Tech Brew Ride Home - Mon. 01/06 - CES Day 1

Episode Date: January 6, 2020

Samsung tries to scoop CES, Amazon’s Fire TV Edition wants to leapfrog Roku TV, Samsung wants the Galaxy Chromebook to change the way you think about Chromebooks, is Softbank ghosting startups even after delivering term sheets, and a roundup of day one of CES. Sponsors: Wealthfront.com/techmeme Ashford.edu/ride Links: Fire TV Edition expands to more soundbars, plus cars, cables boxes and more (TechCrunch) Roku TV adds 15 more brand partners plus a new 'Roku TV Ready' program (TechCrunch) THE SAMSUNG GALAXY CHROMEBOOK IS BEAUTIFUL, FAST, AND EXPENSIVE (The Verge) Scoop: SoftBank shafts startups (Axios) News coverage gets geo-fragmented (NiemanLab) Samsung details its stunning bezel-less 8K TV (The Verge) The 10 Neatest Things We've Seen at CES So Far (Wired) Intel just confirmed it’s building this tiny modular desktop gaming PC (The Verge) Processor With Dieter Bohn Newsletter Signup Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

On April 4th, 2023, around 2 in the morning, a man was found stabbed multiple times on a sidewalk in downtown San Francisco. Hey, who did this to you? What happened next turned the story into a political firestorm. Reports have identified the victim as Bob Lee, the founder of Cash App. From Bloomberg Podcasts, this is Foundering, the Killing of Bob Lee, beginning April 16. Welcome to the TechMeme ride home for Monday, January 6th, 2020. I'm Brian McCullough today. Samsung tries to scoop CES.

Amazon's Fire TV edition wants to leapfrog Roku TV. Samsung wants the Galaxy Chromebook to change the way you think about Chromebooks. Is SoftBank ghosting startups even after delivering term sheets and a roundup of day one of CES? Here's what you miss today in the world of tech. So you should be prepared for an absolute ton of CES triggered news. items all this week. But first, it's actually a tradition for folks to try to upstage CES news wherever possible. Apple is most famous for this sort of thing. But this year, it's Samsung, which has gotten the leg up on CES headlines by announcing its next Galaxy Unpacked event,

which will be February 11th at 11 a.m. Pacific time in San Francisco. We can naturally expect the Galaxy S-10 and Galaxy Fold successors to be unveiled at that event. The accompanying teaser video for the event has two very prominently boxy-shaped items in it, suggesting perhaps new experiments with form factor. And somewhat related, over the weekend, Samsung announced that it had shipped more than 6.7 million galaxy 5G phones globally in 2019, which would apparently account for 53.9% of the extant 5G phone market. And things are probably only going to just pick up pace from here because Samsung had previously said it had shipped two million 5G phones just this

past September. And now for the first of the stuff timed to coincide with CES, Amazon has announced that its Fire TV edition is coming to, well, everything. The Fire TV edition, you may or may not know, powers smart TVs, sort of directly in competition with Roku TV, quoting the verge. Today, Amazon announced a new Fire TV edition. that's capable of powering soundbars and being integrated into automobiles, plus versions designed for operators and certified solution providers. The company's ambitions for FireTV to become a more expansive platform were already known. Amazon this past fall introduced a new fire TV soundbar and over a dozen new Fire TV edition products in order to better compete with

Roku, which at the time had gained a lead over Amazon and U.S. connected TV market share. Fire TV's steady expansion on the international front now continues as well. Since September of 2019, more than 50 Fire TV edition smart TVs and soundbars have been launched from brands including Grundig, JVC, Onida, and Anchor, and from retailers like Best Buy, Dixon's and Soon, media market Saturn. And Best Buy alone has sold millions of Insignia and Toshiba Fire TV edition smart TVs, Amazon claims, end quote. But hey, don't sleep on Roku TV, because, hey, don't sleep on Roku TV, because, because they announced this morning that they have a new Roku TV ready program, which will allow third parties to release products that are easy to set up and allow users to control those products with one remote.

