Face app privacy concerns. CS makes some progressive changes. Amazon dishes on Prime Day totals a new way to never get charged for a free trial ever again. And we're answering your pressing tech questions.
What's going on. I'm Rich Dmiro.
This is Rich on Tech, the podcast where I talk about the stuff I think you should know about happening in the tech world. Plus, I'm answering your tech questions. You send a lot of them to me. This is where I answer them. Producer Megan is joining me today.
Hello, how's it going.
It's been a while.
Welcome back, I know, thank you.
I feel like I've been gone forever.
You ever feel like that when you go on vacation like that, it's just like you'll never come back.
Yes, that's the way I feel.
And then you kind of miss it.
Yeah, Oh I do.
I miss it a lot. I definitely definitely miss work. In fact, when i'm I'm such a creature of like routine that when I'm not doing it, I'm like everything is just thrown away. Like I slept late over my vacation, I wasn't. I actually deleted Instagram and Facebook off my phone before I left. That's smart, and I will tell you the weirdest thing about deleting Instagram was that I
did not miss it. Like, so I figured out what happens every picture I take when I have Instagram my phone, I think, could this be an Instagram picture without it? Never thought about that. I just took pictures and it was really sad because I wanted them to be Instagram pictures.
I was like, oh, this would be so good, but I don't have the app, so.
But that's good to detox a little bit.
It was.
It was good, and then I came back towards the end of the trip and put it back on my phone, posted a couple of pictures. It was fun, but it's weirdest one of those things that when you don't have it, you almost don't miss it.
Yeah, it's kind of nice to get a break that's like a vacation in and of itself.
Yes, I do check like my email like a little bit, like not as much. And that's the other thing I've never done, like an out of office thing, so I don't ever set that. So people are like, Rich, I need your your RSVP by like tomorrow, and I get it like three days later. I'm like look, I'm on it. Like I'm in the tech world. There's nothing that's so pressing that it's going to be that big of a deal for you know, the week that I'm.
Gone, you know, except for face App.
Just kidding, yeah, face app. Oh my gosh.
So of course I started seeing all the people posting these pictures of face you know, their old faces, and I was like, I feel like I remember that app. So I searched my email and I actually remember doing this app like back in the day. So this was like you're talking, I don't know. I think it was like two years ago, twenty.
Seventeen the day.
Well that's a while in tech terms. Yeah, so I have it right here.
Let's see.
The date of the email was Tuesday, April twenty fifth, twenty seventeen, four to seventeen am sent to my producer. Producer back then was Vanessa, and uh it was here's the app everyone is using to make themselves look older, and.
So fiz we were on trend.
Yeah, well this app.
I think I feel I forget how I learned about this app, but they actually I feel like this app was actually kind of controversial when it first came out because it changed I think it changed like your gender, it changed your skin tone, like it did a lot of weird things that people were kind of like up in arms over, but we focused on like the fun you know, old person anyway, So you've seen all the pictures everyone in there, you know, and their mother has
posted the well maybe not mother's just yet because I haven't seen.
My mom do it. Yeah, you know what I don't want to know right now. It's everyone.
But the the big concern over this app, And as soon as I saw this app come up again, I thought to myself, oh gosh, camera roll access, right, Like, you don't want to give your camera roll access to just anyone because you never know what they're going to do with those pictures. And it's not just like that your pictures might show up on the front page of
the New York Times. It's that there's a lot of metadata in those pictures, you know, GPS data, and I think Apple is is locking down a lot of that. So like when you share I think your camera roll, I think they said in iOS thirteen, when you share pictures now, it's not to include your metadata, which is smart because they knew that like anytime you share a picture, out. It goes with your GPS, which can reveal a lot. If you took a picture at your house, people know.
Where you live.
If you take ten pictures, they analyze you know your camera role. They can see where you work, where you live, where you go to the gym, because you see those patterns of where you take pictures. Hopefully you're not taking too many at the gym, right unless you're one of those people that does that. Yeah, And I have my thoughts on those people, and we all know them, we.
Know we do know that I know a lot of you know them, and you know that so funny.
Not as bad as people that take bathroom selfies, though I can deal with the gym selfie. Bathroom selfie is like next level, like come on, so cool. The big thing about the face app is that it's made by Russian developers. Now, I think that this app is actually just fine. I have not taken a deep dive. I have not toward the developers offices or anything like that. But my guess is that what they're doing here is they're using artificial intelligence to make you look old. The
technology is actually pretty good. And I have been to Russia and I actually went to a tech convention in Russia, and they're doing a lot of interesting things with tech over in Russia. I'm not defending that country, but I'm just saying that I think this app, when it comes to privacy concerns, is probably just fine. I think that there should always be a concern when you're sharing your
pictures in an app. But tech Crunch did talk to the developer and he did kind of go over some of the claims that people have had with it, some of the issues, and a couple of things that they said. Number one, they do not upload your entire camera role. They just upload the picture that you select, so that's number one. Then they say most images are deleted from
servers within forty eight hours from the upload date. They say no user data is transferred to Russia, so apparently they use Amazon's Web Services and Google Cloud to process this, which apparently, I guess are here in the US. So that's why they say it doesn't go to Russia, which I don't know if I believe, because I feel like some of your data has to go to Russia, but maybe not. They say they don't share any user data
with third parties. To delete your data from the app, is kind of tough because I think these guys made this app and they never really thought it would go viral this way.
