Rich Hay from https://www.windowsobserver.com/ and his new podcast at https://www.windowsobserver.com/faith-tech-space-podcast/ joins us this week. We talk with Rich about the various communication platforms that we are now using and then how some companies, like Microsoft, have switched their conferences to completely virtual. We wrap with some updates from Rich on his new podcast.

I think you will enjoy the show.

Full show notes, transcriptions, audio and video at http://theAverageGuy.tv/hgg445

Join Jim Collison / @jcollison and Mike Wieger / @WiegerTech for show #445 of Home Gadget Geeks brought to you by the Average Guy Network.

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Jim Collison  [0:00] 
This is The Average Guy Network and you have found Home Gadget Geeks show number 445 recorded on May 14 2020.

Jim Collison  [0:22] 
Here on Home Gadget Geeks we cover all your favorite tech gadgets that find their way into your home news reviews, product updates and conversation all for the average tech guy. I’m your host, Jim Collison broadcasting live from the average guy TV Studios here in a mike. Summer could come any day like it just keeps on has never looked greener. Oh, you know that the rain we’ve been getting lately, which we weren’t getting earlier this season has kicked in and man that lawn is green. It is it’s pretty great. It’s pretty easy to be along here. Oh, we had of course. Big thanks to Dave McCabe, who was on last week talking about his line. Richard, are you aligned guy? Do you know okay.

Rich Hay  [1:02] 
My wife gets the green thumb the gardener lady comes once a week to help her with that so I don’t even mow the lawn. Okay, I plugged the lawnmower in on Friday morning so the battery can charge up. That’s it. That’s it.

Jim Collison  [1:14] 
How did you look out on that? with just this you guys decided that’s how you’re going to split it.

Rich Hay  [1:19] 
That’s interesting. Yeah,

Jim Collison  [1:21] 
no, no run out. And do you guys have you have an extensive lawn? Do you have a big we do

Rich Hay  [1:25] 
we got a good sized lawn I were on just under an acre here I think and so we have a big front we’re on one of those lots. It’s on the curve. So it kind of it kind of gets wider as you move to the front from the back and the back is pretty wide. So yeah, we got a good chunk along here. Yeah, Mike, I saw cutting grass. That’s what you Oh, yeah.

Jim Collison  [1:44] 
Yeah. And then you get I mean, the rain and you’re down in Florida. So that gets covered pretty well. It gets pretty warm, but it’s pretty moist down there. Mike, you. You I saw some pictures you got out last weekend. We I did too. I mowed twice since Dave was

Mike Wieger  [1:58] 
on the show. Have you really I wanted to so bad but like with the rain and stuff, it’s been so wet, you know, last night and stuff like that, that I haven’t been out for a

Jim Collison  [2:06] 
sectional three times. So we podcasted Wednesday I went out and mowed Friday afternoon because I was like, Okay, my skating was pretty thick. So I got that done. And then Sunday, no Saturday afternoon I did it again. Because Dave’s like, you know, do it twice, you know, just get out there. Just knock it out. Right. So then nothing then Tuesday, there was enough to mow it again. So now and no Tuesday we have rain Wednesday, Thursday, so I’m gonna try and vote either tomorrow or Saturday but big thanks to Tim for getting us. All that lawn care stuff. Dave did a great job. A super popular show. Dave, thanks for coming on. And for doing that of course, we posted that show for 44 along with full transcripts and show notes that’s out there. Some pretty good show notes Dave mentioned a few products and if you haven’t gone out, listen to it yet. Catch the show notes. Htg 444 for that show, and then a The Average Guy TV Htg 445. For this one. We may not have a lot but what full transcript that are available. Of course you can listen mobile on on the road or maybe walking the dog. You’re still on the road when you’re walking the dog. So, walking the dog mowing the lawn, doing the dishes, whatever chores you have vacuuming. throw us in streaming live Home Gadget Geeks calm if you want to do it that way, then don’t forget you can also follow the show schedule. I got some scheduling to do right now but head out to the average guy.eventbrite.com and you’ll see the schedule you see Rich’s show that’s out there right now if you want to get it done that way and then subscribe while you’re there. Subscribe, go out to The Average Guy. TV slash Subscribe, subscribe to the newsletter. I didn’t send one this week. But we’ll get one this weekend as well. We have rich here with us tonight. Rich’s a longtime friend podcaster. Rich I think I’ve known you for almost as many years as I’ve known most of the folks around here. 8789 years now going on. Welcome back to Home Gadget Geeks. Appreciate it. Thanks for having me. We’re just saying it’s been since November. It was early November timeframe, I think or mid November that I was last year. Yeah. And I think this is your Long ago, it seems like so long ago to you’ve been does lots of lots of things happen lots of what happened when we were in the in the pre show we were kind of talking about communication platforms. And we didn’t plan on this but I’m gonna do it anyways. There have been so many okay zoom of course has popped up as being kind of the leader you know in on this. But then rich I think you said and I saw to Google has announced that meat is available now for folks who want to use it right so meat that is it meat Google? Yeah,

Rich Hay  [4:30] 
I think it’s me not google.com Yeah.

Jim Collison  [4:33] 
And then what else? Rich What else have you been? You know, Chris, we use stream yard to do the podcast but what else one of the platforms have you been using? You mentioned? teams right? You’re Yes, team MVP.

Rich Hay  [4:46] 
Yep, MVP summit went virtual this year because that all this COVID stuff started just a few weeks ahead of summit and they decided to go virtual that was all done in Microsoft Teams. And it was actually a very good experience. I was I wasn’t planning to go this year because I couldn’t because of it. class schedules. But when it went virtual, I was like, yeah, I’ll get in there. So I did and it was great. It really was a, you know, when you consider everybody straying from their homes that Microsoft folks were in their own houses and their own home offices. We were all wherever we were in doing the video chat thing. It held up very well. They had a few hiccups. I think Microsoft in general, and I think the big tech companies in general, as all this work from home remote stuff kind of picked up initially, they had some hiccups, but I think Microsoft and the others got some, you know, resources spun up pretty quick to take care of that load. And in fact, what was the number 75 million daily users on teams is what Satya Nadella shared a couple weeks ago at their third quarter fiscal their financials at the end of the third quarter. So and then, of course, zoom said we’ve got 300 million and then came back a little later and said no, actually we don’t have 300 million but we have this. So they adjusted their numbers but I’ve been on zoom because a lot. It’s they don’t lie to you. And they got caught off guard because they’ve had to deal with a lot of security type stuff, even though they were a pretty big user base. I’m not sure why they weren’t working on security at the time but they kind of got forced. So you got Google meets now messenger Facebook just released messenger rooms as another way to chat with people that’s available in the messenger app or on the Facebook website or Facebook app

Jim Collison  [6:22] 
actually works pretty easy from a from a guy who uses stream yard to do the podcast. I my sister called me on using Facebook Messenger. And that’s actually as easy to connect to as a Hangout is this was right there’s no no plugins to install, no nothing you just connect. There’s some there’s some basic controls in it. It works well.

Rich Hay  [6:47] 
You’ve always been able to do face call, you know, video calls on messenger but this is an opportunity now bring more people into that and we’ve used zoom for family family calls so we’ve got family on my wife’s side over in the UK and Italy with the Boys, so we’ve been connected with them a few times. We did a big hay family call one Sunday afternoon there was like 17 or 18 of us on the call between brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts, nieces, nephews and everything. So it’s and then of course, you know, Microsoft announced their Microsoft 365 stuff, the big changes coming with personal and family and now teen and available for families and Skype, they added Skype, got some upgrades, they got a thing in there called meet now, so you can do the similar type of thing and have a multi person call.

