Winter Q&A

Welcome to

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User Friendly 2.0 with host Bill Sikkens,

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technology architect.

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And this is User Friendly 2.0

I am your host Bill Sikkens.

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With me, my co-host Gretchen and Bill,

welcome to this week's show.

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Hello there.

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Hello.

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So it's a part of talk radio.

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You do have to talk a little bit quiet.

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If you know that I was trying to be polite

and let Bill say hello first.

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But you said your name first.

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Oh, okay. So I was watching that.

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You know, we've got a video where

we can see each other while we record.

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Of course,

you can't see that on the radio,

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but that's exactly what happened.

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But it was just like silence.

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To feel the tension and attention,

you know?

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Yeah. Put that moment in there.

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Anyway, let's get back on topic here.

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If we can.

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And that topic

is what we're going to be doing this week.

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This is our quarterly Q&A.

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So our second segment

is going to be questions you have sent in.

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And we're going to endeavor answer them.

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Your questions are answered

I don't know who came up with that,

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but I've always thought

that was a cool way of putting it.

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So there we go.

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Our first part of this show,

we're after our news.

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We're going to be talking about

stereo equipment and some basics of that.

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Again, listener request

the things that are out there

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and I'll explain what that is

when we get to that point.

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And next week

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we are going to be talking about

some scams that are popping up with it

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being tax season

here in the United States.

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So for anybody out of the country,

it's different in different places.

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But in the United States,

from the end of January to usually April

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15th or thereabouts,

when you file your annual tax returns

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and the scammers,

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there's

nothing new that they've been out there

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trying to do identity theft

and steal money and all of that.

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But there's some new takes on

some old scams this year,

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and there are some new ones

that are quite creative.

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So check us out next week.

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We're going to be deep diving into that

and letting you know how to help to

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prevent getting taken in by one of these,

because it's pretty easy to do.

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All right.

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What do we have a news.

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All right.

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Radiation detection systems

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are quietly running in the background

all around you.

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Yes, that's on the.

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So where this comes from back in

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like when Chernobyl happened

and all of that

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and some of the other things where there's

been nuclear radiation, there's leak.

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At that time, nobody knew what happened

until after people started dying.

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And especially with the Chernobyl one,

it was the Soviet Union at the time,

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and they didn't tell anyone

for several days that this had happened.

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and as a part of the environment

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around us, there are radiation detectors

and for good reason.

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So something like that happened.

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Again,

you would have the government that runs

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these things would know about it

immediately.

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But there also are DIYers

that have put these things together.

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You can get the schematics and parts

off of online sites like eBay or whatnot.

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And the bottom line of it is,

is this type of technology I think is

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important and a lot better to have

than all of the cameras and other invasive

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things that we're seeing coming around.

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Because if something did happen,

you know, maybe not happen,

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but something like a dirty bomb goes off

or something of that nature.

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These type of systems

would be able to detect it

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and even detect in some cases

the nuclear material, maybe

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allowing the authorities to get in

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and preventing

something like that from happening.

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But certainly if you did have a nuclear

plant meltdown or, you know,

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nuclear bomb being dropped or something

and somehow wouldn't have known about it,

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you would be able to detect

and know that the radiation's there.

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And it's interesting because there's

standards for background radiation

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in different places.

It's different things.

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And and the environments

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I've lived in up here in the Pacific

Northwest is pretty low.

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But I know in Reno it was a lot higher.

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Oh yeah, I had a Geiger counter and I kept

you guys out and checked it all out.

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So it'd be interesting if somebody knows,

go to user friendly dot show and,

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put in the comments

because I'd like to know if there's

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some sort of a basis and is there a reason

that be higher somewhere else?

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Is it environmental or is,

you know, something else going on?

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Speaking of

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radiation, the sun releases for strong

solar flares.

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What to expect?

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Yeah.

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You know okay, so the sun has been nuts

lately.

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And,

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runs in an 11 year cycle, and the solar

maximum is the high point of this one.

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It's the most busy with these things.

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It's supposed to be calming down,

but this time it is.

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I think it's an X flare

that they're calling it.

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And it's the strongest that you can get.

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And they're very rare. And.

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Okay, who's pissing off the sun?

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Yeah, yeah. You know, it's,

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I, I don't know, I mean, just right

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now, you.

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Anyway, the

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the problem that this creates is solar

flares, put out radiation,

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and while our atmosphere

pretty much protects us against

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that, it plays havoc with electronics.

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So low orbit satellites, communication

systems, even stuff down here

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on Earth can be affected

very negatively by these flares.

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So if you're on the daylight side

of the planet, when one of these hits

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and you're talking on your phone or,

you know, working with any kind

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of electronics, you might see things

kind of go a little bit nuts.

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And, it's interesting

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to study the space on this,

but it's a little bit creepy in a way

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that it's like it's getting wilder

instead of homing down.

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Now, I haven't seen anybody throw up

or alarm or anything of that nature,

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and it's probably just, stronger

one than we've seen.

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But hopefully this will start

calming down a little bit.

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And I know this has always been

a thing. Right?

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Yeah.

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Used to be a shortwave ham

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But before that, he had a whole rig

and this giant antenna and everything.

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And you could tell

when there were solar storms

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like this, system either wouldn't work

or it would be very different.

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And how it worked, because of the effect

this was having.

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And now, on the other side of it,

this is where we've had so many aurora

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borealis events lately,

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because this type of thing affects

that and becomes, something you can see

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much farther south than the North Pole

when these things are wild.

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And I even actually saw the last one.

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So these are we still haven't seen it.

