The EFTM podcast – I’m BACK – Now, how can we get Digital Platforms to handle Aussie complaints better?

Podcast: The EFTM Podcast
Date: 6 October 2026
Host: Trevor Long
Guest: Cynthia Gebert, Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman
Callers: Robbie, Vanessa, Christine, Aaron

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[00:00:03] Voice Over: The EFTM podcast. Talkback technology. Got a question about tech? Trev’s here to help. Not sure what to buy? Ask Trev. Australia’s number one talkback technology podcast.

[00:00:31] Voice Over: Join the conversation. Head to eftm.com and click Ask Trev. Helping Australians with tech questions for over 15 years, the EFTM podcast with Trevor Long.

[00:00:44] Trevor Long: Real Australians with real questions every week.

[00:00:51] Voice Over: You can text Trev now thanks to Vodafone on 0477 657 657.

[00:01:08] Trevor Long: Oh, there we go. Welcome back, ladies and gentlemen. Uh, did you miss me? I don’t know, maybe you didn’t even notice I was gone. Did you? Did you notice? Um, look, I, uh, I literally flew in 3 hours ago, landed Went home, had a shower, came straight to the office because producer Rob is making me work for it today. Um, we have a bunch of your calls to get to, of course. Um, we’re also going to talk, uh, to the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman about the Digital Duty of Care Bill. Uh, so we will unpack what the TIO is calling for, uh, and what they want in terms of the Privacy Act and different things, uh, going forward. Basically, they’re looking out for us. So let’s find out, we’ll talk about that in a bit. But of course, your calls on anything tech, whether it’s the latest announcements from iPhone, from Apple a few weeks ago, and it’s forever ago now, right? Or just something cool you wanna buy or get involved in, I’d love to hear from you. Thank you for your patience, and I don’t know, whatever you filled your time with listening to other things. But it’s great to be back, and great to be sitting here in the office. Although I got back and there was no power at the office ’cause there’d been obviously blackout or something. And the fuse had blown. And so I flicked the switch and now I can’t get any of the televisions to turn on, all the lights. It’s okay, we’ve got the studio lights. So I have— I haven’t even— see, this is how hard Producer Rob is making me work. I haven’t even had time to sort out that problem. I’ve just got the computer and the internet working and this phone, and I’m here to take your calls. It’s that easy. Anything else, that’s— that’s— can wait. Everything else can wait. I had the absolute best 38 days. We were in Berlin for IFA. with Stig. And then Stig and I flew to Apple, uh, in Cupertino, California. And then my family met me there literally the night of the Apple event. It wasn’t exactly what I would have liked. Um, I don’t know, people that follow the rumors and things, uh, and you would have heard us talking about this on Two Blokes Talking Tech, the Apple events are normally on a Tuesday, uh, or Monday. And it was on a— the day after this week is what it was. I’ve lost all track of time and understanding, but Essentially all my predictions in the months ahead planning my family to join me were one day out. And what that meant was I did the Apple event, I did a couple of meetings with Apple, which is kinda what you do when you’re at these Apple events, you do meetings and learn about things, and then you hopefully get to play with devices. And then I pretty much just got in a car and went and got my bags and went straight to San Francisco. And I think I arrived at 10 o’clock at night. Saw my family, and we got up at 5 o’clock in the morning to get a plane to New York, and off we went. We did New York, Boston, New York, Dallas, Orlando, and then back to San Francisco and leave. And we arrived home this morning. 38 days I’ve been away from home, uh, which is a long time. But I guess I’ve saved some money on electricity, uh, here at the office. That’ll be an interesting bill, won’t it? Um, but yeah, had an absolutely brilliant time. Did very little tech while I was away. Um, a couple of devices that stand out from the trip. Obviously the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max. I did, uh, and again, a sincere appreciation to the team at Apple Australia who worked really hard to work with their US team to allow me to get hold of the devices in America because they’re different devices, use them, take photos, understand them, and then do a review and then get, but get them back to them, um, before I, you know, so, so I could, I could do the reviews in a timely manner. And then, um, So that was cool to use, and there were some amazing photos. There’s definitely times during the trip where I wish I still had the 18 Pro for things like zoom and stuff, for, uh, for some videos and photos I took. Um, the Dyson, um, what’s called, Hush Jet. Hang on, I’ve got it behind me. Dyson Hush Jet Mini Cool is a little portable fan that came in really handy. We were in Dallas, it was hot. Florida, it was hot. And it uses the fan technology of the Dyson fans, but in a tiny, weeny little format. It’s $170 and game changer. My daughter was pretty hot and we were able to pull that out and make sure that she didn’t get overwhelmed by the heat. And that was a cool thing. I did wear my Meta smart glasses pretty much every day, but I just wear them as sunglasses. There was a few days where I turned them on and there was I did one roller coaster with the family and I filmed that so that there was proof that I did it. And they’re an amazing, they are an amazing bit of kit. Controversial, of course, but still I think very, very amazing. And I think there’s an interesting future for that. And the other bit of tech that stood out probably is Waymo. I mean, I got my family to use it while they were without me in San Francisco and then we used it in a couple of cities. I mean, it’s just so good, you know, it’s just so good. Honestly, the, the simplicity of calling a car, having it pull over, you jump in, it goes, and there’s no driver, and then you get out. It’s one of those— I had one of those moments when we’re in San Francisco this last couple of days while I was going around in Waymos with the kids where I just thought to myself, I haven’t seen a taxi. I don’t think taxis exist in San Francisco anymore. If they do, they’re just running from the airport and back, probably. They certainly don’t exist around town. Who would get a taxi when there’s a Waymo? And I mean, if you’re a, if you’re a taxi driver in any city, in any place in the world right now, I hope that you’ve got a retirement plan in the next few years because these cars will and are perfectly good enough to do the job. Sorry, it’s amazing. And I think that I saw someone, might have been Bill Gates, talking about AI and how we need to accept the places where it’s going to absolutely work and technology will take over and robots and all that stuff versus it not being the case. And I think his point was, whoever this— I think it was Bill Gates— said if you go to San Francisco, you would— you wouldn’t choose anything but a Waymo. Like, the only reason we got an Uber to the airport was because Waymos don’t operate to and from San Francisco Airport in the same way that Ubers do. And also, we had a huge amount of baggage, so it wouldn’t have worked. But man, That is such an amazing technology. So lots to think about there. Speaking of thoughts to think about, I’ve, I’ve got a magazine to, to complete in the next, um, 14 days. I have barely started it, um, but I’m ready. I’m, I’ve got it laid out, I know what I’m doing. I just got to write it all now and find the photos. So the EFTM magazine will go to print, uh, at the end of October, and it will be sent out I would say mid-November. The launch event is on the 17th of November, and it’ll be in shopping, any purchases people make at The Gamesman from pretty much that weekend, the Black Friday weekend onwards. And if you’ve received the FTM magazine before, we’re gonna use the same database. I’m just gonna send it to you, but we are building a quick backend so that you can log in and add your address so that we can send it out to you this year as well. If you’ve changed your address or anything like that. It’s all good, no dramas. But if you’ve received it before, it will just come again. If you haven’t received it and you want it, stand by, there will be details on that in the coming weeks. And let me tell you this, folks. Let me tell you this. The EFTM app win tab is continuing all the way through to that point in November. And by that time, by the 16th of November, I think is the last scheduled weekly giveaway. We will have given away $47,000 worth of prizes this year. $47,000 worth of prizes. And the prize for the magazine, it’s just one prize and it’s a big one. So stand by for that. It’s going to be huge, folks. It’s going to be huge. It’s going to run over 3 months. It’s going to be huge. Stand by. I’m excited, I’m super excited that we’re able to pull this off and do a little deal to make it happen. So standby for the EFTM Best Magazine this year. I’m looking forward to writing it, getting it done, and bringing that to you by the end of this year, or in November actually. There’s no mucking around, I’ve gotta have certain dates, it’s gotta be hit, there’s a print schedule done. So if I don’t meet it, I don’t know, they’ll print just a blank page and send it out to people. Anyway, great to be back folks. Uh, thanks for your patience. It’s good to be back. And if you want to get in touch, please do, uh, 0477 657 657.

