Tech Brew Ride Home - Thu. 09/16 – Ok, The iPhone Chips ARE (Slightly) Faster

Episode Date: September 16, 2021

Alright, let’s settle this iPhone 13 chip specs debate. Walmart+ might quietly be competitive with Amazon Prime. The first electric car with a 500 mile range. China has succeeded in downsizing its biggest companies. And if you’ve got a spare $1.7 million dollars, I’ve got a 325 inch tv to sell you. Sponsors: Canva.me/techmeme Tovala.com/ride Links: The iPhone 13 is a pitch-perfect iPhone 12S (The Verge) Walmart+ is gaining momentum, hits 32 million members, Deutsche Bank estimates (CNBC) The Lucid Air is the first electric car with a 520-mile EPA-rated range (The Verge) No Chinese Stock Left Among Global Top 10 as Tencent Slides (Bloomberg) Chat App Discord Is Worth $15 Billion After New Funding (Bloomberg) Former Startup Darling Genius Sells to Media Lab for $80 Million (Bloomberg) LG now makes a 2,000 pound TV that costs $1.7 million (The Verge) 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 Tech meme right home for Thursday, September 16th, 2021. I'm Brian McCullough today. All right, let's settle this iPhone 13 chip specs debate.

Walmart Plus might quietly be competitive with Amazon Prime, the first electric car with a 500-mile range. China has succeeded in downsizing its biggest companies, and if you've got a spare $1.7 million, I've got a 325-inch TV to sell you. Here's what you missed today in the world of tech. So there's been a bit of a kerfuffle on the interwebs these last few days about whether or not the A15 chips inside the new iPhone 13s manifest significant or insignificant improvements over the

previous generation A14 chips. Well, Geekbench is out with its initial study of the chips, and their ruling is a roughly 15% improvement for GPU performance and a 10 to 18% improvement for CPU performance. So, depending on where you fall on the Apple Stan spectrum, that's either just fine, even maybe a little impressive, or just barely anything at all. Over at the verge, John Porter says this whole debate is silly. This is the smartphone market reality everyone has to contend with these days, even Apple. Yes, Apple used to label iterative phone generations with the S moniker, but, quote, in, In retrospect, it seems absolutely wild that Apple was willing to proudly broadcast that it was having an off year, unless you were the kind of smartphone user that wanted to have the most up-to-date iPhone year after year, that S-suffix was a helpful indication that a new model only contained minor changes.

Don't worry about upgrading this year, folks, was the implicit message. But the reality was that smartphone technology was advancing so quickly at the time that even a minor upgrade could still contain massive new features. The iPhone 3GS was the first iPhone that could officially record video in addition to taking photos. The iPhone 4S introduced Apple's Siri voice assistant to the world, and the 5S was the first iPhone with biometric security, a fingerprint sensor. These were all major additions that we now take for granted on modern Apple devices, and they arrived with the relatively muted fanfare of an S-branded iPhone. The S-branded iPhones also offered big camera improvements over the years. The 4S was the first with an megapixel camera, the 5S added slow motion video, and the 6S increased the rear camera's resolution

to 12 megapixels. Every year, Apple gave its customers a pretty good reason to upgrade. The smartphone market is now a very different place. Smartphones have matured and even mid-range models offer basically everything most people actually need a phone to do. Every year, we're told about the latest phone's performance upgrades and edge case camera improvements, but it's nothing that's going to completely change your life. Consumers have noticed. Consumers have noticed. Far from upgrading to the latest iPhone every year, as of 2019, CNBC reported that U.S. customers were waiting an average of over two years to upgrade their phones. While in the UK, people were waiting almost 28 months. At the time, these figures were all trending upward,

and it seems safe to assume that they've grown even longer in the two years since. It was also around this time that iPhone sales started to plateau, and Apple stopped reporting on iPhone sales numbers, opting instead to bundle their numbers in with other device categories. Instead of focusing on big upgrades. Apple seems to be prioritizing a bigger lineup with devices to appeal to different tastes and price points. As recently as 2017, the company was selling just two flagship phones, the iPhone 7 and iPhone 7 plus. The following year, it released 3, the 8, 8, plus, and 10, and last year it switched to 4 with the iPhone 12, 12 mini, 12 pro, and 12 Pro Max. With so many form factors to keep updated, it's not surprising that big overhauls have become less common.

