Tech Brew Ride Home - Wednesday, May 16, 2018 - Yanny vs. Laurel

Episode Date: May 16, 2018

Zuckerberg to testify in Europe, Prime members to get discounts at Whole Foods, low-end tablets possibly coming from Microsoft, a blockchain phone, a connected toothbrush, and all you need to know about the Yanny or Laurel controversy. Stories from: @markgurman, @chrissyfarr Tweets: @backlon, @anindac92 Links:Amazon cuts Whole Foods prices for Prime members in new grocery showdown (Reuters)Microsoft Plans Low-Cost Tablet Line to Rival iPad (Bloomberg)This start-up made connected toothbrushes -- now it aims to overthrow the 'primitive' dental insurance industry (CNBC)Yanny or Laurel? How an Audio Clip Divided the Internet (NYTimes)The True History of 'Yanny' and 'Laurel' (Wired) Credits: Produced by @brianmcc and the @techmeme editors Music by @jpschwinghamer 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 Wednesday, May 16th, 2018. Today, Zuckerberg to testify in Europe, prime members to get discounts at Whole Foods, possible low-end tablets coming from Microsoft, a blockchain phone, a connected toothbrush,

and all you need to know about the Yanni versus Laurel controversy. Here's what you missed today in the world of tech. At I.O. recently, Mark Zuckerberg joked about his testimony before Congress. by saying, let's not do that again. Well, Zuck didn't get his wish because Antonio Tihani, the president of the European Parliament, said today that Zuckerberg will give evidence to the EU Parliament as early as next week. Quote, the founder and CEO of Facebook has accepted our invitation, Tahani said.

The news that Zuckerberg will appear in person before the EU Parliament comes on the same day that Facebook officially declined the British Parliament's invitation to give evidence before it, a move that some British MPs called, quote, absolutely astonishing. Britain's Parliament has in the past threatened to compel Zuckerberg to testify, and if it does do so, that would create a potentially awkward situation. The next time Zuckerberg set foot in the UK on a connecting flight through Heathrow, say, he could potentially face arrest. The committee that wants to talk to Zuckerberg

is the digital culture, media, and sport select committee, but according to The Guardian, quote, in practice, the committee has no power to force a person to give evidence if they are based abroad, as Zuckerberg is. It is theoretically up to the commons to decide what sanction if a person breaches the summons, although historical powers to jail and fine,

have long been considered to be in abeyance. A few continuing stories here, catching you up on new details concerning things we've covered before. Whole Foods today announced a new loyalty discount program for Amazon Prime customers, offering 10% off hundreds of already on-sale items and a rotating weekly special. These new perks are available now if you're in Florida,

and we'll roll out to all U.S. stores later this summer. On the one hand, this is the continuing integration of Whole Foods into Amazon's larger operations, but it's also part of Amazon's strategy of moving deeper into groceries. And this is a fairly aggressive move to do so, as it has the potential to make Whole Foods, which has the reputation for being more expensive than traditional grocers, whole paycheck anybody, cheaper than other stores for a lot of key grocery items. Grocery retail has no.

notoriously razor-thin margins, so one can easily imagine a scenario where a ruinous price were could break out, especially if Amazon is content to subsidize such a campaign. Tom Murphy, former vice president of consumables at Amazon Fresh and now chief executive of consumer equity partners, told Reuters, quote, given how important it is for Amazon to provide value for their customers and customers value lower prices, I would think they'd be comfortable operating Whole Foods at a lower margin while experimenting with the operating model, end quote. Morgan Stanley has previously estimated that the number of Whole Foods shoppers, that are also

prime members, might total 8 million people. And that was fast. The Supreme Court only just recently struck down the law that prevented sports betting in the United States. And Axios is already reporting that European Online Gaming just, juggernaut, Patty Power Betfair is in talks to buy Fandul for somewhere in the neighborhood of $600 to $700 million. Fandul was once valued at $1.2 billion back when it was planning to merge with fantasy sports