Mike Wieger  [7:33] 
Yeah, I’ve been loving teams. I live in teams pretty much all day and constantly on video calls and that thing has been really rock solid especially I’d say for the last month maybe in the first few weeks there when everyone’s probably starting to get a few hiccups but ever since then it’s been great. Only feature I really want them to release there is the ability to call in via my phone to a video call only because I have my boss has terrible internet connectivity. He fails on every other every platform doesn’t matter. Which platform it is, but when you can call in at least his audio is clear. Even if his video starts to go in and out. It’s the only feature I wish they had there. But yeah, I agree teams has been fantastic. We use zoom on a family side, my grandma, who is not a tech person at all, my uncle went over and set her up with an iPad and put it on there. And she got to zoom all the kit grandkids and she just thought that was the coolest thing she had ever seen. She’d never even seen that technology work. And so it’s been, it’s been cool to see those different companies and how you utilize them in the family space and the workspace. I’ve been pretty impressed so far, to be honest.

Rich Hay  [8:33] 
Oh, yeah, it’s been a boon. Don’t get me wrong. I said this in my last podcast, you know, it’s great that the companies are bragging about the increase in numbers and the users, right? The real, the real. So Spotify is reporting record number of subscribers and listeners and all these services are reporting big increases, right? Big hockey stick type increases, but will they retain that when all this settles down, that will be a good point of you know, looking at Seeing if that happens, but good on them for having the tools available and being able to get out in front of it.

Mike Wieger  [9:05] 
And that’s going to be the hardest part. When you think of being like, the project manager for some of these writing, you’re planning out resources, and you’re trying to figure out cost wise, okay? Do we spin up a bunch of, you know, new servers to support this? What do we need? And then do we have the ability that if we’re gonna start paying for that, do we have the ability to quickly cut those off after this whole spike? If we’re otherwise they’re going to go under real quick if they’re paying for all that not having any income stream coming in? So it’ll be interesting to see hopefully, it’s not too big of a headache for them. And hopefully, it’s a the providers of the data centers and stuff are working with them on that.

Jim Collison  [9:36] 
Yeah. So Brian in chat says he’s been using WebEx for staff work means you guys been using any of the other GoToMeeting or any any those varieties.

Rich Hay  [9:47] 
WebEx is Cisco, right? That Cisco WebEx, if I’m not mistaken, on the new channels are interviewing people and stuff like that.

Mike Wieger  [9:55] 
That’s what we did well for work, so anything external?

Rich Hay  [9:58] 
Yeah, we’re teams can For work for inform, and using teams for In fact, you know builds coming up now I know we’re going to talk about build next for next week but build set the media but Microsoft team site. And so we’ve got a channel that we can go into and make contact with the wagon unfolds and the PR people and reps and stuff like that to get content. And that’s where they’re sharing all the the embargoed material and stuff with this. So if they’re using teams for anything and everything,

Mike Wieger  [10:27] 
yeah, I mean, they really are. I think the media though, has had a pretty good impact on WebEx with especially compared to zoom because I use WebEx all the time. It’s the account I have to work. So all my extra meetings are done through WebEx. I was shocked the amount of comments I get like, oh, man, we got to use WebEx. It’s so clunky, like why aren’t we using zoom?

Mike Wieger  [10:42] 
And I mean, I see a tad difference, but not enough like everyone make comments. I think everyone’s honestly seeing the hype of how great zoom is and how it’s making everyone else look bad. And it’s just almost like ingrained in them but they haven’t really you can’t really point to anything that says zoom is better than WebEx I have zero problems with WebEx, the amount of cost As I get on why we’re not using zoom is has surprised me.

Rich Hay  [11:03] 
Yeah. Ting, go ahead. Go ahead. Right. Well, I was gonna say the whole zoom thing, right. I’ll tell you one thing that zoom forced people like teams to do I know teams for sure it’s to teams defaulted to like viewing two of the members of the call. Right on the screen. Well, they’re about to release the three by three grid because zoom had that. Right. So that is zoom has influenced this industry in a way that I don’t think anybody could have predicted before all the good stuff

Jim Collison  [11:32] 
zooms at the standard really fast whether they intended to or not, that became despite their security. If you don’t, we’ll totally I mean, they they admitted that they were they wanted to be easy to connect. We’re going to default to easy instead of security every single time, right. I think they admitted to that. Now they’ve had to kind of play catch up and they’re kind of coming back on that but certainly they

Rich Hay  [11:54] 
update. They just so

Jim Collison  [11:57] 
yeah, we’re getting weekly updates to the enterprise. resumes. So we split between zoom and teams. And it just kind of depends on what what we’re trying to do with it. So if we’re trying to broadcast we’re going to use the webinar software from zoom. That’s just the way it’s going to go internally for everybody in the company. That makes the most sense for know, but for four No, no, but for for a lot of our internal stuff when it’s just a couple people teams is where we go because we can share stuff in there. Right. And so when you’re doing work, I’m sharing spreadsheets I’m working with with folks messages are there. You can do both. You know, you can you can leave both messages and speaking the same channel. I mean, it’s super convenient, over zoom. Not Not a lot of that stuff gets saved. And I honestly don’t think we want that stuff getting saved at this point, right. So the teams are secure. There’s some things and there’s some I imagine when this is over, we’ll probably in Microsoft’s got everything kind of buttoned down on on teams will probably Try to make another run at 100% teams. That that’s just kind of that’s that will probably be. We’ll keep a zoom account around for some crazy things when we absolutely have to use it that way. But I think that’s been a lot of people Alex said he told in the chat room. There he goes, Alex said, Yeah, tease for us. Miss is having the contact list being separate, like in Skype. And there’s some teams is still got some features to go.

Rich Hay  [13:27] 
They’ve accelerated some stuff, and we’ll get another product. Yeah,

Jim Collison  [13:31] 
they have a couple different ways to do that. Well, it’ll be interesting to see I think we still have a long summer rich, you know, you were talking about Bill, let’s just talk about that really quick here. You’re gonna connect Bill’s gonna be virtual not only this year, but already committed to next year, the MVA summit was already committed. Right? Yeah, be virtual. So you know, there you’re gonna be in that virtual as we think about Microsoft, you’re following them. Really, really close you report on them. As we go into the summer and you think about build, give me some idea, what are you excited? What kind of things you know, the, the the new updates are rolling out, they’re not terribly exciting because they’re just getting fit and finished and stability into them. But what are you getting excited about?

Rich Hay  [14:14] 
Well, everybody, most of the guys in this chat room I would imagine are aware that we’re about they’re about to roll out the May 2020 update the feature update for the first half of this year, that’s going to be known as Windows 10 version 2004. And the target is the last week of May there’s actually leaked not it wasn’t leaked, it was posted by a team called the driver roadmap team or something like that last week, and it basically showed the three days of the month of May that are laid aside for feature update release, circled in yellow, even have a legend that said feature update. So we know it’s coming late May and even Mary Jo Foley reported on that. I think she had that date beforehand. So we’re getting a may 2020 update. This is what my windows 10 will be five years old and July,