So the way you have to delete your data is really tough.
You can't just like you have to send them like a bug report with the word privacy in the subject line, which is not really that easy. Time and he said, most people don't log in, So bottom line, would I use this app? Yes, it's on my phone. No, I
did not allow the camera roll access. You did, right, so I mean and the developer said, look, you can use an internet kind of like network sniffing program to kind of see the data that's going off your phone, and you'll notice that as soon as you press except to the camera roll. We're not just sending all of your pictures up to the cloud. Like you can see that on a server kind of an analysis, you know,
like you can see the data flow. Apparently they say that you can do that, it's not going to happen. So the way that I would be okay with this app, and the way that I did it on my phone is there's a way to allow access to your camera to take a selfie and then affect that picture. Now, you say, Rich I mean, isn't that worse to give them access to your camera because aren't they going to activate your camera on your phone and listen to you and spy and oh my gosh.
But I don't think they're gonna do that either, So do what you want.
But you know, when it comes to any of these apps, I think the bottom line is that it's good that people are much more aware of our privacy totally.
So yeah, people care.
What do you make of the app? Do you think it? I mean, if the pictures are fun, you can't deny that.
But I'm probably going to delete it in a week.
Yeah.
And if I delete it, do they still have access to like all my photos?
Well, it depends what you think.
If you think that as soon as you gave them access to that you know, camera role, they just immediately started, you know, taking in every picture, right, so by the time you delete it off your phone, it's too late.
The damage is done. I don't think that's happening.
But again, I think it's good that people are aware of the fact that we should be aware of the privacy implications of any app that we download to our phones. But I think if you want to look at some apps, or even worse. You look at the facebooks of the world. You look at the twitters of the world, and the Instagrams and the snapchats. They're taking all this stuff and all the stuff that we upload.
And they have you know.
So look, it's it's you know, as long as we know that we're aware of this stuff, I think that's the best thing.
Yeah, so I agree. Let's start with a question from you, Megan.
Okay, so our first question comes from Shirley Lopez. Which smartphone is best for starter? I am seventy nine and I'm preparing to move to a smartphone from a flip phone. After researching, I'm thinking IP seven looks best for my needs sell, email, texting, FaceTime, camera, just the basics.
Am I on.
Target IP seven? When you first said that, I thought that she meant so. In the tech world, there's something called an IP rating, like or is it IPX?
Yeah?
IPX, So it's like, you know that basically says like how waterproof a phone is. So when she said IP seven, I was like, oh, what she wants a waterproof phone? But no, she means iPhone seven. Oh, so okay, iPhone seven. At this point, is I feel like it's getting kind of tired. You know, you had the iPhone seven. Yeah,
the iPhone eight is. I mean, I would say I think that the iPhone ten R would be her best bet, and I recommend that to almost everyone that asks me for a starter phone, because the ten R you're getting the best of what Apple can offer, but in ways they cut back on that phone in ways that don't really matter as much.
So you're still getting.
A really nice big screen, but it's not as good as the screen on the iPhone ten or the Tennis Max. You're getting an LCD screen versus an OLED screen, so it's not gonna be as bright or as clear or vibrant, but it's going to be just fine.
With the iPhone seven.
You're also getting a really old camera at this point versus the iPhone ten are you're getting iPhone or Apple's best camera right now, which is basically the same or similar camera that's in the iPhone ten S and TENNS Max, which is, by the way, way improved over the ten, way improved over the eight.
So let's see what else you're getting.
You're also getting the full screen with the face ID, which is really nice, and I just feel like you're doing yourself a disservice if you buy the iPhone seven right now.
Oh, you're also getting the best processor.
So you're getting the Bionic twelve, which is way better than what's in the seven. You're talking The seven is several generations ago, at least what three years? Yeah, so the processor has greatly improved in this time. So for all of those reasons, i'd say go for the ten R and if you can. She doesn't specify which phone she has right now, but I would try to trade in your old phone for a credit towards the new.
Phone, even if it's a flip phone.
Oh is that what she has right now?
Okay, she's not going to get anything from that then, So you're talking for the iPhone ten R. Apple says as low as four to seventy nine when you trade in, but that's if you have a good phone to trade in. So you're really looking at seven hundred and fifty dollars. So now seven hundred and fifty for the iPhone ten R. The iPhone seven is and I think this is probably why she was looking at it. It starts at four fifty. But here's the thing, you're already paying four to fifty.
Go the extra three hundred, sell some stuff in your garage. Yeah, and get the better phone, because the iPhone ten R is gonna last you way longer. I'm talking for three to four years versus the iPhone seven. You're getting a phone that's already three years old.