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And I keep looking

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now, you know, in the Pacific

Northwest in January,

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where you happen

to be up at 3:00 in the morning,

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which is when you saw this

and you have a clear sky.

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I should have bought a lottery ticket

the next day.

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Yeah, exactly.

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All right.

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Amazon shuts down

controversial payment method.

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So this is something

that is a little much in some ways.

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And I think this is why it wasn't adopted.

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What they're referring to here

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is Amazon had a technology

where you can pay with your palm.

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So when you went up to the checkout or in

some of their stores like Amazon go,

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where it was completely automatic,

you would pay

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and your biometric to do that,

you would scan your palm on the reader

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and it would charge your credit card

or however you had it set up.

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And the problem with

this is, is people don't like that. So,

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you know, the technology worked fine,

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but it is, something that was

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not really adopted.

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And since in all these places

you can still pay in a conventional

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way with, you know, credit cards

or whatever people would offer

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that some people did use this,

but it is, something

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like I said, that wasn't

very widely adopted and definitely is.

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I don't know,

maybe they'll try it again in the future,

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but they're shutting it, down.

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Amazon one, I think, was the name of it,

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and they're cutting it down

completely here in a couple of months.

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But again, they're doing away with a

lot of their I think I never heard of it.

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There's yeah it's it's out there

Whole Foods it it probably still does.

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So and they've also said

that they are going to securely destroy

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all the biometric data,

you know, and stuff, so that's fine.

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But I can understand where people would be

a little hesitant

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of some of these things.

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Technology works great. I mean,

there was no problem from that standpoint.

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It's just people didn't use it.

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Ex officers rated in France

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as the UK opens

fresh investigation into Iraq.

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All right. So a little context here.

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Grok is a version of the

AI that you find on Twitter.

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And this has gone

through a number of different revisions.

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And over the time that this has been out,

it's made some very,

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let's just say, controversial statements

sometimes and,

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and other things

as they're playing with the software.

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And one of the things

that is happening with this

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is that it's putting up pictures

that are inappropriate and other things

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like that, or, you know, responses that,

you just don't want to see.

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And since everybody uses,

you know, every age group in that case

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uses social media, in most places

it is a problem.

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So they're investigating this to try to

figure out what's going on and what to do.

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One of the big things

that, caused the investigation

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that's coming

out of the UK is sexual deepfakes.

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And the fact that there's

no guardrails on that.

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So they're going into

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they raided the offices

and we'll have to see where this goes.

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We'll go ahead and monitor it.

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They are starting from a legal level

to investigate this stuff a little more.

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And when it's appropriate,

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you know, you don't want

your kids involved in something like that.

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Yeah. What was it? Australia.

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I think you have to be 16 or 18 now

to even be on social media.

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They, changed that last year.

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Yeah, I think I saw something about that.

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Yeah. It is, definitely a thing.

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You know.

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All right.

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Bloomberg reports space X to merge with X.

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I seek an IPO

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that valuation of $1.25 trillion.

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But that was a mouthful.

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Yeah yeah it is.

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So this is Bloomberg reporting on this.

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And it, would put them in the top ten

most valuable traded companies on U.S.

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exchanges.

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It's one of the biggest mergers

if not the biggest.

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It's been done like this.

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And the purpose of it is, Elon Musk

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would like to put AI data centers

in orbit.

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So, and this is a somewhat

controversial thing to do

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if you are worried about things

like stocks, Skynet,

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this would be the time to actually start

considering that,

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because one of the things

with these type of technologies,

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if something really did run amok, you

could turn off the data center, you know,

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if it's in space, you don't

have the ability to really do that.

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And any kind of a soft shutdown

it would disable, you know.

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So I don't know, you'd have to get

Reagan's Star Wars thing going.

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Yeah.

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But think of think about it.

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If you actually had AI goal sentient

decide to take over the world,

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it would be able to with the way things

work now, take over the power grids

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very easily.

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Communication,

all of those different type of things.

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And somebody is going to freak out

and go and turn it off, hopefully.

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But, in space, there's not that person

to go and turn it off.

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You know,

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maintenance would also be another issue

because if something breaks down,

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you can't exactly go in there

now. Positives. Yeah.

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There's positives. Few things can be solar

powered.

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It's not going to have the heat problems

that the ones down here do.

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It's not going to use the water

that the ones down here use.

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So there's a lot of advantages

from a resource standpoint

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if this is even possible

and if it's done properly.

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But as I tell people I love technology,

I'm very into it.

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It's and to me, in some cases.

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But I also know where the off button

on everything else

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doesn't mean I need to use it,

but I know where it is

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and I know how to how to deal with it

if I had to.

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So we'll see how far they get with this

and if it's something that actually

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becomes viable.

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But it's an interesting idea.

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And from a standpoint of studying it,

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it's going to be interesting

to see how the engineering would work.

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And if they're, like I said earlier,

if they're actually successful.

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Star Wars

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is officially bringing back

George Lucas's Episode seven plan

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following Kathleen Kennedy's

Lucasfilm exit.

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So I didn't realize

that this was even a thing.

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And it isn't.

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The episode seven was supposed to be

a different script and everything.

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Oh yeah. Oh yeah, he left.

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He literally left the plan for the

the sequels, right?

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Yeah, I you know, I knew that, but, okay.

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So what they're talking about here

is I'm babbling on about it.

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Star Wars maul shadow Lord,

which we've talked about in

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the past, is a series that's coming out

that, looks at canon, does some things.

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It looks to be very good with Darth Maul.

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And this apparently

was supposed to be episode

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seven of the Star Wars

movies, the last trilogy.