Jim Collison  [15:00] 
right, sort of

Rich Hay  [15:03] 
July 2015 was when that first release was done. So, at the five year point, we’ve had a feature update every year, some of the early years, we had to, I suspect that this fall update is going to be another small one, right, like last year kind of stability and things of that nature. And you’re right it’s kind of you know, there used to be this this kind of excitement about new features, but I I just don’t know that we have a whole lot more to go on Windows 10 to be feature you know, to add these whiz bang features is running well for me, I run it across a whole lot of different devices in different different places. But so it’ll be interesting to see this because you know, they just recently made a change, right? So they’ve dropped skip ahead, skip ahead, ring is gone. It’s been shut down. Every fast ring is now this Special Branch. That was RS pre released, but they just released a build out of the manganese branch just to test things they said. And so this will be where all the developers dump their new stuff in right so fast during builds are going to show you the latest and greatest from the development team, as they’re trying stuff out windows 10, slow reign, been baking since December for the 20, h1, this, the May 20 updates. So it has had what now we’re in May, almost six months of kind of just setting in its stew and setting. They’re kind of working cumulative updates. We actually started getting builds for this release that’s about to come up last February. They started releasing built for that last February. So longest we’ve ever had a cycle of release updates for a bill. So I’m hoping 2004 turns out to be a really solid release. Yeah. And so you got that come in build. I’ve been through the Schedule Builder. I looked over stuff. I saw nothing for Windows 10 x. So they’re not going to talk about Windows 10 X and everybody’s aware, right? A couple three weeks ago Panos Panay the new chief of Windows software and hardware came out and said we’re reattached, we’re going to come at this again, we’re gonna it’s not time for dual screens. So the Neo is basically been delayed until who knows when. But they’re going to focus windows 10 X on single screen devices. So it’ll be interesting because windows 10 x is a is a container based system, so it runs in it. So I don’t know if your everyday laptop can run Windows 10 x if it doesn’t have like 64 bit hardware and things like that. So it’ll be interesting to see where they choose to go with that I would expect an insider program for that for people that’s got the right hardware. And so you got that you’ve got they just released a new surface hardware. But in build next week, the man the number of sessions in the session list about AI, about security about as your I think I saw quantum ones there, I saw they got a lot of community stuff. They’re trying to make it community giving the community fail, including one welding with Thea I saw This woman’s going to do two sessions two hours long about welding. Really? Yeah. So she’s doing some kind of project for build. But so she’s going to talk about welding and planning, I think is what the focus is. So they got that kind of stuff, Power BI power, automate, are big subjects this year build, you know, Demisse the car, he used to be the chief of the Windows Insider program. She’s now one of the advocates for Power BI power platform. And it’s this low code, no code kind of catchphrase, where they say, you don’t have to be a coder to be able to build Power BI apps. I’m actually going to put that to the test in a few weeks for a story. See if that’s a reality or not. Yeah. So there’s lots of interesting going on something that delis keynotes only like or though they call it a segment, it’s not a keynote anymore, is only 20 minutes long. So and I’ve been through and there’s some sessions I have to be up in the evening to attend. They’re all bad. They’re kind of starting to Morning all the way through Thursday morning. Yeah, and it just runs straight through. There’s some repeats that will rerun and do that kind of thing for timezones. But they seem that it seems like they really handed this to Scott hanselman, who is one of their I know, he’s not a corporate VP, but he’s quite senior in the company. And I think this is the real test for Microsoft. Yeah, to see how this goes, how the engagement is, and see because they already know they’re going to do next year the same way. So this will tweak things for next year. I think the potential is there for build and other events like this like summit to become virtual events, period. Of course, a lot of that’s going to hinge you can’t you cannot get away from the fact that the in person hallway kind of connections you make at events, or on the expo floor are a big part of these things. Yeah,

Jim Collison  [19:51] 
but here’s here’s what I hope for like it doesn’t have to be either or, it can be both and right, right and I and everybody’s been hesitant And in this space, because the in person is so lucrative, or appeared to be lucrative, right, and that’s what appeared to be what everybody wanted all these conferences, you know, and it was a it was an arms race, you know, between Google and Amazon and Apple, Microsoft, who can do the bigger badder but giveaway the better stuff. Right. And, and I think, you know, you got a swag bag, right? They sent you a show that I mean, oh,

Rich Hay  [20:27] 
yeah, they, they said it was the first thousand or a few thousand registrants. They haven’t released any public numbers about how many people registered, but they sent this really cool kit. And so everybody knows swag is the big draw at these events. You know, the expo show floor. People walk around with bags just to collect the swag. And so but you get a badge and there’s a lanyard in here a build lanyard to go in my collection of lanyards.

Jim Collison  [20:54] 
Yeah. Which is great. They understood that there’s an old legacy there with that

Rich Hay  [21:00] 
Socks socks are really popular swag item lately, I don’t know why Microsoft loves Developer socks

Jim Collison  [21:06] 
are popular.

Rich Hay  [21:08] 
They sent a couple of a couple of they sent a couple of sets of stickers, kind of glossy, sticky stickers. And then they sent a bento box. So this bento box. It comes with a there is a fork knife and spoon in here. It’s made out of a composite material that is based on bamboo. superevil Yeah. And then inside, there’s a little divider and it’s to me what I understand a bento box to be is somebody ordered a restaurant to eat. Yeah. And so it’s it’s intended like a little lunch box to carry food in and get you going. So it’s pretty cool that they thought of that, right? But also you can do it, you could do virtual conference and still provide, right that you just did this. And then I think there’s just a lot of folks for whatever reason who can’t make these things. No, absolutely. I think they’re gonna see Yeah, you can we could do 10,000 people in person those will fill up but then make the rest of it available virtual like I just don’t i don’t get that we we we have a summit gala for where I work has a summit every year we’ve been in person for the last five. We were forced to course to go virtual this year and I’m really hoping it kind of helps us to see we could do because it they always feel like if you provide a virtual option it’s gonna rob from the in person. Right? I don’t think that’s true. I mean, I think I think people will always have people that can’t come. Right, right Microsoft every year build sessions go online for free after people have attended and paid money hotel flight and fee to get in which about 20 $400 for a three or four day conference ignites the same way vast majority of that content goes online after it’s not restricted, right. Anybody can view the content afterwards. So the idea of of being able to have the Digital alongside the person, I’m with you, I don’t think it will still from one or the other, that there are going to be people after all this anyway, this whole all this COVID stuff that aren’t going to go back to travel in the way they used to travel and you know, that kind of thing. So by accommodating people with that, I think now then you get to question how do you pay for that because the bandwidth still cost money. It’s still you know, so that that work and effort still cost some type of there’s $1 figure even though it doesn’t feel like it. There’s $1 figure to that providing that digital content.

Jim Collison  [23:32] 
Well, that doesn’t that doesn’t have to

Rich Hay  [23:34] 
be free. Like No, I agree. I agree.

Mike Wieger  [23:37] 
Well, the hardest part, I think, is you know, sponsorship for these, they have to rethink these event management teams are going to rethink Okay, how do we bring in money because every banner you see every elevator that sponsored by today, the elevator sponsored by whatever, all that in person stuff, I mean, that is the revenue that allows maybe not some of these Microsoft or Apple conferences, but some of the business Bigger expos things like, all of that is ad revenue. And so you got to really rethink if we do this digitally or even if we move 50% digitally. Are advertisers going to be willing to spend that money for, you know, less eyeballs in person seeing those those banners, whatever they are?

Jim Collison  [24:16] 
Well, and I think they’ve even even greater opportunity to advertise online. Like if they would just learn from podcasters and mix that stuff in to the, to the things or do they

Mike Wieger  [24:26] 
want that like the best part now is a lot of times those advertisers, they don’t have to it doesn’t have to mess with the flow of the show. It doesn’t have to be to Hey, and this segment is brought to you by this, it can be more subtle. Do it that well.

