0:00

Welcome to Grumpy

0:03

Old Geeks, I'm Jason DeFilippo. And

0:19

I'm Brian Schulmeister. You

0:22

all right again, Brian? No, no, no. I

0:25

mean, yes, I'm good. This

0:28

is the second week in a row you brought us in

0:30

with a sigh, so I'm worried about you. At the beginning

0:32

of the week, I went for my cancer

0:34

checkups, CT scan, blood work and all that sort

0:36

of stuff. So results have come back

0:38

in. Cancer free still. All

0:41

right. But I've been feeling, you know, I

0:43

was sick last week, I was a little down. Cough

0:46

has not gone away. Guess what the

0:48

CT scan uncovered? What? I have

0:50

pneumonia. Oh, no. So

0:54

good times. It's not that big of a deal,

0:56

antibiotics for a while. I don't feel bad, so

0:58

it's mild at best. So just don't want it

1:00

to get worse. But yeah, got to go back

1:02

to the doctor, get the antibiotics, be on that

1:04

for what, 10 days or something like that. Like

1:07

everything else, I blame Canada. Me

1:10

too. It's too damn cold here. Come

1:12

on back, Brian. We miss you. All

1:14

right. No ammonia's there. All

1:17

right. We got a little follow up here. And

1:19

this one comes from Jason. Not

1:21

to Jason, to both of us. I

1:24

don't like much of Elon's political lunacy any

1:26

more than you guys. However, you are talking

1:29

out of your ass again regarding the brain

1:31

implants. This is scientific research

1:33

that should be taken seriously. Per

1:36

a recent BBC article I read online,

1:38

quote, among the other companies to make

1:40

similar advances in the field is the

1:42

EPFL in Switzerland, which has successfully enabled

1:45

a paralyzed man to

1:47

walk just by thinking. That was

1:49

achieved by putting electronic implants on his brain

1:51

and spine, which wirelessly communicate thoughts to his

1:53

legs and feet. Now let me

1:55

clarify for a second here, Jason. I

1:58

am fully, fully. behind any

2:01

kind of scientific advancement for the

2:03

human race whatsoever. Put

2:05

it in my brain if it works. What I

2:07

am against is the man-child

2:09

running the company that does it. I

2:12

don't trust Elon, the drug addict,

2:14

to run a company that puts

2:17

shit in people's brains. Because

2:19

a leader, you know, or an organization is

2:21

led from the top down. So if you

2:24

have a crazed fucking drug addict running the

2:26

company, who knows what you're going to

2:28

get at the bottom? So that's my only complaint

2:30

about Neuralink and Elon Musk and oh, and the

2:32

fact that they killed all those damn monkeys and

2:34

lied about it, that was a problem too. Well,

2:37

yeah, that's the problem. When this email

2:39

came in, I was thinking to myself, now hold on

2:41

a second. People take from what we say, what they

2:43

want, and they seem to cherry pick it. Because

2:46

I do remember saying immediately afterwards that

2:49

I want this kind of stuff to succeed. I want

2:51

it to. I want the research

2:53

to continue in a very

2:56

good way, in a very transparent way

2:58

that doesn't kill a bunch of monkeys and then you lie

3:00

about it, etc, etc. And

3:03

also I believe I said I'm assuming and

3:05

of course hoping that the Neuralink transplant was

3:07

to somebody who basically we were at the

3:09

last resorts, something like that.

3:12

So okay, fine. Again to

3:14

the very line from the email, and you

3:16

and I 100% agree on this, this is

3:18

scientific research that should be taken seriously. Yes.

3:22

Elon Musk cannot take anything seriously. Exactly.

3:24

That's why he should not be doing

3:27

it. Yes, yes, that's

3:29

all. Yes. And

3:31

by the way, it's not the killing of the monkeys

3:33

that I have the problem with, it's the lying about

3:35

it. Covering it up. Because

3:38

why are you covering it up? Because research has

3:40

its risks. And we know animal testing is required

3:42

for some of this stuff. That's just the price

3:44

of admission. It's terrible, but that's

3:46

why we have what we have today.