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And I'll tell you one thing.

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And of course, this is all subjective

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and a matter of opinion,

but I know for myself

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looking at this versus what was put out,

I'd like this a lot better.

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Yeah, yeah, I agree, it

just and looking at the trailer

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and some of the other things

that's going out

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is, it's going to be very interesting.

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It does tie in in many ways

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to some of the characters

that seem to be somewhat open ended.

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And I like we like it anyway, so no

spoiler alert there, but we do have a do

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we like and a rather cool looking one

that matches Maul's, colors as well.

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A little bit. Are you sure?

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I think that's yeah.

And it's The Apprentice.

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Well, black.

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Okay.

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Because I thought Darth,

Talon was the black and red Twilight,

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and I thought there was a different way

like that.

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Was talking to Maul in the trailers.

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Yeah, I think you're right on that.

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Darth

Maul pollen is the black and red tea like

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you're like, you're pulling out

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of Devin.

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Ezra, I think, is how you say that

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is the one in the trailer.

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Devin Ezra isn't that.

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I don't know what that is. Ezra.

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The character is Ezra. Okay, yeah.

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Or Bridger.

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Yeah. Yeah, yeah. So.

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But those are different people.

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Okay.

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Ezra Bridger

is actually in the trailer that you saw.

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No, I saw it in the description

that they were talking about.

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Ezra. Now? No. Last name.

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So maybe it's a different Ezra,

I don't know.

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Oh, okay.

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There are definitely, some things in here

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that's going to be interesting

seeing number one to see

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if we're right or wrong on this,

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but also just way of looking

like it's going to play out

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is going to be a lot of fun.

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And it's a series I will be watching.

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I've always wanted to do a, cosplay

among cosplay.

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I think I have a lot of fun with that.

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So, you know,

maybe I'll think about doing that again.

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And the new, set up for his character

looks very vicious.

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That's cool.

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Well, anyway.

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All right, so that's our news.

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And and the last part of this segment,

we are going to be talking

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about stereo equipment.

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And this is a interesting conversation.

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We've had a lot of questions on things

and talked about this

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and little bits and pieces.

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But this is something that there's

a lot of interest in.

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And there's a lot of audio files out there

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that really like their equipment

and specific lines and all of that.

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And kind of interesting

how this is going on.

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I mean, when you started

with audio equipment, way back

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when radios were made, it was, well,

not stereo, it would be mono.

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And the audio quality

on some of that equipment

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was, well, not that good, put it mildly.

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Well, well,

it was a Am radio and ham radio.

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Yeah, yeah, we'll make fun of Am radio.

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We're on Am radio on a lot of our market.

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So. Yeah.

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Yeah, but it doesn't have stereo.

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Yeah.

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Actually there is a such thing

as Am stereo.

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They started playing it

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and then when things changed, it

never really went anywhere.

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But it is possible to do that.

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Oh. But but anyway,

so that developed out.

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Then you had our FM.

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Speaking of Am and FM come out,

which can be modulated into two channels

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are stereo same things on records

at the time and all of that kind of thing.

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And that was used.

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There was something called quadraphonic

sound, which meant you had four speakers.

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Yeah, I played with that a little bit.

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Now I'm led to understand

you could buy phonographs

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and things

that were specifically encoded for that.

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I think because when I played with it,

it was just always you had a second set

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of speakers in the back, which was fine,

but it wasn't like separate channels.

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I think four track did that pretty well.

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Okay.

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Yeah. And I like I said, I don't know.

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So if you have experience with that,

be interesting to try it out.

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Yeah, I believe four tracks split it out

into the four channels on some systems.

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Okay.

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Well and I know that afterwards

they, they, they started

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dividing the stereo into components

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so that you could be more detailed

about how high the treble

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and the bass was and, and where,

where the sound was going out to.

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And it was, you know,

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you had a thing where that was an amp

and the turntable was separate

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and it was like, whoa,

this is like really cool stuff,

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you know?

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But I have no idea

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why you, myself and I still have an amp

and a turntable in my living room.

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I need to unpack one for my mom, so,

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you know, and speaking of such things.

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Yeah, it went from, you know, the

very old radios to its component systems.

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Like what you're talking about.

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They can do all kinds of things.

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The audio quality was a lot better.

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There were different encoding formats

for records at the time where you,

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you know, had the right equipment.

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It would sound better.

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You also had things like Dolby noise

reduction, which can no longer be light,

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but at the time,

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things like audio cassettes,

what we remember is audio cassettes,

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which were not designed for music

originally.

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It was for,

you know, like dictation or something.

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And the quality at the time

would never have supported music.

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But as things improved and technology

improved it,

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they were able to make it work.

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Eventually where that went was digital

audio tape, which was not very widely

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adopted, but it sounded just like a CD,

you know, at that level of quality.

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But you could record,

you know, and that kind of a thing.

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And then we move ahead to digital systems

where you have

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surround sound, five channels,

seven channel,

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nine channel, and now things like Atmos,

which don't use channels.

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And it's more of a, modular

surround sound, which I like Atmos.

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It works well, but a lot of audio files

will tell you, well, it's digital.

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You're reproducing the sound.

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It's not really the sound that would have

originally been there, you know.

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So while you can do more with it,

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it's some question

as to the authenticity of what I mean.

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It's not like they think the A song

or whatever you're listening to,

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but something off of an analog

point of origin, like a record.

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You're actually listening

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to the sound going through the amp

and just made louder.

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On digital, it's decoding the signal

and recreating it from that encoded

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signal, which is different, you know,

and it depends on the signal, too.

