Is Michael garfil of Michael Garfield. Michael Garfield's joining us in the high Tech
Texan. Michael Garfield is here with a high tech Texan. It was to
make life easier some new technology. So Michael Garfield has something you might want,
Texas. Michael Garfield is your high tech Texan. Three decades helping you
make magic with your gadgets, heard worldwide on the iHeartRadio Act. Now your
high tech Texan, Michael Garfield. Needless to say, this has been a
pretty rappy few weeks. You know, if it wasn't a hurricane that hit
directly in our hometown, some kuk was trying to assassinate a former president and
current candidate. We got hundreds of thousands of local residents still without power,
and the list of people who passed away just this past week. It stoggering
from celebrities like Shelley Duval, doctor Ruth Richard Simmons, Shannon Doherty, and
to a good friend of so many of us here in Houston, the talented,
the witty, and the ultimate curmudgeon, Ken Hoffman. You know,
Ken was a longtime buddy of mine, known him just over twenty years,
and the memories continue to pop up in my mind since his untimely death on
this weekend, and I'm grateful to have known him and ironically exchanged some text
with him just days before he passed. I'll remember Ken and share some stupid
stories throughout the show, but if you would like to share your thoughts,
I am here at seven one three two one two five nine five oh two
one two five nine five. Oh. I know it's the middle of the
summer. I know maybe you're traveling, and we do. Thank you for
taking us wherever you are not listening to us on the over the year radio
which less and less in people, slowly you're doing. But you can take
us on iHeartRadio free app no matter if you have an Android, and matter
if you have that other thing I think they call it an iPhone, download
it look for KPRC, and no matter where you are, almost in the
world. I don't think China lets us in there, but almost anywhere in
the world you could listen to at this show and many many other radio stations.
Michael Garfield is a name callum reed. He is on the other side
of the glass, pushing buttons and potentially callum if you feel like answering a
phone call or two, and if I feel like answering it or talking to
people, maybe I will pick up the phone. I have a few things,
a number of things as we get down to business here, and you
know, we kind of fly by the seat of our pants. We This
is not all about technology, elas it is called the High Tech Texan Show,
It's really called what in the world does Garf want to talk about?
It? Actually, I should rename it to what I used to call my
daily radio show here the world according to Garf Football's I guess you're you're used
in Texans there now in training camp and it's I've got the All Star break,
just happened. The Olympics coming up. We got the the Open.
I'm sorry, the British Open. I'm that old to remember that. This
weekend, so there are a few other things going around, but there are
some. There are a little technology, a little fun stuff that do you
tune into here? And if you do did tune in last week, you
probably heard my initial thoughts of playing with the news. Samsung Galaxy foldable phones
breaking news phones are are now foldable again, and they have glass screams and
they fold the glass folds. You well, I now have had both of
them for a week, the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip six and these Z Fold
six. I've had them for a week, and I'll talk more about my
thoughts and possible recommendations way before their release, because they're not even out in
the world for about a week. And so that's one of the things that
I'm lucky and I'm honored to have built up contacts and history and a reputation
where a lot of these companies that will send me the inside info, I
do have to sign and agree to some embargo before they I'm allowed to talk
a lot about them, but I am allowed to talk about them as of
right now. They are interesting, they are unique. There was an AT
and T data breach and were you affected. I don't have AT and T,
but if you were affected, because pretty much anybody who has AT and
T service or has had AT and T service, you were affected, and
I will tell you what to do of how to maybe resurrect your how to
save your information, how to change your passwords, why you should change your
passwords, and everything. Samsung is not the only phone that has just come
out or only technology company that has come out with new gear one plus,
which I'm actually a fan of. They have a pretty interesting phone. I
wear their watch on a daily basis. They just came out with a new
watch, some earbuds and a pad. And for football fans, if you
missed it, it is back after many many years e A Sports Finally and
this has been a long time coming. This past week they have released their
new video game, College Football twenty five. It is a video game that
now players in college they actually get paid for using their name and their their
their facial their their their facial aspects so they can get paid. Oh,
how times have changed. We'll talk about Amazon. What did you get for
Prime Day? Because I got absolutely nothing. I don't even know if I
logged on Amazon during their annual Prime Days sale this week. But if you
did get some really good deals, I'd love to hear from you. Share
it. We're all community. I'll give you the number one more time,
which is seven one three two one two five nine five. Oh. You
can find me on all the social media's if you're not blocked. High Tech
Textan spell it out. It's high Tech t e x A n high Tech
Texan. If you go to my website, high Tech Texting dot com.
You actually can see a pre Yeah, pretty thorough synopsis of these new Samsung
Galaxy phones. I had the opportunity to be in New York City get a
rope last week. Samsung invited me up there to go to the super secret
Man. Yeah, it was actually the day before I got to see and
hold and touch the phones before they actually announced them. The next day,
I did an extent some video piece. And earlier this week, I was
on Great Day Houston Channel eleven CPS along with Defor Duncan, which I'm a
correspondent, and uh, we got to replay actually play my three minute to
four minute video and then I brought the k you brought the phones on the
show, show you how they fold and give you some ideas. Also if
you're still if you're still in the dark, still don't have any power for
your hurricane. Talked a little about generators, a little bit about batteries and
for some reason, generators. Man, it's been that's the hot topic.
There's been a lot of hot topics, as I said as I led the
show off, about this sadly untimely deaths of people, celebrities were still without
power, generators, A lot of people said, Man, I'm never gonna
I'm never gonna live without one. Should I get one? No, I'm
not still convinced that I need a generator. Maybe I'm just sweating by the
seat of my pants. Even though I didn't sweat, my power was okay.
I just don't know. It is a big, big output. It's
a lot of money. It is some annual upkeep, some service. What's
the best brand? I mean, just like there's iPhone versus Android, I
mean, there's Generak versus Color. There's going back to the digital TV.
There's LCD versus plasma. It's who do you want and is it worth it?
So we can start that debate, you know what, Just like sports
debate, We're gonna have generator debate. Bring it off. In seventy one,
three, two, one, two, five, nine five h we
were going to continue with what we call the High Tech Textan show right after
this. Sifting through some of these emails, it's nice of you guys to
figure out my email Michael at hi tech Texan dot com. Spellbo whole thing
out. Would you please hi G H T C H T E X A
N. Don't you know this? By now twenty two twenty three years of
doing this right now. That's somebody asked me the other day if I'm ready
to retire, and I think he kind of like laughed or winked at me.
And you know, I got two responses like that. Number one is
I can't retire, not now. No, I still need to work and
never two is I'm kind of already retired. It's kind of I work two
hours a week. Beat my work more than two hours a week, but
I kind of work two hours a week, so I'm still here for you.
The longest running radio program here KPRC nine to fifty AM. I do
think the folks who sit in the carpeted offices down the hall, Eddie Martini,
the market manager here. That's Houston. iHeartRadio, Mark Sherman and Brian
Erickson, who kind of program everything. I doubt they listen, but that's
because I really try to watch my tongue. We are. Even though this
show is podcasted, I mean it's it's kind of a it's a regurgitated podcast.
