From Browser Updates to Robo-Helpers: Tech Tips and Trends

[00:00:19] Back with you live ladies and gentlemen welcome to another edition of Tech Watch Radio where we keep an eye on tech so you don't have to I'm Sam Bushman this is nbitechguys.com that's the website for the podcast this is networkprovidersinc.com the sponsor of our broadcast today and this is yours truly on your radio along with Jay Harrison welcome sir hey Sam how's it going going fantastic my friend there's so much to talk about

[00:00:48] I don't even know where to start there always let's try this headline says time to update chrome again it always is another patch there's a zero day exploit right it's PC world and yeah I just kind of go guys stop I don't even know why chrome even ask anymore just update whenever you whenever you feel like it whenever you see it just update because every time I look at chrome it says there's an update pending can we restart just do it yeah and you don't want to know the biggest problem with it for me what's that what are you going to do

[00:01:18] not update I know that's what I mean just do it every night or whatever pick a time make it happen don't even ask me it's also interesting the way chrome updates too you got to basically go into chrome you got to choose help you got to choose about and then it will check for updates when you choose about right yeah why doesn't it just check on startup Jay like a lot of programs have a checkbox it's like hey do you want us to check for updates on startup whoever starts up their chrome though I mean I

[00:01:48] I have to have chrome running all the time I never started up when I reboot my computer it knows that it was up before and it restarts it again like I never launch chrome but when it restarts it again wouldn't that be a startup well yeah technically and that's probably when the note pops up and says hey we've got a new update but I'm just saying nobody so that no I understand your whole computer is just a window into the web so I don't know that I want it to update in the middle of what I'm doing like Microsoft does no Sam it's just going to shut you down no in the middle and say don't do that no no just do it on restart

[00:02:18] and every day or two or three or whatever when I want to restart or when I reboot my computer when I whatever then it can go ahead and do it I'm all cool with that

[00:02:26] no what I think chrome needs to do is just update in the background and then you and then as you start a new tab it's a new chrome version and then you weed out your other old tab well nobody ever does that anyway so never mind that's a bad idea

[00:02:38] yeah nobody ever closes the tab yeah the only best way is to make it happen on startup I get that it's not as clean as if you could just do it all the time but on startup

[00:02:47] startup is probably the most clean way and what we need to do is techno technology people is encourage folks look you need to do startups Jay okay you need to do that every so often you need to restart that application

[00:03:04] nobody nobody with every other anything Sam I know but you've got to if they want it to be instantly on ready to go chrome needs to just watch it needs to run a counter and when there's been no activity for three hours just restart itself

[00:03:17] I don't know they got to do it when the when the user's not looking though and especially when they're not using the computer

[00:03:26] I know what you're saying I'm not like a dirty secret they just got to do it when nobody's looking and just keep it clean

[00:03:34] I don't disagree with your point I don't know how realistic that is but I'm just recommending everybody you know what go into your chrome right now

[00:03:43] choose help all right I'm going to check this right now on the it says checking for updates using for the connection for this on the ipdto

[00:03:54] now what do I choose now it says chrome is up to date there you go boom amazing right that's like roulette baby is chrome up to date right now I don't know probably not

[00:04:04] yeah then you go back in choose help about I don't know that anybody's better though firefox is chrome is up to date you're pretty good no nobody does any

[00:04:14] better that's my whole point and that's why I say right now unless you can really honestly clearly think of a better way the best way is on startup and then you just tell

[00:04:23] people you know you've got to reboot your computer every so often you've got to restart your things every so often if you have 300 tabs open in your browser every so

[00:04:30] often you gotta most people don't even know how to restart their computer anymore

[00:04:35] I know they're just users and I were asking too much then I wish the competing world was to the point where you didn't need to restart all the time

[00:04:42] I mean I'd love a stable enough system that's why I've said for years what we need to do is instead of having Microsoft Windows version you know 11 or 12 or 13

[00:04:50] why don't they just have operation stability they were supposed to do that with 10 that was the goal for 10 and then make five years later there oh no we're gonna make

