this week, the man behind the ipod. tony fedell, talks about creativity, design, and his greatest adventure and a look at the european startup scene, and a ki ba a debate. should children be allowed on facebook? this week on "press: here." good morning, everyone. i'm scott mcgrew. way back in the year 2000, my first guest had an idea, and he brought that idea to apple. turn a hard drive into a music player. >> so let's look at portable music.

>> the rest, of course, is history. the i believe pod hit the market one year later, in 2001. >> and that product is called ipod. imac, ibook, ipod. >> ipad and its offspring, the iphone, elegant disrupters. elegant because of design, and disrupters because it took existing technologies, music players and telephones and widely reimagined what they did and how they worked. behind both inventions? tony fedell. fedell eventually left apple to create new devices, starting with, of all things, a thermostat, an apple-like reinterpretation of a common

device, an elegant disruption. tony fedell who led the team responsible for the first 18 generations responsible for the i believe pod. joined by martin giles. lots to talk about. i'm struck by the video of steve johns in 2001, saying ipod, and it's dead silent. a different time. not a crowd of fans. >> apple a much different company today. >> and a very small announcement. >> apple, maybe 400, 500 people. >> how much can the word ipod you take credit for? you can take credit for the design and the idea, what about the term? >> ipod, i don't know exactly where it came from, but i did not have -- you know, rights to kind of select that name. >> you're not the father of the name of the ipod? >> not at all. >> what would you call it?

>> i like ipod. when i heard it, it was like, yes. these are the kinds of names when you say them over and over, they just stick. >> absolutely. >> people made fun of it, but now would you call it. ipad. the whole world knows about that. >> and it's just a giant iphone. >> i have no idea. >> it's more subtle than i ever knew. very, very subtle. what would you, if not the -- if not the television, what is the next disruption? >> disruption? i think an amazing disruption in the auto space. you look at evs and nav systems and self-driving cars, i think the auto industry is ripe for huge disruption across the

board. >> based on this whole idea of connected home, when i get pr pitches on that every other day, and twice on sunday. is that also an area ripe for disruption. >> people have tried to connect the home for many deck as. we're at the point where we can take certain devices and begin to connect them. make them much smarter than before. this is an example of that. we're seeing other things, security systems, we're seeing irrigation systems, pool systems, all becoming much more connected, and it's really interesting to us and as well as to the general public. >> wi-fi made a huge difference i'm getting. sun microsystems were going to make dish washers talk to the -- i don't remember what it was called. >> it was kind of prewi-fi. wi-fi gives you that universal

language. >> the internet connection, still today, a lot of homes have internet connections and fast ones. wi-fi, only in about 60% to 70% of homes. >> really? >> still not every where. >> when you live in silicon valley. >> they have garage door oeps, and cordless phones and wi-fi. the idea of a connected home is cool, but i still want and maybe in some parts of the country, i still want my super cool thermostat to talk to the energy company. >> that would be create. >> let's talking about what's coming into the house? >> we had a lot of energy companies come in and talk about how we might be able to work together. the first thing, is having smart meter data. we need to have that in the home. it's rolling out, 20 million or so, it will get more and more. we also need a data standard, to make access to that smart meter

data a new project called the green button initiative starting to take root. still so much more needs no be done before we can actually get the data before we can do something. get much, much smarter. >> here in northern california, controversy over the smart meter program. pg & e, not a wonderful experience i guess in terms of -- at least in terms of pr is that an impediment to what you are thinking? >> i think there are early adopters of smart meters in terms of pg & e. and they were bold to roll them out. and they found hiccups along the way and learned a lot about how they need to market it, sell the customers and teach them about it. the normal backlash. normal backlash about all new technologies. a couple of hiccups. overall, smart meters will roll out worldwide and a very important data resource for many companies to tap into, to help reduce our energy --

>> isn't there sort of a debate about who owns the data? >> exactly. >> google tried to get into this space, and each time, the pg & es of this world, no, we own that relationship, it's coming to us first. and tony wants it to through the thermastat, i don't think so. >> it's my data. i bought it. >> it's my data telling me about stuff i want to know. >> but you bought the electricity, and/or the gas, and that should be your data to know, not just sold to anyone for any reason. so we hope that, you know, each customer will opt in to get certain types of data and that the government in those regions will make sure customers should get access to it. customers should be able to own the data they create. in different parts of the country, some are very pro. let's make sure we get data to customers. and other utilities don't want

anything to do with that. are you seeing back lack. it will say five or seven years before we see a unification. many other countries, australia, uk, germany. you see data available to the customers and really being used wisely. really interesting applications. >> you mention pg & e, what we learned about marketing smart leaders. what have you learned about marketing the rest? a thermostat, $250. >> yeah. >> how have you managed to build a business on, of all things, thermo stats? >> well, first, thermastats are in every home. 250 million thermo stats in residential and light commercial in the u.s. alone. millions more around the world. >> 249,999, 000 of them are ignores, except i'm too cold, too hot. >> exactly.

