there is a chemical issue happening. It's a reaction that's happening inside your phone. You do not want to further that or be a part of that. So get it, get it to a store as soon as possible, stop using it,

and do this today. That's my advice. But let me know what happens, because I think that they are going to be understanding of this issue, and yeah, everything will be good, all right. Next story on the list here, let's talk about Prime Day on Amazon, because Prime Day is the most overhyped non holiday in the world, right, I mean, what's up with Prime Day? I didn't even

shop on the last two Prime Days. I'll be honest, this year I might because I've kind of been looking at some of the I'm gonna go through some of these things. But this year seems like Amazon maybe they're taking mercy on us because they know that they are kind of just ruling in our world, especially in the pandemic. Maybe they know that people's budgets aren't as big these days, and so they just start giving more deals. But it

seems like they're doing a good job this year. So let's go over Prime Day Real quick starts Tuesday, October thirteenth at midnight Pacific. It runs for forty eight hours, so it'll run through Wednesday, October fourteenth. If you want to get a credit right now, if you buy something from a small business on Amazon, you can get a ten dollars credit to spend on Prime Day. And the way to find that is, let's see, you gotta go to like Amazon dot com slash small business. Is that

what it is Amazon dot com? Or maybe it's shop small Let's see. You know, you would think I would do my you think i'd do my homework before I come onto this podcast, but I don't. So let's see. I know I've got it somewhere, and let's see where is it. Oh my gosh, I have so many here we go. I have so many different scripts. I write for TV radio. You know how many things I'm doing at this point, I'm doing TV. So with TV, I'm

doing KTLA, all the other stations we do. We just added like things like Las Vegas, you know, and I already went over this. I'm not gonna I'm not gonna humble brag anymore. So anyway, we're on a lot of places. Let's see where are we Amazon dot Com, Slash Support Small So if you buy something from one of those

and says you'll get a ten dollars credit. The other thing you can do is through October fourteenth, if you spend ten dollars at an Amazon Whole Foods, Amazon Fresh, Amazon Go or Amazon Grocery, Amazon Books, or an Amazon pop up or an Amazon four Star store, you can get up to fifty dollars in credit. Oh wow, so you can do that a couple of times. Interesting, that's why I've gotten that a couple times. I was wondering why they kept emailing me ten bucks. I thought it

was like a problem. I was like, I'll keep taking it, but I think you're mistaking. So I have Oh gosh, I'm trying to figure out where my Amazon like credit is because I have like a little let me see, I'm gonna Amazon ten dollars. Let's see. So they gave me like this reward for shopping at Whole Foods and how do I see it? Come on, where is it? Man? Oh man? They have like this little they have this little like web page that you can actually see your credits on there, and when I claimed it, I had

this little thing where it was like ten dollars. So anyway, I've got twenty bucks to spend so far, which is kind of cool. I don't know where that website is, but I wish I did, because you know, the whole point of this podcast is to give you news that you can use. And when I'm sitting here telling you something and I'm not saying where it is, well that's

a problem. So anyway, I don't know where it is, and it seems like the whatever website they gave me where I claim my credit, it's now redirecting somewhere that's not really working anyway, So that's another way to do it. Let's see shop with an Alexa on an Echo device starting Sunday, October eleventh to get early access to deals, and that is let's see what's the deals there. You have to say, you know, a what are my Prime Day deals? And that's where they reserve a lot of deals.

So let's talk about some of these deals. They've got a lot. I'm just going to go through some of the early Prime Day deals that Amazon already has announced. Echo Dot third generation nineteen bucks, Fire TV Smart Edition TVs. You can get a thirty two inch for one hundred and nine dollars, a forty three inch for two oh nine seventy five bucks off the euro Mesh Wi Fi system, which I'm guessing is the old one, but that's one hundred and seventy five bucks. Ring Video, Doorbell second gen

for seventy dollars. Do you see the trends here? All the older stuff, like the last generation stuff, is on sale. So I'm not saying that they're just trying to like clear the warehouses, but you know, let's be honest, the new stuff is not as much on sale as the old stuff is. So it's just I mean, isn't that how it works in general? Fifty dollars off a Kindle paper white, that's eighty bucks. This is what I'm interested in because my kids are all about their Nintendo Switch.

Save thirty six dollars on a twelve month Nintendo Switch Online family membership plus a sand disc one twenty eight gig memory card, So I'll definitely be picking up two of those thirty three percent off Nintendo Switch titles. I just realized when I bought my kid the Switch my other kid, that you basically have to have two different You have to buy two copies of the game if

your kids want to play at the same time. Yes, there's some workarounds, I have not really figured them out in an easy way, So that's what I'm sticking to. Thirty three percent off of Room Buzz and Yeah, I would definitely look into those. Those are awesome. Twenty percent off Pumpkin Bakery Soy candles from Amazon, handmade maker Loren lorenz In Candle Company. I'm loving I went to I went.

