Waves of Tech

Steve, Dave, and Jim are back at it this week…talking tech and enjoying every minute of podcasting. Join the discussion as we discuss new Google+ features, new music service Rara, and the decline of customer service. Also, be sure to click on the CES banner on the home page and see how you can help support NetCast Studio and TPN.TV at CES 2012.

1. Five Google+ Hangout Features Business Will Love

Six months ago, Google+ came storming into the social media realm. Many were making comparisons to Facebook and pitting the two against each other. As Google+ grows it is starting to creates its identity, being one that is a drastically different than Facebook’s. Despite being in its infancy, Google+ is making huge strides in terms of communication and creating a platform for multimedia conversations. Five great new features introduced by Google are ready for you and your business to dive into. The new features are: “Go Live” “On Air Broadcasting” “On Air Recording” “Dial In” and “Notification.” The new features will allow users to record entire press events and upload those directly to YouTube, creating another content creation platform. As Google continues to develop their social platform, they are successfully integrating several Google services into that single platform. Tune in for more specifics on each of these five features.

2. New Music Rara.Com Launches: Do you feel like you need to own your music?

Rara.com is a new digital music provider on the block. It will offer users access to an ad free streaming service featuring more than 10 million unique music tracks via an Internet connection for a monthly fee. Rob Lewis, the English businessman operating Rara, is convinced that music fans don’t really want to own their music anymore, claiming that many find digital media just to complicated to use. Rara is offering their users the ability to listen to music, access playlists, and create their own lists via the service. The catch…no download-to-own option. What place does Rara have in the digital media sphere and how successful can they be with their revenue model? Listen in to our thoughts and read some of Jim’s just below.

3. Technology Services & Customer Service

Here at Waves of Tech, we are used to the new media model of content consumption. The traditional model bothers many of us because, to a great extent, we do not control the time and place in which content can be accessed (i.e. Network TV Shows). We are told when we have to watch a movie, how long that movie will be available, and in what form we will watch it. Well, Steve always has a story to tell. This week is no different with his experience with DirecTV. We believe his story is reflective of our desire to consume the content we want and when we do want! Steve brings up some valid opinions on big media providers in today’s climate. Jim & Dave follow suit with what these services can do for us and what they’ve lost over the past few years.

4. NTSB wants ban on cell phones while driving

We briefly discuss the recent announcement from NTSB regarding the desire to ban the use of all cell phone usage while driving. With thousands of policy options and a limitless list of counter-policy arguments, the battle is raging at the state and federal levels of government. What are your thoughts on the matter?

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Rara.com Launches and Google Plus Hangout Features – Waves of Tech #Podcast netcaststudio.com/rara-com-launc…

— NetCast Studio (@NetCastStudio) December 15, 2011

Jim, Steve, and Dave bring another three topics of discussion the table. This week we discuss the digital divide. Is it widening, narrowing, or staying static? We preview a bit of CES 2012 and how you can help with the show. We also touch on the changing landscape of news and sports media, a classic new media verse traditional media.

Audio Only:

1. The Digital Divide is it getting wider
2. Sports & News Media: Less viewing, same information, different medium
3. CES 2012 & Apple looses iPad trademark in China

The Digital Divide – the debate always seems to surface every 3 to 4 months on Waves of Tech. This week, we analyze an article titled “The New Digital Divide” from the New York Times. So many variables factor into whether the digital divide continues to grow, shrink, or stabilize. The essential factors include access, cost, income level, and usage. In an age where so much control is in the hands of industries, we have to consider the smart-phone industry, cable company monopolies, and the federal government. Some of Jim’s direct thoughts are included at the end of the show notes.

I (Dave) have always been a major fan of sports. Be it baseball, soccer, football, professional, or amateur, you could also count on me checking out the live games and spending hours in front of the TV. Well with introduction of social media, new media content delivery, and the changing platforms for gathering sports, I recently noticed myself consuming less and less live broadcasts and simply relying on other means of gathering information about sports. I open the discussion up to Steve and Jim to see if they have noticed a similar transition in their own lives, be it sports or not. Check out the discussion.

