You're listenings KFI AM six forty the Bill Handles show on demand on the iHeartRadio f KFI AM six forty Bill Handle Here.
It is a Taco.
Tuesday, April eighth, And since it is Tuesday, and since it is eight o'clock, it's time for our Tech segment with Rich Demurow.
Good morning, Rich, Hey, good morning to you, Bill, welcome back, thank you.
I have to tell you, as you know and as people now know, I went off to Italy where I got married and engaged in my honeymoon. And did you know, let me tell you, do you know how many times your name came up in the two weeks that I was gone?
Three weeks and I came that I.
Was gone, not once, that's correct, absolutely, yes, zero, Oh, thank you, You're welcome me humble.
Absolutely.
Rich of course is not only kfi's tech guy and heard on the show every Saturday here on KFI eleven to two pm, but he's also a reporter on KTLA every day, the tech Reporter Instagram at Rich on tech website, rich on tech dot TV. We're also very proud of the fact, or at least the station is that Rich, you are syndicated and started right here on KFI.
Yes, right there, and have expanded since it's been great and KFI is still my first love.
That's his contract talker, by the way, I have seen his contract.
He has to say that.
All right, big news on the tariffs. Of course, that is the economic news globally. And you think of tariffs in terms of goods and services that are brought in. Let's connect tariffs to tech because we get so much tech from overseas, at least the manufactured.
Part of it.
Yeah, I mean I think that, you know, for me, the only thing that I think of when it comes to tariffs. I know we've talked about cars and all these different things from maple syrup to whatever, But for me, it's all about tech because all of these goods come from overseas.
Pretty much a majority.
Of them are made in China and of course Vietnam, Taiwan. So the entire tech industry is wondering, like, hey, what is happening here? Are we going to be seeing higher prices from the consumer standpoint? And also companies like what, you know, what do they do? How do they react to this? Do they immediately put these things on and pass the added costs on to consumers or do they wait and see Because there's so much turmoil right now, we don't really know what's happening.
So the Chinese.
Tariffs are supposed to happen starting April ninth, which is tomorrow, we don't know if that's going to happen. According to a report out of Bloomberg, they're saying that Apple stores saw a rush of consumers buying things like iPhones. And I would say just in general, like people texting me and asking me questions, there's been a lot of interest in especially phones and laptop computers. That's what people are wondering, you know, are these things going to increase in price?
And then Nintendo, while you were gone last sweek bill they announced the switch to and then they said they have to delay pre orders because they're just not sure, like how this is all going to shake out.
Do they have to charge more?
These things are going to be more expensive than four hundred and fifty dollars, which is the announced price that they came up with.
Yeah, with this tit for tat with China, and I don't see g President g or President Trump backing down. Both these guys have no problem playing chicken, and that's what's going on. And they both have a lot to lose and a lot to gain with these tariffs, more to lose than to gain. But let's talk about iPhones. If the tariffs go up to one hundred percent, which looks like Wednesday, they very well might. I don't see Trump backing down very quickly. What is an iPhone going to cost right now?
It's a thousand bucks for an iPhone, yeah, I mean there's a report over the weekend. You know, the top of the line iPhone could be like over two thousand dollars, twenty.
Five hundred something like that.
You know, most people are getting the basic iPhone for eight hundred dollars. If that doubled in price, that'd be sixteen hundred. I from everything I can tell, the tech companies are taking sort of a weight and see they do not want to raise prices right now. And to give an example of a computer, you know, there are still deals to be had out there because a lot of the stock that we're seeing is stock that has already arrived in the country. It's already in the country,
so those prices don't go up necessarily overnight. But future stock that arrives. That's where the problem is. And like you said, you know, these are two countries that don't want to back down. I mean, those are two leaders that are just sitting there, you know, with the world in their hands right now, and we're the consumers that
are just feeling uncertain. Cenet did a survey and basically one in ten shoppers made big ticket purchases late last year or early this year to avoid these tariff price jumps. And I think the rest of the people are just worried and wondering, like, hey, what do I do now?
Realistically, when we they talk about doubling prices, the price is one thousand dollars. iPhone is not going to double the two thousand dollars because shipping costs are not going to increase. Certainly, the forty percent profit margin that Apple makes or thirty five percent profit margin, that's not going to double to seventy percent.