I dragged my wife to what's that place called Bath and Body Works for some pumpkin candles, and they're really strong. By the way we've got them. You can only burn them for like a little bit because it like really really fills up your house. But anyway, so I'm obsessed with those thirty seven percent off Ninja kitchen products. We've got one of those and I love it. Oh wait, is it Ninja or the other one? I think it

is a Ninja. Yeah, it's really great. Thirty five percent off water pick and I just bought one of those, a water pick for flossing, and I love that. So I'm just telling you this stuff that I like that I've purchased recently that you should get on Prime Day. Thirty percent off a fitbit versa two a versa light. Those are a good deal. But again, last Year's and then Amazon brands all kinds of percentages off on Amazon brands, so things like Solomo, Happy Belly, Mama Bear, Belisi's skincare,

and Amazon gift cards. This is interesting. Prime members get a ten dollars promotional credit when they purchase an Amazon gift card or of forty dollars or more, which I'll definitely be doing that. Why not reload your own card balance of forty dollars or more. That is perfect one per Amazon customer. Definitely doing that. So I mean, why not you put forty bucks in your gift card account and you get ten extra dollars. Why would you not do that? So, I mean, you know you're gonna spend

money on Amazon, all right. So now some of the things that I'll mention on KTLA that I think you should be looking at when it comes to Prime Day. I already mentioned Alexa Lightning deals obviously go on the app make list now, So start shopping on Amazon now and add stuff to your cart. And that way, number one, you're buying the stuff that you actually want and not just garbage that you're like, oh, this is a good deal.

This is ten percent off, like to you know, get the stuff that you actually need, and if it doesn't go on sale, just don't worry about buying it just yet. You don't. Not everything goes on sale during Prime Day. The other place is to look slick deals Wirecutter and deal News. They always do a big deal on Prime

Day because guess what, they get a percentage. So what they do is they look through all the deals, they pick out the best stuff, they link it, they use their affiliate link from Amazon, and when you shop there, they get a little percentage of what you buy, and you know a percentage of that sale, and so it works out for everyone. They they do their job because they're looking for the best stuff. You get the discount. You don't have to look for all the stuff. They

get a little reward. Amazon Assistant on Chrome you can try that. I've not used that, but apparently it compares prices. Honey is another good one. I've got that installed on my computer and that will compare prices and it will tell you kind of the history of a price as well. But if you really want the best price history is the website Camel Camel Camel. That will show you the price history chart for basically everything. All right, have fun on Prime Day. I'll probably shop this year for sure.

Let's go to another question. Let's see, let's go to Hovic. Hovic says, good morning, I have a question about converting DVDs to thumb drive. What are the best options? Thank you in advance, and thank you for all the technology updates and ahead what Okay, maybe I don't know, maybe I got Hovic's name wrong, but anyway, so uh oh gosh, so if you're talking about regular DVDs, you know, like the Hollywood Studio DVDs, there is not a simple way

to convert those to like thumb drive. Like there's not like a simple like oh you know, there you go. So there are our programs that will do it. But in my experience, it is not an easy process. It's not something that is you know, it's not even it's actually like a gray process. But you can do it. I mean, it's your stuff. I mean it's your house. You can, you know, as long as you're not selling this stuff. I think you can make a backup copy

of it. But the program that will do it is handbreak h A N D B R A k E. And once you download that, I think you need another program called f f mp mpeg, which or sorry, that's that's different. I think that's different. So never mind, don't don't listen to me on that one. But I think there's another little like plugin you need for handbreak once you download it to like make it work, because what it has to do is it actually has to like

decrypt the disc the DVD. If you're talking about commercial DVDs, if you're talking about something that you've burned yourself. It's super easy. Just put it in a handbreak it'll it'll do it in seconds. It'll rip it to any format you want. But I I don't know, I don't know why you want to do this. I don't recommend doing this because why. I mean, we're streaming. It's kind of like music. For back in the day, I kept my whole big music collection and then I said, you know what,

who cares? I pay ten bucks a month to whatever and I get all the music I want. I don't need to hold on to the past. And so with the DVDs, they're not gonna be as clear. It's going to be a pain to do this. I mean, unless you have all the free time in the world. I just don't see the point of this. I get it, you paid for this stuff. Maybe you're building a collection whatever, and if that's the case, fine, I mean, do whatever you want. But I'm just saying to me, it's so