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I mean, if you're using a WAV file,

it becomes clear that is very relaxed.

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Very good, very good.

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Those are lossless formats, whereas MP3

is compressed, which causes us.

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Yeah. Oh by the nature of what it is.

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So yeah.

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And that's when you compress something

you're always taking something away.

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It's just physics and and that's true.

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And so mp3's for anybody

that doesn't know is still here.

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But it was the main, format of music

when we started, not streaming,

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but doing things like an iPod

or an MP3 player, you know, handheld

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music devices and sound reasonably good.

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But like you say, it's missing things.

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So if you really know what to listen for

are really good at that,

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you're probably going to have a problem

with that.

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In file formats.

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You mentioned Flac,

which is another format like MP3,

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but as you said, is lossless.

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So in other words, there's no missing

components, but the file is a lot larger.

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Yeah.

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that wouldn't make much of a difference.

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But when this stuff was really being used,

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it would be the difference

between ten minutes to download

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a track or two hours, you know,

so that type of thing, plus

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your storage capacity on your playback

devices were a lot less so different time.

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But it's,

you know, where you're going with that.

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when the majority of people

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that just casually listen to songs

do it over a smart speaker,

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which is not even stereo.

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Yeah, it's a, you know,

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and as we are here today,

you can obviously still do

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multiple channels and surround

sound and Dolby and you know,

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there's DTSx and Atmos and all these,

there's different types of encoding

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which sound amazing in my opinion.

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They're really good.

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But it is not what everybody has.

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So what's interesting

is in digging into this a little bit,

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it is actually possible

do stereo sound with a smart speaker.

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You need

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two of them for one thing obviously,

because there's two channels.

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But if you look at the way

these things set up, you would

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I'll pick on Amazon

and the echos and all of that stuff.

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The others will do the same thing,

just maybe in a little different way

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is you have to have

two devices are the same.

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So the same model of smart speaker.

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And then there's a way to go

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into the configuration and tell it

that you're using these for stereo output.

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And then when it plays back

and you'll notice in one channel

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the one and the other channel

to the other, as long as they're stereo

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separation in there, which, you know,

is better, music tends to have that more.

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But so the thing of it is

it is absolutely possible to do that

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still, it's just most people

don't tend to worry about it as much.

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And I think a big part of it

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is there's a lot of consumption of music

now is more something in the background.

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So whereas in the past

you would actually sit and listen

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to a record album or,

you know, TV or tape or something,

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now you put it on while you're working.

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And I'm not saying

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that people don't do that anymore,

but it's just, kind of a different way

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of handling things.

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Mainly

because when you do watch stuff, it's

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usually videos, because streaming videos

has become so easy to do.

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We're like super malt, multitaskers now.

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Yeah.

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And you're still in HD. In the past.

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Yeah.

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Okay. I don't change,

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because, when I was, you know,

when I was in high school,

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you you you just sit and relax

and listen to a record

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or listen to a record

while you were doing your homework, right?

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You know, and now, well,

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it's a little different, you know, so

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I listen to music while doing artwork

still. So.

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Yeah.

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Yeah.

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And, and, you know,

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there's advantages and disadvantages

to everything as we go along.

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One of the biggest disadvantages

is you no longer own your music,

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so you buy a track and you download it,

that you're in possession of that.

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But streaming music

and all that kind of a thing.

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Yeah.

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If you're paying a fee to,

you know, have access to a lot of stuff,

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but you don't have the internet

or you want to have, you know, somewhere

476

where you can play it back on your own.

477

It's just not possible.

478

So but yeah,

these things are still out there.

479

It is still possible to do stereo sound

and we're going to experiment with that.

480

I wonder if you can just surround

sound off. Look into that.

481

All right.

482

Next segment we're going to be

answering your questions.

483

This is user friendly 2.0.

484

We'll be back after the break.

485

You can see here he's from the future.

486

He's got a really big computer

487

and he uses it every day.

488

And he uses it uses it in every way.

489

I see. You sure.

490

You know, I'm not sure because he uses it.

491

Welcome back.

492

This is user friendly 2.0.

493

Check out our website.

Send us your questions and your comments.

494

If you have a do any friendly dot

show is your one stop

495

for everything user friendly.

496

And I just say that

because this next part is your questions,

497

we're

going to attempt to answer some of them.

498

What do we have?

499

First?

500

Is I really going to take away my job.

501

Yeah.

502

And by far this has been the most asked

question we've had in the recent past.

503

So about four months

since we did our last.

504

Q and a very large concern, and a lot of

people are quite worried about that.

505

And especially now in January and,

first part of February

506

here, we're seeing a lot of layoffs

all across the board.

507

So, you know, comes up with that

is this AI.

508

So the question

or the answer to this question that I give

509

when it's asked,

510

and it's really the way that I feel is

this is very similar in some ways

511

to when desktop computers

really came out in the mid 90s.

512

And our computer is going to take away

my job.

513

No, but it will change

or I it's going to take away my job.

514

Well, no, but it will change.

515

And I think that's what

we're looking at here going forward.

516

The bigger companies have been trying

to use generative AI to replace people,

517

and it hasn't worked out so well for them.

518

In a lot of cases.

519

I find that when I go on and it says like,

you know, this is a chat box

520

and I'm looking up for

521

an answer to a technical question

and stuff that actually can be faster.

522

But if you need to get

any kind of a real resource,

523

you have to go through this cloak

and dagger

524

to try to figure out the path

to get to an operator.

525

And, as far as I'm concerned,

that hasn't made it better.

