TechStuff

TechStuff Classic: TechStuff Takes Manhattan (Project)

12 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

What was the Manhattan Project all about? What went on during the Manhattan Project and who were the influential people involved? Ben Bowlin joins the...

Tech News: Cisco Gets Hacked

11 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Ransomware hackers got access to some Cisco systems but forgot to actually do the ransom part. Streaming services are grappling with the problem of ma...

Super Soakers and Rocket Science

10 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

How did a nuclear engineer end up inventing the Super Soaker water gun? This is the story of Lonnie Johnson, an inventor and engineer who, among many ...

Tech News: How do you Google is Google Down when Google is Down?

09 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Google's software update caused a brief but widespread outage of services. The US government stalls on passing an antitrust bill that would have a mas...

What does Google X do?

08 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Listener Charlie wants to know about X, the Alphabet subsidiary where Google engineers conduct super secret research and development on everything fro...

TechStuff Classic: The Manhattan Project Part One

05 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode, Ben Bowlin joins the show to talk about the scientific and political landscape that made the Manhattan Project possible. What was Ein...

Tech News: Virtual Real Estate Values Plummet in the Metaverse

04 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Late last year, speculation around the metaverse fed into a crazy market for virtual real estate. Six months later, values have dropped 80%. What happ...

Why Facebook Might Leave the EU

03 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Mark Zuckerberg has said that Facebook and Instagram might have to shut down operations if there's not a change to EU privacy requirements. It turns o...

Tech News: The Sun is Angry

02 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

A solar storm is heading toward Earth but it's nothing to worry about. Plus, Apple says its human rights were violated and the Chairman of TSMC states...

The Volume and The AR Wall

01 Aug 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Franchises like Star Wars and Star Trek have recently received a filmmaking upgrade in the form of The Volume and The AR Wall (respectively). What do ...

TechStuff Classic: Disruptive Technologies

29 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

What exactly is a disruptive technology? Jonathan explains the term and gives examples of how technology can really shake things up.See omnystudio.com...

Tech News: A Mega Load of Meta News And More

28 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Meta held its Q2 2022 earnings call and we learned a lot about what's going on with the company. We also learned that soon Meta will charge more for V...

Why Jony Ive Left Apple

27 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Concluding our epic series about Jony Ive and his influence at Apple, we find out how Steve Jobs's death affected the designer, the projects he worked...

Smart Talks with IBM: The Good Hacker: Hacking Businesses before Criminals Do

26 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

The headlines tell us cyberattacks are a big, consistent threat to business data – and ours. In this episode of Smart Talks with IBM, Malcolm Gladwe...

Apple Takes Off with Jony Ive

25 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Steve Jobs, Jony Ive and others at Apple were able to make huge changes, going from the brink of bankruptcy toward success. What would come next would...

TechStuff Classic: Digital Immortality, Part Two

22 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Stuff You Should Know's Josh Clark and Jonathan continue their discussion about achieving immortality through technology. What are the philosophical p...

Tech News: Meta Is Going to Court Again

21 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Mark Zuckerberg is going to have to appear in a federal court to answer questions about his alleged involvement in the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Me...

Jony Ive and the Transformation of Apple

20 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Upon the return of Steve Jobs to Apple, Jony Ive found his role transformed. Given more freedom and authority to have innovative designs find their wa...

Tech News: Twitter Wants Musk in Court in September

19 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Twitter wants to bring its case against Elon Musk's refusal to go through with his acquisition of the company, and it wants that case to happen in Sep...

The Story of Jony Ive - The Early Years

18 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Jony Ive, the genius designer who helped redefine Apple's identity, has recently cut ties with the company. Here we learn about his origins and journe...

TechStuff Classic: Who Wants To Live Forever?

15 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Could technology let us live forever? Stuff You Should Know's Josh Clark joins the show to talk about the possibility of digital immortality.See omnys...

Tech News: Jony Ive and Apple Part Ways

14 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Apple and Jony Ive's design company have chosen not to extend a contract, meaning for the first time in 30 years Apple will be without Ive's influence...

Preserving Video Games

13 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Why is the preservation of video games such a complicated mess? And what's the big deal with preserving them in the first place? We look at how enthus...

Tech News: Whistleblower Outs Uber's Bad Behavior

12 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

A lobbyist who formerly worked for Uber has dumped more than 100,000 internal documents recording various questionable practices Uber used between 201...

The Twitter Story, But Longer

12 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In 2014, TechStuff did The Twitter Story, but a lot has happened in the following 8 years. We look at what has happened to the company, including its ...

TechStuff Classic: Swords - The Real Cutting Edge Technology

08 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

What is the history of the sword? What are they made from and what is an alloy? Special guest Ariel Kasten joins the show to talk about pointy things....

