Conversational Siri, ChatGPT, and Travel Gear & Tips with Gannon Nordberg

Intro

Gannon Nordberg (0s)

I expect that my gold jacket will be in the mail soon, I think, for being a four-time member. Is that how that works?

Tom Anderson (0s)

You're pretty much in the Hall of Fame.

Intro music (10s)

♪ I don't wanna know about your imperfections, too ♪

Tom Anderson (11s)

Hello everyone, and welcome to another episode of Basic AF.

Tom Anderson (13s)

Tom Anderson and Jeff Battersby.

Jeff Battersby (16s)

Tom Anderson, how are you, bud? It's cooking. I'm doing all right. I'm uh, you know among the living We had a little snow in New York. So, you know, I did I did it was a

Tom Anderson (16s)

Hello, Jeff.

Tom Anderson (18s)

Doing all right.

Tom Anderson (19s)

How are you doing, sir?

Jeff Battersby (28s)

Kind of delightful. It's almost all gone now. But yeah, it was great. Nice to get snow. I like snow

Tom Anderson (35s)

Nice, yeah, me too.

Tom Anderson (36s)

We didn't get that.

Tom Anderson (37s)

We had some rain and windy,

Tom Anderson (38s)

but it's a little early for us for snow.

Jeff Battersby (39s)

Yeah, the wind was wild

Jeff Battersby (44s)

Having having trees down

Jeff Battersby (46s)

And power outages and all that jazz

Tom Anderson (48s)

That's always good

Jeff Battersby (49s)

Not in my neck of the woods

Tom Anderson (51s)

Yeah, so we are in Thanksgiving week here in the US so happy Thanksgiving everyone is that is coming up on Thursday

Jeff Battersby (57s)

Yes.

Tom Anderson (1m 1s)

Like most I will have multiple yeah, I'm not buying anything. No, I buy all year take Black Friday off

Jeff Battersby (1m 2s)

Black Friday on Friday.

Jeff Battersby (1m 5s)

No.

Tom Anderson (1m 11s)

Can't afford anything by Black Friday budget spent and Jeff we have a guest with us again

Jeff Battersby (1m 15s)

Fair. That's fair.

Jeff Battersby (1m 17s)

What? Who?

Tom Anderson (1m 18s)

Yes, we do.

Tom Anderson (1m 19s)

Welcome back to the show.

Tom Anderson (1m 20s)

It's gotta be your fourth or fifth appearance, I think it is.

Welcome Back, Gannon!

Tom Anderson (1m 23s)

Hello, Gannon Nordberg, welcome back.

Gannon Nordberg (1m 25s)

Hey fellas, thanks for having me. It's great to be back. I expect that my gold jacket will be in the mail soon, I think, for being a four-time member. Is that how that works?

Tom Anderson (1m 32s)

You're pretty much in the Hall of Fame, the BASIC-AF Hall of Fame.

Jeff Battersby (1m 34s)

Yeah, yeah, right

Gannon Nordberg (1m 36s)

Sweet. Alright, looking forward to that.

Jeff Battersby (1m 40s)

Yeah, and I'm actually here for you to be on the show, which is atypical

Jeff Battersby (1m 47s)

Usually it's a Gannon and Tom while I'm out, you know

Tom Anderson (1m 51s)

Getting robbed.

Jeff Battersby (1m 51s)

fixing car windows

Tom Anderson (1m 53s)

Yeah, so real quick, this is BASIC-AF episode 49.

Jeff Battersby (1m 54s)

Getting new equipment

Tom Anderson (2m 3s)

Can be found at basicafshow.com/49.

Tom Anderson (2m 7s)

Jeff, you want to roll the early credits for the artwork and everything real quick?

Jeff Battersby (2m 10s)

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Jeff Battersby (2m 11s)

So a reminder, feedback at basicafshow.com.

Jeff Battersby (2m 14s)

We're happy to catch your emails, which we have gotten some,

Jeff Battersby (2m 18s)

which we will get to answering those questions at some point in the future.

Jeff Battersby (2m 22s)

We've got show music, as always, Psychokinetics Celsius 7.

Jeff Battersby (2m 27s)

Highly recommend you check that out or him out.

Jeff Battersby (2m 32s)

And then we've got Randall Martin Design for our show art,

Jeff Battersby (2m 35s)

who we really appreciate and who does great work.

Jeff Battersby (2m 40s)

Highly recommend that you find Randall, Randall Martin.

Tom Anderson (2m 45s)

All right, thank you, sir, and thank them for their support with the artwork and the show music.

Tom Anderson (2m 51s)

So what we've got planned for you today, we're going to do a bit of news roundup.

Tom Anderson (2m 56s)

There's some stuff worthy of discussion on this fine podcast.

Tom Anderson (3m 1s)

And then we're also going to talk, we mentioned there a couple of minutes ago, it's Thanksgiving week.

Tom Anderson (3m 5s)

Ah, it's glorious travel season.

Tom Anderson (3m 8s)

And so we thought we would talk a little bit about tips on how to take away some of the

Tom Anderson (3m 15s)

stress around that travel, especially when it comes to your tech devices and gear that you want to take.

Tom Anderson (3m 23s)

The more people you have to account for when you're traveling, the more frustrating that can get.

Tom Anderson (3m 28s)

So if you've got a family or totin' along, especially kids and everything, please listen to this because you want to make sure you keep those devices charged to keep the kids happy.

Tom Anderson (3m 37s)

All right.

Tom Anderson (3m 38s)

So that'll be coming up.

Tom Anderson (3m 39s)

It's kind of going to be in the second half of the show.

Tom Anderson (3m 45s)

Right, Jeff? Okay. Caught you off guard there.

Jeff Battersby (3m 46s)

Fair. Indeed, Tom, no, no arguments. Right, right. I'm all good. We're in a happy place. Well, you might.

Tom Anderson (3m 52s)

All right, good, good. Okay. So, kind of the first topic of the news roundup. So,

Mark Gurman: Conversational Siri in 2026

Tom Anderson (4m 1s)

as everyone is well aware at this point, we're in the Apple Intelligence era, at least some of us,

Tom Anderson (4m 8s)

some of you, depending on which devices you have, if you've got some of the newer devices,

Tom Anderson (4m 11s)

you are in the club, so to speak.

Tom Anderson (4m 15s)

We had the initial releases, feature releases in the .1 updates for iOS 18, Mac OS, Sequoia and iPad OS and a new round of features coming up in 18.2, including Image Playground, which I got access to.

Tom Anderson (4m 31s)

I know Jeff, you've got access to that too.

Tom Anderson (4m 33s)

Gannon, do you have that?

Gannon Nordberg (4m 35s)

No I've not jumped on any of the the beta trains yet. I know I just feel better on the the stable versions but from what I know exactly from what I've seen it's interesting so I am excited to check it out.

Jeff Battersby (4m 41s)

Coward

Jeff Battersby (4m 48s)

It's goofy fun

Tom Anderson (4m 48s)

Yeah, it is.

Gannon Nordberg (4m 49s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (4m 50s)

Yeah, it's been kind of fun messing with that.

Tom Anderson (4m 53s)

We'll see how practical it remains once the novelty wears off.

Tom Anderson (4m 56s)

But, and so, that's, yeah, yeah.

Jeff Battersby (4m 57s)

It's pretty much worn off for me already.

Tom Anderson (5m 2s)

To be honest, I have it on my iPad

Tom Anderson (5m 5s)

and so I don't really have much practical use for it at this point.

Tom Anderson (5m 9s)

But anywho, one of the, of course,

Tom Anderson (5m 11s)

kind of.

Tom Anderson (5m 13s)

features Apple showed at WWDC this past summer for Apple intelligence is the revamped Siri,

Tom Anderson (5m 20s)

which has picked up a couple of little things so far, like it's picked up some contextual awareness

Tom Anderson (5m 28s)

in the .2 updates that are coming out. It also goes off on your phone when you're recording a podcast when you say it. But in the .2 updates, they've added the chat GPT integration. So if you want to bring.

Tom Anderson (5m 44s)

of extend some of the things that Siri can do, which I've turned that on and you can sign in with your account.

