| Hey y'all, it's Austin. While Covid-19 continues to ravage population centers and government phase-in programs sputter, there's at least one sliver of silver lining: Radical technology advances are sweeping across the planet at unprecedented rates. The pandemic has forced businesses to adapt swiftly or risk bankruptcy, a do-or-die dynamic that's catalyzed generational upgrades to hardware and software not over the course of years, but mere months. Restaurants big and small, long stubbornly reliant on phone takeout orders to avoid online service fees, are at last integrating modern point-of-sale terminals such as Toast and DoorDash Inc.'s Caviar. Uber Technologies Inc. and other artificial intelligence developers are refitting their facial recognition systems to function even while users are sporting surgical masks, and ensure drivers are wearing them. And remote productivity and educational tools from Alibaba Group Holding Ltd., Tencent Holdings Ltd., and Alphabet Inc. are booming. We noted in this space in April that tech adoption was accelerating, now Covid-19 is also altering the hardware we use. Old-school desktop and laptop PC sales are ticking upward as more consumers have come to depend on their home offices. It's possible novel norms around social distancing will prove a boon to virtual reality and augmented reality products. Zoom Video Communications Inc., meanwhile, has witnessed so much growth in its streaming platform that it's launching a "Hardware as a Service (HAAS)" program, a play on its SAAS counterpart, to lure in new subscribers. And Verizon has made a major effort to move toward "touchless retail" to speed up the checkout process and reduce chances for disease transmission (though, full disclosure: It didn't quite work when I tried it last week). All this is great for consumer convenience, but will the technology improvements endure? Or will they either slow down or get "sunset," in Silicon Valley parlance, as the world goes back to its pre-coronavirus ways? There are signs of longer-lasting change. In June, Starbucks Corp., already a mobile payments juggernaut, revealed that it's doubling down on e-commerce and accelerating the U.S. development of smaller-format "Starbucks Pickup" store concepts. Likewise, in China, the company has been rolling out more express retail stores—prioritizing to-go purchases over seating coffee sippers. "While we had originally planned to execute this strategy over a three- to five-year timeframe, rapidly evolving customer preferences hasten the need for this concept," Starbucks Chief Executive Officer Kevin Johnson said. Of course, not all of this tech will or should stick around after the virus subsides. Apple Inc.'s masked emojis and hand-washing guides, for example, will (hopefully) soon go the way of Microsoft Corp.'s Clippy and Jennifer Aniston and Matthew Perry-helmed Windows directions. Privacy loss is a significant hazard too, as more technology creeping into our lives inevitably gives corporations more opportunities to capture our data. Also of concern are the consequences of technology addiction, especially as digital tools increasingly supplant human-to-human connection during the pandemic. Eventually we'll look back at this era as a time when tech consumed even more of the economy—but not quite all of it. While we're all self-quarantining, Covid-19 has forced Quibi Holdings LLC to stream their snack-size videos, meant primarily for smart phones, on old-fashioned TV screens. —Austin Carr | 
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