And Roku also said it has brought 15 more global brands on board as partners for Roku TV, including now in Focus, Polaroid and Walmart's Atvio. Chromebooks. So much for them just being disruptive lap, laptops on the low end of the market. Samsung, among others, wants to bring Chromebooks out of the classroom and into the boardroom with beefed up machines. And to that end, Samsung today debuted the Galaxy Chromebook, which has a 13.3-inch 4K

ammo-led display that can rotate 360 degrees. A 10th-gen-I-5 CPU compatibility with the S-Pen, and it's all coming in Q1, beginning at $999. Quoting the verge, There's a fingerprint sensor for unlocking two USB C ports and expandable storage via micro-USB. The screen rotates 360 degrees, and there's an included S-Pen stylus that can be stored in a silo on the device itself. It's built out of aluminum instead of plastic, has a large track pad, and is less than 10 millimeters thick. Also, and I know this is kind of a cheap trick, the laptop comes in an incredibly bold red color that looks electric orange in certain lighting. Samsung calls it Fiesta Red.

There's also a plain old gray color, if you like plain old things. Build quality is top-notch. The laptop looks very much like a pixel book, in fact, two very thin and blocky aluminum wedges attached with a slightly curved hinge. There's no fan, and the sound shoots out of the side through tiny holes milled into the metal. In fact, I joked to a Google executive by saying, I guess I know why you haven't updated the pixel book and was surprised when I got a knowing smile. Samsung and Google have collaborated closely on previous Samsung Chromebooks, and it seems like that's the case again here, end quote. This morning, Dan Premack revealed that sources have been telling him that SoftBank's Vision Fund has actually walked away from several investments in startups over recent weeks. These startups had all received term sheets already from SoftBank to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars.

SoftBank had delayed some funding round consummations recently after the whole we work turmoil, but reportedly SoftBank had told the companies involved that the closing delays would only be temporary. Apparently, that turned out not to be true. To say that it's highly unusual for an investor to ghost after delivering a term sheet would be putting it mildly. Here are just two examples, quoting Dan. Honor is a San Francisco home care company for older adults. that's raised over $100 million from firms like Andreson Horowitz, Naspers, and Thrive Capital. It received a term sheet from SoftBank in mid-November with subsequent reports putting the deal size at around $150 million.

SoftBank CEO Masayoshi Son gave his blessing during a meeting at his Woodside California estate with Honor CEO Seth Sternberg. Per a source familiar, SoftBank kept saying it had to run some process stuff before getting the term sheet fully signed but said they wanted to get it funded by year end, so it started confirmatory. due diligence, law firms, background checks, EY going through stuff, etc. There was no reason to think there was going to be a problem, end quote. SoftBank killed the deal one week before Christmas, telling honor that Son had changed his mind. Sahn did not personally communicate his decision or rationale to the company, end quote. And Creator is a San Francisco-based developer of hamburger-making robots, whose backers include Google Ventures and KOSLA Ventures.

SoftBank signed the company to an exclusive six-month. term sheet for a round that was many multiples of the $25 million it had raised to date. Quote, totally screwed is how one source close to creator refers to what happened next. Like with the other examples, it was unexplained delay after unexplained delay, and at one point said it wanted to add a co-lead investor. The company pushed back and SoftBank agreed to wire between $10 million and $15 million as a show of good faith. But the hurry up and wait persisted with multiple sources telling me last month that the original

deal with dead. Things may have since changed, however, as a source close to Softbank says, negotiations remain active, end quote. Are you ready for essentially gerrymandered news coverage? Neiman Lab profiles how news organizations will start sending more geo-targeted push notifications this year, highlighting different aspects of the same news article to different locales. Expect this to be used quite heavily in the coverage of the 2020 elections, for example, and that is what Neiman Labs is worried about. Quote, local elections can have national interest and implications making election coverage applicable to multiple audiences based on their location.