[00:10:00] Voice Over: This is the EFTM podcast.

Robbie — Smart sunglasses for cycling

[00:10:04] Trevor Long: Great to have your company. And our first victim, uh, on my return is Robbie. G’day, Rob. How you doing, mate?

[00:10:10] Robbie: Hey, Trev, how are you, mate?

[00:10:11] Trevor Long: Really good. Great to be back. What can I do for you?

[00:10:14] Robbie: My question is around, um, with all AI and, um, Sunglasses, smart sunglasses, etc. I’m an avid cyclist, and as you can imagine, there is some differences of opinion between road users and cyclists at times and different events that happen, you know, and even for recreational purposes, filming different routes and bunches, etc. Is there a good sports-orientated smart sunglass on the market? That is user-friendly, will capture all the right images, etc., for not only for safety purposes but also for memories.

[00:10:56] Trevor Long: Mate, have you seen the Oakley Meta Vanguards?

[00:10:59] Robbie: No.

[00:10:59] Trevor Long: So if you search Oakley Meta Vanguard— so Vanguard, I think, is the way that they describe their, you know, those wraparound kind of sporty glasses that, you know, people who are into sportswear, not, not people like me. Anyway, so the Oakley Vanguards are different to your Meta Ray-Bans or your Meta Adventurers and stuff because the the camera is in the middle, right above the nose. Because obviously the design of those wraparound glasses is such that it would be weird to kind of have a dot on the side and stuff like that. So it actually suits the design of them more than anything, but it actually means you get a very centered perspective. The quality is unbelievable. Like I was using the Meta’s a bit while I was away and kind of really enjoyed the quality of the video. I did a, so we went to Disneyland and all those kinds of things and I’m a, I’m a sook, I don’t want to go on any roller coasters. I’m just happy to see the kids happy. But they convinced me to go on one, and I Meta Ray-Banned them just to prove that I did it. And the quality is amazing. It’s like, oh my God, it’s like really being on the roller coaster. And I think that’s what you’d get with cycling as well. The issue I’ve got is these are perfect for nearly everything you’ve described. So you’re riding along and you’re like, oh, that’s a really cool view. Hey, Meta, take a photo. Or, hey, Meta, record a video, you know. So that’s the way it works. You don’t need to use the button on the side because you can use your voice. And I think it would work pretty well even at speed, but you might need to reach up and press the button if it’s not hearing you well because the wind or whatever. But there’s a recording limit. I, I think it’s now 5 minutes because it used to be 1 minute, then it went to 3 minutes. Now I think it’s 5 minutes. But you just got to remember it’s not a dash cam. Yeah, so it’s not, it’s not recording all the time. It’s only recording when you ask it to. And critically speaking, when you record, you drain the battery. So you’ve got this real balance between how much am I going to use the smart features of this versus how much do I want them there on demand for me across the course of a few hours, you know. So it is a bit of a balance, and I would encourage you to probably read some reviews from people other than me, people who are in your field, of the Oakley Meta Vanguards. They’re about $830, so, you know, they’re premium. But mate, they look good. They’ve got the camera built in, plus they’ve got the smarts so that when you get notifications, WhatsApp messages, whatever coming through, you get all that while you’re riding.

[00:13:23] Robbie: Mate, as long as, as long as you look cool, you gotta look cool when you’re doing this sort of stuff too, don’t you?

[00:13:26] Trevor Long: Well, I don’t know, are you wearing Lycra? Is this your go?

[00:13:30] Robbie: I will not admit. I’ll admit to nothing, deny everything, and I’ll put a counter accusation in place.

[00:13:35] Robbie: How’s that?

[00:13:36] Trevor Long: Well, Mate, I would say this, if it’s anything sporty, then these are the look, the Vanguards, ’cause they’re that wraparound look. They’re sleek, they’re aerodynamic, it’s what all the sport, that’s why they made these glasses, ’cause I think they realized that their Ray-Ban Metas are awesome for, I don’t know, walking around and basic, even skateboarding and stuff. But if you’re a snowboarder or something, you need something, you need to not be wearing Ray-Bans. You need to be wearing wraparounds. And that’s where the Oakleys fitted in. And that’s why there’s different styles and colors and all that kind of stuff. Built in. So, and I reckon you’ll look at them and you’ll go, that’s bloody perfect.

[00:14:13] Robbie: Yeah, cool. The other thing is my daughter’s into— she’s an equestrian rider, so it’d be really good for her. But given the 5-minute timeframe, that’s probably the only downfall. But hey, technology’s moving quicker than we can think.

[00:14:28] Trevor Long: So, well, just remember that the limit is only like a one recording. It can then record again straight afterwards. Um, you just need to prompt it, so you need to say, hey, Meta, record a video. Um, because you hear a little beep in your, in your ear when, when it stops recording. Yep, awesome, mate. Good luck. Let us know where you end up.

[00:14:52] Robbie: Thanks, Trev.

[00:14:53] Trevor Long: Welcome back. Thanks, mate. Great to hear from you.

[00:14:55] Robbie: Bye-bye.

[00:14:56] Trevor Long: Cheers, mate. There you go, Meta Ray-Bans, uh, but the Oakley version. So the big difference there is the style. It’s the same technology, uh, it’s the same smarts, but, um, yeah, they’re the wraparound style. I mean, I will admit to wearing the wraparound Oakleys, I think, as a teenager, maybe, maybe, maybe later than teens. Maybe I had them when I had a car. Just, it’s, it’s not the style of a non-sporty person. They’re cool, like, my kids have them when they’re playing baseball. Definitely, you’re playing sport, but I need to be wearing normal sunglasses because It’s not a good look otherwise. That’s just me. Anyway, I’d love to hear from you. 0477 657 657 is the number to text if you want to get in touch, and we’d love to get you on the show.

[00:15:46] Voice Over: Helping Australians with tech questions for over 15 years, the EFTN podcast with Trevor Long.

Vanessa — Microsoft Publisher being retired

[00:15:55] Trevor Long: Great to have your company. We’d love to hear from you. If you’ve got a tech question, you can get in touch anytime you like. You know the deal, uh, go to the website eftn.com, go to the app and just click Ask Trev, or you can send me a text, 0477 657657. Vanessa’s on the line. G’day, Vanessa.

[00:16:10] Vanessa: Hello, Trevor. Welcome home.

[00:16:12] Trevor Long: Great to be home, Vanessa. What can I do for you?

[00:16:15] Vanessa: Well, that’s a good question, but I got these notifications that Microsoft was eliminating Publisher from their system.

[00:16:24] Trevor Long: Microsoft Publisher? Wow, that’s, that’s a blast from the past. What do you use that for?