3:49

You know, just why are you lying

3:51

about it? Because there's some shady shit going on.

3:53

That's why. So that's why I don't trust

3:55

Neuralink and I don't trust Elon. So

3:57

there. Now, as somebody who

3:59

has... Brain damage from a

4:01

stroke. Keep other people, keep making shit, because

4:04

I'm going to need it sooner than later.

4:06

Great. Now, speaking of

4:08

brain damage, let's move on to Chris

4:10

Dixon's new book, Read, Write, and Own.

4:14

You touched on last week with your

4:16

pivot interview that you talked about. I

4:19

went back and I listened to it,

4:21

and yeah, that was a shit

4:23

show. He

4:25

has really nothing to back up what he says,

4:27

but... So Molly

4:30

White, who we adore, did

4:32

a book review on Read,

4:34

Write, and Own, and

4:36

it was a very, very long review. So I

4:38

took the entire review, and because we live in

4:40

a world of technology, now I threw it in

4:43

the chat GPT, and I just asked, does Molly

4:45

like this book? Here's what

4:47

we got back. Molly

4:49

White expresses significant skepticism and criticism

4:51

towards Chris Dixon's book. She

4:53

highlights inconsistencies, contradictions, and lack

4:56

of critical engagement with blockchain

4:58

technology's limitations. Molly points

5:00

out the irony in Dixon declaring

5:02

RSS dead despite its widespread use,

5:04

including on his own website. He

5:07

criticizes Dixon for failing to acknowledge his

5:09

firm's role in the tech industry's current

5:11

state, which is a shit show. The

5:15

absence of successful blockchain examples and

5:17

the superficial treatment of alternative technologies

5:19

further contribute to the reviewer's critical stance.

5:22

Additionally, it keeps going on, but basically she says it's

5:24

a shit book from a shit guy, so there you

5:26

go. Yeah. I mean, you

5:28

didn't... All you had to do was

5:30

listen to like five minutes of that segment on Pivot, and

5:33

yeah, you would know that this guy's full of crap. Now,

5:36

it gets better because it made the New

5:39

York Times bestseller list. It's a low bar

5:41

these days. It is a low bar these days.

5:44

Actually, the numbers are pretty high

5:46

because everybody knows how to game the system now. So

5:49

there's a great article over advice on

5:51

how tech firms make these crypto books

5:54

top sellers. And they game

5:57

the list. They buy a ton of their

5:59

own stuff. books to give their

6:01

employees as gifts. They

6:03

buy print ads in major newspapers, get

6:07

on podcasts like Pivot and Hard

6:09

Fork, and this

6:12

basically do all

6:14

these deals with pre-orders and things like

6:16

that. They basically just game the system to the

6:18

point of half the time they buy

6:21

their own damn books to get

6:23

on the on the system. That's why they give them

6:25

as quote-unquote gifts, but they also run competitions with other

6:28

entrepreneurs and people in there.

6:30

Since they're investors, they

6:32

get all of their little

6:34

companies underneath them that they've invested in to

6:36

buy copies to give to their staff as

6:38

well. It is an entire game. And

6:42

I love what she says here. Perhaps

6:44

he should have released the book on the

6:46

blockchain because he says himself user evangelists are

6:48

more authentic and effective than corporate marketing programs

6:51

run by hired teams. Well,

6:53

turns out that's not true either. Nope,

6:55

sorry Chris. And again, from what I

6:57

remember from his discussion, every single application

6:59

he could even possibly think of on

7:02

the blockchain was just a way

7:04

to get enough attention for it to go

7:06

into traditional distribution methods. There you go. Oh

7:19

yes they do. Yep, Snap, the parent company

7:21

of Snapchat is laying off 10% of its

7:24

workforce according to an SEC filing and confirmed

7:26

by a company spokesperson. The

7:28

company has reported a total number of 5,367 employees at the end

7:31

of 2023's third quarter, so the layoff should impact

7:33

around 540 people. Not

7:37

insignificant again. No, but there's gonna

7:39

be some apartments opening up in Santa Monica if you want

7:41

to move back. Just saying. Oh he's spoiled. Come to the

7:43

valley. It's

7:47

great here. So here's

7:49

the line of corporate bullshit I like to include

7:51

these days. The layoffs would

7:54

best position our business to execute our

7:56

highest priorities and ensure it has the

7:58

capacity to invest incrementally over time. The

8:01

layoffs were necessary to reduce hierarchy and

8:03

promote in-person collaboration. None of those sentences...