Tom Anderson (5m 50s)

So if you have an account, you can link your account to it as well.

Tom Anderson (5m 52s)

So I went ahead and did that.

Tom Anderson (5m 54s)

I have not used it a ton partially because I just don't think to use Siri in that manner.

Tom Anderson (6m 1s)

So I think there's some adjustment there that's going to have to take place.

Tom Anderson (6m 5s)

But anyhow, one of the news items this week, Mark Gurman, as he is apt to do, has these

Tom Anderson (6m 13s)

"Apple readies more conversational LLM Siri in bid to rival OpenAI's chat GPT."

Tom Anderson (6m 22s)

So kind of the one of the big things supposed to be coming next year is the personal context for Siri.

Tom Anderson (6m 29s)

Or she's, or he, whichever voice, they're not even given genders anymore, they're numbers.

Tom Anderson (6m 35s)

So whichever number Siri that you want to use, we'll have personal contacts, so know to know more about the information on your phone.

Tom Anderson (6m 43s)

things but still not conversational in the sense that ChattyPT's voice mode is.

Jeff Battersby (6m 52s)

Yes.

Jeff Battersby (6m 58s)

You have anything further? You know me, Tom, I'm not going to be the chat GPT talking guy. I will say that using Siri now in one of the beta versions, I am getting prompted to use chat GPT

Jeff Battersby (7m 10s)

to further request, but you know me, I'm an AI list. I don't know it feels like you're being godless now if you're a

Jeff Battersby (7m 23s)

I don't believe in AI. Does that make sense? No, I'm insane, but that's okay.

Jeff Battersby (7m 30s)

All right, let's talk to somebody who cares. Yeah, right, there you go, Ganon's in.

Tom Anderson (7m 30s)

So, anyway, Gannon, you have tested the voice mode on ChatGPT a little bit, right?

Gannon Nordberg (7m 37s)

I am insane. Watch out.

Gannon Nordberg (7m 46s)

Yeah, and so I used the standard JatGBT a fair amount just for, you know, research and ideating and brainstorming and kind of kick-starting ideas of various things.

Gannon Nordberg (7m 56s)

And so when I saw they had the voice mode, I was excited to just check it out.

Gannon Nordberg (8m)

I like kind of kicking the tires with some of this stuff, so I was anxious to check it out.

Gannon Nordberg (8m 6s)

So like Siri and the other voice assistants, I did find that it takes a little bit, for me at least, to kind of pre-plan what you're going to ask and what specific…

Gannon Nordberg (8m 16s)

…guidance you're looking for before you start it.

Gannon Nordberg (8m 19s)

Otherwise, I found myself kind of like thinking on the fly while I'm anxiously, you know, staring at this blinking microphone like, "OK, what do I actually want to say?"

Gannon Nordberg (8m 28s)

And whereas if you're writing it out, you know, you don't have that "pressure."

Gannon Nordberg (8m 34s)

But the back-and-forth conversation that I had was pretty seamless.

Gannon Nordberg (8m 38s)

It actually felt like I was talking to another pretty, you know, sentient being, so to speak.

Gannon Nordberg (8m 44s)

speak, it was impressive.

Gannon Nordberg (8m 46s)

Well, one of the things I liked the most about it was it offers, I don't know, 10 or so different voice options.

Jeff Battersby (8m 46s)

So, all the feelings of a great first date, right?

Jeff Battersby (8m 49s)

Those nerves, the butterflies in your belly and, you know, at the end, a decent conversation.

Gannon Nordberg (9m 2s)

Um, you know, each of them have their own style, a kind of a voice style and a personality.

Gannon Nordberg (9m 8s)

And so I, I kind of had fun flipping through each of those and, and it'll give you like like a sample recording, like, hi, my name is so-and-so and it'll.

Gannon Nordberg (9m 16s)

Kind of like give you a sentence about how it responds to messages and things.

Gannon Nordberg (9m 21s)

And so the option that I landed on was soul S O L, which is described as savvy and relaxed.

Gannon Nordberg (9m 28s)

I'm like, Ooh, we can be BFFs.

Gannon Nordberg (9m 30s)

That sounds great.

Tom Anderson (9m 30s)

Yeah, that's who I ended up with too.

Gannon Nordberg (9m 34s)

Okay, cool.

Tom Anderson (9m 35s)

Or I should say the one I ended up with and who sounds a little strange, but yeah, not that the one, you are the one soul.

Gannon Nordberg (9m 37s)

The one.

Jeff Battersby (9m 38s)

The one, right, that, yeah, that sounds really,

Jeff Battersby (9m 43s)

the one, you've, you've found the one.

Gannon Nordberg (9m 43s)

Right.

Tom Anderson (9m 44s)

Jeff is soulless, but you are the soul.

Tom Anderson (9m 48s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (9m 49s)

So in the article, I'm going to pull that up for you guys here real quick, but Mark German mentions in his article there that.

Tom Anderson (10m 1s)

This is going to be not even in 2025.

Tom Anderson (10m 7s)

So this is going to be a 2026 spring.

Tom Anderson (10m 11s)

Okay. So we're looking at, it sure does.

Gannon Nordberg (10m 12s)

It feels like a lifeline way.

Tom Anderson (10m 15s)

And the, um, you know, the personal context thing is supposed to come in early 25, the conversational piece in 26, if this is an accurate story, who knows?

Tom Anderson (10m 27s)

Um, yeah, and it'll be interesting when it.

Tom Anderson (10m 31s)

One of the things that I've liked with the voice mode with ChatGPT, okay, and I think on the free version you get 15 minutes, uh, and then the paid version it's however much you want to use, I suppose, um, but one of the things that I like with it is you can do the voice discussion and then if you come back to it later, it's all transcribed and in ChatGPT, so you can come back, you can search for it.

Tom Anderson (11m)

And then it all gets added into your memory there, right? So as you're using ChatGPT, whether it's through voice mode or through the, just the normal back and forth, or maybe you're using the new canvas feature that they have, which I've just started to use, which is in beta, which is interesting because it is almost a bit grammarly like, where it's, it's basically a document that you're working on in ChatGPT, whereas in the normal mode, you know, it's just text.

Tom Anderson (11m 30s)

You type your thing in your prompt, hit enter, the text comes back up or comes from, you know, ChatGPT and then you can ask it to update, you know, some things, maybe you've got a list and you say, well, I don't like number one, I like number three, but add these two things and it'll spit some more text out on the screen with the canvas mode, you get a document.

Tom Anderson (11m 50s)

It's almost like a Google Doc of sorts, so you can actually have it generate something, you can type in there, take stuff out that you want to yourself, you can have it do it.

Tom Anderson (12m 1s)

And then afterwards it goes right back to the other mode, so it's like a clip of text that you can export out if you want to drop it into your text editor or something and work on a little more, but so anyway, but with that voice mode, I think having the ability to go back to it and seeing it in text is a plus, and I'm kind of curious what Apple might do with that when the time comes, like with Siri, if Siri becomes this thing that's very similar, where you're able to say, you know, hey, blah, blah, blah.

Tom Anderson (12m 31s)

But if you say that, and it's like, hey, you know, I'm working on, you know, my Mac book doesn't boot up, it hangs at the progress bar, you know, what should I try?

Tom Anderson (12m 39s)

And it's like, well, where does that go when the discussion is over?

Tom Anderson (12m 43s)

Does it go somewhere so you can pull it up later?

Tom Anderson (12m 47s)

And so I don't know, obviously it's a long ways away, but apparently they're testing it as a separate app at this point and then will eventually be integrated in.

Jeff Battersby (12m 58s)

So let me ask you a question in, I am interested from a curiosity perspective,

Jeff Battersby (13m 3s)

as you know, I'm not really using, although I, I have used occasionally just to play with it, Claude.

Jeff Battersby (13m 8s)

So I like, I like that interface.

Jeff Battersby (13m 11s)

I like how it works.

Jeff Battersby (13m 12s)

Um, but it, you know, it's basic text entry, ask a question, get a response back and so on and so forth.

Jeff Battersby (13m 20s)

How is this working conversationally for you?

