Movie Draft date announcement, Westworld (102), Justified (313)
00:58 – Winter Movie Draft announcement – OCTOBER 17!
02:19 – Westworld (102)
19:47 – Justified (313)
Daily Tech Headlines – October 12, 2016
Amazon’s new music service, Apple expands in china, Microsoft Hololens comes to Europe.
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Show Notes
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Today in Tech History – October 12, 2016
1979 – The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy was first published unleashing in book form, the world of Vogon Poetry, essential towel behaviour, and the BabelFish.
2001 – An era ended as the Polaroid Corporation filed for federal bankruptcy protection, killed off by 1-hour developing and the rise of digital cameras. Bank One bought most of the company and re-launched a company under the same name.
2003 – Adam Curry posted an AppleScript called RSS2iPod that took MP3s downloaded by RSS to a folder and automatically transferred them to a connected iPod. Christopher Lydon’s Radio UserLand was used as the example.
2005 – After previously assuring us nobody wanted to watch videos on an iPod, Steve Jobs reversed course and Apple started making videos available on iTunes. ABC/Disney was the only TV network available at the time but you could get episodes of Lost and Desperate Housewives the day after they aired.
Read Tom’s science fiction and other fiction books at Merritt’s Books site.
Your Private Driver: Not in Service
This is a weekly column that offers news, insights, analysis, and user tips for rideshare platforms like Uber and Lyft. Look for it every Tuesday after the live show, right here on dailytechnewsshow.com.
You’ve just called an Uber to your quiet suburban home, getting ready to take your significant other out on the town for a night. The car is about 11 minutes away according to the app’s estimate, which should give you just enough time for a last-minute–the phone rings. You don’t recognize the number, but this late at night it can’t be just a random solicitor, can it?
Your Uber driver is on the other end of the line, asking about your destination. That’s weird, you put the destination into the app, they should already know where you’re going, shouldn’t they? You tell them again. They respond with some flimsy excuse about your destination not being in the right direction and say that you should cancel the trip and request another Uber. Annoyed and with the realization that your car won’t be coming to pick you up after all, you start to cancel, then remember that you’ll be charged a five-dollar fee if you do. You’re not paying that, it’s not your fault the driver flaked on you! The driver can cancel it on their own… but several minutes later you realize they don’t appear to have any intention of doing so. You can’t request another car until someone cancels the trip, and your night is slipping away. Angrily you cancel the trip, making a mental note to contest the charges later, then request another Uber… this time with a 17-minute ETA. Grumbling, you call to make a later dinner reservation.
Uber has made it a point of pride to talk about how well their UberX cars provide better service to the neighborhoods than traditional taxicabs ignore, particularly low-income and minority neighborhoods. Uber wants every ride request, regardless of origin or destination, to be a matched with a willing driver. For the most part, this still happens. After two rounds of drastic rate cuts since last year however, drivers have been finding ways to “profile” potential fares and refuse the ones that have a high risk of being unprofitable.
I say “high risk” because contrary to prevailing knowledge, Uber and Lyft drivers don’t know where a passenger is going until they start the trip, which means their riders are probably already in the back seat. This leads to situations like the scenario that opened this article (which Uber discourages with threats of deactivation, by the way). Drivers will more frequently refuse to accept trips (known as letting a ping time out) originating from certain areas that are too far away or don’t have surge pricing applied. Drivers can’t be deactivated for not accepting requests, though Uber will give them a “time out” if they decline three in a row or so.
What are these so-called unprofitable fares that drivers like to avoid? Most commonly avoided are trips with long ETAs. A pickup more than 10 or 15 minutes away will almost certainly result in a net loss for a driver if the rider is taking a short trip (and most trips are indeed quite short). Drivers aren’t paid for the distance it takes to pick a passenger up, only the distance it takes to drop them off. Basically the farther away you are from Uber hot-spots like nightclub districts, the more likely you are to have your trip profiled or rejected by one or two drivers before one eventually accepts.
Pickup requests near airports are another problem. If you need to be picked up at any place close to a major airport, most or all of the nearby drivers will be waiting in line for their shot at a (likely) long-distance run from one of the disembarking passengers. They’re not going to want to leave their place in line to gamble on ping from a nearby hotel or office park.
Finally there’s UberPOOL, which an increasing number of drivers are refusing to accept altogether. I won’t get into why UberPOOL is so disliked, but if you’re curious there’s a previous article that covers the subject somewhat in depth.