8:06

Here's a gadget, a little quote there. None

8:08

of these sentences really mean anything, so let's

8:11

just go with corporate restructuring. There you go.

8:13

And, uh... I

8:17

like this reduce hierarchy and promote in-person

8:19

collaboration, meaning they're firing people who work

8:22

from home. Yeah, that's exactly

8:24

what that bit meant. Mm-hmm. We're

8:26

going to see a lot more of that coming, I think. Microsoft

8:29

is doing some gaming layoffs, including

8:31

86 jobs at Skylanders Studio Toys

8:33

for Bob. And, uh,

8:35

let's see, 86 there and a bunch

8:37

more at some other gaming companies. Now,

8:39

this has got the F.E.C.s'

8:42

attention because they approved this merger where

8:44

they said, we're going to do right

8:46

by Activision Blizzard and all that sort

8:48

of stuff, and now the F.E.C. is

8:50

going, hold on a second. Now you

8:53

got them and you're firing them all?

8:55

Mm-hmm. They're like, yeah, that's kind of

8:57

what happens. Yeah. But

9:00

the thing is, this is a crazy

9:02

thing. In California, you have

9:04

to basically tell people that they're going

9:06

to get laid off months in advance. You have to

9:09

like, you have to fight with the state. Yes. Yeah.

9:11

Which is nuts. Which is why

9:13

I don't know if I ever want to have

9:16

a company that has employees in California. Jesus. Well,

9:18

I mean, I love California, but there is a

9:20

reason that people who, when they start businesses, get

9:22

the hell out. Get the hell out, yeah. Yeah,

9:24

that's true. That's true. I

9:27

just saw this one this morning. Grammarly is laying off 230

9:30

employees as a part of,

9:33

guess, wait for it, business restructuring. They're Grammarly. You

9:35

think they could have come up with a better

9:37

phrase? Yeah, seriously. Come on.

9:40

You've got all the words. Yeah, and

9:42

apparently they have all the monies too. They're

9:44

just looking at their organizational design and current

9:46

skill sets, and they're just going

9:48

to be moving people around like out of the

9:51

building. Yeah. Here's the

9:53

thing. Grammarly is one of those companies that I

9:55

gladly pay for. I love that

9:57

company. So I hope that there's no shenanigans.

10:00

going on behind the scenes is going to screw

10:03

that company because Grammarly, their integration

10:06

into my system is flawless. I

10:08

love it and I don't

10:10

want them to go away. They make me

10:12

sound smarter all day long. There you go.

10:16

Well Warner Music Group is also doing layouts. They plan to

10:18

lay off about 600 staffers in an

10:20

effort to free up more money for music investment

10:23

across the next decade. The majority

10:25

of impacted staffers which represent 10% of the company.

10:28

The company's owned

10:33

and operated media properties, corporate and various

10:35

support functions as well as in-house ad

10:37

sales function. So a bunch of things

10:39

that probably should have been involved in a record company anyways.

10:42

Yeah most things shouldn't be

10:45

involved in a record company. Yeah

10:47

so yeah Warner Brothers losing a bunch of

10:49

people and related to all

10:52

of that I saw this article I can't

10:54

believe I was actually looking at USA Today.

10:56

I think friend of the show Mike actually

10:58

sent this to me because he loves USA

11:00

Today. This is a graphic that shows how

11:02

Americans total credit card debt reached record highs.

11:05

So we had that brief period during the

11:07

pandemic when everybody kind of stopped spending money

11:09

and savings and all that was good and

11:11

getting bolstered. That's all gone now.

11:13

Mm-hmm. Credit card debt as usual has rose to a

11:15

record 1.13 trillion at the end of last

11:19

year. Credit card balances increased by about

11:21

50 billion or 4.6% in the fourth quarter

11:24

of 2023. Credit card

11:26

delinquencies the amount of time in which cardholders

11:28

fall behind in making payments has also increased.