Jeff Battersby (13m 22s)

Is it, does it feel natural?

Jeff Battersby (13m 24s)

Is it, is it something that feels like you're actually having another conversation?

Jeff Battersby (13m 28s)

Conversation with another person in the room, or is it, is it, um, mechanical?

Jeff Battersby (13m 33s)

And the thing that kind of, you know, I'll confess drives me a little nuts about all these AI voices is they're extraordinarily cheery.

Jeff Battersby (13m 43s)

Yes.

Jeff Battersby (13m 43s)

We really like to help you.

Jeff Battersby (13m 44s)

You know, that kind of a feel.

Jeff Battersby (13m 46s)

I want to know if it, if it feels how natural it feels.

Tom Anderson (13m 53s)

So it definitely has still, it's still that, like they're very happy or upbeat,

Tom Anderson (14m 1s)

which, you know, I don't know, anybody wants to go here, you know, Debbie Downer on chat GPT, so, uh, so yeah, there's definitely some of that, right.

Gannon Nordberg (14m 7s)

Maybe that could be the name, Debbie.

Jeff Battersby (14m 10s)

Debbie, great.

Jeff Battersby (14m 12s)

All the Debbies in the world just decided to scratch Cannon's eyes out.

Tom Anderson (14m 12s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (14m 12s)

Uh,

Tom Anderson (14m 19s)

But, and Gannon alluded to it there a few minutes ago.

Tom Anderson (14m 23s)

the first time, even the first couple of times, probably,

Tom Anderson (14m 27s)

because it's just a different interaction than I'm used to.

Tom Anderson (14m 31s)

And so you hit, you know, like, oh yeah,

Tom Anderson (14m 33s)

you do kind of hesitate a little bit.

Tom Anderson (14m 35s)

And I think once it gets started, it's not too bad.

Tom Anderson (14m 40s)

And I was telling you guys before the show,

Tom Anderson (14m 42s)

I plugged the phone in to the, to the Rodecaster here,

Tom Anderson (14m 45s)

and I was going to try and do it.

Tom Anderson (14m 45s)

I mean, we can try it and we can hold it up to the phone if you want to hear it.

Jeff Battersby (14m 47s)

Yeah, try it. Let's see how it works.

Tom Anderson (14m 49s)

So let's go through that scenario we were just talking about

Tom Anderson (14m 53s)

with the MacBook, right?

Tom Anderson (14m 54s)

So the MacBook's not booting.

Tom Anderson (14m 55s)

And let's see what old chat GPT comes up with here.

Tom Anderson (14m 58s)

One second.

Tom Anderson (15m)

So my MacBook isn't starting up.

Tom Anderson (15m 2s)

I'm having problems.

Tom Anderson (15m 3s)

It just kind of hangs at the progress bar.

Tom Anderson (15m 5s)

What do you think I should try?

Tom Anderson (15m 8s)  

• Ah, the infamous progress bar hang.

Tom Anderson (15m 11s)

First, try a safe boot.

Tom Anderson (15m 13s)

Restart your Mac and immediately hold down the shift key until the Apple logo appears.

Tom Anderson (15m 18s)

This runs a basic check and only loads essential software.

Tom Anderson (15m 21s)

If that doesn't work...

Tom Anderson (15m 23s)

...boot into recovery mode by restarting and holding Command + R.

Tom Anderson (15m 27s)

From there, you can use Disk Utility to repair your disk.

Tom Anderson (15m 32s)

Do you think I should take it to the Apple Store?

Tom Anderson (15m 35s)

If those steps don't resolve it, visiting the Apple Store might be your best bet.

Tom Anderson (15m 40s)

They can run more advanced diagnostics.

Tom Anderson (15m 42s)

Plus, if it's a hardware issue, they'll be able to address it.

Tom Anderson (15m 47s)

Oh, the reboot worked.

Tom Anderson (15m 50s)

Awesome! Glad to hear it did the trick.

Tom Anderson (15m 53s)

So, yeah.

Jeff Battersby (15m 54s)

All right, super cheery a little bit of a misinformation there. Yes shift key on older Macs

Jeff Battersby (16m 2s)

You have to hold down the power button on all the newer Macs

Jeff Battersby (16m 7s)

and then load the

Jeff Battersby (16m 9s)

because of you know some hardware changes that are like in the

Tom Anderson (16m 13s)

with the Apple Silicon stuff.

Jeff Battersby (16m 14s)

Yeah, yeah, so that that's interesting. I mean, it's it's definitely has has the basics of it down even though

Jeff Battersby (16m 22s)

The next question would be what kind of Mac do you?

Jeff Battersby (16m 24s)

have you know you have an M1 chip the M2 chip but yeah very cheery no you're having problems let me see what I can do to take care of that for you yeah yeah exactly right but you know that is I the quality of that conversation is good have you ever tried it with anything like personal questions I mean you don't I need to do this live, Tom, I know, you know.

Tom Anderson (16m 32s)

Yeah, she could work at an Apple store.

Gannon Nordberg (16m 49s)

No, I've not.

Gannon Nordberg (16m 50s)

One thing that I--

Gannon Nordberg (16m 52s)

I was surprised by how quickly the voice came back.

Gannon Nordberg (16m 55s)

I was almost expecting a little bit of a delay after I finished talking, and then it coming back.

Gannon Nordberg (17m)

But it was very quick.

Gannon Nordberg (17m 1s)

So I was kind of like, oh, jeez, this is like I need to get ready for my next thought or my next, you know, request.

Jeff Battersby (17m 8s)

Yeah, I'm impressed by that too. That was really quick, which says to me that there's some onboard processing going on.

Jeff Battersby (17m 15s)

You know, it's not headed out to, you know, to servers and then coming back with an answer.

Jeff Battersby (17m 21s)

So, impressive.

Tom Anderson (17m 21s)

Yeah, and so, you know, it's obviously it's leaps and bounds of ahead of where Siri's at today.

Tom Anderson (17m 28s)

There's no question about that.

Jeff Battersby (17m 28s)

Yeah, okay, that's that's a very low bar, by the way.

Tom Anderson (17m 31s)

And I was telling, and I think I can't remember if I told both of you if I just told mentioned it to Kanan the other day, but I would like to have a button in CarPlay for that.

Tom Anderson (17m 45s)

It's not there yet.

Tom Anderson (17m 46s)

And you can do it.

Tom Anderson (17m 47s)

You can start it on your phone and do it over Bluetooth.

Tom Anderson (17m 50s)

of course, in the car if you wanted to.

Tom Anderson (17m 51s)

But I think the button in CarPlay would be nice because a lot of times you're driving to work stuck in a traffic lane and start thinking about something and I would really like to just kind of talk it through a little bit.

Gannon Nordberg (18m 3s)

You mean you get lowly, is that what you're saying?

Jeff Battersby (18m 5s)

No, right.

Tom Anderson (18m 6s)

Jeff doesn't call me during the week, he just sends me text messages and I can't text to drive.

Gannon Nordberg (18m 7s)  

• (laughs) Uh-huh.

Tom Anderson (18m 10s)

I use Siri, but that usually isn't incorrect, right?

Jeff Battersby (18m 12s)

That works not so well, right?

Jeff Battersby (18m 15s)

Well isn't that, that was one of the things that you, that you put in the show notes,

Jeff Battersby (18m 20s)

is that chat GPT needs a CarPlay app, and you know, who knows if that's coming or not,

Tom Anderson (18m 23s)

Yeah, right.

Jeff Battersby (18m 28s)

and whether or not Apple's going to allow such a thing.

Jeff Battersby (18m 31s)

Surprising to me, by the way, how few apps have CarPlay.

Jeff Battersby (18m 35s)

interfaces that I'd like to have.

Tom Anderson (18m 41s)

and Chick-fil-A does. Yeah. And I think you might be able to order. I'm not sure. I saw it on there once and I was like, Whoa. And I tapped on it, but I didn't do anything with it.

Jeff Battersby (18m 43s)

Chick-fil-a. Chick-fil-a. Yes.

Jeff Battersby (18m 47s)

For what possible purpose to find your next Chick-fil-a?

