That rumor mill’s a-churning. Image credit: Wikimedia Commons

This week, Ray, Tom and Sean delve into rumors about the next iPhone as well as Twitter’s famous 140-character limit. Plus, the latest about the Oculus Rift, and the story of a man who found more than he bargained for in his Amazon cart.

By the way, we don’t just have a subreddit page for the fame and the glory. We have it because we want to know what you want us to talk about! We know you’re purusing the tech news all week. Go to our subreddit page, reddit.com/r/deemable, and submit a story, and vote other stories up or down.

And make sure to subscribe to the show and leave a review on iTunes and on Stitcher. The more subscribers we have and reviews we get, the more people will find our show.

If you have a response or comment for the show, give us a call and leave us a voicemail, 1-888-972-9868 or you can send us an email to feedback at deemable dot com.

The Deemable Tech Podcast is brought to you by A Small Orange, Homegrown Hosting. A refreshingly different approach to web hosting. On the web at asmallorange.com.

THE RUN DOWN

Apple planning to remove headphone jack on the iPhone 7

The rumor mill about the next iPhone is churning and this time it has come up with a doozy. In order to get the next version of the iPhone even slimmer, Apple is supposedly going to ditch the headphone jack.

These rumors actually started swirling about a month ago, but now Fast Company has a new source which has confirmed them, along with adding new details: that the replacement will be a lightning jack with a headphone adaptor, or completely wireless EarPods.

Fast Company also says that the next iPhone will employ a new noise-cancelling technology to improve sound quality.

Oculus Rift announces release date, final price

The product that arguably has launched the current wave of excitement about virtual-reality-tech has finally gotten a price, and a date on which you will be able to buy it. That product, of course, is the Oculus Rift. The date? Sometime in March, assuming you pre-ordered, oh, last week. The price? $599.

According to Ars Technica, that scores you a cutting-edge VR headset, a head-tracking camera, an Xbox One controller, an Oculus remote, cables, a carrying case, and two games. That sounds pretty good, but note that it doesn’t include the beefy high-end PC you’ll need to plug your headset into.

If all you’ve got at home right now is Sean Birch’s Chromebook, expect to drop $1,500 to gain access to a high resolution universe of virtual wonder.

After two dev kits, which were priced at $300 and $350 respectively, and Oculus founder Palmer Lucky stating in an interview in October that the Rift would cost “more than $350,” many eager fans are experiencing sticker shock. They have taken to the internets to express their anger. Outrage was so great that Palmer Lucky popped up on reddit to apologize for misleading people. That said, if you pre-order the Rift right now, you’ll be lucky to get it by April, so clearly the high price has not been enough to discourage everyone.

Netflix gives customers socks for the holidays

You probably remember the Netflix-and-chill button that Netflix recently released design specs for so DIY enthusiasts could build their own. Well the company has topped themselves with their latest DIY brainstorm – Netflix socks.

If you regularly binge watch so much that you fall asleep, Netflix socks are for you. These socks detect when you’ve fallen asleep and send a pause signal to Netflix, so you won’t miss a moment of Jessica Jones! You can check them out at makeit.netflix.com. There are even multiple snazzy templates for great Netflix-themed patterns!

Just to be clear, you can’t buy these – you have to make them! So get out your darning needles and soldering iron and get to work! If any Deemable Tech listeners are planning on building this or the Netflix button, we’d love to see your work!

Lenovo ditching the Motorola brand name, but keeping “Moto”

Motorola was once a powerhouse in mobile phones, but it has been through a lot of changes lately. First it was purchased by Google, which launched the Moto X line of phones, and then it was sold to Lenovo.

In an interview with Cnet this month while at CES, Lenovo announced that it would begin phasing out the “Motorola” branding on its phones and replacing it with Lenovo branding. Lenovo will, however, be keeping the “Moto” name and the iconic “batwing” logo. So you can still say, “Hello, Moto.” But really, it is goodbye to Motorola as we know it.

Twitter to break the 140 character limit, probably for real this time

There are always endless rumors swirling that Twitter is about to increase its famous 140 character limit. And actually right now it looks like those rumors have some substance.

According to re/code, sources within the company say that tweets will still initially appear in your Twitter feed as 140 characters, but will then feature some kind of call to action which allows them to be expanded, showing up to 10,000 characters of text. This would be a pretty significant change for a company that has built its reputation on very brief messages. The same rumors also say that Twitter is experimenting with changing its reverse chronological timeline, another core feature from early days.

Since Twitter went public in 2013 it has struggled to impress investors with steady growth. CEO Jack Dorsey and other company heads are definitely looking at radical changes to keep the social media giant relevant.

IE is Dead, Long Live Edge… and IE

Microsoft finally buried Internet Explorers 8, 9 and 10. If you have one of them installed on your computer it will still work, but just like when Microsoft pulled the plug on Windows XP back in 2013, you won’t receive any security updates anymore.

Speaking of operating systems, Windows killed another operating system this week. No, it wasn’t Vista, it was Windows 8! If you’re running Windows 8, you need to upgrade to 8.1 or 10, because you will no longer get bug fixes or security updates. Why did Microsoft skip Vista? Who knows, but our guess is that there is a very small user base running 8 compared to Vista. But the reaper is coming for Vista too. Vista will swim with the fishes in April 2017.

Customer finds unexpected dildo in his shopping cart after poor customer service experience at Amazon.de

Ars Technica reported on an unusual customer service snafu last week. Not that customer service screw ups are unusual, but this one came from Amazon, typically known for their top notch customer service.

