Google's Legal Defeat, Cisco Layoffs, and Tech for Accessibility

[00:00:18] All right. Happy to have you along, my fellow tech enthusiasts. It's time for another edition of TechWatchRadio brought to you by NetworkProvidersInc.com. Spread the word. We keep an eye on tech so you don't have to. Jay Harrison is with me. Welcome, sir.

[00:00:30] Hello, Sam. How's it going?

[00:00:32] For me, it's going great. For Google, not so well, sir.

[00:00:35] Ouch. Google is getting hit left and right, aren't they?

[00:00:40] They are, and sadly, it's about time. I'm frustrated with Google. I get their high tech. I get their easy to use. I get people love them, and I get why.

[00:00:48] I also get that they're very predatory, Jay, in so many different ways, from driving down the street and taking ... I mean, they've got a picture on Google Maps of a tent in my front yard that's like years old.

[00:00:58] And I don't know why, because we were setting up a tent in 10 years.

[00:01:00] Was your wife mad at you, Sam?

[00:01:01] Is that what happened?

[00:01:03] Well, see, that's the problem with the view. It's like, what is this dude doing with a tent in his front yard?

[00:01:08] Talk about a redneck, man.

[00:01:10] But what was happening is that I'm involved in a camping gear company, and part of our thing was to test their water resistance of their tents and stuff.

[00:01:19] And so we set this tent up in our yard, and then we were dumping water on it and doing all these experiments and stuff like that.

[00:01:24] It was part of the QC.

[00:01:26] And the Google car drove by.

[00:01:27] And the Google car drove by and snapped that dude, and it's just on Google Earth for the whole world to see.

[00:01:32] They're like, man, people used to sit on their front porch.

[00:01:35] Now people are setting up tents in their front yard.

[00:01:37] It's like, what is happening?

[00:01:39] It's like San Francisco there.

[00:01:41] There goes your property value, Sam.

[00:01:45] Well, there goes my neighbor's property value because of me, right?

[00:01:48] Right.

[00:01:49] Anyway, just kind of strange.

[00:01:50] But Google, you know, from that to, you know, stealing personal data, claiming they're not to, I mean, they've been attacked around the world.

[00:01:58] And sadly, justifiably so.

[00:01:59] Now we have one more ouch to add to the list, I guess, Jay.

[00:02:03] Yeah.

[00:02:03] So a federal judge ruled that Google violated antitrust laws with its online search business.

[00:02:08] And they handed down a staggering defeat.

[00:02:10] Now, Google is expected to appeal this.

[00:02:13] But they said that after carefully considering and weighing witness testimony and evidence, the court reaches the following decision.

[00:02:19] Google is a monopolist.

[00:02:20] And it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly.

[00:02:24] Currently, Google pays companies such as Apple and Mozilla billions of dollars for prime placement in web browsers and smartphones.

[00:02:31] And according to the New York Times, Google paid Apple around $18 billion should it be the fault to search engine in iPhones.

[00:02:37] And that's just in 2021, $18 billion.

[00:02:39] And also, Google shares 36% of search ad revenue with Safari from Apple.

[00:02:46] So they're just saying, man, they're just a giant.

[00:02:49] And they're trying to break this up as a monopoly.

[00:02:55] They say currently Google pays companies such as Apple and Mozilla.

[00:03:02] Big money for this kind of stuff.

[00:03:04] And I just kind of think, wow, did you realize that we're the guinea pigs for this, Jay?

[00:03:08] Like it or not?

[00:03:09] Don't know not?

[00:03:10] You're just kind of the whatever.

[00:03:12] I wonder, what are companies going to run?

[00:03:14] I mean, what is Mozilla going to run?

[00:03:15] You remember a few years back where Mozilla changed their search engine to Yahoo

[00:03:21] because their deal with Google ran out and Google wasn't going to renew.

[00:03:26] And then they decided they were going to say, and everybody kind of balked at it.

[00:03:29] In fact, Mozilla and Firefox lost a lot of market share because of that.

[00:03:35] Because Google wasn't their default search engine.

[00:03:37] They were almost ready to switch back to Google, paid or not.

[00:03:40] And then they worked out another deal with Google.

[00:03:43] But what are people going to use?

[00:03:46] I mean, what are you going to put?

[00:03:47] Is Apple going to come up with their own Bing and put it on there?

[00:03:49] I don't like Bing.

