speaker-0: Welcome to Plugged In. I'm Katie. And today we're going behind the scenes with Brian Wolfe. Brian is a veteran technology writer and content strategist with over 15 years of experience. You've likely seen his bylines at TechRadar, Make You Sub, Digital Trends, Yahoo, and more. He's also held leadership roles at Future, PLC, and iMore and brings a unique MBA lens to the world of consumer tech. Brian, thank you so much for joining me to break down what we're going to talk about as the Tech Writers Toolkit today.
speaker-1: Thanks, glad to be here.
speaker-0: Awesome. Well, let's dive right in. So I want to just like set the stage, get a little bit of background on your day to day. So I'm curious how much time of your, ⁓ how much time do you spend writing, researching versus on the technical side? So unboxing troubles, troubleshooting, ⁓ stress, stress testing devices.
speaker-1: I would say ⁓ my bread and butter remains research and writing. ⁓ When I do get to do reviews or things like that, it's a welcome change of pace usually because they don't come as often. But it's like everything else. ⁓ You really never know what each day is going to be like. ⁓ If certain news happens, I have to react to that. If a box comes from UPS with a nice package in it that I was not expecting, it's always nice to open that up and say, ⁓ I have a new review I can do. it's, it's day to day is pretty different, which is kind of why I do it.
speaker-0: Awesome. I, um, I was going through your LinkedIn and I noticed you travel a lot. Are you working from home? Are you working remote? Like, cause especially when someone sends you stuff with devices, I'm just curious how you handle all of that.
speaker-1: Yeah, I do work at home. ⁓ I started all this when my kiddo was five years old and she's in college now. the original plan was I was doing this to be at home. So I was here for her when she wasn't in nursery school and everything. And obviously things have majorly changed. ⁓ When I'm traveling, I travel. Yeah. Probably not to write when I travel. But yeah, it's all homework.
speaker-0: I love that a little side gig turned into a full time. That's really cool and awesome. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm sure you've had thousands of products and things that you've tested kind of come across your desk over the years. So when a new device does come that you get to open it up and decide if you're going to review it or not, what are the top technical requirements that you're kind of looking at to see? Does this earn something to be written about?
speaker-1: I would say in 2026, the biggest thing I look for is what does the new product bring to the table that maybe the older product did not? Most companies now, it's not so much a brand new product, it's a new upgrade here and there. And they really have to impress me because, you know, everybody's watching what they're spending now, consumers. And it's very important to, first of all, let the consumer know whether they should upgrade to a certain new product. And if they don't, I don't tell them that. I just don't review the product usually, because that's not here to be negative. it has to excite me. It has to bring something new to the table. I fully admit that we're entering a maturing part of the consumer electronics time period, I guess is the best way to put it. But if it doesn't impress me, kind of box back in the mail and go from there.
speaker-0: Awesome. Yeah, yeah, that's how we think of lot about are we bringing are we solving a problem that people are still having or bringing something to the table that people haven't seen before. ⁓
speaker-1: And there is a lot of, and technology changes to the point where, you know, there is still a lot of evolving in products. It's just that from someone whose main job is to tell his audience the facts about something, it's always important to start with, is this product really worth somebody's time?
speaker-0: Yeah, yeah, I love that lens because people are taking, I spend a lot of time reading ⁓ articles and things that are out there and listening to podcasts is where I spend a lot of time as well. And yeah, if you're not adding value, why, why put it out there in kind of the first place? So I hear that.
speaker-1: People work hard for their money and yeah.
speaker-0: Yeah. So I know you've covered Apple devices a lot over the years. Are you an Apple guy or are you a Windows guy or do you kind of go back and forth? ⁓
speaker-1: Well, I tell everybody I have a MacBook Pro, but I have Windows 11 also installed on my MacBook Pro. I'm going to still lean towards the Apple side. If somebody comes up to me and they say, what do you think I should do to get a computer? I always say Mac. I have a father who's going to be 77 this year. He worked in education forever. And when he retired a few years ago, he said, I need a computer. What do I need? I said, do you need a Mac? And he said, I never used the Mac. And I said, that's fine. You're be able to use the Mac a lot easier than a Windows computer. But obviously, Windows is still the preferred platform for most, but I know how to use them both. I like certain things about every side of it.
speaker-0: Yeah, I'm curious with obviously we're coming off of the Apple announcement a few weeks ago with the Neo and the M5 chips. And yeah, I'm really curious your take when we talk about innovative products, what Apple did there and how you think it's kind of changing the market.