CES 2012 is just over a month away. Thousands of vendors, truck loads of people, and nothing but consumer goodies to scope out over an entire week!! As Steve and Dave gear up for the trip with TPN.TV, we are asking for a little bit of help on sending us out to Las Vegas. We will be provided some ground breaking interviews with floor vendors and product creators. Check out the discussion and help out if you can. Thanks!

Support CES 2012 Support Staff $25, $50, $100, Your Choice

Finally, Apple looses the iPad trademark in China. This court battle has been going on for nearly 4 years and it looks like Apple is going to have to pay top dollar to secure that name in the Chinese market. Proview Technology bought the trademark rights to “iPad” in 2000 in its home county of China. What do you think Apple will do? Pay for the naming rights? Rename the iPad for distribution in China?

 JIM’S THOUGHTS
The New Digital Divide- This article caught MY attention as it purportedly was addressing my students situations. I know that I try to stay very aware that not everyone has Internet access. And so, I started into the article.

“Just over 200 million Americans have high-speed, wired Internet access at home, and almost two-thirds of them get it through their local cable company. The connections are truly high-speed…they can reach up to 105 megabits per second, fast enough to download a music album in three seconds.”

Really? It looks like a mashing of thoughts to me that paints an inaccurate picture. According to this paragraph, you would assume that ⅔ of Americans with wired Internet are sailing at those high speeds. I get @ 20 Mbps and I’m pushing it to get that!

“US Smartphones:  in just over four years the number has jumped from about 10 percent to about 35 percent; among Hispanics and African-Americans, it’s roughly 44 percent. Most of the time, smartphone owners also have wired access at home: the Pew Internet and American Life Project recently reported that 59 percent of American adults with incomes above $75,000 had a smartphone, and a 2010 study by the Federal Communications Commission found that more than 90 percent of people at that income level had wired high-speed Internet access at home.”

As carriers, like Verizon, move towards not even offering feature phones, THIS to me becomes the bigger problem. We are forcing people that don’t REALLY need the SmartPhone features into having to buy them. In discussing the data caps of the carriers, the article states

For example, well before finishing the download of a single two-hour, high-definition movie from iTunes over a 4G wireless network, a typical subscriber would hit his or her monthly cap and start incurring $10 per gigabyte in overage charges. If you think this is a frivolous concern, for “movie” insert an equally large data stream, like “business meeting.”

The majority of jobs are not going to be conducting “business meetings either. So, again, forcing lower income families into something that they don’t really need. But they DO need a phone.

“According to numbers released last month by the Department of Commerce, a mere 4 out of every 10 households with annual household incomes below $25,000 in 2010 reported having wired Internet access at home, compared with the vast majority — 93 percent — of households with incomes exceeding $100,000.

Well, as a teacher, I fall in the middle of those two figures, so mathematically, I guess that would put me in with about 75% of the population. That does not seem like a statistically bad place to be. Of my 26 students, 23 of them have Internet access. I work in a school with over 60% of students on free or reduced lunch, so those figures don’t seem to play out for me.

So where is this all going? The article moves from this point into discussing the problem with way that high speed Internet access is regulated in the US, as opposed to other countries around the world. It addresses the need for alternative like FiOS at reasonable rates. I think this is something that we can ALL agree on. And then it concludes

“Thirty years from now, African-Americans and Latinos, who are at the greatest risk of being left behind in the Internet revolution, will be more than half of our work force. If we want to be competitive in the global economy, we need to make sure every American has truly high-speed wired access to the Internet for a reasonable cost.”

And so, as a persuasive writing, the article does everything right. It throws in an amazing amount of facts (no always connected) and it plays the racial card to tug at your moral responsibility. But the bottom line is this: Internet access has moved into a place where it is becoming more and more of a necessity, whether high speed or not. Email, the most basic of modern communication, doesn’t require the high speed, but you’ve got to have access. With phones coming around like the Republic Wireless, that can pass off data usage to wifi rather than the phone service, and offer customers access for $20/month, I see the digital divide narrowing, not widening.