An IT contractor living in Ireland had ordered a textbook from Amazon.de, the Germany-based version of the site. Unfortunately he was shipped the wrong edition. After spending a great deal of time on the phone with a customer service rep, he was informed that the company did not have the right edition and they would only be able to credit him his money back.

Upset, the contractor left a negative review on a customer satisfaction survey.

A few days later he was browsing the site at work and noticed that there was something in his shopping basket. Not having added anything to the cart, he clicked to see what it was. At this point he discovered that a dildo known as “The Hulk” had been added to his basket.

Since the contractor was at his job and was being observed by coworkers, including a woman, he was not pleased by this. He reports that he was able to get in touch with an executive at Amazon.de and had been credited with 100 euros for the incident. The company hinted that the dildo had been added to the contractor’s basket by the customer service rep, but would not say if any steps had been taken to discipline the rep.

Image credit: Glade_Creek_Grist_Mill.jpg: Gabor Eszes (UED77)derivative work: WVhybrid at en.wikipedia (Glade_Creek_Grist_Mill.jpg) [GFDL or CC-BY-SA-3.0], via Wikimedia Commons

Anyone who’s ever owned an iPod knows that stainless steel scratches.

This week, Google launched a Mobile Virtual Network Operator (MVNO). The new phone service uses Sprint, T0Mobile and Wi-Fi, but it only has one phone, the Nexus 6. There’s a few Apple Watch ‘scandals’ ramping up: tattoo-gate, scratch-gate and tap-gate. Microsoft has a new “edge”ier web browser, a man shoots up his Dell and the robots are coming to steal your car.

If you haven?t subscribed to Deemable Tech yet, get on it! Subscribe to Deemable Tech in iTunes, on Stitcheror subscribe to the show in another podcast reader. Make sure to leave a review on iTunes and Stitcher. The more reviews posted, the higher Deemable Tech will be listed, and the more listeners will see the show.

And make sure to share Deemable Tech on the forums, Facebook, Twitter and all over the interwebs.

Thank you to our Redditors who have been helping us decide what stories we talk about on the show. Go to our subreddit page and submit a story, and vote other stories up or down. Deemable.com/reddit will take you there.

The Deemable Tech Podcast is brought to you by A Small Orange, Homegrown Hosting. A refreshingly different approach to web hosting. On the web at asmallorange.com.

THIS WEEK’S RUN DOWN

You can now embed playable MS-DOS games inside tweets

Earlier this year, the Internet Archive added roughly 2,400 MS-DOS games to their digital archive that are playable through your web browser on their site, Archive.org. But if you?re too scared to leave Twitter to check this out, never fear. The folks at Wired discovered this week that you can embed the games inside of tweets and play them right from those tweets.

So, you can now get your Oregon Trail, Sim City or Wolfenstein 3D fix from Twitter. Or, you can try out other classic games like the adaptation of the 1991 Hulk Hogan cinematic masterpiece Suburban Commando (just kidding, you should never do that).

Google announces cellular data network, which is actually two networks.

Google has officially announced its long-rumored cellular data network: its name is ProjectFi. As anticipated it is an MVNO network, which means that Google is ?renting? time on someone else?s network like many other small cellular companies. The differences is that Google is renting not from one other network, but two: Sprint & T-mobile, as well as WiFi. When you are on a ProjectFi connection your phone will seamlessly switch to whichever one of those networks is strongest. ProjectFi?s offers a very straightforward billing structure which will be appealing to some. It also will let you ?bank? unused minutes each month. And it offers promises of more innovations to come. The catch? Right now it is only offered for a single phone: the Nexus 6, and there is no LTE high speed service.

Robot car movers

The robots are coming to steal your car, or just move it out of the way. Gizmodo shared a story that researchers in Europe have created AVERT, the Autonomous Vehicle Emergency Recovery Tool. It is a system of robots that look like something out of Battle Bots. They are flat pieces of steel with rotors on the ends of them. Eight of them work together to pick up your cars tires and wheel it away. They only lift the car about an inch off the ground, but that’s all they need to move it out of the way. The idea is that the robots can easily move a car parked in a tight spot if there is a bomb in a nearby car. They could also be used to move an illegally parked car or a car that is blocking emergency services. Or, when the robots become sentient, they will likely start a car robbing career.

Man puts 8 bullets in his Dell desktop, tells police it was worth the ticket.

Police say that at 7 PM on a Monday, Lucas Hinch, the owner of a homeopathic herb store in Colorado Springs, Colorado, took his Dell XPS 410 out into an alley behind the store and unloaded eight bullets into it with a 9mm pistol. Hinch was ticketed for discharging a gun within city limits.

Lynch told the Los Angeles Times, which interviewed him, that the machine kept giving him the blue screen of death and that he had ?had enough.? He said that the shooting was ?definitely premeditated? and that he had no regrets. He reportedly told officers he did not know he was breaking the law in discharging his weapon.

Microsoft unveils Edge browser

During the opening keynote of their Microsoft Build developers conference this week, Microsoft unveiled the successor to their Internet Explorer browser (which they recently announced was ending).

The new browser, now called Edge (formerly Project Spartan), is said to be faster and more modern and will be a universal app across all Windows devices. Features will include, among others, extensions like you find for Chrome and Firefox, integration of Microsoft?s Cortana virtual assistant to help you search for things, reading mode (which removes everything from a page except for the text), and an annotation tool (which lets you draw on a webpage, take a picture of it and share that picture).

The new browser will not be in the initial release of Windows 10 this year, but will be included in a later update. Windows 10 will be shipped with Internet Explorer 11 for legacy compatibility, so you will have one last chance to use everyone?s favorite browser before it goes softly into that good night.