Callum what he does. Once I finished the two hours, he will
then put it on a podcast. It's not a dedicated podcast because it's actually
over the year which means we have to follow FCC rules, meaning we still
can't. I can't say anything bad, which I'm pretty sure I haven't said
any bad words in the twenty plus years, which may be one of the
reasons why I'm actually still on. If it was a podcast, we could
just go go. I really should make my own dedicated podcast, not that
I'm a guy who uses a lot of cuss words and really not, but
I don't know. It's kind of a it could be different. It could
be the edgier Garf. What say you? I don't know follow me?
Did give me something on X? Give me something on threads? High tech
textion dot Com? Should I go at rated Garf? What should the name?
What should the show be called? Garf at Night? It's the Quiet
Storm. This is Michael Garfield telling you where to go for all your pornographic
websites. Yeah, you know, it's just not me, man, That
is not me who has AT and T or who had AT and T.
These are facts. It's not like I really want to make fun nor I
should make fun of companies who had a massive data breach, because pretty much
the most there's a lot of companies who had data breaches your company. My
company may have data breaches soon, so you don't want to make light of
it because it is your personal information. But when it's a company like AT
and T, a Texas based company by the way, which I never want
to make fun of a Texas based company, you still have to point it
out, especially when it comes to the world of technology, and that's what
I am here for. AT and T says nearly all of its sell customers
calls and text records were exposed in a massive breach. All text and sells.
Think of what you text, think of who you text, Think of
who you call out in the open somewhere, maybe on the dark web.
I don't know this was in I think let's see because AT and T said
that they filed something with the SEC that alerted April that customer data was illegally
downloaded from their workspace on a third party cloud platform, and this compromised data
files containing AT and T records of calls and texts of nearly every single AT
and T sell customers, customers of all of their other other companies who use
their network. They're called Mobile virtual network operators like MVNOs that use AT and
T wireless networks and AT and T landline customers who interacted with those cell numbers.
All this two years ago May through October of twenty twenty two. This
is big, This is bad now. AT and T says that while the
compromised data also does not include customer names people, there are ways using publicly
available online tools to find the name associated with the specific telephone number. AT
and T is working with law enforcement to arrest those involved in the incident.
Yay, yay, yay. What's that going to do? What does it
mean for you? It's what I'm here for. How can you find out
if you were affected by the AT and T data breach? In What to
do next? Listen up, turn up your radio, bookmark this, Get
ready to listen to it again and again on the podcast here once we finish
the show on the iHeartRadio app. So, yes, they have it on
going investigation. Yes, we know most every AT and T customer data was
exposed in terms of the text and the calls. What should you do well?
AT and T said, as a general rule, you should remain cautious
of any phone call or text requesting you for personal account or credit card detail.
Now, if you suspect suspicious text activity, do not reply. You
should forward the text to AT and T so they can help you forwarding messages.
By the way, they're free. They won't count towards your text plan.
And as I read that, I'm thinking, who is on a text
plan? Do you not have an unlimited or at least a high gig per
month thing? But neither here nor there. And if you're a target of
fraud on your AT and T wireless number, AT and T actually has a
fraud team, believe it or not. Apparently their data teams probably just as
solid as the US Secret Service didn't do too good of a job. You
need to report it to the AT and T fraud team if you're a target
of fraud. So if you suspect fraud on an account, call AT and
t's customer service on your bill for help. If your solid security number has
been exposed, now AT and T says as security numbers were not exposed in
the data breach. Whatever you maybe want to look at. Free credit monitoring.
I don't know if AT and T has offered free credit monitoring. One
point, I think years ago, I think they did offer free credit monitoring,
free credit reports. Have them check for accounter charges that you don't recognize.
All right, then you could place a free credit freeze or a fraud
alert. A credit freeze does make it harder for someone to open an account
in your name. It's going to require a few extra steps to briefly unlock
the freeze. If you apply for something that requires a credit check, there's
a fraudle it now. A fraud alert requires businesses to verify your identity before
they issue new credit in your name. All right, so credit reports?
How about your credit card? What to do if your credit card number or
your bank account information is compromised? A right, contact your bank to close
your account or cancel your credit card. Oh I hate that. God I
had to do that once. Oh what a pain in the Younoa. You
have to review your transactions regularly? Does it ever check your bank account?
Why don't get a I get an electronic statement each month. I stopped the
mailing thing, you know, to save the trees, and you know who
gets their mail anyway? I do a quick review, believe it or not,
actually do a quick review, because I asked myself, why in the
hell is my credit card bills so freaking high? Every month? All right?
Well, there's insurance and I one of my kids actually has my credit
card that he doesn't use too much. But then I'll see a charge from
Austin. I'm like, uh, what did you do? Just do a
quick glance. You'd be surprised how many times you shop at HGV or how
many times you go to the gas station or things. You probably don't realize
how many recurring subscription charges you have. This is actually, this is for
me to you. This is a public service anow's man. You probably forgot
that you may have a subscription to Hulu, Disney Roku, Netflix, Max
de Cock. Oh wait a minute, so why am I being charge eight
ninety five a month? I need to stop this. It's a good thing
actually to always check your monthly credit card statement Number one. You need to
update that payments automatically. Hopefully your data was not effective. But I as
we go to break, got a serious question, how, if anything,
does this tarnished AT and T brand name? How does this turns? Have
you changed your self service people? Have? I do know that seven one
three, two one two five nine five. Oh go ahead and use your
AT and T service which was packed to call me Calvin will pick up the
phone and potentially we'll put you on have you changed or will you change your
service? You know that maybe jumping the gun, because who's to say the
new service you haven't hopped onto is also going to be data breaks. People,
We are all at risk. The world is a mess right now.
The only thing solid that you can count on is me. Eagle scout Michael
garthalp halfway through first hour, we're gonna be right back a texting show.
Right So we're doing the show on a Saturday. What about two days two
and a half days after Amazon Prime Days, we returned to the High Tech
Text and show. As you heard, Miguel, Michael Garf whatever you want
to call me. You know the phone number, you know the all these
social media deeds, high tech text it alright. So if you ordered something
on Amazon Prime Day, obviously you're an Amazon Prime member, so you should
have received it yesterday or today? Is it like Christmas in July. I'm
not a voyeur, I'm not I'm interested in what you got. Open it
up. Talk to me over here, David, send a photo, post
a photo, go to high Tech Text and hey, Garf, this is
what I got on Amazon. Stupidest thing that you ever bought online? What
is the stupidest thing you ever bought? I mean, is it a kitchen
gadget? I mean it could be stupid, or is it stupid that you
bought it online? Hear me out, hear me out. I don't as
techno forward as I am. I don't buy a lot of things online.
I don't call me old school, but I like getting in the car,
going to a store, trying some clothes on if it's closed, going to
a grocery store, walking up and down the aisles. I have never once
used a grocery delivery services Number One, I've got time on my hands.
I understand why you can save it. I just I'm a consumer. I
like looking at the packaging. The color is what's new. I'm not a
big impulse buyer, but sometimes I see something, Ah, this looks neat,
Maybe I want to try it. It's just that the tactical feel and
touch, the smell of a store or clothing or whatever. It is.
So the craziest, oddest, weirdest, most stupid thing that you've ever bought
online? That gosh, this is something I probably should have bought it in
the store, but I actually bought it online seven one three two one two
five nine five zero. I mean it's easy. I'm gonna low hanging fruit.