[00:16:29] Vanessa: Oh my God, I’ve got thousands of files in Publisher and the options seem to be either to transfer it all to PowerPoint, which you can’t do en masse, save it as a PDF or a JPEG. And I’m like, that just doesn’t work for me. So I thought you might have some magical solution for me.

[00:16:49] Trevor Long: Okay, so, but to be clear, you’re actually, it feels like you’re looking at a way to use Publisher files you’ve created as opposed to an alternative to Publisher Generally, do you know what I mean? Like, I got it. There’s a billion things I’d use instead of Publisher, but you’re worried about the files you’ve already created.

[00:17:05] Vanessa: Yeah, because they won’t let you open it. They said as of the 1st of October, but I’ve been able to open them in the last few days, so I don’t know whether that’s imminent, but they said you won’t be able to open Publisher after the 1st of October. And I’m like doing a panic going, who else would be able to help me here?

[00:17:24] Trevor Long: What are the files like? What can you describe to me? What sort of things you’re creating?

[00:17:27] Vanessa: Logo designs, property maps, um, so many files, hundreds and hundreds of files on my computer, uh, all in Publisher because that’s what I got used to using. And I could save it as high-res JPEGs or PDFs or whatever I needed to, but I can’t now en masse transfer all that data and graphics to another system. So other than doing PDFs and then screenshots or whatever, um, I can’t edit anything, um, which just seems crazy that they would do that to us. How can they do that?

[00:18:05] Trevor Long: You know what, it is— the more I look into this, the more it is crazy. Because so the .pub files, that’s what they are, right? They’re Microsoft Publisher files, is that correct?

[00:18:13] Vanessa: Yeah, yeah.

[00:18:15] Trevor Long: So normally you think about even a PDF file, right? We all think of PDF as being this kind of flat open format, but it was created by Adobe. Like, they created that format and But you can, like there’s software you can get that’ll open a PDF and you can edit the text and stuff like that and save it again. But the .pub file format is entirely proprietary and closed. There’s, because there’s plenty of alternatives. Have you heard of a thing called Affinity Publisher?

[00:18:41] Vanessa: Yes, I did do some research before I rang you. I thought, knew you were busy, but I just, there’s a few other options that I found, but none of them are that easy. And I just thought maybe it would be worth A, letting people know to quickly save their files because it doesn’t seem to be widely publicized, and B, seeking advice from the expert on what the alternatives are.

[00:19:06] Trevor Long: So the unfortunate answer to your question is there is no alternative because all of the best alternative software— so we’ve got to think of it this way. With Publisher disappearing, you need an alternative piece of software to make things going forward. So there’s a bunch of options there. I choose Canva personally. I think it’s pretty unbelievable. It’s, it’s cross-platform. It works really well and it’s open. There’s a bunch of things, a bunch of reasons why I’d probably choose Canva for the broad things of what you’ve described. But that’s just an alternative for going forward. It doesn’t allow you to open those files that you’ve got. And what I worry about is finding a way once you do lose access to Publisher, finding a way to even convert those files. I’m like, I’m blown away that they’re just shutting it down and it’s disappearing. Um, yeah, can you open a .pub file in PowerPoint?

[00:20:02] Vanessa: Um, you can’t. I’m not in front of my computer right now, but I think what I tried was I sent on a Publisher file, I went select all, copy and paste into PowerPoint, and it was all over the place. And mind you, when I’ve done logo designs myself, like it’s quite hours and hours of tedious work designing this stuff that it’s, it’s the fragments of the design are all over the page, then it’s going to also take me hours. I may as well just start again, you know, like I’m thinking this is insane. There’s got to be a better way. Can we reach out to Microsoft and say, stop, give me another 6 months to sort this out?

[00:20:40] Trevor Long: Well, I am going to do that. I am going to ask the question because you’re the first person that’s brought this to my attention. So I will ask the question of Microsoft about the the migration plan here, because it feels like they’re— and obviously with the greatest respect, you’re in the minority. There’s not a lot of people that use this software, right? That’s why it’s not a big hullabaloo. But they’re really putting offside a very loyal minority, aren’t they?

[00:21:05] Vanessa: Yeah, and then much to the heads of people that don’t even know that it’s going to happen, and then all of a sudden they’re going to be shut out.

[00:21:13] Trevor Long: And have you played around with other software in the interim? Yeah, like, because I think about like the kind of logo design you’re talking about, people normally use things like Adobe Illustrator and things like that, which frankly are too complicated for my liking. I’ve tried Adobe Illustrator, too complicated, which is why I end up with Canva because it is just so easy. But if you’re doing pure design, if you’re designing a logo, yeah, then you probably need to be in something a little bit more in the design space like Adobe, that opens up a whole other world of pain because you’ve got a subscription cost and all those different things going on there as well.

[00:21:48] Vanessa: Yeah.

[00:21:49] Trevor Long: So the, the answer to your question is there isn’t a way. You do need to urgently think about your most— so if you’ve got 600 files, you need to quickly determine which are the 50 most important and then backwards from there, because you need to quickly do exports in both PDF and, you know, high-res PNG or JPEG style. Um, because you need, you need a copy of your work at the very least. It’s not going to allow you to unpack your work, but at least it’s got the final version. Uh, I, I would also make sure that when you do the, uh, export or save as a PDF, uh, make sure you dig into the settings there. There could be an option in a PDF to open up layers and different things, which might help in some way, because with a PDF file, if it’s, if it’s not a flat document And by that I mean everything’s merged together. You can open a PDF in parts in Adobe Photoshop, for example, and you might be able to take parts out. So that would be, I would just look at the settings of the export when you’re doing a PDF export.

[00:22:48] Vanessa: Yeah.

[00:22:48] Trevor Long: But other than that, it’s time to find something new, Vanessa.

[00:22:50] Vanessa: Well, yeah. Well, I mean, that does, that’s fine for now going forward, but it’s just all of my property maps that I’ve designed for permits and just such detail that I’ve got that I can’t just copy and paste everything across easily. That’s just ridiculous.

[00:23:07] Trevor Long: Export them urgently as PDFs so that they are— because PDF is the most universal format you can get. And once you find— once you do the first one, so spend the most time on the first one looking at those settings. What’s— are there high— because often with a PDF, when you’re saving or exporting as a PDF from a decent bit of software, I can’t speak to how MS Pub does it, but often you can choose things like the quality and the image inclusions and font inclusions and all these different little tick boxes. Make sure you dig into that. And what it’s going to create, it’s going to create very big. The bigger the PDF file, the more information is contained within it. And that’s what you want. You want the most information possible. All right.

[00:23:49] Vanessa: Yeah, yeah, yeah. I can do that. It just doesn’t give me the edit options. So that’s my issue.

[00:23:55] Trevor Long: No, I understand that. But what I’m saying is if you, if you don’t do that now, then you’re going to struggle when you do find an alternative that’s at least a way of opening the content that you’ve created. Yeah, the best result will be a high file format PDF that some software might allow you to unpack a little bit.

[00:24:16] Vanessa: Yes, and even if I then put a JPEG into a PowerPoint, I can do overlays with edits in PowerPoint.

[00:24:23] Trevor Long: Yeah, but remember, a JPEG is nothing more than a bunch of pixels, whereas a PDF can contain other information. Like fonts and layers. So I would be doing both for every, every, every file.

[00:24:35] Vanessa: Or we say, Trevor, can we please contact Microsoft and stop them from doing this?

[00:24:42] Trevor Long: I will contact Microsoft, but I don’t think they’ll stop it.

[00:24:45] Vanessa: Yeah. All right. I’ll leave it with you. Thank you for trying. I appreciate it.