Push notifications about these stories increasingly frame the same topic in ways that are unique to local and national audiences, often even when they link to the same story. Personalizing to different local audiences could have the measurable outcome of impacting name recognition for candidates in particular districts. This location-based personalization, however, is distinctions. distinctly different from historic differences between local and national news coverage. Local affiliates have traditionally provided further details on stories that may impact local audiences, and smaller news outlets have provided more coverage than national organizations for local specific stories.

While the use of geolocation targeted push notifications has parallels to the nested models of local affiliates and national organizations, the human information interactions and overall implications, particularly relative to how this applies to communications around elections, are very different. Personalized push notifications are somewhat unique in that, while the majority of them are paired with frames for local and national audiences, but pointing to the same story, there's no guarantee that a user ever taps on the alert to read the story. That means the tailored frame might be all that the user sees. As a result, geotargeted notifications have the potential to manipulate the information environment,

even through subtle choices about detail or sentiment, potentially examine. exacerbating social geographic fragmentation and gerrymandering understanding of elections, end quote. Well, I'm not actually there yet, and we already talked about some things that have already made headlines today, but how about we just do a roundup of some of the cool things that have already popped up at CES this first day? Cool stuff or even just wacky stuff. First up, you might have seen mention of Samsung's nearly completely bezeless 8K TV. When I say nearly bezeless, I nearly mean it. The Q-led display takes up 99% of the surface of the TV.

The bezel that does exist is just 2.3 millimeters, so basically you can't even perceive it from a distance. The TV itself is 15 millimeters thick. No word on pricing, no word on release date, and also no word on why you would want this yet, because as with last year, the whole problem with the 8K TV hype is the fact that there remains a dearth of actual 8K content out there for you to view. So you could get this TV that can give you the best picture imaginable, except you can't really watch anything that could deliver that best picture imaginable. So one wonders, why not put this bezeless sort of trick on a 4K TV that would actually be more affordable and more people could actually use? quoting the verge, you might expect a TV with no noticeable bezels to be lousy in the audio department, but according to Samsung, this thing packs a punch.

A feature called OTS Plus, object tracking sound plus, recognizes when moving objects are on the screen and tries to move sound along the TV speakers in a realistic fashion, producing an end result that the company says resembles 5.1 surround sound. And there's also a Q Symphony function that optimizes audio performance by utilizing both the TV's speakers and a connected soundbar simultaneously. As for its smarts, the Q-LED 8K has support for Bixby, Amazon Alexa, and Google Assistant. It can quickly pair with Android smartphones for mirroring when they're tapped against or near the screen, and Samsung says it's including what it refers to as a digital butler,

which can control Wi-Fi and Bluetooth-compatible gadgets, but also those devices that lack an internet connection, end quote. Now let's jump to the weird. Can I interest you in facial recognition for your cat? Quoting Wired, Of all the wild and wacky applications of AI we're seeing at CES, cat facial recognition is one of the most delightful. Designed by UC Berkeley students, the Alexa-enabled Lulu Pet,

uses AI to both determine the size, quantity, and consistency of different types of cat excreta, and report which cat did the dirty deed. More than 40% of all cat owners own more than one cat. This will help you figure out which of your beloved kitties is having a rough day, gastrointestinally speaking, the Lulu Pet will go on sale on Amazon for $149 in March, end quote. Also quoting from Wired, but back to the cool side of the equation. This honoree of CES's 2020 Innovation Award is a short throw projector for the home that can turn nearly any flat surface into a touchscreen. Learn to play piano on your kitchen table, for example, by tapping the virtual keys on the projected image.

The multi-touch functionality is easy and intuitive. These neat features don't come cheap. The Hachi Infinite will be available soon for $999. Next, the Aero Next drone puts a true 360-degree camera in the air. Basically, imagine a DJ-I-looking drone with a sort of tower protruding from the top of it. Then on top of the tower, you've got that 360-degree cam. What's this for exactly? Well, shooting VR scenes.