[00:04:58] Windows 11 now because what's the only way we can sell it is to change the version number

[00:05:03] and read and I'm saying just make it part of live 365 office I get the os2 and then just start to basically upgrade me all the time and your goal needs to be stability stability drop the oldest stuff to where you don't need to support that stuff anymore decrease the blow decrease all the incompatibilities and just operation stable

[00:05:22] it's not a financial incentive for that and you give there would be if you did it like I'm saying though that everybody would be paying because it'd be part of 365 anyway and so therefore you know so you get money you know monthly or yearly based on your subscription for 365 you got to do that now there's a lot of people that are running windows

[00:05:37] and office and they're not paying a dime and I'm talking about users and other countries and so I know but they can just stay on the old system then they can just be on the old one that eventually just gets eclipsed and shut down

[00:05:46] yeah and I'm fine with that for the most part like you know I I can handle my own operating system I can make sure there's not problems and viruses and things with it the problem is when things stop supporting it

[00:05:56] I mean right now I've got computers some that are running Windows 7 some that are running Windows Server even and Dropbox is saying hey we're gonna shut down in like May of next year in 2025

[00:06:05] we're not just we're not even gonna run on this computer arbitrarily just because Microsoft says that it's not gonna work anymore so we're just not gonna we're not gonna work with it and that I think that's kind of dumb

[00:06:16] well and what they're really saying though is hey we don't want to support all these versions somehow we've got to narrow our scope somehow we've got to not support some of these legacy devices that are preventing us from doing all kinds of cool things

[00:06:26] there's a lot of reasons for it though

[00:06:28] I understand not supporting it and they can say hey you're in the wild west you're on your own but they don't have to shut it down and make it make it stop working for yes I do I'll tell you why because if you have an old operating system that's not being upgraded and then all of a sudden it gets some kind of virus or some kind of a problem and now you're connected to my system you could introduce stuff to me that I can reduce the likelihood of if I just shut that off

[00:06:51] yeah that's you know that reminds me of that reminds me of like Apple saying hey we have to certify all the cables and you have to pay us a dollar for every one of them because you could have a bad cable and we don't want that to happen and we're doing it for your good

[00:07:02] that's right I mean there's extremes to that I'm just telling you I think that's the reason that they're doing what they're doing though and and all that kind of stuff I bring this I bring this all up not to spend three hours on a browser and upgrading and just to get into the new minutia of this but the reason I bring it up is I really want people to understand

[00:07:16] right now unless there's a better way you need to every so often reboot your computer and you need to go in manually and choose help and about so that your Chrome browser is on the latest version it's a security issue and until they got a better way it needs to be done from time to time Jay and I see all a lot of my time to time never happens I see all kinds of computers I know but I see all these computers that are out of date I agree I see it all the time I get on somebody's computer and Windows is out of date the browser's out of date everything's out of date nobody wants to run that stuff and nobody wants to run that stuff and nobody wants to run that

[00:07:46] take the risk you know because they're like hey it's working right now I don't want to mess it up I don't want a new system I don't want it to change the UI I just want to get my job done you know they're just like come on

[00:07:58] you're exactly right factually everything you say is true but what I'm saying to you is that people are going to have to somehow deal with it until they get a better way to automatically do it for you and they're getting closer to that live through 65 again is the best way that I mean you pay for it monthly or yearly you get all kinds of updates they have

[00:08:18] every incentive to give you the best experience possible whether that's stability or whatever else because they're getting paid all the time the more your your if the more your life is just peaceful and great and here's what I say to my clients about IT I say when you think about IT it's a bad day for me because it means something's wrong there's a problem right it should be when you don't when you don't think about IT you're just doing what you're doing

[00:08:44] like you're on your computer to watch a video you're on your computer to look something up you're on your computer to write a document you're on your computer to email somebody if you do those things that you're trying to do and you don't even think about anything but your email your whatever you're watching your video you're producing your broadcast whatever you're doing if you don't think about it you're just doing it then IT's working great that's the best day on the planet for me as an IT guy because I'm just thinking I'm doing such a great job that man it's just absolutely transparent to you in your life