It might have more issues.
It might.
Yeah, it's just yes, especially with the newer apps, and it's just gonna be a little bit slower. So that's what I would recommend if you ask me, and you did because you emailed me.
That's why she asked.
Let's talk Netflix. Because Netflix is a cancel in my house. It's a big it's a big debate. My wife refused to cancel. I think it's way too expensive. I never watched anything on there. I tried watching a show this year called Dead to Me?
Have you heard of that?
A lot of people watched it was like Christina Applegate, So no, I didn't watch that. I'll tell you the things I've watched on Netflix in the past year or so. Dead to Me, which I only I think I got through four episodes before I got totally bored, where I was almost dead, like I thought I was gonna drop dead watching this show.
It was dead to me. Let's see what's the other one.
I did watch the date movie that was was it always be My Maybe it was like the one where Subway had like a prominent role in the movie.
I didn't watch that.
Okay, so I watched that as a young adult. I'm not the target demo for that.
But I did watch on my wife because we wanted to watch romantic comedy. And what else did I watch? I think I watched and like one of those comedy specials. So long story short, I don't get my value out of this fifteen ninety nine or whatever I paid to Netflix. At this point, my wife loves it because she just watches whatever junk they have on there every night. You know, She'll just find something to watch, which is what a
lot of people do. Yeah, but I tell you this because Netflix, for the first time in the US in about a decade, actually lost subscribers to the tune of one hundred and thirty thousand people.
That is insane.
It is insane because you think everyone has Netflix, everyone loves it, everyone pays for it. But I think it's become this thing where we just assume everyone keeps it. And at this point, with the price increases, people and the content that really not there as much as it used to be. People are kind of like, why do I need this? There's a lot of other place to go for content these days. So Netflix in general had
a major miss with their forecasting. They only grew by two point seven million subscribers this is worldwide in the last quarter, which is still great, but they expected five million new subscribers. So you're talking half of the people that they thought were going to sign up for Netflix signed up.
That's bad.
Now, I'm not an investor, you know all this stuff, and I don't do like the individual stocks and all that. But if you're an investor in Netflix, you're thinking, oh, how did this company miss two and a half million people worldwide? Now, Netflix says it is not because of the price increase, which for the average plan went from ten ninety nine to twelve ninety nine a month. My plan went to a little bit more because I think I paid fifteen ninety nine a month because I have
the h the four K streaming plan. So but they said that they think their content slate was actually not that good and it drove less paid. But they do say that the things that were good was dead to me. Apparently thirty million people watched it in the first four weeks. That's mainly because there was nothing else on there, and so that's why they did that Netflix. I think a lot of people like that show. I'm in the minority there because people did like it. My sisters loved it.
Maybe I'm not the demo. You should try it and let us know. Yes, will The other thing that that was a hit was The Perfect Date, which we did have on our watch list, another young adult romantic comedy.
Did you watch that? No?
Okay, Wow, you're like the worst netflixer. What did you watch on Netflix?
Megan?
What's the one with Jennifer Aniston?
And that is the murder mystery movie?
I watched that?
Okay?
It was weird.
Okay, so you didn't like that. See, that's the only thing I wanted to watch because I love Adam Saymer watch that. I haven't had a chance, and I was.
I know, I know, I worked on the plane there and back. Would you believe I did not work. I did not watch anything on the plane.
I know. I just I'm a workaholic.
Yeah, you really checked my email yesterday? And then the way out there, I don't even know what I did. I think I don't even know what I did. I didn't watch anything. I did not watch a movie on the plane, which is so dumb. Anyway, The thing that I do watch on Netflix once in a while is called Friends.
Have you heard of this show?
Yes? I was about to Yes.
And that's leaving and the office. So here are the things we have to look forward to in the next couple of months. Disney's launching their streaming service. Apple is launching their streaming service. Warner Media is launching some weird thing called HBO Max, like could you not have thought of.
A better name?
The dumbest name since the iPhone Max. NBCU is launching something so again, this is going to be a problem for Netflix because where do you put all your subscription dollars. It's getting a little bit crazy out there.
Do you think they're getting really nervous?
I don't, because I think that Netflix is pretty is pretty splished.
No.
I think they're pretty full of themselves and they think that they can do no wrong. And I think they will realize when people can jump around pretty easily to these things. And there isn't a main show that you must watch like, I bet HBO lost a lot of people after Game of Thrones went away totally because it's like, well, what am I watching on HBO right now?
Can you name another hit right now? On there?
No?
Oh, big little lies?
That is okay, that is true. They did transition to that, and I am watching.
That with my yeah. Yeah.
So what was I going to say about Netflix?
I'm curious to see the one hundred and thirty thousand people that left, like what they watched. What if it was like just The Office or Friends and they were.
Like, well, don't forget, it's one hundred and thirty thousand net They gained two point seven million, So again, how many people shifted?
Like how much churning is going on at Netflix? And this is the thing.