Jeff Battersby (18m 57s)

That's interesting.

Tom Anderson (19m)

So yeah. All right. So moving on, I think, but yeah. Hey, you know, the, the rumors were there a couple of years ago that Apple was two years behind with all this stuff.

Jeff Battersby (19m 2s)

OK.

Tom Anderson (19m 12s)

I think that is looking at where we are.

Tom Anderson (19m 15s)

I think that was probably true.

Tom Anderson (19m 19s)

I know they're working to catch up.

Tom Anderson (19m 21s)

Now, they are doing some things differently than other people with the private cloud compute and all that,

Tom Anderson (19m 26s)

which I think is great for the privacy perspective and everything.

Tom Anderson (19m 29s)

So behind in some ways, ahead in others, I think.

Tom Anderson (19m 33s)

But on the feature side of things, probably still playing a lot of catch up.

Tom Anderson (19m 36s)

Um...

Jeff Battersby (19m 37s)

Yeah and we'll just say or I'll just say you know in put my Apple tinfoil hat on for a second and you know Apple has a tendency to take something and iterate in a way that's better than most of what is around you know Blackberry to iPhone being the initial big jump so hopefully when they do this whatever and however however they iterate.

Jeff Battersby (20m 7s)

It will be something that is a step above what is currently available.

Jeff Battersby (20m 13s)

And yeah, I'm, I'm all down for the privacy.

Jeff Battersby (20m 15s)

That's one of the reasons that I'm reticent to use any of these things, because it's, um, I don't know.

Jeff Battersby (20m 23s)

And I feel like it's data collection with a happy voice.

Tom Anderson (20m 30s)

Yeah

Jeff Battersby (20m 31s)

I'm not cynical, right?

Jeff Battersby (20m 32s)

Not at all.

Tom Anderson (20m 32s)

And by the way, the the web search that they added to chat GPT is very good

Jeff Battersby (20m 35s)

Yeah.

Jeff Battersby (20m 37s)

Is it? [BLANK_AUDIO]

Tom Anderson (20m 38s)

Yeah, I don't again and if you've used that or not

Gannon Nordberg (20m 40s)

Not much actually, no.

Tom Anderson (20m 42s)

Yeah, so they added a there's like a globe icon You can click in the text box and then anything that you search on is basically an internet search But it comes back gives you the text but it sources everything so kind of like perplexity does

Gannon Nordberg (20m 53s)

Oh, nice.

Tom Anderson (20m 55s)

But yeah, it's been very good and it was handy. So

Tom Anderson (20m 58s)

That's good.

Tom Anderson (21m)

Anyway, we'll have more to say about Apple Intelligence, I'm sure, as the new things come out over the next months and years.

Tom Anderson (21m 8s)

Jeff, Gannon, we had a couple software updates lately.

Jeff Battersby (21m 9s)

Yeah. Yeah, we did. But um, those are behind me. I'm on the next betas. Yeah, everything's got a beta, beta man. Right.

Critical Software Updates

Tom Anderson (21m 17s)

Yes, you're beta man. That's it sound right beta man beta max

Jeff Battersby (21m 21s)

Right. No, no, no. All that to say that, um, you know, I am not

Tom Anderson (21m 24s)

Yeah, so I go ahead

Jeff Battersby (21m 31s)

on any of the current iterations of the OS's. So I'm on the

Gannon Nordberg (21m 36s)

I thought I was fully up to date the other day.

Gannon Nordberg (21m 38s)

And then, uh, I was reading through the news and saw 18.1.1 was out.

Gannon Nordberg (21m 42s)

And I'm like, oh, I'm sure I've got that.

Gannon Nordberg (21m 44s)

And I went into settings and into software update.

Gannon Nordberg (21m 47s)

And I'm like, oh shoot, there it is.

Gannon Nordberg (21m 48s)

Like I don't have it.

Gannon Nordberg (21m 49s)

So I was, uh, quickly jumping on that.

Gannon Nordberg (21m 52s)

Cause it sounds like that was one that, uh, is a real important one that fixes some vulnerabilities.

Tom Anderson (21m 58s)

Yeah, apparently a couple of zero days. I think we're in that. So that 18.1 is out. There was a Safari update

Tom Anderson (22m 6s)

Standalone from that for so if you're using the newer Safari on older versions of the operating system

Tom Anderson (22m 12s)

Of course Mac OS got an update vision OS got an update pretty much everything got an update. I think

Tom Anderson (22m 18s)

And along those lines with updates

iCloud Backup Support Changes

Tom Anderson (22m 21s)

Apple has ending iCloud backup support for older devices

Tom Anderson (22m 25s)

These are really old

Tom Anderson (22m 28s)

I was looking at that list and I was like, oh and that

Tom Anderson (22m 32s)

Doesn't that's really really old

Tom Anderson (22m 35s)

So as of December 18th, all devices must be running at least iOS 9

Tom Anderson (22m 42s)

Now we're on 18

Gannon Nordberg (22m 42s)

single digits.

Jeff Battersby (22m 43s)

Okay, right so ten-year-old device

Tom Anderson (22m 45s)

so I

Tom Anderson (22m 47s)

mean Right, which honestly I think Apple should get a little credit for that that they're even going that far back I mean, think about that. iOS 9, we're on 18.

Tom Anderson (22m 58s)

And so that that's if you're a listener, you have an old device, maybe it's something that you're, I don't know, kids using, I don't know, I don't know why you would back that up. But just be aware that we'll put a link in the show notes out to that.

Jeff Battersby (23m 15s)

Yeah.

Tom Anderson (23m 16s)

Okay, to get your updates. If you're on those old versions. There's a support article for that.

Jeff Battersby (23m 16s)

Cool.

Jeff Battersby (23m 20s)

Which you should always be doing on every device, by the way.

Tom Anderson (23m 23s)

Yeah.

Jeff Battersby (23m 23s)

You should always be checking for those updates to see what's up.

Jeff Battersby (23m 30s)

All right.

Jeff Battersby (23m 32s)

You know what?

Jeff Battersby (23m 32s)

I think it's time to jump into the main portion of our show, Tom.

Gannon’s Travel Gear & Tips

Jeff Battersby (23m 37s)

So, Gannon, you have been doing a lot of work on threads

Jeff Battersby (23m 43s)

in a couple of web--

Jeff Battersby (23m 46s)

And in particular, you've, it looks like,

Jeff Battersby (23m 50s)

started a new website that is really almost all travel-related,

Jeff Battersby (23m 55s)

as it relates to...

Gannon Nordberg (23m 55s)

Yeah, so I'm very tuned into all things kind of travel gear and mobile gear and desk gear.

Gannon Nordberg (24m 3s)

I just like, I like gear.

Gannon Nordberg (24m 4s)

What can I say?

Gannon Nordberg (24m 5s)

And so I created a free five day crash course that's to help you build a perfect travel tech kit.

Gannon Nordberg (24m 14s)

You know, the holidays are coming up.

Gannon Nordberg (24m 16s)

Summer vacations are behind us, but you know, spring break's not too far off.

Gannon Nordberg (24m 20s)

And a lot of times if you're traveling with kids, you know, they have devices and they need things

Gannon Nordberg (24m 25s)

and they need cables and they need bags and pouches and batteries and all that fun stuff.

Gannon Nordberg (24m 30s)

And so this crash course that I built is just a way for you to know what to pack, you know,

Gannon Nordberg (24m 35s)

avoid some of the mistakes.

Gannon Nordberg (24m 37s)

Don't forget any of the essential pieces and that'll keep everybody kind of entertained,

Gannon Nordberg (24m 42s)

whether it's, you know, on a plane or in a long car ride and just make for a more pleasant experience.

Gannon Nordberg (24m 48s)

And so in the course you get five emails.

Gannon Nordberg (24m 51s)

There's 4,500 words and I have a list of over 35 different texts.

Gannon Nordberg (24m 55s)

products that you can explore to just enhance your your family's travel experience and that's at buildafamilytraveltechkit.com. But what I really want to talk about today was my recent trip.