much easier. Then you got to figure out a way to play these things on your TV, which you know, you gotta get Plex or one of these other systems, so you know, do what you want. It's fine, but I'll just that's what I'm saying, it's not that easy. There was another little tiny h gosh, what was it called. It was like it was like tiny ripper or something, and it was like a little tiny app for for the Mac computers that would rip the DVDs. I can't remember I had it part of it. I had it

back in the day. But again, it's all pain and I just don't do it because it's just such a pain to do. But if you want to do it, I think the program to look at is handbrake, and that should point you in the right direction. Let's get to another story, and what do we want to talk about next. Let's talk about Instagram. Talk about Instagram because everyone uses it. A couple of new features on Instagram. Instagram is turning ten. I can't believe it. I can't

believe that Instagram has been around for ten years. That's unbelievable. But when I think about it, my kid is nine, and I think that when he was born, we were still using Facebook, but shortly after that we must have switched to Instagram. So I can't tell you. I actually can't go back to my Instagram account and say, like when I opened it, because I deleted it at some point and then, you know, I said I'm done with this,

no more Instagram, no more social media. And then I came back, so well, there's definitely all the stuff that I first had on my Instagram is gone. And then I came back sometime and restarted my not I even restart my account. I started a new account with a rich on Tech because I think my old account used to be rich to Miuro. So anyway, I you know, so Instagram is great. I love it. It's gotten a lot

more blow over the years. It continues to be more like, you know, Facebook is great, but they realize that Facebook is not as hot and cool as it used to be and Instagram is, so they're just trying to push everything on Instagram. Anyway. A couple of features you're getting is with your archives. I don't know if you realize this, but when you post a story on Instagram, it does stick around, even though it looks like it disappears after

twenty four hours. It goes into something called your archive. And this is something only you can see and access, but it's still there. So if you go into your settings and look at archive, yes, it will be there, so you can see all your old stories. Previously it was just one big, massive scroll. Now they're bringing back this app view, which you can you know, if you went to Japan, you can see all the things you

posted in Japan. You can also see it as a calendar of view as well, so if you want to go back to your birthday last year, or the year before and the year before and the year before and the year before, you can see what you posted on your birthday. So that's cool. The other thing they're doing is with bullying. I guess there's a big problem with

comments that are rude. Surprise online. I never thought that would happen, But they are now going to automatically hide comments that they're AI deems bullying or rude or whatever. And they're also going to expand the whole thing where if you're like you're ugly, they will say, are you sure you want to post that? Because it's not very nice? Why would you say that? And if you look at my Instagram today you'll see, you know, this whole idea of the perfect picture on Instagram. I'm guilty of it.

Everyone is. But it's really tough to post like real, honest portrayals of you and your life on Instagram, and I'm guilty of not doing that sometimes. You know, you post the best looking picture you post, you know, your the favorite part of your day or your best vacation picture. But you know, today, after I took a run, I just posted like me, you know, sweaty and all, doing a little review of the power bar I was eating. So you can watch that, and yeah, you're gonna be like,

whoa rich, oh now looking so good? But you know what, it's real and we all do that, right. You don't go out to dinner on a Friday night, you know, rolling out of bed and just you know, throwing on sweats. You put on something nice, right, You're gonna be paying someone to be your waiter and bring you food and sit at a nice restaurant. And of course I'm talking about pre COVID days, right, remember remember going to the restaurant. I don't even care about going to the restaurants anymore.

I've gotten so used to just staying at home for everything that I like it. I like the money savings. And yeah we've gone out to eat a couple of times throughout the pandemic, but it's just not as fun. You know, you've got the person talking through the mask and they've got the the face shield on. It's just not fun. So and you're outside, which is fine in LA. It's great when you're outside. I mean, that's that's that's

the only normal part. But it's like, you know, you feel like every time, like, oh my gosh, every time you touch something, you touch the menu, you gotta sanitize your hands, go to the bathroom, you gotta like, you know, wash your hands. Just kidding. I mean, I hope you, I would hope you have done that before covid. Okay, enough about that, but Instagram does have an Easter egg as well, which if you follow me on any sort

of social media, you've probably already seen this. But you can now change your icon on the app to a retro icon or just any icon you want. It's kind of like a different day, have like twelve to choose from that are unique, and so if you want to do that, just go tap your profile, go into settings and then pull down on the settings page until you reveal some emojis and then it'll go into like this ole confetti burst and you'll get a hidden menu that

lets you change your icon on'm Android and iOS. So pretty cool. Next question comes from Danielle. Hey Rich. I purchased a Toshiba laptop a few years back and it had Windows ten. I didn't like the format, so I took it into Staples and spent a lot of money to have them convert it to Windows seven. And let me tell you, it was quite a challenge for them. It took longer than I expected. I ended up spending a couple hundred bucks. Yeah, I would imagine. So I've

had no problem. But now we're being advised to purchase a new computer that has Windows ten and my Windows seven is no longer supported. Should I give up and purchase a new computer? Or do you think my Toshiba still has the brain power and capability of being converted back to Windows ten. I'm scared to do anything on my laptop until this is resolved. Thank you, Danielle. I wonder there must be it must be something work related. If we're being advised to purchase it must be work related.