speaker-1: ⁓ I do like that they introduced the MacBook Neo because I think they did have to go after the more budget friendly market. I love the new colors. ⁓ My college daughter really wants one of those because kids in college really like the colors. ⁓ MacBook Pro, know, any of these devices with the M5, ⁓ any time they make the You know, processor better, that's a great thing. One thing that I'm not happy about with Apple lately though, is that they said goodbye to the Mac Pro. So for professionals, ⁓ they're really not showing them too much love in my opinion. They have the Mac Studio and then they have the MacBook Pro, which you can pretty much soup up to. I think I checked one time you could spend almost $10,000 on a MacBook Pro. So it's like, There's a big range of options available. But if you do not want to carry a computer, ⁓ like a laptop, ⁓ they aren't giving you really as much ⁓ options as they, in my opinion, should. But I'm not the bean counters. obviously were not selling the Mac Pros very well. So I don't begrudge them on that. ⁓ But yeah. It's a love-hate relationship with Apple right now. I do think on the Mac side, they could have gotten really stale, and they have not done that. And I do like the MacBook Neo in terms of what it will do to open more people up to the consumer market. So that's great.
speaker-0: Yeah. Yeah. I think it's really interesting. Some of the choices and decisions that they've made. And we were just talking internally yesterday about the Neo and how it's outperformed Apple's expectations in terms of how much demand is there. I think they are. I I want one too. I want the bright yellow. Yeah.
speaker-1: Cheers. Yeah, I I one thing that always drives me nuts when I'm buying a new Mac I always have to buy a MacBook Pro because of all the stuff that I do but what always upsets me is it's very bland I mean you you can get a black one or a gray one or whatever color they're calling it with that model, but there's nothing fun in terms of the colors, you know and with the the MacBook Neo and and just the MacBook Air they're always making fresh colors and it really looks a lot neccessary to me than the MacBook Pro but again, that's for the professional market so I completely understand that but they could throw me a green one from time to time or a red one would be great I don't know why they don't do stuff like that but again the bean counters know more than I do
speaker-0: Yeah. It's funny whenever we, we come out with new docking stations for Apple devices, we have to make sure that the dock matches aesthetically the laptop that it's designed for. So we're saying like, is this space gray enough or is this silver enough? And they, people care. They really care about the colors and making sure it matches.
speaker-1: They do sometimes surprise you. You you think you know what the new color, you know, they there is different shades of black and they sometimes surprise you. And I know from an accessory standpoint, it's like, oh, now they've changed this up a little. That little shade difference makes a difference.
speaker-0: It does. Yeah. Yeah. That's so funny. We've done a lot of, a lot of over the years. So, yeah, obviously we're talking about a lot of gear. I'm curious. Obviously there's a lot of stuff that comes across your desk and is there any tool or even just a piece of hardware that you have fired from your toolkit recently? Because maybe it was costing you more time than it was saving you.
speaker-1: Well, here I'm going to be negative about Apple again. And I'll preface this by saying I'm a writer at heart. I'm not, I'm not a creator in terms of that is not my main cap, but I was really impressed with their Apple creatives creator studio when it came out earlier this year. I think the price is right. But I think for most people, maybe even spending $30 a month is a lot of money, especially when there's so many great free products out there. So I kind of. stop subscribing to it, mainly because I wasn't using it the way I thought I would use it. But again, I'll fully admit, it's not what I do 100 % of my time, you know.
speaker-0: Yeah. Yeah. I even feel like with like all the AI subscriptions, I'm constantly looking back at the month. Okay. Did I use my canvas subscription? Did I use my chat GBT pro subscription? And like, yeah, you have to think.
speaker-1: Well, this one on the side with the AI, ⁓ I have noticed that sometimes I switch. And most of them are charging, think, $20 right now a month for the premium AI packages. That adds up pretty quickly. I I would love to have them all because they all have their unique niche. ⁓ It's not, there's no justification in buying more than one, but I have seen myself switch from month to month just based on something I hear. know, Gemini is adding this great new feature. Claude is doing the same and then you have to weigh that out. So sometimes I do ditch one for the other.
speaker-0: Yep, I've gone back and forth too many times and then I'm like, I'm gonna stay focused and become really great at this one. And then I'm like, ⁓ shiny new object. I need to go over here and try this one.
speaker-1: It's changing way too quickly.
speaker-0: Yeah. Yeah. So I was actually, I was reading your article yesterday about how you're using Claude code and how you used it to reorganize five years of obsidian notes. And so ⁓ I'm really curious about some of the stuff that you've been doing with AI and how it's actually improving how you work.