Tired of remember your passwords? Try swallowing them instead?

In a recent interview with The Wall Street Journal, Paypal?s global head of developer advocacy, Jonathan Leblanc, said that passwords might soon be available as ?embeddable, injectable and ingestible devices.? Mr. Leblanc said that in the near future thin silicon chips might be embedded under our skin or capsules might detect glucose levels to verify that someone is who they say they are.

The Wall Street Journal notes, “Mr. Leblanc admits that there’s still a ways to go before cultural norms catch up with ingestible and injectable ID devices.”

Google files patent for laptop with no spacebar.

Google already kicked the CAPS-LOCK key to the curb with its Chromebooks and now it appears it may be preparing to do the same thing to the spacebar. In a patent filed this week the company outlines a design where the spacebar is replaced by an extended trackpad. Sensors would determine whether the user wants the top of the trackpad to be treated as a spacebar or a mouse. Google told Quartz, who broke the story, that some patents get turned into products and some don?t, so only time will tell whether we will see a spacebar-free Chromebook.

Apple Watch – Tattoo-gate

Reports are coming in on Twitter and Reddit that people with tattoos on their wrists may have difficulty using their new Apple watches. iMore.com looked into it and confirmed the reports. The heart sensor detects pulse by flashing an LED light on your skin and senses the reflection. The problem is when you have a tattoo the reflection is distorted by the ink. Your mileage may vary, but for some folks it is really annoying. The Apple Watch uses the heart sensor to detect if you are wearing the watch, so when it doesn’t sense your heart rate, it forces you to re-enter your pin number.

Apple Watch – Scratch-gate

If you don’t like scratches, you probably shouldn’t get the stainless steel Apple watch. A lot of folks are reporting on social media that their steel Apple watches are already scratched up. 9to5Mac.com has an easy fix. Just buff it, like every other stainless steel watch in existence. Or, get the aluminum model, which is actually harder than the steel version.

Apple Watch – Tap-gate

Now for the first, actual, real problem with the Apple watch. According to the Wall Street Journal, Apple has found a major defect in the taptic engine in the watches. The taptic engine is the feature that causes the watch to vibrate or tap the wearer. It was a pretty groundbreaking feature because it models sounds so a tweet “feels” like a tweet, and a tap feels like a tap. Two companies built the taptic engines, but one of the suppliers has produced faulty engines. The Verge says that Daring Fireball’s John Gruber received an Apple Watch that had a taptic engine that didn’t work.

OUTRO

If you have a suggestion, or just have a comment for the show. Give us a call and leave us a voicemail, 1-888-972-9868 or you can send us an email to feedback@deemable.com.

And, don’t forget to help us to decide what stories we talk about on the show, go to our subreddit page and submit a story, and vote other stories up or down. deemable.com/reddit will take you there

I’m Ray Hollister, I’m Tom Braun, I’m Sean Birch and this is Deemable Tech. Thanks for listening.

This week the guys are elated about the death of Internet Explorer, the low, low price of free to upgrade to Windows 10, (even if you never paid for Windows 7 or 8) and Mario, Zelda and the gang are finally coming to mobile phones, but not the way you want them to.

If you haven’t subscribed to Deemable Tech yet, get on it! Subscribe to Deemable Tech in iTunes, on Stitcher or subscribe to the show in another podcast reader. Make sure to leave us a review in iTunes and Stitcher. The more reviews we have the higher we’ll be listed, and the more listeners will see our show.

And make sure to share us on the forums, Facebook, Twitter and all over the interwebs.

Thank you to our Redditors who have been helping us decide what stories we talk about on the show. Go to our subreddit page and submit a story, and vote other stories up or down. Deemable.com/reddit will take you there.

This Week’s Run Down

Windows 10 is free for everybody!

So, you may have heard of the latest version of Windows that Microsoft is working on releasing later this summer. If you haven’t, it’s called Windows 10. If you’re wondering why it’s called Windows 10 instead of… you know… Windows 9, it’s because of a little coding shortcut where programmers referred to Windows 95 and Windows 98 as – you guessed it – “Windows 9.”

Well, it turns out that Windows 10 is going to be FREE for everyone, well almost everyone.

Terry Myerson, Microsoft’s Windows chief to Reuters “We are upgrading all qualified PCs, genuine and non-genuine, to Windows 10”

So that means, as long as you have a computer running Windows 7 or Window 8 or 8.1 you can install 10 on your computer, at no charge, even if you stole the version that’s on your computer right now.

The Death of Internet Explorer

Microsoft confirmed this week that Internet Explorer will not be the primary web browser in Windows 10. Yes, the venerable Internet Explorer, which has been a part of Windows since Windows 95, is being put out to pasture. It will still ship with the next version of Microsoft’s operating system for backwards compatibility reasons, but a new browser with the codename Project Spartan will be Microsoft’s flagship browser. Project Spartan’s real name has not been released yet but Microsoft says that it will not use the Internet Explorer branding.

Nintendo to develop mobile games

After years of speculation, Nintendo is moving into the mobile game market. They announced this week that they have partnered with Japanese mobile game giant DeNA to “develop and operate new game apps based on Nintendo’s intellectual property, including its iconic game characters, for smart devices.”

They were quick to point out that their primary focus will still be their game consoles like the Wii U and 3DS, and that these new mobile apps are intended to complement, not replace, those systems. In the same announcement, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata said that a new console codenamed NX is development.