Jim Collison  [24:38] 
I could say

Rich Hay  [24:39] 
around this time. It’s right. You’ve been at these big conferences, you wear a badge. When you go up to a booth in the badge. What do they do? scan it on the web, they scan it because they’re getting your contact info, you’re called the lead. So even people registered online are leads. Right, right. They have those sponsors can still get all those names and email address. dresses. And unfortunately it’s kind of like scammers and fishers, they’re going to send out a blast thousand emails. And if they get if they get 50 back then that’s a plus for them. Yeah, so so you still have that element of things. It’s because the informer, my parent company is an events company. And so this is totally throwing us for a loop, right? Our editorial stuff is still getting a big push, and we’re doing more webinars and things like that digitally. And we’re doing some of our events kind of digitally as well. But and to show proof of concept kind of thing, and I, we’re not going to go back to just dependent upon the in person shows when this is over. We’re gonna be doing the digital piece because it’s kind of accelerated that move for us as a company, to to provide those digital platforms for the people that can’t travel that don’t have a budget for it, or whatever that might be. Now, right now, we’re offering them all for free, but again, even a free webinar that we do, results in a registration and a username and password and then name you get a lead. To the spot, but

Jim Collison  [26:00] 
I think rich, that’s another area that we need to think differently about the value. You know, because it’s online and virtual, somehow the value is less, it’s the same. We’re doing this where we have speakers, that’s the same speakers, guys, it’s the same people delivering the same information. Why was it valuable in person and not valuable online, in fact, online should be more valuable because I didn’t have to travel. I don’t have to go anywhere. I get it instantly. I can watch it whenever I want. It’s more convenient. Like you’re paying for convenience. But somehow we’ve gotten this idea like if it’s online and has to be free, and exactly

Rich Hay  [26:32] 
what kind of like app economy, everybody thinks app should cost nothing. There’s no work in developing them. I perpetuate that myth because I have a free podcast,

Jim Collison  [26:39] 
right? It’s kind of the way it goes. But but it can be in those things where the value is provided it can be. So I’m kind of hoping when we’re done with this, you know, 234 years from now that every conference has a way of going, Hey, show up in person here. And you can do it and you get the virtual ticket. You can still get all this You get all the stuff that virtual people do, but you’re gonna get some more because you’re here, and then in virtual ticket and that’s still you’re still gonna pay for it. And it’s still gonna be valuable and you’re still gonna get access to information plus all this stuff all the back, you know, all the all the other keynotes and all the session breakouts in a week or whatever. Right. So I think that’s the model we need to go to

Rich Hay  [27:20] 
for sure. I think it’s kind of the future it really is. Just accelerated it.

Jim Collison  [27:26] 
Yeah. Rich, you. You started a new podcast called faith tech in space. Yeah, he was on your show last. I started that up just a couple weeks later. You did. So we haven’t heard from you since then. How’s that going? And most the question I really want to ask is what what have you learned from it? Because you know, you you dropped one a pretty successful podcast and you picked up another little different topic kind of same, but what did you learn? So tell us how it’s going and then tell us what you learned.

Rich Hay  [27:55] 
That I just recorded my life and released my ninth episode this past week. And having started since November. So it’s a slow go in. And the reason why I opted to close down observe tech was because of my entry into formation for the permanent DAC and in the Catholic Church, and I knew I was going to have class schedules and all this other stuff. So I did not want to I needed to prioritize. And that podcast had been around for 10 years. Right. So when I started that podcast back in, I guess that would have been around 2008 2009 I think the world was very different in those days, right? We didn’t have all the social media we have now. You didn’t have all these podcast directories and resources like that. It took me a couple three years to get my podcast out into different places to be accessed right. Within two or three weeks of setting up this podcast and recording my first episode. I had in fact if you on my on my faith tech I Now got, I mean, within a couple weeks I was in iTunes, Google Play Music, blueberry stitcher tune in Spotify, our heart radio Deezer. And then of course, I had an RSS and an Email Feed. So and that was within just a couple weeks, I already had that distribution running. And I’ve since added a few others, I’m now the last two episodes. I’ve live streamed on YouTube, as I recorded that episode, just to try something a little bit different. I’m using the OBS software. Are you familiar with that? Oh,

Jim Collison  [29:31] 
yeah, my course and

Rich Hay  [29:33] 
Okay, and it’s, it’s kind of cool. It really is because it lets you set up different screens and shots and scenes and things like that. So I’ve been having some fun with that. So just to do something a little bit different, right? But so far, so good. It what it does, the show does is I’m still talking about tech and space, which are two of my very passionate subjects. And there’s plenty to talk about in those two areas. But the the piece I added was the faith part right because I, I, I entered formation I this year I’m an aspirant for a Holy Orders in this September, I will be I will be presented as a candidate for Holy Orders. And so it just allows me to share my formation experience. What classes Am I taking? What are we studying a little bit about the seasons of the church and the Catholic Church and stuff like that. So just just a nice touch of that. Then talk tech, which I just talked way too much tech, you know, in the observed tech was always about like this bulleted list of right link after link after link after link. And I’m gonna adjust that a little bit, I think because it gets. So just like when I started observe tech, right? If I went for a couple three weeks without doing a show, it was so hard to get back going again. And back in those days, I didn’t have the permanent setup. I had to drag my audio gear out, plug it up, set it up to record a show. So that was even another level. So one of the best things I ever did was a dedicated podcasting machine and station with the with my sound box and board and my mic and everything automatic, right? Because then I just had to turn on the power. So if you’re ever thinking about podcasting have a permanent setup is the best way to go because it you eliminate that obstacle that it’s mental as much as anything, right? It’s Oh, I gotta pull that out. I got to set it up and I got to deal you know XYZ so it works to have that station set up permanently. Richard, have you learned?

Jim Collison  [31:32] 
What have you learned in switching over? I mean, I really I like I liked your old podcast like that was alien to me because I can get I put you on two and a half speed Not really, like 1.5 speed would you were fast already.

Rich Hay  [31:45] 
I’m already in fact,

Jim Collison  [31:47] 
I used to dress me out on the way to work because I just tried to listen to everything you were saying. You know, I try to absorb it as fast as I could not be super stressed by the time I got to work and then I’m like, Oh, that’s right. I’m listening to him. He’s already a fast talker and I’m listening to him. 1.5 but it got me up to speed super fast, you know? And so I appreciated that work and I know why he changed it What did you learn you learn anything in the six months you’ve been you made the switch over anything, anything unique or different?

Rich Hay  [32:12] 
Nothing in particular, like I said, it’s a very similar format to what I was doing before especially in the tech segment of that show. I think I’ve broadened my space aspect of things of course the faith piece is brand new so there’s more there than then what because it didn’t exist and observe tech but the tech side I’m still talking Windows Insider stuff and edge insider you know, since we last talk edge is now you know, fully out and stable channel and progressing pretty well with features. That’s something you might hear more about next week is edge you know, it’s they’re having I’ve, I’m I’m scheduled for a couple sessions that the edge team is doing to talk about edge specifically. So maybe we might get some alerts about new features coming But Will anyone ever trust a browser from Microsoft, again?

Jim Collison  [33:05] 
a browser by another name a browser by another company. I mean, I just I can’t see anybody. Listen, I hope the best for it. I mean, it’s, it’s great. It strips out all the Google tracking to add their own tracking it. It’s I mean, it’s it’s a really good I mean, it could have for loss potential. I see zero traction in the space. Like I just don’t see it. Really. I don’t see anybody talking about it. You know, me. Yeah. Anyways,

Rich Hay  [33:30] 
mainstream. Yeah. And I agree. I think the one thing that’s got going forward is the chromium base. Yeah. So for sure. Is there for people used to go grab Chrome. Now the one thing is edge in Windows 10. Still defaults to legacy edge, what they call legacy edge. That was the version of edge that was released a couple three months after windows 10 was released, right because edge wasn’t ready when windows 10 came out in July 2015. I think it was the following fall. That’s Fall or maybe spring that it was finally, the new edge or at the time the new edge. So, the compatibility issues, compatibility issues existed for that version of edge because it was very proprietary, right? So to kind of like IE, and and then in the wild wild west of web standards, everybody built their websites to cater to certain browsers. Edge, I guess you might say Safari back in that day, although you can’t get Safari for PC anymore. So people built sites in order to best maximize chrome and those browsers. And that would break in edger. ie, you know, because it would be incompatible. I think now that it’s chromium based standards are getting a little bit better. I can use I use edge as my default daily now. I don’t even have Firefox or Chrome installed on my machine. It’s only edge. They’ve been through some challenges. Been teething pains. Don’t get me wrong. There’s been challenges with sinking favorites. They you still can’t sync history between devices. And I, what’s the other setting that’s not yet turned on? history and they I don’t think it goes to timeline right for Windows timeline. I don’t think your browsing history goes to timeline. Let’s see profiles, sink, open tabs open tabs in history. So those are the last two kind of vestiges of kind of normal expected browser features that aren’t there yet.