Gannon Nordberg (25m 8s)

So I live on the east coast. My brother and his wife live in Australia and my wife and I took a trip there. We've not been that far from home before. We left the kids with the grandparents

Gannon Nordberg (25m 22s)

And it was a terrific time.

Gannon Nordberg (25m 25s)

I love Australia, I would love to visit again soon.

Gannon Nordberg (25m 28s)

But I wanted to talk about what are some of the things that I brought with me.

Gannon Nordberg (25m 31s)

Of course, as you can imagine,

Gannon Nordberg (25m 33s)

it was a very long plane ride.

Gannon Nordberg (25m 35s)

They are 16 hours ahead of the East Coast in the US.

Gannon Nordberg (25m 41s)

So quite a time difference as well.

Gannon Nordberg (25m 43s)

Long flights, all that good stuff.

Gannon Nordberg (25m 46s)

So if it's all right, I wanted to just share what I've got in my travel bag and talk about what's there and maybe give some inspiration to the folks that are listening.

Jeff Battersby (25m 55s)

Yeah, what's there and why, you know, what it is about it that does it.

Gannon Nordberg (25m 55s)

There you go.

Jeff Battersby (25m 59s)

All right, kick us off.

Gannon Nordberg (26m)

So the thing that starts it all out is I have a little zippered pouch and this is where I just put all my stuff.

Gannon Nordberg (26m 7s)

So if you're not seeing anything on the screen, if you're just listening to audio, this is about the size of maybe an iPad mini or so.

Gannon Nordberg (26m 14s)

We'll see if we can do some sound effects.

Gannon Nordberg (26m 16s)

There's the zipper and it's just, well, you know, we're trying to enhance it here.

Jeff Battersby (26m 16s)

Oh, listen to that.

Tom Anderson (26m 17s)

Oh, it's our ASMR version. [laughs]

Gannon Nordberg (26m 21s)

I got to bring my A game for you guys.

Gannon Nordberg (26m 25s)

It's a Creek Packet gear pouch.

Gannon Nordberg (26m 27s)

It's around $17 or so as of this recording.

Gannon Nordberg (26m 30s)

They come in various sizes, but this is the small one and I found that it fits everything that I need to into my kit.

Jeff Battersby (26m 38s)

Awesome. So what kind of stuff do you put in there?

Gannon Nordberg (26m 38s)

All right.

Gannon Nordberg (26m 41s)

So the first thing that powers everything is this little Anker Nano 3 47 watt charger.

Gannon Nordberg (26m 48s)

It has a little foldable plug on the end, which is nice and handy to kind of keep those plugs out of the way.

Gannon Nordberg (26m 55s)

It has two USB-C ports, so one charges at 27 watts, the other charges at 20 watts, or you can charge a single device at 47 watts.

Gannon Nordberg (27m 4s)

But it's a nice, small, compact little charger that has lots of power with it and I'm sure they're on sale all over the place for Black Friday.

Tom Anderson (27m 13s)

Yeah, I have one of those. Those are great.

Jeff Battersby (27m 14s)

Yeah, and by the way, Anker's, oh, yeah, and I was going to say Anker's stuff is top notch.

Gannon Nordberg (27m 19s)

Agree

Jeff Battersby (27m 20s)

One of my favorite companies to get that kind of gear from. Really solid, well-designed,

Gannon Nordberg (27m 23s)

Yeah

Jeff Battersby (27m 26s)

and some of that was stolen when my stuff got ripped off. So anyway, enough about me.

Gannon Nordberg (27m 32s)

No, it's fine

Jeff Battersby (27m 34s)

Back on. What else goes in that bag?

Gannon Nordberg (27m 36s)

The next thing in mind is a product that Apple doesn't make anymore. This is the Apple MagSafe Duo

Gannon Nordberg (27m 42s)

Wireless charger, so this is a little foldable charger

Jeff Battersby (27m 44s)

Oh, I love that thing.

Gannon Nordberg (27m 45s)

It's got a kind of a magsafe puck on one side and then to have

Gannon Nordberg (27m 49s)

a little flip-up charger for your watch on the other. I love this thing. I know Apple doesn't make it anymore. I bought it on Amazon, you know, a year ago or something like that. It still works great. It does require a lightning port which is a little annoying since everything is USB-C these days it seems and then you just need a 20 watt power adapter. So our little Anker one that I've I've got with me works perfectly fine.

Gannon Nordberg (28m 12s)

Um, big.

Jeff Battersby (28m 13s)

Yeah, that by the way, it's unfortunate that Apple doesn't sell that.

Jeff Battersby (28m 17s)

That is on my desk presently for charging my phone and my watch and then easily slips into a pouch such as the one that you have.

Jeff Battersby (28m 25s)

So that's a great.

Tom Anderson (28m 28s)

Yeah, wonder if they'll bring something back maybe a different iteration of that thing

Jeff Battersby (28m 34s)

Yeah, I hope so.

Gannon Nordberg (28m 34s)

I hope so I don't know that's a good question

Tom Anderson (28m 35s)

Yeah, did it do did it fast charge the watch

Jeff Battersby (28m 42s)

Yeah, I don't know either whether or not it fast charges.

Tom Anderson (28m 46s)

So if they add USB-C and fast charge capabilities to charge you $40 more, hey, we're in business.

Gannon Nordberg (28m 48s)

Yeah, that would be nice

Gannon Nordberg (28m 51s)

Hmm. Yeah

Gannon Nordberg (28m 53s)

Well, I think I bought it for a hundred and thirty or something like that I mean it wasn't cheap, but at the time it was the only thing out there and now I don't know if you've seen this But the company 12 South has a butterfly

Gannon Nordberg (29m 5s)

Two and one chi-chi-chi two charger. That's very similar where it's like a little foldable

Gannon Nordberg (29m 11s)

Hockey puck kind of thing that you can charge two and two devices there

Gannon Nordberg (29m 15s)

so if you're looking for something like it and

Gannon Nordberg (29m 18s)

you can't get your hands on an old one from Apple,

Gannon Nordberg (29m 21s)

check out the one from 12 South.

Gannon Nordberg (29m 24s)

That'll be next on my list once this one kind of kicks the bucket.

Jeff Battersby (29m 27s)

And we'll try to add that to the show.

Tom Anderson (29m 31s)

Yeah, I think that's it there, right?

Gannon Nordberg (29m 33s)

Yeah, yeah, so look at that, I mean it looks very small and compact, you know it'll charge a couple devices and because it's got the Qi 2 support it should charge things faster too.

Gannon Nordberg (29m 46s)

Cool, so the next one is a little battery pack.

Gannon Nordberg (29m 51s)

So I'm just going to read the Amazon name of this because I think it's hilarious and you'll just indulge me for a minute.

Gannon Nordberg (29m 56s)

So this is the Victom X mini power bank, 10,000 milliamp hour, 22.5 watt fast charger.

Gannon Nordberg (30m 4s)

charger with power delivery 3.0 and QC 3.0, USB-C slim lightweight iPhone charger, dual output compatible with iPhone, Samsung, travel must haves.

Tom Anderson (30m 15s)

Wow, that's loaded up for SEO, isn't it?

Jeff Battersby (30m 15s)

Yeah, holy cow, that's the title?

Gannon Nordberg (30m 20s)

That is the name of the item on Amazon.

Gannon Nordberg (30m 22s)

So this is this is not a brand that I purchased things from before, but it's a small little you know battery pack, it's lightweight, it's thinner than a deck of cards, but maybe close

Gannon Nordberg (30m 33s)

in size.

Gannon Nordberg (30m 34s)

You can charge a device at 22.5 watts.

Gannon Nordberg (30m 38s)

This will charge a battery two times or an iPhone two times, which is nice.

Gannon Nordberg (30m 43s)

It has a little LED display on it that will show the battery charge level, which is handy if you reach in your bag and plug something into it, you can know like, oh, it's at 14%,

Gannon Nordberg (30m 53s)

maybe I need to charge the battery next time.

Gannon Nordberg (30m 56s)

You can charge two devices at once so it has a 20 watt USB-C port a 22.5 watt USB-A port.

Gannon Nordberg (31m 3s)

18 watt micro USB port and they've got a couple of different color options.