526

So the tool is fine,

but the way that it's been

527

tried to be deployed

used, in other words, for big companies

528

to eliminate full time employees,

it's not going to work.

529

And I think a part of it might be that

it just doesn't want to work that way.

530

So, you know,

531

so I think what we're going

532

to see going

forward is use of AI technology is here.

533

It's not going to go away.

534

And as a programmer myself,

because this is one of the professions

535

that a lot of people

are really worried about.

536

I still have to code my own projects.

537

I can't ask an AI to do it

and go take a vacation.

538

You know that word yet?

539

Might be in there,

but I don't know if we're ever going

540

to really get to that point,

but it sure as a search function,

541

if I don't know a routine

or a, you know, a logic problem

542

or a procedure for what I'm doing,

or I have one that I've programed

543

and I just am stuck,

I can put that into an AI as a prompt,

544

and it really does help to go through it

and answer it and not only answer and go,

545

you know, telling me things like,

by the way,

546

if you have the SQL command in here,

this way, your site will be hacked in 10s.

547

So you might want to fix, yeah, I'm exaggerating, but it actually can look both.

548

So so in this case, what you're saying is

549

the AI is kind of like your sidekick,

your buddy, your pal, your wingman.

550

So to speak. Yeah.

551

So it's not really replacing you,

but it is, is a helper.

552

Yeah, it's a helper.

553

And it's, again,

the type of tool that, that is there,

554

and one that is really beneficial,

but where people are trying to use

555

AI to actually completely replace

themselves, we're seeing a lot of kind

556

of funny things happening.

557

I guess it's funny.

It wouldn't be if it happened to you.

558

Why don't we talked about in the past

this in the legal profession where lawyers

559

were using

AI specifically to write their briefs.

560

And,

if you're a lawyer and you sign the brief,

561

you're signing that what's in the brief

is accurate to the best of your knowledge.

562

Well,

if you do this, the AI will go through

563

because it's not designed to be

a paralegal.

564

It'll go through and write the brief

and do it beautifully.

565

In the case, sites may or may not be real.

566

If it can't find what it wants to make you

happy, so it's just going to create one.

567

But again, the idea of this is not meant

to actually be filed in a court.

568

But that's what, you know, what

is happening with some of these things.

569

It's just one example.

570

So the idea of being able

571

to completely replace the professional

or the worker or anything like that, no.

572

But to make jobs and life easier.

573

Absolutely.

574

Because a lot of the kind of, brain work,

575

you can do, I will help a lot for that.

576

But you still have to be there to do it.

577

So, you know, just to be

on the hopeful side, it seemed like after

578

computers became more popular,

New jobs came up because of them.

579

Right.

580

So this might be the result

that when I becomes more used,

581

we might have new jobs that we

we haven't been able to imagine.

582

Yeah.

583

Well, up here we're already seeing that.

584

And, Oh, okay.

585

One of the things that's interesting,

586

and we did an interview last year

with somebody on this,

587

but it's just kind of a footnote on

that is the expansion of data centers.

588

And first thought is, okay, I have to be,

you know, a hardware engineer

589

or something to do that. No, no.

590

Data centers require all kinds of jobs,

everything from maintenance people

591

to engineers, of course,

to even janitorial staff and stuff.

592

So it's actually adding

a whole slew of things.

593

Security. Security. Yeah.

594

And and that so and it seems like

595

a lot of those kind of jobs are better

paying than in some other places, too.

596

So if you're worried about it, you

597

definitely want to look at thinking

about how the world will be.

598

Learn how to use and interact with AI.

599

At this point,

I think that's a very basic thing to do.

600

It's also not hard to do.

601

You can go online

and most of the eyes are there.

602

It doesn't cost anything

to use the basic functions,

603

and you can just start going from there

and you'll find out that it's very helpful

604

and it's not something

that, really to be scared of.

605

You know, at least not yet.

606

So hold on. I've got a call on Skynet. Oh.

607

Anyway, what's our next topic?

608

Is it true

609

AI's are forming their own social network?

610

Oh, no.

611

This has been also a thing

that, people are,

612

worried about.

613

And, it you know what?

614

What's real and what's not on that.

615

Okay, so I guess the short answer

to the question is. Yes.

616

It's called notebook, and it's

617

where AI agents interact

and talk to each other.

618

But as far as being worried

about something like this, I asked both

619

GPT and Gemini, and they both promised

nothing to worry about.

620

So we're good.

621

So. So you believe the AI?

622

Oh, they're sitting there

sipping their virtual coffee, going,

623

those humans are so annoying right now.

624

So what?

625

And what's interesting about it,

626

I think what people are seeing here

is that a lot of the conversation

627

that goes on on this does

look surprisingly, you know, human like,

628

if you want to put it that way,

agent server jokes, debate topics,

629

have religion or, philosophy discussions

630

and even mock humans in creative ways.

631

Oh, so I was right. Yes. Yeah.

632

But anyway, it's it's going

to be interesting to see where that goes.

633

But I do think that

this is not actually Skynet yet.

634

So, you know, again, we'll,

we'll see where this goes.

635

Do they still make vacuum tubes?

636

So last year, we got into a lot of retro

electronic conversations,

637

with some of the old arcade games

and other things.

638

And there's been a lot of questions

639

that's been generated from this, and some

that I've had to start thinking about,

640

really, to see what's going on.

641

Because this is strange

that even ten years ago,

642

15 years ago, the answer to this question

would have been very, very different.

643

So do they still make vacuum tubes? Yes.

644

Do they make all the vacuum tubes that

you would need to work on old electronics?

