AS HEARD ON - The Jim Polito Show - WTAG 580 AM: The Right to Repair - Question One and Ring's new security camera -- Its a Drone.

Welcome!

Good morning, everybody. I was on WTAG this morning with Jim Polito.  He had a few questions about VPNs, seems like it is a little confusing for people to understand that they were designed for something completely different than what people are using them for today and that is where the problems are coming from. Then I broke some big news about the Federal Register changes and DOD contractors and sub-contractors that went into effect last night at 5 pm. Then we got a little light-hearted with a brief discussion about Love and Zoom. Here we go with Jim.

For more tech tips, news, and updates visit - CraigPeterson.com

--- 

Automated Machine Generated Transcript:

Craig Peterson: [00:00:00] So that it can be hooked up by any technician to read what's going on. And to at least clear it, if not adjust it. Now, the opponents of this are saying, Hey, wait a minute. Now, do we really want backyard mechanics getting their hands on the software on the internal runnings of our car?

Jim Polito: [00:00:22] Yeah.

Craig Peterson: [00:00:23] Hey everybody.

We got to talk about a couple of cool things this morning. Craig Peterson here. I was on with Mr. Jim Polito. We talk about a new law, actually, it is on the ballot.

It is initiative one in Massachusetts, where it is an augmentation to another law that passed, The Right to Repair. We may do another segment on it. Jim talks a little bit about this, cause just can you cover in 10 minutes. Then also a little bit about Ring's latest security device. So here we go with Mr. Jim Polito

Jim Polito: [00:01:00] One of my favorite days of the week, just because of who visits. Our good friend and tech talk guru. Craig Peterson. Good morning, sir.

Craig Peterson: [00:01:13] Hey, good morning. That is so kind. I appreciate that.

Jim Polito: [00:01:17] Come on, come on. You offer a great segment and you help an awful lot of listeners here.

That's why I want to do two things today. Cause I know we're going to eat up all the time, just doing these two. One of them is the right to repair. Question one. If I were to look at what do I get the most questions about emails and messages, it would question one. Second, I want to talk about Rings' latest security camera, the drone.

Oh my God. That's crazy. So let me just say, folks. I will do this as the deep tease, the drone flying around your house to keep your house secure. I mean, now that's something I would buy.

But let's start off with the right to repair. Okay. Many people it's the 2020 Massachusetts question one. It's a ballot initiative. It's looking to augment the right to repair. Now I gotta tell you I'm voting. Yes on this. Okay.

But when I see the commercials against this, they are highly deceptive. That's my opinion. Let me see now if the brilliant man agrees with me and that is Craig Peterson. All right, sir. Go ahead. The floor is yours,

Craig Peterson: [00:02:48] Go for it. Right?

Yeah. This is a very, very interesting problem. We've got an article this week. In fact that I put into my newsletter, that everybody got about Elon Musk in Elon's coming out with another car. He says here within the next three years, that's going to be a $25,000 electric car from Tesla that's fully autonomous.

Now I brought that up because that's kind of the extreme. These electric cars run entirely on software. Well, of course, there are mechanics, right? There are electric motors in them, but Jim, these things are software. How do you repair software? That's really what it comes down to, nowadays.

You've got a computer. For decades, Jim, you bought a computer, Microsoft came out with a new version of the operating system. It required a faster machine, more disc space, more memory. Every time there was a new release of Windows you had to buy a new computer.

Jim Polito: [00:03:51] Right?

Craig Peterson: [00:03:51] We know on the Samsung-side and the Android-side, your phone only gets updates for two years. That's at best. Some phones have only had updates for three months.

So, what do you do when the car company decides it's not going to support it anymore? It's not going to give you updates, right? Or what happens now? When the car company says, yeah, we can fix that. It's only a $4,000 and all they do is hook it up to their computer. It uploads some software. The problem is gone. In reality, it took them less than five minutes, right. That I think is what it boils down to.

Jim Polito: [00:04:31] Okay. So I understand that I have a neighbor, one of the guys who lives across the street has a Tesla.  The mechanic comes to his house in a vehicle and works on his vehicle.

You're right,. Mechanically, there aren't as many things in that vehicle. You got a suspension. You've got internal things, power windows, all that stuff, those types of things. There are mechanical things that could break, the wipers, all of that, but right. The thing that usually breaks the most, mechanically, the engine is just software.

There is an engine and it runs off a battery. But it's not as complex as an internal combustion engine.

Craig Peterson: [00:05:16] No, it needs electric motors that are in the Teslas and these other cars are designed to last a million miles. Now the batteries won't. That Tesla won't. You're only good for your Toyota Prius or your Tesla for maybe a hundred thousand miles. Although Elon Musk is working on that. We'll see he's coming out with a million-mile battery, supposedly, which would just be incredible.

But what do you do now? You've got people in the Midwest. You've got farmers who have tractors. You buy anything, nowadays, your Harley that you buy.

Jim Polito: [00:05:52] Yeah.

Craig Peterson: [00:05:54] You're out riding has computers on board. That's been true for quite a while. And so the Federal Government mandated a port in your car that is standardized so that it can be hooked up by any tech nation to read what's going on and to at least clear it, if not adjust it.

Now the opponents of this are saying, Hey, wait a minute now, do we really want backyard mechanics getting their hands on the software on the internal runnings of our car.

Jim Polito: [00:06:27] Yeah.

