We discuss the mind-bending power of Cosmos, the cocaine-fueled power of Archer, our take on Rick and Morty. Plus Tom keeps watching The Shield.
S&L Podcast – #169 – Sneaking Peeks and Swapping Sleeves
From a debate on whether we should read early chapters from George R.R. Martin’s “Winds of Winter” to the usefulness of Asimov’s three laws, to our wrap-up of Altered Carbon, this is an episode that should contain a lot of wisdom. Who knows? It might!
WHAT ARE WE DRINKING?
Tom and Veronica: Bulleit Bourbon
QUICK BURNS
Amazing Stories relaunches on April 1
Pre-order William Gibson’s new far-future novel The Peripheral
A New Novella from Patrick Rothfuss’ Kingkiller Chronicles Series Arrives November 2014!
Excerpt from the Winds of Winter | George R.R. Martin
All Hell Breaks Loose In That New Winds of Winter Chapter
Why Asimov’s Three Laws Of Robotics Can’t Protect Us
TV, MOVIES AND VIDEO GAMES
BOOK CHECK-IN
WRAP-UP Altered Carbon by Richard K. Morgan.
Finished – overall impressions?
APRIL PICKS
A Dance of Cloaks by David Dalglish
BARE YOUR SWORD
Which real-world companions would accompany you on a fantasy world quest?
***
Hey Tom and Veronica!
Listener from Bosnia here. Since you’re reading Altered Carbon I’d like to weigh in.
Kovacz which is a transliteration of Kovač. The last letter is read like a “ch” sound like in cheap, chore or champion.
The “a” is more like an “ah” sound rather than “ay”. Like the second “a” in “large”. And Kovač means “smith”. So there you go! Takeshi Kovacz – Warrior Smith!
Not chiding you for the pronunciation btw; I just found that this was an appropriate excuse to contact you!
Love the show and I hope it keeps going strong for years to come.
All the best,
Stefan
P.S.:
I hope (rather arrogantly) that this email gets picked up for the podcast because I would absolutely love hear Veronica mispronounce my name, because I’d find it quite charming!
***
Hey sword and laser!
I need some help. I’m trying to find a book I read once upon a time. It has to do with the the earths rotation stopping, I think because of an asteroid strike, and is an adventure set in what remains of civilization. I want to say it’s by Navarro… But can’t find any hints of it anywhere. Does this ring a bell?
Thanks and keep up the good work!
Ryan
***
DTNS 2203 – April Fools BALEETED
Natali Morris joins the show and we get tot he bottom of all this April Fool’s Day nonsense. Also it’s Gmail’s legit 10th birthday.
Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.
Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.
A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.
If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!
Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!
Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!
Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke and scottierowland on the subreddit
Show Notes
Today’s guest: Natali Morris, CNBC Contributor and cofounder of ReadQuick
Headlines
Today is April 1st. April Fools’ day which the Internet first made amazing and then risked ruining. How did the Internet do this year? Google Japan gave us a robot hand you can use to type. Google+ introduce auto awesome photobomb which inserted David Hasselhoff into your pictures. Richard Branson played along with Nest for flights, giving Virgin airline passengers climate control. YouTube decided to stop producing the memes and let people do it this year. And SwiftKey for physical keyboards, Roku Watch, Samsung, Toshiba, AND HTcC’s smart gloves, CERN changing to comic sans as the official typeface, Sphero’s selfiebot, iFixit bought by Apple, AND the inevitable raft of awesome, possibly soon to be real fake products from ThinkGeek.
April 1st is also Gmail’s birthday. Harry McCracken has an excellent piece on Technologizer about the origins of Gmail and why it was launched on April Fool’s day. It mostly had to do with Sergey Brin’s sense of humor. Happy birthday Gmail! You did better than the email system I was using ten years before you, called PINE.
And now news. Ish. Reuters reports Apple suppliers will begin producing displays for the next iPhone in May, which would be about right on schedule for a fall release of the phone. Reuters source says Japan Display, Sharp and LG Display have all been tapped to make screens. The screens being produce in May are supposedly 4.7-inches, a big jump up from the current 4-inch screens in the iPhone 5S. Apparently a 5.5-inch screen is in the works but hit a snag and won’t be produced until later this year.
Engadget reports its sources say Google is testing a new camera app for Android with a background-blurring effect for portrait shots and improved panorama and Photo Sphere modes. Also photo framing gets a tweak so that what you see in the viewfinder is what you get in the picture. Nothing creeping in at the edges. And support for third-party filters is also supposedly on the way. The improvements would come in a standalone app so Android device owners wouldn’t have to wait for a carrier update to their OS.
Now actual news from not anonymous sources. TechCrunch reports that Pavel Durov, founder of Russian social network Vkontakte, announced he has resigned as the company’s Acting Director General. Durov said said it became “increasingly difficult” to run the social network after ownership changes put pressure on the company’s freedom of speech ethic. Durov has become increasingly outspoken about mass surveillance and freedom of speech in Russia. He sold his remaining stake in the company in January. Mail.ru owns 52% of Vkontakte.
