In this episode of The Tech Jawn Amazon workers are appalled by AWS CEO Matt Garmin's return to office remarks and urge a policy reversal. Meta intends to use a proprietary software tool it calls an “adult classifier” to determine if users who say they are older than 18 might actually be children who are lying about their age. Who would have thought that dating apps were designed to make money, not matches? And, Microsoft Is struggling to retain Black, Latin, And Female Employees who seem to...

In this Just The Two of Us episode of The Tech Jawn, we discuss the release of Apple Intelligence, Apple and Goldman's Sachs having to pay $89 million for Apple Wallet issues, Google, and Microsoft, and Perplexity promoting scientific racism in AI search results, and Congress thinks digital price tags could be problematic. Link To Notes Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

In this episode of The Tech Jawn, we discuss new guidelines on pulse oximeters, easy-to-cancel subscriptions, Passkeys replacing passwords, and using AI to ace job interviews. Link to Show Notes Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

At Tesla’s We Robot event last week in Los Angeles company CEO Elon Musk unveiled the Optimus line of humanoid-looking robots, but, they didn’t seem to be all that autonomous.  14 State Attorneys General sued TikTok claiming the social media platform was designed with the express intention of addicting young people to the app. Matt Mulleweg, one of the creators of WordPress, and WP Engine, a WordPress-managed host, are going through it legally. And we shine The Tech Jawn Spotlight on Dr....

Brothatech wants to get a new camera to look good on video. He wants something better than a webcam, but, without all the complexity of a DSLR. Maybe we don’t want ChatGPT speaking in ebonics after all because AI seems to make the same racist decisions based on dialect as humans do. Police seldom disclose the use of facial recognition when used to identify suspects and often lie about its use in public-facing reports.  And when you put cameras in glasses, real-time facial recognition was...

Verizon experienced a nationwide outage on Monday. An outage any day is bad. Right after a hurricane is particularly bad timing.  Who knew that your interest in electric vehicles could depend on what side of the aisle you sit on politically? It seems like maybe auto manufacturer execs should have known. ChatGPT can speak in ebonics. We do a live test during the show and the feature is surprisingly good. A Common Sense Media Study shows that Black students are twice as likely to have their...

Some new hotness made its way to the Apple Store last Friday.  BrothTech stopped by to pick up a new iPhone 16 Pro Max and the Apple Watch Ultra 2 and today he gives us his first impressions. The government appears to be taking child online safety more seriously as the  House Committee on Energy and Commerce forwards two bills on to the full House of Representatives. Section 230 protects online platforms from liability for what users post, but, according to a three-judge panel, not from what...

iOS 18 has been released and is now available. We cover a few of the new features and ponder if you should go ahead and update now, or, wait until 18.1 comes next month with Apple Intelligence. The Fearless Fund, which awarded $20,000 grants specifically to Black women-led businesses, shut its Striver’s grant as part of a settlement in its appeals case. Oprah Winfrey did an ABC special on artificial intelligence, and OpenAI’s Sam Altman seemed to remove some of her skepticism about AI. And...

In this episode of The Tech Jawn, we are joined by Malcolm Coley, Chief Technology Officer at Futures First Gaming, who chops it up with us about all the things announced at Apple’s iPhone 16 “Glowtime” event before telling us a bit more about Futures First Gaming, a STEM.org Accredited Ed. Tech, Media, and Esports Entertainment company that convenes esports enthusiasts to engage in competitive and recreational gaming events, fosters a gaming community, and presents opportunities for...

Will Melody Hobson’s $1.45 billion Project Black fund which plans to “minoritize” existing businesses help to narrow the wealth gap? Spotify has invested less than 10% of the $100 million it pledged to its Creator Equity Fund during the Joe Rogan controversy, and it doesn’t appear it ever took the pledge seriously from the jump. Things just keep getting worse for Twitter as the social media giant issued a copyright takedown notice to GitHub after finding out parts of its source code had been...

French authorities arrested Telegram founder and CEO Pavel Durov over the weekend as part of an investigation related to charges of "complicity" in various crimes that happen on the cross-platform messaging service.  Apple lost its lead when it comes to podcast listening market share. The iPhone maker sits in third place with 12% solidly behind YouTube with 31% and Spotify with 21%.  The Justice Department is suing real estate startup RealPage whose software helps landlords price fix rental...

Pittsburgh may be the latest major city to drop Shotspotter, the gunshot detection system that uses a network of microphones to alert police to gunfire incidents because the technology just doesn’t work. Former Google CEO and board chair Eric Schmidt walks back his comments about Google being behind startups like OpenAI because ‘work-life balance was more important than winning’. The U.S. DOJ is considering a breakup of Google to address its monopoly on search. And, everybody should check to...

group of users it knew skewed towards those under 18. X sued the Global Alliance for Responsible Media for abusing its influence and prompting a boycott against advertising on X. New York City’s drone warning system shouted incomprehensible Spanish to residents when delivering weather-related instructions. And the number of Black podcast listeners is increasing in the United States with 46% of Black listeners listening for the first time within the last year. Link to Show Notes Hosted on...