Jim Collison  [35:32] 
Yeah, I want I want to like it, like I want to, and I do, but I just can’t like I just it’s one of those things where you’re like, I just don’t know if anyone’s gonna take it seriously or take it seriously enough to market share. Well, you know, so

Rich Hay  [35:50] 
yeah, I don’t know. But they’re certainly contributing to chromium. Right. They’ve made several changes there. They helped with mouse scrolling, smooth scrolling, which IE and edge was edge especially The old edge legacy edge was very good at so they, you know, they have made some improvements to the chromium base. So yeah,

Jim Collison  [36:07] 
no, it’s it’s good, they’re in the community and it’s good for Chrome, I just don’t have Chrome is good for them. You know, and if it’s really, if it’s, it’s kind of actually gonna, if that’ll be something that’ll ever it may be they don’t care, you know, chips with it, they’re gonna get some default users who like my mom, who just use it, it’s gonna be their thing, right? They’re gonna get,

Rich Hay  [36:28] 
I take care of a couple people’s PCs. And when I put them on edge, I was able, I stopped installing all those crazy toolbars and where they would call me Two months later and go my computer’s really slow. Good point because so on release preview, I think they just started offering the edge update to some release preview devices. So I get a feeling that version 2004 that’s about to get released the May 2020 update. This may be the first version of Windows 10 where they start to push that update out and replace legacy edge make the new edge the default. So yeah, though I forget there’s a number floating around a few weeks ago was it two or 3%? Somebody was reporting. I don’t know what net market share shows these days. But so there is a little bit but you can probably account for that. Like you said, you can probably account for that for people that are it’s not a default yet, but people can get it on their systems. It’s just

Mike Wieger  [37:27] 
a conversation so interesting because the last time we had you on rich we were talking to you know, Jim was asking me Okay, do these updates and everything like that? Like does it affect you Mike? And I said no, because I had my iMac as my main driver. And then I had my Mac laptop and the only Windows machine I was running was for siteground in my server rack, and now we get today Hannah has taken my Mac laptop as her that’s her school stuff. She uses it for that. my iMac is in the server rack running Windows, running blue Iris. So the IMAX not even running. And then I built myself a new computer for myself. That’s obviously windows So now I’m full windows, I don’t touch besides my iPhone, I don’t touch an Apple device all day anymore, which is just so interesting because the reason Jim brought me on the show five years ago was because I was I was the apple guy. Um, you know, so we were starting to, I’m remembering all these things that they Okay, now that I’m in this ecosystem every single day EDG I honestly, when I fired it up, I just my default has always been get chrome on there and go, I might actually give it a shot and see, because I’m not tied to I don’t jump between computers. So like the sinking for me for Chrome, isn’t that important? I’m just looking for a really good browsing experience. So I might actually be a pretty good candidate for edge. perfect candidate. Yeah. And here’s the thing. This is one thing they have done because of the chromium base. They’ve got their own set of extensions that are in their own kind of collection. But you can go to the Chrome Web Store and install extensions. So you know, the whole thing that beat up Windows Phone, I’m sorry, I mentioned Windows Phone, Windows 10. Mobile.

Rich Hay  [38:58] 
Is that app issue right? Yeah, but here, the one thing this browser has that their previous version of edge didn’t or IE, every browser in the Chrome, every extension in the Chrome Web Store can be installed. There’s a button, you got to toggle. But you can install extensions from the Chrome Web Store. And ever since they activated, extension sync, I’ve been over the moon because I am on multiple machines. And so now extensions can sync between devices.

Mike Wieger  [39:24] 
No. Great with the extensions, because I mean, I only really use one I use bit Warden as my password manager.

Rich Hay  [39:31] 
Yeah, I discovered that a few months ago. Do you self host it? It’s not self hosted. That it’s a great open source Password Manager.

Mike Wieger  [39:40] 
It’s fantastic. It’s absolutely amazing. I have been I was just looking for fun. Someone mentioned on this show. I remember who it was that it was open source and you can self host I’m like, that sounds awesome. I’m a huge self hosting guy. Oh, yeah. And there’s it’s a it’s like, if on Unraid. It’s as easy as going to Qt applications. It’s already a doctor. It’s just pre bill and you’re up and running in two minutes. It was easy, super easy, almost too easy. And but yeah, I’ve been I’ve been loving it. But so I run one extension, I really should give edge a shot on this computer. And

Rich Hay  [40:12] 
the now here’s the other thing that you just made me think of another open source security piece of software is called authy. Okay, I would heard of it. two factor authentication tool, okay, and you run it on the desktop. So I’ve got authy on my desktop. So when I’m working on the desktop, I don’t have to go to the phone to get a code. I can add it up right here.

Mike Wieger  [40:35] 
Now. I’ve actually still been using LastPass authenticator for my authenticator for my two factor. So I still am in the LastPass world just for the authenticator piece, but I like that because LastPass backs up all your to FA because my biggest thing has been Okay, perfect, because my biggest thing is okay, on the Google one. It doesn’t like Google Authenticator scares me. That’s

Rich Hay  [40:56] 
not thinking they just updated last week that now you can restore the We’ll back up and save accounts and restore. Oh, Microsoft authenticator. Got that a couple months three months ago. authy does that on every device, you can choose to backup or not back up and update and so authy does well. So when I go to a brand new machine, I install authy. I give up my master username and password, and then it will validate me and

Mike Wieger  [41:21] 
bring in my stuff. And it hasn’t happened. Assuming because when you are out, yeah, okay, I’m all about the open source stuff. So I’m going to check that one out.

Rich Hay  [41:29] 
So but you just have me, you know, so that is a great and I don’t use there is an authy extension, I think for Chrome. So it is available to do within the browser as well. Okay,

Mike Wieger  [41:40] 
great. Well, because there’s been all these things when I first built this machine. We had did an episode on we were talking about we had everyone in the community in chat and then afterwards, give me a rundown I said, Guys, it’s the first time I’ve ever been full windows. What are you using, you know, what are the tools, the tricks and stuff like that? Because even for me going, like if I needed to do basic audio editing GarageBand which is free on Mac, right? Basic video editing iMovie. Also like, ooh, like, what do I use for that kind of stuff here. So the community has been a great source. But if you had to pick like your top, maybe off the beaten path windows tool that you use on a regular basis that maybe the new user won’t know about, what would you suggest?

Rich Hay  [42:20] 
A problem? problems. See I have 38 I’m actually happy to go on in bit Warden for the password stuff. No, I would, you know, I read a lot of RSS feeds. Yep. And I use a Windows 10 app called next gen reader. Okay, one of the first ones to partner with Feedly when Google Reader disappeared, right and went off the map, and Feedly kind of came in and picked up the scraps from Google Reader and but in G so next gen reader allows me to see my RSS feeds from Feedly and pull them in and we’re using them within the app, share them directly to buffer, share them to Twitter, share them to my Facebook, Page wherever I want to share stuff too. Okay, if you do a lot of RSS feeds, I like it, it presents in a grid format, there’s an option for a grid format. And so I’ve got my one button shortcut is the one note. So when I’m looking for stuff from my podcast, I’m a one button push and it’s dropped into my OneNote. folder, so I can add it to my show notes.