11:31

The percentage of card delinquencies 90 days or more rose to

11:33

6.4 from 4% in the fourth quarter

11:36

of 2022. So yeah

11:38

we have spent all that money we saved and

11:40

now we're spending the money we don't have again.

11:43

Yep yep I can tell you

11:45

that's true for me. So out

11:48

of that 50 billion I'm sure a couple of

11:50

that's mine. Yes and cast your minds back to

11:52

the great resignation and what we said at that

11:54

time. Do not do it. Don't

11:56

do it. Don't do it. Don't do it because

11:59

all we've been doing is reading off pink slip

12:01

notices and talking about how we're all in debt and

12:03

losing money again. Four months now we've

12:05

been doing that. It's getting

12:07

kind of depressing. I'm starting to get, I'm starting

12:09

to get pink fatigue. So,

12:12

uh, Barbie. Yeah,

12:15

that's true. Um, Amazon

12:17

is going to be doing okay though,

12:19

because they're going to start charging you

12:21

for IPV for addresses a lot

12:24

more. Uh, they were, I mean,

12:26

they were charging before, but, uh, for static IPs.

12:29

But now, uh, they're trying to get people to

12:31

move to IPV six, but I think it probably

12:33

behooves them that they don't get people to move

12:35

the IPV six because they're

12:37

looking at making about a billion dollars

12:39

a year, a billion with a B

12:42

for renting out IPV four addresses at

12:45

wait for it. Half a cent per IP

12:47

per hour for all

12:49

of their addresses. Okay. That's not

12:51

about $43 and 80 cents a year. Her

12:55

address. Yeah. Yeah. Since they have 132 million

12:57

addresses, which is nuts. One

13:01

company has, you know how hard it was for me

13:03

to get a class C back in the day? Yep.

13:06

Jesus. It was, it was, it's so much paperwork.

13:09

Oh God, it was such a pain. And these guys have 132 million of them.

13:13

It's good to be Amazon. It really is.

13:15

It really is. Uh, it's

13:17

going to be Google too, because Google has

13:19

finally killed off the bard. It

13:22

is now called Google Gemini. And,

13:25

okay. Yeah. Yeah. And, uh,

13:27

now we have three flavors of Google

13:30

Gemini. We've got nano pro and ultra.

13:32

You tell me the difference at a glance.

13:35

I couldn't, uh, here's the surprising bit. There's

13:37

no plus. No,

13:39

I was waiting for stayed away from plus.

13:41

Yeah. Gemini plus. Uh,

13:44

the thing is now, if you want, uh, uh, nano

13:46

and pro, I guess you can get for

13:49

free, but if you want ultra, um,

13:51

or Gemini, see the whole thing, this is

13:53

the crazy part. You have to get Gemini

13:56

advanced to get ultra. And.

14:00

And that's $20 a month, but it's free

14:02

for the first two months. I need my

14:04

AI to tell me which AI I should

14:06

get. Right, and you have to get a Google

14:09

One AI premium plan to

14:11

get Ultra and Advanced and...

14:15

Jesus! I

14:17

certainly don't make it easy. That's bullshit. No,

14:20

and here's the other thing. So when you get

14:22

the Google One subscription, they also give you more

14:24

storage for photos and Gmail and drive because it's

14:26

like... because yeah, why not? I

14:29

don't know about you. I was paying for an extra

14:31

two terabytes of space on my

14:34

Google account. And then

14:36

last month, I think I talked about this, like I

14:38

had to delete all my photos. Because

14:41

what they did was they screwed up with

14:44

allocating. I paid for it, but they didn't allocate

14:46

it to my account. This happened to other people

14:48

I know too who were paying for it. And

14:51

I did all the stuff. I deleted it and

14:53

then they charged me again and I'm like, what the hell?

