Gadgetory

moaning on Monday March 12th it's episode 367 of the 359 podcast I'm BVG and your host today are Alfred a and Roger Chang what's up guys how's your weekend morning happy Monday is it I came back from really warm and sunny Mexico to do this sorry yeah sorry you had to hang out in warm and sunny Mexico you shouldn't be sorry that I well we were without power should be sorry that I had to come back to this powerless hellscape no I had a good weekend well things could be worse you could be on Mars this is true where I don't know if there are great bars and Mars then so we'll get to all this I will talk about Elon Musk and his thoughts about Mars we'll talk about security loopholes security vulnerabilities of robots yep and lastly we'll talk about ready player one it's not out yet out at the end of this month but Aaron Carson got a chance to check it out South by Southwest gave her a early review we'll talk about talking about that and why Alfred hates ready player one and why I'm actually pretty excited it's a terrible book as always if you have any questions in the comments section Brian will pick out the best and we will get to them in three minutes and 59 seconds all right hang out folks we'll record the audio podcast and then you can join us back here from a more artistically wonderful segways in three minutes and 59 seconds from three to welcome to the 359 I'm Roger Chang I'm Alfred hang Elon must want to save humanity by building bars on Mars musk was at South by Southwest for an impromptu chat with West world showrunner Jonathan Nolan and talking about his SpaceX initiative and his his plans for Mars he sort of hints at World War 3 and what would happen if the world would basically kill itself basically we want he wants to have pockets of humanity in outer space kind of keep humanity because this is literally a Gundam plot that says how Gundam starts you're right it really is yeah but I mean I get what he's like trying to do here I don't know if we'll be seeing something like that within our lifetime I know he has his whole SpaceX program right as long as as Mars program yeah I I don't I mean I'm skeptical of it with I know it'll happen at eventually out someday in the future I don't know if ever happened and like I'll be alive to see it it's it's interesting that in the typical Elon Musk way like he talked about all those high tech stuff but then you know he mentions how Mars will need to have everything from iron foundries the pizza joints and nightclubs and that Mars should have really great bars he didn't so that's actually a direct quote from him like that's not Roger just like paraphrase okay and that is Elon my almost literally said of that and I mean it's not wrong I feel like Mars should have really great bars we should have really great bars yeah let's have great bars on earth first I feel like we should get rid of all the terrible bars on this planet I have great bars we live in New York City we have many terrible bars yes but we have really great bars which I feel like we should solve Earth's the bar problems before we look at Mars all right so next up as you hinted before you just got back from the kaspersky conference down in Mexico tell me some of that the big headlines yeah so almost every story that I was on was essentially about some IOT device having vulnerabilities smart cameras gas stations cars yachts right and we're looking here at some popular robots yes so this is from Softbank they make pepper and now yeah which is the smaller version of pepper which their big thing about it is oh this is humanoid robot you can talk to it can help you shop it can help you like figure out what you need to get at a hotel or an airport or anything like that here's the big problem of them they have a massive security vulnerability where as long as you're on the same Wi-Fi network as it yeah you can basically get root access and do anything you want with them well so they did a demonstration where they changed its voice and then had it just basically demand a Bitcoin from you and the whole problem of that is that and I spoke I spoke with a rep from Softbank and the idea is you know they're not they can't change this because these robots are so expensive and like it's built into their architecture like a software update no they're they're whole statement was essentially you know just have a their own private Wi-Fi network so like make sure no one else is able to get on that same Wi-Fi network but the problem is though is that because these are in like your malls and airports and they are using the public life yeah they're all on the same exact Network like I can get on that Network I can't I don't have the technical expertise to get root access to it but like I can get like theoretically if I did I'd be able to do whatever I wanted with these robots alright lastly we wanted to talk about ready player one movie comes out March 29th but our own Aaron Carson was at South by Southwest and was able to grab a premiere viewing of it you know in her review she basically says it's really great at mining 80s nostalgia a lot of pop-culture references but it doesn't really go that deep in a story where I really should write there's there's a lot a lot of interesting themes like our dependence on technology like being in this this VR world as a because the rest of the actual world is terrible but it doesn't really mine or explore those those topics very well there were so many ways that they could have gone with this book and they decided to go with the worst way possible yeah you you watched you read about a quarter of the book and you gave up I read a quarter of the book and I dropped it because I was just like this is literally an 80s fanfiction I there's no point for me like I have no nostalgia for anything I will say having grown up in the 80s like this really hits a sweet spot with a lot of art the book out particularly hits a lot of sweet spot