speaker-1: Okay, try to take it from a macro level. My life revolves around writing about tech. I am now involved in a vacation-based website, so I'm writing vacation ⁓ articles. I'm also writing a mystery novel that is set on Icon of the Seas, the ship. So I write a lot. I write about a lot of different stuff. So of course I have notes for everything. So I try to write ⁓ in one place and the notes pile up and they pile up and they pile up. And I noticed not too long ago that I had, there's nothing wrong with having hundreds of notes, but if you don't know where the note is and when you wrote it. And you you're writing your notes evolve in time, like how you create notes. So I, I use Claude and, ⁓ well, you read the article you, ⁓ it, and again, I'm not an AI expert. I'm not going to say I'm an expert at this point. I don't know how many people that are because everything's changing every day. But anyway, within a half hour, it organized everything. And the best part about it, it. It wasn't what I remembered that that wasn't important. Like I remembered certain notes. It's the things that I forgot or that I didn't document properly. Like if it doesn't have a title on and you just do it like on a regular search on a computer, like you can't find it. But with this tool, it just put everything together and it's like, ⁓ well, that's where that was. And you do forget a lot of stuff after how many years. So yeah, I was impressed.
speaker-0: Yeah, that's amazing. I know I was thinking about all my notes and how horribly done they are and I'm constantly like, command F, like trying to think about how I would have like typed this and finding it. And so yeah.
speaker-1: I get frustrated when ⁓ I spend a lot of time on a note and then completely forget about it. And because of this new tool that I'm using, I've seen notes and I'm like, you know, that was a really good idea. I wish I would have remembered that because, you know, you sometimes forget things day to day. So, yeah, so use it. I recommend it to anybody, really. You don't have to be an expert.
speaker-0: No, I know. feel like people think there's this huge barrier to entry or I need to know how to code or no, you don't. And but yeah, like you said, who can call themselves an expert when it's it's changing every week, there's new news out. So yeah, keeping up is hard, definitely.
speaker-1: And I can see people are very scared. ⁓ You and I had this discussion not too long ago about, you know, we don't really know where it's going. So that's part of what makes it scary to everybody that works in tech. you got to harness that. And if that means what you're doing in your job, even with personal stuff, if you're writing personal stuff, embrace the changes and it does. make your life a little bit easier, but they do have to continue to educate and people get very scared. And there's still headlines that come out every day that I can see scare people. I mean, I have people that you would think are very knowledgeable with computers and they are, but they will not go near AI because. I don't know what they think is gonna happen. Like, I guess they think they're just gonna completely control their computer and take all their personal information. And honestly, that can happen, but that only happens if you tell the AI to do that. companies like Google, they need to constantly educate people and maybe they're not doing a great job at that.
speaker-0: Yeah, yeah, it's almost it almost feels like all these tools have been thrown out there and they say go and for some people Yeah, you hear you see the headlines and you're like, ⁓ my gosh security privacy. Well, and you don't
speaker-1: ⁓ And this is knee deep in the weeds, but and you go to their home page like and then you get a pop up and it's like now you can do this. And it's like, well, I don't really want to do this right now, but I will later. But it's like, I haven't learned how to do this. And now there's this, you know, and it's like, OK, and it just like I embrace it. But I can see how people are scared.
speaker-0: Mm-hmm. Yeah, I got the pop-up of connect all of your apps and I was like, oh IT warning. I don't know I don't think I should be doing this
speaker-1: I have some scary stories for another time, but yeah, it's. Anything that makes me anytime they say something that is like, really somebody like. Referring back to something that you discussed with them even a month ago and it's like, how do you remember that? And do you ever use them with the voice? Like I use in the car like, especially with. When I'm planning this book and we're talking back and forth and a few weeks ago, I was on my way somewhere and I stopped at Duncan and I was in the drive through and I ordered, I don't know. was like a, one of those new drinks, a protein blueberry protein drink. Well, anyway, the day went on and later I go into Claude and he, I'm saying he, because he has a British accent, at least where I'm listening. He said, how was your protein drink? And it really, it really messed me. And I said, how did you know that? And he said, you left your mic on, on your phone. And that made me feel a lot better because there was a reason for that. Cause you know, some of these things like ⁓ Apple or Amazon, sometimes you hear these horror stories where they are listening in on your home. But it kind of scared me. was like, how did you know that I had that drink? ⁓
speaker-0: Well, and for it to ask you about it, that would throw me off of like-
speaker-1: It wasn't like I said, hey, I'm hungry. Can you recommend some local places to eat? It was just like a random thing. ⁓ by the way, how did you like your drink? it's like, ⁓ Things don't surprise me so much, but that really surprised me.