14:55

So I just canceled it and then they gave me a

14:57

refund on the unused portion of it. Pro

15:00

rated over time. There is something going on over there where

15:02

they just... Apparently, the AI

15:04

has taken over because Bard is running the

15:06

billing. I don't know

15:08

what's happening over there. I've always

15:11

had a bad feeling about Google. I've never

15:13

really gotten involved in their infrastructures. I've avoided

15:15

as much of Google as I can. Obviously,

15:17

everybody has a Gmail address. I have a

15:19

backup address that's in Gmail. I've

15:22

tried to never give them money because

15:24

they just seem to kill programs that actually work.

15:26

And they keep the programs that don't. And they're

15:29

just a mess. They're just a big,

15:31

godawful mess. With zero customer

15:33

service. Yeah, zero customer service either.

15:35

So I avoid

15:37

Google like the plague. Yeah,

15:41

I would never host a web site there. Seriously.

15:45

Because I've never known

15:47

anybody that's had a good experience

15:50

trying to host on their infrastructure.

15:52

It's always been a shit show. It's godawful. AWS is...

15:55

Yeah. AWS is... Like my kid's

15:57

school uses Google's school... kid

16:00

or home kid or I can't even remember what

16:02

it's called. Logging into that thing is a goddamn

16:04

nightmare. Like it's impossible. And this is

16:06

just supposed to be for parents and teachers. And

16:09

most of the teachers give up using it like

16:11

within two weeks of every school year. Yeah.

16:15

I'm, I'm tempted to, to kill my business

16:17

account there because I was grandfathered in for

16:19

10 years and

16:21

you know, I am no longer grandfathered in. And

16:23

now it's costing me 45 bucks a month for

16:25

like six email addresses. Yeah. Fuck that. It's like,

16:28

yeah. I, it's just inertia that

16:30

I don't want to change. I don't want to have

16:32

to go move the DNS. I don't want to

16:34

have to worry about losing mail here and there.

16:36

And you know, I've got people on there that are

16:38

about as technically savvy as a slug. So,

16:41

uh, trying to get

16:43

them to move that, you know, figure out how

16:45

their email is going to work and they live

16:47

across the country. It's like, Oh, well, I got

16:49

to say, I have this as a shout out

16:51

for later in the show or at the end

16:53

of the show, but I'll do it now. Shout

16:55

out to Anthony at note, host.ca/Hey.cafe. Uh,

16:57

that's where I've been posting my personal email for ages

16:59

now. And, and, and except for the fact that he's

17:02

trying to restructure a bunch of things. I'm gonna have

17:04

to move something soon. It has been great. Yeah.

17:06

Wait till you have to move. I know. I

17:09

did that last week. It's not fun. Give

17:11

me the sheet. Yeah, no. But

17:14

as far as like my email goes, it's been great.

17:17

So I didn't know that they, yeah,

17:19

I should, I should move my email over there. Yeah, you

17:21

should. It's easy. Yeah. And, and Anthony,

17:23

if you, if you decide to move your infrastructure

17:25

again, I'm coming to Canada and finding you. Yeah.

17:28

Or we'll just buy out the one server. Don't touch it.

17:30

Don't touch it. Leave ours alone. So

17:33

getting back to Google and Gemini, uh, now

17:36

of course this is going to happen. Uh,

17:38

in their privacy policy, they, they,

17:41

uh, tell you that, uh, Gemini

17:43

is going to retain your AI

17:46

conversations for three years by default,

17:49

by default. So you

17:51

have to go in and, and, you

17:53

know, flip that switch manually. If you

17:55

don't want it to actually, you know, save

17:57

them, they will save them still for 72 hours. hours

18:00

to quote, maintain the safety and

18:02

security of Gemini apps and improve

18:04

Gemini apps. And they

18:06

also say that regularly human annotators

18:08

routinely read and label and process

18:11

conversations. So they say

18:13

that the conversations are quote unquote

18:15

disconnected from the Google accounts. Sure

18:17

they are. We've heard that

18:19

before from you guys. We've also

18:21

heard that you can stop tracking and

18:23

incognito mode is not. And

18:26

yeah, so caveat emptor on

18:29

Gemini. Or again, just don't use Google stuff

18:31

if you can avoid it. Yeah. Yeah.