[00:09:14] it's just integrated so well into your life it's fantastic and then people go why don't we even have this IT team you know they're not even doing anything everything's working perfect

[00:09:22] yep and then you let me go and everything goes to crap and I say this because I work hard and you just don't realize it

[00:09:28] it's it's sad but true it happens you know you're right and so anyway the reason I bring all this up though is hey everybody needs to upgrade their browsers get that done until they find a better slick way to do it and the better slick way to do it really is to charge monthly so they have an incentive to do it or yearly or whatever

[00:09:43] I mean I don't I don't mind just but okay and what they need to do is build it all in and their goal needs to be the more stable they make the operating system the more stable they make the office suite the more stable they make the tools that I use every day then I'm going to be bugging them less they don't have to have a big technical support department they don't need to roll out these massive updates that drive me freaking crazy all the time they can start to push updates and it's just seamless and I don't even concern myself with it or think about it or care about it it's like they're updating me to where I'm virus protected they update me so I'm malware protected

[00:10:12] they update me so my latest printer that just came out works they update me so that I okay and I don't even need to think or worry about it and that's where we want to get in the meantime though you guys have got to do what I'm telling you and that is go in choose help choose about and update your browser just telling you right now now I got an email from network providers inc.com j and anybody can sign up and get these emails too if they choose headline is a cyber security tip and this cyber security tip says

[00:10:42] why you want to cover up your webcam mark zuckerberg does so yeah so why would you want to cover up your webcam j because you never know who's in there with your computer and it's just good safety a lot of computers nowadays are shipping with little like shutters that you can just close especially laptops where the webcams are built in you can't disconnect them so a physical shutter that you can close but that doesn't do anything for the microphone

[00:11:09] but it's just like hey people have shown where there's malware that can not only get in and access the camera but can turn it on without turning on the light or the indicator that says that the camera's on and run it in the background and just because people know that that's there you know it's it is considered a good practice to cover your cam now do I do that in all situations like do I do that with my phone for example myself no I don't know many people that do I do know some people that do

[00:11:34] but they kind of seem a little bit fringy when that happens and they got tape on their phones and stuff like that but

[00:11:42] they seem fringy but they're probably smarter than the rest of us is the truth probably true right it's probably true yeah

[00:11:47] but they do seem paranoid but this this email basically says Sam here's a disturbing but real tactic for hackers

[00:11:57] spying on you via your devices yeah on your camera for example believe it or not they can turn it on without

[00:12:03] notifying you in any way that it's on some simply watch you for fun others attempt to obtain incriminating

[00:12:12] information and then they want to blackmail you with it they'll threaten to release the videos or the photo

[00:12:18] or the whatever else they're claiming they want to leak it to all your you know Facebook friends or wherever

[00:12:24] they'll send it to your boss or whatever claim they want to make they link into your connections

[00:12:29] on different services or your contact list or your whatever they might also have that collect that

[00:12:36] use that against you unless you quote pay ransom if you pay guess what you just identified yourself

[00:12:42] as someone who will pay for extortion yeah there's a mark of a sucker yeah putting literally a target on

[00:12:50] your back then they can come back and oh they'll just wait for the right time and they will never

[00:12:55] leave because they know how much you care they will never get out of your system and they will never

[00:12:58] let you go they're just they'll back off for a little while but they'll come back for more

[00:13:02] in a month or maybe six months or a year but they're gonna just keep milking that cow

[00:13:08] there's no question the answer is follow the various security strategies we've been sending you by

[00:13:14] these emails they say as a backup believe it or not you can buy stickers that cover your camera

[00:13:22] with a slider so that way you can uncover it when you really need to use it

[00:13:26] um or join a web meet or take a picture or whatever but yet hey they're inexpensive

[00:13:32] they can be found on amazon for under 10 bucks i mean you can get them for even cheaper than that but