speaker-0: ⁓ my gosh, now I'm worried it's gonna be watching my Uber Eats orders and saying you said Dunkin'. I'm like, ⁓ my Dunkin' obsession. And it's gonna say, here's your Dunkin', it's on the way. And I'm like, please don't, I don't need any more Dunkin' than I already have. Yeah. I feel like AI has become a huge flashy term. You see it everywhere. There's AI, mouses, AI desktops. And so I'm curious if you, there's been any AI devices that actually have solved bottlenecks for you or you found useful.
speaker-1: I'm going to be perfectly honest with you and say as much as I embrace AI as a software product on my computer or on my phone, as far as mice and things like that go, I'm not impressed with that yet. A lot of that stuff is just gimmicky right now. It may not be in three months, ⁓ but I haven't really embraced any of that. I can see where it's going. It's going to be a big thing that they're going to want to slap on AI on the box. ⁓ And there's going to be a fight between all the developers, like, OK, ⁓ Google's going to sign a contract with this accessory maker. we're going to, this includes AI. But I would say right now, I'm not there to be comfortable with having AI take over my hardware in that sense, if that makes sense.
speaker-0: Yeah, we're very early, early stages. And ⁓ yeah, even here at Plugable, that's on our long-term roadmap of where we're headed and where we're going. Closest thing we've gotten right now is our Thunderbolt 5 AI enclosure for local AI. yeah, even then, it's still very early, early days in terms of people implementing these types of solutions in an effective way.
speaker-1: Yeah, and I mean, seriously, in six months, we could be talking about something completely different. I don't expect this is going to be like five years down the road. This is going to be six months a year.
speaker-0: Yeah, and it'll be an explosion. I'm sure I'm very curious what CES 2027 is going to look like.
speaker-1: Just gonna say that. I actually was right on the tip of my tongue. was like, we may hear more in January. Yeah, of course. Yeah. Yeah. I, and even then, mean, I tried to explain to somebody a while ago and this ages me a little bit, but I think AI is a lot like when the internet went mainstream. There's just so much about it that it's like, it's not in this contained box right now. And Society as a whole is going to have to decide where we're going to allow AI and where we're not going to allow AI. And I think that once we get to that point, the masses are going to embrace it just like they obviously embrace the internet. yeah, CES is where we're going to see a lot of this stuff.
speaker-0: Yes. Yeah, I agree. All right. Final question for you. So obviously you've had as ⁓ a tech writer, you've had a unique view into products, software, a whole bunch of things over your career. So I'm curious if there's ⁓ one specific piece of gear or software in your kit right now that like you can't live without or it's unswappable.
speaker-1: Okay, I actually have three, but you'll understand why I have three. Okay, all I need to do to live and make money is my computer, which is a Mac. Obviously I needed internet connection and I will throw in there right now, Claude, which is my number one AI assistant. Those three let me run my life. ⁓ I could not.
speaker-0: I'll take it.
speaker-1: A would be the third thing I'd get rid of, but obviously a computer and the internet and I can do everything.
speaker-0: I love that simple, but also ⁓ so important to making sure that you can function in every which way possible.
speaker-1: You can have anything shipped to your house. You can have. Uber eats, can have the local grocery store, can have somebody come and pick up your old clothes, I guess, if you want. ⁓ But yes, those are the top three things. And nothing else. Yeah. Yeah. Don't need a printer. Don't need stuff like that. Just those three things.
speaker-0: I love that. Yeah, it's very true.
speaker-1: You might add a phone too, probably.
speaker-0: Yeah, we have the conversation a lot around laptop first phone and where the world is headed and are you going to be able to replace your phone with your laptop someday? right now when I travel, like even if I feel like I'm going to have to work at some point, I bring my laptop. I just cannot function solely on my phone just yet. So I'm with you laptop first, then phone.
speaker-1: Yeah, I used to think that tablets would take over and replace my computer, but I still don't think that's where they are. So. They tried. Did you try?
speaker-0: Yeah, I tried. did. Yeah. Yeah. I tried with my iPad pro and got the keyboard and everything. And I even struggle just to do just normal like productivity work in docs and do Google calls. And it's just clunky. It's not easy.
speaker-1: My iPad Pro has become basically my television where I watch Netflix every night before I go to bed and that's about it and check my email and stuff. But yeah, yeah, it has not replaced the computer.