I'm guessing which is odd because they're making her buy it. But whatever, Danielle, it's funny that you converted your Windows ten computer to Windows seven because my father in law I talk about him a lot on this show, I've realized.

But he's a funny tech guy. He's like very like particular about his technology, and so he I remember when Windows ten was kind of this big transformation, and he searched high and low for a computer that's still like a desktop that still came with Windows seven because he hated Windows ten and Windows ten. Yes, was a rough start at the beginning. So I understand that, but now

it's fine and it's actually quite good. So to answer your question, I would say, since your computer already had Windows ten at the beginning, and it sounds like you said this a couple of years ago, and so I'm guessing, you know, three years maybe I think your computer. Here's what I would do. I would find the installation discs for your Windows ten that came with your computer, and I would format your computer with the Windows ten on

it and see how it does. It's not going to cost you a dime, and so that would be my first You know, whenever I'm looking at solutions to things, I'm looking for the path of least resistance number one and of course the lowest cost. So that's what I would do. First off, get the disk, spend the afternoon formatting. You know, of course, back up your computer, put everything in the cloud, and then you know, format it, bring it to Windows ten, and then see what happens. Now.

You can probably also just do an upgrade to Windows ten, depending on how your computer is set up, But personally, I would do a clean install just to kind of set things fresh, and you know that would give you your the most mileage out of this older computer going forward, because if you just install it on top, things get a little ichy and you know it might run slower than you'd like or whatever. So I would personally do a format a clean install and look that up and

you can see how to do that. But I would do a clean install, install Windows ten, try it out for a little bit, and if it totally is a terrible experience, everything's laggy and slow and just annoying, then I would go ahead and buy a new computer. But again, go with the Windows ten. It came with a computer, so clearly it can handle it. It's been a couple of years, so maybe it's gotten slow, but just see

how it works and you know, go from there. So first solution doesn't cost you anything, and then you've you've exhausted that solution, then you can go and try out the next So that's what I would do. All right, let's go to the next question. I just realize I'm trying today. If I'm a little bit slower today, it's

because I'm trying to be eco friendly. So I go through this thing with you know, whatever I talk about in the show, I kind of print out from the web, like, you know, the articles that I want to talk about, and when I do that, I once I do that, I put them, I print them out and then I highlight the stuff that I want to talk about in those articles. Well it's a lot of paper. It's like fifty pages every week, and you know, I hate that because that's it. I just print it and it goes

into the trash or recycle whatever. So I'm trying this week to use my iPad, and I've done this a couple times. It's not as pretty, it's not as easy, but it just takes me a little bit longer to navigate the iPad because it's kind of like the same but not really. I mean, printed page is always going to be better. But I'm trying to use the iPad for eco reasons. So bear with me if it takes me a little bit longer because the stories are not as easily. I can't just pull a piece of paper

and start looking at it and interpreting it. I have to kind of like look through this list of things, and you're getting the real inside baseball this week. I hope you enjoy this podcast because you know, when I'm on TV, I'm on KTLA for about blink and you

might miss it. So when I get here, I just talk and I talk and I talk and I talk and I talk, because I feel like if you've gone through the trouble of finding me online, following me online, giving me a chance to download my podcast, and listening this far in thirty minutes, you might like what I have to say, and so I feel like you deserve to be rewarded for all of your effort. And I will tell you really what's going on in my life and really what's happening with everything. So that's why I

do all this. All right, let's move on to uh, let's see T Mobile. This is interesting. So T Mobile they are expanding their T Mobile ISP, which I think is really cool. I just have yet to see a place for this actually works. But I love that they're doing this. So T Mobile is T Mobile is like kind of like all excited because they finally have all the spectrum with the purchase of sprints, So they just

have like a lot of like spectrum. And I think what that means is that they have a lot of bandwidth that they're kind of able to use in different ways and you know whatever. And I get that their network is still you know, they're still figuring things out with how they're merging these two networks and with the five G and stuff. But I like what they're doing. I really do like T Mobile as a carrier. I think that they are very customer centric, let's put it

that way. And so what they're doing is they are opening up what's called T mobile ISP to more people four hundred and fifty cities and towns. And what they're doing is they're just using their their network that they have, their wireless network. They give you what amounts to sort of a little router that taps into their wireless network at your house and then creates a Wi Fi signal. So it's kind of like having a hot spot, but