[00:13:37] i'm just saying there's different you know different ones some are better than others or whatever

[00:13:43] you can search for web camera slider and uh there you have it if you have other questions about

[00:13:48] security or other it issues we're always here to help network providers inc.com now and let me say

[00:13:54] this though about that um when you i would say 99 of if you ever see emails that says oh hey we've got

[00:14:01] footage of you you know doing something stupid or whatever and we're gonna try to extort you 99 of

[00:14:07] those emails are fake they don't even have the footage they're just bluffing you so i i don't know you

[00:14:12] can't trust this i mean you can't trust that they do and you can't trust that they don't

[00:14:15] just you gotta avoid that stuff yeah so anyway it's very interesting i bring it up though because i want

[00:14:21] people to really understand there's simple things that you can do now whenever they say sam we've got

[00:14:25] video of you in sexually compromising situations or something you know what my response to that is jay

[00:14:31] yeah it's like good luck because i know you don't i know you don't it's not true

[00:14:38] right it's just not the truth so you know immediately they're bluffing absolutely um

[00:14:43] and that's something that really you should take to the bank is what i'm kind of driving at here is

[00:14:47] that you know what live your life in a way to where you don't have all these concerning scandal

[00:14:52] kind of scenarios in your in your wake in the first place and you don't have to worry about it if

[00:14:55] they're saying that it's just not true hey we caught you with a something something it's just not true

[00:15:00] i know it's not true live your life like you're on camera because you probably are that is the point

[00:15:06] yes uh you know and if they say sam we've hacked into your bank account and this and this and this

[00:15:11] what you find is if they don't have details then you know they're lying if they have details and they

[00:15:19] tell you those details all you got to do is use those details and look it up and see if they're the real

[00:15:22] details and don't go look it up on the same device that they're trying to compromise go look it up

[00:15:27] elsewhere but i'm telling you that you can you you can know that you can you can kind of confirm

[00:15:32] uh the details very easily but if it doesn't have details if it's vague it's vague because they don't

[00:15:39] have information what they want is information yeah they had it they're social engineering they're

[00:15:44] bluffing most of the time and another thing you can do too is if you know you know god forbid

[00:15:49] anybody actually run a desktop these days instead of a laptop or a cell phone but if you do have a

[00:15:53] desktop about desktops are awesome nobody has desktops anymore sam you and i are are um not

[00:16:00] the gamers have desktops jay yeah okay i'll give you that they do and what you can do with the

[00:16:06] professionals and offices have desktops too jay some of them do a lot of them don't they're using ipads

[00:16:12] and they're using cell phones and stuff like that but if you have a desktop desktop's gonna gonna see

[00:16:16] the sunset and be gone no i don't because i mean you got a group into that with servers and everything

[00:16:21] else too and they'll never they'll never see the sunset by the way i do have desktops though that

[00:16:25] are tiny what's that what are those tiny pcs called uh you're talking about the dell uh mff um

[00:16:32] micro micro format it's either mmf or mff and i can't remember the acronym of these yeah anyway

[00:16:38] whatever it is you know i have some of those no it's mff it's a micro form factor is what it stands

[00:16:42] for and they're like i've got some i've got some mff desktops and i kind of like those jay they're

[00:16:46] pretty cool i do too i'm we are running them here in studio i have three of them surrounding me right

[00:16:51] now they're the size of a roku or something you know just about well roku is pretty tiny now but

[00:16:56] the the size of the original roku's yeah and it's hard to kind of say you know why you'd want those

[00:17:02] but to me there's a lot of reasons you want them because they have a lot more connectivity is one

[00:17:05] reason number two the screen's separate from the device which is kind of nice in many ways to where

[00:17:10] the screen needs to be at a different location laptops are great but remember your screen is just

[00:17:14] hard on the thing and unless you're a blind person like me you can't just run around with your lid

[00:17:18] closed i run around with my laptop lid closed and people just when i'm at events and everything

[00:17:22] and i'm typing and nobody can see a screen anywhere people kind of freak out i think you're just