645

No, it there's some stuff

that's still out there.

646

And there's a lot of, people that use

especially in things like guitar amps

647

and other stuff where they want

an analog circuit in a tube does deliver.

648

Most people say, and I agree with this,

better sound, more realistic sound.

649

It's crisper, you know, so

those type of tubes, are still out there

650

and it has, you know, the old,

651

what is 12 volt or whatever it was in

that thing that I was working on?

652

Those tubes are not as easy to come by.

653

And if you need a CRT

or a picture to forget it,

654

unless you can find one out there.

655

Those, they stop making those officially,

656

and even now, it's

even for things like high end equipment

657

where you really need a CRT, like in

a hospital setting or a lab or something.

658

They're just not out there anymore.

659

And the companies that rebuild them

aren't either.

660

Although I've heard some rumors

that there is somebody that's going

661

to start rebuilding them again,

and I think they're gonna have a lot

662

of business when they do, as long as they

don't price themselves out of the market.

663

Oh, right.

664

What technology is no longer made

that was popular?

665

Well, CRT yeah, CRT monitors.

666

But I do suggest what's

what do you think, Bill?

667

Gretchen,

if you were to, say, what's a technology

668

that was made that was popular

that doesn't exist anymore or is not used?

669

I can think of 100 of them,

670

but yeah, I can't think of them right now.

671

Yeah,

it is interesting what you mentioned. One.

672

The Walkman,

673

player that would be one.

674

Definitely.

675

And there's a there's a whole long

list of these things that are out there.

676

It's like you say,

that's a lot to talk about, but

677

things like in the audio,

you know, area mini would be another one.

678

You can still buy CD

players and stuff, but,

679

many this was a technology that was used,

a lot more in Europe

680

and in the United States,

but one that was out there.

681

And you mentioned things like CRT

is in the old game consoles and handhelds

682

and everything

that went along with the track tapes.

683

Yeah, eight track tapes.

684

I guess they were popular.

685

I hated eight track tapes.

But anyway, so did I.

686

Floppy disks?

687

Yeah. Floppy disks are another one.

688

Storage media and hard disks or

689

the interesting

690

one is they're not made,

but there's a company out there

691

that's literally

sitting on billions of them.

692

And what is it?

693

I can't remember the name of the company,

but that's all they deal.

694

It is floppy disks for companies

that need floppy disks.

695

Yeah. Oh, yeah.

696

So, another thing

is, is they don't put the drives

697

in the,

the laptops or the computers anymore.

698

Yeah. Right. Yeah.

699

Get them special.

700

Yeah, yeah.

701

And, you know, and along

those lines, VCRs are another one.

702

I mean, there's

a whole list of these things that,

703

that were out there that's no longer made,

and it's just the way things go.

704

But it seems strange to me in 15 years,

705

it's not only that

a lot of this stuff has stopped

706

being made,

but you can't even get parts anymore.

707

You can't. It's it's like totally gone.

708

Look at the cameras.

709

It's harder to now find camera,

710

because everybody's using their phones

to take pictures.

711

Certainly for, regular use.

712

Just somebody that would have had a point

and shoot

713

camera or camcorder, like the 110.

714

You know, the really cheap ones.

715

Yeah, the cheap film.

716

That kind of stuff

is probably completely gone.

717

And even you, you can still buy some film,

but it is really expensive.

718

You know,

where people live, they'll shoot the film.

719

But even digital cameras, analog

digital cameras are hard to come by.

720

And I know for some of the stuff we do in

the professional world, we have cameras.

721

But they're thousands of dollars.

722

It's not like somebody

that you're going to use for home use it

723

in a lot of cases, your phone's 4K

and that's just as good a job.

724

Yeah,

725

compared to what it used to be.

726

I mean, when I was in high school,

I took a photography class

727

and yeah, I mean, film was king then,

and then

728

I should have gotten it

when I had the chance.

729

But there was a mod kit for my camera

that turned it into digital.

730

But,

731

yeah, yeah, yeah, I knew something.

732

Last film with something

733

called Advanced Photo System,

I think, or something along those lines.

734

But Advantech.

735

Yeah, they go cartridges

and I'm having a problem right now.

736

I've found, a couple of rolls of film

that never had been developed

737

that I'd like to be on.

738

I'm having to ship them, like,

to another state.

739

You can get it done,

but it's also back in the day.

740

You dropped them off at the,

741

you know, grocery store or whatever,

and it was 5 or 6 months up the road.

742

Not anymore.

743

Yeah. No, you know that.

744

And quarter arcades are long gone.

745

Oh we sound old.

746

Do they still make that

or do they still make new matrix print.

747

Yeah.

748

And definitely another one

along the lines if you don't know.

749

And a lot of our younger listeners

may never have experienced these things.

750

But for a while

you had paper that went in the printer.

751

It was on continuous feed thing with pens

and the printer was loud.

752

It would go,

753

you'd be hearing that old in an office,

and there were different levels of quality

754

on these.

755

But basically what it was is

you had a set of, pens, usually nine

756

and 24, I think it was in the printhead,

and it would fire the pens

757

against the ribbon

and create the image on the paper.

758

That way.

759

And it was used

a lot with things like carbon paper,

760

which again, if you haven't heard of that,

is something that they used to use

761

where you could write on a piece of paper

and it would duplicate what you're doing

762

to the paper underneath.

763

It's the reason where we get the term

carbon copy on our emails.

764

Yeah,

all of this kind of stuff was out there.

765

So little research on it.

766

There are still a few dot

matrix printers being made,

767

but it's a lot like modern day

cassette decks that we just talked about.