[00:24:49] Trevor Long: No worries, Vinicius. I’ll let you know how we go.

[00:24:52] Vanessa: Thank you so much.

[00:24:53] Trevor Long: No worries.

[00:24:53] Vanessa: Thank you.

[00:24:54] Trevor Long: Cheers.

[00:24:55] Vanessa: Bye. Thanks.

[00:24:55] Vanessa: Bye.

[00:24:56] Producer: Yeah.

[00:24:56] Trevor Long: What a tough one. That’s, that’s not easy because it’s a piece of software that I haven’t seen for a very, very long time. Like Microsoft Publisher, people used to use that to design websites. Like there’s, it’s got a great history, but I don’t think many people are using it, which is of course why they’ve discontinued it. But it’s not a highly used thing and therefore there hasn’t been a lot of publicity about it. So hopefully, we’ll ask the question, but yeah, it doesn’t sound like a huge likely outcome unfortunately for Vanessa.

[00:25:31] Voice Over: Helping Australians with tech questions for over 15 years, the EFTN Podcast with Trevor Long.

Cynthia Gebert, Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman — The case for a Digital Platforms Ombudsman

[00:25:40] Trevor Long: Now, if there’s one thing that you and I both know is that we, we can complain for— we could complain as an Olympic sport, but most of the time it goes unheard. And that’s one of the biggest challenges for the average Australian is when you complain about something or you’ve got an issue with something, and you’re trying to get resolution and you just can’t get it from the company. And what I love about our system in Australia is, and we’ve had this over many years, I’ve been talking about this on here on the podcast and on the radio in different places, if you’ve got an issue with one of our telcos, there is someone there to help. Now, I never say go directly to the TIO, the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman, because I, I would really like you to try and resolve your problems directly, because I’d like to think that over the years our telcos have gotten better at doing that. But there’s another problem looming, and that is broadening the reach of what a telco is, but it’s in the digital space. It’s Meta, it’s Facebook, it’s, it’s Google. It’s companies that we struggle to communicate with because they don’t have customer support. And so what is the, what is the world, what’s the future when it comes to resolution for Australians over issues that are sometimes really, really debilitating for businesses on social platforms, and how could that be operated under an ombudsman-style approach? So to talk about that and understand where we could push this with the government is the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman herself, Cynthia Gabert, and she’s on the line. G’day, Cynthia.

[00:27:05] Cynthia Gebert: Hi, Trevor, how are you?

[00:27:06] Trevor Long: I’m really well. Let’s go back to just simple starts here. When you’re at a dinner party with a bunch of people you don’t know and they say, well, what do you do? And you say, I’m the TIO. How do you describe what it is that happens at the TIO?

[00:27:20] Cynthia Gebert: I suppose the easiest way for me to describe it when I’m talking to people is we’re here to help people, average consumers and small businesses resolve all sorts of phone and internet related problems. So as you said in your intro, first stop is always to let your telco know there’s a problem and try and get it resolved with them. But if you can’t, we’re free and independent and we’re here to try and get fair and reasonable outcomes. So more than just what the laws and codes require, that for us is the floor, not the ceiling. We’re really looking at what is the right thing to do in the circumstance.

[00:27:49] Trevor Long: And when you say free, I mean, that’s a challenging thing for me to understand, and it took me a while, but essentially you’re not funded by the government, you’re not funded by the people who complain. Your funding, as I understand, and you correct me if I’m wrong, happens from the telcos. So if a telco gets too many complaints, you basically charge them per complaint in simple terms.

[00:28:09] Cynthia Gebert: In simple terms, yes. So very much like what you would see if you’re going to the Energy and Water Ombudsman or the Financial Ombudsman, the businesses who drive the complaints pay the fees to— I mean, there’s an incentive in there, isn’t it? Get your complaints resolved and you don’t have to pay as much to my organisation.

[00:28:26] Trevor Long: That’s what I love about it. I like the idea that if you let down your customers in a big way over and over and over again, the bill is going to keep getting higher and higher. So it’s incumbent on you, the telco. And we’ve seen this, haven’t we, over many years? We’ve seen improvements from the telcos, both mobile and internet. We’re talking about the whole range of telcos in essentially treating customers better in handling their complaints. It doesn’t mean that It doesn’t mean that things don’t go wrong, but they essentially, we think, they try harder to resolve those complaints so that they don’t end up at the TIO.

[00:29:01] Cynthia Gebert: Absolutely. So we have seen some really significant improvements in the way that telcos are handling their complaints. But as you said, you know, you can’t lose sight that every one of those complaints that comes to my organisation is still a person, it’s still human who’s reached out to their telco, tried to get a fair and reasonable answer and they haven’t got it. So they’ve had to come for further help from an independent organisation.

[00:29:22] Trevor Long: What’s the— just before we move on to the Digital Duty of Care Act, I’m assuming that these telcos are beholden to some sort of act or government policy that requires them to pay the bill. I mean, if, if, if 16 people call you about a small telco, how do you make sure that they pay the bill?

[00:29:41] Cynthia Gebert: Yeah. So they are required to be a member of the Telecommunications Industry Ombudsman and they are required to pay our bills and agree which is good for us, to pay our bills, but also to comply with our policies and processes and our decisions. So if we get to a point where we need to issue a decision because we haven’t been able to negotiate an outcome between a customer and a provider, if we have to make a decision and the consumer accepts it, the telco has to comply with it. If they don’t, we’d be referring them to the regulator, the Australian Communications and Media Authority, to have them step in and go, wait a minute, it’s an obligation on you if you want to play in the telco space to comply with the TIO’s directions.

[00:30:22] Trevor Long: I’m assuming that never goes well for them if it ends up at ACMA. And I guess there, it must require some scaling of your business at times because complaints can come from nowhere, complaints can come en masse for over an issue. We’ve had outages and things like that. That creates a problem for you in terms of managing those complaints, I’m assuming.

[00:30:42] Cynthia Gebert: Yeah, inevitably you have to, you sort of go up and down depending on what’s going on in the market. So we have been a much larger organisation back in the height of NBN rollout. We were in the realm of 180,000 complaints. We’re back down to closer to 60,000 complaints now. So the organisation is much smaller, but we’ve had to also adapt to significant technological change over the— well, we’ve been around since 1993. So over that time, as you would know more than anyone, the telco market has changed significantly. And it’s meant that we’ve had to continue to get bigger and get smaller, and as well as changing our processes and ways of working to ensure that we’re actually meeting meeting the needs of the Australian community.

[00:31:21] Trevor Long: What is the Digital Duty of Care Act? What is the government trying to achieve with this concept of digital duty of care? And I assume by digital we’re trying to broaden the concept of, you know, duty of care across organizations which aren’t your average, in your case, telco and those kind of things.

[00:31:40] Cynthia Gebert: Yeah, look, in its simplest terms, it’s about trying to make it safer for people to be online. It’s very hard to continue to trust an environment online or physical if you’re not sure you’re going to be kept safe on the, on the way through and in the way that you’re working with it. So there’s some good stuff in there. My view is it doesn’t go far enough in some areas. I think there’s still some gaps, particularly around complaints handling. So, you know, at the moment there’s a recognition, and I applaud the government for recognizing that there’s a need to put the onus on digital platforms to have internal complaints handling procedures. But there’s no obligation to provide any support by way of an external complaints handling procedure. So I don’t know about you, but my experience has shown that you can’t just trust people to do the right thing. Otherwise you wouldn’t need ombudsman schemes and tribunals and all these sorts of things.