Unfortunately for those of us hoping this means we’ll be able to play classic Mario or Zelda games on our devices, Iwata also said that Nintendo’s plans do not include direct ports of console games. He cited differences between dedicated controllers and touchscreens as the reason.

—-

If you have a comment, contact us at feedback at deemable.com or leave us a voicemail at 1-888-972-9868.

Help us decide what stories we talk about on the show, go to our subreddit page and submit a story. Or vote other stories up or down. reddit.com/r/Deemable

Photo Credit: Internet Explorer, a web developers menace by Jorgen Kesseler is used under CC BY-SA 2.0.

Q: Is there any way to completely block pop-up ads while running Chrome or Internet Explorer? I have turned on the built-in pop-up blocker on both, but that doesn’t stop them on many of the sites I visit. What is up with that? I have to wonder what the point of blocking pop-ups is when so many get through anyway, slowing down the page loading to the point that it reminds me of being on dial-up.

A: To be honest, Bill, it’s been so long since we have dealt with a pop-up that we had forgotten Chrome and Internet Explorer even had settings to block them. To turn on the pop-up blocker in Chrome, click the button at the top right of the screen that has three horizontal lines. Then click on “Settings,” and search for “pop-ups” in the search box. In Internet Explorer, click on “Tools” and then go to “Internet Options.” There you can find the setting under the “Privacy” tab. Recent versions of Firefox have this option too, and you can find it under the Firefox settings.

Ah, the good ole days! Fortunately pop-up ads are much fewer and farther between now, but how do you make them go away completely?
Image credit: Minesweeper / Wikipedia

But as you say, Bill, these settings don’t always work. Why is that? Well, you have to understand that pop-up blocking is like an arms race. Every time there’s some new advance in pop-up blocker technology, the people making the pop-up ads just get smarter.

To make things even more complicated, browser-makers can’t simply ban all pop-ups. There are lots of legitimate uses for pop-ups – in fact, half of the websites on the Internet would stop working without them.

Now, the other way to deal with pop-up ads is with what Firefox calls “extensions”. Extensions are small programs you can download which add features to your browser, including more effective pop-up blocking. Extensions also work for Chrome and Internet Explorer, where they’re known as “plug-ins” and “add-ons”, respectively.

One of the most popular ones is Ad Block Plus, which is available for both Firefox and Chrome. It’s an industrial strength pop-up killer, and we’ve found it effectively blocks most pop-ups. Another good plug-in we’ve found for Chrome is called Better Pop-Up Blocker. You can find either one of these by just searching for it in Google. Try keywords like “Chrome pop-up blocker”, and you should get some very helpful results.

Your options are more limited on Internet Explorer, but there is an add-on called Smart Pop-up Blocker that will block most pop-ups. It’s not 100%, but it’s the best that we could find.

Regardless of what your favorite browser is, if you’re getting fed-up with annoying ads on the websites you frequent, there are tools out there that can make your web-browsing experience a little smoother.

Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, it’s time for a friendly little PSA about pop-up blocking. Many of your favorite free websites are ad-supported, so when you visit one of those sites and you’ve got a pop-up blocker running, you may avoid seeing that annoying pop-up ad but you’ve also cost that site some ad revenue. So be sure to deploy your pop-up blocker judiciously.

This is such a big issue that the ever-popular Ad Block Plus actually has a setting called “allow non-intrusive advertising” which is on by default. As the name suggest, this allows many of the less annoying ads through. But keep in mind that the ones that it does block – the really annoying ones – may be real money makers for small, independent websites. Ad Block Plus gives you the option to allow pop-ups for certain websites to remedy this. Other pop-up blockers should, at minimum, allow you to turn them on and off.

Please pop-up block responsibly! Ads may be annoying, but they help keep the web free.

On this episode of Deemable Tech, Ray and Tom finally get a question they’re not qualified to answer: How do you make a podcast?! Sound ridiculous? Most podcasts are not recorded in an amazing studio like WJCT’s, and most podcasts do not have incredible producers like Sean Birch. In other words, Ray and Tom have no credible experience in producing a real podcast! So, Ray invited DJ Shott, host of The Green Light Show, a comedy podcast recorded in Jacksonville, to come to the studio to talk about what it’s like to really produce a podcast. A word of warning, The Green Light Show is a very explicit comedy podcast that holds nothing back. So, if you get offended at the Comedy Zone, The Green Light Show probably isn’t for you. But if you like comedy that gets really raunchy, check out The Green Light Show, and subscribe to The Green Light Show in iTunes. However, no need for a warning about this episode. Ray, Tom and DJ were perfect gentlemen, and refrained from any potty language during the show.

After they talked about podcasting, Ray and Tom asked DJ about his Nike+ FuelBand and got his take on it.

After the break, Ray and Tom recapped what DJ talked about. Ray mentioned a website where you can easily create a podcast, but he couldn’t remember the name of the site. The site is BuzzSprout. If you aren’t tech savvy but you want to start a podcast, BuzzSprout is a great resource. You can try it out for free to find out if you like the service, and it’s free forever. If you decide to upgrade, paid plans start at only $12 per month.

Also, Ray and Tom answered questions about printing contacts from Outlook, email file attachments that cause the Internet to disconnect, and how to block pop-ups on Internet Explorer and Chrome.

Don’t forget, we’re still in the middle of the $50 Amazon Gift Card giveaway! If Deemable Tech gets at least 500 subscribers on iTunes and at least 200 subscribers on YouTube by the end of August, we are going to give away an Amazon Gift Card worth $50!