Tech News: Beware of Chinese and Korean Hackers

07 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Intelligence and law enforcement agencies warn that hackers from China and North Korea are causing massive problems. A former Facebook employee claims...

COPPA, YouTube and a Creepy Cartoon

06 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

When Kris Straub uploaded a creepy animated short to YouTube in 2018, he indicated that it was for audiences 18 and older. So why did YouTube's AI ove...

Rerun: Fireworks, Part Two

05 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Where does the color come from in fireworks? How are those giant displays choreographed? We conclude our discussion on fireworks.See omnystudio.com/li...

Rerun: TechStuff Lights Some Fireworks

04 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

How do fireworks work? From the basics to fully choreographed displays, we take a look at the tech of making stuff go boom.See omnystudio.com/listener...

TechStuff Classic: High Tech Farming

01 Jul 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Agriculture has come a long way since the invention of the plow. Learn about how high-tech gadgets are revolutionizing agriculture!See omnystudio.com/...

Tech News: How Roe vs Wade Decision Affects Tech

30 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

A controversial ruling by the US Supreme Court has had a big impact on the country as a whole and the tech industry is no exception. Plus, one FCC com...

How Flash Drives Work

29 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

By listener request, here's an episode about flash drives and flash memory. What makes it different from RAM and hard drives? How does it store inform...

Smart Talks with IBM: Building Trustworthy AI: A Holistic Approach

28 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Advocating for artificial intelligence to be built and deployed ethically is no longer just a compliance issue but more of a business imperative. In t...

Patents and Inventors Not Getting Their Due

27 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Sometimes, the folks who invent important (or at least popular) tech end up being left out when it's time to collect the cash. We look at invention, i...

TechStuff Classic: What's My Address?

24 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

The URL is a handy way to navigate to a specific web page. But where did it come from? How does it work and why are they almost always in English?See ...

Fw Thinking: Your Body as a Computer Interface

23 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Could the future of electronics be the human body? We explore efforts to turn your body into a technological interface.See omnystudio.com/listener for...

Rerun: Proof of Stake vs Proof of Work

22 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In the world of cryptocurrency, there's a need for algorithms to create a consensus for validating transactions. Bitcoin uses Proof of Work. Ethereum ...

Tech News: Cloudflare Outage Disrupts the Internet

21 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

An outage in Cloudflare's content delivery network disrupts multiple services across the Internet. Plus, Meta shows off some mixed reality headset pro...

The Brink Plays Games With Sega

20 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

It was once a powerful video game company that many thought would challenge Nintendo for dominance. So what happened to Sega to make it fall so far?Se...

TechStuff Classic: Techs Top Rivalries

17 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

All's fair in love and tech, so they say. In this episode, we look back on some of the famous rivalries in technology.See omnystudio.com/listener for ...

Tech News: Did Samsung Fudge TV Benchmark Tests?

16 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

TV reviewers suspect that Samsung is using a cheating algorithm to boost TV benchmark scores. Is Tesla's Autopilot dangerous? And did Chinese scientis...

The Obligatory “Is E3 Dead?” Episode – 2022 Edition

15 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

For years, E3 served as the video game industry's platform to promote video games and video game hardware. But some setbacks, including canceled shows...

Tech News: Microsoft Says Goodbye to Internet Explorer

14 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This week, we're seeing Microsoft's browser Internet Explorer come to an end as Google pulls the plug (officially) on Google Talk. Plus we learn about...

Is the Google AI sentient?

13 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

A Google engineer was suspended after sharing a document suggesting that Google's LaMDA conversation model may be sentient. But if a machine was senti...

TechStuff Classic: A Stingray Operation

10 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

What are Stingrays and how are they used in surveillance? Jonathan brings in the guys from Stuff They Don't Want You To Know to find out.See omnystudi...

Tech News: Twitter Refuses to Hand Over Data to US Government

09 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

The committee investigating the January 6th insurrection reportedly wants Twitter to hand over more internal communications about what folks in the co...

Rerun: What is an algorithm?

08 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

The word algorithm pops up a lot in tech discussions, but what the heck is an algorithm? From learning about an Arabic genius to discovering a way to ...

Tech News: Twitter and Tesla and Elon, Oh My!

07 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

We get an update on Elon Musk and his quest to own or walk away from Twitter. We also learn what Apple unveiled at WWDC 2022. And we hear about an AI-...

Rerun: Machine Learning 101

06 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Why is it so hard to define concepts like artificial intelligence and machine learning? What do those even mean? And how does it work? We take a very ...

