2019 Daily Tech News Show


1	:00		TITLE: The Drone Hippo-thesis	Guest:

2
3			RECORD BEST OF INTRO - SEE SCRIPT BELOW
4
5			Stories subject to change up until showtime
6			Coming up on DTNS Our thoughts on the Xbox One Series X, do you mind robots writing your election coverage? and Blair from TWiS tells us about Hippo Drones!	Twitch Chat
7			play the opening music here....	Twitch Chat (Dark Mode)
8			Today's date
9			This is the Daily Tech News for Friday Dec 13th, 2019. In LA, I'm Tom Merritt
10			From Studio Redwood, I'm Sarah Lane
11			Drawing the top teach stories from Cleveland Ohio I'm Len Peralta
12			And I'm the show's Producer Roger Chang
13			Introduce Guest
14			Blair Bazdarich co-host of This Week In Science!
15
16			Get the wider conversation on our expanded show, Good Day Internet by becoming a member at patreon.com/dtns.
17	:31	TM	Let's start with a few tech things you should know...
18			play the news segue music here....
19			Quick Hits
20		sl	Cancel the folding party. Yes, Samsung Electronic’s President Young Sohn told the audience at TechCrunch Disrupt Berlin that Samsung has sold 1 million units of the Galaxy Fold. But unfortunately, a Samsung spokesperson told Yonhap News that Sohn confused 1 million actual sales with Samsung’s sales target. So no, Samsung has not yet sold 1 million Galaxy Folds. Yet.	https://www.thurrott.com/hardware/225335/samsung-didnt-sell-1-million-galaxy-folds-after-all
21		tm	Amazon's Echo speakers (and other Alexa-enabled devices) now work with Apple Podcasts in the US, with the option to make Apple Podcasts the default service. Users can ask Alexa to play a show, and continue listening from where they left off on another device. Alexa can also fast forward through an episode or skip to the next one.	https://www.engadget.com/2019/12/13/apple-podcasts-echo-speakers-amazon-alexa/
22		sl	Microsoft has updated its Windows logo and the icons for many of the company's apps with new colors, materials, and finishes. Jon Friedman, corporate vice president of design and research at Microsoft said “We needed to signal innovation and change while maintaining familiarity for customers. We also had to develop a flexible and open design system to span a range of contexts while still being true to Microsoft.”	https://www.theverge.com/2019/12/12/21012997/microsoft-new-windows-logo-fluent-design-icons
23		tm	CNBC reports that several bugs in Apple’s iOS 13.3 exploits a new feature called Communication Limits that adds new parental controls, supposed to let parents block their children from contacting anyone who isn’t in their address book, and preventing kids from adding new contacts unless a parent enters a PIN they set up ahead of time.	https://www.cnbc.com/2019/12/12/apple-iphone-parental-controls-bug-in-ios-13-lets-kids-text-anyone.html
24		sl	HP’s latest EliteBook, the Dragonfly is a 2-in-1 convertible which is part of HP’s business line. Prices start at $1,629 for a base configuration; the model The Verge has been testing is $2,169. To note, the Dragonfly has a dark blue color with a matte finish. HP covered the surface of it with an oleophobic coating, helping to repel fingerprints and grease. It also starts at 2.2 pounds with a 2-cell battery, with an optional 4-cell battery that bumps the weight up to 2.5 pounds. Inside, the Dragonfly has an 8th Gen Intel Core processor, up to 16GB of RAM, and up to 2TB of internal storage.	https://www.theverge.com/2019/12/13/21020445/hp-elite-dragonfly-laptop-convertible-review-price-specs-features
25			Let's talk a little more about...
26	:34	sl	Bloomberg noticed public filings indicating Apple acquired Spectral Edge, a UK company that uses machine learning to blend photos from a standard smartphone image sensor with infrared photos to improve picture quality and color accuracy. Spectral Edge has said this can be implemented in software or hardware. Potential apps could be low-light photography and improving grainy images.	https://www.engadget.com/2019/12/13/apples-spectral-acquisition/?
27	:36	tm	At the Game Awards, Microsoft revealed its next-generation console will be called the Xbox Series X. The design is a PC -inspired black rectangular box with a slot loading disc drive. You can stand the machine vertically or horizontally. According to Xbox chief Phil Spencer, the Xbox Series X will include an NVMe SSD and get four times the "processing power" of the Xbox One X from a custom AMD Zen 2 CPU and twice the power of the original Xbox One X which had 6 teraflops-- so that works out to 12 teraflops of GPU performance from Radeon RDNA. It supports 8K gaming, 120 fps in games, hardware-accelerated ray tracing, and variable refresh rates. The console also features Auto Low Latency Mode (ALLM) and Dynamic Latency Input to increase responsiveness and allow for better game streaming performance. Microsoft also revealed the new Xbox Wireless Controller, which features a slightly smaller design than last generation, and includes a share button for clips and screen shots. The controller will work with existing Xbox One consoles and Windows 10 PCs. The Xbox Series X is slated for a holiday 2020 release.	https://www.theverge.com/2019/12/12/21016575/microsoft-xbox-series-x-next-xbox-console	This is an almost-PC for the living room with an easier interface than windows and access to an instant library of games through GamePass and xCloud. - price?