So it's the cost of.
The good at goods as it leaves China and comes to the US. But still we're talking about a huge, huge jump in price, and you.
Know what, and the go ahead.
You know, look, these companies, I think at the beginning, if this goes on in a small way, these companies are probably going to take a hit on the profits that they make, right They're probably going to try to hold off any giant price increases as long as possible on the flip side if one company does it, because right now, nobody wants to be the first electronics the first tech company for a big headline to say iPhones just went up by one hundred dollars, right They don't
want to be the first, because that's going to kick off a chain of events where every tech company can now say, okay, now we can raise the prices too.
And then for consumers.
Who are already sort of like in a tailspin here wondering like what's going on, that's not a good thing because then all of a sudden everyone has an excuse to raise prices. And it reminds us a lot of that pandemic era, right where one person raised prices and the grocery store prices just kept going up, up.
Up up. We don't want that to happen with our gadgets.
Well, it's not going to be fun at all.
And thank goodness that I just bought my new iPhone, which, by the way, I still don't know how to work it. I just you know, it's kind of need the technology and hopefully talked about this, but I've become a grilling freak for you know, just for some reason.
I'm now grilling like every day.
And there is a thermometer that I have that works on an app that immunigate to the meat. It's so neat and I still don't know quite how to work it because it's an app and it's I'll get.
There because right now I'm just the meter bill. Uh, I don't know what.
It's a little thing with the black handle that you it just sticks in the meat and you just put it on the grill.
Yeah, it's about one hundred dollars. Meter is the big one.
Yeah, that's that's I mean, that's probably a meter, but it's it's basically an app connected thermometer. So I tested the first one way back in the day. Wasn't a big fan because it was like a beta version. Now they've you know, they sent me a new one. I have yet to try it, but summer grilling seasons coming up. What do you what do you make in most days?
Oh?
Steak?
And I went to, uh, this is this is one that I never thought I would do, and that is I go to Costco, of course, where I buy my meat, and I am buying prime meat at twenty six dollars a pound for the high end steak. Now keep in mind, twenty six dollars for one pound of meat is equivalent to two shirts or two pairs of pants at Costco.
And you gotta make choices. Do you want to be?
But that is uh, just just to become a grill nutcase?
All right, We're gonna come back and we have a bunch more to talk about. Smart watch a budget one the day oh app which I have absolutely no idea.
Is this a Harry Belafani situation here?
I have no idea what that means.
But okay, okay, Frank, okay, you don't know what that means? That stated me? Kno? That is that is that that day? Have you depour bunch?
All right?
Banana? Okay? Uh, that's okay.
That's the deo song Harry Belifan eclips of music, having nothing to do with this app at all. But I just wanted to throw that out because I just wanted to throw that out.
So what is the dao app?
Okay?
Well, I do know that song, by the way, that was in the Beetlejuice movie, So I do know that.
Oh that's right, it wasn't the Beatle Juice music.
Harry Belafani introduced Calypso music the United States in the nineteen fifties, and he also and he then went on to become one of the great eros of the civil rights movement. He was there at the march on Washington, the Martin Luther King I have a dream speech day and on and on. But anyway, let's talk about the app, because this is good for you for knowing that.
By the way, the h what's the app?
You know a little bit of pop culture. So this is an app called Deoh. It's based out of Portland, and the whole thing is to reward you for spending less time on social media. So if you can limit your usage to thirty minutes a day, you could.
Earn five dollars in rewards, and.
You can exchange those rewards, you can bank them and then get discounts on products like JBL YETI a whole bunch of other products that they have listed inside the app. And the whole point is to keep you off of Instagram, TikTok, Facebook X, and the founder said they did this because you know, we're not getting anything in exchange for this unless you're a social media influencer making money off this stuff. You're basically giving up your data and your attention and
they want you to reclaim that. So we'll see how this goes.
Ye, I'm a little confused.
You're getting points for not going onto all of these social media apps?
Correct? And how do they measure how many you're not going to?
Great question?
So on the iPhone they're gonna I'm assuming they take advantage of the screen time where they can read how long you've been on certain apps. So under thirty minutes you're good. Over thirty minutes, they start docking that five dollars down to zero.