You don't want Netflix to become a thing that people subscribe to for three months, they get rid of for eight months, they come back for three months.
That is Netflix's biggest fear.
Yeah, because imagine trying to build a budget on ten million people one year one month, five million people the next month, fifteen million the next month. So they've got a lot of thinking to do, and I think they just need to get much better stuff, which they seem to be doing. They're getting a lot of bigger names, bigger movies. I think they're still evolving. But the fear is that we've all these new things coming along, and.
Where are people going to put their dollars.
There's no way people are going to subscribe to ten different things and pay fifteen dollars a month for each one of those.
It just doesn't work.
It's crazy, all right.
Next question is from Lori Wartik Roku versus Amazon. Hi, Rich, I'm interested in purchasing a thirty two inch ten eighty p smart TV. Some come with Roku, others come with Amazon. Please tell me which streaming service you recommend, especially for Netflix, Oh.
She said, especially for Netflix. Interesting.
Okay, So she's basically trying to figure out Amazon versus Roku, which is great. Those are two big companies that have two very established streaming platforms. So with Amazon, you've got the Fire platform, which they also make TV, so it's a little it's a little confusing because they call it
Amazon Fire TV. And you can get that as a stick which is like a USB that you are sorry HDMI thing you plug into the back of your TV, or you can get a box which goes under your TV, or you can just buy the TV that has the software included. Roku's kind of the same way. You can either get a Roku stick that plugs on the back of your TV. You can get a Roku box that goes under your TV, or you can get a Roku TV that has the Roku software built in, which I think you.
Have right and I have and my parents have the Amazon Fire TV Stick.
Okay, they have the stick.
I have the Fire TV Stick four K plus the their box which is a DVR under my TV. So the way I see Amazon versus Roku, I think you're gonna be fine with either, especially due to the fact that Amazon just made nice with Google again. Because for a while you could not get the YouTube app on the Fire TV. Now you can. Everything's good.
My kid just downloaded it yesterday unbeknownst to me, but it's there again, so now you have full YouTube.
Plus Amazon has access to all the major streaming services. There's nothing at this point. There's really none of the major stuff that you can't get on either. So when you look at Netflix on Roku versus versus Amazon, it's going to be pretty much the same experience now because you're on two major platforms, and she says, especially Netflix, your Netflix app is going to be great on either one of those because they're always updating it. Roku is
a huge platform for Netflix. In fact, Netflix's first or Roku's first box, was a Netflix streaming box. A little bit of trivia for you. Back in the day before Roku is Roku, they basically made a box that was I forget what it's called, but it was a Netflix box. It only did Netflix basically. They since expanded obviously, So my advice is, if you're an Amazon shopper and you love Amazon and all things Amazon your prime, I would go with the Fire platform. If not, then go with
the Roku platform. And Roku, like I said, is kind of like the Switzerland of streaming. They just want to please everyone. Pretty much everything is available on there, and I think she's gonna be very happy with both. I think it comes down to the features you want. So if there's a feature on one of those that you don't see on the other, then go that. Let that be your dividing line. But when it comes to apps, you're pretty much going to be covered on both of those platforms.
So hope that answers your question. So you went to CS with me last year?
Correct this year?
Oh my gosh, that's right, it was this here. So we're looking forward to CS in twenty twenty. And I get this email from CTA, which is the Consumer Technology Association which puts on CS, and here's the headline. CTA announces policy updates, new partnerships, and new programming track for CS twenty twenty.
If you saw that email, what would you do? You would hit.
The delete button right because it sounds so boring. Well, I just happened to open this email out of due diligence, and guess what it announces in not so unto certain terms about CS twenty twenty.
Oh yeah, there will be.
Tech based sexual products at CS. Okay, that's a bomb that they just drop inside this email that you know, Oh my gosh, wait what so CS has always had this weird thing where, you know, there's been one thing at CS that is always kind of weird, and it's this one company that does like virtual reality adult movies, right, and so they always pitch me, They're like, come to our booth and experience it, and I never do so,
but some people do. And it's like kind of like the undercurrent talk of the town that these people go and they you know whatever. So now you have sex Tech will be a part of CS twenty twenty on a one year trial basis, because number one, you got to imagine if you're CS, You've got two things happening here. You've got a lot of money being thrown your way by these companies. Yeah, and there's a lot of them
that make these products. On the other hand, you're kind of like, we don't really want to be known as like a sex show. And so because there used to be a show in Vegas which I did cover for c NET called I forget what it was called, but it was some sort of like basically the Porn Convention.
It was. It was pretty crazy. I did it, and it was we did three stories and it was.
Like, they're gonna have like porn stars.
Well they will not, So they said porn is still banned. The existing CS ban on pornography will be strictly enforced with no exceptions. So they're taking this as a health and wellness thing, and they're gonna have products that must be innovative or products must be innovative and include new or emerging tech to qualify, and this will be part of the startup area and the health and wellness area of Eureka Park, which Eureka Park I believe is not at the main convention floor.