Mike Wieger  [43:20] 
So notes the other one that I have just like recently went full into I feel like I’m the kid who’s always like, late to the party, especially in this community. Like, I’ll start talking about some everyone’s like, yeah, welcome to the party, Mike, like you’re a little late on Windows number one, and OneNote and all these sort of tools, but I’ve used OneNote at work. I really, I switched roles a few months ago, and I said, You know what, I’m getting rid of paper, because I whenever I do a search for something to do in OneNote. And then last week, there’s actually Dave McCabe was on he was talking about how he tracks his lawncare notes. He keeps track every time he does like, you know, the oil changes blade sharpening, when did I do this sort of seed or chemical on my grass and so Mike, you know, like, I’ve never fired up my personal account on OneNote and it’s been a Amazing. It’s been it’s synced everywhere on all my devices. And I love how in the mobile app, I can still have my work account and my personal account, all in that same one app. So I’ve been diving deep into the the windows ecosystem. And I have to say, I’ve been like really enjoying,

Rich Hay  [44:15] 
it’s gotten quite robust. And if you stick Jim’s shaking his head, if you use sticky notes on Windows 10, your sticky notes are in the OneNote app on the phone.

Mike Wieger  [44:24] 
I have never been fired up stickies. Now you got me nothing. I got

Rich Hay  [44:29] 
another app.

Jim Collison  [44:30] 
And I need to get another beer.

Rich Hay  [44:34] 
He’s slumming, I just looked at net market share because I had to. So they’re showing chrome at 69%. Now again, net market share any of these things is a slice of the pie, right? It’s not an internet wide thority but for their traffic 69% is chrome edge is 7.76% above five Fox so that’s for April so is it like gaining some share?

Mike Wieger  [45:06] 
So when I think of like you know, he’s we think about Chrome we think of like obviously a resource hog and that got me thinking along the lines of is it my imagination or did windows back in the day used to have a lot of bloatware, I feel like your CPU was always a pretty much a certain percent running the thing I’ve noticed. And maybe it’s just because I built a brand new system. But I mean, I have a lot of I’ve installed a lot of games on here. It’s not a bare bones system by any means. I mean, my CPU sits at 1% all the time. And even like, right now I’m doing this podcast, it’s at 8% and the background, it’s downloading a 90 gigabyte game, you know, like, I feel like it’s really efficient. Now, when back in the day, you used to compare Mac versus windows. And it was like, Wow, man, Windows is just clunky. It’s got a lot of overhead to it. And now I feel like that’s just been pretty much eliminated.

Rich Hay  [45:50] 
Yeah, I think they’ve done a lot of work to make it more efficient with the memory with disk access and everything like that. I mean, I’m on a core i five right now. And so I’m running my CPU is running a 30 32% powerhouse machine. This is a four year old enterprise level desktop, right? Okay, the only reason I have this on my desk is because it’s got the 34 inch curved monitor. I love this widescreen monitor. I used to be a dual guy now I’ve gone single because of that and so it’s got an extra port on it so I actually run my main desktop through this screen, but I also use the I five itself on this device to do my podcasting.

Mike Wieger  [46:30] 
Interesting. Yeah, I want to do actually dual wide screens one up and one down because I’m a quad guy and I have four I’ve right middle left and I have one up above. I would love to do just two wide screens instead of these four monitors but does allow me some flexibility like my one of my right here is vertical. You know, I kind of have my workflow pretty much set up for four monitors.

Jim Collison  [46:50] 
My son just bought a 44 inch curved monitor 1500 bucks, rainy. This is a kind you order. Like you They don’t make it till you order it. So I ordered it paid for it took four weeks shipped in 1500 bucks beautiful. He’s like yeah, amazing.

Rich Hay  [47:10] 
Males there you doing a lot of moulson on the those greens?

Jim Collison  [47:13] 
Yeah, well, he’s, it’s he’s a gamer. And so he’s kind of using it for that and because he can, and then he’s got. So he was telling me so he’s got a quad. He has a quad setup of Dell 20 fours that are their IPS monitors from five or six years ago. And he’s like, those were really great when I bought them But dad after looking at after looking at this monitor, it’s got it’s got like, zero response. It’s g sync. It’s like all these things, right? He’s like, I can’t I have a hard time looking at those old monitors now.

Rich Hay  [47:45] 
So I’m a Navy guy, right I did 30 years in the Navy. I sailed on small ships and sailed on aircraft carriers. I set see if the Sea of Thieves up on this 34 inch monitor. I got seasick. Because really, because of the motion in the screen it so that the screen feels more in my periphery. And so those movements on the ship was like yeah, I think the station’s when I was on a small boy in in rough ocean, rough sea.

Mike Wieger  [48:20] 
Well, that’s kind of the I had. So I just got a brand new so I had four and I now have a new main monitor. It’s an Acer I think 27 inches, I believe. But it’s got a high refresh rate, right? I was I’ve only ever had 60 hertz monitors. And now we’ll have 144 hertz, which still isn’t top of the line. But I play it that and man, it’s so smooth, and the GC makes a huge difference. So this is a G sync monitor, which actually now supports Nvidia GPUs. So I still I don’t you don’t need a GC sorry. It’s not g sync. It’s an open, open sync. No. Free sync. There you go. Yeah, right. It’s a free sync monitor. But I’m using it with Intel now sorry until I can think of this Nvidia GPU. So those actually work now you can use those in conjunction man playing at 144 hertz when you’re used to less than half of that. The smoothness of it is kind of a weird sensation to get used to. I felt like especially on certain games probably like see a thieves, racing games things where you have just kind of fluid motion. I was shocked. I had that like, man, if I believe in the stone age’s like for the past few years because I just had never played on something that could do that refresh rate. It’s been great little upgrade.

Jim Collison  [49:31] 
It’s a whole new world. It is

Mike Wieger  [49:33] 
a whole new world.

Rich Hay  [49:35] 
technology has advanced, you know, and I act to those I came across some old photos the other day of my computer setup when I was stationed in Italy, and this would have been let’s see the late 80s, early 90s and I had that big CRT to white monitor on the desk, took up like the whole desk. I just crazy how far we’ve come

Jim Collison  [49:58] 
with I still have 24 inch CRT in my garage. I just can’t, can’t bring myself to get rid of it because it was super expensive in its day. And I would took that thing from place to place. And then, of course it sits out in the garage. Now I’ve missed the opportunity to recycle it, it’s gonna cost me like $100 to recycle epic at this point, but it’s and then it’s also an established item. Like, there’s not too many of those monitors left, right. And so, you know, I could always plug that in into VGA, but I could plug that thing in and it still fires up. So got a fairly decent look to it. But yeah, it’s, you know, I’m 12345678 monitors now my desk I hear that in you know, I have a monitor problem and one is cheap, right? They’re super cheap. Very, yeah, no, and you can just, you can just put them anywhere. And so you know, it’s it’s crazy how good they’re so rich, you change some things around there right then so you brought your 34 kind of You’re using that kind of full time now or is that just for podcasting? No, no,

Rich Hay  [51:04] 
I so the so the the HP device it’s called the elite 1000. This came out about four years ago. So it has the 34 inch monitor on top of basically it’s a laptop computer in there because the laptop what it uses so dim memory chips, so I bumped it up to 32 or 16 Giga memory I think it’s got a good size drive and all that stuff and it’s a decent performing system. I mean, I was this old system I was running on over here for my podcasting was an AMD quad core, eight Giga Ram. So it was an it’s an older, it’s because systems have a rotation when I build a new one, right? They rotate through this room over the wife has the third best. The worst is the cloud caster. The best is at my workstation. So this I wasn’t using the elite 1000 computer for anything except for running insider builds. So I’ve just installing insider builds once a week on there was a bad And I like you know, I’d really like to shuffle this around. So I moved relocated all the podcaster gear over here, I spun up the I five, and it’s a it’s a quad core, I think so it’s a good performing machine. And, and I use the 34 inch curve for my main monitor from my my main desktop. So that’s the one I work on all the time. And then I got the work laptop over here finally on Windows 10, as of last fall, took them long enough, but I had a Windows seven machine until last December. I think