competitor Draft Kings, but the government put the kibosh on that merger. I'm telling you guys, get ready, because the floodgates have truly been thrown wide open in this space. A few years from now, you probably won't be able to escape. betting ads on every commercial break when you're watching a sporting event. We spoke yesterday about the enormous Surface Hub 2 that Microsoft is rolling out sometime next year. That's clearly a high-end computing device. Microsoft didn't share pricing information for the Surface Hub 2,

but we can safely assume it'll be expensive. But news leaked out today that Microsoft is also planning to attack the low end of the computing market, specifically planning to launch a line of 10-inch surfing. tablets that it is hoping to price around the $400 range and could reach market as soon as the second half of this year. This scoop comes from Mark German, of course, who notes that this attempt to enter the low-end tablet market is a shot directly across the bow of Apple's iPad, which pretty much has the cheap tablet market sewn up. The new tablets, quote, will have rounded edges like an iPad, differing from the squared-off corners of current models. They'll also include USBC connectivity, a first for surface tablets,

a new charging and sinking standard being used by some of the latest smartphones. The tablets are expected to be about 20% lighter than the high-end models, but we'll have around four hours fewer battery life. The current Surface Pro can last 13.5 hours on a single charge, according to Microsoft, end quote. Just this past March, of course, if you'll remember, Apple launched a new iPad model that came in at the low, low price of $329, and was aimed squarely at education buyers. The current pro-oriented Surface Pro tablets begin at $799. The last time Microsoft attempted a low-cost tablet was in 2015, with the launch of the Surface 3, which started at $499.

Interestingly, the rumors suggest that this new cheap tablet will still run Windows' 10 Pro, not one of Microsoft's neutered versions of its OS. Last month, people were super jazzed that Google had released a new version of Chrome, which blocked those annoying autoplay videos, which can be super annoying, especially when they pop up in ads. Well, Google had to announce yesterday that it was partially rolling back that feature. Why? Because it inadvertently disabled audio on a lot of interactive web-based games and projects. The autoplay blocking in Chrome 66 isn't going away completely.

Google is just upping the limits in the web audio API system for app developers. And this is only a temporary reprieve, as Google says, when Chrome version 70 comes out in October, the autoplay blocking will fully come back. Google Project Manager John Palette wrote, quote, The team here is working hard to improve things for users and developers, but in this case we didn't do a good job of communicating the impact of the new autoplay policy to developers, end quote. But developer Benjie K was among the many web developers still not satisfied.

Responding to Pallet, he wrote, quote, simply delaying the enacting of this policy doesn't solve any of the major concerns that have been raised. Come October, any existing software which utilizes sound and which is not or cannot be any longer maintained will be broken. Additionally, these changes are not in the spirit of a free and open web. as Google controls the formula which decides which sites will be affected and which will not. The primary job of a web browser is to support web standards. As it stands, Chrome is changing itself to not support web standards across certain blurry and arbitrary lines, end quote.

That can be the problem when one major player makes and controls the web browser used by the majority of people. Where have I heard that cautionary tale before? HTC is developing a new Android phone that will have blockchain technology baked right into it. The new phone, which it is calling Exodus, will sport a wallet with a secure enclave that will support the storage, trading, and use of cryptocurrencies and other blockchain applications. HTC said it is even considering accepting cryptocurrencies as a form of payment for the phone. Phil Chen, who created HTC's virtual reality headset Vive, is the one in charge of the phone's development,

with the shiny new title of Decentralized Chief Officer. Chen said, quote, through Exodus, we are excited to be supporting underlying protocols such as Bitcoin, Lightning Networks, Ethereum, DFINITY, and more. We would like to support the entire blockchain ecosystem, and in the next few months, we'll be announcing many more exciting partnerships. At the blockchain conference consensus yesterday, Chen said, quote, we envision a phone where you hold your own keys, you own your own identity and data,

and your phone is the hub, end quote. This is not the first blockchain phone. Siren Labs announced a $1,000 blockchain phone last September, and that's scheduled to come to market this October. But generally, people seem to be seen to be. skeptical of the very concept of a blockchain phone. Since most blockchain stuff can be done solely with software, you don't really need any specific dedicated technology.