[00:32:36] Trevor Long: Oh, imagine the world. Imagine the world.

[00:32:38] Cynthia Gebert: Lovely.

[00:32:39] Trevor Long: But it’s a really important thing. And you would have seen stories that I’ve been a part of, let alone acted upon on A Current Affair and on radio and different places where People— and the best example, and I— you can say what you want to say, I’ll say what I want to say, which is I think Meta are one of the worst organizations in the world when it comes to customer service. We are the customer of that organization. Um, our data is their, their, their mechanism for making money. Yet when they make a decision about something— oh, you’re banned because of this, or you did this and your, your account’s been turned off— when they make these decisions, they are normally not are not human, they are normally automated processes of some sort. They can have very simple effects on individuals, but quite extreme effects on businesses who have begun to rely on their platforms for business and engaging with customers, let alone selling. And yet there’s no one to call. And Cynthia, my challenge with this has been, and this is the case with the TIO as well, we often are one step before the TIO for some people. People will ring me and go, “I’ve got this problem.” “Oh, let me try and sort it out for you.” And I’ll just ring— a person that I know and they’ll get it sorted, you know, because it only takes a phone call. But I wish everyone had that person’s number, but it’s not that easy. But here’s what happened with Meta, Cynthia. I had a great relationship with Meta where I would get these complaints now and then. I’m not talking one a day, I’m talking one a week or maybe a fortnight. And I’d say, listen, let me, let me handle it for you. I’d send it on and it’d get fixed. But then Meta made a decision, unbelievable decision, that unless I physically knew that person in my life, i.e., it wasn’t a listener, If they’re a mate of mine, because I could essentially vouch for them, they would help. But otherwise, no, no, they wouldn’t help. And I’m like, are you kidding me that you’re trying to push away a path of problem solving? And so we’ve gotten to a point now where people have nowhere to go. And as I understand it, what you’re saying to the government is, guys, this is a great thing, this digital duty of care, but where do the customers go? Where do the average Aussies go to say, what, guys, my Instagram account’s been turned off. They said I did something wrong and I didn’t do anything wrong. What do I do? There’s no phone number to ring that you’ve, you’ve essentially— my recommendation to people is you’ve got to pay Meta to be a member to get their support, which is outrageous. So we do need it. We need to solve this problem, don’t we?

[00:35:00] Cynthia Gebert: Look, what you’ve just outlined there, Trevor, is exactly what people are coming to us about already. You know, we don’t have jurisdiction to require any platforms to comply with any— to even really talk to us, to be frank. Very, very different to what you and I were just talking about in terms of the telcos. But we hear from small businesses whose livelihoods are at risk because there’s been a decision made where there’s no opportunity to engage with a human, to question it, to get an explanation around why it might be the right decision or an explanation to— or someone to talk to to say, hey, wait a minute, that’s not quite right. You’ve misinterpreted this because you run your AI models over something that actually isn’t breaching a community standard. And we’re hearing from people that are trying to get out of pardon me, fees and charges where they’ve been double charged and everyone gets caught in this automated chatbot loop, unable to speak to a human. And we’ve had some really sad stories of people who are isolated, physically isolated, who’ve developed really strong community support communities, particularly where there’s medical and health issues involved. People who understand what’s going on, they’re finding themselves blocked. They’re trying to engage with Meta. They’re, they’re paying the premium to have more more engagement to try and get someone to help them, and they’re still reaching some sort of arbitrary limit of, oh, you’ve engaged with this too often and we’re not going to talk to you again for another month. And they’re trying to do all the right things and they’re not getting anywhere. So we’re seeing small businesses’ livelihoods put at risk, we’re putting people’s health, mental health and well-being at risk. Um, and you know, I don’t think that’s good enough in Australian society. We did some research, um, Consumer Policy Research Center did some research for us earlier in the year, and they found that 4 in 5 people had at least one issue with the digital service in the last year. More than half of them had been impacted financially, and with a really conservative estimate, um, of half a, half a billion dollars. People are losing trust online, um, you know, where more and more services are being pushed online. But if you don’t trust, um, why would you continue to engage in an online environment? So yeah, we’re saying you somewhere to go when things go wrong. It’s great that we’re seeing laws come in to give people rights. It’s great that we’ve got regulators who are able to, to take that more systemic and enforcement approach. But if you’re an everyday Australian and you’re trying to get something sorted, where do you go? Where do you go to get it sorted when you’ve got some significant, you know, risk if it’s your small business, but also broader to people if they’re unable to continue to conduct their life online the way they have.

[00:37:42] Trevor Long: And I would have thought there’s an incentive here for the digital platforms too, because there’s a couple of angles of attack that can occur. The other thing that I’ve been saying to people is ring your local member, write a letter to your local member saying, my Instagram account has been turned off for these reasons and I’ve got nowhere to go, I want you to fix this. Now I know that your local member is not meant to fix it, but see, what happens with local members is they’re essentially required to, you know, send their letters up to the right people and And look, a little bit of political pressure does make these companies do things at times. So they don’t want the government on their back every day. They frankly don’t want eSafety on their back every day either. So it kind of works in favour of the digital platforms, doesn’t it, to have someone like the TIO as the go-to between Aussies and them when it comes to resolution of complaints?

[00:38:29] Cynthia Gebert: Look, I think it really would demonstrate some good corporate citizenship, don’t you think? Like, we’ve got a problem here. We want to continue to engage, you know, we want to demonstrate that we’re not here trying to screw people over or rip them off. We actually understand that you, as you said in the intro, you are our user, you are our customer, and we’re accountable to you. And we want to be held accountable to get things right by resolving individual complaints, but also importantly looking to see what they can do to improve the system to prevent complaints and incorrect accounts being blocked and all those sorts of things, which are a core part of an ombudsman’s Ombudsman’s role. It’s not just the individual complaint handling. How do you actually improve the system?

[00:39:08] Trevor Long: And you know, most of the time— and I, to be honest, if I had the time in my life, I’d love to sit as a fly on the wall at the TIO and understand how your process works, because no disrespect to how complicated it can be at times, but I’m guessing there’s a lot of times when complaint comes in and your people have great contacts at the telcos and they pick up the phone or they send a note and they go, this, this, and this, and it’s almost instant. So it’s like, oh, we made a mistake, we’ve got to do this, we fix it, whatever. I imagine it being the exact same thing with a, with a contact, you know, uh, whether it’s a contact center or whatever at these digital platforms saying, uh, if, look, if the contact comes from Trevor Long, yeah, who cares? But if it comes to the TIO, well, that’s level one, it goes to the top of the charts and someone checks it and goes, oh my God, the AI bot thought it was child porn again, but it was, it wasn’t, it was a, it was a swimsuit ad, um, and we’re off and just tick a box and it’s fixed so quickly that it’s in their interest, as you say. And again, the other thing we talk about, like revenue-wise, Facebook makes a bit— $2 billion a year here in ad sales. Um, this is a drop in the ocean.

[00:40:09] Cynthia Gebert: You’re—

[00:40:10] Cynthia Gebert: oh, absolutely.

[00:40:10] Trevor Long: The TIO’s total budget wouldn’t be— what is it, $20, $30 million or something? I mean, imagine their digital— the digital platforms were 10% of that. And, and it was— it’s also probably a much more digital process too, where there’s less looking at logs of phone calls and all these kind of things. And it’s just solved the problem for the punter.