Jim Collison  [52:32] 
it’s just surprising to me. I think the components are last year too. So you don’t have a 747 70 I think here, that number could be wrong. I can’t remember but it’s a it’s a fairly I mean, five or six years now. I don’t I’m it’s got 16 gigs of RAM in it. It works for podcasting. I have no reason to do keeps windows 10 keeps getting better on it keeps getting more efficient and kind of runs better, right have no reason to change out. I mean, I really have got to wait for it to go bad for what I do. Now if I was a gamer, Mike, you know you needed upgrade some equipment and you did right? Well, I

Mike Wieger  [53:10] 
did, but I have the same thing as you. So I was running a 3770 in that rig, and I will tell you so I just bumped up to a rise in 530 600 fantastic processor. The only time I notice a difference is when I’m gaming. Now mind you, I’m not editing any video and I would notice it in other areas. I know I would. But as far as like the basic tasks of browsing, listen to music, podcasting, watching YouTube videos, you will I could never tell you if I was on a different processor until I fire up the game and the game is obviously a much different experience. But you’re right Jim for for most people. I mean, that’s a third Gen Intel chip and it was great. It worked just fine again, yes, 16 gigs of RAM. If you have an SSD in there, you’re just fine. That’s the other hard part is that the hardware is lasting forever. That’s why I hope this is a 510 year build here that I have having put all the new stuff in there. I probably won’t need it. Going forward

Jim Collison  [54:01] 
500 gig SSD it’s a core a 747 70 I can’t believe I got the number, right. Like is that 16 gig of ram I’ve had it for I don’t know five six years whenever I think and it works great. Sitting next to it as a Dell Core i seven from it’s a year younger maybe two years younger that I do some mining stuff I’m not I’m anticipating that thing running forever. I mean, until it breaks right until something goes wrong, you know, whatever you got to swap it out. I got a core i three 540 that that had been my main driver before I went on the core i seven that’s gotta be 540 things got to be first or second gen Core i three right? still does what I needed to do, right. I mean, so it’s it’s crazy. I think the laptops are a little bit different because they you just beat them up a little bit more. Right? You take them, you take them places, you have batteries to deal with all those kinds of things. But man hardware, it’s rich. It’s kind of disheartening sometimes because you want to you want to swap it out faster, right? You’re kind of like in some do right? But when it works, it’s hard especially the time like this.

Rich Hay  [55:03] 
Well this is it and I think my current main desktop is about three years old. I’m running a six core, what is it an AMD FX 6350 I think in there it’s got 32 gigs of RAM it’s running a one terabyte SSD. And but it does well and I got an Nvidia 1050 in there or something like that or 1051 so it does what I needed to do. I don’t do a tremendous amount of PC gaming. I am running a couple of things on PC right now because I’m I’m alpha tester for a certain piece of software that Microsoft’s working on that

Mike Wieger  [55:43] 
Oh,

Rich Hay  [55:43] 
well what

Mike Wieger  [55:47] 
if what he didn’t say

Rich Hay  [55:48] 
what I didn’t say,

Mike Wieger  [55:50] 
guys notice in the video you missed it. He showed it to all of us. You guys didn’t hear it on the audio.

Rich Hay  [55:54] 
And, and so it runs really well for that. You know, I’ve got my Xbox outlet. I’ll be honest With the Xbox doesn’t get powered up much these days with classes and studying and other things like that. It’s just the nature of the beast. Although I got it the we were talking about getting seasick watching doing these on this monitor fortnight I got into fortnight for a while about a year and a half ago, and fortnight at certain resolution or not when it was pub G, it had an ocean compared to fortnight and it would make I would get that kind of nauseous feeling like I would see all I get the same thing with VR. I can’t do the VR headsets, because I get the same kind of sense. That’s kind of your ears. I think they are I mean, I’ve never had a balance issue or anything like that. I live and but even so I tried all the tricks like chewing gum when you’re wearing the VR headset. That’s probably one of the things to help you not get nauseous didn’t work. Didn’t matter. So

Jim Collison  [56:53] 
well no worries, no worries. So they’ll come up with a they’ll come up with a VR thing that works for you. I have not Yeah, even put my head in one of those headsets I just had not had the interest now. I just haven’t had any interest in the first ones that came out for Windows 10. I have the Acer headset and they sent me the they sent me the little controllers as well at one point because I bought the Acer headset. But yeah, cool, don’t get me wrong. And if you really want to learn about VR in in that kind of stuff for Windows, Ian Dixon, who is a Windows Insider MVP, and he does he he reviews every new insider build through his virtual reality. I mean, he I think he participated at summit through his VR goggles, and you know, the sessions in his VR theater. So if you ever want to follow somebody that’s an enthusiast around windows and Microsoft stuff for VR, Ian Dixon on Twitter, he’s from the UK just constantly talking and posting about that stuff he commits you know, time when he’s gonna do something he commits rich, last question for you is We can bring the show in for landing as you as we’ve gone through these last, we’ll say nine weeks of, of this pandemic and lockdown and all those other things. Any new tech that you’re leaning on now that you maybe weren’t using. We talked about the communication stuff at the front of the show. But has it changed any patterns for you the way you use stuff I mean certainly. Now that I’m home I get while you’re thinking about that like now that I’m home site hound for me has become super important because it’s my window. It’s the site down is a video it’s up for security. For security cams, and we have a front door cam so I have not not the ring I have a ring doorbell as well but I’ve got a cam that we call the porch camera the package cam in it views the where the packages get laid, right, that’s all its job. But in this pandemic, it has been it sits right here. It’s my view to the outside world. I’m down in the basement right in my in my office down here. I don’t really have an outside view. So This camera, which I set up for security now is actually like, what’s it look like outside is the sun shining? My office at Gallup, you know, we’re windows everywhere. And so I’m kind of used to not Windows software but windows, actual windows, the glass things right that let the light in. So I’m kind of used to being able to see outside I’m a weather I’m a weather nerd. So I love the weather. I love to know what’s going on. So for me, the site hound and then I started using my radar which is a Lemire

Rich Hay  [59:30] 
that I use that

Jim Collison  [59:32] 
I on Windows, I paid for it to get rid of the ads as like 299 you know, it’s just super cheap. And yeah, actually, it’s running right over here. So this is my radar right here. Running started. Store. Yeah, yeah. No, you can buy in the Windows Store. It’s they have the ad version 299 and then you can get the ad taken off

Rich Hay  [59:54] 
for all my Oh, I already own it. There you go.

Jim Collison  [59:56] 
There you go. So it’s a pretty great I haven’t run into full time right here. And so you know during the day, I’ll come by and look at Scott the forecast and what it’s doing and a sweet radar with wind. And you know, for the weather nerd, it’s the it’s the perfect so I can ask you this question too, but so rich, have you changed anything anything new that anything you’re doing differently because you’re home all the time for quite

