DaveMason.com
ComputerTalk with Dave Mason
The official archive of all available ComputerTalk with Dave Mason radio shows. Spend some time with Dave. Listen to a full show or explore clips by topic.
3,475 unique clips. Each clip appears in one section. Historical conversations, not current advice. Full episodes remain available separately by date.
562 clips, strongest first.
Dr. Dave explains why a reported international Citibank incident was historically alarming: attackers appeared to have obtained not only account data but also PIN information. His account captures a moment when the financial industry was still trying to determine which processor or system had been compromised.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Dr. Dave doubts that Microsoft’s intermediate sized Origami device can replace either a phone or a useful laptop. Instead, he predicts that people will keep a screen and keyboard sized for human hands while phone, music and personal functions move into connected glasses, an earpiece or a watch, including a heads up display linked to the main computer.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Dr. Dave and Evil Steve mark the first reported full month in which notebook retail sales exceeded desktops in the United States. They explain why a single portable computer, paired with a full size monitor and keyboard at home, could replace two machines and eliminate synchronization.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Dr. Dave reports limited AT&T trials to move customers from conventional copper telephone lines to Internet Protocol service. He sees the transition as overdue, predicts wider adoption within the next several years and explains why an IP network could be less expensive and easier for a provider to manage and extend.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Dr. Dave and Evil Steve explain why scratch-resistant strengthened glass mattered as phones and other portable devices moved into pockets and daily use. Their CES-era discussion captures Gorilla Glass 2 as a newly stronger material expected to spread across high-end smartphones and laptops.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Dr. Dave welcomes Google News customization and explains why a clean, efficient service with personally chosen subjects matters more to him than a crowded general news page. The discussion captures an early stage of personalized online news.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
A period discussion of moving from miniature spinning disks toward solid-state storage and the practical limits of ever-smaller cards. The speculation and human usability concerns are the point, not specific card deals.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
A major platform transition explained through bottlenecks, compatibility and the cost of replacing components. This is broad computer history, not a small product deal. Keep the advice that an immediate need may outweigh waiting.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
The arrival of Windows 7 Service Pack 1 lets Dr. Dave document a major platform milestone, explain why he would wait briefly before installing it and summarize the update’s role as both a catch-up package and a collection of smaller improvements.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Major operating-system preview includes Spotlight, VoiceOver accessibility, Dashboard and comparison with awaited Longhorn.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Looking back from the releases of Internet Explorer 9 and Firefox 4, Dr. Dave remembers admiring Chrome’s unusually simple interface even before he was ready to recommend it and argues that the other browsers’ redesigns showed how influential that approach had become.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
As carriers consider placing outside advertising on cell phones, Dr. Dave objects to a paid device becoming another surface for unsolicited sales. He remembers cable television and satellite radio being promoted as alternatives to advertising, only for commercials to follow audiences there too.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Dr. Dave reports on an early BrainGate clinical trial in which a participant with paralysis moved a cursor, used email and controlled a robotic arm through an implanted sensor. He moves from studio jokes to the technology’s potential hope for people with serious motor impairments.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Dr. Dave reports that an earthquake south of Taiwan broke six of seven undersea cable systems and that carriers rerouted traffic through satellites and surviving lines. He and Evil Steve marvel that the modern Internet still depends on immense physical cables laid for thousands of miles along the ocean floor.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
After telephone networks were disrupted by the Japanese earthquake, Dr. Dave and Evil Steve describe Skype, instant messaging and Facebook remaining available and one stranded acquaintance using an Internet message to ask friends for help.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
In a snapshot of the early smartphone race, Dr. Dave agrees that Sprint was right to wait because the first Android release was not yet ready, while acknowledging its potential and comparing it with WebOS and the iPhone.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Lance Cottrell traces his privacy work to the early 1990s Clipper Chip proposal, open source encryption and an anonymous email system with tens of thousands of users. He says the subject became important enough to leave his astronomy doctoral program and build Anonymizer before most people were online or thinking about privacy.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Dr. Dave and Evil Steve react to the remarkable 2011 report that another unreleased iPhone prototype had been left in a public place, preserving their disbelief that a company known for secrecy could face a second similar incident.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
The Apollo guidance system astonishes Dr. Dave because its moon mission software operated with only eight kilobytes of memory, less than a modern printer driver. He uses the comparison to say that a forward looking industry can forget both how far it has come and the developments that made the progress possible.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Dr. Dave and Evil Steve debate whether the news belongs in the Microsoft or Apple update before announcing that Apple’s new Boot Camp lets Windows run natively on Intel based Macs. Their blue screen jokes capture both the significance of the platform shift and the show’s long running Mac and PC rivalry.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
As Steve Jobs returns to the stage and introduces the camera-equipped iPod Nano, Dr. Dave says Apple often executes ninety-eight percent of an idea exceptionally well while deliberately leaving a final feature out, perhaps because perfection would become an impossible permanent expectation.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Evil Steve introduces Archive.org as the website of the week after testing it with their own old site. The brothers explain the Wayback style date navigation and say a DaveMason.com version from 2000 is still available, directly documenting their own interest in preserving the site’s history.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Before Microsoft had publicly named the Zune, Dr. Dave and Evil Steve discuss reports that the company was developing a music and video device and service to compete with the iPod. They speculate about its appearance, note Xbox leader Robbie Bach’s reported role and promise to wait for firmer facts.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Weeks before the first iPhone launch, Dr. Dave predicts strong early sales and praises the device's likely look and feel, but argues that its lack of third-party applications will limit its usefulness and broader appeal. The hindsight makes this a particularly revealing record of how even an experienced technology observer assessed a major product before the market could respond.
Listen to the full show’s available recordings · Source recording and timing
Browse by year, then month, to find the episodes from that month.
442 proposed broadcast dates, plus 2 undated entries. Dates are based on archive filenames and may be approximate. Some broadcasts survive as separate parts or incomplete recordings.