speaker-0: Nope, I agree. Yeah. Well, thank you so much. It was a pleasure talking to you. this was fun. It was, Awesome. Well, thank you, Brian.
speaker-1: Yes, anytime.
speaker-1: Thanks, glad to be here.
speaker-0: Awesome. Well, let's dive right in. So I want to just like set the stage, get a little bit of background on your day to day. So I'm curious how much time of your, ⁓ how much time do you spend writing, researching versus on the technical side? So unboxing troubles, troubleshooting, ⁓ stress, stress testing devices.
speaker-1: I would say ⁓ my bread and butter remains research and writing. ⁓ When I do get to do reviews or things like that, it's a welcome change of pace usually because they don't come as often. But it's like everything else. ⁓ You really never know what each day is going to be like. ⁓ If certain news happens, I have to react to that. If a box comes from UPS with a nice package in it that I was not expecting, it's always nice to open that up and say, ⁓ I have a new review I can do. it's, it's day to day is pretty different, which is kind of why I do it.
speaker-0: Awesome. I, um, I was going through your LinkedIn and I noticed you travel a lot. Are you working from home? Are you working remote? Like, cause especially when someone sends you stuff with devices, I'm just curious how you handle all of that.
speaker-1: Yeah, I do work at home. ⁓ I started all this when my kiddo was five years old and she's in college now. the original plan was I was doing this to be at home. So I was here for her when she wasn't in nursery school and everything. And obviously things have majorly changed. ⁓ When I'm traveling, I travel. Yeah. Probably not to write when I travel. But yeah, it's all homework.
speaker-0: I love that a little side gig turned into a full time. That's really cool and awesome. Yeah. Yeah. So I'm sure you've had thousands of products and things that you've tested kind of come across your desk over the years. So when a new device does come that you get to open it up and decide if you're going to review it or not, what are the top technical requirements that you're kind of looking at to see? Does this earn something to be written about?
speaker-1: I would say in 2026, the biggest thing I look for is what does the new product bring to the table that maybe the older product did not? Most companies now, it's not so much a brand new product, it's a new upgrade here and there. And they really have to impress me because, you know, everybody's watching what they're spending now, consumers. And it's very important to, first of all, let the consumer know whether they should upgrade to a certain new product. And if they don't, I don't tell them that. I just don't review the product usually, because that's not here to be negative. it has to excite me. It has to bring something new to the table. I fully admit that we're entering a maturing part of the consumer electronics time period, I guess is the best way to put it. But if it doesn't impress me, kind of box back in the mail and go from there.
speaker-0: Awesome. Yeah, yeah, that's how we think of lot about are we bringing are we solving a problem that people are still having or bringing something to the table that people haven't seen before. ⁓
speaker-1: And there is a lot of, and technology changes to the point where, you know, there is still a lot of evolving in products. It's just that from someone whose main job is to tell his audience the facts about something, it's always important to start with, is this product really worth somebody's time?
speaker-0: Yeah, yeah, I love that lens because people are taking, I spend a lot of time reading ⁓ articles and things that are out there and listening to podcasts is where I spend a lot of time as well. And yeah, if you're not adding value, why, why put it out there in kind of the first place? So I hear that.
speaker-1: People work hard for their money and yeah.
speaker-0: Yeah. So I know you've covered Apple devices a lot over the years. Are you an Apple guy or are you a Windows guy or do you kind of go back and forth? ⁓
speaker-1: Well, I tell everybody I have a MacBook Pro, but I have Windows 11 also installed on my MacBook Pro. I'm going to still lean towards the Apple side. If somebody comes up to me and they say, what do you think I should do to get a computer? I always say Mac. I have a father who's going to be 77 this year. He worked in education forever. And when he retired a few years ago, he said, I need a computer. What do I need? I said, do you need a Mac? And he said, I never used the Mac. And I said, that's fine. You're be able to use the Mac a lot easier than a Windows computer. But obviously, Windows is still the preferred platform for most, but I know how to use them both. I like certain things about every side of it.
speaker-0: Yeah, I'm curious with obviously we're coming off of the Apple announcement a few weeks ago with the Neo and the M5 chips. And yeah, I'm really curious your take when we talk about innovative products, what Apple did there and how you think it's kind of changing the market.