[00:40:29] Cynthia Gebert: Yes. Yeah, yeah. And I think that’s the piece that can so readily get lost, isn’t it? You know, it’s— we are talking about your average everyday Australian who just wants to get things sorted.

[00:40:40] Trevor Long: It’s—

[00:40:41] Cynthia Gebert: it doesn’t have— you know, if we go back to first principles, is it right that platforms aren’t held to account when they make mistakes and things go wrong for people? I don’t think it is. I think we should have somewhere that your average everyday Australian can go to get sorted when things go wrong online.

[00:40:56] Trevor Long: So what can the average everyday Australian listening to this do to make this happen?

[00:41:01] Cynthia Gebert: Look, I think at the moment it’s a bit— it’s a tough one because there isn’t somewhere specifically to go, but we are calling on consumers.

[00:41:07] Trevor Long: You’re calling on the government though, aren’t you?

[00:41:09] Cynthia Gebert: Oh, absolutely.

[00:41:11] Trevor Long: So again, we go back to— and again, I go on this a little bit because my wife used to work for a local member, so I know the process. I’m like, write to your local member and say, I’ve heard about the TIO thinks about the digital duty of care, uh, wouldn’t it be logical for them to act as an ombudsman for the digital platforms as well? I mean, overwhelming correspondence/support for something can make a difference. It can make a difference to engage in the process.

[00:41:37] Cynthia Gebert: Absolutely. And we’re encouraging people to go to our website and share their stories, to share that call for a digital platforms ombudsman. So our website, for any of your for listeners that don’t know what it is, is tio.com.au. And there’s a section there to join the call for the Digital Platforms Ombudsman to share stories exactly like the examples you provided before, Trevor, to help us paint a picture for the government to understand what the impact is on everyday Australians when things go wrong online and how diverse the impacts can be and how, and how deep and harmful they can be if we can’t get it sorted.

[00:42:12] Trevor Long: If you’re not willing to take 20 minutes of your life to write a little few paragraphs on how something happened to you and how it was difficult to do, then you’re probably not willing to see the solution, you know, at the end anyway. So all we’re asking is for people to take some time to document a problem. To be very clear, you’re documenting it not to get it fixed because the TIO doesn’t have the power to do that, but you’re documenting it to hopefully make a, make a change where the TIO could become the digital industry ombudsman, a little bit of a rebrand in the future.

[00:42:42] Cynthia Gebert: Or a communications ombudsman. Modernisation. Yeah, do you like that? It’s reflecting how people communicate now, not how we communicated back when we were set up in 1993.

[00:42:52] Trevor Long: That is a long time ago.

[00:42:54] Cynthia Gebert: It is a long time ago.

[00:42:55] Trevor Long: Most of the things we’re talking about today, let alone dealing with today, didn’t exist back then. So it is an important change and government needs to come along for that ride at the same time. Absolutely. Well, congratulations on the push. I like it, I support it, and hopefully people will share their stories with you via tio.com.au. Cynthia, thanks so much for your time.

[00:43:15] Cynthia Gebert: Thanks so much, Trevor.

[00:43:17] Voice Over: Join the conversation. Head to eftm.com and click Ask Trev.

Christine — iPhone 18 Pro Max vs iPhone Duo

[00:43:22] Trevor Long: Great to have your company. Let’s keep going with calls. Christine’s on the line. G’day, Christine.

[00:43:27] Christine: Hi, how are you?

[00:43:27] Trevor Long: Very well. What can I do for you?

[00:43:30] Christine: Oh, well, I was inquiring. I have a good old Apple iPhone Pro Max 11.

[00:43:36] Trevor Long: Okay, nice phone.

[00:43:38] Christine: Figure it must be time to upgrade. So I’m tossing up between obviously the 18 Pro Max, but I really like the look of the folding Duo.

[00:43:47] Trevor Long: Oh, ah, you’ve been tempted by the fold, are you? There you go.

[00:43:51] Christine: Yes, but then I’m a bit scared, like how’s it going to hang up? And I figured you’ve seen it, so you’ve felt it, you’ve seen it and all that. And I thought, well, what better place to go than ask the expert?

[00:44:02] Trevor Long: So what do you use the iPhone 11 Pro Max for most? What, what, tell me, tell me about your usage. What features do you use? What apps do you use?

[00:44:11] Christine: A lot of surfing, you know, like social media and watch videos and stuff like that and listen to my music on it. I like to take photos, but I’m not a photographer. Like, I like nice photos, but I don’t— yeah, I’m not a big photographer. As long as it takes a nice photo that I can have. Yeah, that’s— and a bit of work. So I tend to— when I travel, I travel with my iPad and then I thought, well, maybe the Duo will sort of eliminate that.

[00:44:40] Trevor Long: It’s a good point because it’s an interesting one. I want to say this to you about the Pro Max going to Duo. It’s a very interesting thing. Um, think about, uh, do you like watch Instagram Reels or TikTok? Do you scroll through videos like that?

[00:44:53] Christine: Yeah.

[00:44:53] Trevor Long: So think about the size of your screen there, and you’re like, oh, it’s a nice big screen. And then you think with the Duo, I’m getting this, you know, even bigger screen when I open up. But actually, when you open up the Duo and you stand it it kind of upright in vertical mode, if you like. It’s not really a very vertical thing, it’s a little— it’s more square than vertical, but it’s like an A4 piece of paper. It’s— that’s the exact same, um, aspect ratio. But when— if you put an iPhone, uh, Pro Max on top of the Duo, you actually get a very similar sized video display, right, for TikTok and Instagram and things like that. So you’re not actually seeing a lot more. I’ll just say that to you straight up.

[00:45:29] Christine: Yeah, okay.

[00:45:30] Trevor Long: Yeah, but it’s, um, it’s a lighter phone, it’s a thinner phone, and when it’s closed, it’s a smaller phone. So there’s a lot of those advantages to it. The— before you mentioned the iPad, I thought to myself, I don’t think this is for you. Like, yeah, you’ll— if you’ve got a Pro Max, you’ve got a big screen and you’ve loved the big screen. If you’ve got a Pro, then you’re moving up in size when you open up and things like that. But when you use the Duo and you say to yourself, okay, so I use my tablet for what when I’m working? Is it emails? Is it documents? What sort of things did you go to the tablet for?

[00:46:05] Christine: Yeah, sort of a lot of the online stuff, like in the cloud, you know, the booking systems and things like that, just to have a dual screen so that I’m not— because when you’re traveling and you’ve only got your laptop, sometimes I just need another screen with other information on it. Now I do have a portable screen that I purchased a little while callback. So maybe my option is to go the Pro Max as opposed to the Duo.

[00:46:33] Trevor Long: I think you need to go and play. I wouldn’t commit to anything until you’ve bought the Duo. And I’ve said this to people about the Duo. I think that the sales, the pre-sales of it, you know, so the preorders and then people get it on the first day will be great. But I think they’ll do better out of the Duo in the couple of weeks afterwards because people will go into a store and they’ll feel it, they’ll, they’ll decide if it is for them. So what I would say to you is when you open up the Duo and you go, okay, imagine I’m traveling, I’m going to open up my email on one side and a browser on the other, or message on the other. How does it work to move an image from a browser over to my messages or into an email and things like that? How does it work multitasking? Because if I look at the Samsung Galaxy Fold 8, the little same size device, you know, I think it’s a beautiful design. I think this is why Apple’s gone to this size because it’s a really good size in the hand and you can literally have two apps running at the same time and it feels, it feels right to have two things on the screen at the same time. It feels like I’m being productive by going, okay, there’s that message there from, from, from my wife and she wants me to go to this website. Now I’m scrolling and I can write back to her while I’m reading the thing on the side. Christine. So, yeah, do you know what I mean? There’s some real advantages to that.