And who is coming up with the five dollars if they're not monetizing this.
Well, it seems like since you have to put the five dollars towards these rewards, it seems like it's more of a these companies have you know, given products to this day, oh, startup, and that's how you get it. So let me look at the products that they've got. They've got north Face hydro flask and Espresso diyce in. So it seems like it's it's more of a partnership with these companies to say, hey, look, you know, we'll
give you a discount. You know, it's like maybe you'll get fifty dollars off of Dice and if you if you spend that little bit of time on social media. So it's kind of a partnership, it seems with these makes sense.
It's a marketing I'll buy a marketing partnership. That's I'll buy that.
Now, the five dollars is signifies what a length of time and I don't quite know the formula.
Here, thirty minutes or less gets you five bucks. So thirty minutes or less you get the five dollars. You get that every day. So if you theoretically in a month you can rack up one hundred and fifty dollars, that to me, Bill seems way too good to be true, because that that seems like if you're on this thing for two months, that's three hundred dollars worth one of these brands. So there must be like some fine print the only use it towards like fifty percent of the product or something like that.
Yeah, and you have to be some somewhere a Nigerian prince is connected to this.
I'm convinced of.
That, well, a Nigerian prince in Portland.
But remember those, remember those scams. God, I love those, all right.
Rich Thank you Saturday morning, eleven to two pm here on KFI and Instagram, at rich on Tech website, rich on tech Dot TV.
Rich you have a good day. We'll catch you tomorrow on this ship on the TV. Take care bye, Thank you.
Bill.
All right, there is a story out there that just grabbed me, as it did with Ann also, and that is about a biotech company called Colossal Biosciences, and it has brought back it is claimed to have brought back the dire wolf. The dire wolf went extinct ten thousand years ago, and Colossal says.
Here it is, we have two of these little cubs. Oh they're cutest pie.
I don't know if you've seen the video. Oh they're the cutest things, a little white dire wolves. Anyway, it's calling it the de extinction process. Interestingly enough, is it genetic engineering? Is it cloning? Now I'm not an expert in this stuff, the technical side of it, and there seems to be a difference between what they did and actual cloning.
Cloning is taking DNA.
From For example, they're working on the wooly mammoth, bringing a wooly mammoth back. And if you ever saw Jurassic Park, which of course everybody has, they took the DNA of dinosaurs that the mosquitoes sucked up its blood and then got encased in amber. But that was the actual DNA, which can be preserved for certainly ten thousand years.
Isn't the problem. This is a little bit different.
This is using wolves that are in existence now, but the closest thing to dire wolves doing some a little manipulation. Don't know whether or not they've actually gotten DNA from dire wolves either, bones certainly that would be it. I think there's not a little bray of tarpits I have dire wolves in it, and they took.
It out for the exhibit. I think dire wolves are part of it.
But anyway, these guys are long gone and they're saying, here we go, We've brought back this puppy and it went extinct ten thousand years ago. Now, BOYD, does that open up all kinds of issues? Does that mean that I guess you can bring back dinosaurs. Probably not, because you know, there isn't much DNA left the species that
died forty million years ago. But if this is real, and I'm not saying it's not real, it's a question of is this genetically is this a dire wolf or is it kind of sort of looks like a dire wolf and it is as close as you can get without it being the real thing. And there are detractors that say, no, it's close, it looks like it, but it really isn't. On the other hand, what Colossal is saying is it looks like it, it talks like it, it walks like it.
It is much like a quacking duck.
And so the head of the team, the investigative team, the scientific team that did this, extracted dire wolf DNA from two existing fossils to sequence the animal's genome. Did they use that DNA specifically? You know, I don't know the science here, but there is a difference. They've taken a gray wolf genome. A gray wolf is genetically ninety nine point five percent identical to dire wolves, so the
two are really close. And they said they edited the cells that multiple places to sequence the dire wolf version of the DNA. Again, I'm not an expert, and I'd love to have someone who is in dire need of information. That's very funny, who is in need of information to send me an email and say, handle, you got it, or handle you don't know what the hell you're talking about, Probably the latter. But this is such fascinating stuff because
when I started practicing in third brought party reproduction. One of the issues and we're talking about I was teaching. I know it's hard to believe, but I taught law school for four years and reproductive law. One of the issues was genetic engineering in terms of human reproduction and where this is going to go and the ethics involved in that. There's nothing unethical about this bringing a dire
wolf back. No one's going to argue bringing a human being back as a clone, or genetically engineering a human being is a very different animal, as a dire wolf is a very different animal.