You probably. I mean it may have been a kitchen gadget. I
remember air fryars were huge and one of those not crock pots, but uh,
pressure cookers were big years ago. I mean, you can order TVs
obviously online TVs that's something I never wanted to order online because they're very fragile.
They're fragile enough coming from the manufacturer, which is generally overseas, crossing
the waters into America, to get on a train, to get on an
eighteen wheeler, to be transferred to a warehouse, to be transferred to a
big box store, then to be transferred in your car to be that's a
lot of transferring which is gonna crack. You don't know. Maybe if it's
delivered to your home, maybe that actually does cut out one or do parts
of it. But that's kind of fragile. But I mean, listen,
TV's are so inexpensive right now and may be worth the time. Phrases Calamarie,
do you have you did you buy anything on Amazon Prime? No?
I just it's they don't need anything you listen if you're a long time listener.
I've got three wonderful boys. They're in their twenties right now. I
tell them there's a difference between need and want. We need a few things.
You know. We need air in Houston. We need electricity. Oh,
look at me preaching, Go preach carf centerpoint you listening. We need
air conditioning, all right, we need water. We need a number of
different things. Want is a different thing. You know, do I really
need this new you know, pair of pair of slacks? You know,
I like these new, cool, new white tennis shoes that I want to
I need. Now, there's a need and want Prime. I haven't got
the numbers, but it was in the billions and billions of dollars of business
that they sold over two days this past Tuesday and Wednesday on their Amazon Prime
Days. And again I have jokingly say that this is their annual garage sale.
This is when Amazon and their partner companies clear out their warehouse. Is
to make room for the new gear that's coming in for the holiday shopping season.
This is a lot of the stuff that didn't sell over the past year.
What does that tell you? Yeah, some of the better deals were
Amazon products. Why not Amazon Fire TVs, Amazon Fire tablets, the Amazon
Kndleman that actually was pretty cheap, the e reader. Did anybody get those?
So the way Amazon tips, Amazon Days have come and gone? Did
anybody there's it a So it's really to attract Amazon Prime members and the good
deals were only for Prime members. Prime membership is what is it about one
hundred and thirty nine dollars a year. But they offered you could sign up
for a free thirty day trial, and so a number of people all over
the world they signed up for a free thirty day Amazon Prime membership. So
you now probably have twenty twenty five days now to play with it. Might
I suggest taking a look at Prime Video. That's the reason I actually assigned
up for Prime years ago because I wanted to watch a TV series, The
Marvelous Missus masl At You, which is great that's now gone, And like
an idiot, I still have Amazon Prime, even though I don't buy a
lot of stuff, but I watch. They're an NFL partner. They're gonna
have in that they have NFL Thursday night games, they're gonna have a Day
after Thanksgiving game, They're gonna have two Christmas Day games, one of which
is going to be you were used in Texans And this is not an Amazon
commercial, It's not you don't want it again. I underutilize it and I
think I'm not getting ripped off because I can stop it at any time.
But I don't use it though. The ROI is not there for me.
How many people are going to cancel through thirty day subscriptions? What percentage?
It's the retention rate. This is what the subscription, this is what cable
man, cable is just I'm not saying it's dying, but cord cutters retention
rate. They want to retain you and you as a company. They want
a very low retention rate. They don't want churn, man, they don't
want churn. They want you to subscribe and subscribe. It's mailbox money,
it's money coming in. But you have the option a lot of these things
just once. Now, why done? They have to provide value? Money
is tight for so many people. That's why I say, last segment,
look at your credit card statement, look at it, go through it line
by line. Oh man, I don't know. I didn't know this.
This subscription is still here. I got to cancel it, right, now
go through all of your your your your streaming services. Hi Anni, did
you know that we have nine streaming services? Really? All right, that's
it, We're chopping them down to two. You're welcome. I just gave
you a little money over here seven one, three, two, one two,
five nine five of If you want to tell me what you got it,
what you and if you got if you got to actually, if you
got a deal of that steal the century, tell me then I'll be mad
that I actually did not hop on it for the Amazon Prime Day. I'm
actually gonna be not bad because it's probably gonna be on sale again and in
the next week. If not, it'll be on sale in the next few
months before the holiday shopping season comes into play. One thing I did not
get that I know my youngest son got. He had a job, and
I don't think he worked a lot this weekend because I think for about twenty
of the twenty four hours of the day he was playing the new EA Sports
College Football twenty five video game. If if you're a gamer, and if
you're a sports enthusiast, and you're I guess in the demo demographic, this
has been long coming. It's been eleven years since a college football video game
has been released, just because EA Sports, you know, got the rights
to this and they stopped making a college game now. To be sure,
Madden is an NFL game, Madden twenty five, twenty six, whatever,
they're gonna call the whole thing, and it's different. And I and I
spend some time. Let's see. So Adam, so my son, I
guess it came out Monday and you could download this thing. I think,
what is he? He has an Xbox? What is it? No?
No, my oldest has an Xbox. My middle ones got the Nitdendo.
So the youngest one, Adam, he's got the PlayStation. So I guess
he downloaded for PlayStation. So he downloaded it and he sent me a shot.
That's all he's been doing. He's been sitting in his Austin apartment and
he's been playing the University of Texas Longhorns because obviously that's our favorite team.
That's where he went. And he's did you play arch Manning? He goes,
no, No, I'm playing Quinn yours. So so I really actually
should get him on the phone for the for the review. But he said
it's cool. He said it's neat and it and the game is different.
The game is different because it's college. The rules are different than the NFL,
the players are different, but the settings goes college football atmosphere and what
EA Sports has done. And I have not played it, and I probably
don't plan on playing it, but I've seen the graphics. College football is
an entire different game than NFL. This scene is crazy, and EA Sports
did a great job of going from over one hundred and to what thirty Division
I schools to capture the essence of the craziness and the hype of stadiums of
Virginia Tech when they're coming into Metallica, Sandman of Bevo running out. They
actually did the Red River rivalry of Texas versus OU, and they've got the
state bear in the background. Apparently you can almost smell the Fletcher's corny dogs.
He says, it's it's really and then there's nil. Now I know
you can be the in Madden the NFL game. You could play the general
manager and you've got the you got the salary cap. Now you have nil
how to lure and recruit these things. It's it's it's amazing how realistic they
is. It is you know what good good for these college students because they
are student athletes. We're getting paid, I think getting paid what five or
ten thousand dollars to lot to for their like for their name, image and
likeness to be in this video game. So anyway, it is EA Sports
College Football twenty five. It came out this week. If you've got thoughts
reviews. Standard version of the game seventy dollars. Deluxe is one hundred dollars.
No clue what the difference is, but so far the reviews have been
good. It's not a Madden reskin as they call it. There's different plays,
dynasty modes, Hall of Fame type of things. I'd like your review.
Feel free open phone lines as we have one more semi coming up this
hour in the High Tech Textan show. We've got more information and we're going
to be back with some reviews of phones and other fun stuff. Right here,
Michael garfielders the Neat got about eight or nine more minutes left in the
first hour of the show. Have no fear, We've got all our next
man, we're going to talk talk about a lot of stuff I've been really
enjoying and playing and reviewing a number of different vehicles. I had not one,
not two, but three different test vehicles this week, including a Bronco
Sport, the Ford Broncos Sport. That's the small version. I'll let you
know how that compares to the lig Bronco. I had a Kia, a
hybrid Kia, very nice, great gas knowledge and surprisingly when is a mas
de fan, I'm really not a Mazda fan. MAZD c X seventy.