To be eligible to win the $50 Amazon Gift Card, you need to subscribe to us on YouTube and iTunes, like us on Facebook and follow us on Twitter. Then, send us an email at giftcard@deemable.com. In that email, include your Facebook name, Twitter and YouTube username. We’ll pick one eligible email at random and we’ll announce it on the show. The links to all of our social network profiles are in the top right corner of the website under the heading, Follow Deemable Tech.

Also, the Deemable Tech app is now available for iPhone, iPod touch and iPad in the App Store and for Android phones and tablets in the Google Play store. You can find a link to the app simply by visiting Deemable.com on your mobile device.

One last thing! Don’t forget to vote for Ray and Tom in Folio Weekly’s Best of Jax for Hottest Local Celebrity. Go to http://folioweekly.com/bestofjax to enter your vote!

#45 Deemable Tech and The Podsters

DRAFT TRANSCRIPT

RAY: From WJCT studios in Jacksonville, Florida, I’m Ray Hollister,

TOM: I’m Tom Braun,

RAY: and this is Deemable Tech, tech help worth listening to.

RAY: This week’s episode of the Deemable Tech podcast is brought to you by A Small Orange, Homegrown Hosting. A refreshingly different approach to web hosting. On the web at a small orange dot com.

And, by audible.com – Deemable Tech listeners can get a FREE audiobook download at audibletrial.com/Deemable Over 100,000 titles to choose from for your iPhone, Android, Kindle or mp3 player.

TOM: Got a question about your computer, smart phone, tablet or the Internet? Give us a call us at One Eight Eight Eight, Nine Seven Two, Nine Eight Six Eight, or send us an email at questions@deemable.com.

RAY: So, if you listened to last week’s episode, you know that we are in the middle of a contest. If we reach 200 subscribers on YouTube and 500 subscribers on iTunes we are going to give away a $50 Amazon Gift Card. Here’s what you have to do to be eligible. First, Subscribe to us on YouTube and iTunes. Then, like us on Facebook, and follow us on Twitter.

Then, send us an email to giftcard@deemable.com. In that email, tell us your Facebook name, Twitter and YouTube username.  We’ll pick one eligible email at random and we’ll announce it

To make it easy for you, the links to our Facebook, YouTube, iTunes and Twitter accounts are all available at the top-right of our website under the heading, “Follow Deemable Tech”

So, go subscribe, like and follow us, and get your emails in so you can win that $50 gift card.

TOM: Hey Ray, I just wanted to tell you that you look great tonight.

RAY: Thanks Tom, you don’t look too bad yourself.

TOM: Ray, we’ve often been complimented that we really have faces for radio. And to commemorate that, we’ve entered ourselves into Folio Weekly’s yearly Best of Jax contest under the Hottest Local Celebrity category. Because, listeners, we know that when you think of Hot Local Celebrities you think of Ray and Tom.

RAY: folioweekly.com/bestofjax *blah blah blah*

TOM: Alright, Ray, should we answer some listeners questions.

RAY: I think we should.

TOM: OK, let’s take a look at Carlos’ question.

TOM: Carlos writes:

Hey Ray and Tom,

I’d really like to start a podcast, but I have no idea where to begin. Would I have to buy studio time? Don’t some people podcast out of their house? What kind of equipment would I need to do it that way? Thanks, love your show! Carlos

RAY: You know what Tom? I think we have found a question that we are not qualified to answer.

TOM: Why is that Ray? We do a podcast almost every week.

RAY: Well, Deemable Tech is really not like most podcasts. Most podcasts aren’t recorded at radio stations. So, we’ve invited somebody who has experience doing a podcast the real way.

Joining us in the studio we have DJ Shott, the host of the Green Light Show.

• Describe your show to us. What is your podcast about?
• Why did you want to start a podcast?
• How did you get started podcasting?
• Where do you record and stream your show from?
• What kind of equipment do you use? Mics, soundboards, headsets, computers, Internet connection…
• What software do you use? Ustream, Audacity, Garageband, WordPress, etc.
• How long does it take you to prepare for the show? How long does it take you after the show is over?
• What have you done to grow your audience?
• Is the show making any money?
• Where do you see your show going from here?
• What has been the most rewarding thing about producing a podcast?
• What has been the most challenging thing about producing a podcast?
• Was there ever a time when you just felt like giving up? Why?
• If people dare, where can folks find your show? (EXPLICIT content!)
  • http://Greenlightshow.com/
  • http://Facebook.com/greenlightshow
  • http://Twitter.com/greenlightshow
  • http://greenlightshow.com/itunes

Next question:

Marvin writes, I have an HP computer  with Windows XP.

I have been trying to print my contact list alphabetically from Outlook. The left half of the page prints out, but the  right half is hidden and will not print. It is laborious to have to  click on an individual’s name to get the whole address, etc.

This is frustrating, because I want to print out a hard copy to keep by my desk so I do not want to have to have the computer turned on.

Any ideas? Thanks.

TOM: Hi Marvin, thanks for the question.

The first thing I would do is check your printer settings when you are printing. Just before you click the print button that prints the actual page you should see the screen where you select what printer you want to print with. While you’re on this screen you can make changes to the print settings.

What this screen looks like and what options it gives you depend on a lot of different factors: what operating system you’re running, what kind of printer you have, what program you’re launching from, etc. There should be a button on this screen for printer preferences or advanced settings. Click that, and then look for an option that says something like ?Fit to page? or ?Fit to paper size? or ?Shrink to fit?. Most printers have a setting like this which will automatically resize a page that is too big to fit on the paper. You may have to click a different tab to find it. Just look around, you won’t hurt anything!