So this could all be seen in a certain light as nothing more than marketing hype. On Twitter, the verges, Dieter Bone, joked, us, give us more battery life, phone companies, second camera lens, us, okay, but battery life, phone companies, face scanning Us Okay sure But also more phone companies

Blockchain Beam Dental is a startup That makes Bluetooth connected toothbrushes It's sort of in the family of those subscription consumer products like Harry's Razors or something like that

You get a regular supply of floss and toothpaste and replacement heads for the smart toothbrush from Beam and the toothbrush gives you adjustable brush speeds and all sorts of

different gamified tools to help you keep up with better dental hygiene. Okay, you might be thinking, that's an odd little tech gimmick. But here's the thing. Since the toothbrush connects to the app, it's keeping track of your dental data. And here's the genius part. Beam now offers users dental insurance plans with significantly lower premiums so long as you share your brushing data with the insurance company.

Better brushers and flossers are less likely to need things like root canals, so the insurance companies can offer better rates. This clever business model was enough to secure Beam a new $22.5 million investment round led by Kleiner Perkins, who's been doing a lot of investing in the health tech space recently. Beam has raised a total of $30 million so far. This new insurance product is currently available in 16 states,

and there are plans to extend this to 35 states by the end of the year. Connecting smart tech to health products as a way of lowering insurance costs and offering consumers better premiums has been something of a trend lately. On Twitter, Aninda Chowdhury explained how this works. Quote, this strategy is playing out across all insurance verticals. More data leads to better actuarial math, which leads to lower premiums for consumers,

which leads to favorable risk pools for insurers, which leads to more profit. Okay, guys, Yanny versus Laurel. Let's do this. No doubt you've seen the viral video. It's simple. It's just an audio clip. Let me play it for you. Yerry. Yerry. Yerry.

Yerry. Yerry. Yerry. Yerry. Okay, now some of you will have heard the word Yanny. And some of you will have heard the word laurel. I personally hear Laurel. This little thing has become the dress of 2018. except people aren't fighting over what color they see, but rather what sound they hear. There's no real tech news angle to this story.

Just consider this a know-your-meam public service by yours truly. Here's the story behind Yanny v. Laurel. A while ago, an 18-year-old high school student in Lawrenceville, Georgia, was working on a school project when he recorded this sound clip from the vocabulary website, vocabulary.com. His fellow students heard the clip on his computer speakers, and a disagreement broke out in the room about what the word was that was actually being spoken. The student, Roland Sabo, says he had searched for the word laurel, a wreath worn on the head as a symbol of victory. So Mr. Sabo posted the clip to Reddit. Then it spread when a self-described YouTube influencer named Chloe Feldman posted it to her popular YouTube channel.

So why exactly do different people hear different things? It all boils down to this. If you tend to hear high frequencies better, then you probably hear the word Yanny. If you can't hear high frequencies as well as others, then you probably hear the word laurel. It all has to do with vagaries such as your age, what frequencies your brain emphasizes in speech, and even what you're expecting to hear. Also, some people are reporting hearing different words depending on what device they're playing the sound on. One more confusing wrinkle to this story.

There are actually two conflicting stories about how this meme actually originated. The story I just shared involving young Mr. Sabo came from the New York Times, but there's a competing Yanni Laurel Origin story in Wired. Similar theme, high school students, Vocabulary.com, sharing to Reddit, etc. So if it's not enough that different people hear

different words. What origin story for this meme you believe also depends on which group of high school students you believe. Isn't the internet wonderful? And that's all for today. I've been your host, Brian McCullough. You can follow me on Twitter at Brian MCC. I was tempted to put up a Twitter poll asking what you hear, Yanni or Laurel. But in the end, what does it really matter, right? Talk to you tomorrow.