Very impressed with this over previous mas That's a nice CUV, kind of a
large, it's a wider body. I'll give you my thoughts next hour because
it's one of the things that I covered. I do reviews of cars.
None of this is a commercial. I get paid for none of it,
sadly, so that means I can diss the you know what out of it
or I can praise the you know out of it. So that's how we
roll here on the high tech text and show. I want to spend a
minute or two over here, as I said at the top of the hour,
remembering a good friend of mine, but also a really good friend of
all of Houston. Ken Hoffman a long time humorist, writer, colonist in
the Houston Chronicle going back to the Houston Post more recently of culture map Online.
Unexpectedly passed away last Sunday, and it was a shock. I got
the call from another close friend of Kin's just a few hours after it happened.
And I won't get into the details of what happened out of respect for
the family, but it was a shocker. Ken Hoffman. The tributes online
from Eustonians who read him, who thought, who seemed like they knew kid,
We're amazing and heartfelt. You can't say anything bad about him. You
could kid with him because if you read his columns and understood his humor and
I called it his shtick, listen, there are so many people who have
stick. His stick was to be a curmudget. His stick was to call
people or companies out unfittingly. So his final column ever, that he wrote
and published just two days before he passed, was on Center Point and guess
what he called that company out? That was Ken's Today I went to a
private memorial gathering comedy power with a lot of his friends, most of him,
many of them in the media, and his family and there were just
laughs because Ken Hoffman was crazy. I go back yesterday I was in another
local radio show and we were joking because they twenty years. You find out
a lot about people, especially when you actually spend time with him, and
I spent I spent a good amount of time with Ken. He gave me
business. He gave me which I can't say the word. He gave me
a lot of the bleep, but it was good. And I credit Ken
with helping me and helping my career. He followed the media. He loved
media. He loved most of the media. He loved writing, but he
loved radio. Ken actually came to Houston and he was part of the Q
Morning Zoo, and that was before I got to Houston. I guess this
was the late eighties or early nineties, and he played characters and he was
a writer. He wrote for radio. This is when you actually wrote for
radio. No one writes my radio stick, but sometimes did you have bits?
And Ken wrote for radio. And then he appeared on radio. He
appeared on I had a daily radio show here on nine fifty am for several
years and Ken appeared on a weekly basis, and he would come on and
he would talk about nothing. I don't like what I talk about. We
would shoot the breeze and we would play trivia games because he was like me,
astute with the most meaningless facts that you would ever know. And we
would try to stump each other. And we all have our sweet spots.
If you read Ken's column in the papers over the years, he talked about
his loves, just like I talk about what I enjoy. Love of my
life. Let me talk about my kids. You know where I'm from.
You know I'm from Dallas. You know why I went to the University of
Texas. You know my favorite football teams. You've listened to me talk about
how my three boys have grown up and what they do. You know I'm
a runner. You know my favorite coach. I may have learned that from
Ken. He was the biggest Beatles fan. He loved playing and watching tennis,
loved living in West u love literally because of his son. Andrew bloated
on his son. Andrew loved eating. His stick was about eating. He
had a part of his column was the Fast Food Gourmet. It was syndicated
all over the country. He didn't care about anything pretentious. He would cuss
out anything pretentious. Yeah, I'll tell you a story here at a second
or two. But for him, it was Chick fil A, it was
Hooters. We have spent so many times at Chick fil A and Hooters because
we liked the wings at Hooters. Seriously, he helped my career because when
I started story number one and again, I'll have about another minute or two
or three in this segment. I first started my career, my media career
here in Houston in two thousand. I was on Channel two and I was
in the early morning and I was doing a segment right before the Today Show
came on, about three minutes and it was about technology. And this is
two thousand, this is when technology was just it was the dot com era.
It was crazy and someone needed to explain technology in a really easy to
understand since so I was on and I came up with the moniker the high
Tech Texts, and I trademarked it. And then at that point A time
Warner AOL Time Warner had just released road Runner, remember their high speed internet
service, and they used me as their spokesperson and they created TV commercials.
I was on TV commercials. I was on radio spots on all radio stations.
It wasn't just Clear Channel back in the day. I was on billboards.
I mean, this is me out of nowhere. I created this brand
and I came out of nowhere. So as I knew who ken Hoffman was,
he he would write about media and it was like, oh my god,
how cool it would be to be mentioned in a ken Hoffman or a
Maxim messenger. Call him back into the society. Call. So one day,
about a year or two into my career, two thousand and one,
two thousand and two, I get a phone call voicemail. Hey, Garfield,
this is Jenn Hoffman from the Houston Chronicle. I don't know about you,
but I'm getting emails and I'm getting letters left and right asking who the
hell are you? Call me back? Here's my number. I was at
all. Ken Hoffman's calling me. He wants to interview me. Called it
back and we probably had an hour long conversation telling him who I was and
what I did. But we hit it off. I don't know, just
because that we're both we don't take ourselves seriously. We probably didn't imagine either
of us being in a very large market to be able to spout our views
or talk or smile in front of a massive amount of people, and so
we got along. He wrote about me in a column and he didn't give
me too much crap. He was very respectful. Here's a guy who actually
kind of came up with an I Dan. He ran with it in over
the years and years and years. He would mention me and he would always
praise my radio show, probably because he was on my radio show here and
there, and people would write in with letters. And I have every single
one of his column where he wrote about me, and because it was big,
it was me. I was pinging myself. I'm an a Canna Hoffman
column and he would, you know, talk about you know, Garf.
He's so funny, he's got the best hair in the business. He dresses
well, it's why is he looking so good? And he has so good
hair and he's not on TV. He's in the radio. We would go
to go to lunch and you would talk about our lunches of Oh my god,
I can't believe I got stumped on this music trivia from the eighties.
He was he was just a funny, funny soul. And to pass away
so suddenly and unexpectedly, it's a shock for not just me, for not
just the people that knew him, for so many people here at iHeartRadio,
Matt Thomas, our good buddy here on our sister station seven ninety Sports Sports
Radio, very good friends with him too. It's it sucks, and it's
a tragedy, and just it's another crappy thing that is going on in this
world. So for all of you who Redkin and you enjoyed him, continue
to think about him. His columns live on Google him and just think and
remember of his son Andrew, his wife Aaron, and may his memory be
a blessing indeed, and we will get thinking. On the other side of
the high Tech text Show, I is Michael Garfield, of Michael Garfield.
Michael Garfield's joining us in the high Tech Texan. Michael Garfield is here with
a high Tech Texans. It was to make life easier some new technology.
So Michael Garfield has something you might like. Michael Garfield is your high tech
Texan three decades helping you make magic with your gadgets. Heard worldwide on the
iheartwadio after now You're high Tech Texan. Michael Garfield. Iwer number two is
just beginning. Take a look at the clock. I'm her way through my
work week, since I allegedly only work two hours a week, which means
we are a halfway to happy hour. And wherever you are, if you're
in the hot, you mid nasty Houston sign and I you know, listen,
odds are if you don't have power man, odds are you are schmit
singing. I wish I could apologize, and I feel for you, I
really do. If you're your center part, a center point, and you're
one of the linemen or line women, listen, we empathize with you.