768

You can still get a cassette player,

but the quality's no longer there.

769

There's no selection,

you know, in that kind of a thing.

770

It'll do what it's supposed to do,

but that's about it.

771

Remember the,

the credit card readers were used.

772

The the person would stick

the paper in there and then the card,

773

and then they'd smash the card

to get the image

774

and have this receipt and stuff, and,

I'm sure they don't make those anymore.

775

Well, can you imagine in the modern world,

something like that?

776

Because that would not be an online,

check.

777

So you can take a no credit card

and say, here, I'm paying for it.

778

And they'd run the, you know, thing

through the paper, and later

779

they wouldn't be able to

because the cards are now flat.

780

Yeah. They don't have the raised.

781

That's Yeah.

782

I mean, the yeah, the punch up

numbers are gone now so anymore.

783

But, yeah, even so,

the idea of that is, is just.

784

Yeah, I guess people were more honest

or something back when this was used.

785

And as far as the matrix printers,

do you guys

786

remember when the, those tape

printers came out?

787

They were a big deal

because the print would be super pretty.

788

And then later on, if you were lucky,

you could get Ahold

789

of one of the big fancy

laser printers done by HP.

790

Or what is it, canon?

791

Yeah, well, there's HP, canon, Xerox,

you know, that make those bad

792

laser printers

also were $10 million when they came out.

793

I mean, that technology does date

794

back to the early 80s, but not where

you would have it in your home. No.

795

You know, it, it was

it was super expensive.

796

And yeah, the, the film transfer printers,

which would do color

797

and everything else,

very expensive to run.

798

And I think that's one of the reasons

that they were done in.

799

Another one was thermal printers, too,

800

in the day where, you know, fax machines,

a lot of them work that way.

801

And,

you better get what you need off of that,

802

because that's

probably going to fade away.

803

And it certainly if it gets in

heat or something, it's done.

804

Yeah.

805

It's there's we use it every day.

806

Well thermal printers

still are in the sense of yeah.

807

The mark. Well, I have a label printer.

That's a thermal.

808

But what I'm talking about

is the thermal paper that that.

809

Okay. Yeah. Slippery stuff.

810

And then if it's subjected to heat,

it would turn black. Yeah.

811

Thermal printers are still out there.

812

It's just it's a different implementation

of that technology.

813

Now that does actually work a lot better.

814

Yeah.

815

All right.

816

Our C-band satellites going away.

817

Yeah.

818

This was another good question

that I didn't really think about.

819

But a lot of questions came in on it.

820

And so did a little research.

821

So C-band satellites are or and satellite

dishes rather are the

822

you might still see them around,

although there's not as many anymore

823

is that they were this huge

satellite dish.

824

They would sit out in the yard

825

or something

and oh, it just the father had one.

826

Yeah. Yeah, I had one in Austin. Yeah.

827

Austin it out goes down.

828

The list is probably still there.

829

But anyway, no it's not.

830

I looked on Google Earth, it's gone along

with the place that we used to live in.

831

So what's been happening

that prompted this question?

832

There's still a lot of people that use

C-band.

833

It's, you know, an analog

method of transmission.

834

And if you have the equipment,

it will still work.

835

And early on, things like HBO and stuff

would be sent over it.

836

And you could get it

without the scrambler, you know,

837

then they scrambled it, then you figured

out how to build a disc scrambler.

838

Yeah.

839

It was, you know, kind of the whole cat

and mouse thing with all of that.

840

But what's happening is

they've been auctioning off the spectrum

841

or the bands,

for C-band for use on other things.

842

And so they slowly been chipping

back at the range.

843

But no, it's still out there.

As far as I know.

844

There's not any idea of turning off

C-band completely.

845

So if you have a system like this,

it will still probably work for a while.

846

I say probably because you never know

what's around the corner,

847

but it's just like the old analog

televisions used to go up to channel 83,

848

and then the FCC wanted that bandwidth

so they wouldn't

849

go above, I think it was 51 for a while,

you know, that kind of a thing.

850

So it's still there.

851

It's just a lot less bandwidth

to be able to use with it.

852

So and, you know,

some of this stuff is a lot of fun

853

because the old school things,

it's like we were working on this,

854

wanted to pick up some over

the TV and over analog TV.

855

If you didn't have a strong signal,

you might have had some static.

856

Now it just goes black.

857

It won't do anything, you know?

858

So, yeah,

there are some advantages to that.

859

Now, the disadvantages is your picture

quality was standard definition or less,

860

you know, and stuff like that.

861

And now when it does work,

you've got a crisp picture.

862

I like my 4K TV, I like the digital stuff,

863

but it is a lot more involved,

864

which means it's

got a lot more to go wrong with it.

865

And when you have things like emergencies,

866

that's the first thing

that's going to go out. You know,

867

like I think an old NOAA emergency radio,

they picked up the signal.

868

I think they actually still do it.

869

It's the thing that took a battery.

870

And if there was an emergency,

you got it over that.

871

Now it comes over your cell phone.

872

Okay.

873

Well,

the NOAA thing requires a transmitter

874

somewhere that's analog

and just it works and gets out.

875

Now you need your phone, a phone network,

the battery to be charged.

876

You know, all this stuff

877

and those type of things are what

goes away first when you have a disaster,

878

because it's a more involved

thing, you know?

879

Yeah.

880

Talking about satellites, what are zombie

satellites?

881

Well, this is 28 days later. No.

882

Oh, so these is, you know,

this is kind of a cool thing,

883

and it's something that if you really want

to get creeped out, look this up online.