references for me just looking at the trailer seeing like like a Gundam in action with the Iron Giant that alone kind of in the fact that it's directed by Spielberg that alone kind of gets me excited regardless of the fact that it is admittedly a shallow plot a shallow story but like there you can do references on nostalgia with like a good plot though like wreckit-ralph was a really good movie yes yeah yeah Oh we'll see ya Aaron I think James agree with you not so deep pretty good with the 80s stuff I mean Brian what do you think about this film you're gonna close the show first or yeah oh okay alright what do I think of the film I'm excited I'm a fanboy I sometimes I don't need to have anything all that heavy plot driven I'm not looking for the Citizen Kane I'm looking for bright shiny pictures in this instance they're just watch wreck-it Ralph then I did was wreck it was great oh boy these stories check us on CNN I'm Roger Cheng I'm Alfred Inge thanks for listening what are you doing to me you can't bring me into the race sorry you're so you're like I feel like forbidden no no I'm sorry confused I don't know I just felt like you were the perfect person to weigh in on this given your love for 80s nostalgia and you just wanted a two-on-one yes somebody else would pick on Alfred fair enough so what did we say we've got we got Gundam in the first segment we got Terminator in the second segment we brought got in the back for the third and Berg gonna back for the third segment so we're essentially screwed so one thing I did want to ask as we've said so many times on the show one thing I did want to ask with the bars on Mars are there going to be Busey bars are we gonna get like blue milk green milk from Star Wars or something oh good question I mean as long as the blue milk gives you a buzz we're gonna be like a cantina Connor bar like who drinks milk at a bar they didn't Star Wars yeah there was blue milk in the background at the cantina maybe I was a Blume alcoholic drink I think it was just because they didn't have as many props yeah milk they call it them no no no but they didn't call it milk in the bar I would go on for this with this for a while yes I'm gonna start digging through the chat but I did want to give a shout out to Matthew dacher who says I hear Martian bars will have great drinks but no atmosphere and that's why I need a yeah why don't we have a sound board give me money to get one I'll make a Kickstarter for you yeah all right so the sound board but while I'm digging through looking for your comments and questions Alfred how doomed are we with this robot security like first we thought like hacking a teakettle was bad and now it's like oh this thing can hold a gun yeah there's so many like Oh a can pepper hold a gun pepper can hold a gun right man I actually don't know there was a video of a robot like holding a gun that was from like Paulson's I never intend that was waste guys not pepper yeah I mean that was the inspiration for metal hood so yeah yeah so the thing for me is that yeah there's so many IOT devices around us that or like easily like hacked I mean the good news is that usually they can fix them or like you need physical access to them or something yeah this is not one of those scenarios so but the thing is just be fair how many of these are out that many they're pretty popular though yeah like I don't know I've never seen one in person you might be more popular in Asia yeah but yeah I don't know it's it's the good news is like you know they're mostly using it for ransomware so it's not like they're sending these robots to come attack kill you what you know the pepper I was I was more interested to see how vulnerable the robots from you know those security robots in like San Francisco that like push out like homeless people and oh yeah the one that drowned itself at the mall in Washington DC yes I'm very interested in their security and like what the issues were with that I asked a researcher about it and they couldn't get access to one because it's so expensive they don't want to buy something into research just to like break it right thing we do have a question here from Alex Mitchell says Alfred you're probably my favorite but why do you hate this book I'm sensing sarcasm thank you thank you for saying that I'm probably your favorite there's doubt to it like maybe baby so I read the first quarter of it I'm very into dropping things when he's just a big quitter doesn't really play out offerings this is also true but it's just you know life is too short to read books that you hate I didn't like how referential it was a there which is like literally the defining quality of that yeah the issue for me is essentially you know there's so many things going on and it's just like I don't know why you chose to like just hey look at like the part where he's like getting bullied in school or whatever but like in the in the chat room that's invite-only and then he like best this person who's like way tougher than him because it is no because he knows one more about 80's knowledge like that's that's the important thing here like it just seems like some like weird like fanfiction that like I don't know I I was not a fan of like several plot lines and I was like this doesn't make any sense I don't okay cool whatever I'm done with this book I suppose one would need to experience the 80s - yeah I think that that is the key right there is like having and that's not a criticism I don't know like I I really like hip-hop music but it's not like I grew up like with hip-hop music but like you grew up with a different generation yeah yeah yeah yeah but it's I don't know like I like 80s hip-hop too but like it's not like I had to experience it to enjoy it I just wonder yeah but I think it's less than enjoying like how it hits the song just like so like these nostalgia very powerful thing yeah made this based in the 90s you think could be more appealing