Netflix Wants to Manage Your Streaming Bill - DTNS 5338

[music] >> This is the Daily Tech News for Monday, August 24th, 2026. We tell you what you need to know, give you important context, and help each other [music] understand. >> Today, Netflix inches closer to becoming the platform to manage your streaming subscriptions. >> Hmm, does it really want that? I don't know. I got some I got some thoughts. Rob's got some thoughts. I'm Tom Merritt. >> And I'm Rob Dunwood. >> Let's start with what you need to know with that big story. >> [music] >> So, the New York Times becoming the latest to say its sources say folks at Netflix have considered adding on programs. What the New York Times has that we haven't seen before is names. Netflix considering selling access to Peacock and Fox One. And possibly making it available from within the Netflix app. That that part was not sure. Maybe they just haven't decided yet, but whether you would get the programming in the Netflix app or just add the bundle and then you'd go to the Peacock app or the Fox One app. This follows a similar report that Netflix execs were considering this. The Wall Street Journal put that out back in July. And starting on July 19th, Netflix began offering France's TF1 programming to subscribers in France. No extra charge there. You you get the TF1 linear channels and all of that. It's sort of an experiment. Netflix is saying if this goes well, we might do more of this sort of thing. What we're talking about is something that already exists. You can add channels to Amazon. In fact, Amazon and Apple, both, you can add channels to. And you can add each other's channel to them themselves. If you're on Amazon, you can add Apple TV to your Amazon. If you're on Apple, you can add Prime Video to Apple. Roku Channel also does this. Hulu lets you add some services as well. And YouTube, very interestingly, lets you do this through YouTube TV. You you can add like Stars and HBO Max and all of that to YouTube TV as well as YouTube Premium. Even if you don't have a YouTube TV subscription, which is their more cable-like subscription, you can add some channels to YouTube Premium. In fact, you can add Peacock right now to YouTube Premium, but starting next year, YouTube and Peacock reached a deal where Peacock will just be available as part of your YouTube Premium subscription, no additional charge. And a lot of people don't realize this, but in the United States, a lot of the cable companies, Comcast, Cox, et cetera, include streaming services with your cable subscription. It's a way to keep people from canceling cable. Like, "Hey, we'll just give you Peacock. We'll just give you Disney Plus as part of your subscription." So, we have definitely entered the stage where streaming services are sorting themselves into platforms and programming providers. This is something that on the other show I do, Cord Killers, I've been talking about for a long time. We were in the consolidation phase, which we're still kind of in with Paramount trying to buy Warner Brothers Discovery, and that platform phase where companies decide, "Do we just want to make programs?" That's what Sony's doing. "Do we want to have a channel, but not try to run everything?" That's what companies like Stars have done for the most part. Showtime's kind of like that, and it looks like Peacock might be leaning that way. Or do we want to be the platform provider? Do we want to be the bill that people pay and decide when they add channels and when they don't? Rob, what I know you you are way into this as much as I am. What do you think of all of it? >> So, Tom, I am a serial churner. I will cancel a a subscription just because there's nothing on it that I want to watch that month. And you know, why pay for it if I can just cancel it and not pay for it and then come back a month or two or three later and then watch the thing that I want to watch. So, because of that, I am a huge fan of Amazon. That's where I do a lot of my viewing because I can just buy everything. I've got MGM through Amazon. I now have HBO because of Lanterns through Amazon. As soon as Lanterns is over, HBO probably gets canceled again unless there's a Lanterns 2 that comes out the week after Lanterns 1, uh you know, stops. So, for for me, it makes sense because it's much easier to remember that I only have to go one place to subscribe and to cancel to stuff. And because I do it so regularly, I am literally in and out of accounts almost on a monthly basis. So, for people like me, it makes sense. I think another part of this is that the industry is just maturing. Some of the When you look at a Netflix, Netflix has been around for decades. It was a whole different company before it is the company now that people don't even remember. And it was huge when it was doing when it was doing DVDs. It was ginormous doing that. And people don't even think of it as that type of company any longer. So, they've been around, they've been doing this for a while, and they're probably no longer looking to add users by leaps and bounds. Why? Because they've already added all the users in leaps and bounds. They're going to get a few here and there, but now it is as much as anything about churn. Can we keep the people that we've already subscribed and keep them