884

Zombie satellite, basically,

a definition of that is a satellite

885

that's no longer used,

that's gotten out of orbit

886

or is out of communication

or something like that.

887

So in other words, satellite

that no longer works for whatever reason.

888

But this thing about this,

where this kind of gets a little spooky,

889

is that these go back to the time

when know Sputnik

890

and our satellites

went up in the beginning of the 60s.

891

And a lot of those,

especially in the early days,

892

are out there still,

but they no longer work.

893

And there's one in particular

that sounds like a ghost.

894

And it was out of operation

for about 30 years.

895

And then all of a sudden it started

being picked up again once in a while.

896

And it's this weird, weird sound

that comes off of it.

897

And they think, what happened?

898

Is it spinning in orbit somewhere?

899

And after enough time went by,

the batteries were burnt through

900

and just became wires.

901

So now every time the solar panel

hit the sun, it turns on

902

and sends out a little bit of a recording

and they're not recording,

903

but of a signal.

And it turns back office. It's turning.

904

It does this,

905

but there are recordings of this online

and it's really cool to check out.

906

I encourage you to do it,

but it is a little, spooky.

907

And there's a lot of these out there.

908

And if you really want to dig in, you can.

909

There are sites that will tell you

what the responder sounded like and

910

what frequency and stuff,

so you can get like a software

911

defined radio and go out

and listen to them yourself.

912

All right.

913

What is next gen TV?

914

So, there's this book that talks about,

915

cyborgs, kids that are next gen,

cyber hawks.

916

I suggest you check it out, but I actually

call them cyber gen cyber again.

917

Definitely. You know, we got to get

our verbiage right, you know?

918

But, in any event,

that's not what this is.

919

So next gen TV is something

that has been a little bit controversial.

920

If you want to think back to the idea

of when analog

921

and we went to digital.

922

Right.

923

And so that was fine.

924

But at that point

it was ordered that this was something

925

that was going to be done.

926

And this isn't quite that a transition

to this.

927

It's a new version of digital TV.

928

Just to give the quick answer to it.

929

And they're trying to put new features

in it, are putting new features in it.

930

It will include things like,

4K, HDR picture quality, better sound,

931

mobile reception,

which would be really nice

932

because we analog went away,

we didn't have that anymore.

933

Interactive features and enhanced

emergency alerts that can do things

934

like wake your television up

935

if there's an emergency,

even if you have it turned off.

936

So there's some advantages to this.

937

The biggest issue, though,

is that there's a fight going on right now

938

that, next gen TV allows broadcasters

to encrypt their signals.

939

And over-the-air television

classically has been something

940

that's just that over the air.

941

You pick it up and you can pick it up,

you can watch it.

942

There's not a cost to do it.

943

And there is commercials and other things.

944

If they're encrypting the signal,

945

unless you have very specific equipment

to decrypt it,

946

and there's not a lot of that out there

right now,

947

it can become a problem.

948

And then the question is, it's okay

if they start doing this,

949

what's the next step?

950

I don't think you can record

and this is an experiment.

951

I'll talk about it later.

952

But I'm getting the,

hardware building thing out right now.

953

I want to know if I can still record

over the air signals

954

on, in this case, a laptop

like you would have done with a VCR.

955

And I'll be checking the new, technologies

against each other.

956

And this will be without hacking anything,

957

just with components

that you can legally buy.

958

It'll be interesting

to see where that goes,

959

but I think that's another thing

we wouldn't see anymore.

960

And, it's, you know, it's a problem.

961

So there's a big fight going on right now.

962

The FCC is reviewing things and it'll be

interesting to see where that goes.

963

But the technology as a whole

actually is a step up.

964

Does it, you know, require everybody

to replace their televisions again.

965

Well yeah. Or the tuners, you know,

so it'd be like that.

966

So that's a drawback.

967

And you can buy a television

now with a next gen tuner.

968

But it cost a lot more

because the tuners are expensive.

969

So you know, there's all kinds of things.

970

There are a lot of

people are going to go, my 4K

971

television is just fine,

thank you very much.

972

Yeah.

973

So you know, but that's what it is

if you hear about it.

974

That's what they're talking about.

975

It's just a new way of doing digital

television that has higher resolution

976

and more features.

977

Okay.

978

So what is wind FS?

979

So this isn't a formal lottery

that you can,

980

go to and get out.

981

So where this question comes up is

people are seeing this acronym

982

and this is nothing new.

983

It's a form of

984

or a method of how you set up

985

something like a hard drive

or a memory stick drive.

986

That kind of thing.

987

And basically what it is, is a

988

they're using more

and more of this technology,

989

something originally

developed by Microsoft.

990

And is drives and components get bigger.

991

The old file systems that were used at 32,

992

being one of the more common ones,

are no longer capable of really managing

993

a larger storage medium

like a big hard drive or something.

994

And as far as that goes,

what we're seeing is just needing this.

995

Well, what's happening is a lot of times

you'll go to format a flash drive

996

on your computer and you want to format

this is when FS or something else.

997

But what is it

when FS and there isn't really a lot of

998

ability to answer that properly.

999

So all it is is it's in windows,

it's in windows and other things.

And it's just a method

of how the computer writes files

to the drive or to whatever it may be.

And there's other ones out there too.

That's hard.

Not hardly.

Not the only one, but it is a method

that you probably will see it

because it's one that's used in windows.

And windows is a big, still a big part of

our operating environment on computers

and everything else.

So keep them coming in.

These are some good questions

and we love to answer them.

We try to do

one of these shows every quarter.

userfriendly.show

is the place to send them over.

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