speaker-1: ⁓ I do like that they introduced the MacBook Neo because I think they did have to go after the more budget friendly market. I love the new colors. ⁓ My college daughter really wants one of those because kids in college really like the colors. ⁓ MacBook Pro, know, any of these devices with the M5, ⁓ any time they make the You know, processor better, that's a great thing. One thing that I'm not happy about with Apple lately though, is that they said goodbye to the Mac Pro. So for professionals, ⁓ they're really not showing them too much love in my opinion. They have the Mac Studio and then they have the MacBook Pro, which you can pretty much soup up to. I think I checked one time you could spend almost $10,000 on a MacBook Pro. So it's like, There's a big range of options available. But if you do not want to carry a computer, ⁓ like a laptop, ⁓ they aren't giving you really as much ⁓ options as they, in my opinion, should. But I'm not the bean counters. obviously were not selling the Mac Pros very well. So I don't begrudge them on that. ⁓ But yeah. It's a love-hate relationship with Apple right now. I do think on the Mac side, they could have gotten really stale, and they have not done that. And I do like the MacBook Neo in terms of what it will do to open more people up to the consumer market. So that's great.
speaker-0: Yeah. Yeah. I think it's really interesting. Some of the choices and decisions that they've made. And we were just talking internally yesterday about the Neo and how it's outperformed Apple's expectations in terms of how much demand is there. I think they are. I I want one too. I want the bright yellow. Yeah.
speaker-1: Cheers. Yeah, I I one thing that always drives me nuts when I'm buying a new Mac I always have to buy a MacBook Pro because of all the stuff that I do but what always upsets me is it's very bland I mean you you can get a black one or a gray one or whatever color they're calling it with that model, but there's nothing fun in terms of the colors, you know and with the the MacBook Neo and and just the MacBook Air they're always making fresh colors and it really looks a lot neccessary to me than the MacBook Pro but again, that's for the professional market so I completely understand that but they could throw me a green one from time to time or a red one would be great I don't know why they don't do stuff like that but again the bean counters know more than I do
speaker-0: Yeah. It's funny whenever we, we come out with new docking stations for Apple devices, we have to make sure that the dock matches aesthetically the laptop that it's designed for. So we're saying like, is this space gray enough or is this silver enough? And they, people care. They really care about the colors and making sure it matches.
speaker-1: They do sometimes surprise you. You you think you know what the new color, you know, they there is different shades of black and they sometimes surprise you. And I know from an accessory standpoint, it's like, oh, now they've changed this up a little. That little shade difference makes a difference.
speaker-0: It does. Yeah. Yeah. That's so funny. We've done a lot of, a lot of over the years. So, yeah, obviously we're talking about a lot of gear. I'm curious. Obviously there's a lot of stuff that comes across your desk and is there any tool or even just a piece of hardware that you have fired from your toolkit recently? Because maybe it was costing you more time than it was saving you.
speaker-1: Well, here I'm going to be negative about Apple again. And I'll preface this by saying I'm a writer at heart. I'm not, I'm not a creator in terms of that is not my main cap, but I was really impressed with their Apple creatives creator studio when it came out earlier this year. I think the price is right. But I think for most people, maybe even spending $30 a month is a lot of money, especially when there's so many great free products out there. So I kind of. stop subscribing to it, mainly because I wasn't using it the way I thought I would use it. But again, I'll fully admit, it's not what I do 100 % of my time, you know.
speaker-0: Yeah. Yeah. I even feel like with like all the AI subscriptions, I'm constantly looking back at the month. Okay. Did I use my canvas subscription? Did I use my chat GBT pro subscription? And like, yeah, you have to think.
speaker-1: Well, this one on the side with the AI, ⁓ I have noticed that sometimes I switch. And most of them are charging, think, $20 right now a month for the premium AI packages. That adds up pretty quickly. I I would love to have them all because they all have their unique niche. ⁓ It's not, there's no justification in buying more than one, but I have seen myself switch from month to month just based on something I hear. know, Gemini is adding this great new feature. Claude is doing the same and then you have to weigh that out. So sometimes I do ditch one for the other.
speaker-0: Yep, I've gone back and forth too many times and then I'm like, I'm gonna stay focused and become really great at this one. And then I'm like, ⁓ shiny new object. I need to go over here and try this one.
speaker-1: It's changing way too quickly.
speaker-0: Yeah. Yeah. So I was actually, I was reading your article yesterday about how you're using Claude code and how you used it to reorganize five years of obsidian notes. And so ⁓ I'm really curious about some of the stuff that you've been doing with AI and how it's actually improving how you work.