Once you find ?Fit to page?, select it. Then click the OK button to get back to the print screen. Now go ahead and print. Hopefully the right side of the page is no longer cut off!

RAY: Cool. So, that solves the problem.

TOM: Wait, there’s one more thing Marvin may need to know about and it’s kind of a doozy. If he has Outlook 2003, it actually prints using Internet Explorer. So he needs to go into an entirely different program to change his settings!

RAY: Wow, that’s convenient.

TOM: Yeah. So Marvin, if you have Outlook 2003, open up Internet Explorer, go to Internet Explorer, then select ?Page Setup? from the File menu. There you should find the Shrink to fit option. Check it, and boom. Happy printing!

Richard writes, When I try to attach an attachment to an email, Internet Explorer looses connection to the Internet. I am using Windows 7 with latest patches applied by Window’s Update and IE 10. This email attachment problem happens on my Gmail and a friend’s yahoo mail.

TOM: Thanks for letting us know what versions of Windows and Internet Explorer you are using, Richard.

Based on what you’re describing, my first guess is that your copy of Internet Explorer has an add-on that is being a little too helpful. Possibly you have a security or anti-virus add-on such as Norton that’s malfunctioning and interfering with uploading files. To be on the safe side, start by disabling all the add-ons in Internet Explorer.

You can do this by clicking on the settings menu and then going to Manage Add Ons and disabling them one by one. But if you have a lot of them it’s quicker to click on the Tools menu and then under ?Toolbars’ you should see an option that says ?Disable Add Ons’. Click on that to bring up the dialogue box that will allow you to do that.

Once you’ve done that you will need to reboot your computer. When it comes back up, open up Internet Explorer and see if you are able to add attachments in Gmail now. If you are, you can start enabling add ons one by one through the manage add-on menu until you figure out which one was causing the problem. Or just leave them all off.

Again, if you have something like Norton Anti-virus it’s a good bet that it’s add ons are causing the problem.

If this doesn’t resolve your problem, well… try a different browser? You know, Chrome is looking very nice this time of year…

Bill writes, Question: I just read your response to Christine’s question about browsers in April, and have a follow-up question. Is there any way to completely block pop-up ads while running Chrome or IE? Or is Firefox’s add-in the only solution? On both Chrome and IE, I have adjusted the settings to block pop-ups but that doesn’t stop them on many sites I visit. I realize that those annoying ads are paying for these otherwise free websites, but I have to wonder what’s the point of blocking pop-ups when so many get through anyway, slowing down the page loading to the point that it reminds me of being on dial-up.

Thanks!

TOM: Excellent question, Bill. You turn on the pop-up blocker and you still get pop ups! What’s up with that?

The thing you have to understand is that pop-up blocking is an arms race. Just like you can’t tell your computer to block all viruses, you can’t really tell it to block all pop-ups. Every time there’s some new advance in pop-up blocker technology, the people making the pop up ads just get smarter.

RAY: To make things even harder on the makers of pop up blockers, you can’t just block all pop ups everywhere. there are lots of legitimate pop ups people want to see. Blocking all pop ups would make too many sites non-functional.

So the ?block pop ups’ options in Internet Explorer and Chrome walk a fine line.

TOM: If you’re really serious about blocking pop-ups in Internet Explorer or Chrome you need to download an add-in or extension that does so, much like you did for Firefox. On Chrome, check out Adblock Plus or Better Pop-up Blocker.

Your options are more limited on Internet Explorer, but there’s an add on called Smart Pop-up Blocker that will block most pop-ups. It’s no 100%, but it’s the best we could find.

RAY: Just a friendly little PSA about pop-up blocking: many free websites are ad supported. When you visit your favorite site and you’ve got a pop-up blocker running, you may have avoided seeing that annoying pop-up ad but you’ve also cost that site some ad revenue. So be sure to deploy your pop-up blocker judiciously. Most pop-up blockers give you the ability to allow pop-ups for certain sites. Be sure to allow them for sites you want to support!

OUTRO

Thanks for all your questions, and keep them coming. Call us at our toll-free number, 1-888-972-9868 or you can send us an email at questions@deemable.com. Also, subscribe to the show! Search for Deemable Tech on iTunes or point your favorite podcast app to dmbl.co/pod.

Our producer is Sean Birch. Thanks to Robert Snyder for Video Production Assistance. I’m Ray Hollister, I’m Tom Braun, and this is Deemable Tech. Thanks for listening. Have a great week.

Q: I used to have a link to my email on my desktop, but somehow it got deleted. Now I search for my email on MSN. My son says I’m doing things the long way. To be honest I don’t know much about the web and I get a little bit overwhelmed every time I open Internet Explorer. Any advice?

A: Deep breaths, Kevin! It’s going to be okay. We’re here to help.

The good news is that you are definitely not alone here. We talk to people all the time who can’t figure out how to get from Point A to Point B on their browser. When you open Internet Explorer you may see up to three different fields where you can type things. You know you want to go to a specific website, but where do you type it in?

What you want to do is type the URL into the address bar. URL stands for “Uniform Resource Locator,” which is just the formal name for a web address. For example, www.google.com and deemable.com are both URLs. Either way, they usually look like “www.nameofthewebsite.com”.

Now here’s a secret: 99% of the time you can leave off the “www”. You don’t have to type “www.google.com”, you can just type “google.com” and your browser will figure out the rest.

The place you want to type it is not the search bar of the website that is your home page. That will search for any web page that references the name of the website. Granted, the web page itself will probably be the first search result, but you’re adding an extra step. You want to type the web address, or URL, into the address bar, which is above the web page. You can identify it because it will have the address of the current page, usually prefixed by “http://”/ or “https://”/ (incidentally, you don’t have to type “http://”/ either, because your browser will fill that in as well).