[00:03:51] Nobody does.

[00:03:52] I know.

[00:03:53] And you get that with Windows.

[00:03:54] I guess Windows doesn't have this deal with Google.

[00:03:56] I don't know why, but I guess Microsoft couldn't work it out.

[00:04:00] But what search engine are you going to use?

[00:04:01] I can tell you personally.

[00:04:02] I mean, I use ChatGPT probably more than Google nowadays.

[00:04:05] It depends on what you're looking for and how you're looking for it.

[00:04:07] If I'm looking for an actual site on the web, of course, I'll use Google.

[00:04:09] Yeah, it's a difference in the response you want.

[00:04:11] If you want just a link to something else or you're looking for a cuttable link for something,

[00:04:16] then you know what?

[00:04:16] Google or a search engine is great.

[00:04:18] Otherwise, if you want rounded out answers, then ChatGPT is the way to go.

[00:04:23] I use them both.

[00:04:24] It just depends on what I'm kind of querying and what I'm looking for.

[00:04:28] But I look at this and go, what do you use?

[00:04:31] DuckDuckGo instead?

[00:04:32] What do you do?

[00:04:32] Yeah, that's actually a great one.

[00:04:34] I use DuckDuckGo a lot.

[00:04:35] Yeah, I use it.

[00:04:37] Another cool thing about DuckDuckGo is if you want to make your own

[00:04:39] home pages, you can use that as the search engine.

[00:04:42] They let you incorporate it into pages where you can have that as your search.

[00:04:46] So I've used that before for that.

[00:04:48] But I also wonder, isn't this why Google became Alphabet, though,

[00:04:52] and separated into a bunch of different companies,

[00:04:54] was to try to preemptively avoid this kind of monopoly, hand-down ruling?

[00:04:59] Yeah, but it didn't do any good.

[00:05:00] It was just game playing.

[00:05:01] Well, I know, but they preemptively did it.

[00:05:04] And I'm surprised that they're still getting, you know, I guess that tactic didn't work.

[00:05:09] Well, Monday's, or I should say it was Monday a couple of weeks ago when this thing came out.

[00:05:14] But the high-stakes decision here marks the second kind of loss that Google's had, right?

[00:05:20] I mean, talk about this next one.

[00:05:22] Yeah.

[00:05:24] Well, it is.

[00:05:27] Google, a federal jury in California, previously decided in December that Google runs an illegal monopoly

[00:05:32] with its proprietary app store.

[00:05:35] And in that case...

[00:05:35] So see, that's a whole different discussion.

[00:05:36] We were just discussing search.

[00:05:38] Yeah.

[00:05:38] Now we're talking about a whole store of products or, you know, software and whatever, right?

[00:05:42] And Apple's getting that, too, from the EU and others with their app store

[00:05:45] and, you know, the 30% that they want from everything on there.

[00:05:49] Yeah.

[00:05:49] Yeah.

[00:05:49] But I'm just surprised.

[00:05:51] I'm surprised that Google hasn't either prevented this or lobbied against it or whatever.

[00:05:57] They certainly have the clout to try to prevent it.

[00:06:00] And maybe it is.

[00:06:01] Maybe it's not preventable.

[00:06:02] Maybe that's just the road that things are going to take.

[00:06:05] Well, and in that case, the one about the store, they're saying they're still trying to pursue

[00:06:09] whatever the rightful remedies would be.

[00:06:11] So it's complex, too.

[00:06:12] Oh, yeah.

[00:06:13] It definitely is.

[00:06:14] And they've tried to release the reins a little bit on things, and so has Apple.

[00:06:18] With their store.

[00:06:19] But I don't think it's enough.

[00:06:20] I think that there's a lot of people that are not happy with it.

[00:06:25] Anyway, I find it kind of shocking, but not really.

[00:06:28] And these are only the cases, what, Jay, in the United States?

[00:06:32] Yeah, this is the U.S.

[00:06:33] Because Google's been attacked around the world, too, for all kinds of different stuff, right?

[00:06:37] Certainly.

[00:06:39] And I don't really know where we go with this.

[00:06:41] And I'll tell you what I mean by that.

[00:06:43] To me, I don't disagree about the predatory practices.

[00:06:48] And I have a problem with those.

[00:06:50] But I have a bigger problem, Jay, when you think about it, with when these companies get hit

[00:06:55] and pay out billions and hit and pay out billions.