Don Lemon sued Elon Musk and the social media platform X for fraud, negligent misrepresentation, and breach of contract after Musk canceled a deal for the Don Lemon Show to appear on the platform. After dragging its feet with a proprietary system for over a year, California is now preparing to launch support for adding your Driver’s License to Apple Wallet.    No smartphones in school seems to be a growing sentiment globally. The prestigious boarding school, Eton College in Great Britain is...

Immediately following the live recording of The Tech Jawn we host The After Party, a 30 minute-ish show exclusively for the patrons of The Tech Jawn. The show is unscripted, we talk about whatever, and patrons are welcome to join the conversation via the live chat. We didn't do a live episode of The Tech Jawn this week, so, we are hitting everyone with our last After Party. If you enjoy it, think about becoming a patron where you will get access to The After Party every week. Hosted on...

The European Union gives Meta until September 1st to come up with better membership options for Facebook and Instagram other than simply paying a fee not to be tracked or consenting to being tracked for free. Artificial intelligence can detect prostate cancer at substantially higher rates than human doctors and AI-assisted predictions of cancer size were 45 more accurate than without AI. Cybersecurity company Cloudstrike’s Falcon Sensor software pushed out an update that caused Windows Blue...

CNN is shifting its business again.  The Cable news network is laying off 100 employees, disbanding its Race Equity Team, and launching a digital platform similar to the shortlived CNN+ in 2024.  Yes, AI is screwing over Black folks, and, Latin X folks, and, lower middle-income white folks.  Here are a few tips to protect yourself from the job-eliminating A.I. boom. SIM Swap Attacks are on the rise. SMS related two-factor-authentication meant to keep your accounts safe, actually make them a...

Multi-Purpose-Tap could make mobile NFC payments more useful and more complicated. The new concept could allow you to tap your phone, pay for alcohol, and get carded all at the same time. Morehouse College launches 3D, AI, Teaching Assistants in its Metaversity. They probably don’t need to be 3D, a chat interface would suffice, and we hope they don’t displace real human TAs. Middle school students in a Philly suburb cyberbully and defame 20 teachers to little to no consequence… At least thus...

The Detroit Police Department, after a settlement with a man who was wrongly arrested based on grainy security camera footage, can no longer use facial recognition results as its only basis for an arrest. The Federal Communications Commission wants to change rules that would force mobile carriers to unlock phones for consumers.  Facebook and Instagram’s ‘pay or consent’ ad model violates the Digital Markets Act in the EU. And RCS is finally available in iOS 18 beta dev 2.    Messaging between...

Microsoft Recall was supposed to launch with Copilot+ PCs last week, but Microsoft decided to send the controversial, AI-powered, timeline snapshotting feature to the Windows Insider Program. Social Media Influencers aren’t seeing the sponsorship and brand deal payouts that they once did, possibly because everyone and their momma is trying to become one.  Meta is flagging real photos edited with AI as AI-generated.  Maybe we need a flag that says AI-enhanced.  And Wil.I.Am unveiled an...

Apple’s new Tap to Cash feature that allows iPhone users to tap their phones to initiate an Apple Pay transfer makes paying someone really easy.  The question is does it make it too easy? The US Surgeon General wants tobacco-like warning labels on social media. The proposed labels would regularly warn users that social media platforms have not been proven safe for their mental health. The Fearless Fund was dealt a blow in the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals in its effort to support women-owned...

In this episode of The Tech Jawn, we cover Apple’s World Wide Developer Conference Keynote.  Brothech breaks down the new hotness coming to visionOS 2, iOS and iPad OS 18, WatchOS 11, and macOS Sequoia.   TechLifeSteph catches us up with the saga of the phantom system data on her new Macbook Air.  To make a long story short, Steph had to make a trip to the Genius Bar. And we wrap things up by talking about New York’s new Stop Addictive Feeds Exploitation (SAFE) for Kids Act.  The bill,...

A pair of studies published in the journal Science indicate that predominately older Republican women are responsible for the vast majority of the “fake news”. Spotify is raising its prices for the second time in as many years. Will the streaming music service be able to maintain the industry's best churn rate? The social media platform X has updated its terms of service specifically allowing for adult NSFW content on the platform.   And be careful when you receive requests for cash through...

We’ve got something special in this week’s episode of The Tech Jawn. We interview Cherish Samuels, a unicorn of unicorns, as she is a Black, female, mechanical engineer. We talk about everything from her journey getting into engineering at a young age, for years being the only face on the job that looks like hers, and how she has transitioned into tech now working on Amazon Fresh, the automated checkout grocery store. We also talk about Cherish’s son’s unique name, her not changing her last...