Unless you really want the latest and greatest technology, there really isn't much of a reason to upgrade every year. And that's a good thing. It's much more affordable for those people who opt to buy their phones outright, and it's worlds better for the environment. Apple may now be using more recycled materials and its devices, but manufacturing them and shipping them in the first place still uses resources. In this context, it isn't surprising that Apple has changed with the times, end quote. And quoting Jeff Nolan on Twitter, I really wish my phone had a faster processor. said no one. Focus on experiences, not numbers, the screen is easier to read and direct sun, the battery lasts longer, games are smoother. This is what matters to users, end quote. According to a Deutsche Bank survey, Walmart Plus, Walmart's Amazon Prime rival, has grown to around

32 million U.S. subscribers since its 2020 launch, and around 86% of them have Amazon Prime as well. So, number one, it looks like Walmart has finally gotten competitive with Amazon when it comes to e-commerce, but also maybe this is not a zero-sum market, quoting CNBC. The subscription service, which launched almost exactly one year ago, has grown to an estimated 32 million U.S. households, according to the equity research firm's monthly surveys of consumers. In the note, retail analyst Christina Katie said Walmart Plus has hit an inflection point after months of slower growth. Walmart, the country's biggest grocery, debuted the membership program as a way to encourage customer loyalty, drive more frequent sales,

and beat competitors with convenience. However, Walmart has offered few specifics about the performance of Walmart Plus and has not revealed its membership numbers. The program costs $99 a year or $12.95 on a month-to-month basis. One of its key perks is free unlimited grocery deliveries to the home for orders of $35 or more. It also includes benefits such as fuel discounts and access to a scan and go app that allows people to skip the checkout line. Over time, Walmart has sought to sweeten the deal with new perks such as prescription discounts. It also dropped its online shipping minimum, bringing the company in line with Amazon Prime's membership, and allowing people to get a single item delivered next day or in two days, end quote. The Lucid Air is the first electric car

with an EPA rated range of more than 520 miles, which gives it around 100 miles more range than the longest-range Tesla, quoting the verge. The EPA rating certifies Lucid's claim from over a year ago that its forthcoming electric sedan would be the longest-range production EV on the market. It also represents a victory for Lucid Motor CEO and CTO Peter Rawlison, who led development of the Model S when he worked at Tesla, and has said that the Air will outmatch Elon Musk's company in terms of range, luxury, acceleration, and price. The Air Dream Edition best the long longest range Tesla, the model S long range plus by over 100 miles. But that added range will come at a cost with the Dream Edition with 19-inch wheels starting at $169,000. If that sticker price is too spicy

for you, it may be best to wait until 2022 when Lucid plans to release a base model that starts at $77,400 or $69,900 with the federal EV tax credit. The Air's battery pack as well as its aerodynamic design, help contribute to the vehicle's impressive range. Of course, range is highly subjective, and the EPA rating is meant to present a snapshot of the air's performance under the specific conditions of the agency's testing process. It typically excludes factors such as steep hill climbing and the effects of cold weather. The Newark, California-based company, which recently went public, is gearing up to start delivering its first vehicles to customers later this year, and it has already built more than 100 near-final quality versions at its new factory in Arizona. Lucid is hosting

a production preview of its advanced manufacturing plant factory known as Amp 1 in Casagrante, Arizona at the end of September, end quote. From the, these are meaningless yardsticks in a way, but also it feels like this is worth noting file. Amid the recent crackdown on tech companies, there are now no longer any Chinese companies in the top 10 of the largest companies in the world by market value, quoting Bloomberg. Tencent Holdings has long as lost its place among the world's 10 largest companies by market value, leaving no Chinese company in the list as Beijing's regulatory crackdown continues to wreck havoc on the stock market. Hong Kong listed shares of the gaming and social media company fell half a percent on Thursday,

valuing it at $556 billion. That's just below U.S. chipmaker Nvidia, data compiled by Bloomberg shows. This is the first time that a Chinese company isn't among the world's 10 largest since 2017, the data show. Tencent's unseating follows that of Ali Baba. group holding earlier this year as China's tech behemists face tougher rules on everything from monopolistic practices to data security and kids' gaming hours. Tensit has lost about $388 billion in market value since its shares reached a record high in January. Hong Kong's

