Category Archives: Samsung

Episode 69 – Q3 2016 Tech Earnings Review

This week’s episode is a review of earnings for the biggest tech companies that have reported earnings for Q3 2016 so far: Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Samsung, and Twitter. We cover each for a few minutes in alphabetical order, discussing the highlights and trends they suggest.

As usual, you’ll find some links to related content as well as other ways to listen to the podcast beneath the embedded Soundcloud player below.

We invite listeners to submit questions for subsequent weeks in the comments below, on Twitter (@jandawson@aaronmiller), or via email (jan at jackdawresearch dot com). We also have a dedicated Podcast Twitter handle at @BDPcast.

As ever, you can also find the podcast on iTunes, in the Overcast app, or your own favorite podcast app. Here is the RSS feed for the podcast if you want to add it manually to your app of choice.

Show notes:

Here are some useful links relating to this week’s episode:

Please leave us a comment or get in touch via Twitter to give us feedback. We’d love to hear from you. Also, we’d love it if you would leave a review of the podcast on iTunes.

Episode 66 – Conflict Minerals and the De-Democratization of Publishing

Our News Roundup returns this week with three topics: first off, the latest installment of the Samsung Galaxy Note7 saga; secondly, Amazon’s launch of two new streaming music services and the implications for the sector; and thirdly, the figures on iOS 10 adoption and what they tell us.

Our Question of the Week is “What is the human impact of mineral sourcing in consumer electronics?” Aaron talks us through the meaning and significance of the phrase “conflict minerals”, but he also explains the latest reporting from the Washington Post on two additional minerals used in consumer devices: cobalt and graphite. We talk about the implications of all this for device manufacturing, as well as what we as consumers can do about it.

Our third segment is a discussion of a topic Jan writes about this week for Techpinions, which he refers to as the de-democratization of online publishing. Essentially, new platforms such as Google’s AMP, Facebook Instant Articles, and Apple news make it harder for smaller publishers to have their voices heard. We also talk about the broader changes in publishing and media, especially in the current presidential election cycle in the US.

We wrap up the episode with a Weekly Pick, which this week is a movie recommendation from Jan.

As usual, you’ll find some links to related content as well as other ways to listen to the podcast beneath the embedded Soundcloud player below.

We invite listeners to submit questions for subsequent weeks in the comments below, on Twitter (@jandawson@aaronmiller), or via email (jan at jackdawresearch dot com). We also have a dedicated Podcast Twitter handle at @BDPcast.

As ever, you can also find the podcast on iTunes, in the Overcast app, or your own favorite podcast app. Here is the RSS feed for the podcast if you want to add it manually to your app of choice.

Show notes:

Here are some useful links relating to this week’s episode:

Please leave us a comment or get in touch via Twitter to give us feedback. We’d love to hear from you. Also, we’d love it if you would leave a review of the podcast on iTunes.

Episode 63 – Research on Product Recalls, iPhone 7 & Watch 2 Review

Our News Roundup this week covers the reports that Apple has been considering an investment in or outright acquisition of British supercar manufacturer McLaren; the release of Google’s Allo messaging app; and Comcast’s announcement that it will finally launch its long-rumored cellular wireless service sometime in 2017.

Our Question of the Week this week is “What can the research on past product recalls teach us about the Samsung Galaxy Note7 recall?” We’ve talked several times previously about Samsung’s recall of the Note7, but this week Aaron spent some time looking at the history of product recalls and reading some of the academic research on the topic with a view to understand a couple of things. Firstly, we talk about what the history suggests about how Samsung will be impacted by the recall, and secondly we discuss the general lessons for product recalls that come out of the research.

Our third segment is a review of the new iPhone 7 Plus and Watch Series 2, both of which Jan has been using for the past five days or so. This builds on the meta-review we did last week of all the published reviews of both products.

Our Weekly Pick is a set of iPhone apps recommended by Jan.

As usual, you’ll find some links to related content as well as other ways to listen to the podcast beneath the embedded Soundcloud player below.