[00:06:58] And then they pay out billions to be the search engine of choice or forced to be this store

[00:07:05] or forced that they get revenue from this channel.

[00:07:08] Or whenever they force those things, they pay billions for the benefit in the first place.

[00:07:12] Then they pay billions on the back end as they get beat up for it.

[00:07:15] But what does that do to the consumer?

[00:07:18] Well, ultimately, the consumer will pay for it.

[00:07:20] I mean...

[00:07:21] That's what I mean.

[00:07:22] Is that it's not good for anybody.

[00:07:24] And you can say, well, Sam, I haven't paid for a Google thing and I've used Google forever.

[00:07:28] No, you've just given all your information to them.

[00:07:30] And then they've given it to everybody else for money.

[00:07:32] And then everybody else has been hacked.

[00:07:33] And then you've been compromised.

[00:07:36] Yeah, but the world...

[00:07:37] I think the world's seen a lot of benefit from Google as well.

[00:07:40] I mean, just think where we would be without Gmail, for example.

[00:07:43] You know, and that was a free product.

[00:07:45] I'd be in heaven without...

[00:07:45] Anyway.

[00:07:49] It's just crazy, though.

[00:07:50] I mean, it's hard to know really what to think about all this stuff in terms of what it really means

[00:07:55] and where we go.

[00:07:57] I don't know.

[00:07:58] All right, well, we've mentioned over the last several shows, Jay, layoffs in big tech, right?

[00:08:04] Yes, we have.

[00:08:06] It's tragic.

[00:08:07] I mean, I really feel bad for the people that are getting laid off and all that kind of stuff.

[00:08:11] I don't really know exactly how to respond to it.

[00:08:14] But now Cisco to lay off thousands more in second job cut this year, Jay.

[00:08:21] That is something.

[00:08:23] I mean, Cisco is the, what, guys that make all the cool equipment, right?

[00:08:27] Yeah, they make a lot of big router switches and networking gear and stuff like that for big enterprise.

[00:08:36] You know, they've been the leader of that for a long time, for decades.

[00:08:41] Now, they say this.

[00:08:43] They say they will cut thousands of jobs in a second round of layoffs this year, which I mentioned.

[00:08:48] But then they say in their U.S. networking equipment maker, as they shift focus to higher growth areas, including cybersecurity and AI.

[00:09:03] So the reasons they're laying people off is very interesting.

[00:09:06] It's no longer about the hardware that used to make their big money.

[00:09:09] That's what Cisco, what I know Cisco for.

[00:09:11] Hey, man, they have all kinds of expensive hardware corporate enterprise devices, and they make a lot of money on the devices and the contracts to support and service and whatever those devices.

[00:09:20] Now they're going, yeah, not so much.

[00:09:22] We're going to start making a lot more of our money on, what, AI and cybersecurity?

[00:09:28] I just wonder if people just throw AI into every press release.

[00:09:31] Just sprinkle it in.

[00:09:32] I agree.

[00:09:33] I'm starting to think so.

[00:09:34] Because, look, how is Cisco going to be involved in AI?

[00:09:37] Unless you say, okay, we're going to update our firmware on a lot of our devices to be AI intelligent.

[00:09:41] What does that mean?

[00:09:43] And then when you mix AI and cybersecurity together, is it going to be automatic learning for security?

[00:09:49] Is that where the fight's gone?

[00:09:51] Well, then it's just my AI bot against your AI bot.

[00:09:54] I'm the bad guy.

[00:09:55] You're the good guy in this case, I guess, right?

[00:09:56] Or vice versa.

[00:09:58] I'm just saying, is it just a war of the bots?

[00:10:01] It may be.

[00:10:01] If they're running, you know, if they say, you know, servers and stuff are getting too complex

[00:10:05] and people aren't keeping up with all the security things that need to be done

[00:10:08] and so you need an AI to manage your security for you on your end, it may be something like that.

[00:10:15] And then you have your stuff fighting against the other people that are trying to get in

[00:10:18] and it could be a battle of the bots.

[00:10:24] So I just don't know.

[00:10:25] And I just don't really see how Cisco is going to interface with my life in AI or cybersecurity.

[00:10:30] I mean, I can see them building cybersecurity into their hardware.

[00:10:32] I get some of that.

[00:10:34] But I mean, is every company just an AI company?

[00:10:38] Well, Cisco...