Gannon Nordberg (31m 9s)

So just having some a few different ports on the end is pretty handy for all the various devices that you're might be traveling with whether it's headphones or tablets or Kindles and that kind of stuff.

Jeff Battersby (31m 20s)

How long does it take to recharge that?

Gannon Nordberg (31m 23s)

I haven't timed it but maybe you know an hour or two of course it probably depends on what you're plugging it into if it's a high-powered charger.

Gannon Nordberg (31m 33s)

You're using a quick charge cable.

Gannon Nordberg (31m 34s)

If you charge it through USB-C,

Gannon Nordberg (31m 36s)

I think it charges faster.

Tom Anderson (31m 38s)

Yeah, that's something I don't have in my arsenal yet, is a battery pack like that to top things off while you're out.

Gannon Nordberg (31m 40s)

Hmm.

Tom Anderson (31m 44s)

Jeff, do you have anything like that?

Jeff Battersby (31m 45s)

Nope. You know, my car has wireless charging, so that's typically how I'm charging stuff.

Jeff Battersby (31m 53s)

Although it's not fast charging. If you're putting a lot of pressure on it, like streaming audio and using maps or something like that,

Jeff Battersby (32m 1s)

it basically maintains whatever you had, but it's not charging it.

Tom Anderson (32m 5s)

We'll hold it steady but not increase it.

Gannon Nordberg (32m 10s)

I use this a bunch in the airport. I mean, airports are funny because you can always tell where the outlets are in the kind of the gates, because everybody kind of hordes around an outlet and they're like tethered with their little three-foot lightning cable or whatever. And so this is nice to not have to be married to an outlet. You can still charge up your device while you're waiting for your flight to board and, you know, still have plenty of juice on the flight if you need it.

Tom Anderson (32m 36s)

Yeah, and that's good.

Tom Anderson (32m 37s)

And if you're on a long car trip, road trip,

Gannon Nordberg (32m 40s)

Yep.

Tom Anderson (32m 40s)

and you don't have so many outlets in the car that you can plug into, that'd be handy.

Tom Anderson (32m 45s)

Or like Jeff mentioned, you got a charger,

Tom Anderson (32m 46s)

but it's not robust like some of the wireless stuff is.

Tom Anderson (32m 51s)

Usually if you plug in in the car, you're okay,

Tom Anderson (32m 52s)

but you may run out.

Gannon Nordberg (32m 53s)

Mm-hmm

Tom Anderson (32m 54s)

So if you got to top off the kid's iPad or something,

Gannon Nordberg (32m 55s)

Yeah The other thing that I I kind of want but I don't really have a strong need for is like a mag safe battery pack That'll clip onto the back of your phone. I know Apple used to have one of those

Tom Anderson (32m 56s)

definitely good to have.

Gannon Nordberg (33m 9s)

I've actually got one here that I that still works fine But this is you know older the batteries showing some wear and tear it still charges through lightning

Gannon Nordberg (33m 18s)

But anchor again our buddies anchor they make a mag go power

Gannon Nordberg (33m 23s)

bank it's a 10,000 milliamp hour battery it's also Chi 2 certified it'll wirelessly charge at 15 watts which is part of the the new Chi 2 spec as I come to know it and then if you want to plug it in directly with a USB C cable it'll charge at 30 watts so that's one that I'm curious about and we'll make sure we have a link in the show notes if you're looking for something like that if you You don't want to necessarily tether up a cord to a battery.

Tom Anderson (33m 53s)

Yeah, nice

Gannon Nordberg (33m 53s)

I do still keep a couple of cables with me just in the event that something fails.

Gannon Nordberg (34m 5s)

You know, I'm of the mind that having backups and redundancies is important and I'm sure if you're listening to the show, you'll probably feel the same way.

Gannon Nordberg (34m 12s)

So the next item in my bag is an Apple Watch magnetic fast charging USB-C cable.

Gannon Nordberg (34m 18s)

Have you guys, do you realize how beautiful these cables are?

Gannon Nordberg (34m 23s)

They're woven, they're not even like, they're just like luscious cables.

Gannon Nordberg (34m 27s)

I don't know how to describe it, but I'm, I'm a huge fan of Apple's cables and I've got one of the USB-C cables too of kind of the same, the same material.

Jeff Battersby (34m 31s)

Yeah, yeah those new ones are pretty amazing you know that I saw some article the other day that it was kind of looking down at the old ones which got filthy and cracked. These are really quite amazing.

Tom Anderson (34m 35s)

Yeah.

Gannon Nordberg (34m 46s)

Mm-hmm

Gannon Nordberg (34m 50s)

And they fold up so nicely, you know Like they're not the rubber coated kind of silicone material that we're used to in years past there. They're really really nice cable So, you know what?

Tom Anderson (35m)

Yeah, you know what's funny about that is,

Tom Anderson (35m 2s)

originally those cables, even with the rubber exterior,

Tom Anderson (35m 7s)

they used to fold up really nicely too.

Gannon Nordberg (35m 9s)

Mm-hmm

Tom Anderson (35m 9s)

And then somewhere along the way,

Tom Anderson (35m 11s)

Apple changed that up and those things just were not,

Tom Anderson (35m 14s)

like they were funky and they just didn't want to do that.

Tom Anderson (35m 18s)

But yeah, the newer ones are really nice.

Tom Anderson (35m 21s)

I bought the new MagSafe charger,

Tom Anderson (35m 24s)

came out for the, when the 16 lineup came out,

Tom Anderson (35m 28s)

'cause it does the faster fast charging.

Tom Anderson (35m 31s)

And one notable thing with that is the puck itself is just a smidge thinner than the previous one.

Tom Anderson (35m 40s)

Doesn't matter if it's on your desk,

Tom Anderson (35m 41s)

but if you've got something that you put that puck into,

Tom Anderson (35m 43s)

like some people do,

Tom Anderson (35m 44s)

like they've got the little stands or whatever that they put them in.

Tom Anderson (35m 47s)

And I saw some people saying that it didn't quite fit flush as the other one did,

Tom Anderson (35m 51s)

and they had to kind of work with it a little bit,

Tom Anderson (35m 53s)

but it's been good.

Tom Anderson (35m 55s)

I mean, I love the wireless charging stuff just for the convenience, just pop it.

Tom Anderson (36m)

And obviously it's super easy to plug a cable into if you need to do that.

Tom Anderson (36m 3s)

So it's not a life changing thing, but, but I do like it.

Gannon Nordberg (36m 4s)

Mm-hmm.

Gannon Nordberg (36m 7s)

That's cool.

Jeff Battersby (36m 8s)

Again, I noticed when you showed us those cables, which again, not everybody's going to be able to see this, but you've got some pretty slick ties there.

Gannon Nordberg (36m 19s)

Mmm, I'm glad you asked Jeff. Thank you so much. This is the Cable Matters silicone magnetic cable tie. So the two ends are actually magnetic and so after you wrap it up you just kind of click these two ends together and it kind of stays tight. But this is a stretchy cable so you can really, you know, wrap it around as many times as you need to depending on the size of the cable. And yeah, I got these not too long ago and now I've got them all over the place. My kids like to just play.

Gannon Nordberg (36m 49s)

with them and they're great for the whole family.

Jeff Battersby (36m 50s)

Oh, I've been for years you know I used and still do velcro cables you know velcro cable ties and they're kind of a hassle I mean they they do work but they're not they're kind of imperfect I really like those those are those are pretty slick which by the way at this very moment in time I don't know if you guys have ever seen that that NPR sketch the Public Radio sketch where Molly Shannon, and I can't remember who...

Gannon Nordberg (37m)

Yeah

Jeff Battersby (37m 20s)

I just felt like I sounded like that. Those are really nice. You can use those to wrap up your cables. Yeah See, I changed it up. That's what I was feeling like

Gannon Nordberg (37m 24s)

Mm-hmm.

Tom Anderson (37m 24s)

Oh, you just did the NPR voice too.

Tom Anderson (37m 30s)

This is NPR.