I know it's hot, I know it's nasty. It's not your fault.
Just just hang in there. The worst comes source you just need to move.
It's as symbol as that. I saw some poll somebody posted on Facebook,
which means you can take it at not even face worth. That somebody
pulled somebody Eustonians and they I said, three out of ten Eustonians would consider
moving or leaving just because of the way the power grid and the system goes
down. I'm actually think it's pretty low. But where else are you gonna
go? I mean, you know me, I'd go to California mostly because
of the gorgeous weather and job opportunities in media. My son lives out there.
But you know, the price of living, and it's just we are
just not having a very good time in our lives right now. As I
started to show an hour ago, it's been a pretty crappy few weeks.
If it wasn't a hurricane that hit directly in our hometown, there was a
kuk who tried to assassinate a former president and current candidate one hundreds of thousands
of residents right here still without power. And the list of people who passed
away just this past week, it's staggering. Shelley Duval, doctor Ruth Richardson,
and Shannon Dougherty, Bob NewART, and of course our good friend of
mine and our good friends of so many people here and used to the talented,
the witty and the big ultimately curmudgeon Ken Hoffman, longtime writer the Euston
Chronicle, the Houston Post. Just an untimely death last weekend, and I
am just I remember him. I am so grateful to have known him.
I went to his memorial, very private memorial service yesterday that his family held,
and I exchanged some text with him just a few days before he passed.
I did the last segment before you know, we we took a break.
I shared how we met when he first interviewed me for one of his
columns, and he just do in chronicle, and I'll share a quick,
funny story. The very last time I communicated him, it was it was
just over a week a week and a half ago, and I was traveling.
I was in New York and Ken famously Wright wrote about food, fast
food, burgers, pizza, fries. He had a column the what was
it, the drive through Gourmet, and he would just just he would just
choose fast food over anything that's nice. I don't know if the guy's ever
eaten in a nice restaurant in his adult life. That was his stick,
that was his thing. But he had one place, his favorite pizza in
the world, and it's in New York that he would write about. He
wrote about since I've been reading him for thirty years, Yeah, gotta got
her to this one pizza place. And people would write into him because when
Sundays in the User Chronicle, he used to publish some emails and letters that
he would get and inevitably once a month, once every two months, somebody
would hey, Ken, I'm going to New York. What's your favorite pizza
place? And he would always he was always write about it again and again
for what it's worth. It's Lombardes and it's in Little Italy. So I
happen to be staying in Soho, which is just a few blocks from Little
Italy, and I knew it was Lombard's and I went there for dinner.
So I walk over there by and I'm by myself, walk in and there's
pictures in the wall, famous pictures, and it's on the corner and it's
Little Italy is it's it's a fun place. If you've never been highly recommended,
just walking up and down and so going into Lombards and again I have
I haven't talked, texted ten in a while. It has been a while.
So I go in and I sit down at the bar by myself,
and I order a beizza bye, and I order a whatever. It's a
cheese, it's it's mushroom, spinach, whatever, had a beer. Took
some pictures of it, and then I go outside when I'm done, and
I take a picture, I selfie of me standing in front of Lombard's.
So I texted to Ken week and a half ago and I said, in
New York, honoring you eating at your favorite pizza place ever sitt in the
picture here. He responded, Oh, that place is now a bleephole.
The original owners sold it to somebody else a few weeks A few years ago.
I wasn't bear going there again. Oh my goodness. I mean,
I make a track to little Italy. I go there. I sit at
the order to think, thinking, kid is gonna be so impressed. He's
like, no, it's a beepeepepepepe peep. Don't go there again. And
so I laughed, how you doing? What's going on? He told me
that this was this was a day after the hurricane hit and he uh met
a lake house in Lake Conroe and he was up there and he was fixed.
He just said, yeah, you know that the water was churned up
in the dock. It was just messed up and whatever. And I go,
okay, you know, I hope it's hope you've been well stuff like
that in New York visiting. I get back and let's let's get together.
And always in that way with so many people, it's like, okay,
we'll get together and get back. And that was the last time I ever
texted, the last time I ever communicated him. Sunday morning, he had
an untimely, just an accident, and Kin is gone. But I will
always share us all the stupid things that is stupid thing. We didn't do
too many stupid things that were you know, he loved Hooters, he loved
Chick fil A, he loved fast food burgers, and he would just we
would just go and talk about the media and just whatever. Played tennis a
few times. He loved tennis. So I'm sitting Shiva, I am thinking
of him, and you should too, for his wife Aaron, his son
Andrew, the great kN Hoffmann, and may his memory be a blessing,
and it is going to be a blessing for so so many people here in
Houston because he was such a fixture now from New Jersey, but he made
Houston his adoptive hometown. And whoever one day writes the official history of Houston,
ironically, they have to include Ken, who is a writer who probably
should have written his own history of Houston. Ken Hoffman, we love you,
man, We love you. All right, we are going to continue
the high Tech Textan show. Last hour, we talked about the AT and
T data breach. We talked about some of the Amazon Prime deals. Of
what you missed out on and actually was it even worth it to have some
open phone lines? Seven one three, two one two five nine five.
Oh, coming back, do we need another chatbot? There's another one?
And he guesses of what the crazy name this one's called? Oh no,
no, it's not Siri. Nope, it's we got a new one over
here. Let's see if you like it, plus your calls and emails right
here on Michael Garfield. It's called the high Tech Texting shown. Where were
you fifty five years ago? Today? And I say today, if you're
listening live seconder day, it is Jill twentieth. It was nineteen sixty nine,
ring a bell, July twentieth, nineteen sixteen, Noah in the chap
Aquatic Kennedy incident, that that was the day before. Where were you when
man first sent foot on the Moon? Happy anniversary NASA and everybody involved with
freaking landing a man a vessel on the Moon. I was a very young
kiddo, so I don't remember it. But as a historian, as a
kid who grew up in the seventies, man alstronauts were it. I had
the metal lunch box with the astronauts on it. Yep, the glass,
thermous astronauts and everything. Yep, had to have that one if you grew
up in that era. And I guess I speak as a man, I
speak as a male, and maybe he was males moves than females who didn't
want to be an astronaut. Not there Apollo eleven and then well we're not
gonna kind of follow thirteen, which obviously everybody came back safely. Thank you
Tom Hanks. It was just the coolest thing ever. My radiotellision film classes
that I took at the University of Texas, we dissected historic TV broadcast and
the Walter Cronkite live reaction when he teared up, took his glasses off when
he first saw the Apollo Elevan rover just just land in the moon. And
then Neil Armstrong step out with his famous words one small step from man Win,
giantly from man Coin and then buzz was playing around. That was a
you talk about a siminal moment in history, not even American history. It's
just time. I mean, we can go back to dinosaurs, caveman tire,
the wheel fire launching and landing on the moon. Listen, for those
of you people who think it didn't happen for the conspiracy theory, I don't
know. Maybe you think it was Lee Harvey Oswald actually was filming that doubt.