speaker-1: Okay, try to take it from a macro level. My life revolves around writing about tech. I am now involved in a vacation-based website, so I'm writing vacation ⁓ articles. I'm also writing a mystery novel that is set on Icon of the Seas, the ship. So I write a lot. I write about a lot of different stuff. So of course I have notes for everything. So I try to write ⁓ in one place and the notes pile up and they pile up and they pile up. And I noticed not too long ago that I had, there's nothing wrong with having hundreds of notes, but if you don't know where the note is and when you wrote it. And you you're writing your notes evolve in time, like how you create notes. So I, I use Claude and, ⁓ well, you read the article you, ⁓ it, and again, I'm not an AI expert. I'm not going to say I'm an expert at this point. I don't know how many people that are because everything's changing every day. But anyway, within a half hour, it organized everything. And the best part about it, it. It wasn't what I remembered that that wasn't important. Like I remembered certain notes. It's the things that I forgot or that I didn't document properly. Like if it doesn't have a title on and you just do it like on a regular search on a computer, like you can't find it. But with this tool, it just put everything together and it's like, ⁓ well, that's where that was. And you do forget a lot of stuff after how many years. So yeah, I was impressed.
speaker-0: Yeah, that's amazing. I know I was thinking about all my notes and how horribly done they are and I'm constantly like, command F, like trying to think about how I would have like typed this and finding it. And so yeah.
speaker-1: I get frustrated when ⁓ I spend a lot of time on a note and then completely forget about it. And because of this new tool that I'm using, I've seen notes and I'm like, you know, that was a really good idea. I wish I would have remembered that because, you know, you sometimes forget things day to day. So, yeah, so use it. I recommend it to anybody, really. You don't have to be an expert.
speaker-0: No, I know. feel like people think there's this huge barrier to entry or I need to know how to code or no, you don't. And but yeah, like you said, who can call themselves an expert when it's it's changing every week, there's new news out. So yeah, keeping up is hard, definitely.
speaker-1: And I can see people are very scared. ⁓ You and I had this discussion not too long ago about, you know, we don't really know where it's going. So that's part of what makes it scary to everybody that works in tech. you got to harness that. And if that means what you're doing in your job, even with personal stuff, if you're writing personal stuff, embrace the changes and it does. make your life a little bit easier, but they do have to continue to educate and people get very scared. And there's still headlines that come out every day that I can see scare people. I mean, I have people that you would think are very knowledgeable with computers and they are, but they will not go near AI because. I don't know what they think is gonna happen. Like, I guess they think they're just gonna completely control their computer and take all their personal information. And honestly, that can happen, but that only happens if you tell the AI to do that. companies like Google, they need to constantly educate people and maybe they're not doing a great job at that.
speaker-0: Yeah, yeah, it's almost it almost feels like all these tools have been thrown out there and they say go and for some people Yeah, you hear you see the headlines and you're like, ⁓ my gosh security privacy. Well, and you don't
speaker-1: ⁓ And this is knee deep in the weeds, but and you go to their home page like and then you get a pop up and it's like now you can do this. And it's like, well, I don't really want to do this right now, but I will later. But it's like, I haven't learned how to do this. And now there's this, you know, and it's like, OK, and it just like I embrace it. But I can see how people are scared.
speaker-0: Mm-hmm. Yeah, I got the pop-up of connect all of your apps and I was like, oh IT warning. I don't know I don't think I should be doing this
speaker-1: I have some scary stories for another time, but yeah, it's. Anything that makes me anytime they say something that is like, really somebody like. Referring back to something that you discussed with them even a month ago and it's like, how do you remember that? And do you ever use them with the voice? Like I use in the car like, especially with. When I'm planning this book and we're talking back and forth and a few weeks ago, I was on my way somewhere and I stopped at Duncan and I was in the drive through and I ordered, I don't know. was like a, one of those new drinks, a protein blueberry protein drink. Well, anyway, the day went on and later I go into Claude and he, I'm saying he, because he has a British accent, at least where I'm listening. He said, how was your protein drink? And it really, it really messed me. And I said, how did you know that? And he said, you left your mic on, on your phone. And that made me feel a lot better because there was a reason for that. Cause you know, some of these things like ⁓ Apple or Amazon, sometimes you hear these horror stories where they are listening in on your home. But it kind of scared me. was like, how did you know that I had that drink? ⁓
speaker-0: Well, and for it to ask you about it, that would throw me off of like-
speaker-1: It wasn't like I said, hey, I'm hungry. Can you recommend some local places to eat? It was just like a random thing. ⁓ by the way, how did you like your drink? it's like, ⁓ Things don't surprise me so much, but that really surprised me.