TechStuff Classic: DARPA Robotics Challenge Review

03 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

What did the teams competing in the DARPA Robotics Challenge have to do? Who won? And what does this mean for the future of robotics?See omnystudio.co...

Rerun: The Epic Epic vs Apple Battle

02 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Apple is facing pressure from regulatory agencies around the world to allow developers to use payment systems outside of Apple's own. You could say th...

The Rise and Fall of Onkyo

01 Jun 2022

Contributed by Lukas

By listener request, we learn about the history of the Onkyo company and brand. From its humble beginnings in 1946 to the declaration of bankruptcy in...

Home Lending Pal: Disrupting the Mortgage Industry with Cloud and AI

31 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Historically, there have been cultural biases that have complicated the home buying process and made home ownership difficult. In this episode of Smar...

Chilling Out with the Coolest Cooler, an episode of Business on the Brink

30 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

It's Memorial Day in the United States, and so we're on holiday. We're bringing to you an episode from Business on the Brink back in 2019, where Ariel...

TechStuff Classic: The Basic Components of Electronics

27 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

It's time for Electronics 101. What are the basic components of electronic circuits and what do they do? Jonathan explains.See omnystudio.com/listener...

New Smart Talks with IBM Season Coming Soon

27 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Smart Talks with IBM returns May 31. This season, host Malcolm Gladwell and a team of correspondents from Pushkin Industries meet with New Creators wh...

Tech in the Great Outdoors

26 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

We often think of technology as stuff that keeps us sitting at home, wired to our phones or computers or game systems. But there's an entire world of ...

TechStuff Talkback: Does Tesla's Full Self Driving work as advertised?

25 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Listener Greg used the Talkback feature on the iHeartRadio app to ask an interesting question: does Full Self Driving do what Tesla says it does? We t...

Tech News: Zuckerberg Gets Sued

24 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

The Attorney General for Washington DC has sued Mark Zuckerberg over the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Airbnb shuts down rentals in China. And a Florid...

The Illegal Number

24 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Listener The Gregolas asked if I might explain The Illegal Number. What makes a number illegal? Can numbers actually be illegal? Isn't that absurd? YE...

TechStuff Classic: Hack That Auto 2.0

20 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Could your car be hacked remotely? We take a look at claims and explore the possibilities of wireless car hacking.See omnystudio.com/listener for priv...

Tech News: Google Pulls Out of Russia

20 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Lots of news to cover today, including an update on Elon Musk's acquisition of Twitter, Meta is scaling back on some departments within the company, a...

TechStuff Tidbits: 8-Bit Audio

18 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

What gives those classic video games like Super Mario Bros and Legend of Zelda their unique sound? We look at what makes 8-bit audio special, and why ...

Tech News: Musk's Twitter Deal On Hold

17 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Elon Musk says unless Twitter can prove its claim that less than 5% of all monetizable accounts are bots, the acquisition deal won't progress. A secur...

An Update on Autonomous Vehicles

16 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Not all self-driving cars are made equal. We take a look at the various levels of autonomous driving and speculate on how long it might be until we ha...

TechStuff Classic: The Internet Kill Switch

13 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Is there a kill switch for the Internet? Is that legal or ethical? Ben Bowlin joins the show to talk about it.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy ...

Tech News: ICE ICE Surveillance

13 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

All right, stop! Collaborate and listen; ICE is back with invasive digital surveillance covering essentially all US residents. Plus the SEC is after E...

Goodbye to the iPod

11 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

On May 10th, 2022, Apple announced it was discontinuing the iPod Touch, the last in the line of iPod products. We look back on the debut, evolution an...

Some DRM Disasters

09 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

DRM, or digital rights management, can cause far more problems than what it was meant to solve. And it doesn't even solve the problem it was designed ...

The Future of Work

09 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

The last couple of years have been hard, but they've also pushed businesses to adapt quickly and innovate. We look at the technologies that power work...

TechStuff Classic: The Story of Internet Explorer, Part 2

06 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Nate Lanxon from Bloomberg joins the show to talk about the history of Internet Explorer and the future of Project Spartan.See omnystudio.com/listener...

The Future Right Now

05 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In this episode sponsored by Nissan, we take a look at the technologies being developed right now that will reshape the web and how we interact online...

The Crazy Story of Pixelon

04 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In the late 90s, a man calling himself Michael Fenne had a radical idea: why not create a 1,000-channel online video network? The result was PIxelon, ...

Tech News: US DOE Recharges Battery Production

03 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

The US invests in electric vehicle batteries. Meta decides to shut down its podcasting platform. And Spotify is in Roblox now!See omnystudio.com/liste...

Data Preservation and Destruction

02 May 2022

Contributed by Lukas

It's hard to hold onto information. Paradoxically, it can also be hard to get rid of it. In this episode, we look at why long-term data preservation i...