We invite listeners to submit questions for subsequent weeks in the comments below, on Twitter (@jandawson@aaronmiller), or via email (jan at jackdawresearch dot com). We also have a dedicated Podcast Twitter handle at @BDPcast.

As ever, you can also find the podcast on iTunes, in the Overcast app, or your own favorite podcast app. Here is the RSS feed for the podcast if you want to add it manually to your app of choice.

Show notes:

Here are some useful links relating to this week’s episode:

Please leave us a comment or get in touch via Twitter to give us feedback. We’d love to hear from you. Also, we’d love it if you would leave a review of the podcast on iTunes.

Episode 62 – Verily Overview, iPhone Reviews Review

Our News Roundup this week covers the ongoing fallout from the Samsung Galaxy Note7 battery problems; the story that Amazon is going to be experimenting with a 30-hour work week for some of its employees; and the expansion of comment filtering functionality to all users by Instagram. We discuss each of these topics for a few minutes and talk about the context and implications. We’ll likely do a Question of the Week next week on consumer product recalls using the Note7 recall as a jumping-off point.

Our Question of the Week this week is “What is Verily and what does it do?” This question builds on a piece Jan wrote for Techpinions Insiders contrasting Alphabet and Apple’s approaches to the healthcare space, with Verily being Alphabet’s Life Sciences subsidiary (formerly Google Life Sciences). We talk through what Verily is, who runs it, what it’s intended to accomplish, its internal projects and its partnerships with other organizations, and lastly how it’s perceived within the broader life sciences community. It’s a fascinating business and we both learned a lot from doing this segment.

Our third segment is a discussion of the reviews for the iPhone 7 and Apple Watch Series 2, which will be available for sale on Friday, as well as a brief discussion of iOS and watchOS 3, which were released to the general public this week.

Our Weekly Pick is a TV show recommendation from Aaron.

As usual, you’ll find some links to related content as well as other ways to listen to the podcast beneath the embedded Soundcloud player below.

We invite listeners to submit questions for subsequent weeks in the comments below, on Twitter (@jandawson@aaronmiller), or via email (jan at jackdawresearch dot com). We also have a dedicated Podcast Twitter handle at @BDPcast.

As ever, you can also find the podcast on iTunes, in the Overcast app, or your own favorite podcast app. Here is the RSS feed for the podcast if you want to add it manually to your app of choice.

Show notes:

Here are some useful links relating to this week’s episode:

Please leave us a comment or get in touch via Twitter to give us feedback. We’d love to hear from you. Also, we’d love it if you would leave a review of the podcast on iTunes.

Episode 58 – Unsticking Twitter, What We Use

Our News Roundup this week covers the Samsung Note7 reviews that came out this week; Google’s launch of its Duo video calling app for Android and iOS; and Apple’s announcement of an R&D center in China.

Our Question of the Week is “Why does Twitter seem stuck, and how can it unstick itself?” Jan answers questions about what makes Twitter seem stuck, from its user growth to monetization in the US to its product; why Twitter seems to be executing so slowly on its strategic priorities; and what Twitter can and should do to fix itself and get past its current stagnation.

Our third segment is a bit of a departure from our usual pattern, in that it’s just us talking about the technology – hardware, software, and services – that we use in our daily work and personal lives.

Lastly, we wrap up with a Weekly Pick, which is a book recommendation from Aaron.

As usual, you’ll find some links to related content as well as other ways to listen to the podcast beneath the embedded Soundcloud player below.

We invite listeners to submit questions for subsequent weeks in the comments below, on Twitter (@jandawson@aaronmiller), or via email (jan at jackdawresearch dot com). We also have a dedicated Podcast Twitter handle at @BDPcast.

As ever, you can also find the podcast on iTunes, in the Overcast app, or your own favorite podcast app. Here is the RSS feed for the podcast if you want to add it manually to your app of choice.

Show notes:

Here are some useful links relating to this week’s episode:

  • Various posts from Jan on Twitter
  • Aaron’s Weekly Pick was The White Man’s Burden, by William Easterly, which you can find on Amazon (affiliate link).