Craig Peterson: [00:06:28] Because it is their car. We haven't even answered the question of who's liable for an accident when a car is in the autonomous mode. Right?  It's the manufacturer is the one that's liable. Should we really allow even a trained service tech to make adjustments that might be outside the specifications that the manufacturer set for the car.

There still are so many questions here, Jim, it just kind of blows my mind you to get down to it. Then there's one more point, which is that Tesla you buy this year may actually be a better car next year because Tesla is continually coming out with updates and releases and downloading into the vehicle.

So your car can actually get better and even more valuable as time goes on, as new features are added.  If you're messing with that software and you install it, you got problems.

We've got a saying, I do manage security services, that's what I do. the thing is whoever touched the computer last owns the next problem.

Jim Polito: [00:07:43] My mother had a philosophy like that with things in the house too.

Craig Peterson: [00:07:47] Yeah.

So whose fault is it, when something goes wrong? If people have been tinkering with it. It's one thing to maybe replace an electric motor. We've had issues even with these inkjet printers, they'll give you a printer for free because the ink costs an arm and a leg. They put into the ink cartridges, little computers to track whether or not this is an unofficial cartridge. Your printer won't work with an official cartridge that we overcharged for.

Jim Polito: [00:08:15] All right. I want to make sure we get the Ring in. So the bottom line is. What am I doing with question one? I mean, if Tesla is going to continue to update the software in their vehicles, are we saying they're going to charge for it if they do. We're saying that my local mechanic can't do that.

Craig Peterson: [00:08:35] Yeah. Well, again, does your local mechanic have the actual capability, the ability to manipulate the software in such a way that it retains it's security. It's integrity. If by opening it up to the local mechanic, or we now opening it up to maybe state-run bad actors that are out there that want every Tesla in the country to crash on September 11th. Potentially, a big deal. I think that there's another idea. Example of the law, trying to get ahead of technology, and these lawmakers really just trying to make a bit of a name for themselves, right? It's not a big problem yet and there's too many unresolved.

All right. We, you know what, I think we need to do a segment on this alone because we need more time to go through this.

 I think I need to bring you back on a day when we're not doing the regular segment and do that.

Jim Polito: [00:09:28] But meanwhile, as the clock winds down, I need to hear about this, the Ring - drone,  the new always-on home cam. An autonomous drone that can fly around your house. That's going to drive pops crazy when we're not home, you know. I don't know if he's going to like that. He just may be able to jump up and get it.

Craig Peterson: [00:09:51] You might want to take the lasers off of it. It doesn't like zap pops.

Jim Polito: [00:09:57] So wait a minute. Tell us quickly what this is. We've only got about two minutes.

Craig Peterson: [00:10:02] Here's what it is. This thing's expected to cost about 250 bucks and the calling of the always home cam. What this is, it looks like a T the letter T capital T in fact, and it has motors in it. Obviously, it has little fans and the camera itself is down at the bottom of the T and it's in a charging station.

So if it's not flying that camera's not going to work it, can't sit there and monitor you.

The idea behind this is if anything happens if any of the other Ring sensors detect something or even on a regular interval, it's going to fly around the house is fully autonomous mode as well. You can tell it where you want it to go, and it's going to give you viewpoint and it's going to record stuff.

If it hears a window smash, it's going to go have a look and it's going to be streaming the video. that video will be stored online and you can see exactly what's been happening.

Jim Polito: [00:10:59] That is cool. Now that's something I can go for. I'll tell you what my mother-in-law has. One of the autonomous vacuums, I helped her to set it up, which I thought was very cool.

You know, for our house, that thing would get a hernia with all the hair that the dog is shedding. For my inlaws, it's perfect. It just takes off at a certain point, cleans up vacuums. This picks up this thing. Yeah.

This thing sounds great and we're going to have to talk more about it in the future.

Alright, Craig, I did have a question. A gentleman from Boston, Joe from Boston wanted to ask you about five G, and I don't have time to get to him.

Craig Peterson: [00:11:39] Yeah

Jim Polito: [00:11:40] How can he reach out to you or send a message and try to get some kind of an answer in between segments.

Craig Peterson: [00:11:48] Well, I'm always available at me. M E @craigpeterson.com. You can just drop me an email, anytime [email protected]. Remember I have a busy schedule, so it might take me a couple of days to get back to you, but I always do.

Jim Polito: [00:12:04] You heard that Joe, me at Craig Peterson, which is spelled P E T E R S O N, but that is the Canadian pronunciation, even though Craig Peterson is all red, white, and blue. He's still got a maple leaf in there somewhere. Correct? Listen, this was a great segment. Very interesting. And again, I'm going to, I'm going to reach you offline and we should talk more about this, cause that's fascinating about Tesla software, it's basically turning a car into a laptop and who's going to give you the updates. I find that very, I find that very, very interesting. So, Mr. Peterson, always a pleasure and I hope folks listened to your show Sundays at 11 o'clock. And then it is dropped into the schedule on at other points on the weekend at times.

So a great, great show. And then we look forward to talking with you next time.

Craig Peterson: [00:13:00] All right. Thanks, Jim. Take care.

Jim Polito: [00:13:02] Thank you. All right. When we return a final word, you're listening to the Jim Polito show, your safe space.

--- 

More stories and tech updates at:

www.craigpeterson.com

Don't miss an episode from Craig. Subscribe and give us a rating:

www.craigpeterson.com/itunes

Follow me on Twitter for the latest in tech at:

www.twitter.com/craigpeterson

For questions, call or text:

855-385-5553