Gadgetory

good morning on Thursday October 13th it's time for episode 123 of the 359 podcast with Roger Cheng and Ben Fox Rubin good morning guys morning happy Thursday greetings we're almost over the week's almost done yeah alright alright I was not sound too excited way I don't have to look at you goons anymore there you go that's something to look forward to sure um so surprise surprise we're gonna be talking about Samsung again again yeah the new pokemon go it's dominated the headlines and it continues to do so and we'll talk a little bit about the little incentive that Samsung throwing in mm-hmm to get you to turn your notes Evans back in yeah and we've also got a feature about the NYPD and smartphones they've yes you'll never in the future you'll never guess which phone yeah I actually can't wait to talk about it's pretty awesome and also Obama's budding cyber war with Russia hmm the new Cold War the new Cold War 9 ends up happening right now China I so let's get started yeah let's do it look as always if you have any questions about these topics leave them in the comments section our producer Brian will grab and we'll do our best to answer them all right and we'll start the recording in three two welcome to the 359 where we talk about the top tech news of the day plus whatever crap we want to throw in I'm Ben Fox Rubin I'm rock cocaine Samsung is trying to prevent a flood of customer defections by offering a hundred bucks that anyone who trades in their galaxy note 7 for another samsung phone this offer comes after samsung had to issue yet another recall on its fire starting note 7 so Roger 100 bucks is that enough to rebuild trust no I mean it's a nice first step I think it's nice a little olive branch I think the real incentive here the real motivation is Samsung really wants to get people trade in their phones there we've talked to a number of hardcore super fans of notes Evans who who say despite all the warnings despite all the reports they will keep their phone and they will just take the r is really dumb yeah and so do not agree with that it's completely stupid by the way if you have note 7 you should absolutely turn it back in because there is you know there is a real hazard the percentages are low theoretically but they're much higher than what any anyone in the industry feels comfortable with right and you will live another day right to buy a note aid or whatever the heck they call that new phone so yeah it look it's it's definitely it's a couple couple reasons for this right it's a little bit of an olive branch it's also trying to get people to actually turn in their phones lastly this 100-dollar deal only applies if you trade in for another samsung phone so it's trying to keep they're trying to keep you in to Samsung right ecosystem or Samsung family just to note that if you want to trade your phone in for another brand another device like HTC LG whatever they will give you a $25 credit so it's not it's not they're not giving you not as nice that is nice but it's something well how many folks do you think are going to swap to a different phone maker it's hard to tell because these folks are the most loyal Samsung customers they said time and time again if no 7 users are almost fanatical about Samsung they love their aspect literally do no wrong well that's that the folks that we talked to about why they want to keep their phones because there's nothing really comparable in the market you know the nice i phone 7 plus you know the upcoming pixel x all these are all big phones but they're not quite what the note is Note has an S Pen Stylus and that's that's sort of custom-made for the phone and the users of the note franchise are just they're just they love that thing so it there isn't really another alternative out there that's like the note well alright maybe maybe we maybe the NYPD has found the solution for them I don't think so actually so next up the NYPD this year finally caught up with the modern age by equipping all its officers with smartphones the phones can be used to respond to crimes faster and connect with folks in the community but I was a little surprised by the phones they chose these are microsoft lumia windows phones yes windows phones even still a thing not really the kind of i mean their thing is in there products out there but no one's buying them right well except for the image of the what and the worst part about is these phones one of them came out 2014 the other one came out last year these are all outdated phones I don't think you could actually buy them now or you might find them in a bargain bin somewhere nice but good text that's what to be fair the NYPD argues that you know they picked it for security features and the ability to remotely manage these devices although I would argue you could do the same thing with an iphone or android maybe I don't know I don't know anything about Windows no absolutely can but just an interesting point that like are you know the finance New York's finest is protecting us with the power of Windows Phone sure sure and last Obama is waiting some sort of response to Russia's alleged cyber attacks to sway the presidential election this could be some badass cyber warfare it's already going on right now but what I think is really interesting about it is is that it's possible the US will never actually admit to doing any offense yeah I know it's like the secret war that's going to go on look I have bhama if you're listening to the podcast because I know you are please enlist me on this cool cyber war I want to ya know we had Russian front lines of this cyber war yes absolutely so if you want to read more