Please leave us a comment or get in touch via Twitter to give us feedback. We’d love to hear from you. Also, we’d love it if you would leave a review of the podcast on iTunes.

Episode 56 – Q2 2016 Tech Company Earnings Review

We’re back after a two-week break, and this episode is exclusively devoted to a review of major tech companies earnings for Q2 2016, which were reported over the last several weeks. We take a thematic approach to the topic, focusing first on hardware companies, principally Apple and Samsung; then on the big ad-focused companies: Google, Facebook, and Twitter; and then two companies that stand somewhat apart: Microsoft and Amazon. We discuss the themes that emerged from earnings this quarter, and also some of the surprising elements in each company’s results.

Next week, we’ll be back to our usual structure, with a News Roundup, Question of the Week, and Weekly Pick.

As usual, you’ll find some links to related content as well as other ways to listen to the podcast beneath the embedded Soundcloud player below.

We invite listeners to submit questions for subsequent weeks in the comments below, on Twitter (@jandawson@aaronmiller), or via email (jan at jackdawresearch dot com). We also have a dedicated Podcast Twitter handle at @BDPcast.

As ever, you can also find the podcast on iTunes, in the Overcast app, or your own favorite podcast app. Here is the RSS feed for the podcast if you want to add it manually to your app of choice.

Show notes:

Here are some useful links relating to this week’s episode:

  • The only external link we discussed on the show was a piece in the Atlantic by Ian Bogost entitled “Facebook is not a technology company”. We discussed this right at the end of the episode.

Please leave us a comment or get in touch via Twitter to give us feedback. We’d love to hear from you. Also, we’d love it if you would leave a review of the podcast on iTunes.

Episode 41 – Apple News for Publishers, Tesla Model 3

Our News Roundup this week covered the following topics:

  • Conflicting reports on early iPhone SE sales
  • Samsung’s decent preliminary Q1 financials
  • Twitter’s deal for NFL rights.

Our Question of the Week is “What is Apple News like for a small publisher?” and focuses on our experience publishing to Apple News over the last several weeks. We talk through the reasons why Apple launched Apple News, the different ways publishers can get content onto Apple News, and the pros and cons of each. We also talk about how Apple needs to evolve Apple News to remain competitive against other options like Facebook Instant Articles, Google’s AMP project, and platforms like Medium.

Our third topic this week was Tesla’s Model 3 announcement and the pre-order process that accompanied it. We talk about the significance of those preorders, the convergence of cars and tech and Tesla’s role in that, and the interesting questions Tesla raises about how car design could change in a world without gasoline-powered engines. As usual, we wrap up with a Weekly Pick, this week one from Aaron.

As usual, you’ll find some links to related content as well as other ways to listen to the podcast beneath the embedded Soundcloud player below.


We invite listeners to submit questions for subsequent weeks in the comments below, on Twitter (@jandawson, @aaronmiller), or via email (jan at jackdawresearch dot com). We also have a dedicated Podcast Twitter handle at @BDPcast.

As ever, you can also find the podcast on iTunes, in the Overcast app, or your own favorite podcast app. Here is the RSS feed for the podcast if you want to add it manually to your app of choice.

Show notes:

Here are some useful links relating to this week’s episode:

Please leave us a comment or get in touch via Twitter to give us feedback. We’d love to hear from you. Also, we’d love it if you would leave a review of the podcast on iTunes.

Episode 37 – A 5G Primer and Samsung’s New Phones

Our News Roundup this week covers three new items: Android’s early developer preview of Android N; the conclusion of the Apple eBooks trial; and the debut of Amazon’s first live TV show. Our Question of the Week is “What is 5G? And should you care?” and piggybacks on an article Jan wrote for Techpinions on Monday offering something of a primer on the technology. We talk through the first four Gs briefly, and in particular talk about what’s unique about 4G, before moving on to where the process of defining 5G has got to, and when you’re likely to be able to actually use it. Our third topic is Samsung’s new phones, which were reviewed by many publications this week. We discuss the consensus from the reviews as well as what the phones seem to signify about the state of Samsung. We wrap up as ever with our Weekly Pick, which is another cooking-themed recommendation from Aaron.