from going to someplace else? So, if doing that ultimately comes with we're going to allow you to sign up to this other thing that's not our IP, but you can sign up and we'll get a you know, a percentage of it and you just stay in Netflix where we really want you to be as compared to you logging out of Netflix and going to a whole different system to watch. I think they're saying that this is probably the future of where our company resides. Yeah, when you are the platform provider, you get a retention advantage, right? Uh you are less likely to cancel Prime Video because you're using it to manage all your other stuff. Uh and and Netflix looks at that and says, "Ooh, that's kind of tempting." The other thing Netflix gets out of this, the other thing any platform gets out of this, is revenue per user. And you're absolutely right. Netflix has reached the saturation point on adding users in its biggest markets. There there are still markets around the world where it's adding users and it's doing things to try to get those users on board. Uh but they are focusing a lot on how do we increase the revenue per user? One thing they did to do that was an advertising supported level because when you are advertising supported, the more people watch, the more money you make unlike a flat subscription level where it doesn't really matter how much people watch as long as you keep them paying, that's what what you're going to make. You're also never going to raise what you're going to make without raising your prices. So, they look at this platform as another way to add revenue per user without having to add advertising. For the people who just want to subscribe to Netflix at a flat fee with no advertising, you can increase the amount of revenue you make off of them if you get them to add Peacock or get them to add Fox One because you get a cut of that. And so, every one of those you can get them to add not only gives you that retention level like you were saying, but it also increases the amount you're making off of them. >> Yeah, one of the things that Netflix is trying not to become is a big cap company. We think Tom, you and I are old enough to remember when IBM was considered a tech company. It is absolutely a tech company, but it's a big cap. We don't look at how it moves, you know, in in in in its day-to-day operations like we do a Netflix or a you know, a Disney as far as their streaming services. Netflix is really really big and they don't want to they don't want people to start looking at them they're just a big cap. This is just This is just what they are. This is just what they're going to be. So, they're trying to figure out how can we just increase the amount of money that we make per user but let's add this in here. Something that 10 years ago Netflix would have never thought about doing this, but 10 years ago they were still adding users by leaps and bounds. That's no longer the case. So, their business changes. >> Yeah. The The other direction they can go is a direction they've gone before which is to add a product. You know, don't forget Netflix started as DVDs by mail. Then they added streaming, which became the dominant product to the point where they had to retire the DVD by mail service and spin it off into its own separate thing that they don't own anymore. Video games is one of their bets to do that, but that is not working out as well as the streaming did. And it may yet work out one of these days, but you know, Netflix just shut down a couple of studios. So it doesn't seem like that is the direction that is going to pay off fastest. That leaves them with the idea of like, well, we can either be a holdout, right? And be the one option that you have to have in addition to your platform. I like you you probably have, right? You have Prime Video where you add and subtract things, but then you also have to have Netflix cuz you can't add it or subtract it to Prime Video. So I think it makes sense for Netflix to consider this. The question is, do you want to just be a bundler? Like, yeah, we'll we'll manage the bill for you. You'll still log in to Peacock, but you know, it'll be a a little bit cheaper cuz you get it through us. Or do they want to be the destination and say like, no, all your Peacock videos show up here. Your MGM videos show up here. That is the way Apple does it, where you say and that's the way Amazon can do it too, where you're like, no, you you're using our Apple TV app to watch your Paramount subscription, your MGM subscription and everything else. And I don't know if Netflix wants to do that because they love you identifying the TV with Netflix. And if suddenly you're watching a disappointing show on MGM or Peacock, and and you attribute it to Netflix cuz you launched the Netflix app to get there, Netflix doesn't love that. >> I think that Netflix will do what the revenue revenue dictates they do. So right now they probably don't have to do that. They can still be known as Netflix. If I'm honest, when I think of Amazon Prime, the only thing that I can think that I actually watched that's like an Amazon Prime exclusive maybe is Reacher. >> Mhm. >> Everything else that I watch on Amazon Prime outside of sports because I you know it does have live sports. I do watch a lot of live sports on