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We are fresh off our Thanksgiving Holiday Extravaganza and ready to dive into the crazy and never changing world of technology. We have a great show lined out for everyone this week. We hope you enjoy and don’t forget to join in on the conversation and become a part of our community here at NetCast Studio.

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One of the top sellers this holiday season is going to be Amazon’s Kindle Fire. The Kindle has gone through quite a progression the past few years. Starting as a simple e-reader, this brand now offers a sleek, dynamic way of consuming information and staying connected. Despite the constant comparison to the iPad, the Fire provides another fresh way to enjoy technology. We had the privilege of getting some hands-on experience with a Kindle Fire over the holiday weekend. Silk, the ultra-fast browsing, could still use some fine tuning. The app store is pretty well developed. A few default settings make for an uncomfortable experience but customizations are available to remedy those. The touchscreen is vibrant and breathtaking. The weight of the Fire came as a surprise but nothing beats having your Fire preloaded with your content when taken out of the box.

Black Friday is quickly becoming a black stain in American culture. Yes, the deals are amazing. Discounted home entertainment systems, gaming consoles, and tablets are all fun to shop for and acquire. But, what does it say when you are looking forward to the commercialization of a holiday rather than the family focused approach that it really should be. Just something to consider this season.

Well, a Kansas high schooler made headlines this week when she sent a tweet regarding the Governor of Kansas. Here are some thoughts from Jim on the situation in it’s entirety.

A Kansas teen tweeted “Just made mean comments at gov brownback and told him he sucked, in person #heblowsalot.” She was called into the office of her high school and told that she would have to issue an apology.She was an “embarassment” and they were going to have to do “damage control.” The school board had issued a statement on Monday that said that the teen would not be issuing an apology:

“The district acknowledges a student’s right to freedom of speech and expression is constitutionally protected,” the district said in its statement. “The district has not censored Miss Sullivan nor infringed upon her freedom a speech.” On Monday, Governor Brownback also issued this statement in support of the student and her Freedom of Speech. He wanted to thank “the thousands of Kansas educators who remind us daily of our liberties, as well as the values of civility and decorum.”
“My staff overreacted to this tweet, and for that I apologize,” the governor said. “Freedom of speech is among our most treasured freedoms.”

I believe in freedom of speech. The student certainly had the right to say what she felt, as her statements were not slanderous, or libelous, or malicious. And it is good to see teens getting involved in the political system. I do, however, think that an apology is in order. First, for thinking that any Tweet that you send out is going to be private. And secondly, for a senior to not capitalize the name of the governor, making comments at instead of to him, and having a lack of vocabulary that can only categorize him as “he sucks”.Yes, indeed, apologies are in order.

At the end of 2010, the tech crew made predictions as to what the year 2011 would hold. We touched on the tablet markets, the 3D technology market, and even the touchscreen market. We did not however consider what changes in music would happen in 2011. In 2011, we experience a major shift in music toward “the cloud.” The evolution of Google Music, iCloud, Spotify, and Last.fm are a few examples of cloud based music. Every field of technology seems to have a social component to it as well. Social media integration into the music industry is pretty prevalant. Consider Ping (despite its failure), Rdio, Mog, and Facebook’s move to incorporate music seamlessly. Thirdly, we now often take the advice of the machine rather than the man now. Music platforms suggests songs. We approve or disapprove and move on. There is a hint of human separation when considering the changes of 2011. Finally, we all have the access to create music. Garage Band is a great example of this venture.

Well, we cover a lot of content this week and we hope you enjoyed the show. Be sure and tell someone this week about our network. We would truly appreciate the word of mouth. We hope everyone had a great holiday and continue to ride…those waves of tech.

1. Kindle Fire review and the Consumer holiday
2. Digital Music Trends in 2011
3. Teen and Governor in Twitter battle

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