

Texas Mutual is proud to sponsor an informative podcast series by Omar Gallaga, former tech culture writer for the Austin American-Statesman and ongoing contributor to public radio’s “Texas Standard.” Mr. Gallaga has served as a contributor for CNN.com, MSNBC.com, and NPR’s “All Things Considered,” and each 60-second podcast provides useful insights into the latest developments in technology.
Texas Mutual is at the forefront of the industry with technologies that help companies work safer. In addition, we’ve introduced innovations that make the workers’ comp process simpler, faster and more convenient for our policyholder owners.


Texas Mutual is proud to sponsor an informative podcast series by Omar Gallaga, former tech culture writer for the Austin American-Statesman and ongoing contributor to public radio’s “Texas Standard.” Mr. Gallaga has served as a contributor for CNN.com, MSNBC.com, and NPR’s “All Things Considered,” and each 60-second podcast provides useful insights into the latest developments in technology.
Texas Mutual is at the forefront of the industry with technologies that help companies work safer. In addition, we’ve introduced innovations that make the workers’ comp process simpler, faster and more convenient for our policyholder owners.
- All EPISODES
- Business Tech
- Personal Tech
- Tech For All
Episode 199: Sleep Trackers: Do They Really Work?
Sleep data trackers have never been more popular, but they’re limited in the kind of data they can accurately gather.
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Episode 198: Your Digital Library Awaits
It may surprise you that your local library has many kinds of digital entertainment available to you for free.
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Episode 197: Frontera is Very Super
More computing power has landed at the University of Texas with “Frontera,” the most powerful supercomputer at any university in the United States.
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Episode 196: Emerging Job Field: Online Video Talent Agents
As online video stars get established, many are starting to rely on management companies and talent agencies to handle their bookings and business affairs.
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Episode 195: Why Tech Companies are Listening to Your Voice Commands
We knew tech devices might be listening to us all the time and processing our voices as data, but it turns out other humans might be listening as well.
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Episode 194: Police and Your Ring Doorbell
Police are working with Amazon to use Ring doorbells as a kind of neighborhood watch crime-prevention tool.
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Episode 193: Facebook’s Privacy Tool Has a Catch
A new tool from Facebook will make it easier to see how you’re being tracked online, but it’s not a cure-all for the social network’s privacy problems.
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Episode 192: Drones May Go Even Higher
A cheaper alternative to satellites may be drones, which are being built to climb as high as the stratosphere and to perform many of the same kinds of functions.
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Episode 191: Ransomware Attacks
Texas has been a target for ransomware, in which data systems are held hostage for money.
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Episode 190: Apple Mac Pros Will Continue to Be Made in Texas
Apple will continue making its high-end Mac Pro computers in Texas, after some indications that it might move manufacturing to China.
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Episode 189: Do Students Still Need Laptops?
Before parents choose a laptop for high school or college students, they might want to think about how and whether it’ll be used.
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Episode 188: Theme Park Technology
Big screens with motion seating, VR, and 3D are just some of the technologies that are being incorporated into new amusement park rides and attractions.
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Episode 187: Startup Co-Founder Matchmaking
Starting a company is lonely work, but matchmakers are helping set up co-founders to share the workload and pair up skills.
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Episode 186: Will We Stop Buying Cars?
More flexibility in getting around without owning a car is prompting some to wonder how many of us will start to give up owning a vehicle entirely.
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Episode 185: A New Deepfake Law
Texas is one of the only states in the country to outlaw “deep fakes,” which could be used to battle fake information during local and national elections.
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Episode 184: The Rise of Raspberry Pi
A $35 computer the size of a credit card created by a nonprofit has made PC-computer power more accessible to the masses.
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Episode 183: Lubbock as a Tech Hub
Lubbock may be the next rising technology hub in Texas and its leaders are pushing to grow the high-tech industry there.
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Episode 182: The Robot Salads are Coming
Machine-made salads are coming to Houston in the form of kiosks from a company called Salad Station.
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Episode 181: What do Tech Workers Make?
Tech-industry salaries keep rising and the average tech worker in the U.S. makes about $135,000 a year.
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Episode 155: Digital License Plates Could Be a Thing!
Digital license plates that can display different kinds of information on a screen are in use in some states and Texas is considering making them legal.