>> 10% of programs. 10% of all thermostats programmed. >> they don't care, because energy was free. you didn't care about how much gas prices were until they got very expensive. energy prices are going up, going up around the world and when you start to think about your annual bill for heating and cooling, that is as much or even more than what you pay for cable or satellite tv or your cell phone service and if you could actually save 20% or 30% on those services, would you immediately. why wouldn't you think about that for your heating and cooling bill, when it's $1,500 a year? >> we'll take a quick break. go to commercial. and we're spending time with tony fedell. stay right here.

welcome back to "press: here." we're talking with tony fedell.

>> martin drag well, the author of "the tipping point," he thought in 50 years that steve jobs would have been completely forgotten, whereas bill gates will be remembered by everyone, with statues everywhere, because bill put his money into entrepreneurial things -- i'm sorry, philanthropy. it's the fill it's that that will be remembered. >> i ran into malcolm three or four years ago right when his book came out when he was talking about disruptors and profiled bill gates, when i ran into him, i recognized him. hey, malcolm, i read your book, i love the book, i was wondering why didn't y you profile my bos steve jobs? he said steve didn't want anything to do with it. so i think there was a little motivation there. >> the guy who actually returns

your phone calls. >> okay. >> but if you look at edison, other inventors of previous centuries, they are always remembered, regardless of philanthropic or other endeavors. steve will definitely be remembered. >> do you see any of his management style in your own style? >> in my own style? i learned a lot from him, absolutely, you have to look at entire experience. that's when i really learned a lot. every consumer touch points and optimized the best experience overall. and to strive every day, we're a tiny company, don't resources of apple. we go back to the roots and hope we can innovate just like apple does. >> innovation, what's next? what's ripe to enno have ative about? you did the music player, you've done thermo stats. who would have seen that coming?

what's next? >> i look around, see so many products once you connect them and add smart to them, the cell phone, the guts of the cell phone, so much high volume. 1.8 million cell phone a yore. those are so cheap now, you can put them into everything, you are seeing scales, all kinds of fitness monitors, these things are utilized and the components that accompany high volume businesses. and you will see invasion all around. i don't want to mention any specific thing. >> do you think you can teach creativity and innovation or something that's inate? a number of "d" schools, design schools all the rage. tony fedell, if he had gone to

"d" school, would he be a better designer today? >> i had to create my own "d" school in university. and literally, project-based classes with multidisciplinary people around you to help educate you about different things. absolutely. before school, it used to just be academic about one subject. these schools are about design and project-based things with multidisciplinary people. you learn about these things in school as opposed to going to your one little silo, and someday, graduate 20 years later to talking to people. >> tony fedell, thank you for being with us. >> thank you. >> up next, the european crisis seen through the eyes of a german scholar, when "press: here" continues.

welcome back. it's been said europeans have an

advantage in the global marketplace, because they instinctively think globally. it may be the only advantage they have these days. with a dozen countries recession, for the second time. europe has not been good for europe, and europe has not been good for business. the exception, germany. and berlin-based sound cloud. sound cloud is a bit like youtube for sound. audio files that can be embedded anywhere from facebook to blogs, and it's expanding. it's english born ceo hops around the globe between berlin, london, l.a., san francisco. one reporter called alex young's sound cloud, the poster child for berlin's startup scene. his company has raised more than 80 million in funding.

welcome to "press: here." i know there is nothing you can do about the eurozone. tell me about the attitude in the younger, in the startup cloud, in the venture capital backed areas, and is that the what are the attitudes there? >> we have seen quite a different perspective. in berlin, and other cities around europe, so much in the tech world at the moment. this attitude of what technology is bringing to the world is so remarkable, kind of like ignoring the outside factors. a small group of people with a tremendous impact on people's every day lives. hundreds of millions around the world. leverage technology brings today is phenomenal. that gets us so affected, we're not necessarily looking at some of the other things going on.