[00:17:26] listening to tunes because you got headphones on and you're just jamming away at the keyboard

[00:17:31] yeah but with a desktop though you could disconnect if you're kind of paranoid about this you could

[00:17:35] disconnect your cam and your mic physically from the computer and you can't go wrong that way i

[00:17:41] think yeah that's even better than a uh slide cover right yeah absolutely do you have those slide

[00:17:47] covers i have one on my on my current laptop that i use all the time there's one built in so i do use

[00:17:53] it i leave it on all the time but because i so rarely use it the camera on there i mean you know

[00:17:58] everybody thought video call was going to be the next big thing but and yeah i use them for meetings

[00:18:03] once in a while but even then most of the time when i do meetings it's in a like a board room with a

[00:18:09] tv with its own camera and stuff like that so it's it's rare but i do use it sometimes

[00:18:15] all right anyway i find that interesting though i i don't have a cover on my camera jay and i'll tell

[00:18:21] you why remember as i told you i'm a blind person so i don't need my screen on and so if i just set

[00:18:27] the settings to close my laptop lid yeah then your camera's covered too right i've got the ultimate

[00:18:32] camera cover that's right i know that's weird but i just i think people listening would find that kind

[00:18:39] of fascinating it's certainly an unconventional way to solve the problem right absolutely but you know

[00:18:43] it doesn't do anything for your mic the mic's there and i i would submit that there's probably

[00:18:49] more relevant for my mic but it does make it all muffled though yeah but i would submit there's more

[00:18:54] relevant information in tapping somebody's mic where you can transcribe it than tapping somebody's

[00:18:59] video i mean maybe for blackmail or something like that if you see them changing their clothes but

[00:19:03] as far as if you're if you're like trying to espionage you're trying to you're a hacker and you're

[00:19:08] trying to get information on somebody you're gonna get more information i think from their microphone

[00:19:11] anyway all right speaking of that then let's talk about lawnmowers jay all right go greenworks what do

[00:19:19] they call this thing six 60 volt 21 inch self-propelled lawnmower right all right do you know about this

[00:19:29] thing i have looked into some lawnmowers i don't know i think a greenworks one yeah but i i don't

[00:19:35] remember i almost bought one of these but there's some issues and i think you're about to touch on

[00:19:40] them let's talk about them so they're really cool because all you got to do is plug that dude in and

[00:19:45] it's it's it's you know and they're this one takes like eight batteries or something right or 12

[00:19:49] batteries yeah as we've mentioned that they they literally can handle um i mean they're pretty

[00:19:54] powerful the torque of electricity is incredible no doubt even even more than you know your traditional

[00:19:59] lingeons and stuff like that it's the longevity though the longevity that's the problem with

[00:20:05] these babies they're getting better jay but they're not there yet yeah and you combine robotics to this

[00:20:11] and you've got the lawnmower on the outside and your vacuum on the inside virtually i know they do

[00:20:17] different things literally but virtually the same discussion right right from a robotics point of view

[00:20:23] yeah it's got to navigate and do what it does either it sucks stuff up in vacuums or it cuts stuff as it goes

[00:20:28] wait is this a when you say self-profile is this one that you ride on or is this one that just cuts

[00:20:33] your grass on its own like a room just cut your grass on its own but okay this is totally different

[00:20:37] the one i was looking at was like you ride on it like a ride a lawnmower like a ztr yeah no those

[00:20:42] things will go out of batteries fast those are those are different it's like because they're hauling my

[00:20:46] fat butt around that's right that's the problem mowing the grass that's the easy part now but these

[00:20:54] ones that mow the grass these ones that vacuum your house and stuff really they're

[00:20:58] i'm finding it interesting they're getting robots in a lot of places they're not full robots everywhere

[00:21:03] like you'd like them to be but they're starting to get these robots that can do your house and your

[00:21:07] lawn and you know here's what's interesting when people first heard about these these are appliances