a little bit more industrial. And also the plan is a fifty dollars unlimited plan, and so I think this is really cool because it kind of opens up Internet without getting a wire to your house for a lot of people nationwide. And so they say they're fifty fifty dollars a month, no contract. Internet Home service is now available in four hundred and fifties, four hundred fifty cities in towns and that's it. So if you're one of these, you can do this in fifty dollars with auto pay,

of course. But here's here's some of the details. It's self installation, so no one comes to your house. They just send you this little device. No hardware fees, so zero hardware. Lease with service. So lease means they send you the device to use. When you cancel service, you have to send it back. Taxes and fees are included. No contracts, no introductory price off offers, what you sign up for is what you pay, and no data caps.

So they talk about cities in Alabama, Arkansas, California, including Los Angeles, Florida, Georgia, Florida, Georgia, Line, Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, miniapp Minnesota, Missouri, Mississippi, North Carolina, New Mexico, Nevada, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee. Is this just every state? Texas, Virginia, Wisconsin, West Virginia. So anyway, I would check it out. T mobile dot com slash isp is the place to go

to check it out. I put in my address. I put in a couple other addresses. I know. None of them are coming up as like service. Yes, service in your place, which I know T mobile works at my house, so I don't know what their criteria is, but and maybe it's still kind of like propagating. But anyway, that's the deal. And if you are in a rural area or you just want a different alternative to what's available at your place, pop your address in and see if

it's available. Because this is really cool. I wish all the service providers did this. All right, let's get to the next question. Let's go to Oh, this is a good one. Richard in Hemmett says, good morning, rich Sorry, I heard you mention. You get a lot of questions referencing mornings. I usually listen to podcasts the first half of the day and then news radio the second half.

My question is a sign in prompt. I see with every new app sign up, a lot or a lot of them have the option to sign in using my Google credentials. I almost never use that option, but with an email sign up, since I use a password app, you recommend it a long time ago dash Lane, I don't have a problem remembering passwords, although I have to go through the steps to open dash Lane and had the app info. Is there any danger in going with Google to sign up sign in? Any advantages? Thank you

rich Richard In hemet a great question. I love this question and it's a great opportunity for me to explain this. So you see this a lot, and you see at this point when you go to download a new app, you see a sign in for you know, one click sign in for Facebook. Sometimes it's Twitter, let's see Google and now Apple is also up there, and it's super easy, right, It's so tempting to just click that and boom, you know, it's like there you go, You're in. But here's why

I do not recommend doing this. And I think you're doing the right thing by creating an independent log in through something like a password manager, because then that does not link your account. Now you have to understand why all these companies want you to, you know, sign in with them. It's in their best interest because if you have one hundred sign ins with Twitter, are you ever gonna cancel your Twitter account? Absolutely not, You're gonna keep

that account forever. Same thing especially with Facebook. I mean, this is what Facebook specialized in. It's that stickiness, right, They just get you because they have you signed in. You can't cancel your Facebook Now. I use that to

sign in on one hundred different websites. Apple. I like Apple's approach a little bit more because they had the whole privacy thing where it will create like an anonymous login for you, which is great, and I will admit I do use that sometimes when I'm testing apps because it's so easy. But again it's the sticky factor. Apple is doing that because the more you log in with their stuff, the less you're gonna give up your iPhone or any Apple product. So what I recommend is that

you continue to create these independent app sign ins. I know it's a little bit more work and it takes a little bit more time, and I know we're all rushing through these app sign up processes, but believe me, it's better. And there's a couple of reasons why it's better. Number one, if the site has ever hacked, you know, you've got an independent password on there. It's a unique password and it's just on its own right, You're not

sharing that with anything else. The second thing is that when you sign in using one of these you know credentials, these shared credentials, they're always trying to get a little bit more information from you then you like. And that's why Apple did the anonymous login is because when you sign in with Google, you know, you have to watch out for what they're able to access on your Google account.