Unfortunately, as a passenger there’s not much you can do if your trip falls into one of these high-risk categories. Drivers place their need to make money above your need to get to where you want to go in an efficient manner (though even other drivers get annoyed with the tactics used at times). Uber occasionally offers incentives to entice drivers to complete more trips than they ignore, but those are gradually ending in the wake of the company’s massive hemorrhaging of capital that it blames on those same incentives. They could raise rates, but that would take Uber out of reach of the lower-income users the company is trying to court in order to expand its market dominance. They could make their drivers employees instead of independent contractors, but there’s no way that’ll happen, not with all the money they’re spending on court cases to prevent that outcome. Drivers themselves suggest promising a cash tip for their time. It sounds like bribery, but it does cut cleanly through the problem of income versus expenses.
At the end of the day, you may just have to plan on waiting a bit longer for an Uber to pick you up than you were expecting. And if you’re willing to wait long enough, self-driving cars that don’t care about how much money they’re making individually will replace all those pesky humans that need to pay their bills. Problem solved. Eventually.
Sekani Wright is an experienced Uber driver working in the Los Angeles metropolitan area. If you have any questions you would like answered for this column, you can contact him at djsekani at gmail dot com, or on twitter and reddit at the username djsekani. Have a safe trip!
DTNS 2876 – The French Connect Things
Can we use the Internet of Things to make our cities smarter? Laetitia Gazel Anthoine joins to explain. Plus Tom Merritt and Patrick Beja discuss the fallout from Samsung abandoning the Samsung note 7.
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Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the headlines music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!
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Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke, sebgonz and scottierowland on the subreddit
Show Notes
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Daily Tech Headlines – October 11, 2016
Samsung halts Note 7 production, Facebook brings software to Workplace, Yahoo ends email forwarding.
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A special thanks to all our supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.
If you are willing to support the show or give as little as 5 cents a day on Patreon. Thank you!
Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the theme music.
Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!
Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke, sebgonz and scottierowland on the subreddit
Show Notes
To read the show notes in a separate page click here!
Today in Tech History – October 11, 2016
1950 – CBS’s mechanical color system was the first to be licensed for broadcast by the FCC. Color TV would not become widespread until the late 1960s.
1957 – The Jodrell Bank observatory, with the world’s largest radio telescope, designed by Sir Bernard Lovell, began operation. It’s first job was to track the just-launched Sputnik satellite.
1958 – NASA launched the lunar probe Pioneer 1 the first of the Pioneer program. It didn’t get very far, falling back to Earth and burning up in the atmosphere.
Read Tom’s science fiction and other fiction books at Merritt’s Books site.
Cordkillers 140 – HomeCast
Netflix declares war on theaters, why you need a new Roku and Chromecast, and Dark Tower leaks!
CordKillers: Ep. 140 – HomeCast
Recorded: October 10 2016
Guest: None
Intro Video
Primary Target
- Netflix reached a deal with luxury-theater chain iPic to screen 10 of Netflix’s movies simultaneously with release. IPic has 15 locations in the US.
– Netflix reached a deal with luxury-theater chain iPic to screen 10 of Netflix’s movies simultaneously with release. IPic has 15 locations in the US. - Netflix CEO Reed Hastings Criticizes Theater Owners
– New Yorker TechFest event Friday: Reed Hastings, “Movie theaters are strangling the movie business. There’s been no innovation in the movie business in the last 50 years.”
– Said studios want to experiment with direct distribution but fear theater owners.
– Says Netflix will stay away from live sports for now
– Says VR will be a gaming tech for the next 5 years - Netflix Hires Former Universal Television President
– Netflix hired Bela Bajaraia as vp of content (developing content and acquiring rights – replaces Sean Carey)
– Former president of NBCUniversal’s Universal Television, Ms. Bajaria worked closely with Netflix on such shows as “Master of None” and “The Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt.”
– Will oversee development of original unscripted - Someone’s definitely going to buy Netflix
How to Watch
- Roku makes it easy to launch a streaming TV channel
– Roku has introduced the Roku Direct Publisher tool which lets anyone create a Roku channel without having to code. Users must host the videos themselves. Rolling Stone, Us Weekly and Cracked have used the tool to make apps. Channels built in the tool cannot charge subscriptions or video on demand fees yet. — And a 50-inch Roku TV from Hitachi is now available from Sam’s Club in the US for $499. 55 and 65-inch models are coming soon. - Apple Discontinues Third-Generation Apple TV
– MacRumors notes the Apple TV third generation is no longer listed in Apple’s stores. The older Apple TV sold for $69 but did not support the app store or Siri. The 4th gen Apple TV sells for $149 at the cheapest. - Chromecast Ultra gives you 4K content for just $69
– Chromecast Ultra
– 4k, HDR and Dolby Vision
– Google Play Movies adding 4K in November
– Ethernet port in the power adapter
– $69 in November - The Google Cast app is getting a new name and purpose
– The Google Cast app is being renamed again to Google Home and adds in features for Google’s new connected speaker.