Amazon. But as far as like regular content, most of it is like going to the MGM portion of Amazon or going to the HBO portion of Amazon and watching other stuff that I subscribe to through Amazon because Amazon just makes it easy to get in and out of those subscriptions from one place. That's compared to having to have you know a a spreadsheet with 19 different apps that I may be subscribed to at any point in time. >> Yeah. And then Netflix is going to solve that, right? If they look at that revenue and they're like, "Mhm, we need to do this." They're going to want to solve it by giving you a separate part of the app. Well, this is the not Netflix part. Go over here to do it. Uh and that's not the way Apple and Amazon have done it. You know, you you know you're going to your HBO row. You know you're going to your Fox One row. But it's all part of the interface. So Netflix is going to have to to decide what they're comfortable with, which is why we haven't seen them make an announcement on this yet. >> And one of the really cool things about this is that I miss the cable TV guide. Uh you know, the the the guide on the >> [laughter] >> on your cable subscription that just told you what was on what channel. Sometimes there might be something that I want to watch because there's literally 19 different places that you could watch it. You just don't remember where you need to go. So I've got to go do sometimes do Google searches to figure out on what platform can I watch this piece of content. >> Yeah. >> Um that's kind of disappearing. It's like I see the stuff that I'm interested in show up on Amazon Prime's uh you know, whatever their home page is when I go there. It's not all Amazon stuff. It is mostly not Amazon. It's mostly stuff of the things that I watched that are on two or three of the other networks that I just pay for through Amazon. Um and I I don't think Netflix wants to do that. But once again, I do believe that if the revenue dictates that they do that, I think that would be a change that they would be open to if the revenue dictates it. Um I just don't know that it necessarily does right now. >> Yeah. And and we are headed towards that world whether Netflix joins the platform wars or not. We are headed that towards that world where you pick your platform because they offer the stuff you want, but it's going to be a while before every platform offers most of everything. If you remember back in the early cable TV days in the '80s, uh you you would talk to friends in the next town and they'd be like, "Oh, yeah, we don't get that channel on our cable." Right? That kind of went away in the '90s and and most cable systems had the majority of the channels that people talked about. We're going to have that conversation again. We're like, "Oh, right. I'm on Amazon. They don't offer access to that particular streaming service." But the improvement is back in the '80s you were stuck. You you you either had to move to the town that offered the the channel or you just didn't get it. Uh now you'll have the option of like, "Well, I can I can subscribe directly, you know, or I can even go to another platform that operates it and just use it for for just that channel." So, there's a little more flexibility built in. >> Another analogy to the old cable providers. There was a lot of content that you got on cable that if you didn't care about it, it didn't matter. If you didn't care about sports, you still got ESPN. >> Yeah. >> It didn't matter. It's just if you paid for cable, you got it. What I like about what's happening now is that if I, you know, if I think about the old cable model, it didn't come with Showtime. If you wanted Showtime, you just say, "Hey, I want Showtime." and your your bill goes up a little bit per month. If you wanted HBO and Cinemax, you didn't uh didn't come with it. You just said, "Can you add this to my plan?" If you wanted a few other services, it didn't come with cable. You added it to your plan. And that's what I feel like the streaming um you know, you know, the streaming industry is kind of doing now. If if I go to Amazon, it's like, "Here's what comes with Prime, but I can also get a little bit of MGM. And I can also get a little bit of HBO. And I can also get a little bit of Paramount. I can also get a little bit of, you know, whatever else they offer through their through their interface." And I like that because it gives me choice. It gives me the ability to watch the stuff that I want to watch without having to jump through an enormous number of hoops to do so. >> Yeah. Uh speaking of ESPN, a side note since we're talking about streaming, ESPN announced it's going to raise the price of ESPN Unlimited uh $30 to $32 a month. Uh and if you are an ESPN Plus subscriber, which is now called ESPN Select, that's basically everything that isn't on ESPN's cable channels, uh that one's also going up from 13 to $14 a month and the bundles will be going up uh as well to reflect these cost increases. >> DTNS is made possible by you, the listener. Thanks to that Charlie dude, Justin Zellers, Chris Benitau, and Kelly Berryman. >> Thank you. >> [music] >> There's more we need to know today. Let's get to the briefs. >> Game preservation group Does It Play began a 1-week boycott of PlayStation from