Tech Brew Ride Home - Thu 02/27 - The Year Of No Conferences

Starting point is 00:00:00 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 right home for Thursday, February 27th, 2020. I'm Brian McCullough today. What else? More coronavirus stuff. Roblox is the most interesting rays I've seen in a long time. DoorDash files for an IPO, but don't expect it anytime soon. Nokia is exploring its options. Oh, and the first reviews for the Galaxy S20 Ultra suggest the cameras are having issues. Here's what you miss today in the world of tech. So I recorded half this show before lunch, and then, went to a TED event, and then just now I came back to record the rest of the show and edit it. I'm telling you all of this, because the TED talk I saw was about the coronavirus situation.

Starting point is 00:01:17 I think it might be online by tonight or tomorrow. But anyway, sure enough, I came back here to the news that Facebook has canceled its F8 Developers Conference, which was scheduled for May 5th and 6 over coronavirus concerns. Quote, this was a tough call to make. F8 is an incredibly important event for Facebook, and it's one of our favorite. ways to celebrate all of you from around the world, but we need to prioritize the health and safety of our developer partners, employees, and everyone who helps put F8 on, Facebook said in a statement. Instead, Facebook says it is planning to bring together developers at locally hosted events and do

Starting point is 00:01:50 the usual demos and keynotes via video and live stream. Also, Microsoft announced it will not be attending the game developers conference for similar COVID-19 reasons. By the way, it was driven home to me at the event at TED that we should be calling it COVID-19. instead of coronavirus because that's the disease. Coronavirus is just the type of virus family that COVID-19 is a part of. Anyway, I gave you all that background because it will help explain maybe why this next segment, which I recorded this morning and which was supposed to be the first segment, might now sound a bit disjointed.

Starting point is 00:02:24 So at the time of this writing, the Dow has opened down another 600 points, and of course it's coronavirus concerns that are taking the blame. The tech angle here is that it's been tech companies with their Chinese-centric supply chains that have been on the leading edge of issuing earnings warnings. And indeed, Microsoft last night announced that it would likely miss its previous guidance for its more personal computing segment, which includes Windows due to impacts on its supply chain. Quoting CNBC, although we see strong windows demand in line with our expectations, the supply chain is returning to normal operations at a slower pace than anticipations. at the time of our Q2 earnings call, Microsoft said in a statement. As a result, for the third quarter of fiscal year 2020, we do not expect to meet our more personal computing segment guidance as Windows OEM and Surface are more negatively impacted than previously anticipated, end quote. Windows OEM revenue, which derives from selling Windows licenses to device makers, includes licenses for commercial and non-commercial PCs. Revenue from licenses for commercial Windows devices represents 40% of Windows revenue, while revenue from

Starting point is 00:03:37 licenses for non-commercial devices makes up about 20% of total Windows revenue. At $10.75 to $11.15 billion, Microsoft guidance for the segment for the quarter was wider than usual, specifically because of the public health situation that had been emerging in China. The company did not issue updated guidance. It said the other guidance it had provided for the fiscal third quarter, which ends March 31st, still stands, end quote. Now, the more personal computing segment accounts for 36 percent of Microsoft's total revenue and 30 percent of its operating income. And again, here's the thing. Right now, these warnings are all about companies being unable to produce product. We have not yet started to hear warnings due to companies having a hard time selling products. In other words,

Starting point is 00:04:26 no one has visibility yet on the possible impact on the demand side of this equation. But that's also likely why markets are so worried. You have to figure that's another shoe that will drop eventually. Super double plus interesting raise today. Online gaming platform Roblox has raised a $150 million series G round led by Andresen Horowitz's late stage venture fund, reportedly at a $4 billion valuation. Roblox was valued at around $2.5 billion in its most recent round last year. You might remember, we've spoken of Roblox a couple times before. It's that sort of game that's more than a game because you can build other games inside it. It is, as the the great Matthew Ball has put it, the ultimate metaverse play, quoting TechCrunch.

Starting point is 00:05:16 The funding comes at a period of significant growth for the gaming platform. Just last summer, it was being visited by 100 million users topping Minecraft, and its developer community of over 2 million actives earned $110 million in 2019, up from around $70 million in 2018 and $40 million in 2017. Since then, Roblox has further invested in its developer business with the launch of new tools for building more realistic 3D experiences and a marketplace where creators can sell their own development assets

Starting point is 00:05:44 and tools to others, among other products. Roblox offers a platform for its developers to build upon, similar to the App Store. Many of its most popular games are free, instead monetizing as players spend on in-game items using virtual cash called Robux. Some of its largest games average over 10 million users monthly. Over 10 games have seen more than a billion visits.