I think it's like off site all the Yeah, so you will have to go seek this stuff out.
But I'm saying that I think this is gonna make headlines for CS because it is a change. There will be now CES will be associated with these products, and it will be in the same headline. So and of course it's going to be you know, it's going to be headline capturing because it's link baity, it's click baity, it's it makes for good pictures, it makes for good story, it makes for good videos. So CS has this really interesting, interesting thing happening in twenty twenty.
We'll see what happens with that. Yeah, so that's how.
Much we can actually cover with that.
I don't see us covering it for the morning news.
Maybe it's a it's probably if I had to guess, it's a web only thing, you know, it's a it's a web slide show or something like that.
Yeah.
But anyway, so I thought this was so interesting that they sent out.
This email that basically doesn't really say anything, and then all of a sudden you get to this line, you're like, wait what now. The other thing they're doing is they're basically banning booth babes, which you went to CS I didn't really see that many this year, and booth babes for the uninitiated is kind of like these women that stand outside booths and basically scantily clad bikinis or less and you know, less, well maybe not less, but you know, really like a lot.
Is going on a lot, Yeah, trying to get attention.
They're trying to get you to come to the booth, and to me, I always see that as like the saddest way of getting me to the booth, because that's it's a booth. I'm basically not going to visit because it's really sad that they have to go to.
That measures, you know, totally.
Yeah, So they are banning booth babes by doing this. Booth personnel may not wear clothing that is sexually revealing or could be interpreted as undergarments.
That's the less I was talking about, like.
Lingerie based okay, okay.
Clothing that reveals an excess of bear skin or body conforming clothing that hugs hugs genitalia must not be worn. These guidelines are applica applicable to all staff, regardless of gender. So anyway, interesting, kind of interesting for CS. You've got the toys on one side, but no booth babes on the other right, So.
CS, Yeah, they're trying to you know, controversial this year, I think. So we'll see what happens with that.
All right, so switching gears. Our next question comes from Patty Edstrom. Subject is videophone for elderly Hi rich, we enjoy your segments in Sacramento. I have an elderly mom ninety two years old who lives in Tennessee and we chat daily, but would like to have a video device so we can do something similar to Skype. Her vision and hearing are good. I've looked at view clicks, grand Pad connect portal from Facebook. There does not seem to be much out there as far as reviews. It would
have to be super simple to use and reliable. And she lives she lives in an assisted living facility and they.
Do have Wi Fi.
Okay, so she wants a video chat device, which to me, I'm still confused why there is not a good video chat device that sits on top of your TV, because to me, the simplest way to do video chat is to sit at your TV and you have a camera on the top of your TV and you just chat with the person on the other end. The problem I find with FaceTime and all these other ones that use your phone is that people don't really understand how to video chat. I don't want to be moving around your house.
It's tough to hold your phone there. And I know you're you're probably I don't know if you FaceTime a lot, but yeah, I mean I don't. And I have family across the US, and it's always been like this dream of like being able to face to face with them, right, but we never do it because it's just kind of annoying. Plus, when you're video chatting with someone, you don't really know where to look. You're like kind of holding your phone. Then you kind of like you look at different parts of your screen.
It's kind of weird.
You're you're wishing you could be checking Instagram while you're talking or your mom's talking, and.
Then when you check Instagram, it's like where'd you go exactly?
It's like, yeah, it's a weird thing. It is, so nobody has really cracked video chatting. Of course, you know in the business world people do it, and FaceTime is very popular, and so Skype. But to answer your question, I think that something like the Echo Show would probably be your best bet. The Facebook Portal is probably great as well. And then there's also so the main options, all those other ones she mentioned, like the view click and all those things, the ones that are made for seniors,
I would stay away from. And the reason I'd stay away from them is because they probably made them simple for seniors, but because nobody's really using them in a big way. I just don't see them as being very good. The software is probably wonky, it's probably not updated as much as I'd like. It's also Mike Mike go out of business and you rely on their backbone to do your video chatting, so like, if that happens, you just
wasted all this money. So I would stick to one of the big ones, which is Facebook Portal, which is Amazon's Echo Show. Or there's an upcoming one from Google that we did a story on. Do you remember this was the Google nest Hub Max, Yes, And it's kind of like their Google Yeah. It's like a big screen. Yeah, it's like a big iPad. Now, I think that one would be your best bet, but it's probably too expensive. I don't know what the pricing is. I think it's
over two hundred for that. And it's also supposed to be coming out any day now, because Google told me that it would come out mid June. They actually missed the date that they told me, but that was not official, so they said it could be you know, could be anytime in the summer basically. So the reason why I like the Echo Show five. It's brand new, it's small, it's just like a five inch display. It works with Sky, which is a common thing that a lot of people have.
You sign up once. It works on both yours and your mom's. That's funny to say that, right, it works on your mom's.
I know. I'm also a kid at heart.
You'll be able to use this too.
It's ninety dollars for one, or if you buy two, which you probably want to do in this case, it will be nine times two is one eighty minus thirty dollars, so it's one.