[00:10:38] Because every company seems to think that they're going to have AI at the center of what they're doing.

[00:10:42] Everybody.

[00:10:43] I know.

[00:10:43] They do.

[00:10:44] And they probably are right.

[00:10:45] But it just seems like it's a crazy buzzword right now.

[00:10:48] But Cisco is supposedly the largest maker of routers and switches and direct internet traffic

[00:10:53] and it's been grappling with sluggish demand and supply chain constraints over its mainstay business lately.

[00:11:00] So they're going to lay off 4,000 more employees.

[00:11:03] Currently, they have 84,000 employees.

[00:11:05] So that's a lot of employees.

[00:11:07] They're going to lay off 4,000 employees, according to their annual filing last year.

[00:11:10] And that number doesn't account for the people they laid off back in February either.

[00:11:15] They're just one of the latest in layoffs in the tech industry.

[00:11:20] But however, if you look at their stock, I'm looking at their stock for the past year, it's down 6%.

[00:11:26] But they're not really taking a big hit on this news that they're laying off people.

[00:11:31] I don't know how to respond to it because on one hand...

[00:11:33] Maybe Wall Street thinks they're just trimming it up, you know, that they're making changes.

[00:11:38] And I think there is legitimacy to that, Jay.

[00:11:40] I think that companies do ebb and flow.

[00:11:43] And as, you know, the world in IT, whatever you want to call it, changes happen,

[00:11:48] I do think there's, hey, we need to trim here.

[00:11:51] You know, our devices, the earlier generations had a lot more issues,

[00:11:54] needed a lot more tech support or whatever.

[00:11:56] Now they're getting a lot more hardened and stable to where we don't need as much tech support.

[00:11:59] We've got better manuals and better tools that can help, you know, troubleshoot

[00:12:03] and consultants that are all up to speed on everything.

[00:12:05] Yeah, chatGPT.

[00:12:07] Yeah, that too.

[00:12:08] I mean, if you ask...

[00:12:10] I can see that.

[00:12:10] This is a fact.

[00:12:12] Last week I was programming a Cisco router, or actually it was a managed switch.

[00:12:16] And rather than even touch a manual, you could just ask direct questions to chatGPT,

[00:12:21] and it knows, you know, it's already there.

[00:12:23] And even when it's not exactly right because, say, it's a different model number,

[00:12:26] it's enough to just point you in the right direction.

[00:12:28] It's like having an assistant who knows a ton about whatever it is you're working on,

[00:12:32] and they're just helping along.

[00:12:34] So it's just amazing.

[00:12:36] So that may be kind of the AI that they're looking at.

[00:12:39] Maybe the help assistant when you're setting up your switch or your managed router

[00:12:44] or whatever that you're doing will be more AI-centric to where you can just talk to it.

[00:12:48] You can just tell it what you want to do in real language, and it just sets everything up

[00:12:52] and puts up all the barriers and creates everything for you.

[00:12:57] Indeed.

[00:12:58] Indeed.

[00:12:59] They say sluggish demand, which I find supply chain issues, sluggish demand,

[00:13:06] that I'm just kind of thinking.

[00:13:08] One of the things people need to kind of understand is that, you know,

[00:13:11] once you have one of these devices, Jay, they can last for a long time.

[00:13:15] I mean, if they update the firmware on them and different things,

[00:13:17] and, you know, you put it in an enterprise router or an enterprise something, switch,

[00:13:21] whatever, costs a lot of money.

[00:13:22] It might be there for 5, 10 years, and you're just relying on upgrades for it

[00:13:26] and everything else.

[00:13:26] And so to me, at some point, it's a market saturation discussion

[00:13:30] more than it is a real problem, if that makes sense.

[00:13:33] I find in hardware like this, whether it's routers, switches, things like this,

[00:13:38] the hardware lasts forever.

[00:13:39] It's only because after, say, 7 years they stop supporting it

[00:13:43] that usually companies have to change things out.

[00:13:46] And if you're a small business, you know, you may have a router.

[00:13:49] Or you've got some 10-base-T router that's been working for 20 years in the closet,

[00:13:53] you know, the broom closet or whatever, and people just don't upgrade until they need to.

[00:13:57] On that end, however, on the bigger corporate end, you have people that are just like,

[00:14:01] hey, every five years we're switching all of our equipment out

[00:14:02] because that's what the license is on it, and that's what has to be done,

[00:14:07] and we need to have the latest, greatest, and the software

[00:14:10] and the service support before it runs out.