As usual, you’ll find some links to related content as well as other ways to listen to the podcast beneath the embedded Soundcloud player below.

We invite listeners to submit questions for subsequent weeks in the comments below, on Twitter (@jandawson, @aaronmiller), or via email (jan at jackdawresearch dot com). We also have a dedicated Podcast Twitter handle at @BDPcast.

As ever, you can also find the podcast on iTunes, in the Overcast app, or your own favorite podcast app. Here is the RSS feed for the podcast if you want to add it manually to your app of choice.

Show notes:

Here are some useful links relating to this week’s episode:

Please leave us a comment or get in touch via Twitter to give us feedback. We’d love to hear from you. Also, we’d love it if you would leave a review of the podcast on iTunes.

Episode 35 – State of the Smartphone Market, more Apple/FBI

This week, our News Roundup covers Apple’s response to beta users’ feedback on iPad Pro Pencil navigation support in iOS 9.3, smartphone announcements from Mobile World Congress, and Fitbit’s earnings. Our Question of the Week is “What’s the state of the global smartphone market?”, which Jan addresses. We talk about whether the smartphone market is growing, and where, which players are growing (and which aren’t), we talk about the fact that iOS/Android and Apple/Google are no longer the most interesting competitive dynamics, and offer some predictions for the future. Our final topic is a sequel to last week’s discussion about Apple and the FBI, given all the new information that’s emerged since our earlier discussion. We wrap up with our Weekly Pick, as usual, which this week is a website recommendation from Aaron.

As usual, you’ll find some links to related content as well as other ways to listen to the podcast beneath the embedded Soundcloud player below.

We invite listeners to submit questions for subsequent weeks in the comments below, on Twitter (@jandawson, @aaronmiller), or via email (jan at jackdawresearch dot com). We also have a dedicated Podcast Twitter handle at @BDPcast.

As ever, you can also find the podcast on iTunes, in the Overcast app, or your own favorite podcast app. Here is the RSS feed for the podcast if you want to add it manually to your app of choice.

Show notes:

Here are some useful links relating to this week’s episode:

  • The Verge story on Pencil navigation in iOS 9.3 and future versions
  • The Verge’s coverage of Mobile World Congress announcements
  • Jan’s live tweeting of Fitbit earnings, as a Storify story
  • Related to Apple / FBI:
  • Aaron’s Weekly Pick, Serious Eats, a cooking blog/website.

Please leave us a comment or get in touch via Twitter to give us feedback. We’d love to hear from you. Also, we’d love it if you would leave a review of the podcast on iTunes.

Episode 25 – Christensen’s Theory, Apple Resellers, Samsung Mobile

We kick off the discussion this week with a conversation about Clayton Christensen and his theory of disruptive innovation. Specifically, we talk about the recent controversy about whether his theory has a monopoly on the use and definition of the term disruption and its application in the technology market, and whether it even works and applies in the consumer technology market specifically. Our second topic is our Question of the Week, in which we discuss Apple’s changing relationship with its resellers. Specifically, Aaron runs us through some of the differences this Thanksgiving shopping season compared with last year. The final topic is the change in leadership at Samsung’s mobile division this past week, and what it might signify for the future of the business. As ever, we finish with our Weekly Pick, which this week is a handful of applications for the new Apple TV.

The SoundCloud player is embedded below, and under that you’ll find the usual collection of relevant links and other information.

We invite listeners to submit questions for subsequent weeks in the comments below, on Twitter (@jandawson, @aaronmiller), or via email (jan at jackdawresearch dot com). We also now have a dedicated Podcast Twitter handle at @BDPcast.

As ever, you can also find the podcast on iTunes, in the Overcast app, or your own favorite podcast app. Here is the RSS feed for the podcast if you want to add it manually to your app of choice.

Show notes:

Here are some useful links relating to this week’s episode:

Please leave us a comment or get in touch via Twitter to give us feedback. We’d love to hear from you. Also, we’d love it if you would leave a review of the podcast on iTunes.