Fifty for two.
That's a pretty good deal for video chat. You set it, you forget it. Don't forget. This also has all the benefits of an Alexa, so she can use it to play music when you're not doing video chatting. There's also a feature called drop in, so if she, if mom approves it, you can actually drop in to her room and see the camera at any time. Now, I don't know if Mom's gonna go for that, but that's a feature that's available.
Can Mom do the same to you?
Yeah, if you set it up, Yeah, of course. Yeah, so you can just drop in.
And basically, I think the way it works is that the drop in doesn't let you see their camera immediately. So let's say you had this in your office. You can drop in by being like, I'd be on your screen. You would see me on your screen. I'd be like, hey, what's up, Megan?
You around?
You would be at your desk and you would see me, and then no, you would approve it, so I wouldn't see your camera without you being like, oh, yeah, I'm here. And I think that's how it works. I should test that because I haven't actually tried it, but I think that's pretty pretty much the way it work. Yeah, so drop in is kind of fun and it's cheap and it's Amazon's you know, it's going to be around for a while. It uses Skype, or if you don't want to use Skype, you can just use their built in
video chat. They have their own, so either way you're covered. But I think for ninety bucks, I was thinking after I It's like, I was planning on getting my mom the Amazon or the Google one, because I want to be able to do this with her. But I was thinking because I'm not really in the Alexa ecosystem right now. So right now I'm in the Google ecosystem, So I'm waiting for that one to come out with my mom because I think that'd be perfect.
That's two hundred and thirty dollars.
Two thirty okay, so there you go.
That's the Google Nest Hub Max, which has not come out yet right No, still being released.
So yeah, it says release date summer.
Okay. Yeah, so some of they said June or July mid July, but I guess that's.
Uh, it could be any day now. Okay, So that's that's the way i'd go with that. Let me tell you, have you ever had this happen to you where you sign up for something and you forget you say you're going to cancel, but you forget and you get that charge on your credit card, and next thing you know, you're like, ah, and now some companies are really good about giving you the money back.
This just happened to me. Oh yeah, class pass.
Oh with class Pass, I forgot. I forgot.
Yeah, but then I ended up actually using the credit.
So how much was it?
Eighty dollars?
Yeah, that's a lot.
That's a lot.
That's a lot. Yeah.
And if it's on a debit card where you're right in the line of like do I have that money in my account, it could be an overcharge, which you know, hopefully your debit card is connected to some sort of savings account that like will overflow or I guess overdraft into there, yeah, and not charge you like thirty five dollars. But that can happen too, you know. And that's why I don't do my auto pays on my debit card.
That's why I do use a credit card because if something is on there, I have a little bit of time, and I can also kind of what's it, debate the charge if I.
Need to, or what's the word dispute the charge? Yeah, So in a lot of times.
I will tell you these companies, even though they do the automatic, they will almost a majority of the time will give you a credit like if you forget and you say, oh I forgot.
It might take some getting in contact with them. But anyway, I digress.
The reason I'm telling you about this is because this twenty two year old entrepreneur called or named Joshua Browder has come up with something called a free trial card, and this is through his app called Do Not Pay. This guy has come up with all kinds of stuff and Do Not Pay. This is like a one stop shop for like if you get a parking ticket, if you have all these different things, Like, they do a lot of different things inside this app.
But the main thing that he got famous for.
Was the ticket dispute, which was if you get a parking ticket, you can have him kind of dispute it for you through this app. So anyway, he has this new thing where you basically use their virtual credit card to sign up for the free trial, and at the end of the free trial, they can't charge you because
the credit card doesn't work. Now, if you do want to continue with the trial, there's an option they will send you an email before the end of the trial, saying like, hey, if you want to keep this, switch to your own credit or debit card and it'll just continue on. So it's a good idea. I have not tried this, so I don't know how simple it is. But a writer for Wired, Emily Dreyfus, she did try it out and she said it was pretty simple and
it did work. And so in fact, they give you a fake email address as well, so they give you like entirely free credentials.
Wow.
So the good news about that is personally, the way I would do it is sign up for the free trial. You get a free trial, and then if you like it, sign up with your own and you basically get two free trials.
Yeah, that's actually smart, and that's.
Part of the cost of business of these companies, Like they know if they're doing a free trial that a lot of people are going to, you know, sign up for the system, like using like a lot of people have two email addresses. She might sign up with one, like with class Pass, and then go into a second
do that. The thing I don't like about this, and this happened to me with Aptive because I signed up first with my KTLA email because testing it out for a story, but then I wanted to continue on my own and I had to sign up again and it lost all my data for like the month, which I kind of didn't like. So let's say you sign up for Netflix on a free trial, you add all this stuff to your watch list, and then all of a sudden you have to get rid of it and start over again.
You lose all that stuff.
So there is a catch twenty two with kind of scamming these companies totally. My trick is, and I just started doing this on iOS thanks to a life Hacker article, is to cancel the subscription as soon as you sign up.