about these stories check us out on CNN I'm Ben Fox Rubin I'm Roger Cheng thanks for listening and go figure we have a lot of hardcore Samsung fans on the chat today really be bought back no shocking no and as well they should however one I found fascinating is someone who's incurred like a double whammy Joseph said they cannot buy me back especially now that have a six month old washer that's on a recall with him they have no idea yeah he got the exploding phone and exploding washers yeah it's an ad hoc loading washer that uh if you hey if you run it at syrtis cycle like well the nuts and bolts will I blow out dude that sucks like we're sorry berries are you up but it yeah it's pretty terrible yeah but i mean III do hope that samsung bout I don't think they they could possibly hurt so bad from this like they're they're not little bit okay will survive fatal move not sure they can dig in bounced back from the system take a wagon and still around I mean I know and they had to face a ton of other regulars we were having a discussion about sort of what comparable to this in terms of what's happened in the mobile industry there have been other phone recalls and other and it's like there's but nothing to this magnitude right had to actually ship no we had to basically compare it to the Volkswagen incident recall of the Ford Pinto the tylenol Tylenol pill recall I mean those were that's the kind of like that's a magnitude of terribleness that this is now it's not just like a minor tech recall it's like Samsung transcended the tech industry by the way they never would have wanted to go that all yeah too little too late it's a hundred bucks it is in in some ways but I think people tend to forget sometimes and so when they come around with the essay and it's also hard to argue that it's too late cuz a lot of this kind of dragged on there were like multiple developments to it that even Sam that was kind of out of Samson's control right like there was a first recall and there was a the way for the CPSC to weigh in and that happened and then the second stuff happened like it just to be fair or Samsung didn't do a really good job of communicating these issues especially during the second time around but you know it part of it was out of their control yes because their phones were terrible this time they'll be back probably better than ever though let's be honest and I'm so really this is going back under the microscope after this oh absolutely what thing the thing is fairly subjected to say how big an impact this truly did have I mean yes it was bad but it's not like the entire line exploded right that would be a real problem like if no kidding if the essay came out a one-percent failure rate oh my god that would definitely always really tragic that would that would cause them to return our business but I think the most the the comment that rang most true through this entire week's worth of shows discussing this as we drill it into the ground is the person who said this is going to really put shine a spotlight back on the concept of quality control not only absolutely but across yeah all consumer brands oh yeah you know I had reported digging into this in terms of looking at this kind of issue we found that no one really actually tests for this sort of thing like maybe I'm sure Samsung eternally does but in terms of like government regulatory agencies the the carriers phone carriers who also do their own testing most of the testing is on based on like signal quality whether or not the phone can actually make it works yeah no one really tests something like this that's why I kind of like slept through everybody's radar interesting yeah I guess maybe they'll be adding some additional testing later just as a major you know what safety is what I imagine is what was one one thing that was really impressive with his phone they packed in a lot into a fairly thin device right his thin it was small it was pretty compact for the the power that had the screen size that it had I think all those resources drawing that battery I think they're gonna date a second they didn't have give a second thought to you know making the next phone f thin or as slim as possible i think it might be even a little bit bigger just a comedy space well maybe if the technology bakes for another year i would say that that that could potentially help them bring back something very similar but they just needed to spend a little bit more time improving the blueprint yeah but because that's what got people so excited about the note 7 in the first place was that they packed so much into that one design yeah and i think it's the pressure of just constantly trying to one-up yourself eventually something like this was bound to happen yeah yeah that's a good point here's some interesting information now this is from our friend and listener mark in the chat and we have no way to 100 sent validate this data so take it with a grain of salt but it sounds pretty believable so he says i work for a wireless carrier thirty percent of the note 7 trade ins have gone to Apple fifty percent have switched to another samsung device and twenty percent have moved on to another Android device now again they can't present this as fact right but thank you Mark for contributing information and there sounds like there's some merit to that like Nielsen well actually I'm a little surprised but I didn't think that note 7 users would move to Apple like I didn't think well but you're only talking about thirty percent 70 that's that's a bigger chunk than I was even expecting because if I'm if I'm a note 7 user on pretty hardcore about some hardcore walk Android I