Sometimes it could be your entire Gmail, like, everything in your Gmail, it could be everything in your Google Drive. You don't want to do that with Facebook. It could be your friend list, it could be your date of birth. Basically, why should you give them any more information than they need. And it's also linked to that account, so there could be some cross talk on the back end there that you may not know about. So again, go with the

independent logins. That's my advice, and it will keep it's a little bit longer, a little bit more of a process, but it keeps everything separate, and it keeps everything nice and tidy. Now, I'm not saying I never sign in with Google or some of these other third party providers. I do sometimes when it's a trusted site and when

I know what's happening. So for something like you know a certain website that I understand what's going on, I will sign in with Google, and there are pup I have with that, and it is easy, it is convenient. But as a rule I always sign up with an independent username and password, and that is the way to do it. And you're doing it right if you're going through something like dash Lane. All right, Richard, great question,

Thanks for submitting that and thanks for listening. All right, something to know about this is pretty quick, but the Roku channel. Roku has been really expanding the reach of the Roku channel that came out. I think I talked about it last week with an app that's on Android and iOS, and now they have it on fire TV. So if you like to watch free stuff, this is another option. And I've noticed with these free services like to b and Pluto that the free live streaming stuff

is really getting interesting. So a lot of them are doing like live streaming of like news networks. So this is where it's at. I mean, people love free It's kind of like TV all over again. It's free TV, but it's streaming, and I get it. I'm not everyone minds the commercials. In fact, my kids we watched Shrek or they watched Shrek on UH. I think it's called is it IMDb TV whatever? What's uh? What's Amazon's free one? Amazon free streaming they have like their own I forget

they I forget what it was called. Oh my gosh, it was called IMDbTV, I think when it first came out, and then they changed the name to something else. So let's see if I can find that. Let's see im D Yeah, I think it's IMDb TV, but it was something else when it first came out. That was like kind of confusing anyway, So my kids watched Shrek on this and and it was so funny because my wife is like, well, it's gonna have ads because it says ads supported, and they're like, nah, it won't have ads,

And sure enough, it didn't have any ads. So it was great. And by the way, Shrek looked like a really funny movie. I'm gonna I'm gonna watch that. I'm gonna go back to watch that because I was laughing, just watching it sort of in the background. So let's see see showtimes. See this is what I'm saying. Okay, rent By, I'm so confused because what is this? I did a story about it, and now it's not free anymore, which is also odd. So what is Amazon's Oh my gosh,

I can't believe Amazon's. Maybe it was called Freeview when it first came out. I can't remember what it was called, and I talked about it, but oh my gosh, you know what, this podcast is just worthless to you this week because I'm talking about all this stuff that I just don't even know what I'm talking about anymore. But it's on Prime anyway. So again, Roku Channel is another option that is totally free and you can watch it

and you don't need anything except a Roku account. The only caveat here is that you can't subscribe to premium channels through the Roku channel app, so if you want to, you have to sign up for those directly through Rokuti. And this is another weird thing that, like, it's so funny that all these little streaming things is becoming like

a cable TV service. So if you have Roku Channel, you can subscribe to Showtime, Stars, Epics or HBO through the Roku channel, which is so weird, but you know, Roku makes a little percentage on that, so that's why they do it. But anyway, that's what it's all about. And I still can't believe I can't remember what this thing was called because I did the story on it. It was like, I think it's just IMDbTV now, but it was something. It was IMDb formerly known as let's

see I think it was. Oh that's what it was. Okay, used to be called IMDb Free Dive. I knew it had a different name. And now it's called IMDbTV. Yeah, so there you go. Now, you know, I like to give you the full story. Okay, So that's it. And if you want just again, you can say, find the Roku channel app to Alexa on Fire and you can

download that, and I would say, go for it. I mean, if you don't mind setting up a Roku account, which you know, I actually, you know what, when I did that on my iPhone because I tested the Roku channel on my iPhone when you can download it, they didn't even ask me to set up an account. So maybe that's the same way on Fire TV. I'm not sure I have not downloaded it just yet, but yeah, so check that out if you like free stuff. All right, do I have time for another question? I think I do.

My timing on this podcast is all off because I tried to do it again. Whenever I try to do things differently, it never works out. So I try to do the timer on my Apple Watch this time because it kind of gives me, like a little to keep the pacing of the show. I try to, you know, I have like a little like buzzer that buzzes every three minutes or so to keep me moving. And sure enough, I did it on my Apple Watch this time, and it my Apple Watch is set to silent, and nothing happened,

so the timer is over. I can't tell if it's done or whatever happened, but I will just keep going for another ten minutes. And if it's a long podcast, too bad. All right, Raoul says, good morning, Rich. What's the best way to protect your iPhone from viruses? Malware? Oh? Was I supposed to do that? What's the best way to protect your iPhone from viruses, malware and other cyber attacks? Is there an app for this purpose? Any assistance will

be greatly appreciated. Thanks Raoul. Raoul, the answer is, you do not need anything. There are a million and one anti virus and malware apps on the App Store. I don't even understand why Apple approves them because they don't do anything you can't the iPhone. And I've said this before, but the iPhone operating system is sandboxed, which means when you are running an app, that app can only interact with other parts of the operating system and other apps