And a French company called Cosmo Connect has a bike helmet slash motorcycle slash scooter helmet that has lights and turning and braking lights built in on the back of the helmet, which sync to the handlebars via Bluetooth and, you know, indicate that you're about to make a turn or something. Now, we've seen stuff like that before, but this new helmet, quoting from Wired One More Time, also comes with a pair of wraparound glasses that when linked to your phone's navigation app shows directions in a heads-up display. Sideways watching sensors send a warning to the display if cross-traffic vehicles look like they might hit you.

And if you take a spill, the helmet automatically notifies emergency services and sends your GPS coordinates. The helmet and glasses go on sale later this year as a bundle for a price somewhere around $300, but you'll also be able to buy the glasses alone if you don't want to wear the brain bucket, end quote. Also, Intel just confirmed a new power. powerful modular gaming PC, quoting the Verge. When Intel conducted a short-lived experiment that put AMD graphics inside an Intel processor,

it led to one of the most diminutive yet capable gaming PCs ever made, the Hades Canyon NUC, aka the NUC 8, or NUC 8, I guess. That wasn't a computer you could really meaningfully upgrade, though. That's where its successor, the NUC 9, Extreme Ghost Canyon, may excel, letting you swap out the CPU, GPU, memory, storage, and ports with a minimum of effort. Tonight, Intel gave a sneak peek to the Ghost Canyon at CES 2020 in Las Vegas, confirming a leak we've been wondering about for months. The existence of an entire gaming PC built around Intel's NUC-compute Element initiative

to turn its CPUs into swappable cartridges for easily upgradable computers. The leaks said this computer would be just five liters in volume, practically as small as a game console, and that's just what Intel confirmed this evening, as well as the ability to swap out those compute element CPU cartridges, end quote. And finally, in his new newsletter called processor, Dieter Bone says that this is his favorite thing that he's seen at CES so far. It's the Natatoomo HomeKit Smart Lock, which makes use of physical NFC keys. So imagine actual key-shaped keys that are really, really just NFC devices. You still insert them into a lock and you turn it just like you do

with normal keys, but there are no teeth, just the NFC chip. Here are the advantages of this, according to Dieter, quote, because it uses NFC to authenticate into the lock instead of ground-down metal, you can program the keys yourself. You don't have to go visit a locksmith to change your lock or to get a new key made. You can just order some keys and tap a few buttons in an app. Because these keys are just NFC codes and the locks are just NFC readers, there's no reason a single key couldn't unlock multiple different locks. You could mix and match access to doors, however you like, just as if you were some kind of office manager. Because it's a physical lock and doesn't have a motor in it, you can power it with four

AAA batteries and don't need to change them very often. It unfortunately doesn't offer all the advanced remote unlock features you get from more sophisticated locks, but that trade-off might be worth it. Because it's a smart lock, you can still unlock it through the app or with home kit if you lose your key. On top of that, Natatoamo doesn't charge you a monthly fee, end quote. Oh, and Natammo has the advantage of not being one of the bigger platforms like Amazon, Google, or Apple. So if you did buy this and start using it, it wouldn't mean locking yourself into someone's larger overall ecosystem, and especially in the case of Amazon or Google, wouldn't mean that data relating to you when you're at home and when you're not going

to the global Panopticon to help sell you stuff. And frankly, increasingly with smart home stuff, I think that's got to be a factor when and if you decide to buy some of this stuff or not. So if all goes well, you should be getting this in your podcatchers a little early today as I'm rushing to the airport to jump on a plane to Vegas right now. Hope to see some of the things that we just talked about with my own two eyes over the next few days. Yes, Vegas listeners or folks attending CES. I'm going to try to do a listener meetup if folks are interested.

I'm staying at Bally's because of the easy monorail access. But I know that Bally's is not exactly the hippest place. So if folks want to suggest a place to hang out that's nearby Bally's, let me know. Maybe the Bellagio, Cosmopolitan, or Paris. I don't know. This is actually my first time in Vegas in exactly a decade. So if somebody knows a cool meetup spot where a handful of us can hang out comfortably, let me know. I'll try to give more details at the end of tomorrow's show.

Or just keep watch on my Twitter feed for specific up-to-the-minute details. Talk to you tomorrow.