I mean, every conspiracy is a conspiracy. I take it. It's
face value landed on the Moon. How we want to go back? I
don't know why, but we do. So Happy anniversary because you know what,
it did take rocket scientists all their knowledge to do that, and it's
pretty pretty cool. I bet there's some people listening right now who were involved
in the in the Apollo in the mission. I mean at some point,
if not, maybe your parents were part of your family. A lot of
listeners down in the Clear Lake area, So shout out to NASA, So
happy aniversary with that. Michael Garfield is the name. It doesn't take a
rocket scientist now to create apps and websites and new business models. When it
comes to the world of technology, I wonder how smart people are what It
takes a lot of marketers though, to create something to get people to use
it. Let's go with Amazon. Amazon was another similar point in the Internet
of a paradigm shift. Was a paradigm shift. That's how we bought books.
Original point mean you could buy a book online, Amazon's whols largest bookstore.
Amazon is sell almost anything you want right now? Did it take?
Is Jeff Bezos a rocket scientist? Now pretty smart, good businessman? All
right? But Amazon pretty cool? I talked about Amazon ex Amazon just came
out with something and they probably had some semi smart people do it. They
just came out with an artificial intelligent chatbot. That's right, there's another a
I chat bot bringing on the Air's always room for a chatbot. Now we've
got everything from Alexa, We've got Siri, we have got Bixby for Samsung,
we got an hour things Amazon AI chatbot. The new name, any
guess is Calum. I'm looking at you. Calum is a punch of butts
by in the class. You don't even guess. It's just I don't know
where they came It's it's a it's one word, it's one name. It's
a it's a guy's name. I would assume nowadays it didn't matter. You
can go, get go, but it's a generally you guys, dad uh.
He was also the name of a pretty famous musical artist who sing with
Cha Ka Khan. Chaka Khan. You don't know what Shaka Khan is all
right, Hey, I chatbot the new name rufous. Hey, rufus,
help me find a new name. That actually the first question I would ask
it it is. It's actually live right now for all US customers. It's
in a beta version, but they started testing this thing back in February.
Right now, rufous looks to be tied directly to Amazon's if you have the
shopping app, not the web version. So if you're on the web version,
and you probably were on Amazon Prime Days earlier this week, you potentially
can play with rufus. Let me tell you what it does. It helps
you with shopping. I wonder why. Because it's an Amazon chatpot. You
can ask it for a list of recommended products and ask what specific products do
and stuff like that. Wait a minute, shouldn't have been have been called
the high Tech Texan because that's what I do. I recommend products, I
tell you what products do, and stuff like that. To play with the
little To me, it's kind of boring, which is not like the high
Tech text. And that's why they probably couldn't call it the high Tech Texan.
But if Amazon chemic on and they wanted de license the name the high
tech Texan. I'm more than abby to belly up to the bar and talk
with them. So do we need something like this I Amazon says it's been
trained on product on the product catalog, customer reviews, community questions and answers,
public information found through the web. Try it out. You have to
update. Go to the Amazon app, but update to the latest version of
the app, and you look for this little colorful icon at the bottom right.
I don't know it's I just don't know if we need anything like that.
I don't even use I have one. I don't use Amazon Election.
I don't because I only have one of those. I actually have two of
them, White House. I do use the Google app. I do use
that weight orb because I have a lot of Google enabled devices in my home
in I have used Samsung for years, decades. I have never once used
Bixby. That's the name of their AI helper. Chat by person is Bixby
a girls name or guy guys? I think of the incredible Hulk Bill Bixby.
That's what I think of when I think of Bixby. You know,
if anybody wants to try that. It is now called rufus In Shaka Khan
Sadly, because of licensing rules, we cannot play a Rufous and Shatka Cohn?
Can I can I sing this callum? You know the rules over here.
I mean, we don't want to get ie hard in trouble. I
don't want them. I don't want my bosses coming to me and saying I
owe eighteen point three cents because we played on Rufous? Can I sing chuck
a callin? Everybody? Can I Did I just break some rule I don't
even know? I go ahead and try that. When we come back.
I'm gonna take a break. There are other companies other than Samsung and other
than Apple who make decent earbuds and decent watches and pads and everything. I'm
gonna come back, and I got a another company who I'm actually find I
wear their watch daily. This is my fitness in tracking watch daily. My
favorite one. Not made by Samsug, not made by Apple. I'll tell
you what that is. But they just came out with some upgrades. I
will tell you that along with your calls here on the Depiction Show, all
right, trivia question for you about them? They are trivia question. As
we approached about that thirty minutes to left to go in the show, how
much is the price of a first class postage stamp? Anyone? Anyone didn't
think so? Well, it's about the change. If you thought you knew
what it is. Tomorrow Sunday, the price of a first class posted stamp
is going up for the second time this year. I remember it took years
for first class post to stamps to go up in price second time this year.
Keep thinking about it. Why just tell a little story too. I
want to know the percentage of my audience right now. Win's the last time
you've used a postage stamp? Win? How many things do you actually snail
mail? Other than maybe you have to send packages or at the holiday season
you sell something on eBay? You gotta do you print these things out?
I am of age where we grew up with postage stamps. Postage stamps were
I rente. I should check. Hey, there were out of dope sixteen
seventeen, eighteen cents, they were a quartered, they were forty cents,
they were fifty cent. Now you get these things. What are they called
the forever stamps? It's I guess it's a smart thing. But what you
if you plan to send snail mail. Years ago, you should have brought
rolls and rolls and rolls of forever stamps at forty or fifty cents whatever it
is, because the price of a stamp tomorrow goes up five cents to seventy
three cents, seventy three cents to to send a what a one ounce two
ounce piece of mail Somewhere, kids, pull up a chair. Let me
tell you what the post office is. Let me tell you what a mailing
of a letter or a card is. I was talking to my mom a
month or two ago about this about something, and she did I send her
I guess it was a Mother's Day card. Maybe she's up there up now.
And we got to talk about stamps. No, no, no,
no, no, no. Yeah. She told me about a month ago
that, oh, if you run out of if you're running out of stamps
or any more stamps, go buy some stamps right now because the price is
going up in July. And I I'm like stamps. I said, do
you know how many times a year I actually mail something? And I can
easily count it on two hands, if not one hand, because I do
mail. I mail her Mother's Day card, I mail her birthday card,
I mail a Father's Day card, I mail his birthday card. I am
trying to think if I mail anything else. He all my bills online.
All the communication is there. I don't even really get a lot of things
in the mail for my bills because I said, no, no, no,
save the paper, just you know, send me the email or whatever
it is. And again I see it on an email, but anyway,
it's She was very adamant about me going to stock up on first last post
of stamps, forever stamps, so I could save five cents on each if
I mail five, six, seven eight pieces of mail a year. How
about you? Does anybody do mail? Like handwritten notes? And it's a
lost art for them? And occasionally if I meet somebody that I it has
got to be old school. I have got to meet somebody who's older than
me and I actually know what I liked. I did this earlier this year.
I ran into a gentleman, a businessman here. He was probably in
his upper sixties, young lower seventies. I was someone with him and I
overheard him talking about handwriting thank you notes, your handwriting letters and mailing him
and I walked up to him and I said, you know what. That's
a lost art. I don't do it a lot, but I have done
it before, and we really hit it off. We had lunch and he
turns out he's an eagle scout. I'm an eagle scout. We go back
and forth, and I got his business guard and guess what I did.