CNET’s Jeff Bakalar reports select Xbox Live members will get invites to early access to a few new features for the Xbox One. Among the features are the ability to set DVR recordings and watch recordings from a tablet or smartphone. Also coming is “Rent Once, Play Anywhere” which lets you stop playback of a rented video on one device, say your Xbox and pick up where you left off on another, like a Windows Phone.
News From You:
fja submitted the BBC story on OKCupid dissuading its visitors from using Firefox, in protest over CEO Brendan Eich’s previous support of antigay marriage law in California. Visitors to OK Cupid’s site who use Firefox receive a screen asking them to use another browser, with an explanation of why. However a link does allow Firefox users to continue on to the main site. Mozilla told the BBC it has not been contacted by OKCupid and said “Mozilla supports equality for all, including marriage equality for LGBT couples.”
LifeDownloaded passed along the Verge story that HP has settled a class action lawsuit that alleged the company misled investors. The plaintiff’s claimed HP publicly said it would flood the market with WebOS powered devices after acquiring Palm in 2010, but that privately the company never actually planned any such thing. HP will pay $57 million as part of the mediated settlement.
And KAPT_Kipper posted the GigaOm story that Google+ users can now see a stat telling them their total views adding up profile, post and photo views since October 2012. The number will show up on the profile page. Number-hungry companies desperate to show some kind of reach on their brand pages are calling this addition ‘analytics.’
Discussion Section Links:
http://time.com/43263/gmail-10th-anniversary/
Pick of the Day: f.lux
Wednesday’s Guest: The Internet’s own Lamarr Wilson!
Cordkillers Ep. 13 – My algorithm loves it
Do you want a service that know what you want to watch better than you do? Why does Roku think it’s better than Apple TV? Will CBS really take its channel off the air?
DTNS 2202 – Mo Money Mo-torola
Wil Harris joins us to chat about the patent wars heating up, CBS’s Les Moonves threatening to take his channel and go off air, and more!
Multiple versions (ogg, video etc.) from Archive.org.
Please SUBSCRIBE HERE.
A special thanks to all our Patreon supporters–without you, none of this would be possible.
If you enjoy the show, please consider supporting the show here at the low, low cost of a nickel a day on Patreon. Thank you!
Big thanks to Dan Lueders for the music and Martin Bell for the opening theme!
Big thanks to Mustafa A. from thepolarcat.com for the logo!
Thanks to our mods, Kylde, TomGehrke and scottierowland on the subreddit
Show Notes
Today’s guest: Wil Harris, Wil Harris, co-founder ChannelFlip
Headlines
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella is starting to put his own stamp on the company’s executive team. TechCrunch reports Nadella announces Monday morning that Scott Guthrie is now the executive vice president of Cloud and Enterprise, filling Nadella’s old role. Phil Spencer will now run a team that combines Xbox and Xbox Live with Microsoft Studios and reports to Terry Myerson who runs operating systems. And when the Nokia acquisition is finally complete, Stephen Elop will become executive vice president of the Devices group.
Reuters reports that researchers found another vulnerability insecurity company RSA’s random number generator. Reports in December indicated the NSA paid RSA $10 million and that the NSA had implemented a back door into RSA’s Dual Elliptic Curve random number generator. Now professors from Johns Hopkins, the University of Wisconsin, the University of Illinois and elsewhere have discovered that an extension called “Extended Random” could be exploited as a vulnerability. Extended Random was touted as a way to boost randomness but makes predicting secure numbers easier according to the researchers. RSA continues to maintain it has not intentionally weakened any of its products.
The Washington Post reported jury selection began Monday in the latest court battle between Apple and Samsung. Apple accuses Samsung of infringing five patents on newer devices, including tap-from-search that makes things like phone numbers into links as well as slide to unlock. In a counterclaim, Samsung says Apple infringes its wireless technology system that speeds up sending and receiving data on iPhones and iPads.
Reuters reports the European Parliament will vote on the Net Neutrality recommendations at noon on Thursday. The current proposal, put forward by Socialist and Green party MEPs, says: “(Specialised) services shall only be offered if the network capacity is sufficient to provide them in addition to Internet access services and they are not to the detriment of the availability or quality of Internet access services.” The proposals need approval by the EU’s 28 governments before they can become law. Only the Netherlands and Slovenia have net neutrality legislation already in place.
The Next Web reports on data from the Kantar Worldpanel ComTech Report showing good news for the budget phone folks. Motorola went from virtually nothing to 6% of the UK market in six months, on the strength of the MotoG which launched in November. Similar surges came for Wiko in France which has 8.3 percent share, and Xiaomi in China with 18.5 percent. Android remains the top OS in Europe at 68.9 percent with Apple at 19 percent and Windows Phone with 9.7 percent. In the US, Android is the most popular platform at 55% and LG is the US fastest growing manufacturer at 8% marketshare on the strength of the G2.
