On this week’s The Drill Down podcast, Google‘s new toys, Yahoo! let the US read your email, Facebook takes on CraigsList, Amazon challenges students to get conversational… and much, much more!

Podcast

What We’re Playing With

Andy, Dwayne & Tosin: HBO’s Westworld / Violent Delights

Headlines

• Yahoo secretly scanned customer emails for U.S. intelligence
• With Its Newest Feature, Facebook Takes on Craigslist
• Amazon’s $2.5M “˜Alexa Prize’ seeks chatbot that can converse intelligently for 20 minutes
  • Samsung acquires Viv, a next-gen AI assistant built by the creators of Apple’s Siri
• Google Translation Breakthroughs
  • How Google Used to Translate: Crowd (22 June 2010)
  • How Google Translates Now: Neural Machine Learning (03 October 2016)

Audible Book of the Week

• The Girl on the Train by Paula Hawkins
• Sign up at AudibleTrial.com/TheDrillDown

Music Break: Come Talk to Me by Peter Gabriel

Hot Topic: ‘Made by Google’ Event 2016

• These are the features that make Google’s new Pixel phones special
• Google’s “Daydream View” VR headset is smartphone-powered VR for $79
• Google WiFi is a router that simplifies whole-home wireless
• Google Chromecast Ultra brings 4K video and HDR support for $69
• Google Home will be cheaper than the Amazon Echo, available in November

Music Break: Tiny Machine by The Darling Buds

Final Word

• Nanoscale Machines Snag the Nobel Prize in Chemistry

The Drill Down Video of the Week

• Google’s Pixel phone event in 10 minutes

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Geeks Of Doom’s The Drill Down is a roundtable-style audio podcast where we discuss the most important issues of the week, in tech and on the web and how they affect us all.

Hosts are Geeks of Doom contributor Andrew Sorcini (Mr. BabyMan), marketing research analyst Dwayne De Freitas, and Box product manager Tosin Onafowokan.