no because in the movie in the movie they obviously update it to have more like there are definitely more like Master Chief from like halo they have like the Iron Giant like in one of the trailers - must L just become somewhat ubiquitous I mean I just think that if nostalgia is your only driving force I don't think that's that that's it feels like it's pandering it doesn't feel like you actually told a good story it feels like you totally here's all the things that you like so like Family Guy yeah Family Guy for Syfy pretty much that that's a thought I'm still just kind of excited to see these things I mean it's it's the same appeal to me that I get when I get giggly at a Marvel movie and it's like Captain America the same screen this is neat and it's just like maybe that movie was great maybe it wasn't it's just kind of like that childhood fantasy come to life mm-hmm and I think that's that obviously that's the Pele that's why they made it and I think there's anything wrong with that mhm that's that's my two cents I don't like I said I'm just to see Iron Giant and Gundam fighting together yeah why does Spielberg directed movie effects do great pretty cool walk me through this and when you're reading the book and it gets to one of these in the static moment like what what are you like oh wow I can't like believe it or like what is this no it's not it's not like anyone nostalgic moment really like it's a no for me I think it's just like the undercurrent of nostalgia that it's just constantly there it's not the highlight of it I did like the story it moves like a trashy novel it moves very quickly it is a thrashing it is a trashy novel what was wrapped in nostalgia totally I get that but I'm not I'm not saying I'm like oh look at that thing and look at this reference like I never thought that I just thought it was it was a clever use of a lot of that 80s nostalgia a lot of those references folded into the plot it is look I admit it's not the deepest story at all it's like a it's very easy very disposable very digestible story and mu very quickly it's very breezy you don't really think about too much afterwards but it is it was enjoyable me when I went through it yeah but yeah I hope you guys enjoy it I you know I'm not here to take away anyone elses joy no no you just enjoy this person yeah I don't get any joy from this do you think that there was potential in the story do you think there are elements that could have been done better was a potential I think the world was the world was set up where you could have explored things a lot of deeper like I said addiction to technology the fact that we're using VR to get to escape from our real world there are a lot of issues there that are real that are worthy of exploring I don't think the book did a really good job of that I mean just sort of was too busy getting on this adventure and wrapping up all this nostalgia around it but that's it that's not what this book was I think had a cool concept I think you know despite me like making fun of it seeming like some kids like fantasy or something like that a while ago it does seem like you know they have a lot of like fantastical like elements to it that like they could have explored a lot and it's just like here's all 80 stuff that yeah well I will say though that it did a really good job at predicting like oh if there's a VR world where anybody can make anything it's all just give me like cartoon references and stuff because that's essentially what's going on in the our chat right now Futurama did it first yeah so do you know about VR chat no it's this game on Steam that's available it's kind of like second life but like VR wise right now it's been taking over taken over by a bunch of like little knuckles like from sauna our chat yes but yeah that's my point though like if there were like really like a VR would it be all these like obscure references and stuff right from what I had seen so if it's not the knuckles it's like all these like anime characters and like there's a guy who's like really well-known as like Hank Hill from king of the hill and he just runs around doing like Hank Hill noises I will say there are a lot of interesting concepts about applications of VR that that are pretty interesting like I don't want to get into like spoiler territory look or the movie but like as you get through like more of the challenges that he faced the main characters face like those are some interesting VR experiences Turk I would be interested in yeah I think we're way over analyzing a movie that we have anyone I know I know frankly a movie that probably doesn't need to be analyzed this deeply I mean it was cater made to be a summer popcorn films yes yeah yeah I'm probably gonna see it oh we want to give a shout out before we close a good discussion - Channing in Columbus who says people are just kind of excited because it is a story that takes place in Columbus and they hype the book is anything good yeah I think that's cool I mean in a world where every damn movie just takes place in New York in LA and sometimes Gotham it's nice to see other cities represented especially place as nice as Columbus because one of my best friend's lives the ironic thing is like even though it's set in Columbus I mean a vast majority that movie is actually it's in a VR world right you're not really seeing Columbus and then which has also been underrepresented in film did you be super excited with the way Columbus is presented in the movie because it's not described as the nicest place yes I know like trailer stacks now yeah it's like literally stacks of RV homes yeah because that's just how that's how we would like a high-rise building yeah it seems it's like I was a great place I love Ohio alright let's move back into IOT imagine psyche wasn't really sure what I ot was we did not clarify yeah yes yes oh yes ants were Internet of Things and it's basically most connected gadget gadgets so