What to Watch
- The Leaked Dark Tower Trailer Has a Lot of Modern Day New York City in It
– A trailer for the Dark Tower movie briefly leaked online. It focused on Jake having dreams and visions and talkign to a therapist about them. There are also scenes with Jake and Roland and some with Walter. - Amazon picks up ‘Lore’ TV series
– The Lore podcast which examines popular myths and legends sometimes with re-enaactments, has been picked up for a TV series by Amazon targeting early 2017. - Blade Runner sequel gets a title and release date
– The Blade Runner sequel will be called Blade Runner 2049 and arrive in theaters October 6, 2017. Harrison Ford will reprise his role as Detective Rick Deckard and star alongside Ryan Gosling in a setting 30 years ahead of the original. - New trailer is out for Iron Fist, the last of the Defenders to premiere. He’s very punchy. Arrives March 17.
- A trailer’s out for the first 6 episodes of season 3 of Black Mirror, coming to Netflix October 21.
- And along with releasing a teaser, Netflix announced the adaptation of Lemony Snicket’s A Series of Unfortunate Events will arrive January 13.
- Amazon has a new trailer out for Man in the High Castle. Comes December 16.
- They’re still making Underworld films with Kate Beckinsale. There’s a new trailer for Underworld: Blood Wars. Opens January 6.
- To celebrate the 50th anniversary of Roger Corman’s Deathrace 2000 there’s a new direct to video Roger Corman’s Death Race 2050 coming January 17.
What We’re Watching
- Brian: My Scientology Movie, Westworld, More Luke Cage (2 more eps), Justified 313,
- Tom: Flash, Arrow, Westworld (102) Justified (313)
- On the Lookout: Freakish
- Louis Theroux’s My Scientology Movie Leaks Online Before UK/US Theatrical Release
Front Lines
- HBO releases Westworld’s second episode two days early
– HBO released Westworld’s second episode two days early on HBO Go, HBO Now, and on demand in order to avoid people skipping the episode to watch the US Presidential Debate. - Why Cord Cutting Is Spreading to Broadband Internet Subscribers
– Pew Research issued a report on a different kind of cord-cutting, dropping a home Internet connection in favor of a smartphone. In 2015 13% of US adults used a smartphone as their only Net connection up from 8% in 2013. And adults with home broadband connections dropped from 70% in 2013 to 67% in 2015. - BitTorrent Fires CEOs, Closes Los Angeles Studio, Shutters BitTorrent Now
– BitTorrent fired its Co-CEOs and is closing its LA-based production studio and closing its BuiTorrent Now streaming efforts. BitTorrent Now, an ad-supported music and video streaming platform that launched in June. - AT&T Turns to Media Acquisitions as Its Video Ambitions Grow
– Sources tell Bloomberg that AT&T plans to acquire content producers and shift its model toward owning some of the content it distributes. AT&T owns DirecTV and has partnered with the Chernin Group on Otter Media which intends to bring content targeting a young audience to the cord-cutting service DirecTV Now. - This fall, more new milestones for the DVR
– DVRs are starting to materially affect ratings. During fall premiere week, five programs grew at least 100 percent from Live+Same Day to live-plus-seven-day-DVR playback, more than ever before. In total, 37 broadcast shows grew by at least 50 percent in 18-49s. This means the network will push to charge ad buyers on the 7 day rating, currently they generally charge on 3-day playback. - Toca TV is a new streaming service just for kids
– Popular kids app maker Toca Boca has launched Toca TV a $5 a month subscription service of kid-friendly videos for iOS. Minecraft gameplay, DIY crafts, recipes, songs and more are made by partners including Broadband TV (BBTV), DreamworksTV, AwesomenessTV, Studio71, and Freedom!
Dispatches from the Front
There was a question about travel router on #cordkillers. Here’s my pick.
– @ecardwell1
If you’re like me, you’ve been listening/watching since this was FrameRate. I’m always looking for more info on streaming services, and Inside.com has a newsletter just for that (https://inside.com/streaming). They put out a bunch of topics, people vote, & when a topic has enough subscribers, they create a newsletter.