Starting point is 00:06:05 Players on Roblox often do more than just focusing on completing a goal or task, they go online to hang out with their friends in a gaming environment. Half of weekly active users go to Roblox to play with friends. In addition, half of Roblox users update their avatar every month, end quote. Also, last we heard around half of U.S. children aged 9 through 12 were playing on the Roblox platform. Roblox recently entered a strategic partnership with Tencent to expand further in China. Roblox says users spend one and a half billion hours on its service each month. The last time we spoke about Roblox, I said keep an eye on them, and this is why.

Starting point is 00:06:44 They could be bigger than Minecraft because they already are. They could be bigger than Fortnite for all the headlines there, because Roblox actually has the potential to maybe become the biggest play in all of gaming. DoorDash has announced it has confidentially filed documents for an IPO with the SEC, quoting CNBC. DoorDash raised $100 million in a recent funding round. Bloomberg reported in November. valuing the company around $13 billion. The company became the leader in digital food delivery in

Starting point is 00:07:16 2019, capturing a third of all food delivery sales in the U.S., according to data from analytics firm's second measure. The firm found it overtook Grubhub, Uber Eats, and Postmates. DoorDash's disclosure comes after the company explored a merger with rival Uber last year, according to a Financial Times report, end quote. A couple things to note, though, filing an S-1 doesn't mean will necessarily see an IPO anytime soon. Postmates, for example, submitted a draft S1 last February, and it's been crickets ever since. Plus, given the market conditions around coronavirus, I can't imagine March would be looking like a good month to make your debut at this moment. Busy day for corporate machinations. Sources are telling Bloomberg that Nokia is

Starting point is 00:08:05 working with advisors to explore strategic options ranging from asset sales to mergers and more. quote, other options include shifting investments and making balance sheet adjustments, one of them said. Deliberations are ongoing and there's no certainty they will lead to any transactions, the people said. A representative for Espoo, Finland-based Nokia declined to comment. Nokia shares have lost roughly a third of their value over the past year before news of its deliberations.

Starting point is 00:08:30 The stock rose 3% on Thursday. The firm cut its outlook and suspended its dividend in October saying it's not expecting major recovery and profit until 2021. That's ratcheting up pressure on Chief Executive Officer Rajiv Surrey to act, end quote. In other words, folks inside and outside the company are worried that Nokia might be in serious trouble. There are some whispering that Nokia could combine with Erickson, but might that not raise antitrust concerns. Problem is, though, there are few direct rivals available to Nokia to combine with, so maybe Nokia would have to shop itself to tech companies or telecom companies. And then, of course, U.S. Attorney General William Barr,

Starting point is 00:09:09 earlier this month, suggested tech companies should invest in either Nokia or Erickson in order to build up strong rivals to China's increasing dominance in 5G tech. Google is officially adding support for Google Earth on Firefox, Edge, and Opera browsers, and says it is working on adding support for Safari browsers. Apparently, it's been the emergence of new web standards like WebAssembly that is allowed for Google to make this move, quoting ghacks.net. Users who open Google Earth in one of the browsers may, use it just as if they are using Google Chrome. The service displays a, you are running an experimental

Starting point is 00:09:50 version of Earth while it is opened, however. The message suggests that the version for these newly supported browsers is still not up to par with the Chrome version. The Chrome exclusivity on Google Earth left a sour taste for many non-chrome users. While it is Google's right to create products as it pleases and design them to favor its own products over others, doing so does not really align well with sentences like, quote, at Google, we are big supporters of open web standards, end quote. By far, one of the biggest knocks on the whole smartwatch revolution has been that the smart watch is yet another device that you have to charge overnight every single night. And yes, that is an improvement to the battery sometimes barely making it through a whole day,

Starting point is 00:10:37 as it was with some of the original smart watches. But still, you know, for hundreds of years, we had watches that could work forever, telling time without any need for upkeep before you had to wind it or something at the very least. Well, Timex is apparently releasing a GPS smartwatch with 25 days of battery life, quoting the verge. The Timex Ironman R300 GPS is available now on Timex's website for $120. Timex is touting the R300 as its first smart watch, but it has sold fitness trackers with smart features, including a touchscreen GPS speed and distance tracking phone calls and the ability to upload workout data in the past. Still, labels aside, it's fair to say that this is