[00:14:12] But that's a lot of trash in the landfill, too,

[00:14:14] things that I think can still be capable because of the speed of, for example,

[00:14:19] Ethernet isn't moving that fast where you've got to replace everything every five years.

[00:14:22] And so I would like to see these companies support their equipment longer.

[00:14:26] I think that's when you can.

[00:14:28] If there's a real reason why you can't, then sure.

[00:14:30] But if it's just because we want to make more sales, I don't think that's cool.

[00:14:34] I agree.

[00:14:35] I just don't know, you know, when you talk about the amount of employees that it takes,

[00:14:38] and then you talk about AI and, like I say,

[00:14:42] more and more capabilities to reduce the need for their tech support.

[00:14:45] They've gone from, you know, you used to have to have a tech support guy take a phone call

[00:14:48] and talk to somebody for 20 minutes.

[00:14:50] Now you've got that same support guy chatting with people.

[00:14:54] Yeah, he's chatting with 20 people.

[00:14:55] 20 people, and it's one guy.

[00:14:57] And so all that kind of reduces things.

[00:15:01] And I just kind of don't know if it's just changes in the world that are just a natural reality.

[00:15:09] As I look at it, that's kind of the deal.

[00:15:11] And so some of these companies are going to have to change, but over 126,000 people have been laid off

[00:15:16] from big high-tech companies.

[00:15:18] That's right.

[00:15:19] Over 393 tech companies from the start of the year, according to layoffs.fyi.

[00:15:26] That's kind of astonishing to me because if you have a high-tech job, you're thinking you're stable, right?

[00:15:30] Yeah, but I think you've got to also cross that with how many new jobs have opened up.

[00:15:35] So 126,000 layoffs, yes, but I still, at least you hear in the industry that tech is still booming.

[00:15:42] There's still a shortage of knowledgeable people.

[00:15:45] Yeah, you know where they're working, Jay?

[00:15:46] Where are they working?

[00:15:48] Yeah.

[00:15:48] Google.

[00:15:49] I don't know where.

[00:15:50] No, no, no.

[00:15:51] Google's not doing great either.

[00:15:52] Neither is it.

[00:15:52] They're working in AI, all the new AI jobs.

[00:15:54] Look, if all these companies are cranking up AI divisions, then there's got to be jobs for those, right?

[00:16:00] Well, and if you're an expert in AI, you probably can name your price.

[00:16:04] Yeah, and even if you're not an expert in AI, they're willing to take on people and train people because AI is such a new field that it's like, I think they're just still thinking of new uses for AI every day.

[00:16:13] I find new uses for AI every day.

[00:16:15] Let me give you a quick example, a very strange example, but it's worth talking about because it's tech related.

[00:16:21] I have a friend that's blind and he's in a wheelchair.

[00:16:25] Okay.

[00:16:25] And he just got in a wheelchair not too long, so most of his life he hasn't been, but things are going south in his health and now he's in a wheelchair.

[00:16:32] And he called me up because I'm an IT guy, right?

[00:16:35] He says, hey, do you know of a product that I can put on my wheelchair that can like beep when I get close to a wall or close to something that I might crash into?

[00:16:44] And I thought, you know what?

[00:16:46] That's a great question.

[00:16:48] And I don't know the answer.

[00:16:49] I have no idea.

[00:16:51] What do you think I did, Jay?

[00:16:52] You looked it up on ChatGPT.

[00:16:54] Yes, sir.

[00:16:55] Sure did.

[00:16:56] That's what I would have done.

[00:16:58] That's exactly what I did.

[00:16:59] And you want to know what?

[00:17:00] That's one of those things because, you know, if you – when I ask a question to Google, I'm thinking, how do I phrase this question so that other people have asked this question and it's been answered on a forum?

[00:17:10] You don't have that kind of constraint when you're talking to an AI.

[00:17:12] You can just ask it the crazy idea that you've had in your head and it will at least steer you in the right direction to get you some more information to go down the road of research on it.

[00:17:22] So it jettisons the middle step of a gazillion results that I have to kind of power through.

[00:17:27] Right.

[00:17:27] It then takes those results and finds the most relevant reality things that relate to it, merges them together in a usable format of something that's actually intelligent response.

[00:17:36] I'm just telling you, ChatGPT is search engine – I don't know.