[00:47:45] Producer: Yeah.

[00:47:45] Christine: Yeah.

[00:47:46] Trevor Long: The other thing I’d say to you is that photography-wise, you got to remember you’re only getting two lenses on the Duo.

[00:47:50] Christine: Yes.

[00:47:51] Trevor Long: They are, and they’re not the zoom, they’re the ultra-wide and the standard telephoto. It’ll say there’s a 2x zoom, but that’s really just an image crop, so there’s no zoom. So if you use the zoom on your Pro or Pro Max phone, the 3x, 4x zoom on a Pro, Pro Max phone a lot, you’ll miss that, and you will absolutely miss it. I used an iPhone for, I would say, oh, 70 to 80% of my, my family trips And many times I went, I wish I had zoom. I really did.

[00:48:21] Christine: Yeah.

[00:48:21] Trevor Long: But yeah, you know, a couple of times it was so much so that I did reach for, because I carry a 17 Pro Max as my content phone. And every now and then I went, I’m going to take that with me today because I think I might, you know, want to do something with the zoom. But, you know, in daily life, did I, did I miss out? I took this really cool slo-mo video of the kids on a roller coaster, and it would have been even better if it was zoomed. But it’s still a great memory and it doesn’t matter. You could never see their faces anyway. Do I really miss it? Who cares kind of thing. So I think photography is a compromise of the Duo, but it’s not a deal breaker. I think you will fall in love with the Duo the minute you hold it. It’s a beautiful phone.

[00:49:03] Christine: I went and looked at the Galaxy just to sort of get the size and all that today, and I’m like, oh, I do really like it.

[00:49:11] Trevor Long: Yeah, I think you will. And you know what? It doesn’t matter if you have that. What portable screen did you get, do you remember, by the way, for your laptop?

[00:49:18] Christine: Oh, um, no, I don’t. Oh, ASUS, I think it is.

[00:49:21] Trevor Long: Okay, yeah, so you got a decent one. So look, I think also that if you are traveling a lot and you do work from your laptop, it is good to have those portable screens. It’s just sometimes when you travel, and I don’t know how often in different ways you travel, but sometimes you don’t want to take that much stuff, and that one small thin portable screen can be the difference between your backpack and your carry-on luggage. So it’s there. But all I’d say is don’t pre-order the Duo. Um, yep. And be ready for the fact that it might, it might be quite delayed if you, if you don’t pre-order it. You might not get it on day 1 or 2 if you love it. You might have to wait a little bit, but it won’t kill you. But also, at the same time, remember that if you don’t love the Duo, the 18 Pro Max is— oh my God, what a leap up from the 11! I know you’re talking about 7 generations of improvement. I know, in everything, everything you do on your current phone is enhanced. So you’re, you’re at the absolute perfect generational leap here. People that go from a 16 or 17 to an 18 go, yeah, it’s just another phone, but you are going to be blown away by the 18.

[00:50:28] Christine: And then with the Duo though, like, I’m scared about this folding screen, like Is it going to crack?

[00:50:35] Trevor Long: Is it going to, you know, like, look, you know, Samsung’s been doing this for 7 years and their first generation was not great. It had some, had some failings, but they learned instantly. And yeah, I mean, I’ve definitely had people say to me, yeah, but mine cracked 6 times or whatever. But I don’t know what they’re doing with it because I’ve had other people that absolutely adore them and have used them for 6 years and have never had a problem with them. So look, I would, if there was a real problem with foldable phones, we would, we would know about it and we don’t. We haven’t heard anything about it. Apple’s going to have spent an inordinate amount of time and energy on that mechanism and testing it. I have great confidence in the mechanism and the screen, and I wouldn’t worry about it being first generation because it’s first generation Apple, but it’s really kind of fifth or sixth generation foldable, if that makes sense.

[00:51:23] Christine: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. And the other thing I kind of figured, you wouldn’t be opening it every single time you used it anyway.

[00:51:30] Trevor Long: Not at all as well. So, and I’m confident that in this, in the phone settings, there will be a hang up on close, but no one’s going to make a phone call with the phone open like that. That’s just weird. Why would you take a phone call unless you’re on speakerphone and you open it up to look at a reference document or something, you know, or a website, you know, something on a bigger screen.

[00:51:50] Christine: I use mine on speakerphone all the time.

[00:51:53] Trevor Long: You’re not one of those people, are you? Okay, Krista.

[00:51:55] Christine: Not in public. Not in public.

[00:51:58] Trevor Long: All right, well, let me know in a month or so. Let me know what you’ve ended up doing.

[00:52:02] Christine: Okay, I will. Thank you very much.

[00:52:04] Trevor Long: I’d put you 50/50 on an 18 Pro Max versus a Duo right now. I don’t think it’s an easy win either way.

[00:52:10] Christine: Yeah, it’s kind of where I’m at. It is where I’m at. It’s like, yeah, eeny meeny miny moe.

[00:52:14] Trevor Long: Yeah, spend some time in an Apple Store with an Apple staff member talking about what you do. And see, the great thing is they don’t get— I’m pretty sure they don’t get commissions or anything. So They don’t care whether you buy the 18 or the, or the Duo. They want you to have the right experience. And yeah, and so that’s why I think you don’t need to spend time playing with the 18 Pro Max because you will love it. I guarantee you that. Yeah, you do need to spend time understanding whether or not there’s any efficiency in having the Duo over the 18 Pro Max. So sit them side by side and go watch a video, read a website, do those kind of things and go, what does it look like different? And is it that much different? Because as I said, with a Pro Max, it’s a big, big screen already.

[00:52:54] Christine: Yes.

[00:52:54] Producer: Yeah.

[00:52:54] Christine: Yeah.

[00:52:55] Trevor Long: Good luck.

[00:52:56] Christine: Yeah.

[00:52:56] Trevor Long: Happy shopping.

[00:52:57] Christine: Thank you very much. Cheers. No worries.

[00:52:59] Trevor Long: Thanks for getting in touch. No worries at all. Look, it’s interesting because it is— it’s going to be such an interesting, I guess, debate over the coming weeks and months, which device people choose. There’ll be people who choose the Duo just because they want to have the Duo. There’ll be people that choose the Duo because they’ve loved secretly what Samsung has done but they haven’t wanted to admit it, and so they’ve just waited for Apple to do it. There’ll be people who know exactly what they want to do with the Duo in terms of multitasking and things, things that you can already do on the Samsungs. And there’ll be people that get it and probably don’t feel the benefit of it. And that’s, that’s, that’s, it’s going to be fascinating, uh, but a long, long road ahead for the, the Apple Duo, the iPhone Duo. And we look forward to hopefully reviewing that in the weeks ahead.

[00:53:45] Voice Over: You’re listening to the EFTM podcast. Join the conversation. Head to eftm.com and click Ask Trev.

Aaron — Travel camera for holidays and vlogging

[00:54:01] Trevor Long: Great to have your company. Let’s keep taking your calls. If you want to get in touch, you know how to do that. Aaron’s on the line. G’day, Aaron.

[00:54:07] Aaron: G’day, Trev. Hoping you can help me out, mate. We’re off on a family holiday and we’re looking at a really small travel sort of camera. We want to be able to take those still photos as well as some video, but also thinking longer term. I’ve just started a celebrancy business as a civil celebrant and I’m looking to also use it, you know, for a bit of vlogging type scenario.