Jeff Battersby (37m 34s)

Anyway, I really I really like those those cable those cable ties awesome. Thanks

Gannon Nordberg (37m 37s)

Yep, check them out.

Gannon Nordberg (37m 38s)

We'll have a link in the show notes for everybody.

Gannon Nordberg (37m 42s)

So the next thing is a--

Gannon Nordberg (37m 45s)

this is from a brand called Spigen.

Gannon Nordberg (37m 47s)

This is a three-in-one universal charger cable.

Gannon Nordberg (37m 52s)

Again, this is probably overkill,

Gannon Nordberg (37m 54s)

but if you're traveling with a family,

Gannon Nordberg (37m 55s)

you don't have an inventory of what kind of devices everyone's traveling with.

Gannon Nordberg (38m)

So this is a single USB-C cable--

Gannon Nordberg (38m 3s)

sorry, USB cable.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 4s)

This is USB-A. Boo.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 7s)

And it has micro USB, USB-C, and lightning.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 11s)

And so it has a little cap that you kind of just fit over top of it.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 14s)

And then you can plug your device into--

Gannon Nordberg (38m 17s)

plug the cable into any device.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 19s)

It is a nice nylon-braided cable.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 21s)

They come in a bunch of different colors.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 23s)

And it's just nice to have kind of like a single catch-all if one of the kids dropped their lightning cable at the rest stop or something like that.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 34s)

A cable stopped working.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 35s)

One of the pins gets damaged on the lightning cable.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 37s)

Whatever.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 38s)

And so just having kind of an extra that can accommodate multiple needs has been useful for me.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 46s)

Next-- all right, so this is the Studio Neat Glyph.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 52s)

This is a-- it attaches to a tripod.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 57s)

So this is kind of a combo pick.

Gannon Nordberg (38m 59s)

My other pick is the Ulanzi mini tripod stand.

Gannon Nordberg (39m 3s)

This is just a mini little tripod.

Gannon Nordberg (39m 6s)

I think this is a--

Gannon Nordberg (39m 8s)

on it, which is pretty standard.

Gannon Nordberg (39m 9s)

I hope they have the dimensions right there.

Gannon Nordberg (39m 11s)

But the glyph is something that you can attach either vertically or horizontally to kind of put your iPhone into.

Gannon Nordberg (39m 19s)

And so when I was in Australia,

Gannon Nordberg (39m 21s)

we were at different parks and things,

Gannon Nordberg (39m 23s)

and I've never been a fan of handing my phone to someone and saying, "Here, can you take our picture?"

Gannon Nordberg (39m 30s)

You know, call me paranoid, but I'm like,

Gannon Nordberg (39m 32s)

I know people do that all the time.

Gannon Nordberg (39m 33s)

It's probably not a big deal,

Gannon Nordberg (39m 34s)

but I like to have a little more control

Gannon Nordberg (39m 37s)

So I would prop this tripod up on a bench or on the sidewalk, put the glyph mount on top of it,

Gannon Nordberg (39m 44s)

and then put my phone inside of it.

Gannon Nordberg (39m 46s)

And then you could do the little timer from the phone itself.

Gannon Nordberg (39m 49s)

Or if you have an Apple Watch, I really like the,

Gannon Nordberg (39m 52s)

what is it, the remote camera capture?

Gannon Nordberg (39m 54s)

I forget what they call it.

Gannon Nordberg (39m 55s)

But that worked really well.

Gannon Nordberg (39m 57s)

And they're small and light enough.

Gannon Nordberg (39m 59s)

They're not metal, but they are sturdy materials.

Gannon Nordberg (40m 2s)

And so they're just big enough to put in my bag for those moments where you wanna.

Gannon Nordberg (40m 7s)

Capture a photo with everybody in it.

Gannon Nordberg (40m 9s)

You could even use it as kind of like a pseudo selfie stick.

Jeff Battersby (40m 13s)

And I'm looking at the actual phone holder, the piece of that, and it doesn't look like it's spring-loaded. It looks like it's got a...

Gannon Nordberg (40m 21s)

So it has a little plastic clip on it that's actually pretty sturdy, but once you unhinge it,

Gannon Nordberg (40m 26s)

then you can adjust based on what size phone you have.

Jeff Battersby (40m 27s)

Yeah, I like that.

Gannon Nordberg (40m 30s)

And then

Jeff Battersby (40m 30s)

So one of the things I run into, even, you know, I have a

Jeff Battersby (40m 33s)

light ring here, and that light ring has one of the spring-loaded ones,

Jeff Battersby (40m 38s)

and those things are such a pain in the neck to get to work, right?

Gannon Nordberg (40m 39s)

Hmm.

Gannon Nordberg (40m 39s)

Hmm.

Jeff Battersby (40m 43s)

Because what I find is I end up taking a screenshot with them or something, because you've got it, you know,

Jeff Battersby (40m 47s)

it's, they're not easy to manage to get your phones in. So I really like the fact that that's a...

Jeff Battersby (40m 54s)

It's got a lock on it, and you basically can pull it out without any spring tension, and then tighten it.

Tom Anderson (41m)  

• Yeah, and I think that's been around forever, right?

Gannon Nordberg (41m)

Yeah. Oh, yeah. A long time. So this is from Studio Neat. They make all kinds of really interesting but very specific products. You know, they've got a strong reputation of

Tom Anderson (41m 2s)

The glyph, that's been out for years and years and years.

Gannon Nordberg (41m 15s)

quality products, and that's one that's been in my bag for a long time.

Jeff Battersby (41m 19s)

I think they also make a cocktail app called Highball that I use while bartending.

Gannon Nordberg (41m 25s)

Oh, that's right.

Jeff Battersby (41m 30s)

So it's a great little app as well.

Jeff Battersby (41m 33s)

It hasn't been updated in a while, but they do make, they are kind of one-off, you know,

Jeff Battersby (41m 37s)

you kind of have to be in love with what it is that they're making, you know, some wooden iPhone holders and things like that.

Jeff Battersby (41m 44s)

But really, as you said, high quality, and I didn't realize that they made that.

Gannon Nordberg (41m 51s)

Then I've also I don't go anywhere without my trusty AirPods Pro - I've got these in my ears all the time

Gannon Nordberg (41m 58s)

during the day when I'm not traveling but

Gannon Nordberg (42m 1s)

you know airplanes are incredibly noisy just that that kind of the ambient noise in an airplane and

Gannon Nordberg (42m 7s)

having something in your ears to block out that that kind of noise and

Gannon Nordberg (42m 11s)

you know now that you can turn on the noise cancelling and

Gannon Nordberg (42m 15s)

Listen to something more pleasant than the the cabin noise

Gannon Nordberg (42m 19s)

they're always with me.

Gannon Nordberg (42m 22s)

There you go.

Gannon Nordberg (42m 23s)

Now I do have three,

Gannon Nordberg (42m 26s)

that's it for my travel tech kit, but I have three apps that I use the bunch for travel.

Gannon Nordberg (42m 30s)

Is it alright if I share those two?

Jeff Battersby (42m 32s)

Absolutely, please do.

Gannon Nordberg (42m 33s)

So one of them is an app called Time Shifter.

Gannon Nordberg (42m 36s)

So this is an app that will help you kind of combat the effects of jet lag by suggesting when to get more sunlight,

Gannon Nordberg (42m 44s)

when to take a nap, when to get some sleep, to just help you adjust with a big time zone change.

Gannon Nordberg (42m 51s)

And it does that by suggesting habits and things to do a few days leading up to a trip, but also a few days after a trip.

Gannon Nordberg (42m 59s)

Now if you're just going from east coast to west coast, maybe you don't need something like this.

Gannon Nordberg (43m 4s)

But like I said, Australia is 16 hours ahead of the east coast, so I knew it was going to be pretty drastic.

Gannon Nordberg (43m 10s)

And this app was helpful because at certain points it'll say, "Oh, try to take a two hour nap."

Gannon Nordberg (43m 17s)

or make sure you get plenty of sunlight and don't wear sunglass.

Gannon Nordberg (43m 22s)

or something like that.