News From You:
spsheridan pointed out the Ars Technica article about the US Supreme Court hearing oral arguments today in the case of Alice Corp. v. CLS Bank. Four patents at issue describe software that performs trusted financial exchanges. Nobody, except maybe Alice Corp. expects the Supreme Court to rule the patents are valid. The importance of the case revolves around the reasoning the court gives. The Court could rule that software itself doesn’t qualify for patent protection. Companies that favor software patents, like Microsoft, Adobe and IBM, have filed briefs recommending the court invalidate the Alice patents very narrowly without impacting software patents in general. Other companies like LinkedIn, Twitter, Yelp, Newegg, Netflix and Rackspace have filed a brief asking the court to make it much harder to get software patents. Unsurprisingly the justices’ line of questioning today indicated they are likely to invalidate the Alice patents but eliminate the legal basis of software patents altogether.
KAPT_Kipper submitted the TechCrunch article explaining that Dropbox complies with copyright takedown notices by turning files submitted to them into hashes and then comparing the hashes to dropbox folder contents. If the hashes match then sharing is disabled for that file, though otherwise it’s treated normally.
metalfreak posted an OpenSource.com story that the US Department of Labor is requiring the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license on all content created with the grant funds in their Ready to Work Partnership grant program. The program is meant to help long-term unemployed workers get employment in industries, like tech, where H-1B visas are used. In other words anything made by the 20-30 recipients of a share of the $150 million of government money will have to be openly licensed.
nickgiulioni pointed out this Gizmodo article about Samung’s $700 4K monitor now up for pre-order. The 28-inch UD590 has a resolution of 3840 x 2160 pixels.two HDMI 1.4 ports, displayport, and audio out. Looks like Amazon already sold out of their stock of them.
Galcyon sent in the Verge article about Google getting a jump on April Fool’s day. Maybe the schedule for this one was left up to Australians. Google has a video up advertising an augmented reality Pokemon game tied in to Google Maps. If you zoom into certain areas around the world on Google Maps today, you’ll see where the creatures are meant to appear. Yay April Fools day where news goes to die!
Discussion Section Links:
Pick of the Day: Amazon Glacier
Tuesday’s Guest: Natali Morris, CNBC contributor
It’s A Thing- s03e04 – 2048
Number games like Threes and 2048 are sweeping the nation. Why? No idea. We’re too busy playing 2048.
It’s A Thing- s03e03 – Egg on top
What’s not better with an egg on top? We come up with a couple things. But honestly, it was difficult. This podcast contains trace amounts of yolk puns.
FEATURED REVIEW: The Martian by Andy Weir
Welcome to our Featured Reviews! In this series, we’ll be highlighting book reviews by the S&L audience. If you want to submit a review, please check out the guidelines here! -Veronica
The Martian starts with our protagonist, Mark Watney (a smart Andy Dwyer from Parks and Recreation to me) getting struck by shrapnel from a communication satellite as he and his crew mates evac on Mars, leaving Watney behind. This premise could be very dry with all of the technical details about oxygenators and CO2 scrubbers and water reclaimers but author Andy Weir makes it interesting. Watney has such a great voice and he’s very funny, pulling the reader into the story and immediately making Watney sympathetic.
Lucky for Watney, he is a botanist and mechanical engineer, making him well-suited to survive alone on another planet. He’s able to fix problems that arise (make water from rocket fuel, build things out of spare parts, repair his home) and grow some food from Earth soil mixed with Martian soil (yay potatoes! Boo human manure. Smelly business). To keep things interesting, (Mark is alone. Things would get boring if things didn’t go wrong) bad things sometimes happen. It’s fun to see how Mark figures out how to solve these problems with his limited resources.
The book also follows NASA personnel on Earth as they make plans to rescue Mark. We also spend some time with Mark’s crew mates aboard the Hermes. These characters aren’t as fleshed out as Watney is but that’s alright. After all, this is Mark’s story. The NASA folks have interesting interactions and plenty of disagreements about the right course of action. I enjoyed the Earth parts as much as Mark’s parts.
Not only is the plot to The Martian gripping but the writing is great as well. It’s descriptive but not overly technical without sacrificing the emotion. The research that went into this book shows. Everything that happens seems totally plausible. The technology is basically modern day with perhaps a few advanced pieces of hardware but nothing that’s space magic. I’m kind of floored that this is Weir’s first novel. It completely blew me away. Maybe in a few years, this will be turned into a movie. Gravity meets Moon!
It’s A Thing- s03e02 – Naps
It’s A Thing- s03e01 – Cleanses & Instacart
We’re back for another round and a tweak to the format. One episode, one thing, no waiting! Who’s on a cleanse? Everybody apparently! But man those containers are expensive!