So as soon as you sign up, you go.
In and you cancel right away, and a lot of them will let you use it until the end of your free trial. Some of them won't, but a lot of them do. And so like for the instance I did for my last trip to China, actually I sign up for I think it was like HBO or Cinemax or one of those, or Showtime through Apple, and I immediately canceled, so I'd have a week of using the app to watch shows and then I could you know, i'n't have to remember to cancel it. I did this
for you can do this for iOS. I did for Amazon when my kid wanted to watch something on PBS. Kids subscribe to the app, and I immediately canceled it, but I still had a use of the app for a week.
And so again a lot of things.
So you're if you're in the mindset of like, let me do the subscription and then let me cancel it, you know.
Or fine, you'll be fine.
Yeah, So just remember to do that.
And you might think that it's stupid and you're like, oh, rich, well that's so mean to the companies. I actually think it's a better thing because you remember, you do it, and if you like it, you'll just resubscribe, So it's fine.
I think it works all around, all right.
So this next question is from Facebook.
Her name is Karla Abu Lahian.
She asks, I'll just assume you didn't pronounce that properly.
But I mean there's h oh lash Carla abu lashin, yeah, lash and lashin lashing.
Okay, Okay, So anyways, I saw in the morning News that you noted Apple laptops, and I was wondering the best place to purchase their products directly.
From them, maybe Amazon Prime Day, Best Buy.
Oh this is a little dated, but she's asking the best place to buy the new Apple laptops.
Okay, So my thoughts on this is I will tell you one story. So Amazon used to sell Apple laptops for a little bit cheaper than your regular you know, the Apple store, right, and.
They all do.
Basically, if you go through anywhere except the Apple Store, you're going to find the prices for Apple products fluctuate and there's usually deals.
They're usually cheaper.
Like right now, I'm looking at this Apple MacBook Air on Amazon's website. It's nine nine ninety three versus nine ninety nine on Apples. Okay, or here's the yeah, okay, so but the main thing, Okay, there's two things to look out for here. You have to think about if you're getting this thing service. So where this bit me in the in the in the behind is bit you period?
Where it bit me was?
I had a logic board failure on the laptop that I bought from Amazon, and I brought it to the Apple Store and they started doing all this stuff, Oh yeah, you need a new logic board. It's failed, blah blah blah, And then all of a sudden, they were ready to hand me a new laptop, and they said, oh, you bought this not through an Apple authorized reseller, and I was like, oh shoot, I didn't realize there was a distinction. So they said, you have to return this sto where
you bought it. So I had to return it through Amazon, which was fine, I mean, big deal. I had all my stuff on there. Is kind of annoying because I had to get a new one, so I returned it to Amazon without buying a new one through them.
I bought the new one through the Apple Store.
Because I learned my lesson, I said, Okay, in the future, if something happens to this, I want to be able to service it at the Apple Store. And of course they can always service things there. It's just how much it's going to cost you. But if you get it through you know your official warranty whatever. That's the long story. The short story is, I do believe at this point that Apple and Amazon have made up, and I think that if you buy things through Amazon they are authorized.
At this point it should say on there. But that's my main thing is always make sure that wherever you're purchasing your laptop or Apple product it is from an Apple authorized reseller, because I did buy my second one through B and H and they are an authorized reseller,
so I still I made sure I emailed them. I said, hey, if I buy this through you, because it was like one hundred dollars less, do I still get the ability to bring it to an Apple store for warranty issues, right if something goes wrong, you know whatever?
And they said yes.
And with that laptop, my kid threw a toy at it and broke the screen and I had to replace it was like six hundred dollars.
But that was my fault. It was not.
It was not defective, even though I brought it to the Apple Store and I'm like, I don't know what happened, can you It just cracked.
I didn't say that. I didn't lie.
I just said, here's my screen, and you know, I let them go through the things. They're like, yeah, this is clearly damaged on your part. And I had to pay the six hundred dollars, which is fine. I knew I would, but I was like, you never know, maybe they looked at it and they're like, oh, this screen, it's the We knew there was a problem with this glass on this screen.
So here's a freedom that would have been nice.
That's not the way it happened. So my recommendation is shop get the best price. But at the end of the day, I tend to buy my stuff through the Apple Store just because it's the most seamless when you need to get things fixed, if it's an authorized reseller. And now the best Buy is also an authorized repair center for Apple stuff, I'm sure if you buy it through best Buy you can get it repair there, no problem, and it's just as if you brought it to the
Apple Store. So things have gotten better since that time when I bought on Amazon. Yes, but I'm looking on Amazon. Well I'm trying to see, like what it says on Amazon, like where you know, if it says on here, we're an authorized reseller or reseller, but I think they are just based on what I'm seeing here, it looks like they have made amends with Apple and everything's okay.
So yeah, that's the good news.
That's good.
Speaking of Amazon, did you do any Prime Day shopping?
No, we messed up.
We were supposed we should have gotten the ero I know price, and it was the we were like, okay, let's do it.