Sunday, August 23rd through Sunday, August 30th to protest Sony's decision to stop making physical media next year. The group calls for those who agree with their position to make no logins, no play sessions, and no purchases on any of Sony's platforms. >> Now, here's the thing. I'm very sympathetic to Does It Play. I'm very sympathetic to game preservation. I'm even pretty sympathetic to people who are like, "Man, I'd rather have a physical disc." But, I don't think most people are. And so, I think this is going to be this may backfire in the sense that Sony looks at it and goes, "Okay, we've now seen how many people are actually serious about this and it's not that many." Cuz that that's what Sony's been saying is, "We're not selling that many physical discs, so it doesn't make sense to keep making them after next year uh and they're give we're giving you a lot of time uh to get used to the idea." And Does It Play is trying to say, "Well, let's let's put rubber to the road and show you that there's more people than you think. Uh and I don't know that there are. >> So, you know, there there there's a part of the world I'm I'm going to imagine a a large part of the world that thinks that most people who play games play on things like PlayStations and Xbox and Nintendo Switches uh and things of that nature. But, that's actually not the truth. The truth that most people where most people play most games is on their phones. And one thing that no one has ever done for a phone is buy physical media for it. All your games come via download when you're playing on your phone, when you're playing in the cloud. So, I think that Sony has has has put their finger in their mouth, put their you know, stuck it up in the wind to see which way the wind is blowing. It's like, yeah, there's people who are going to be really upset about this, but there's way more people who really just don't have any dog in the hunt. They don't care enough. And the savings for us in not having to create that media is good business for us. So, we we're going to have some folks upset, but how many of those folks are actually going to stop playing PlayStation games because they can no longer buy physical media. There will be some. There there undoubtedly there will definitely be some who will no longer play PlayStation games because they can't buy physical media for it. But, that number probably is a rounding error as far as Sony is confirmed you know, is concerned as far as what they have you know, the the metrics that they're getting back on how big of a hit is this going to be for us. >> Yeah, and and unfortunately, I think this is about to prove it to Sony and confirm their belief rather rather than dissuade them. I think what would be smart to push for if this doesn't work is the right to have your game, right? Forget about physical. One of the one of the reasons people like physical is like, and then I can do what I own the game and I can do what I want with it. Problem is you can't really. Like like yes, it's put on a a physical disc, but you still have to download a lot of it to get the game to go. I think what is more logical to focus on is pointing at good old games and saying, "Look, I buy digital copies of games from from GOG and then I own them. I can play them offline. I I I don't have to check in with them. I am able to back them up. That's what I want from PlayStation. Not necessarily I need physical cuz I think most people are arguing I need physical so I can do what I I I am doing with my GOG games, right? So let let's I know that sounds harder uh to to get done but honestly I don't know that it's harder than getting them to keep making physical discs at this point. >> Yeah, and I'm a person who has an enormous number of physical discs. But do you know the games that I play the most? The ones that are installed. Because they're installed and they're the newer games. The newer games they require you to have a persistent connection because you're playing with other people or you're just playing in an you know in an immersive world. So as games have evolved the game that you don't install and just play offline just doesn't exist in the same way that it did. Those games are all there. They were already all made. Still have all of them. The new stuff isn't that way. So I I understand people's frustration. I kind of you know I kind of was you know in my feels about it when I first heard the news but when I think about it how often do I go to my Xbox or to my PlayStation and insert a disc? I don't think I've done it probably in the last year year and a half. >> Yeah. RW National noted on the DTNS subreddit that at the second annual world humanoid robot games in Beijing a humanoid robot ran faster than Usain Bolt's world record of 9.58 seconds for the 100 meter dash. I keep seeing this that the robot broke Usain Bolt's record. The robot is not a human so the robot didn't break Usain Bolt's record. Usain Bolt still has his world record. However, the robot did run faster than that record. A Cheonggong Ultra robot ran the 100 meters in 9.39 seconds. Again, Bolt's record is 9.58. And an Honor, yeah, the phone maker Honor lightning robot ran at 9.47 seconds, came in second place. So, two of them ran faster than Bolt. Those are huge improvements from last