Starting point is 00:11:20 Timex's most advanced smartwatch to date. It provides guided workouts from top athletes and coaches, and always on display and sleep tracking. It also sports a whopping 25 days of battery life, according to the company, though, that drops down to 20 hours if you've got GPS turned on. And it's water resistant to 30 meters, so you can even wear it swimming if need be, end quote. Finally today, the first of the Galaxy S20 reviews are starting to trickle in, but instead of doing the usual review whip around, I wanted to focus on just one early review right now, and that's a review of just the S20 Ultra right now. I want to do this for a couple of specific reasons. Deeterbone at the Verge says that the S20 Ultra is a good phone, and as he puts it, no expense spared, no stop unpooled kind of phone. he loves the display, loves the battery life, but he points out two things that I wanted to highlight.

Starting point is 00:12:19 Number one, as we discussed a couple times already, if you're paying up for 5G on a phone right now, be prepared to be disappointed when Promise doesn't meet reality in the real world. And that is probably not the phone's fault. That's the state of 5G networks right now. Quote, on T-Mobile, I saw 5G speeds that range from barely better than LTE all the way up to 120 mbps, which is quite fast. On Verizon, once I found a street corner with 5G, no easy feet, I got download speeds between 800 and 1,400 MbPS, which is stupid fast. However, I could also walk 50 feet and the 5G signal would drop, or I could just turn around and put my body between the

Starting point is 00:13:02 phone and the cell tower to slow down the signal. I could even simply stand in one spot and wait, and 5G would occasionally drop. My advice, don't buy the S20 Ultra just because it supports 5G. In fact, don't think you should buy any phone just because it supports 5G. At some point in the future, you'll upgrade to a phone that has it, and if you have the right carrier and the right city, you'll get faster speeds. It'll be nice, but not worth seeking out yet, end quote. The other thing, he pointed out, is, remember, the S20 Ultra is the one with the five cameras, including the insane 108 megapixel one. Well, Dieter says that for all that photo firepower, he had a lot of concerns about the photos from this phone.

Starting point is 00:13:47 Quote, the problem arises with faces. Like the iPhone, the S20 Ultra seems to see a face and wants to do a different kind of photo tuning to make sure it looks good. The S20 Ultra brings up shadows on faces and sometimes on the whole scene. It tries to adjust white balance differently and it smooths out skin.

Starting point is 00:14:05 None of those are bad ideas in principle, but in practice, Samsung's algorithms are trying way too hard. The aggressive brightening is ham-fisted, the skin smoothing is out of control in a lot of cases. I don't even know what's going on with the white balance at all. These effects don't happen every time with faces, but they happen often enough that it's troubling. I've asked Samsung about it,

Starting point is 00:14:25 and other than gesturing to the possibility of a future software update, there's not really a clear answer for it. There are no settings to turn off this smoothing on faces. In fact, Samsung's Bixby Scene Optimizer setting tends to make it worse. What's wild about all of this is that none of it is really necessary. If your subject turns their head 45 degrees, suddenly the S20 stops doing all of those things and the photos come out really good. Similarly, if you switch into Samsung's pro mode in the camera app, these problems disappear. There's another potentially more worrisome problem with the main rear camera, focus hunting.

Starting point is 00:15:00 At first, I assume that my blurry faces were simply a result of user error. Often that's the case with new unfamiliar cameras. But input and PC mag reported the same problem, and I've repeated the problem now, with video tests. The phone just takes a half-tick longer to grab focus than it should, and when shooting video, it'll lose focus and have to hunt for it again. The focus issue seriously undercuts shooting video, which is a bummer because otherwise, Samsung has an easy claim to make as the best video camera on an Android phone, and it might even be able to take on the iPhone for quality, unquote. Well, according to Sam Bifford at the verge,

Starting point is 00:15:36 Samsung is aware of these problems, and they're going to fix them soon, hopefully. quote, the Galaxy S20 features a groundbreaking advanced camera system. Samsung says in a statement to the verge, we are constantly working to optimize performance to deliver the best experience for consumers. As part of this ongoing effort, we are working on a future update to improve the camera experience, end quote. This is one of those days where I feel like I'm in a time machine. I'm recording this intro and outro right before lunch. I'm not even done writing the other segments yet.

Starting point is 00:16:10 So by the time you hear this, will the stock market have crashed even further than it is crashing right now, or will it have completely recovered and rallied? What coronavirus news do you already know that I don't know yet? Time travel, man. Talk to you tomorrow.

Tech Brew Ride Home - Thu 02/27 - The Year Of No Conferences

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