I actually got a piece of stationary, which I still have it. I
still think my stationary is my thank youness for my bar Mitzvah forty plus years
ago. I'm not kidding him. I wrote him a nice to meet you.
Little things like that go a long way, and if you want to
do it, it's gonna cost you seventy three cents. We continue. I
have no clue how I got on that, because this is just how times
I'm a paradigm shift guy. I am a paradigm shift God's exactly what I
am. You know what's also old school? Remember your first computer. Let's
go back to nineteen wow, well, if you you know, listen,
we go back to personal computers. You know, massively. If you had
one of the first Apples in nineteen eighty four, maybef you got your first
PC. I may have got my first big, semi powerful PC back in
the late eighties, early nineties or whatever it was. It was a Microsoft
was I've always had a Microsoft operating system. You remember, they used to
come loaded with a few games and they were the worst, most rudimentary games
you've ever seen. Do you remember Wait for Your Loves? Do you remember
Mine Sweeper, y agnor mind Sweeper? How many hours did we just kill
a lot our office desks playing mind Sweeper? It was kind of a strategy
slash guest game. Whatever, you don't think. I don't even know is
Mine Sweeper still on? I'm looking at a Microsoft operating system, Ida,
I don't even know if I have a mind Sweeper. But guess what,
Mine Sweeper is back. Just like flip phones, Mine Sweeper is back,
baby, because you can now play Mine Sweeper on Netflix's app. Netflix.
They have reimagined this TC puzzle game with an international setting, and it takes
a player literally looking for underwater mines by by overlaying interfaces of numbers and flags
and pictures of waterways from all over the world. Pretty cool. I guess
it's it's free, there's a there's an it's it's an advertiser supported, or
you could purchase it without ad free, I wouldn't purchase the thing. It's
it's retro people mine Sweeper. It's an interesting retro addition to really what Netflix
is trying to do. They have they have a wide range of game titles.
You think Netflix is just oh, let's just watch some movies and some
TV shows. Now, no, they've got games. There's Hearts, they
have Solitaire, and they they have they have the Grand Theft Auto series.
They're really casting a wide net with his endeavor. Mine sweet, what am
I missing? Seven one three, two one two five nine five? What
other Solitaire? Yes it was Solitaire, mind sweeper? What else can where?
They'll see only two games on like the original windows. Need some help
here, go go to high tech textan on my on my x account or
my threads. What games were? What games did you play? I mean
I remember playing was Tetris? Was Tetris was on the Game Boy system first?
But anyway, listen, this is I called Now, this is the
the doulgrums of the summer. Football is not happening yet. Basketball is over
hockey if anybody cares about that's not happening baseball. If you're a baseball finan,
that's what you got Olympics are coming out. You may have watched everything
on all your streamers. You don't know what to do. Why not play
games? And if you subscribe to Netflix, they really do have a pretty
solid collection. Again, this is not I don't have Netflix, so this
is not an endorsement. I'm just telling you Netflix is really doing an interesting
job for games. Now. Obviously, you may have your own Xbox,
you may have your PlayStation, you may have your Nintendo. All three of
my boys have all each of them has their own system. But if you
have a Netflix and soo many people have Netflix, there you go. You
actually can watch that. I'm gonna play with that. Got an email over
here, Michael, I hear you talking about new phones. I want to
know how the camera is. It's interesting that the new flip phone finally upgraded
to fifty megapixels. It sounds like you're excited with it. So let us
know, please how it is, because if so, I do like the
form factor of the Flip and full phones, and so I may actually get
one of those things. But also what about camera tips? I know AI
is is still the email. The AI looks like it's al but the AI
can take over. So many functions to make photos better. Any specific camera
tips that you use, because I follow you on Instagram at high Tech text
and you take some really nice videos and photos. That is from Who's that
from? Janet? Janet? Is apparently a good question, Janet. Cameras
on phones, they're getting so much better. As I told you, I'm
playing right now with the new Samsung flip phone, the Flip six, the
fold phone, the Full six. The Flip phone went from a twelve megapixel
camera, which was yeah, to a fifty megapixel which is very good.
It's not great, there are greater ones out there, but it's a big
step upward. But when it comes to taking videos and taking photos, there
are a lot of things that you can do where you stand versus this sign
is there is there backlight on some of these things. And so yeah,
there are some rent you know, interesting things that that that you can do
for for some tips and so you know, let me see maybe I could
you know, play around with you know, giving you a a tip or
two of some of these things. Again, watch where you're standing in the
sun sun. You never want to put it directly behind somebody because it's going
to be backlited and even if there's AI could fix it, it's very tough
to do. Another thing, don't forget that your phone, your camera has
a timer on it. It's got built in photo timer, no matter what
phones do you use it and if you use a timer yet generally, sometimes
don't have to ask some rando stranger to take a photo, because sometimes you
hear stories that could lead to bad news. Somebody you can hand your your
traveling You hand a phone to some stranger and guess what, they can run
away with the phone. And then there's the selfies are good, but how
your arm is only what three three feet long, and you're not gonna get
the whole scope with there. Set your camera down on something you know,
make sure it's steady, a rock or a wall, or prop it up.
Set a timer. My timer I think has a two second, a
five second, and a ten second, which gives you ample enough time.
I actually have my Samsung cameras, my lett A Samsung cameras. I can
set up a phone for SELFI mode, and I can stand back. I
can hold my hand up, hold five fingers up to a phone. It
recognizes that and it'll take a snap. It'll take a photo. Some some
of them. You actually you could you can say photo cheese snap use that.
That's another little tip to actually help it out. You could do that
in your settings over here. Make sure it's stable. Get a selfie stick,
Get a tripod. They are tripods that are very small and very light.
You can actually do that too and clean them up. You don't even
need sometime to actually download apps like face tune or photoshop or any of this
stuff. I know specifically my Android operating system, the when I use on
Samsung right now, they have really nice ways to to what I if you
know me, you know what I call it. I call it sexing it
up. Hey, nice photo. I'm not gonna send you it, yeah,
because I gotta sex it up. Sit up to me is I'm gonna
I'm gonna make sure it's bright. I'm gonna make sure everybody faces faces can
be seen. Put a little bit more color, maybe put a little more
saturation. But now there's AI, specifically with Samsung, there's Galaxy AI because
I know that because I use it. What it does. It fixes things
automatically. And the other thing is one of the neat things that I've been
doing. When I was in New York, so I'm taking pictures of the
New York landscape or shea cut and I was in Chicago too, and I'm
taking a picture of the bean for example, you know the famous bean,
and I'm taking a picture of the selfie of the beam, and there's so
many people around the bean. You could see me, but there's all these
people around me. You can digitally remove these people. Now, yes,
you could always have done that if you know what you're doing. A photoshop.
Ah with Galaxy, there's like one tap, one tap, you tap
on something you want to I could I could have removed the bean itself.
I could have tapped on a picture of the bean. Hoof it's gone.
And what it does it uses artificial intelligence to fill in what would have been
there. But what I use it for is I can erase things. It's
like back to the future. Remember the famous photo of Marty and his brother
and his sister and it was his body was slowly erasing. That's it.