year when the winning time for a humanoid robot was 21.5 seconds. I could be the robot from last year. So, we are seeing humanoid robots really improve. And we're talking about bipedal robots here. We're not talking about ones on wheels. None of them mastered the art of stopping yet, Rob. I don't know if you saw the videos where they they all like slid or crashed into foam pads at the end of the course. >> Or running in straight lines. They still they >> Yeah, they're all a little hard to still still having a hard time with that. >> There's a little a line changing. So, for the 100, they pretty much maintained their lines. Go look at the at the same event. Look at the 400. The 400, there is not a robot that maintained >> [laughter] >> The robots that actually completed the race, not a single one stayed >> They still stayed in their >> They did it was stayed in their line in in their lane. So, they're they're still a ways off. But, this is I mean, we you know, we've all seen iRobot. We know that iSines can run faster than we can. I mean, that's that's not that's not >> a robot. Of course it is. What what is a machine. The the trick is the agility and the balance, right? And the ability to to stay in your lane, right? Which they're they're still having problems with. Uh I like The Next Web pointing out uh there were 51 competitions over the 5 days of the humanoid robot games. The Next Web thought the Galbot uh was more impressive. Uh the Galbot robot completed 100 consecutive autonomous tennis rallies against a retired number 15 tennis player, Yang Jie. The robot model was unnamed. Uh Galbot said it was created in collaborations with the scientists at Tsinghua University, uh but it was impressive in that it was able to do coordinated things, right? A rally uh is is even more difficult to do because of the changing of the paddle and the movement and the following the ball than than just maintaining your balance and running. Uh we also got some unrelated news off the pitch as you might say. Xpeng announced the largest single round of private financing yet for Chinese physical AI companies valuing it at $6.3 billion. Uh that unfortunately collided with the news that Xpeng was forecast forecasting its Q3 revenue below expectations, but still robots are hot and China has got the hottest humanoid robot companies right now. >> They definitely do. Data centers are shaping up to be a bipartisan issue in the US with all parties against them. Texas Governor Abbott followed Pennsylvania Governor Joshua Shapiro and New York Governor Kathy Hochul in declaring a pause in the development of new data centers. In November Governor Abbott called Texas the epicenter of AI development. In June Abbott directed state regulators to make sure that data centers pay the full cost of any new electrical infrastructure needed to support their operation and phase out tax incentives. Earlier in August he ordered regulators to audit data centers before allowing them to connect to the Texas power grid. On ABC on Sunday the governor said that tech companies need to get the support of local communities and blamed the companies for the backlash against them. The US president criticized the move saying for Texas to say no to data centers is a mistake. >> Yeah, this we we've done a couple of debates. We've had Justin Robert Young on the show. We've talked about like where are the parties going to fall in the US midterm elections on data centers and it turns out most of the parties are falling against. >> [laughter] >> They are they are like everyone in my district is mad at the data centers. So I am going to be on their side. I think what Governor Abbott is saying actually makes sense which is you need to pay for your electricity. You need to pay for your water. Although as as we've discussed in previous episodes the water is becoming less of an issue in new designs. But but a community should make sure that that's the design being used, right? You want that that zero water use or very low water use use. But, the electricity is a big deal. And so, making companies pay for whatever infrastructure needs to be built to support them and of course pay for the electricity that they use in a way that makes sure that your community stays powered and your prices don't go up for your electricity is important. And and you know, maybe Governor Abbott took a couple extra months to to get on that page the same page as Kathy Hochul and and Josh Shapiro, but but he's there now because that's what people in his in his state want. >> So, I live where I live here in Central Ohio. I'm right next to you know, in Columbus right next to New Albany, Ohio. That's where the the new Intel super fat, you know, super foundry is being built. But, there's also a ton of data centers. Like just in residential neighborhoods that you wouldn't even realize. That's like, "Oh, what's that big building?" It's like you you look it up. It's like, "Oh, that's a data center." Now, here's the thing with these data centers. They aren't quiet. They make noise. Now, it's not like you're living next next door to a steel mill. It's not that kind of noise. But, there if you just go outside and listen and you're less than, you know, you know, a quarter mile away from a data center, there's like a constant