[00:17:40] Is it 2.0 or 10.0?

[00:17:42] I have a hard time telling that.

[00:17:43] 3.0, 4.0?

[00:17:44] Whatever it is.

[00:17:45] Yeah.

[00:17:45] Oh, it's ChatGPT 4.0.

[00:17:46] So it's 4.0 in the chat world.

[00:17:48] 4.0 for like what – you know, they had Web 2.0 and then you have Web 3.0, which is everybody contributing.

[00:17:54] And so maybe it's like Web 4.0.

[00:17:56] Something.

[00:17:56] But the reason I bring it up – and so I basically said this.

[00:17:59] I said, are there products that can allow a blind person in a wheelchair to adapt their wheelchair to notify them when there are obstacles in the way, beep, or some other tactical, you know, feedback response or whatever?

[00:18:13] And, buddy, it wrote me this outrageous like summary kind of a thing that just shocked me because I was kind of thinking about a beeping device.

[00:18:28] And the reason I was is because that's kind of what he said.

[00:18:30] Can you get something that would beep?

[00:18:31] That was his original question.

[00:18:32] Right.

[00:18:33] Listen to this.

[00:18:34] ChatGPT.

[00:18:35] Yes, there are devices specifically designed to help visually impaired persons who also use wheelchairs.

[00:18:43] There's many different technologies to accomplish this.

[00:18:47] Now listen to this.

[00:18:49] These devices employ several technologies such as ultrasonic sensors, infrared sensors, or LiDAR sensors

[00:19:00] to go ahead and detect obstacles in the environment around the blind person.

[00:19:07] Then it goes on and says, upon detection, they can either provide auditorial, tactical – or I'm sorry, auditorial, tactical – let me start over.

[00:19:16] Auditorial, tactile, or visual feedback to the user so they can either vibrate and you can feel them or they can beep or they can do all these different things.

[00:19:26] And so then they say, here's some ideas.

[00:19:29] Ultrasonic sensors, and then it goes and explains all that.

[00:19:32] Two, infrared sensors, it goes and explains all that.

[00:19:35] Wearable devices, you can put on glasses or put a watch on or different things that can go ahead and do a similar thing.

[00:19:41] Some of them connect to your smartphone.

[00:19:42] Some of them connect to a hardware device that connects, you know, phones home for information.

[00:19:47] Smartphone apps, some smartphone apps can – and then they say wheelchair-mounted systems.

[00:19:51] And they go through all this stuff, and then they start listing a few devices for examples to make their point.

[00:19:57] One, there's this thing called Sonic Pathfinder.

[00:20:00] This is a type of head-mountable – you know, and it goes on and on.

[00:20:03] And I'm telling you right now, it wrote me 20 paragraphs.

[00:20:06] I'm virtually like an expert on this compared to most people now.

[00:20:09] Now, am I an expert?

[00:20:09] Of course not.

[00:20:10] Of course not.

[00:20:11] I'm not saying that I am.

[00:20:12] But I'm saying I'm an IT guy, so I understand what I read.

[00:20:16] And I'm just telling you right now, I went from knowing nothing, like, I don't know.

[00:20:20] That's a good question.

[00:20:21] What the heck?

[00:20:22] To coming back going, hey, man, I know quite a bit about this.

[00:20:26] I mean, they even have this thing called an ultra cane, Jay.

[00:20:29] It's originally designed as an electronic mobility aid that looks like a white cane, but it uses ultrasonic technology to make you aware of obstacles.

[00:20:37] Now, that's pretty cool.

[00:20:40] And you can attach this cane to the wheelchair.

[00:20:43] Smart sensory and mobile visual aids.

[00:20:45] Okay.

[00:20:46] And then they compare it to, oh, what are those little cars that you use, like, at the airport or different places or whatever?

[00:20:51] What are those?

[00:20:51] Shuttles?

[00:20:53] Yeah.

[00:20:55] Golf cars?

[00:20:56] Anyway.

[00:20:57] And they basically say they've got advanced technology research.

[00:21:04] And then the last one they tell me about is really cool.

[00:21:07] They say this.

[00:21:09] Consider a robot guide dog.

[00:21:14] And I'm going, a robot guide dog?

[00:21:18] Well, I know guide dogs to be animals.

[00:21:19] Well, believe it or not, guide dog animals are expensive to train.

[00:21:22] I know a lot about this.