[00:54:32] Trevor Long: Nice, nice.

[00:54:33] Aaron: Hoping that you could perhaps steer me in the right direction, mate.

[00:54:37] Trevor Long: What have you looked at? What’s in your mind?

[00:54:40] Aaron: Um, I’ve looked at the Canon GX7s, I’ve looked at the DJI, um, 3s, the, um, Pocket on the sticks. Yeah, the Pocket.

[00:54:51] Trevor Long: Yep. Uh, and also the, uh, Sony, uh, the, the vlogging, it’s like a VF-1 or something like that. I know the one.

[00:55:01] Aaron: Yeah, yeah, that one. Yeah.

[00:55:03] Trevor Long: Um, that’s a really good combo. Yeah, um, so I love the G7X. Uh, I actually carried one with me for the last few weeks on my holiday. Didn’t use it a lot, um, because I just felt like I was taking photos with my phone all the time. And it was only— yeah, it was something I should have pulled out more but didn’t. Um, I carried around the Insta360 Luna, which is their competitor to the Pocket, which you’re talking about, the little handheld on a gimbal. Um, yes, I’ve got the Pocket The Pocket 4 is the latest one. Mate, they’re unbelievable. And here’s the thing, I think that your first decision is, am I taking a compact camera, which like your Canon or your Sony, or am I, am I going with this gimbal format? And they’re vastly different things.

[00:55:46] Trevor Long: The—

[00:55:47] Trevor Long: if you’re going to do stills more than anything, then you definitely should lean towards your Sony or your Canon because they’re going to take far better photos overall. But there’s nothing wrong with the photos that the Pocket takes. It’s just little things like, you know, the zoom levels and, you know, changing aperture and all these different settings of a camera are not obvious and easy in, in the DJI Osmo Pocket series because they’re made primarily for videos. But they definitely will take stills, no question at all. But when you started talking then about your celebrancy and your vlog, you know, being able to do little vlogs or even, you know, point-of-view videos and things, You lean definitely towards the Osmo Pocket series, mate. Just so much towards that because they do beautiful video. Beautiful, easy point-and-click video, um, stabilization, walking and talking, walking and shooting, um, things that while stabilization exists in the Sony and the Canon, things like that, they’re just not made for, um, that style of video. But like, okay, Mate, when you get— if you get the Pocket series and you get the— they normally sell a version that is like the Creator Combo, I think they call it sometimes, but it comes with a microphone is what I’m saying. That’s a game changer because you could set that up somewhere and have a microphone attached to yourself and, and do little vlogs or videos of what you’re doing in your work. Mate, they’re a great camera, and you know what, you don’t need to buy the latest one, the Pocket 4.

[00:57:15] Trevor Long: 4.

[00:57:16] Trevor Long: The Pocket 3 is totally fine. It’s a great camera. I can’t even tell you why you would want the Pocket 4 other than it’s probably better in low light with the bigger sensor. I think it does a slightly higher quality video, but you’re not going to notice that stuff in general sharing and the things you’re doing. The, the absolute value choice is definitely the Osmo Pocket 3. If you are willing to invest your money now in something that’s going to last you a long, long time, then go the top end, which is their their dual lens Pocket 4P, which has literally a zoom lens built into it and stuff like that. But you’re talking, we’re getting really complex stuff now. For the basics of, I wanna do videos when we’re on the family holiday. I wanna be able to hold it out in front of me, double-click the button and it spins around and it’s taking a video of us and just go, hey, we’re in Japan, we’re, you know, see Mount Fuji or whatever it is. Mate, it’s such a great little camera. It really is a great little camera, the Osmo Pocket.

[00:58:15] Trevor Long: You, you will—

[00:58:15] Trevor Long: you’ll be blown away with what it can do. Honestly, it’s such a versatile little unit. And as I said, you either get the Creator Combo or you buy yourself a mic with it if you’re going to do anything that requires speaking and audio.

[00:58:31] Aaron: All right, fantastic. Thanks. Um, my wife did have one more question about it. She said that I had to ask, is there anything that helps us get two kids to actually take a family photo on a holiday?

[00:58:43] Trevor Long: No. How old are the kids?

[00:58:44] Aaron: Not wanting to do it? 11 and 14, mate.

[00:58:48] Trevor Long: Mate, the 14-year-old is going to be the same as my 14-year-old who turned 15 while on holidays, sometimes just not wanting to be in the photo, quite frankly. Um, but you know, the only thing I would say is, why don’t— again, this is a money and a budget thing, but there are so many accessories for these things. If you get yourself the little, little extendable handle, get the kids to control it, give them that.

[00:59:11] Aaron: Okay.

[00:59:12] Trevor Long: You know, like, I think if I said to my 11 or 14-year-old at the time, hey, okay, you do this one, you know, get it, hold it out so we can all be in the photo, you know, you know, you be in it and make it happen that way. If you get your kids to take control, then, you know, I think they engage in it more. Plus, you got to mean with the little pocket, the screen is facing missing you when you’re taking it. So it’s a better composition. You’re like, oh no, we’re not all in it. You know, let’s do a silly version, all that kind of stuff. I think the kids, if they’re— because this is an expensive bit of kit, right? You’ve got to teach them that it’s not a toy. But if you give them some control, they engage in it a little bit, I think.

[00:59:49] Aaron: All right, brilliant. Thanks so much for your time, Trevor. I really appreciate it, mate. Yeah, thanks so much again for being in touch. Love the podcast, love what you do, mate, and really appreciate everything.

[01:00:01] Trevor Long: Enjoy the holiday.

[01:00:03] Aaron: Cheers, thanks, Trev.

[01:00:03] Trevor Long: Thanks, mate, good on you. There you go. Yeah, I think getting the kids involved is a big part of that, big part of that. And the Pocket is an unbelievably good camera. Good luck.

[01:00:12] Voice Over: Tech, cars, lifestyle. This is the EFTM podcast with Trevor Long. You can text Trev now thanks to Vodafone on 0400 888 888. Thanks Dixie.

[01:00:26] Trevor Long: And, uh, I need to get some new jingles made. We have, uh, we have a new sponsor for the EFTM Podcast, um, but I’ve just landed and they haven’t sent information yet, so I haven’t included them properly in this episode. But super exciting to welcome TCL to the EFTM Podcast, uh, to Kevin and the team at TCL. Looking forward to reviewing more of their products and making sure that we’ve got the best information for you all. So this is the EFTM podcast, thanks to TCL, which interestingly— I know it sounds— it probably stands for something for them, but Tech Cars Lifestyle. See, EFTM, Tech Cars Lifestyle, TCL. There you go. Who would have thought? So perfect. But there are SQD Mini LED technology, stunning. And, uh, well, I’ve done one review already. We’ll get another TV up in the next little while. But now I’m back, I can and do such things. But yes, thank you to the team at TCL for supporting the AFGM podcast. And, uh, well, we’ll be back next week. Of course, that’s what we do. We come back, we come back as Carryover Champ each and every week. We do it again. So I need to hear from you. If you’ve got a tech question, get in touch. I want to hear from you. Let’s go secret shopping. Let me spend your money for you here on the AFGM podcast. Thanks, folks. Talk to you next week.

[01:01:42] Voice Over: You’re listening to the EFTM podcast. You can text Trev now thanks to Vodafone on 0477 657 657.