just hum you know, in the air, you know, at night. You can hear these things. So, people generally they just don't want these in their neighborhoods and you know, people's political power is is is making a mark right now. >> Yeah. You see and you've seen in Texas to where the governor was full bore, we love data centers. And now it's like, nah, not necessarily coming here. We're going to stop this for you. >> data centers. Maybe we don't love data centers. And we really don't want it built next to people's houses anymore. Yeah, no, it's a good point. Like it's not that the computers make any sound really. It's that the cooling systems and the operation systems and all the things you have to do to keep it going make sounds. And like you said, it's not like a steel mill, but you wouldn't want a steel mill built next to your house. You probably want to keep these a little farther away from anywhere that is noise-sensitive, like residential areas, uh as well. And that's that just makes sense. >> Right. >> Yeah. Uh well, folks, uh if you don't know, Daily Tech News Show also is live on the YouTubes. Uh we're also live on Patreon and Substack and Twitch. Uh and you can catch those live streams. Uh for instance, on Mondays, I do a live stream uh where I just chat with the audience. It's called the office hours. Talk about what's going on in the world. Talk about what's going on with the show. Uh we have a little tech tournament on storage. What was the best storage technology that ever came along? Uh and we're we've been playing with that. You can watch those uh and become a subscriber at youtube.com/dailytechnewsshow. >> [music] >> Now, some quick headlines that are good to know, might make you look smarter. >> Xiaomi contracted TSMC to manufacture its own 3-nanometer system-on-a-chip called the Zring 03, designed for more power-efficient image and neural processing. >> Uh getting on board. Uh Apple, Google, everybody's doing it. Samsung does has done it for years. Uh about time Xiaomi got on board. Uh the makers of a privacy-focused mobile phone operating system, I know a bunch of you on our Discord have heard of this cuz you're all we're talking about it, GrapheneOS, posted on Mastodon that Motorola phones with support for GrapheneOS will go on sale starting in 2027. Now, they won't come installed, uh but they will have the specs that GrapheneOS needs. GrapheneOS needs some very sophisticated privacy-focused hardware. So, until now, only the Pixel phones met GrapheneOS's requirements, and you know, Pixel phones aren't necessarily the cheapest ones. So, having Motorola phones that you could buy and then install, you have to install the GrapheneOS yourself, uh is a a boon in choice for people who like a privacy-focused operating system. >> Yeah, this is like this is good news here because there's there's there's more real phones being sold than Google phones right now. So our Pixel phones right now. So this is a good thing for graphene. >> In this week's Power On newsletter, Bloomberg's Mark Gurman says that Apple's forthcoming foldable iPhone, presumably called the Ultra, has impressed early testers, fits easily into a pocket, and has a durable hinge and an iPad-like layout. Expect to hear more, including whether it will actually be called the Ultra, at an Apple event in early September. >> Yeah, I [snorts] think we're going to get that on like everybody thinks it's going to be the 9th. We haven't got an official invite yet. Uh and certainly Apple has an interest in getting sources to tell Gurman they like the phone, but but Gurman's pretty good at weeding out those those kinds of things. So it does does seem like it's a it's a decent build. >> Tom, you haven't heard me say this. I'm excited about this iPhone coming out. No, I because I haven't said anything like that about an iPhone, but I I haven't said anything like that because if it's anything like the Note 8, if it's that kind of good, which I got to play with for a you know, fair amount of time, you know, a couple days. Um it's I'm excited for this phone. >> All right. I I'm I'm now even more excited to see what it's like, too. ASUS announced the ROG Flux charger dock. It's an all-in-one hub with a built-in 1.9-in LCD screen for status and stuff. It's not a monitor screen. It's very tiny. USB-C, 140-W charging, 10 gigabit per second transfer speed capability, HDMI 2.1, and can support monitors plugged into it up to 4K at a 144-Hz refresh rate. No price or release date on this yet, but it's a it's a nice little gaming creator dock. >> Yeah, not not at all. Gamescom starts Tuesday, August 25th in Cologne, Germany and runs through Sunday, August 30th. >> Yep. Gamescom is always a big one. That's probably why ASUS is announcing that. Shein filed the price for its IPO on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange for September 1st at a price that would value the online retailer at around $26 billion. dollars. >> It's amazing how quickly these online retailers have gotten as big as they are. >> No kidding, right? >> China's AG.AL won the club championship at the eSports World Cup in Paris this weekend after a dramatic win in the Trackmania game and a first place finish in Tekken 8. Saudi Arabia's Team Falcons finished second. >> Uh yeah, Paris took