TechStuff Classic: The Story of Internet Explorer, Part 1

29 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Nate Lanxon from Bloomberg joins the show to talk about the history of Internet Explorer and the future of Project Spartan.See omnystudio.com/listener...

Tech News: Meta's Numbers are on the Rise Again

28 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Meta saw more users join its services, giving investors more confidence in the company. Amazon is in a tussle with the Australian government. And the ...

TechStuff Tidbits: Fuel Cells and Catalysts

27 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Some researchers in the UK made a breakthrough that could have a dramatic impact on the cost of fuel cell technology. But how do fuel cells work anywa...

Tech News: Elon Musk is Buying Twitter

26 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Despite all the back and forth, it looks like Elon Musk's bid for Twitter will be a success. And as you can expect, the Internet reacted with measured...

The Chaos of the Music Industry

25 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

In a continuation of last week's episode about tech and the music biz, we look at how different media had a huge impact and how digital downloads and ...

TechStuff Classic: The Secret Space Plane

22 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

What's the story behind the Air Force's X-37B space plane? What is it doing on its super-long missions? Ben Bowlin joins the show to make wild specula...

Tech News: Netflix Has a Rough Phone Call

22 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

The earnings call for Netflix led to a very bad day for the company. Tesla did booming business in the first quarter of 2022. And net neutrality propo...

TechStuff Tidbits: MAME

20 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Today we look at the Multiple Arcade Machine Emulator software, which does so much more than emulate classic arcade machines. What is MAME's actual pu...

Tech News: Twitter Takes a Poison Pill

19 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Twitter's Board of Directors have initiated a poison pill strategy in an effort to fend off Elon Musk's bid to acquire the platform. In other news, Am...

Tech and the Music Industry

18 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

The tech and business of music have evolved together, creating an enormous industry. We learn how recording technology, radio and more have shaped bus...

TechStuff Classic: A Series of Tubes Part Two

15 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Our history lesson about the implementation of pneumatic tube systems continues. We also explore how pneumatic tubes are used currently.See omnystudio...

Tech News: Elon Wants His Musk All Over Twitter

15 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Remember on Tuesday when we heard analysts wonder if Elon Musk turned down a seat on Twitter's Board of Directors because he wanted to make a move on ...

TechStuff Tidbits: Format Wars

14 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

This tidbits episode rapidly got out of hand. We take a look at big format wars in history and why they are important. We also look at how format wars...

Tech News: Twitter's Board Won't Be Musky

12 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Elon Musk won't be joining Twitter's Board of Directors after all. Plus, what happens when cops pull over a driverless car? And we learn about a goril...

Rerun: TechStuff Samples Some Raspberry Pi

11 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

What is the Raspberry Pi? Who came up with the idea? What can the Raspberry Pi do? Listen in as your favorite tech gurus break down Raspberry Pi.See o...

TechStuff Classic: A Series of Tubes Part One

08 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

How do pneumatic tubes work? Lauren Vogelbaum joins the show to talk about the physics and history of pneumatic tube systems.See omnystudio.com/listen...

Tech News: Meta Still Wants to Make Zuck Bucks

07 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Meta ditched Diem but still plans to introduce a digital currency that employees call "Zuck Bucks." Some of Mark Zuckerberg's employees refer to him a...

TechStuff Tidbits: The Terahertz Gap

06 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Take a close look at the electromagnetic spectrum and you'll notice there's a span of frequencies we don't seem to use very much. Why is that?See omny...

Tech News: Exploring the Amazon (News)

05 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Employees at an Amazon warehouse in Staten Island pass a vote to unionize. Elon Musk becomes Twitter's newest board member. And scientists have create...

Using Tech for Good with Baratunde Thurston

04 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Advocate, technologist and comedian Baratunde Thurston joins the show to talk about his podcast How to Citizen and how, with a little work, we can mak...

TechStuff Classic: How Steganography Works

01 Apr 2022

Contributed by Lukas

How can you hide a message so that no one knows you're even communicating? Use steganography! Ariel Kasten joins the show to talk about the art of hid...

Tech News: Big Tech, Big Problems

31 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Today's news covers a lot of important problems cropping up around Big Tech, from anticompetitive practices to deceptive lobbying strategies to the sp...

TechStuff Tidbits: Satellite Orbits 101

30 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

What are the different kinds of satellite orbits, and what purpose do they serve? From low Earth orbits to Lagrange points, we take a high-level view....

Tech News: Sony Announces a New PlayStation Subscription Service

29 Mar 2022

Contributed by Lukas

Sony is combining two existing services into something new. Plus the supply chain problems we've been having are likely going to get worse. And we hea...