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Episode 154: For Great Pictures, Wipe that Lens
One of the best ways to improve photos and videos you take with your phone is also one of the easiest – make sure the camera lens isn’t blocked by dust, smudges or any other particles.
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Episode 153: Know Your Quantum Computers
You may not understand how quantum computing works, but you should know that many tech giants are exploring the technology for future applications.
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Episode 152: Are Challenger Banks Going to Take Over?
Leaner institutions that do away with branches, ATMs and customer perks may be the future of banking for people who do all their financial transactions online.
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Episode 151: Your Boss in Your Facebook
There’s no law on the books in Texas that prevents employers from requiring employees or job applicants to hand over their social media passwords.
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Episode 150: What is a Data Center?
Texas is a major player in data centers with a large concentration of critical IT data moving through the Dallas/Fort Worth area.
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Episode 149: Preserving the Internet
Preserving data and artwork that has only ever existed on the internet can be a huge challenge for museums and historians.
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Episode 148: Organizing Photos and Videos
Organizing all the photos and videos that you’ve accumulated is not an easy task; but there are some practical steps you can take to get started.
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Episode 147: Texas Big Data is Just a Click Away
The state of Texas has an online portal for big-data junkies with public datasets from agencies all over the state.
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Episode 146: Cars Are Collecting More Data Than You Might Think
Cars are becoming rolling data collection centers capable of collecting information about driving habits and on-board communications.
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Episode 145: The Content Moderators
The task of determining whether content is inappropriate and should be removed from social media typically falls on automated software or employees.
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Episode 144: Tech and the Military
Google and Microsoft are among companies that have had to figure out whether their technology should be used by the U.S. military amid pressure from employees.
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Episode 143: Adaptive Game Controllers
Microsoft’s efforts to make adaptive video-game controllers mainstream have put the spotlight on physically disabled gamers and the communities making hardware to get them playing.
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Episode 142: Online is Forever
Deleting something you’ve posted online is never a guarantee that it will actually disappear forever because the internet is pretty permanent.
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Episode 141: Deceased to Diamonds
A Texas start-up helps transform the ashes of pets and loved ones into lab-grown diamonds.
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Episode 140: Tech Hardware Purging
Many of us are holding on to too much tech clutter, but trust me, you don’t need to keep all those adapters, cables and extra hardware for a rainy day.
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Episode 139: The Internet… in Space!
Posting to Facebook may not be a high priority for astronauts, but a Texas firm is working to provide interplanetary internet access for future workers and tourists on the moon and Mars.
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Episode 138: The State of Delivery Robots
Package-delivering robots are coming, but there are big challenges to making them work on public sidewalks.
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Episode 137: Putting the “Tech” in Texas Tech
Texas Tech University started as a technological college, but even as it has expanded its scope, the name has managed to remain the same.
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Episode 136: Changes in Retail Experience
Retail brick-and-mortar stores aren’t dead, and they’re evolving to offer more digital services that enhance or speed up the shopping experience.
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Episode 135: The California Poach
The Texas tech economy is growing in part thanks to many companies looking to relocate their headquarters to the state from more-expensive areas, such as Silicon Valley.
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Episode 134: The Bitcoin Reckoning
Bitcoin had a terrible year in 2018 but that doesn’t mean the ride is over for a lot of cryptocurrency investors.
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Episode 133: Cash Back and Discount Codes
Cash-back sites are taking over where coupons used to rule, saving money and cutting special deals for frugal online shoppers.
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Episode 132: DNA Kits
Despite their popularity, DNA kits that tell you more about your genetic background can carry some risks. Be aware of what those risks are before sending in a saliva sample.
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Episode 131: Texas’ Top City for Women in Tech
Based on census data, a financial services company says that Houston ranks highly as a good city for women in the tech industry.
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Episode 130: Coming Soon: A Phone That Folds Up
The next big design change for smartphones could be screens that can bend or fold like pocketbooks or wallets.
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Episode 129: Siri is Fading?
Despite having a big lead when it introduced its Siri voice assistant in 2011, Apple appears to be losing the home voice assistant battle to competitors such as Amazon and Google.
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Episode 128: Coding Academies
Short of a college degree, one way to get skills for a tech-industry job are coding academies and bootcamps.
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Episode 127: AT&T, Media Company
AT&T has toyed with entertainment production in the past, but with its acquisition of Time Warner, it’s playing in the big leagues of content creators.