third in their own hometown. That's so sad. Phonak launched a hearing aid platform. It's called Eon, that's EON, which uses a processor that can run a deep neural network and a sound classifier in parallel, but still draw 37% less power than the generation before it. Eon is 25% smaller and 20% lighter than Phonak's previous generation and can run 38 hours on a charge. Licensed hearing care professionals in the US will be able to place orders now uh with more markets to follow in September, so you'll want to talk to your doctor if you want to get one. >> Shokz announced new ear clip earbuds called OpenFit Air 2 at 7.2 g per bud, the weight of a handful of paper clips. They go on sale August 27th for $130. >> An anonymous model called Ox Alpha is causing a lot of buzz and speculation. Launched on OpenRouter at the end of last week with a free million token context window. OpenCode says that they hear it'll be free for a week with capacity of 100 million tokens per day. Uh developers have found it pretty impressive, but everybody wants to know who's behind paying for that much compute even for a week. >> OpenAI said on August 21st that it will cut the developer prices for GPT-5.6 sold by more than 20% for the next 3 months. >> Yeah, there's a little there's price pressure uh on these AI services these days. And finally, Chinese car manufacturers say they are coming up 20 to 30% short for the number of printed circuit boards and multi-layer ceramic capacitors. I mean, these are these are like less than a cent uh sometimes per capacitor, but they they can't make enough of them for the auto world uh and so they can't build as many automobiles because they're being bought up by people making data centers. >> Absolutely. We end every episode of DTNS with shared perspectives. Today, Brian in Raleigh has some thoughts for the judge who ruled that Google needed to change how the third-party app store listings work. >> Yeah, Brian says, "I have been stewing on this ever since I heard you your story concerning Judge Donato's directives moving beyond requiring outcomes and instead specifying solution design in the Google Play third-party app case. As a recovering business analyst, I like that phrasing. Uh one guiding principle when specifying requirements is to avoid locking yourself into specific UI elements that may prevent product evolution or force a design implementation that is outside the parameters of your established design language. Examples from the judge include make that install, not view, remove the are you looking for screen, and difficult to measure requirements like a search query that is even 70% properly phrased must find competing app stores, and searching directly for Aptoide or app store should surface normal results rather than route you through a special banner or page. Those are the types of constraints that dictate how a product must render rather than an abstraction of what the product must do. For example, it may have been stronger for the court to require something like this. Third-party app stores must receive treatment equivalent to comparable applications and cannot be subjected to additional friction without a demonstrable security justification. This is an outcome requirement versus a solution spec. And to top it all off, these changes must be implemented in a week. You have your own sprint cycle and release cycle. I don't care. One week. I just found all of this cringeworthy. Thanks for letting me rant, Brian. I love the recovering business analyst giving a us a business analyst analysis of this decision. >> I'm not mad at it. I get it. I I get everything that Brian and Raleigh is saying. Um I think what the judge is saying is like, Google, you knew. You knew better. You should have just made this work like any other app. That's probably if if they would have done that, we probably wouldn't be having this conversation today. But because they didn't, they made the third-party app stores absolutely feel like a, you know, like a red-headed stepchild, so to speak, uh you know, on this platforms. Like, you will know that, you know, you you spell the name correctly to get to it. Um I I think I mentioned that when I first tried to find the App Store, I did spell it incorrectly and did find it. That didn't last very long. That went away. Um so uh so so so I so I I get where Brian and Raleigh is coming from. I think what Google they they probably overstepped is that they should have just made this work like any other similar app. The exact the that remedy that Brian and Raleigh is saying that they should have implemented. >> Yeah, and and maybe Epic should hire Brian as an expert witness next time. I'm just, you know, just a thought. >> Well, folks, we want to know what you're thinking about. So, if you've got some insights into a story, please, please, please share it with us at feedback@dailynewsshow.com. >> Yeah, big thanks to Brian and Raleigh for contributing to today's show. Thank you for being along for Daily Tech News Show. You're the folks who keep us in business. Become a patron if you aren't already. It's easy, fast, and gets you perks. patreon.com/dtns. >> [music] >> The DTNS family of podcasts helping each other understand. >> Diamond Club hopes you have enjoyed this program. >> [laughter]