in very specific ways that Apple outlines. It is not like a Windows computer where when you get a virus on there, it can take hold of that whole thing, and you know. And again, this gets very complicated because almost all all of the new platforms are set up this way. Android a little bit more at risk, but I still think that overall, on your smartphone, the chances I guess on Android you could definitely download malware and

and apps outside of Google Play. Google Play is pretty safe, but if you're sideloading apps, yes, you can definitely install an app on there that can wreck havoc on your phone. On iPhone, there's no real way to install a third party app outside of the App Store. Unless you've jail broken your phone. And if you've done that, that's way above this podcast. This podcast is for the average consumer, and if you're jail breaking your phone and doing things

like that, you're probably not listening to this. So I'm not really even going into that because I would never recommend jail breaking an iPhone. There's just no point to me. Now an Android. What I like about Android is much

more open. You can do whatever you want an Android now. Again, So to get to your question, Raoul, I don't think you need anything on and they're the biggest The biggest danger on an iPhone is really clicking links, and so most of the exploits we've seen on iPhone have to do with links that you might get through a text message. And even when you get you know, your average text message link that you might get with like spam on the iPhone, and I've clicked all of them, believe me,

this is what I do to test stuff. It most of the time is trying to either steal your personal information through a phishing scheme, or it's trying to get your personal information or you to sign up for some sort of offer. So I don't recommend clicking those links, And I would say if you're using an iPhone, just be aware of the links that you're clicking more so than apps that you're downloading. So if an app is done through the app store, chances are it's not going

to be real malware. It might be annoying when you open it, but it can't really once you close out an app on the iPhone, it's not really doing anything in the background, So it can't like, you know, nefariously, like put a key logger on your phone. Now that's not to say, hey, this stuff can't be done. Believe me. I'm sure there are government organizations and you know others out there that have devised things to do this stuff.

They're just not very prevalent in a main way on your phone, Raoul, So I don't think you have to worry too much about this stuff. But yeah, there's not there's not an app I recommend to to protect your iPhone. Let's put it that way. It's more of your personal kind of just looking out for what you're doing on the phone that is the most important. Let's see, this

is just a really small thing. But uh, you know, since you're if you bought an iPhone last year, and you did the free trial of Apple TV Plus, like if you got the free year that is coming up on November first, because on my phone it says that I'll be billed on November first for Apple TV Plus. And if you cancel it, you know you lose access.

So don't cancel it because according to nine to five Mac, they're automatically extending all Apple TV Plus trials through February twenty twenty one, which means you will get another couple of months to get you through the pandemic of watching Apple TV stuff Apple TV Plus stuff. So that's just something to know. If you pay for a plan, you're gonna get three free months of your plan. So I

have not played. Now here's the funny thing. Almost every single subscription through the iTunes store, let's say you have a free trial, you can cancel. This is a little tip by the way. Let's say you sign up for something that's a two week free trial, right, you can go into the subscriptions and cancel that free trial immediately, and nine times out of ten, you still have access to that service until the free trial is over. At that point it'll just end and your card won't be charged.

But Apple lovely Apple. The way they do it is if so, I've done this many times because I go in there, I'm like, oh, I'm gonna miss this this November first deadline. I'm gonna get charged for a year of Apple TV or a month whatever it is. And so I keep going in there a couple times throughout the year and I say cancel because I figure, oh, it'll it'll last through November first. Oh no, it doesn't. Apple says, if you cancel this, you lose your access immediately.

So it's kind of interesting that Apple does that with most of their services that I've noticed, But yet every other app developer is pretty nice and saying, yeah, we'll give you the two weeks and you can cancel tomorrow, but you'll still have access for those two weeks. So I have not, even though nine to five Max says that this is happening, it has not hit my personal

iPhone just yet. So if you're in kind of the boat like I am, where you bought an iPhone around launchtime last year, go into your subscriptions and kind of monitor this, because if you have not canceled Apple TV Plus just yet, check that date and see if it's extended. To February twenty twenty one, and then you know you've got a couple more months, but especially as you get towards that November first date, depending on when you bought your iPhone, this is coming up, so just be aware.