[00:21:23] I've had a couple of guide dogs in my life.

[00:21:24] But anyway, they've got these in other countries now.

[00:21:27] They are literally experimenting with guide dog robots, man.

[00:21:32] Is that in the market now?

[00:21:33] Or is that just prototype stuff?

[00:21:35] It is prototype, but it's being tested in the real world.

[00:21:38] So it's beyond prototype, but it's not, you can't just buy one tomorrow.

[00:21:41] But it's beyond just prototype.

[00:21:43] Like, they're literally having blind people use them.

[00:21:46] It's kind of like some of these driverless cars that are going.

[00:21:48] I mean, they're not everywhere, but they certainly exist in real life, right?

[00:21:50] Yeah.

[00:21:51] They're not just, it's ideas.

[00:21:52] They're not ideas, and they're not prototypes like so restrained, but they're also not just buy one and use them.

[00:21:58] They're around, and there's, you know, it's like that.

[00:22:02] Makes sense.

[00:22:03] Anyway, then they finish up and talk about smartphone solutions and stuff like that.

[00:22:08] And then they say to find specific products compatible with your needs, you might consider contacting companies that specialize in da-da-da-da-da.

[00:22:17] And so they give me kind of a recommendation of where to go for more at the end of this several-paragraph thing.

[00:22:22] And when I read that whole thing, I was stunned not only at how complete it was, but I know quite a bit about this kind of stuff.

[00:22:32] But compared to the average Joe, I don't know much.

[00:22:34] I mean, I'm sorry.

[00:22:35] I know quite a bit about this stuff.

[00:22:37] Compared to the average Joe, I know a lot.

[00:22:39] Compared to somebody who may, you know, spend time in this field every day, I don't know much.

[00:22:43] But at the end of the day, I feel like, you know what?

[00:22:45] You could bring up any of these technologies to me, or I could discuss any of these technologies to somebody.

[00:22:49] And I've got a good basis, a starting point for real discussions, though.

[00:22:52] Yeah, but the AI is just like this super librarian who can point you in all these different directions to further your research and assist with things.

[00:23:02] That makes it pretty incredible.

[00:23:04] It's not the end-all answer, but it's kind of like what Wikipedia.

[00:23:09] Like, remember how revolutionary Wikipedia was.

[00:23:11] Like, hey, we're going to have this open encyclopedia.

[00:23:13] You're not going to have to get volumes.

[00:23:15] Things aren't going to be all out of date.

[00:23:16] It's going to be instantaneous.

[00:23:17] You can look things up.

[00:23:19] But the AIs, and not just ChatDipT, but all of them, the AIs are doing this now for any kind of information and making it very accessible.

[00:23:27] I see some of these things where they have, like, an AI in a box, and it uses, it references Wikipedia and things so that it can be even completely offline.

[00:23:36] So that when you, you can ask it a question and it can give you answers from that.

[00:23:40] Instead of you having to read, you know, just tons of material and do all this research, it points you in the right direction.

[00:23:45] It shows you the pieces and the places of where to go and help you with that research.

[00:23:49] And I think in this case like this with, I mean, you're certainly familiar with those sort of disabilities and the accessibility features and the things that are out there.

[00:23:59] But it's still pointing you in new directions and things just like, oh, I didn't even know that existed.

[00:24:03] Without question.

[00:24:04] And I was thinking about, you know, something that beeped, but I didn't realize, you know, that you've got wearable devices, watches.

[00:24:10] You've got wheelchair devices.

[00:24:12] You've got, you know, all these different ways of feedback that I didn't really consider.

[00:24:17] And you've got these things that can be put on the wheelchair versus things you can put in your hand, things you can add to your smartphone.

[00:24:23] I mean, there's all levels from very inexpensive, add something to your smartphone for hardly anything to real installs that cost thousands of dollars that are holistic.

[00:24:32] It's incredible.

[00:24:33] Anyway, this is TechWatch Radio and I'm just telling you, we're having fun.

[00:24:36] We hope you are as well.

[00:24:38] NetworkProvidersInc.com.

[00:24:38] Check it out.

[00:24:39] You've got a friend in the IT business.

[00:24:41] NPITechGuys.com.

[00:24:42] Thanks so much.

[00:24:44] We keep an eye on tech so you don't have to.

[00:24:46] Make it a great tech day, will you?

[00:24:47] Hey, thanks.