yeah like your smart refrigerator that like tells you like what food is left in your fridge or something like that the point is that small refrigerator is able to talk with other things yeah it's connected it's not it doesn't just tell you something like it it goes on the internet to find the information yeah so the fact that they're all connected and all talking to each other means they're potentially all vulnerable yeah because the thing is like a lot of IOT makers when they make these devices they're you know they don't really make them with security in mind they make them more so how do we connect us online how do we make them talk to each other because sometimes like when you do have this like secure aspect to it it makes things but sometimes can make things like inconvenient for you like if you needed to enter a password every time you wanted to use your refrigerator or something like that that can be kind of annoying so they they do implement some like ignore some security features more for like convenience sakes but if you're the bioscan your thumbprint to open your fridge I'd be okay that seems like a lot of trouble and what if you get guests over exactly yeah so they can trade my fridge so we're saying is variable there was oversight in the security consideration for developing new technology we've never seen that before no what kind of conversations do these things have I you say they're there talking to each other can you just imagine that chat room with like the fridge in the toaster the idea that like your refrigerator knows that your milk and it'll talk to your phone if your knows that your phone you are in the market because your phone is in the market like sending you alert like oh by the way if you're in the market yeah so the thing most IOT devices use like different kind of protocols to like chat with each other and in some scenarios like the one with this robot it was oh I know it wasn't this robot it was a it was a smart camera one that I had written where it was a it was sent in plaintext like over like your wife your internet signals or whatever some it's some use like encrypted signals so that like if I were on the same Wi-Fi network as you I wouldn't be able to see like you sending your password over or something like that but those smart cam one that was sent over in plain text over jabber which is like from like the IRC days oh yeah yeah yeah yeah so that one like it was like particularly like insecure because yeah an aspect like that that is like novice level screw-up right there I think it shows you like a lot like you said all these device makers when they're making these products they don't think it was yeah so like they're like what what can you do to make this feature this product look cool and do cool things but the security is sort of a second that's their astonishing in this day and age so are there any groups out there actually trying to move that forward and make it a higher yeah so the Senate has basically proposed a bill that like to make cybersecurity like you know have more of a standard in IOT devices but they're not doing it and like a standard like all companies that sell within the US it's just what they're trying to do is like all US government like properties that buy IOT devices which is like a lot cuz like you think about it in terms of like a TV or fridge but like it's everywhere it's like the sensors that like track like traffic lights it's like that track like water levels when it rains like just even like tiny or like smaller ones so they're trying to do it kind of like how New York is trying to enforce mentality rules by basically telling the ISPs that do business with the government to follow those rules like that's me it's like we're not we're not making businesses do anything but if you want to sell to us that's it yeah didn't Washington just implement that bit while Washington actually implemented a full net neutrality like state rule state which is government leave New York was like if you want to do business with us you have to follow these principles got it which is sort of an end-around to actually making a rule Washington like went out and just said nope we're doing this this is a rule now yeah the hope of the IOT security bill is that like because they buy so much IOT products that they would change it to fit them and then once they change it to fit them but anybody else that buys from them like would also have that added like benefit hmm interesting all right we are just about out of time I wanted to propose a question to farm out to viewers and listeners if you would hit us up on Twitter we want to hear your best Mars cocktails mmm give us the titles and the recipe if you feel to go that far I want to see we can let try to actually make one maybe let's do that the best one just submit your best Mars cocktails and if you can how to make them and if you come up with the best one you'll motivate us to make it and drink it here early in the morning yeah yeah we're reminiscing of our old open tap show we're on them we're on Twitter at at the 359 podcast yeah if you want to put it in the description I'm sure it already is I don't have a hashtag for you got a good hashtag for it I'll come over in a bit okay yeah yeah look out look out for our account on Twitter and should have the information there yeah so please do that yeah until then that's gonna wrap it for the day Roger you wanna bring us home yeah if you like to anything you saw or heard here check us out on CNET our podcast is also available on iTunes tune in stitcher Feedburner google play music and the amazon echo you can also subscribe watch us and join in the conversation weekday mornings on the scene at periscope live show live stream and YouTube channels so see y'all tomorrow thanks folks to get a girl there are we what well no no it's fine okay we'll be there we'll be here will be here right did you drink a cocktail already yes you