28			--	https://www.theverge.com/circuitbreaker/2019/12/13/21020149/xbox-series-x-pc-specs-analysis
29	:40	sl	During the election in the UK Thursday, the BBC used an automated system to generate 689 election stories for each of the UK's constituencies, 40 of which were in Welsh. Journalists wrote templates for various types of stories, using BBC style and the machine selected appropriate phrases to fit the data. Each article was checked by a human editor before publication. And in some articles, human-written analysis was also added.	https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-50779761
30	:43	tm	Last month engineers at Slack released a distributed VPN mesh tool called Nebula as free and open source software under the MIT license. Nebula runs on Linux, MacOS and Windows, with mobile version planned. Nebula encrypts data using the Noise protocol, also used by Signal, then selects the most efficient path out of available nodes on the network. It's a little DIY right now. You can get binaries from GitHub along with a sample config file to modify. One downside is Nebula operates over UDP, meaning it can't get through some firewalls. If Wireguard doesn't work, Nebula probably won't either. It also sticks out a bit even if it is allowed. Nebula's best advantage seems to be efficiency.	https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2019/12/nebula-vpn-routes-between-hosts-privately-flexibly-and-efficiently/
31	:46	sl	Vice reports how Intel recently took several BIOS drivers for a number of unsupported motherboards off its website, saying the firmware has reached end of life. Intel used a lot of words to explain this to Vice, but ultimately it came down to not wanting to be responsible for old firmware. Which is understandable given all the spectre/meltdown hell the company has dealt with. Another source of old drivers are FTP repositories, but Vice points out that is getting harder too. Chrome will remove FTP support by version 82 and Mozilla is considering removing FTP support as well. While FTP clients stille exist, it's another hurdle for users, especially regarding finding the URLs. Thankfully Archive.og has been trying to collect old drivers and runs a section called the FTP Site Boneyard preserving old FTP contents.	https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/3a88z3/getting-drivers-for-old-hardware-is-harder-than-ever
32		topic reader	To get all the tech headlines each day in about 5 minutes subscribe to dailytechheadlines.com	http://dailytechheadlines.com/
33			play the news segue music here....
34			PAUSE PAUSE PAUSE
35
36			Discussion Story
37
38	:48		You hear a lot about drones being misused around airports, or being used to fly things like blood samples in Rwanda or Burritos in Australia, but the use of a quadcopter is expanding to other areas. Like studying animals!	https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2019-12/uons-soh120919.php
39			A research team from UNSW-Sydney are using drones to monitor Hippo populations in Southern Africa. What's the problem? (Hipppos are understudied because they're nocturnal, amphibious, and mean) How have they been counted before? (Aerial surveys - unreliable, land and water - hazardous) So what did they do? (Drones! -- multirotor DJI Phantom 4 ~$1000 ) How did it work? (Comparisons found it as affective as land counts, without the danger -- from about 40 meters above it was 10% more accurate. Drones could also measure body length - a way to measure age. ) Were the Hippos bugged? (Apparently not) Anything else come out of this? (Mornings are the worst time to count, contrary to previous thinking, because the Hippos go underwater a lot more)
40
41
42
43
44
45		sl	Thanks to all those who participate in our subreddit. Submit stories and vote on them at dailytechnewsshow.reddit.com and join in the conversation in our Discord which you can join by linking to a Patreon account at patreon.com/dtns	http://dailytechnewsshow.reddit.com
46
47
48		tm	Let's check out the mailbag
49	:56		Mailbag (feedback@dailytechnewsshow.com)
50			In your last show, a listener was asking about a projector that he could put in the middle of his bed to watch shows while his baby was sleeping. My wife and I have been doing this for years. I’ve had small portable projectors and they don’t work well due to the awkward angle that you are trying to point the projector to. Many times the cable is in the back and results in the projector sitting precariously and highly susceptible to falling over. Then we got a Lenovo Yoga Tab Pro 3. It has an integrated projector and jbl speakers which sound great. We place it on top of the headboard and angle the image to the ceiling and can get a decent sized image with very good brightness at night time. It is running android, so you can use Plex, Netflix, Sling, Disney Plus’s, YouTube etc. The tablet itself is a bit slow as the tech is a few years old, but it is more than capable of handling this task. The link is $312 in Canadian dollars, so probably closer to $230 is USD. Regards, Neil	https://www.lenovo.com/ca/en/tablets/android-tablets/yoga-tab-3-series/Yoga-Tab-3-Pro/p/ZZITZTBYT1F
51
52
53
54
55		sl	Shoutout to patrons at our Master and Grand Master levels including ...
56			Tony Glass Rueshann Brantley Adam Carr
57
58			Check in with Len	lenperaltastore.com
59
60	:58	sl	Thanks to... Blair Bazdarich	twis.org
61				twitter.com/blairsmenagerie
62			Patron Thank You	http://www.dailytechnewsshow.com/support
63
64		tm	We have new Patreon reward merchandise! To celebrate 6 years of DTNS, Len Peralta created a 6-year anniversary DTNS logo. If you back certain levels at patreon.com/dtns for three months you can get either a sticker, poster, mug or t-shirt. Get the details at patreon.com/dtns/merch	https://www.patreon.com/dtns/merch
65			And you can always support our show at any level at dailytechnewsshow.com/patreon	http://dailytechnewsshow.com/patreon
66			And please peruse our fine selection of DTNS stuff!	http://dailytechnewsshow.com/store/
67
68			play the end theme music here....
69		sl	Our email address is feedback@dailytechnewsshow.com! We're live M-F at 4:30 PM eastern/21:30 UTC find out more at dailytechnewsshow.com/live.	http://www.reddit.com/r/dailytechnewsshow/
70		tm	See You All Monday!!	Good Night Rob
71			END OF SHOW
72
73
74			STOP DISCORD Stream
75
76			POST GDI	Much Kneaded Dough
77			Welcome to the very Last episode of DTNS for 2019!! Thank you all so much for your support. You make each and every DTNS a fun and worthwhile experience. And on that note Joe aka Theater Monkey has put together a set of best of highlights from this year's GDI. Enjoy!