– Chris
Hey guys!
First off, thanks for the show. We’ve come to the most wonderful time of the year, hockey season. It’s also the time where it’s toughest for me to be a cord cutter.
I’m a Flyers fan, living in a flyers market. My ISP showed me across state in a Pittsburgh location. Last season I signed up for NHL Gamecenter, but missed out on games against Pens, This season, my ISP has relocated (yay faster speeds), so now I’m thinking of signing up for Playstation Vue. Vue has CSN so I’d get the majority of games, along with NBC Sports.
Quick questions about Vue, how does it work for viewing outside the home? If I end up traveling for work outside my home market, can I still watch the games? I know when Eklund was on, he mentioned some problems, all of that get cleared up? At home, am I better off using a dedicated device like a Fire Stick or casting it from an Android phone?
Thanks for the help!
– Bob
So I was doing some volunteering the other day. Including me it was 8 people. I’m 51, and six of the people were in their early 20’s. so I asked how many of them were “Cord-cutters”. I received six puzzled expressions. So I started saying Roku and Apple TV and they all went ‘Oh, yeah. Why would you pay for cable when you just want to watch a couple things. Cable is so expensive.’ So all the young people don’t know the term Cord-cutter.
Also, when a younger person starts talking about how they just started lifting… they probably mean Lyft. Because all the kids seemed to know what that person was talking about, because their responses confused me and I had to ask. I thought they were talking about working out. But it was about the driving service.
Have a better than good day!
– Blair
Hi guys. Dave82 from the chat room letting you know Charter called my Ooma land line last Friday.They wanted me to sign up to cable again.Like always,they wanted me to sign up for a triple bundle.
I declined the triple bundle.She then offered me a double bundle.The original offer was Charter Cable Select 125 channels + 60mbps internet for $96.98.I declined.At the last second,she offered the bundle for $86.98 for 12,months.
I took the offer.I agreed to a Wednesday installation for the cable box with DVR that’s free.The install will be $34.00.Having seen the first 2 episodes of West World,I’ve decided to bump the cable package to Silver.They said that will be an additional $20.00 a month.But I’ll have access to Cinemax,HBO,and Showtime.
I cancelled my Slingtv Orange package this morning.Halt and Catch Fire on AMC was really the only reason I kept my subscription.As I’m all caught up.I figured I’ll watch the rest with Charter.Really recommend episode 8 if you have not seen it yet.
I liked Sling TV.But reliability and adds with AMC On Demand were very frustrating.Also,no cable authentication with Cable channel web sights as well.I could of went with PlayStation Vue.If I would,I would choose Core package with HBO add on having did some research.
I’ll email next week how my re- connection to Charter Cable went.
– David in Fond Du Lac,Wisconsin
It breaks my heart that you guys seem to have given up on The Get Down after only two episodes. Yes, the early episodes had some cheesy moments (although much of that seems deliberate), but it is a very fun, and in some ways surprisingly accurate, almost-fairy tale/children’s book retelling of the origins of hip hop — and does an especially good job of showing the four elements of hip hop culture, deejaying, bboying (breaking), emceeing, and graffiti “writing”.
Links
Today in Tech History – October 10, 2016
1964 – The opening ceremonies of the summer Olympics in Tokyo became the first Olympic broadcast relayed live by geostationary communication satellite. Too bad all the US networks gave up on live broadcasts of the Olympics.
1967 – The Outer Space Treaty came into force, banning nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction from being placed in Earth orbit or on any other celestial body. It also prevented any state from claiming sovereignty over any celestial resource like the Moon.
1994 – Håkon Wium Lie published “Cascading HTML style sheets – a proposal.” He proposed addressing the problems of existing style sheets being static, platform-specific and not allowing enough influence by the HTML author.
1995 – The Media Laboratory at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology wrapped up “A Day in the Life of Cyberspace” an attempt to chronicle what people did online that day.
Read Tom’s science fiction and other fiction books at Merritt’s Books site.
Daily Tech Headlines – October 10, 2016
The US accuses Russia in the DNC email hack, Hangouts is replaced by Duo on Android, and part of Salesforce REALLY doesn’t want to buy Twitter.
Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.
Follow us on Soundcloud.
A special thanks to all our supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.
If you are willing to support the show or give as little as 5 cents a day on Patreon. Thank you!
Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the theme music.
Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!
Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke, sebgonz and scottierowland on the subreddit
Show Notes
To read the show notes in a separate page click here!