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GeekNights Monday - Tech News Roundup April 2015

Tonight on GeekNights, there's more tech news than we have time to talk about, so we focus on age-discrimination claims against Google, the launch of the iWatch, another victory for the Internet with the breakdown of the Comcast/TWC merger, the EU's misguided antitrust suit against Google, enemies of mine enemies fighting one another in the TV/cable network race toward grim death, and a turning point where robots are replacing migrant and seasonal labor in agriculture.

In other news, Rym finally bought a new phone and GeekNights will have one final hiatus next week while he is in Hong Kong before returning to our full regular schedule!

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  • I like this lettuce harvesting robot:

    "Means only half the people to do the same work at twice the speed, and they now work standing up in the shade, not hunched over in the sun. And they get paid 11 dollars an hour not 10 dollars an hour."

    "Lettuce cutters rejoice!" Half of them, at least. Turns out they had to start using a robot due to not finding enough people willing to do the normal work for that pay.
  • Laughed my ass off when you said Google's streaming stuff worked well. Eh @open_sketchbook?
  • Laughed my ass off when you said Google's streaming stuff worked well. Eh @open_sketchbook?

    What doesn't work well about it? I'm genuinely curious. ;^)
  • Rym said:

    Laughed my ass off when you said Google's streaming stuff worked well. Eh @open_sketchbook?

    What doesn't work well about it? I'm genuinely curious. ;^)
    This may be a different system, but we had a hell of a time getting Hangouts On Air to work. I invited someone to an event and they didn't get the invite until about 45 minutes later.
  • Which is bizarre because when I got invited onto Friday Night Party Line/Acceptable Vices, things went super smooth and worked first try. When we tried this, I didn't even get their emails through gmail until after the stream was over.
  • Just use Skype.
  • Daikun said:

    Just use Skype.

    Skype can't do the on air part.
  • Rym said:

    Laughed my ass off when you said Google's streaming stuff worked well. Eh @open_sketchbook?

    What doesn't work well about it? I'm genuinely curious. ;^)
    This may be a different system, but we had a hell of a time getting Hangouts On Air to work. I invited someone to an event and they didn't get the invite until about 45 minutes later.
    Hangouts? Fuck that. We stream RTMP to a Google Live Event.

  • Rym said:

    Rym said:

    Laughed my ass off when you said Google's streaming stuff worked well. Eh @open_sketchbook?

    What doesn't work well about it? I'm genuinely curious. ;^)
    This may be a different system, but we had a hell of a time getting Hangouts On Air to work. I invited someone to an event and they didn't get the invite until about 45 minutes later.
    Hangouts? Fuck that. We stream RTMP to a Google Live Event.

    You have everyone in one spot. I don't have that luxury.
  • Rym said:

    Rym said:

    Laughed my ass off when you said Google's streaming stuff worked well. Eh @open_sketchbook?

    What doesn't work well about it? I'm genuinely curious. ;^)
    This may be a different system, but we had a hell of a time getting Hangouts On Air to work. I invited someone to an event and they didn't get the invite until about 45 minutes later.
    Hangouts? Fuck that. We stream RTMP to a Google Live Event.

    You have everyone in one spot. I don't have that luxury.
    You can have multiple cameras on a live event.

  • Apreche said:

    Rym said:

    Rym said:

    Laughed my ass off when you said Google's streaming stuff worked well. Eh @open_sketchbook?

    What doesn't work well about it? I'm genuinely curious. ;^)
    This may be a different system, but we had a hell of a time getting Hangouts On Air to work. I invited someone to an event and they didn't get the invite until about 45 minutes later.
    Hangouts? Fuck that. We stream RTMP to a Google Live Event.

    You have everyone in one spot. I don't have that luxury.
    You can have multiple cameras on a live event.

    I may actually look into that then.

  • Which is bizarre because when I got invited onto Friday Night Party Line/Acceptable Vices, things went super smooth and worked first try. When we tried this, I didn't even get their emails through gmail until after the stream was over.