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Episode 126: How to Quit Facebook
Fed up with Facebook? There are two main ways to get out of the social network: putting your account on pause or deleting it permanently.
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Episode 125: Deep Breaths, Look At Your Phone
You might be able to find some peace with some highly evolved meditation and mindfulness apps available for free on your smart hone.
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Episode 124: Your Pizzas, Upgraded
There’s a lot of technology investment happening behind the scenes at the giant pizza chain based in Texas.
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Episode 123: Is Robocall Help Finally Coming?
There’s been very little done to minimize unwanted robocalls, you may have noticed, but the FCC says it recognizes the problem and wants to take steps to address them.
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Episode 122: The Exoskeletons are Coming
Helper technologies that can assist warehouse and factory workers — lightweight exoskeletons — have gotten less expensive and perhaps more necessary.
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Episode 121: Cyberbullying in the Workplace
Corporations are required to maintain a safe work space for employees and that includes an environment free of cyberbullying.
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Episode 120: End of the Line For Game Consoles?
There may be a future where what we think of as video-game consoles become more like tiny streaming-video boxes. But we’re not quite there yet.
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Episode 119: Dell: Public to Private to Public Again
Remember that time Dell went private? After five years off the stock market, the company returned to public trading at the end of 2018.
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Episode 118: Biggest Crowdfunded Game Ever
A huge new video game in development, “Star Citizen,” has roots in Austin and more than $200 million in crowdfunding raised so far.
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Episode 117: Are Theaters Bouncing Back?
Netflix and other streaming services haven’t killed movie theaters; in fact, they had a very strong year propped up by event movies.
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Episode 116: Tech Spring Cleaning
Tech clutter can really add up. You should develop an urge to purge outdated, unused, and unnecessary tech gadgets and accessories.
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Episode 115: Lottery in Texas
A company that makes a popular lottery-tracking app has been doing so well in Texas it moved its headquarters to the state.
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Episode 114: Photo ID on Your Phone
They’re not here yet, but the option to use your phone as your driver’s license may be on the way in Texas and other states.
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Episode 113: Bad Update Blues
It’s not just you! Bad system updates can cause problems with computers or mobile phones for people just trying to keep their gadgets up to date.
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Episode 112: Finally, a Babel Fish
The idea of translating speech in real-time for conversations between two people or groups seems to be finally becoming a reality with tech from Microsoft, Google, and other tech companies.
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Episode 111: Zillow Might Sell You Your Next House
The next time you look through home listings, you may be shopping for homes owned directly by real-estate sites Zillow or Redfin.
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Episode 110: Robot Vacuums in the House!
It can be “The Jetsons” in your house with a robot vacuum. But what should you look for as you shop for one of these dirt-buster ‘bots?
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Episode 109: Mapping Airports With Robots
A San Antonio startup has been working to make the San Antonio International Airport easier to navigate with the help of its mapping robot tech.
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Episode 108: Robot Week – Texas Kids and Robots
Kids are participating in Texas robotics programs and competitions and learning valuable STEM skills along the way.
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Episode 107: Robot Week – Alexa, OK Google and Others in More Places
The range of Amazon Alexa and Google Home Assistant products is going beyond smart speakers. Laptops may be another new place where that tech becomes available.
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Episode 106: Robot Week – Coffee by Briggo
An Austin company has rolled out about a half dozen automated coffee-dispensing kiosks called Briggo serving on-demand coffee drinks for iOS and Android app users.
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Episode 105: Remember Power Computing?
Mac clone computers used to be a thing and they were built in Texas with Apple’s blessing. At least until Steve Jobs’ return.
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Episode 104: And Now E-Bikes
The next evolution of electric scooters might not be scooters at all; they may have opened the door for a surge in e-bike sales in large Texas cities.
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Episode 103: Austin a Tech Hub, Nation Discovers
While locals have already known it for years, Apple’s expansion in Austin has caused some around the country to discover what a tech hub the city has become.
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Episode 102: Our Internet’s Fast Too
With three cities in the top five for Internet speeds in major U.S. cities, Texas ranks highly for its download and upload rates, according to Ookla.
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Episode 101: Big in Biotech
The Texas Governor’s office says that part of the state’s strong economy can be attributed to an abundance of life science and biotech companies here.
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Episode 200: Where’s Your Health Data?
Personal health records have often been harder to access, but making them accessible to apps from tech companies may have side effects.
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