In the book Made To Stick, it talks about to get people to quickly understand and idea. One really easy way is to take something they already know and then tell them how it’s different. Thus the formula “It’s the [existing company] of [new market]” was born.
Did you know that LOLs are on the way out? haha.
WeChat is huge and chances are you’re not using it because it’s huge in China. What makes this app interesting is that it breaks many of the current rules that US app makers follow.
Google is now part of Alphabet. It’s both a fascinating name, and a confusing name. Same goes for the structure. Hopefully this will make it easier for us to predict what Google is going to do.
Disneyland and Walt Disney World are adding a Star Wars land, to which we declare: about time! Seriously, this is going to be awesome. Just as awesome is the work that ILM is doing to bring VR to the professional movie level. As the camera guy who made bullet time says, he wants to make the Matrix.
People still think Apple is making a car. James still thinks they’re wrong.
HTC is worth less than the cash they have. That’s not a good sign and we expect something big to happen to them within the year.
Foursquare is still around, BTW.
Baseball is starting to experiment with computer aided batter’s boxes instead of umpires. This is a fascinating proposition that requires some fundamental answers about the purpose of the game. Check out the South Park episode right below that link.
Samsung creates the first 16TB SSD… which is just crazy.
And finally, if you’re on AT&T, check out their new shared data plans because they just got better.
Enjoy the show!
Fantastic 4 really wasn’t that fantastic…
The New York Times signs up over 1 million digital only subscribers, Verizon ditches the two year contract, Jennifer Granick pleads to to not give up our freedom at the Back Hat Conference, Epson tries to kill the ink cartridge (good luck with that), Uber is a Full-Stack Startup but Snapchat is not, Facebook continues to make Messenger attractive to businesses, Stems makes it possible split music into 4 separate tracks, Nico Gerard comes out with a watch that uses Apple Watch as an accessory (yes, really), Elon Musk can neither confirm nor deny the future of self-driver cars, Chris Sacca wants Jack Dorsey to be Twitter’s CEO, and VR movies are coming to Oculus (just like we said).
Mission Impossible came out this week. Go watch Tom Cruz do his own stunts.
Don’t forget to help us celebrate our 200th episode by getting in on our 2 $100 gift card giveaway.
In the meantime, is iTunes poorly designed (we’re still not sure)?, Zazzle is slowly growing and turning into a huge company, Intel & Micron invent a new memory called 3D Xpoint, OnePlus unveils the OnePlus 2, Motorola unveils the Moto X and Moto G, Microsoft releases Windows 10, Google starts killing Google+ but will revive Glass, Stephen Hawking and Elon Musk think militarized AI is a bad idea, Facebook plans to do the same bait and switch with Messenger/WhatsApp that they did with Pages, and Snapchat is selling a beach towel just because.
Twitter has tons of potential and that can only be unlocked with a full-time CEO, SQFT aims to reduce agent costs to only 2%, Taylor Swift and Apple harmonize over Apple Music, Google and Tidal try to keep up, Pando become subscription based, Facebook Messenger doesn’t require a Facebook account, Uber is driver France crazy, 360Fly wants to capture the VR recording market, and Swarm mayors are in the house again.
James celebrates the birth of his new daughter: Elinor. Thankfully she manages to be quiet the entire episode. Speaking of this episode, we talk about:
Vox buying Re/Code, Jony Ives moving up the ladder and doing less, Minecraft’s massive size, Google I/O: Photos, Pay, M, Now on Tap, Brillo/Weave, Jacquard, Soli, Ara, and Vault. We also talk about Mary Meeker’s Internet Trends Report, Snapchat’s something or other, and Facebook becoming a bank.
We talk about four stories this week. That’s right. Just four.
First, Google has an image problem which is going to cause them problems with their self-driving car program. Second, Nasdaq is going to be implementing the blockchain on their private equities market. Third, Verizon is buying AOL. Nobody should care, be we all really do. Fourth, Facebook announces Instant Articles in an attempt to speed up the internet by making links native.
An online acquaintance is a ecquaintance. Get it?
This week we talk about Nucleus Scientific and their battery disruption, Selequity’s service to make funding real estate deals easier, Facebook’s Internet.org, Nintendo’s profitability, Keurigs pouring out of customer satisfaction, Fitbit’s statement to IPO, Oculus Rift’s pressure to ship, and how Showcard is using the Blockchain to store your identity.
The Spanish city of Jun using Twitter to run its government, Matthew got an Apple Watch, Google experiments with cell networks with Project Fi, BWM is selling a car that parks itself, Elon Must almost sold Tesla to Google, Central Japan Railway breaks a speed record at 603km/h, Cedar Fair’s new roller coaster Fury is decided to scare us, Apple haptic are going to become more life like, the Chevrolet-FNR looks cool but isn’t real, and Twitter is getting more into the messaging space.
Matthew joins us after running a Tough Mudder and getting virtually zero sleep the day/night before. Still, we soldier on and cover all of Facebook’s latest plans to take over the Internet. The crazy part: we think it just might work.