    User error.
  • I find it hilarious in this show that I said Twitter is not a real business.

    And lo, I was right again. Confirmation bias proves I'm so smart!

    http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/04/28/twitters-earnings-report-leaks-on-twitter-an-hour-early/
  • Apreche said:

    I find it hilarious in this show that I said Twitter is not a real business.

    And lo, I was right again. Confirmation bias proves I'm so smart!

    http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/04/28/twitters-earnings-report-leaks-on-twitter-an-hour-early/

    Can someone in finance explain to me how hitting your revenue estimate by 95.5% equals "badly missing revenue estimates"?
  • I raised over $400 million for my company. I'm a horrible business manager!
  • Apreche said:

    I find it hilarious in this show that I said Twitter is not a real business.

    And lo, I was right again. Confirmation bias proves I'm so smart!

    http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/04/28/twitters-earnings-report-leaks-on-twitter-an-hour-early/

    Can someone in finance explain to me how hitting your revenue estimate by 95.5% equals "badly missing revenue estimates"?
    There are stated estimates, and investor expectations. Thus, there are "soft" estimates that feed directly into the stock price.

    My industry is fucked up.

  • edited April 2015
    Dude our companies ratings were raised and our stock went down.
    Post edited by Cremlian on
  • edited April 2015
    Rym said:

    Apreche said:

    I find it hilarious in this show that I said Twitter is not a real business.

    And lo, I was right again. Confirmation bias proves I'm so smart!

    http://blogs.wsj.com/digits/2015/04/28/twitters-earnings-report-leaks-on-twitter-an-hour-early/

    Can someone in finance explain to me how hitting your revenue estimate by 95.5% equals "badly missing revenue estimates"?
    There are stated estimates, and investor expectations. Thus, there are "soft" estimates that feed directly into the stock price.

    My industry is fucked up.

    http://slashdot.org/story/275339

    Yep!
    Post edited by Hitman Hart on
  • Rym said:

    Rym said:

    Laughed my ass off when you said Google's streaming stuff worked well. Eh @open_sketchbook?

    What doesn't work well about it? I'm genuinely curious. ;^)
    This may be a different system, but we had a hell of a time getting Hangouts On Air to work. I invited someone to an event and they didn't get the invite until about 45 minutes later.
    Hangouts? Fuck that. We stream RTMP to a Google Live Event.
    You guys have all your hosts in one physical location. If Churba, Nelson, and I were all in one place, I'd be streaming RTMP too. Hangouts is the easiest way for us right now.
  • MrPeriod said:

    another victory for the Internet with the breakdown of the Comcast/TWC merger

    Now that Comcast is out of the picture, Charter is making another shot at buying TWC.
  • Daikun said:

    MrPeriod said:

    another victory for the Internet with the breakdown of the Comcast/TWC merger

    Now that Comcast is out of the picture, Charter is making another shot at buying TWC.
    Well, I guess that's less monopoly-ish, but still bad. We need more competition in this market, not less.
  • I'd like to see Google acquire TWC, then they can give TWC customers a boost with Google Fiber. It would also help with Fiber's expansion, which is currently moving at a snail's pace.
  • Always funny when the third biggest player is being the 2nd biggest player...
  • Daikun said:

    I'd like to see Google acquire TWC, then they can give TWC customers a boost with Google Fiber. It would also help with Fiber's expansion, which is currently moving at a snail's pace.

    How about nobody buys it? How about we just split up the existing companies so there are more of them competing?

  • Apreche said:

    Daikun said:

    I'd like to see Google acquire TWC, then they can give TWC customers a boost with Google Fiber. It would also help with Fiber's expansion, which is currently moving at a snail's pace.

    How about nobody buys it? How about we just split up the existing companies so there are more of them competing?

    I'd be happy with forcing them to move in on each other's turf as well.

  • It's been a while since we heard about the Google antitrust suit. They're likely to pay over 3 billion Euros for it.
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