[00:21:11] in my opinion yeah i don't think i would call them robots okay i mean there's some there's some

[00:21:19] cool stuff and yeah they're probably even running ai and stuff like that but they're running ai they've got

[00:21:23] all these sensors and stuff but like a vacuum cleaner or a lawnmower this one task thing this

[00:21:29] is an appliance in my opinion it is but it's it's it's a robot a robot is like rosie from the jetsons

[00:21:35] that can do everything oh i know but that's that's that's expensive and far off well let me say this

[00:21:41] it's not far off it's expensive elon musk says it's next year you know optimus prime rock yeah i'm just

[00:21:48] telling you and how much will it be next year jay oh you know the price of a mid-sized sedan

[00:21:53] it's a 30 grand yeah five grand or something okay so you know who's gonna buy rosie from the

[00:21:58] jetsons for 35 000 not me if you could really know five grand to get serious i'll send this

[00:22:04] thing to work at burger king or something it'll make its money back in a couple of years you know

[00:22:08] if it could really do anything you you throw at it people are people are going to be employing these

[00:22:12] robots they just run all the time hook them up to a shore power cable and they don't have to

[00:22:16] charge and they're going to be taking jobs there's no question about that but now you're

[00:22:21] changing the discussion entirely i know i got you off the rails i'm sorry sam i started this thing

[00:22:26] mowing my lawn jay let's get back on the road we only have two minutes anyway so and then jay wanted

[00:22:30] to be on the lawnmower and he wanted to ride around and come on now i'm just talking about look these

[00:22:34] robots are incredible the reason i'm bringing this all up jay is if you want to look at vacuums for

[00:22:38] christmas or you want to look at some of these outdoor lawnmowers you say well sam it's the middle of

[00:22:43] winter i don't need a lawnmower i know but if you can get one of these on a on a

[00:22:46] you know some kind of a special out of season to buy okay i'm bringing this up because the even

[00:22:53] five years ago the lawnmower or the vacuum that you would get is nothing compared to the way it is

[00:22:59] now nothing they're smart they're capable my daughter bought one of these lawnmowers or one of these um

[00:23:06] vacuums for her husband yeah i'm telling you this thing is incredible i watched it work and it's smart

[00:23:11] enough when it's running around if it runs out of a charge and it feels like it needs batteries or

[00:23:15] charges it goes goes back to its home and you have to go dump the the bag or whatever on it well

[00:23:21] kind of but it's got a big bag and it dumps its own thing every time it goes out and vacuums it

[00:23:25] dumps it and you only have to dump the other thing out every couple why can't it go out the

[00:23:29] doggy door and just blow all the dust out in the yard or something you know take care of itself

[00:23:33] it can that's the next step jay that's if if your whole do everything thing is coming next year

[00:23:38] it'll be here in a month okay that's what i want i want optimus from uh from elon musk to go

[00:23:43] empty the robo bag it's not happening but the reason i'm bringing it up though is i'm just telling

[00:23:48] you right now this technology updates itself rapidly and it is a night and day difference between the

[00:23:53] vacuums and the lawnmowers of yesteryear meaning even two three four five years ago versus now they

[00:23:58] are incredibly smart and capable and an indoor vacuum used to be kind of a pipe dream all the

[00:24:03] stupid thing will just bump into everything now you can literally create maps for it to follow

[00:24:07] and it it can you know and use the the the guidance that you give it um i watch this thing go over and

[00:24:14] find the stairs it doesn't tumble down the stairs it's smart enough to see the ledge and back away

[00:24:18] from it and go around it's just amazing and i'm telling you if you want some unique christmas gifts

[00:24:24] there you go we had a stupid one here in the studio and we just kept finding it off the charger and dead so

[00:24:28] that was the end of that project i know so you need a modern reality check on this because they're

[00:24:33] getting good by the way and it does proceed elon musk's robots will do everything that's coming

[00:24:37] just not yet we keep an eye on tech so you don't have to network providers inc.com npitechguys.com

[00:24:42] hey make it a great tech day will you thanks