Telling the difference between a search box and your address bar can sometimes be a challenge, especially if you’re new to surfing the Internet.

There are a couple of things to be aware of. First, you may or may not have another field at the top of your browser that is for searching. Typing the web address into that field is just the same as if you went to Yahoo or Google or Bing and searched for the web address there. It’s for searching, not for navigating directly to a website.

The other thing to be aware of is that in newer browsers the address field can also do web searches. So if you type “facebook.com” you will be taken directly to Facebook, but if you type in “books of faces” it will search for “books of faces” on your preferred search engine.

So, Kevin, try typing the URL for your email site into the address bar and hitting enter. Once you’re there, don’t forget that you can bookmark websites that you use frequently. Look for a star icon up at the top of your browser and click that. That will add your email to a list of favorite websites. Once you do that, you won’t have to type anything – your email will always be just a click away.

What Internet browser do you use? There are dozens to choose from, and many offer unique features. So which one is best for you? Ray Hollister and Tom Braun, the hosts of Deemable Tech, have the answer on this week’s Ask Deemable Tech.

RAY: Hi, I’m Ray Hollister,

TOM: I’m Tom Braun,

RAY: and we’re the hosts of Deemable Tech. On the show, we answer your questions about computers, tablets, mobile phones and the Internet, like this question:

TOM: Christine asks, I have been having trouble getting on the Internet lately because of pop-up error messages. My friend Jeff, who usually fixes my computer, says the problem is my ‘browser’ and keeps trying to get me to use something called ‘Firefox’. I’m used to the normal way I get online. Do I really need to change?

RAY: It would be nice if the Internet worked and looked the same for everybody, Christine!

TOM: But that would be too easy! It’s a little more complicated than that.

Any program you use to view web pages is called a ‘browser’. The browser that comes pre-installed on Windows is Internet Explorer, or IE for short. It’s the most popular browser in the world. But, there’s a catch.

RAY: Yep. Different versions of Windows, like Windows XP, Vista or Windows 8, come with different versions of IE. For instance, if you still have Windows XP then you may be running the version of IE that came with it, version 6.

TOM: But Internet Explorer is now on version 10! So IE 6 is way out of date.

RAY: If you have an old version of IE, some web pages may look wrong or not load correctly. You may see bugs or weird pop-ups like you described, Christine. You are also in danger from all kinds of malware and online attacks through loopholes that were fixed in later versions.

TOM: To find out what version you have you need to bring up the ‘About Internet Explorer’ screen. Depending on what version you are running, that will be under the Help menu, or under the menu that comes up when you click the little gear icon. They’re both at the top of the screen.

Then you should install the latest version available for your version of Windows. On Windows XP you can get up to Version 8, and for newer versions of Windows you can get version 10. Having the latest version of IE will likely fix many of the problems you are having. Plus, it’s just safer.

RAY: Okay Tom, but Christine said her her friend Jeff is trying to get her to switch to Firefox? Why should she change to Firefox?

TOM: Well there are lots of different web browsers besides Internet Explorer. There’s Firefox, Chrome and Opera. Those are just some of the bigger ones. There are literally dozens out there.

Other browsers offer a lot of different features and are often faster, so techies who want more control over their internet experience almost always use something else.

For instance, with Firefox you can download ‘add-ons’ for the browser, that do cool things like block ads, let you download YouTube videos to your computer, display the weather at the top of the screen and more.

RAY: Google’s Chrome browser is quickly gaining popularity. Chrome is known for being really fast, which is nice. But its killer feature, is that you can synchronize all your copies of Chrome on any computer, tablet or phone. Any changes you make to one copy are automatically made to the other copies. You can also access web pages that you had open on other machines.

TOM: I love that feature. It’s so nice to be able to open a web page at work that I had opened earlier on my computer at home.

It’s also worth mentioning that most browsers other than IE conform more closely to the standards for displaying web pages, so web sites may display better on Firefox, Chrome or Safari.

RAY: Unless you’re visiting a lot of Microsoft sites: often those sites won’t work correctly on anything but Internet Explorer.

TOM: But the good news is that you can have two browsers at once, and switch back and forth between them anytime you like. So there’s no harm in downloading Firefox and giving it a try. It will get your friend Jeff off your back, and hey, you might even like it!

RAY: To hear more answers to questions like this one, listen to our show at Deemable dot com, that’s D-E E-M A-B-L-E dot com. There you can listen to all of our previous episodes and subscribe to our podcast.

TOM: If you have a question for Deemable Tech give us a call us at One Eight Eight Eight, Nine Seven Two, Nine Eight Six Eight, or you can send us an email at questions at deemable dot com.

RAY: For Deemable Tech, I’m Ray Hollister,

TOM: And I’m Tom Braun.

If you heard today’s Deemable Tech segment during Morning Edition, you know that you need to disable Java on your web browser, now! If you didn’t hear today’s Deemable Tech segment, you should listen to it, and well, you read the last sentence, so now you know too. It’s not just our opinion, either. The Department of Homeland Security put out an urgent advisory in January for everyone to disable Java now, unless it is absolutely necessary for you to use it. What you need to know now is how to disable Java, now.

Keep in mind, if you regularly visit a website that uses Java, that website will not work once you disable Java. To reenable Java, simply follow the directions again, and enable Java instead of disabling it. Also, you should probably call and complain to the company that owns the website, and ask them to stop using Java.