Hongseng Index is the world's worst-performing major stock benchmark this month, amid the clampdown with Alibaba and Tensit the biggest drags, end quote. Discord has raised $500 million, led by Dragonere, Fidelity, and others. Sources say at around a $15 billion post-money valuation, more than double its valuation from last year, which is good. It's always good when your valuation doubles in a year, but I'm still flabbergasted that the valuation is seemingly so low,

quoting Bloomberg. San Francisco-based Discord is especially popular with video gamers, but it has expanded to everything from study groups to art communities. It now has more than 150 million monthly active users, who used the service to communicate via voice, video, and text. Earlier this year, several companies approached Discord about an acquisition. The company was in talks with Microsoft, which bid $12 billion for the startup. People familiar with the matter said at the time, but the discussions ended with Discord

rejecting the offer this spring, end quote. Is there something under the hood at Discord that prevents its valuation from exploding, something we're not aware of? If anybody has the inside scoop, please DM me. But also, it's always worth remembering. that not every buzzed-about startup is guaranteed to become a Grand Slam profit-making success. I don't delight in pointing this out, but it is worth being sober and realistic sometimes. Brooklyn-based Genius, a music-anitating startup that provides context for rap lyrics,

has sold its assets for $80 million, less than the total amount of money it raised over the course of its life, quoting Bloomberg. The sale represents a come-down for Genius, which, at one time drew contributors ranging from singer-songwriter Lord to rapper Nas to music producer Rick Rubin. It entered into partnerships with Spotify and Apple Music. In 2012, Genius, then known as Rap Genius, raised eyebrows in Silicon Valley when Andreessen Horowitz, then a relatively young and untested venture firm, invested $15 million in the business. At the time, that was a considerable sum of money for a three-year-old company, but its backers seemed convinced of the site's potential. Genius's mission was to, quote, create the internet Talmud, wrote Mark Andreessen in a blog post in 2012, referring to interpretive texts on Judaism.

He suggested the company could expand to annotate the world, including poetry, literature, the Bible, political speeches, legal texts, science papers, end quote. In fact, it had trouble expanding beyond its core group of music fans. Because the company's obligations to its preferred shareholders exceeded the sales price, investors won't be paid out in full. according to a document reviewed by Bloomberg. Genius finalized the deal to sell its assets this week with $60 million paid on closing and $20 million to be paid in two years, end quote. And finally, if you're a long-time listener to this show,

then you know that my particular kink, when it comes to gadgets, are thin and light laptops and thin and big TVs. I can't resist either one. Even if I don't need them, I want them. So say hello to the knee-plus- Ultra, at least when it comes to TVs. You got a spare $1.7 million on you? Listen up, quoting the verge. LG has announced a new lineup of Direct View LED home cinema displays, which range in size from a huge 108-inch HD screen to an obscene 325-inch 8K panel that costs an eye-watering $1.7 million. according to CNET, and weighs in at over 2,000 pounds. The company has previously reserved these

displays for commercial buyers, but now it'll sell them to anyone with pockets deep enough. Obviously, these screens mean the home theater displays aren't going to fit in a lot of houses, a limitation that's likely to have a lot to do with the display technology they're using. Rather than using an LCD layer to create pixels and lighting it with separate LEDs, these displays just use LEDs, with some using smaller micro-LEDs, similar to what we've seen from Samsung's The Wall and Sony's crystal LED lineup. This has the advantage of creating better contrast levels, like what you'd see from an OLED display, because individual pixels can turn off entirely to create deeper black levels without the risk of burn-in.

But the challenge with this approach is making LEDs small enough to work as individual sub-pixels, hence why these early DV-L-D screens are so dang big. As CNET points out, it's better to think of LG's new DV-L-D displays as a replacement for high-end projectors that can already create an image of 100 inches or larger. Obviously, a DV-L-ED is a lot more expensive, but you're left with a screen that gets bright enough to use in a well-lit room, unlike the dungeons that most projectors prefer. Peak brightness output for most of these LG screens sits at 1,200 nits,

which is comparable to a regular high-end TV. Most of the screens are offered in a regular 16-9 aspect ratio, but LG is also selling 32-9 versions in case you want to watch two video feeds side by side, or perhaps to watch a film while you grind for Destiny 2 loot, end quote. I also wonder what a screen that big would do to your electric bill. Nothing really for you today. Talk to you tomorrow.