It’s been a tough week for American society, so we’re clinging to our relative comforts a little harder than in recent weeks. Things like playing Yu-Gi-Oh! games and messing around with Tamagotchi hacks are what we call “comfort tech,” and we’ve been indulging without shame.
This week on Gadgettes, we’re leaning into the womansplaining. We pushed the Google Assistant to the Samsung Galaxy Watch 4 after the companies announced its availability earlier than expected, and almost immediately got frustrated over the lack of seamlessness to the update. The Google Assistant on Wear OS still has a ways to go until it’s the wrist-based digital assistant of our dreams.
Meanwhile, on the other side of the hosting table, we love the experience with the Apple Watch SE. It’s easy to use, lets you use Apple Pay to get onto New York City transit, and it’s not screaming for a charge a mere four hours off the charger.
Then, it’s time to talk about cloud gaming apps: What are they? What kind of games do they offer? And are they a legitimate replacement for the physical console? Your co-hosts aren’t quite convinced they’ll revolutionise the gaming industry, and they may even end up hurting independent game developers if they grow too big without considering the stakes. But it is kind of neat to pop into the latest console title without forking hundreds and hundreds of dollars for the setup.
Finally, we’re doing something a little different with our last segment of the show. We’re talking about what we don’t fan over, and currently, that’s screens in the car. This week, a New York Times opinion piece solidified our stance that adding more touch panels and displays inside the car does nothing to mitigate distracted driving, even with a digital assistant at the helm. Buttons and knobs forever.
Listen to this week’s episode of Gadgettes on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you get your podcasts. For the full show notes and past episodes, check out our Gadgettes hub on the web.