Sadly, most people are still using Internet Explorer, so we’ll start with that.

Internet Explorer 8 through 10

(If you are using anything older than Internet Explorer 8, you need to upgrade! Try one of the browsers listed below, except for Safari.)

Click on the Tools menu at the top, and choose Manage Add-ons. On the left of the window that pops up, select All Add-ons from the drop down under the heading Show. Then, scroll down and disable anything that says ?Oracle America, Inc.? next to it. Finally, restart your browser.

Chrome

Click the white address bar at the top of the screen. In that field, type “chrome://plugins” (do not type the quotation marks). Then, press Enter. In the new tab that opens, look for the the item(s) with Java in the name. Click the blue Disable link below it. Finally, restart your browser.

Firefox

If you don’t see the menu bar, (File, Edit, View, etc.) at the top of the page, first click the orange Firefox button at the top-left. Then go to Options and click Menu Bar.

Open the Tools menu, and click Add-ons.  On the tab that appears, click Plug-ins on the left. Scroll down the list on the right-hand side until you see something that begins Java (TM) Platform… Click the Disable button to the right of the listing. Finally, restart your browser.

Opera

Click the white address bar at the top of the screen. In that field, type “opera:plugins” (do not type the quotation marks). Then, press Enter. In the new tab that opens, look for the the item(s) with Java in the name. Click the blue Disable link to the right. Finally, restart your browser.

Safari

If you’re using Safari on Windows, you should get rid of it. Apple has stopped updating it. Follow this guide to migrate to a new browser.

If you decide not to heed our advice, and you want to keep Safari on Windows, click the Action menu in the top-right corner. It looks like a gear. Click Show Menu Bar. Now, click Edit, then Preferences. On the window that appears, click the Security tab. Uncheck the box next to Enable Java if it is checked. Finally, restart your browser.

In Safari on Mac, if the menu bar isn’t visible, press the Esc button on your keyboard to exit full-screen mode. Now, click Edit, then Preferences. On the window that appears, click the Security tab. Uncheck the box next to Enable Java if it is checked. Finally, restart your browser.

Follow these directions, and keep Java disabled until Oracle pulls their act together. Stay tuned to Deemable Tech, and we’ll let you know when and if that happens.

Mary Beth says the text on her email is too small. Is there an easy way to change the text size so it’s easier to read? The hosts of Deemable Tech, Ray Hollister and Tom Braun, help her out in this week’s Ask Deemable Tech.

RAY: Hi, I’m Ray Hollister,

TOM: I’m Tom Braun,

and we’re the hosts of Deemable Tech. On the show, we answer your questions about computers, tablets, mobile phones and the Internet, like this question:

TOM: Mary Beth writes: Yesterday at work, when I came back from lunch, I opened my email and all of a sudden my emails were super tiny. I tried to find a menu or button to change the view, but I couldn’t find anything. I’m using Outlook 2003 on Windows XP. Help! The text is so small I can barely read it.

RAY: Thanks for your question, Mary Beth. That has to be frustrating! My best guess is that you might have slipped on the wheel button on your mouse? Do you remember what you had for lunch that day? Maybe your fingers were greasy?

TOM: All right Ray, quit picking on her eating habits, you don’t even know this woman! Yeesh!

RAY: OK, OK. Well, Mary Beth, here’s why that might have happened. In Outlook 2003, the only way to change the font size in the body of an email you receive is to click on the body of the email, then hold down Ctrl on your keyboard, while you scroll the mouse wheel button up and down. Roll it up to make it larger, and roll it down to make it smaller. Play with it and just keeping rolling the button up and down until you find a size that is comfortable for you.

TOM: The neat thing is, this trick also works in a lot of web browsers, like Internet Explorer, Chrome and Firefox. So, if something you’re reading on the web is too small, or too big, just hold down the CTRL button and roll the mouse wheel button up and down until you find a size that is easier to read. You can do this on a lot of laptops also. Some laptops have specific areas of the touchpad that are designated for scrolling, and they’ll usually be marked with arrows. Others will scroll if you use two fingers on the touchpad. Whichever way your laptop scrolls, just hold down the control button while you do it, and it will make the text size larger and smaller.

RAY: And this trick works in a lot of other applications other than just Outlook and Internet Explorer. Adobe Acrobat, Microsoft Word, Excel and Powerpoint were just a few of the programs that we were able to find that this trick works in as well.

Another thing is, if you try holding down the CTRL button and rolling the mouse wheel button up and down and it doesn’t work, or you’re not able to make it large enough to read comfortably, check your screen resolution. Right-click on your desktop when everything else is closed or minimized, and then click Properties and Settings. You’ll see a slide bar under the heading Screen Resolution. Moving that slider and clicking “Apply? will change the how big everything is on your screen. Generally, the “native? setting, or the one that will look the best, is the one that is farthest to the right, but move it around until you find a setting that you like and is comfortable for your eyes.

TOM: So, that’s two things you can try, Mary Beth. One of them will definitely fix the problem. Try zooming the text size by holding down the CTRL button and rolling the mouse button up and down, and then if that doesn’t work, right-click your desktop and then click Properties and Settings, and change your Screen Resolution.

RAY: To hear more answers to questions like Mary Beth’s listen to our show at Deemable dot com, that’s D-E E-M A-B-L-E dot com. There you can listen to all of our previous episodes and subscribe to our podcast.

TOM: If you have a question for Deemable Tech give us a call us at 1-888-972-9868, or you can send us an email at questions@deemable.com.

RAY: For Deemable Tech I’m Ray Hollister,

TOM: and I’m Tom Braun.