speaker-0: ⁓ my gosh, now I'm worried it's gonna be watching my Uber Eats orders and saying you said Dunkin'. I'm like, ⁓ my Dunkin' obsession. And it's gonna say, here's your Dunkin', it's on the way. And I'm like, please don't, I don't need any more Dunkin' than I already have. Yeah. I feel like AI has become a huge flashy term. You see it everywhere. There's AI, mouses, AI desktops. And so I'm curious if you, there's been any AI devices that actually have solved bottlenecks for you or you found useful.
speaker-1: I'm going to be perfectly honest with you and say as much as I embrace AI as a software product on my computer or on my phone, as far as mice and things like that go, I'm not impressed with that yet. A lot of that stuff is just gimmicky right now. It may not be in three months, ⁓ but I haven't really embraced any of that. I can see where it's going. It's going to be a big thing that they're going to want to slap on AI on the box. ⁓ And there's going to be a fight between all the developers, like, OK, ⁓ Google's going to sign a contract with this accessory maker. we're going to, this includes AI. But I would say right now, I'm not there to be comfortable with having AI take over my hardware in that sense, if that makes sense.
speaker-0: Yeah, we're very early, early stages. And ⁓ yeah, even here at Plugable, that's on our long-term roadmap of where we're headed and where we're going. Closest thing we've gotten right now is our Thunderbolt 5 AI enclosure for local AI. yeah, even then, it's still very early, early days in terms of people implementing these types of solutions in an effective way.
speaker-1: Yeah, and I mean, seriously, in six months, we could be talking about something completely different. I don't expect this is going to be like five years down the road. This is going to be six months a year.
speaker-0: Yeah, and it'll be an explosion. I'm sure I'm very curious what CES 2027 is going to look like.
speaker-1: Just gonna say that. I actually was right on the tip of my tongue. was like, we may hear more in January. Yeah, of course. Yeah. Yeah. I, and even then, mean, I tried to explain to somebody a while ago and this ages me a little bit, but I think AI is a lot like when the internet went mainstream. There's just so much about it that it's like, it's not in this contained box right now. And Society as a whole is going to have to decide where we're going to allow AI and where we're not going to allow AI. And I think that once we get to that point, the masses are going to embrace it just like they obviously embrace the internet. yeah, CES is where we're going to see a lot of this stuff.
speaker-0: Yes. Yeah, I agree. All right. Final question for you. So obviously you've had as ⁓ a tech writer, you've had a unique view into products, software, a whole bunch of things over your career. So I'm curious if there's ⁓ one specific piece of gear or software in your kit right now that like you can't live without or it's unswappable.
speaker-1: Okay, I actually have three, but you'll understand why I have three. Okay, all I need to do to live and make money is my computer, which is a Mac. Obviously I needed internet connection and I will throw in there right now, Claude, which is my number one AI assistant. Those three let me run my life. ⁓ I could not.
speaker-0: I'll take it.
speaker-1: A would be the third thing I'd get rid of, but obviously a computer and the internet and I can do everything.
speaker-0: I love that simple, but also ⁓ so important to making sure that you can function in every which way possible.
speaker-1: You can have anything shipped to your house. You can have. Uber eats, can have the local grocery store, can have somebody come and pick up your old clothes, I guess, if you want. ⁓ But yes, those are the top three things. And nothing else. Yeah. Yeah. Don't need a printer. Don't need stuff like that. Just those three things.
speaker-0: I love that. Yeah, it's very true.
speaker-1: You might add a phone too, probably.
speaker-0: Yeah, we have the conversation a lot around laptop first phone and where the world is headed and are you going to be able to replace your phone with your laptop someday? right now when I travel, like even if I feel like I'm going to have to work at some point, I bring my laptop. I just cannot function solely on my phone just yet. So I'm with you laptop first, then phone.
speaker-1: Yeah, I used to think that tablets would take over and replace my computer, but I still don't think that's where they are. So. They tried. Did you try?
speaker-0: Yeah, I tried. did. Yeah. Yeah. I tried with my iPad pro and got the keyboard and everything. And I even struggle just to do just normal like productivity work in docs and do Google calls. And it's just clunky. It's not easy.
speaker-1: My iPad Pro has become basically my television where I watch Netflix every night before I go to bed and that's about it and check my email and stuff. But yeah, yeah, it has not replaced the computer.
speaker-0: Nope, I agree. Yeah. Well, thank you so much. It was a pleasure talking to you. this was fun. It was, Awesome. Well, thank you, Brian.
speaker-1: Yes, anytime.