It actually works right now. So appreciate the email. Do that you play
with your phone, upgrade your camera on your phone, and sometimes there's updates
those things, and you'd be surprised how much better pictures that you can get
all right. That's about it for that thing. We've got. Team one
has one more segment left before we end this show here in the middle of
July. It is Michael Garfield the High Tech Techna and we're gonna be right
back. We are finally at the point of the final segment Good or Bad,
which means my work week is about ova and about nine or ten minutes,
I do thank you for hanging in. Michael is the name. It's
Michael Garfield, the original Michael. Maybe a few other Michaels here at iHeart
Houston, but I've been here a while, and I do thank you for
hanging in. It is called the High Tech Texting Show, and we talked
a lot more than the technology here. Certainly with the untimely passing of our
good friend in Houston, Ken Hoffman, longtime writer of the Houston Chronicle,
it's very, very tragic, on top of so many other deaths this past
week. He recently is Bob Newhart and Doherty, doctor Ruth, the Richard
Simmons. It's I don't know where we are in this world. Oh.
On top of that, I really haven't hit it. This past Friday yesterday,
the world almost it seemed like it came to its knees with what happened
with the Microsoft Windows enterprise shutdown. We didn't really talk about that too much,
but if you woke up yesterday morning and you saw computers all over the
world, or you were trying to get on an airplane, it may have
been disrupted at hospitals. Apparently a CrowdStrike, which is a US cybersecurity firm,
they had a glance they were updating something which then enturred affected Microsoft Windows
operating systems, mostly on the enterprise system, not so much your home,
but your businesses and big corporations. It brought it to a standstill. I
mean American Delta Airlines, hospitals, there were a lot of media companies early
in the morning on Friday who had trouble getting on air, and so they
slowly try to fix it. It's not Microsoft per se, but it did
affect a Microsoft Windows operating system. And I've said before, and I did
a lot of I spent a number of hours yesterday morning doing some radio hits
and some TV. They wanted you know my thoughts. You know, Michael,
can you break this down? I long said before that the next big
threat that I think the world is going to see in terms of a war,
and I hate using that term war. It's a cyber war. And
to we were brought to our knees. Companies were brought towards you. Businesses
could not open and shut down. I mean having a full groundstop for airlines
and hospitals. It's we've got to protect your data. Companies like you know,
cyber strike. They've really got to you know, nil things down because
the world can't operate this like this. This was not around twenty thirty forty
years ago, certainly one hundred years ago. But everything we do, everything
from what you're hearing of how my voice gets over the ear and through the
app to your ears right now, it is all technology. And that's why
technology is so important. I didn't want to pay off a tease I did
about it. I don't know what. Thirty minutes ago, you know,
we talk about Apple, We talked about Samsung, which I have with some
of their new flip in fold models. There are other manufacturers who make phones,
who make earbuds, who make smart watches. Company called one Plus,
which I'm familiar with. They held a press event earlier this week and they
announced a slew of new gadgets. They have an upgraded tablet. They came
out with some new earbuds, the Buds three Pro and again I have to
see it in that order, not the Buds Pro three, and also a
upgraded smart watch, the Watch two are it's kind of a refresh of these.
These are kind of the pad and the watch are kind of refreshes from
last year's model. But I will tell you if you're unfamiliar with these,
I am familiar because I have one of the latest one plus phone. It
was their fold phone. Last October, I got to go to a press
conference in New York where I learned a lot about one Plus. It's a
fold out phone with a wonderful camera. It's a Hassle blog camera. If
you know anything about cameras, Hassleblot is a great name. And also the
watch, it's my daily wear. It's you know I have. I think
I had the past three different versions of Samsung's Watch on my daily on my
wrist. If I want to monitor my beats, permitted, my my oxygen
level, my steps. I wear one Plus Watch too works wonderful with my
Android system, my operating system. And this new two are much I just
received. I haven't whipped it out yet and played with it, but I
will try that. But again, the point is, there are so many
options for you to try to buy. That's what I do. I'll give
you in my opinions. None of this, sadly are paid for. So
I will tell you what is crap, what is good, what is decent,
what is worth your money? And so of options, more than just
that big company in Coopertino that is named after a fruit, which I rarely
talk about because I don't know. I'm an Android guy and Apple do just
have no really doesn't know who my name is. And so what screwing people,
I'm going to tell you to buy and shop somewhere else. Kind Of
winding down a few other things that we did not get to, and again
I did just mention what happened yesterday in the world of crazy Microsoft stuff.
That was I hope it didn't infect or slow down your business, but in
many cases the world that it probably did. I did see Netflix, boy.
I'll tell you what you know. I did talk about streamers, certainly
when it came to Amazon. You know, Amazon Prime just didn't. As
we've talked about Amazon Prime members you get included Amazon Prime, which is a
video or Prime Video is what they call it. But you may have Netflix
too. They are the world's leader. They are the leader when I go.
They were first to market. They just announced they're Wall Street subscriber and
revenue. They had another huge quarter. They corn know how they did this.
They added another eight million global subscribers. I thought every person in the
world already had it, but apparently not. Eight million, almost doubled what
Wall Street predicted. They said memberships to its new advertisers supported tier that grew
thirty four percent. It's now it's good news are bad news. I just
hope they don't raise the price on some of this stuff. But that's a
big one too. And it's this is the neat stuff that I get to
cover. It is cars, it is trucks. That is the world news,
and it is also the sad news. As we almost wind this down,
and I'll tell you one more time, we do remember the people we
lost, and it's just it's you kind of are scared of waking up and
like, oh my goodness, who did we lose today? Who did we
lose this morning? As we continue to me you know, memorialize so many
people that we adored watching on TV, watching their movies, listening to their
comedy albums, Bob Newhart, but also waking up locally and reading their columns
in the newspaper in that case, which was ken Hoffman, a good friend
of mine. So many anadhotos stories that it would take more than two hours
of my radio show here. But when and if the history of Houston is
written about, there are some icons here from you know, maybe there's some
politicians, and there's a lot of sports stars, but everybody from in the
media. Maybe it's Maxim Messenger used to do a society column in the Houston
Chronicle. Certainly there's ken Hoffman. There are business icons from Mattress Mac and
it could go on and on. But to ken Hoffin certainly should have been
the one who wrote the history of Houston, because you know what, I
would have read it because it wouldn't have been long, and it wouldn't have
been born, and it would have been a little zinger here and there,
and it just really would have captured the essence of this great city like ken
has done so long. So at that I am going to slowly wand myself
and my show down Callum Reid, who is on the other side of the
glass who's pushing the buttons. Thank you as always for keeping us on the
ear. He will in about what five minutes, my brother, he is
going to put this entire two hour show on our podcast. So if you
missed it you want to hear it again, you can go to iHeartRadio.
Download it's an app. Download the podcast, look for KPRC, look for
Michael Garfield, and you can hear it at your pleasure wherever you are around
the world. But on behalf of all our good friends and our listeners who
have done this with me here for twenty two plus years. I do thank
you people. It is hot, it is nasty. I hope you get
your power back. You stay cool, and we will see you next week.
It is the High Tech textan show. My name is Garfin. Right
now, this show is over.