Gannon Nordberg (43m 24s)

And whether it was coincidence or not,

Gannon Nordberg (43m 28s)

the jet lag that I experienced was so much less than I was expecting,

Gannon Nordberg (43m 33s)

especially for that big of a jump that I got to think this app had something to do with it.

Jeff Battersby (43m 38s)

Okay next step

Gannon Nordberg (43m 40s)

The next one is an app called Endel, E-N-D-E-L.

Gannon Nordberg (43m 43s)

So this is an app that creates kind of personalized soundscapes to help you either focus or relax,

Gannon Nordberg (43m 51s)

or use it to help you sleep.

Gannon Nordberg (43m 52s)

But it uses real-time inputs like your location and the weather outside.

Gannon Nordberg (43m 59s)

And if you have an Apple Watch,

Gannon Nordberg (44m)

it'll integrate your heart rate to just generate these adaptive sounds that are tailored to your current activity and your mood.

Gannon Nordberg (44m 8s)

I find myself, I'm a bit of an anxious traveler.

Gannon Nordberg (44m 11s)

And so, you know, while on the plane,

Gannon Nordberg (44m 13s)

I'll put in my AirPods 2, AirPods Pro 2,

Gannon Nordberg (44m 16s)

and then just put on kind of the relax mode.

Gannon Nordberg (44m 19s)

And it's just something that's going to help.

Gannon Nordberg (44m 21s)

chill me out a little bit and, you know, distract me from, you know, something that could otherwise be anxiety inducing. So I use it throughout the day when I'm working just as kind of focus music,

Gannon Nordberg (44m 33s)

but it also helps with travel. Last but not least is the iOS game Alto's Odyssey. Have you guys ever played that or heard of it? So I'm not a big game player, especially on iOS. But for some reason,

Jeff Battersby (44m 44s)

sigh I have.

Gannon Nordberg (44m 50s)

and every time I got on an air--

Gannon Nordberg (44m 51s)

airplane during takeoff and just like as we climb to the elevation that the plane's gonna be traveling to, I just love playing Alto's Odyssey. So this is an endless runner style game where you're a sandboarder across kind of an adventure in the desert and you're jumping over dunes and canyons and different obstacles. The soundtrack is terrific, so again if you've got noise canceling headphones you could just get sucked into the the soundtrack there. It's very kind of chill vibes.

Gannon Nordberg (45m 22s)

And worth checking out.

Gannon Nordberg (45m 23s)

I think it's also on Apple Arcade if you're an Apple Arcade subscriber.

Tom Anderson (45m 27s)

Nice. Yeah, good.

Jeff Battersby (45m 27s)

Yeah, I think it is, you're right. Awesome.

Jeff Battersby (45m 30s)

Alright, I have one last question for you. One final as it relates to travel gear.

Jeff Battersby (45m 36s)

So you've got, you know, all those little things. What kind of backpack or other bag are you putting that in?

Jeff Battersby (45m 44s)

What's your go-to bag for travel?

Gannon Nordberg (45m 48s)

So I've got the Tom Bihn Synapse 25,

Gannon Nordberg (45m 51s)

which I am in love with.

Gannon Nordberg (45m 52s)

I've had it for probably eight or nine or almost 10 years at this point.

Gannon Nordberg (45m 56s)

I think Tom's got a similar bag, or at least he did.

Gannon Nordberg (45m 59s)

And yeah, I just love it.

Gannon Nordberg (46m 1s)

So this little pouch fits inside one of the kind of front-facing pockets for me.

Gannon Nordberg (46m 7s)

And it's easy to reach in and grab it and pull it out through security checks and that kind of thing.

Gannon Nordberg (46m 12s)

But yeah, Tom Bihn.

Jeff Battersby (46m 15s)

Awesome. Well, Gannett, man, thank you, and just in time for Thanksgiving travel.

Close

Jeff Battersby (46m 22s)

You'll get this on Monday, and you'll have time to order it from whatever place,

Jeff Battersby (46m 26s)

and perhaps get it before you hop in the car on Wednesday to, you know,

Jeff Battersby (46m 30s)

visit grandma or whatever it is that you do.

Jeff Battersby (46m 33s)

Really appreciate you spending the time with us.

Gannon Nordberg (46m 36s)

It's a pleasure. I appreciate you guys. I listen to you every week and was just excited at the chance to jump on board and chat some more

Jeff Battersby (46m 44s)

And why don't you remind us of all your outlets, because you have a few.

Gannon Nordberg (46m 49s)

sure. So on social media I'm most active on threads and LinkedIn. I'm @GannonNordberg and if you want the free five-day crash course to kind of help you build the perfect travel tech kit so you know exactly what to pack and stay stress-free that is at buildAFamilyTravelTechKit.com.

Tom Anderson (47m 11s)

excellent yeah go sign up for that I did that when he first released it and a lot of good information in there and especially I think the thing to not overlook is the planning piece of that I kind of have an idea of who's going with you where you're going how long you're going to be going what charges you need and a lot of it will just depend on who you're traveling with right so if you've got kids and you know Nintendo switches and iPads and phones and laptops and

Tom Anderson (47m 41s)

it's out of control really the stuff the stuff we drag around with us but but that's what we do so yeah go sign up for that and Gannon as always it's pleasure having you on with us we do really appreciate

Gannon Nordberg (47m 42s)

Mm-hmm pretty much

Gannon Nordberg (47m 54s)

Thank you guys. Keep doing what you're doing.

Jeff Battersby (47m 55s)

Yeah Yeah, thank you. We're we're having fun. We really are. It's all always a good time

Tom Anderson (48m)

We are, we are.

Tom Anderson (48m 2s)

It's been a lot of fun.

Tom Anderson (48m 3s)

Episode 49, The Big Five-O coming up a couple of weeks.

Jeff Battersby (48m 5s)

Yeah, yeah, we're finally hitting the middle age

Jeff Battersby (48m 9s)

So once again basic a F show feedback at basic a F show calm and

Jeff Battersby (48m 16s)

We're really pleased that you've determined to burn another 45 or so minutes with us always better when we have a guest

Jeff Battersby (48m 25s)

Nobody wants to hear Tom and me every day

Jeff Battersby (48m 29s)

So feedback at basic a F show calm remember to like us share us let people know

Jeff Battersby (48m 36s)

About about us and we really are grateful for everyone who has

Jeff Battersby (48m 41s)

Passed us on to others and for our growing audience, and it really is growing so I

Tom Anderson (48m 47s)

Indeed

Jeff Battersby (48m 47s)

Think we'll catch up with Joe Rogan in another 50 or 60 years, so we'll be right there

Tom Anderson (48m 52s)

Only that many that's not bad. That's way better than I thought. Yeah. Nice. Look at us go

Jeff Battersby (48m 53s)

That's that's it. No, we'll get

Jeff Battersby (48m 55s)

there. Right, you know, I'll be a bag of bones here, but that's okay. Okay, good.

Tom Anderson (48m 58s)

Well, that's okay, it'll be alright

Gannon Nordberg (49m 1s)

I'll take over, don't worry.

Jeff Battersby (49m 3s)

Thanks, Gannon. Appreciate it. Pass it on to the younger generation.

Tom Anderson (49m 5s)

That's right, we need to bring some youth into the show

Tom Anderson (49m 9s)

That's right enjoy that train wreck kids

Tom Anderson (49m 13s)

But I guess that'll do it for this one. Thank you everybody for being here.

Tom Anderson (49m 17s)

Happy Thanksgiving to those celebrating this week in the U.S. or abroad if you're doing that.

Tom Anderson (49m 22s)

Have a great couple of weeks until we talk to you again, and have a great rest of your day or night.

Jeff Battersby (49m 27s)

See ya!

Outro Music (49m 29s)

♪ I don't wanna know about your imperfections ♪ ♪ Dude, prefer to leave you on a pedestal ♪ ♪ So I'll improve ♪ ♪ 'Cause if I'm finding out you know ♪ ♪ That I'm just like you ♪ ♪ That gon' smash my whole world ♪ ♪ Lost in illusion ♪ ♪ Drowning myself up in the sauce ♪ ♪ Put my glasses on backward ♪ ♪ And rewind my watch 'cause ♪