This gets very complicated. So you know what I'm gonna do.
I'm going to bail out of this one, and I'll pick up this story later on as it develops, and and I'll talk about.
This all right.
I want to end the show with the concept of space ads, a sky full of ads. Now I'm not talking about sky writing, which are adds up in the air. Even those drones that fly around those are kind of neat how they can.
It's in lieu of fireworks.
The drones make American flags and you see all kinds of fun stuff that you can do with drones. But that is near what's right on top of it's a few hundred feet up in the air. These are ads in space. And there's a Russian company that's doing exactly that. They've actually sent up a prototype already. The company is
Avant Space. It has deployed the first space media satellite into Earth's orbit and it's a prototype for a quote planned fleet of small, low cost laser equipped satellites designed to and here's according to the Scientific American and they described it to emblazon the Earth's sky with corporate logos, QR codes and other consumer cultural ephemerara.
I even had to look that up. What the hell epemera.
Something it's temporary, Yes, that's exactly right. It's something that's very temporary, like fireworks. And so imagine this. You're talking about looking up at the night sky and it's only going to be between this hilarious how they scribe it between dusk and daylight. Wow, really, thank you for telling us that, because up in the middle of the sun, in the middle of the day, yeah, you'd be able
to see it, right, Thank you, you geniuses. So it's only at night, and they say it's only going to be above populated cities because the big concern actually is telescopes that would be wiped out.
They wouldn't be able to see the stars.
I mean, it's kind of weird, but that seems to be the major complaint. Now a lot of scientists are a little upset about this, having these giant billboards up in the sky and I'm talking about filling the sky up. And it's cheap too. They're saying, sixty five million dollars. They can put these puppies up and make a bucket of money. Is anything stopping them? Is there a loss stopping them? Absolutely not. You know, space is internationalized by treaty.
It belongs to nobody. Now everybody has their own every country has its own airspace, but it only goes up to the stratosphere. After that it's an open playground. You can no one can tell anybody what to put up what not to put up.
Elon musk.
Now he is because it's an American company, SpaceX, he has to comply. And if you're launching rockets off the United States, you have to comply. The FAA actually controls that. But you go to other countries, they're by treaty, they can do whatever the hell they want. And that is the fear, and scientists are going nuts. Now can you imagine you walk out, Not that we don't have a lot of pollution with billboards already as you drive down the street, but you look up and the sky is
filled with effectively what these drones can do. And it's all pretty neat stuff. And my in favor of it depends on what they show up there, to be honest with you, all right, Neil, stop shaking your head. We're done, guys, all right. Coming up Gary and Shannon at ten thirty. They're going to talk about homes being rebuilt in Palisades, which is great news. Not one permit has been issued in Altadena and they're talking about that at ten thirty.
Also, I'm taking phone calls.
And I will be engaged in answering marginal legal questions with marginal legal advice off the air right at the top.
Of the hour when I say goodbye.
A few minutes after we lock out the number eight seven seven five two zero eleven fifty. Eight seven seven five two zero eleven fifty. And since I'm doing this off the air, as I us plee and always tell you, there are no breaks, there are no commercials, there's no news, there's no traffic, and certainly no patients on my part. So we go through these phone calls fairly quickly. Eight seven seven five two zero eleven fifty.
We're done. Peene back again tomorrow.
Wake up call at five am with Amy, and then at six Neil and I join a board and we do this show until right about now, and then of course we have kno and and do whatever they do.
And Will, I think, is back tomorrow.
He will be.
He's fine, he will be. Will will be here. Ah huh, there you go. Hey, you really miss me, didn't you? All right? Catch in the morning, everybody Handle in the morning. Pardon we actually did? Oh, I appreciate that.
All right, tomorrow morning KFI am six forty.
You've been listening to the Bill Handle show.
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