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Tech News and Commentary
Dave and the team discuss drone surveillance of large events and other issues, Twitter’s decline in revenue, a dedicated lane for Teslas into Mexico, and more.
Nolan in Henderson, Texas listens on KTBB and asked: “Wanted to see what you think about me, as a dog trainer – and a guy that’s had a lot of experience in radio in the past – doing a podcast regarding dog training. I have the Focusrite unit and have a good condenser microphone, and I just wanna know how I can get good software that allows me to do the EQ properly without hooking up the old time voice processor and stuff and then I want to do the podcast and you guys have given some good recommendations on that. And thank you for bringing us all this great stuff every week.”
Nolan, sounds great, lots of people have dogs, you may find an audience, and with the hardware you already have your investment will be minimal.
In terms of software, there are options. Podcasts are not very complicated so you dont need super powerful software.
We use Adobe Audition, which IS powerful software and it does require a license, but it may be overkill for just a podcast unless you successfully monetize it. Still, if you dont mind spending the $21 monthly fee, it will get you everything you need and much more.
If youre using a Mac, lots of podcasters start out with Garage Band which is free, included with your OS, can do multiple tracks and its easy enough to use without much if any research.
If you wanted to go with a more professional level solution on a Mac you could look at Logic Pro, but it is definitely more than you need. The only advantage of something like Logic Pro is that you can spend $200 and keep using it rather than having to pay an eternal subscription like Adobe asks for.
Regardless of what OS youre using, if you want something free, powerful, and something that will remind you of what software user interfaces looked like in 1996, you can use Audacity.
Audacity is free and open software, its been around for a very, very long time, it includes lots of filters, automatic silence elimination, it can automatically lower the volume on other tracks when you speak and bring it back up when you stop speaking, you can drop makers in the form of what they call labels, and more.
Overall its very capable free software, but it is clunkier than commercial software.
Some hosting platforms also offer their own basic online editing tools, you might as well take a look at those and see how you like them, but theyre typically too basic to be of any use and youll be better off with any of the options we gave you.
Richard in Benton, Louisiana listens to our free podcast and is participating with the AskDave button at IntoTomorrow.com and asked: “I would appreciate a breakdown and information regarding the various apps that purport to save money on gasoline purchases.”
Richard, they are all more or less the same. They mainly rely on public APIs to pull prices and supplement that with reports from their own user base.
That means that you will benefit more from apps with a large number of users and those fall into two categories:
Old apps, there youre looking at apps like GasBuddy and GasGuru that have been around for many, many years by now
Apps that do something like, mostly mapping. For example, Google Maps and Waze will show you gas prices nearby.
Apps like GasBuddy and GasGuru will typically offer you some kind of loyalty program discount at that pump. GasBuddy can be linked to a checking account and they offer a 5 cent discount, for example, and they say that can add up to $300/year.
Those loyalty programs vary, but thats roughly the discount you can really expect, nothing major, just some money off.
You will also find apps from companies like Geico or AAA, those mostly act as ads in app form. We care, were saving you money on gas! Did you know we can also save you money on insurance?.
Theyre less likely to be well maintained in the long run and they have far fewer users, so wed skip those.
If youre looking to try a couple, both GasBuddy and Waze are good places to start. GasBuddy has had active users for many years and now offers a slight discount, and Waze has trained its large community to do work for it and report on what they see, so theyre both likely to have somewhat accurate prices.
Keep in mind that the app that will work the best for you is that one that has the most local users. If Waze is very popular in Portland, Maine, but has no users in Benton then it wont help you, so dont give up and try a few until you find the one that is most active around your area.
Personally, I use GasBuddy A LOT. I havent gotten into the loyalty stuff, but I use it all the time to find the lowest prices in my area. While the car I drive can use regular gas, it can also use e85 fuel, which is available at far fewer stations but can also be far cheaper. So especially when Im in an area Im not familiar with, I pull out my GasBuddy app, filter it to show me only stations with e85 gas, and find the one with the cheapest reported price.
John in Fairbanks, Alaska listens on Newsradio 970 KFBX and asked: “I have a Motorola Android phone and I love the camera on it, but when I take a picture, I’d like to look at a hard copy of it or something and I’m not sure how to transfer pictures from my phone to my laptop, which is also an Android.”
John, if both devices are truly running Android your easiest solution is to sync your phones pictures to Google Photos, just install the app and Google will nag you to let it sync the pictures to its cloud and they will become available in both devices.
The same goes for other cloud storage providers, you can install Microsofts OneDrive, Dropbox, Box, and any other cloud storage solution with an Android app.
There are lots of other solutions, you could mount a network drive and move them there, you could just email them or send them via the messenger of your choice, you could skip the laptop completely and just upload them directly to a printing service via their own app or website, there are lots of ways to do it.
Having said that, if you just want the laptop and phone to both have access to the images then Google Photos gives you an easy and free syncing solution that was built with Android in mind.
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