And then it was gone, Yeah, that was.
The best deal, like two hundred dollars off. I tweeted about that. I know that I came out of retirement for that, for that, I was totally on vacation during during Amazon Prime Day. So Prime Day, I think is a big letdown every year. I think that people search. I'm so negative. I talked crap about Netflix, I talk crap about Amazon, but.
The reality is critical of it.
I'm I am a consumer like everyone else. And what did I do on Amazon Prime Day? I looked at Amazon on Monday and I was like, eh, I looked on Tuesday, Eh, all the stuff that I had my shopping cart e, I did that.
Nothing. Nothing really went down in price.
I haven't looked at my Amazon Essentials pants, my joggers that I love now that were like twenty two dollars. They were twenty two dollars on Prime Day. And I looked at my receipt from my original order to see, like, are these two dollars off?
Are they a dollar? Nothing?
I like that. You're like going, yeah, I had to Yeah.
I didn't remember how much played.
So Prime Day twenty nineteen, of course, in Amazon's world was like the best day ever. But here's what Prime Day does. It drives Prime Day subscriptions, which they said on July fifteenth and sixteenth, more people sign up for Amazon Prime than.
Like any other day in history. But I'll tell you what they did.
So.
Top selling items include the i Robot, Rumba, the MiQ Smart garage door opener, and Amazon Smart Plug. They also purchased two times as many ring and blink.
Devices this year.
They also purchased one hundred thousand lunch boxes, one hundred thousand laptops, two hundred thousand TVs, three hundred thousand headphones, three hundred and fifty thousand luxury beauty products, four hundred thousand pet products, six hundred fifty thousand cleaning supplies, and one million toys. Prime members purchased more than two hundred thousand life straw personal water filters.
Gross never using that unless I had to.
You know, those are four like drink out of like a river, which, by the way, I went on a couple of hikes over my trip and I did see people using those, and I was explaining to my family, like what they are, and the water in the bottle was like brown, and you drink it through the thing and it's miraculously cured. Now I get it if you're in a country that does not have clean water, these things are amazing. Yeah, and if you're a backpacker for four months, you need to get them.
But I personally don't want to like use that.
That's funny because I randomly watched your package from like two two years ago because I was going through our camping one. No, no, the one the story about the like the just like the gross water turned into water like clean water.
Oh, that was my favorite story every Yeah, if you ever, that was one of my apps, was favorite story.
It was called watch this tap water turn into watch this toilet water turn into water.
I still watch that story. I love it.
They literally take water that is flushed down the toilet, yeah, clean it, and I drank it at the end.
Of the piece, I know, which was really hard to watch because I was like, I can't believe he's.
Doing I felt sick for two days after that. Of course, it was all my.
Head totally back to Prime day. Anyways, This was a big shopping day I did. There was four items in my basket that were cheaper than normal that I did not buy. And we actually bought them today. So I told my wife, I was like, why don't we just buy these on Prime Day? It's like you almost don't want to because you're like, eh.
Prime Day. Yeah, So I didn't.
Yeah, I didn't. I didn't buy anything. But apparently it was a big success for Amazon. But all the stuff they sell, the stuff that I found that has the biggest discounts is their own products, which is great if you need like a ring, doorbell or a video camera or anything, Amazon, fire stick, fire TV, They're always a great deal. The rest of the stuff you really have to hunt, you know, and you have to see like is this a good deal? Is this is this worth my time and effort, or just buy stuff.
When you need it.
So yeah, that's about it. All right, that's gonna do it for today's show. Thanks so much for listening. Subscribe if you haven't already done so. So if you're just listening to this, like on the web somewhere you found like a play button somewhere, you can subscribe to this and get it for free in your favorite podcast app, and that could be Apple Podcasts, which is pre installed in every iPhone. You can get an app called Pocket casts you can get overcast. Those are a few good
apps that I do recommend. You can also listen on Stitcher all the smart home devices as well. And don't forget sign up for my newsletter at rich on tech dot tv. If you're keeping track of my whereabouts, you know I have not sent one out in the last two weeks. So your inbox is welcome. But it is coming back tomorrow or maybe not. We'll say it probably won't come back tomorrow. I don't say that it's I
don't say it's my weekly newsletter. It's just my newsletter. Yes, I have done it weekly on a regular basis, but if I don't feel.
Like doing it, you don't get it, which is fine. Your life will go on. You do you say, oh my gosh.
That's my brother and I were saying that the whole trip for when we went to STONA.
Producer Megan, did you enjoy the show? Yeah?
That was fun?
You glad to be back in the saddle here?
Yes, it's been it feels like forever.
Did you sad listen to the show that you weren't a part of and be like I could have been there.
I just didn't even listen.
I know, I don't want to.
I don't want to listen to just Rich.
All right, thanks so much for listening. Find producer Megan on Twitter at producer Megan. You can find me at rich on Tech. I'm Rich tomorrow.
Have a great day. We'll talk to you real soon