>> you said in an article, we don't live in a country, we live on the internet. >> that's true. my background, in a couple of different countries, never necessarily felt one country is the place. i've always looked at the world as one place. especially with the internet. i'm talking with someone and i don't necessarily know why in the world they are. i think that's a great thing. borders are something constructed. not the most natural thing. income the world, being connected with everybody is more natural than the national thing. >> people have to be somewhere. are you in san francisco, starting to become more like silicon valley. a multicultural place. a lot of people coming out of great universities. wonderful beer all over the place, just like the bay area. do you feel berlin is like a

kinship city to san francisco? >> definitely similarities. what i like about the city, you see people doing things their own way. the norm, trying something different. a lot of things in berlin are very unique, and the thing that drew us to the city, this amazing intersection of arts and technology in one city. you feel as much of a part of the technology world as from the arts scene, and art in terms of topography, music. for us, that's really been appealing. the intersection of building technology, creative in different ways. i feel the creative component is a lot stronger in berlin at the moment. >> that was exactly going to be my next question. san francisco, historically, a cultural center, are we lacking? >> i like to -- if we go back to the beginning of silicone valley, the cool thing, the intersection of technology world

and counterculture hippy world. >> steve jobs. >> and the creativity around technology came out of that. and accounts you know, i wasn't around back then, but i get the feeling that berlin is like that at the moment. a lot of crazy artists bending technology. manipulating it, doing strange things with it, and having that sort of intersection of creative minds, and strong technology is really fascinating. >> i'm surprised your audio, it sounds so retro. video these days. it kind of youtube for audio say real quick shorthand of what you do. why audio? >> so sound is the most magnificent things in the world. absolutely amazing. justine before you are born as a human, we have perfect hearing 20 weeks. your visual comes later.

you experience so much of the world through what you hear and speak to people, it will make you dance. this rich part of human life and it tends to affect us. it's omnipresent, around us all the final. my girlfriend and i come back a background of loving sound, and loving technology on the social web and it's been so bizarre to us in the offline world, all this richness around sound and such a big part of our lives, and online, just mute. silent. >> and i saw this on sound cloud. a lot of bands putting up sound. but the social soft knowing of music. the sort of music that people are working on. so scott, rich and i want to launch our own punk group. could we actually go on and sort of say, please, help us find music? >> yes. >> a great way of sorting

putting together. >> and the perspective, the great thing about the web, ties people together wherever they are. and you share your ideas. same thing with all around sound. go online and you can find a date, and make your own version, and this is a couple of things that people have sent as well. >> bend back together. >> i have a sense that you are sort of moving into the spoken world as well. >> i think that, you know, sound is a lot of different things. like definitely music. snoop, madonna, springsteen. much more that that. sound can be the spoken word. mayor bloomberg is using it. it's all for these things, like my cousin is recording his kid and sending that to the family. >> and because you have recorders out there, you had -- if you were doing radio reports,

very expensive digital audio, where everybody has an iphone that's pretty darn good. >> the microphone is amazing, and the fact that everybody is walking around with a microphone in their pocket all the time. >> the more mobile, the stronger you get. >> yes. >> we a minute left. i want to bounce on this idea. also, there's this history, this archive there, previsuals that isn't on the internet. are you ready to take that fdr speech that kind of thing online. >> yeah, you know, in some parts of the world. story telling history, oral history. things not necessarily written down or documented. being able to capture different sounds having them online. we think sounds are about unmuting the web. the side effect is that we'll have a future history that won't be muted as well. >> alex young, ceo of sound

cloud. thank you for being with us. >> thank you. >> we'll be back in just a moment.

an article called let the nippers nip. by martin gilles. and one of the things he said, "facebook and other social networks have millions of invibls clandestine users. it's time to bring them into the light. why is that? >> as you point out, they are clandestine. there are something like 6 million american children who are currently on facebook. they are under a single identity. they are there. it's very difficult to sort of weed these kids out. so -- and not just on facebook, on lots of other social networks as well. they are being exposed to everything that we as adults are

being exposed to. and it's time that facebook finds the way to bring them on safely, with parental supervision, with appropriate privacy controls. >> who is more at danger for facebook? to some degree, facebook -- as a parent, i worry about crazy people, but i worry about facebook too. >> facebook is any social network could be potentially a risk for children. i think the statistics show that they are no month more risky than other types of social networking. i think it's very important that we don't actually encourage children to lie to get online. and. >> right now, especially now with facebook is a public company, they are in the business of monetizing information. do we really want our kids monetized? >> last time i looked, capitalism wasn't illegal in

america. i gather. maybe it's coming, but facebook is out there to make money. that's absolutely clear, but it's also out there as a service and many other ways, look at the -- >> being monetized already, and martin's point, at least we can identify them as children. thou shall not monetize them like this, because they are kids. >> there is a law. children online, protection act. if you are hosting children, you need to stick to certain guidelines, it's unclear. facebook would say we know we have children, it's really difficult to tell who they are. we need to create a safe haven and need to have parents. at the end of the day, this is parents' responsibility, we need to educate our children about how to responsibly use social network. no way to do that, no way for facebook to educate children. >> i can see my child's -- my

older child's as well and grandparents and aunts and things see it as well. >> that's absolutely right. a matter of getting the balance right. >> i recognize that. but i think it much better than having clandestines network. >> let the nippers network. that's our show for this week. thanks to our guests, i'm scott mcgrew thank you for listening on this sunday morning.