probably would have gone to another android phone or gone to Samsung like most of the folks I talked to who did trade in their phones went to an s7 edge they weren't happy about it they went to a they went to that edge that sort of the stepped outside that came out earlier this year and I was really expecting people to kind of especially with the second round to kind of hold off maybe wait for the pixel Excel yeah just not have a smartphone for a while I guess that's true that's probably that really option is it no but I pigeons yeah no I think I'm gonna keep pitching this until it's completely done after the point I was making like there's not really another comparable phone like there's the there's LGV 20 that's come out there's deal like it's the boat 0 Z but there aren't that many phones that could do with the note 7 right so you might have to go back to the note 5 yeah something like that yeah well given that concept I guess it makes sense that they will come out with something pretty similar to the note 7 next year like after they actually I just don't know if they're gonna call crouched afraid I saw her no way your time yeah no I can really slow down the process but yeah at first I was like no way are they gonna kill off the note name but after so many of these podcasts no I'm starting to think you know what like maybe they will get rid of the note name and just be like it's called something different you think talking by next week our bosses will let us move on to another topic of course not no no no no silver talk about this let's just go back to Pokemon go please okay those are more innocent times right right 2016 has become very very dark oh yeah hey uh marks back in the chat and he says windows phones oh my god ice age for cell phones into which I assume you're talking about the huge blockbuster film hit ice age starring Ray Romano and if that's the case yeah or one hundred percent correct that is right yeah it's kind of like switching gears it's unbelievable the NYPD like one finally just got phones smartphones right like sedition note in know what I you know what I thought about it I realized maybe they got windows phones because there less likely to be stolen you know if like somebody for doing what is yeah like if a cop accidentally dropped it on the street or sometimes though though people try all the cops guns and you know little don't know that it's a cop's phone but if it's a Lumia they're like here can I turn this and like I don't even want and that's just like the latest lube years too late yeah I'll de lluvias picture that scene from The Simpsons were they break in the Lenny's house and he's like don't tell any what I live like this which is done Ferris is unlike knows what are the interesting points of its Alfred story by the way and is that before they got these phones they were actually unable to give out their phone number or an email dress like or an email address like for someone who's like for victim trying to get in touch with that officer they had to basically call it the precinct and I leave a voice message in a lake group phone right that like sometimes the entire school on had to share oh it was impossible to reach an officer if you actually had to because it was against the policy like give out your personal phone number and they didn't have email addresses or something so it's really really rather strange I was just kind of floored by the fact that I was just like we didn't have smartphones yep like what is what's going on here so all right they have them now thank God yes and eventually little the upgrade to Windows 10 mm hmm and so that would be great yeah they're not even upgrade it that one doesn't either there yet no because they've got the old those are old phones are running on Windows Phone 8 i believe right vista vista their phones they're fighting crime with the phones so before we wrap it up before the inevitable grand return of samsung because it will bounce back hopefully stronger than ever after this do you there's a there's a question in the chat do we think that of all people right now Google pixel can capitalize on this fault yeah I think so no really I understand the benefit the most I would think that they would try to rush the phones out earlier but we've seen what's happened with that idea yeah maybe they'll make sure but it's coming out in like later this month anyway yeah it'll be pretty soon and I think that those phones have a lot of what people are looking for the XL is probably a pretty good note 7 replacement I think so similar size a high-end specs all the out great camera all stuff you really want it doesn't have a stylist but then no other phone has a stylist I mean it didn't really there shatter any new ground here but it's a good middle road pretty attainable pretty adaptable I don't look like I could probably get my mom on a pixel if you're really interested in there AI platform too I think that maybe the note 7 people are curious about like whatever cutting-edge technology right is available out there and so you can jump on board and start talking to a lot you can have awkward conversations with Google assistant yeah yeah definitely kind of like what we do here Siri shut this show down there you go big all right good good place to wrap things up if you like anything you saw here check us out on cnet our podcast is also available on itunes tune in stitcher SoundCloud feedburner and google play music that's it for the week see you Monday CEO everybody yeah alright thanks for listening thanks for sticking around it's been fun to having you all this week dad well we'll try not to talk about Samsung or try try you