And I'm not really watching anything on Apple TV plus anymore, especially now with Google Chrome Casts, I don't really have access to it anymore. So you know, I don't particularly care, and I do want to watch Greyhound, but I do. I am looking forward to the second season of Morning Show if that I know it's happening, but I'm not sure when. All right, let's do one more question. Let's see, let's do one more question from Keith. Keith says, I want to be able to watch TV using earbuds and

the TV sound on mute. I currently have a chord connected to an audio port on the TV, but the chord is a hazard and I have no volume control. Is there an easy solution? I would like to use Apple AirPods if possible. So I don't know what type of TV or setup you have, Keith, but the easiest way, I think is just to get a Bluetooth transmitter. If you're if I mean it sounds like whatever your TV is has a three point five millimeter out because you're plugging a chord in there to the audio port on

the TV. So if you're if you're doing that, then it sounds like you're halfway there. So I look on Amazon and I see you know, if you just search three point five millimeter to Bluetooth transmitter, this one is called Teotronics Bluetooth five point zero transmitter and for TV, home sound system, car, Nintendo switch. Pretty simple. You plug it into the three point five millimeter jack and this has a Bluetooth transmitter on it. Then you connect your

AirPods to this device and boom. There's even a transmit or receive toggle switch on here, so you'd want this in transmit mode. Obviously, this is thirty dollars and that would solve your problem and make it pretty simple. The other thing you can do is if you're using one of these streaming services like an Amazon fireTV stick or an Apple TV or even a Roku, a lot of them allow you to plug headphones. Sorry, a lot of them allow you to bluetooth stream the audio from the

device to Bluetooth headphones. So check there and see what type of device you're using. If you're using a Roku, the higher end remotes have a plug, which I love. I think this is a brilliant, brilliant solution. The higher end remotes have a three point five millimeter jack right on the remote, so you can plug your headphones into the remote. That is amazing. Now, I do think that almost all the Rokus allow you to use the Roku app on your phone to then plug headphones into your

phone and listen that way as well. So if you have a Roku, I think they've thought about this. But again, I think it sounds like you're just listening to regular TV. But you've got the Apple AirPods, which you know, leads me to believe, you know, maybe you have a streaming setup going on. But that's what I would do. You got a couple options, and any of them, just pick the one that works best for you. All right, let's just end on this way. MOO is opening its driverless

cars to the general public in Phoenix. How cool is that? So would you take a ride in one of these driverless cars? I don't know. I think I would. They've been around Phoenix for a while. Waimo. I don't know if the rules over there are easier. The streets are easier, but that's where they've been testing them a lot. But beginning October eighth, they're opening up their fully driverless offering

to Waimo one riders. Members of the public can now take rides, can now take friends and family along in their rides and share their experience with the world. We'll start with those who are part of Waimo one, and over the next several weeks more people will be able to book directly through the app, the Waimo App. One hundred percent of our rides will be fully driverless. Pretty cool, I mean, kind of neat, kind of scary to get

into a driverless car for the first time. I've been in several of them, so I know what it's like. It's a little nerve racking, thinking like this computer might make a wrong decision and end my life. That is I mean, I'm saying that, but it's I'm not joking. I mean it's weird, right, this computer is in charge of you, but you know who. Hopefully they have these things to a point where they're pretty safe if they're letting random people into them. So the other cool thing

is that there's no driver so COVID times. It's it's kind of like you don't have to worry about someone coughing in there or sneezing. Now you might have to worry about the drive, the passenger before or after you, But you know that gets into a whole nother conversation. Anyway, kind of cool if you're in Phoenix. I would try it out. In fact, I might make a drive to Phoenix to do a story on this. Why wouldn't I write.

I've emailed Waymo to ask them if I can do this with their help, you know, pr and they've said no. So now if I just go there as a regular person, they can't stop me. So I might be Yeah, I might be in Phoenix very soon to try this out. But it looks like it's rolling out, so it's probably not going to be immediate, but I will. You know, I'm gonna check the app and see if I can book a drive or a ride. I should say, pretty cool. I mean, I'm I'm I like the idea of driverless cars.

They do scare me in weird ways. That again, it is a computer in charge of your life, so kind of scary. I mean, you drop your iPhone and you know it's gonna be just fine. You know, screen myke crack, but you know, this car makes a wrong decision or you know whatever, and it's a little different. Interesting. That's gonna do it for this episode of the show. If you'd like to submit a question for me to answer, just go to rich on tech dot tv hit the

email button at the bottom of the page. You can also email me a voice memo Hello at richon tech dot TV. So far nobody's taken advantage of that, which is fine. I get it. That's a lot of work, so I wouldn't I wouldn't do that either, but you know, if you want to, it's an option. Also, i'd love it if you would rate and review this podcast to help other people discover it. Just go to rate this podcast dot com slash rich on tech got I think

two hundred and something reviews. We're doing really well. There a lot of you actually review the show by giving it stars, but you don't write anything. So if you write something, I will read it on the show. But so far, nobody's writing anything new. It takes a little bit longer to get those, So write something and you'll hear your name on the show. How exciting is that you can find me all the time at rich on

Tech across all of the various social media platforms. My name, once again, in case you don't know, is rich Demiro. Thanks so much for listening. Stay safe, I'll talk to you real soon