Rich Hay  [1:00:21] 
a while I was always home anyway, right. I was working from home anyhow, the big change for me is the no travel. So you know, I should have been heading to Seattle this weekend. Last week, I should have been in Orlando for a conference. So so that’s the bigger change. Now we’re we’re a two story house. We got the mother in law suite above the garage kind of thing. And then it’s all one floor house. And so I’m up and out of my seat throughout the day and I see the outdoors and things like that. The big change for me in my schedule and my routine because of the pandemic is actually six days a week. I head out to my church and we’re using Facebook Live To livestream the mass to the folks that are stuck at home and can’t get out. So in fact, today was our 48 live stream mass. When we were at our 32nd a couple weeks ago, we’d had nearly 40,000 views Wow, our stream masses I haven’t done up the numbers for new now this weekend we’re starting to open up a little bit very limited but so when we’re going to continue to livestream so I’ve been out every morning six days a week for a drive right it’s only about a 1520 minute drive to my church but it’s so it’s a drive out into the the weather livestream the mass and then I hit home and and so there’s been in fact it’s convinced my pastor we’re actually investing the money in a really good mountable camera that you’ll run will run through the OBS software to continue to live stream our masses even when the pandemic so yeah, so I’ve been learning a lot about OBS this that is the coolest program so they’re you know, doing that that’s a fun program to play with all that The kind of like having your own TV studio, right? So that’s been a change. Now, I’m learning how to connect OBS to actually have to use stream labs on stream labs on an Android. You can’t use the OBS open open source software because it’s not available on Android. But stream labs uses that as sir. So I’m learning how to connect that to Facebook, try to automate this a little bit more, because at some point, I’m gonna have to start traveling again. So we have to have the tools in place to be able to automatically start live streaming our our church masses. So there’s been that it’s been interesting delving into this live streaming thing because it’s nothing I’ve ever done much of and so so because people are hungry for that connection, right? I mean, it’s me and my wife here at the house. We had I think on Easter, my daughter and her family visited we set the card table up on the front porch and they ate out there we ate at the kitchen table had an open window. My wife threw a sheet over her to give her a hug for the first time in five weeks, right? Yeah, I saw it online that that was the way you gave somebody a hug and this contact. So it’s been a whole new approach to kind of how you use technology. And and I talked about this one on my podcast a few episodes ago. Imagine going through this pandemic 15 years ago, in 2005. Right? When before social media before the streaming services, you know, we were still going to blockbuster and written physical tapes to bring home a VHS tape filling in a machine to watch a movie, right? How different this experience would have been not only for work, but just for personal

Jim Collison  [1:03:43] 
stuff, right? Yeah. Doing what we do. People been a lot watching a lot more broadcast TV than they would than they do these days. So it’s it’s interesting you know, the gamers have been doing this OBS streaming everything for the longest time and it was the church’s That brought it to the mainstream for everybody, right? They Oh, you can you can do all this kind of stuff. And so you know, your church, our church as well. We’ve done some driving services. So we we get a big parking lot and they set up a truck with a lift on it and the pastor’s up there, you know, and everybody can just pull in, like a drive in theater, they have big screens and stuff. And I was like, wow, like, we if we would have done this before the pandemic, nobody would have come, you know, and but but you know, Necessity is the mother of invention, Mike anything. So you think about the last nine weeks any technology you particularly leaned on?

Mike Wieger  [1:04:35] 
For me, it’s been not necessarily leaned on but having all of a sudden the time to use so I sit here at the desk, and I turned to the left as my work laptop. So I sit at my work laptop all the time, which means I have the ability now to monitor things. And I love monitoring things. So I monitor my Unraid, server Plex, all that stuff. So I’ve actually been diving deep into using graph fauna, and building out really custom defined a dashboards to monitor Everything. So getting all that up and running, be able to sit here and almost have like this, you know, network control center type thing where all my monitors are showing me something about my network, you know, setting up obviously I’m sitting here all the time now so it was really important for me to get my security camera monitor up there. So putting a monitor up there with a that gym Actually, this is using the kangaroo. The kangaroo is is running Linux and that is just a chromium browser and plugged into blue Iris. So that’s how I monitor my so it’s just like sitting down here. I’m usually at work and I have no need to but then it turned into okay now I need to build a different profile for blue Iris because I’m here I don’t need notifications if all notifications so I built a home profile in a way profile. And so it’s it’s been fun for me there’s not really probably no new tech. It’s just finding different ways to have fun while I’m sitting here and what might as well monitor it if I can, you know we’re huge stat nerds you and I when we were mining back in the day that was the fun part about it was you know watching all the stats on the miners and how are they doing? and everything like that and you probably still have a monitor dedicated to viewing some of those minor Yeah you do. Yeah, exactly. So for us nerds like that it’s a lot of fun to be able to see that type of data.

Jim Collison  [1:06:10] 
Yeah, no, it’s it’s it is interesting you just mentioned and Richard you’re already working from home but for the two of us our security profiles changed because we went from worried about nobody was here to some of these here all the time now and so that kind of changed the way I use my cameras and started thinking like okay, I don’t know if I need as many if I need as many pictures. You know, as I was getting before going, do I really need all that I mean, I’m kind of here and yet the other day a neighbor came by to drop off some he made some sourdough for us and brought it over fresh, hot, still warm, right when he brought it over. It was great. And, and I didn’t I saw him at the door like it was down here like oh my neighbor, so you know, pop out to get it and and so they Are those moments to I think in our neighborhoods, where we may we may be seeing more of our neighbors because they’re actually home. Right? Or whatever. And so I’ve really been trying to focus on what are the good things

Rich Hay  [1:07:14] 
in this? Yeah, no, that’s what you got to do. You know,

Jim Collison  [1:07:17] 
what, what are the good things? How do we focus on that? And what how do we take our tech in that in that arena, too? And how do we what kind of things can we do? What’s different, what’s new, my son, my, my marine son, who’s coming home will be home the summer and then gets out of the brains this fall. We’ll be living with us for a while. He decided to build his own. In Mike actually, next week, I’m going to read his parts box. So you and I are going to get we’re going to because he had them all shipped here. And then he had his brother take them out of the box and they put them in, in kind of his, you know, storage box. So next week on the show, we’re kind of break into that box. I’m not going to unbox anything like that, well, that would be that kind of dad. But we’re going to Preview. He doesn’t know we’re going to do this. So don’t tell him we’re going to preview his build and critique his build before he does. So if you’re if you’re around next week and you wouldn’t come to the mic and I break into my to my son’s build, he will get home. He has incredible discipline. This is a kid who’s shipping parts home two months ahead of time. So they’ll be there for him. I would have I I would not have that kind of discipline. I would. I just I need it like I buy it. I want it. I need it exactly right. You know, so this kid’s got some serious discipline. So he’ll be putting that together when he gets home rich, great to see you all it’s great to be on thanks. Glad you are healthy and well and staying well and doing sounds like you’re doing all the necessary things to do that as well. Appreciate you and your work in the community and hope folks get over there. If I throw a link in the show notes. I’m gonna throw a link in the show notes for for Rich’s new podcasts as well faith, tech and space. I’m sure you can find that you can find that again. More podcasts are found if you want to you want to get a dose I’m sure it’s still a heavy dose of tech. And probably you did it before, right?

Rich Hay  [1:09:07] 
Same style. Yeah. The tech part is like,

Jim Collison  [1:09:11] 
yeah, yeah, just kind of blow through blowing through links. Mike’s. Mike, thanks for jumping in tonight as well. Always good to see it. We’ll do a little bit of post show. With that a couple reminders. Kind of on we’re on our way out. When Don’t forget The Average Guy TV hosted and just kind of sponsored by Maple Grove Partners. Get secure, reliable high speed hosting from people that you know, and you trust. You know, it’s Christian doing great job for us. He’s got room for more partners, by the way, anybody who wants to host a website, do some kind of media hosting. It’s super secure and he’ll get you a super fast service. So Maple Grove. partners.com plans start as little as $10 a month Mike, I think you’re you’re using Maple Grove for a site in some email and Yep, as well. Contact Christian he’ll get you hooked up as well. A couple reminders. Send me an email Jim at the average guy got.tv I’ve been having trouble talking all day. I’m not sure what’s going on there maybe it’s just Thursday. You can also download the app if you want to listen live on the road we don’t really do that right now but when we do Home Gadget Geeks calm and we are live every Thursday 8pm Central nine Eastern now here at The Average Guy TV live this may be the first one in a while we didn’t go over an hour and 20 so enjoy the extra time that you have if you’re listening to the podcast thanks for doing that. And by the way, if you are a podcast listener and you haven’t done it yet head up to The Average Guy TV slash subscribe get on our mailing list every well most I’m calling it mostly I will send you some kind of some kind of just quick notification a little bit what’s going on with me and then some updates here on the network The Average Guy TV slash subscribe sign up. We are live every Thursday 8pm Central nine Eastern out here at The Average Guy TV slash live. We if you’re listening live stay around for a smidgen of post show in the emergency Bud Light will get open during the post show. With that we’ll say Goodbye everybody.

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