18:34

There's you can throw a rock and hit

18:36

an AI company nowadays. So go for it.

18:39

Not to say that any of those are

18:41

any better. It's the exact same

18:43

thing. So I'll wait for apples. Yeah.

18:46

Or just write it yourself. Like we used to

18:48

do. Oh wait, I sound like an old curmudgeon

18:50

now. Oh God. Quit

18:52

spray painting that graffiti on my lawn. You misspelled

18:55

something. Get the AI to do it. Back

18:59

to one more AI story for me here. GitHub.

19:01

I did this. This

19:03

is one of those things that drives me crazy. The

19:06

headline is AI tools like GitHub.

19:08

Copilot are rewiring coders brains. Yours

19:10

may be next. Not

19:13

once in this fucking article, do they mention

19:15

your brain being rewired. It's because

19:17

we wouldn't know. We don't know any of

19:19

that stuff. That is what we need to early for. Yeah.

19:22

Uh, coding rewires coders brains. That's

19:25

what does that. It is reading

19:27

or eating or watching TV. Our

19:30

brains are constantly rewiring themselves. Yes. Neuroplasticity

19:32

people read all about it. Yeah, but

19:35

not those stupid companies that claim to

19:37

increase it. Yeah. So it

19:39

says in here, GitHub research in collaboration

19:41

with MIT shows that Copilot allowed coders

19:43

faced with relatively simple tasks to complete

19:45

their work on average 55% more quickly.

19:50

This increase, by the way, I think half of

19:52

this article is written by AI. Cause it is

19:54

really hard to read the whole thing. It's kind

19:57

of a foster clock. Um, this

19:59

increase in protocol. suggest that companies could

20:01

get the same work done with fewer

20:03

programmers. But companies could use those savings

20:05

to spend more on labor in other

20:07

projects. My argument here

20:09

is, why don't you get more coders? Because

20:12

if you're going to save money, you can get more coders to

20:14

do more stuff. Forget the other

20:17

projects. Building

20:19

is always underfunded. So

20:22

save the money on middle management, get

20:24

more programmers in there. And they say,

20:27

there are other potential side effects of

20:29

tools like GitHub Copilot besides job displacement.

20:31

For example, increased reliance on automation might

20:34

lead to more errors creeping into code.

20:36

I would say, forget might,

20:38

will lead to more errors. One

20:41

recent study claimed to find evidence of such a trend.

20:44

Although they say it reported only a

20:46

general increase in mistakes since Copilot was

20:48

introduced, not direct evidence that the AI

20:50

helper was causing an increase in errors.

20:53

While this is true, it seems fair to

20:55

worry that less experienced coders might

20:57

miss errors when relying on AI to

20:59

help. Or that overall quality of code

21:01

might decrease thanks to autocompletes. Duh.

21:04

Duh. Of course.

21:07

This is called the sub-stack effect. This has

21:09

been around for ages. You Google the problem.

21:12

You find the result from the forum. And

21:16

everybody grabs the same damn code, which probably hadn't error

21:18

in it in the first place. And we all plugged

21:20

it in. That's what we all did. Yep.

21:23

And I can tell you there was one flaw

21:25

that got me when I was a junior programmer.

21:27

I grabbed a piece of code to do a mail-to

21:29

thing. Just to, you know, shoot off an email, grabs

21:31

the same damn code, which probably hadn't error in it

21:34

in the first place. And we all plugged it in.

21:36

That's what we all did. Yep.

21:38

And I can tell you there was one flaw

21:40

that got me when I was a junior programmer.

21:42

I grabbed a piece of code to do a

21:44

mail-to thing. Just to, you know, shoot off an

21:46

email. And it had no

21:50

scrubbing of input data whatsoever.

21:52

Oopsies. Yeah. And

21:54

so we're in it. It

21:56

snuck into JPEG magazine's code base.

22:00

This is when OpenDNS was next door to us. They

22:02

were just starting to. And they

22:04

were like, guys, you guys are sending

22:06

about 4 million emails an hour.

22:08

Do you have any idea why? We're

22:11

like, no. And then we all looked at the code

22:13

and we're like, no, it looks fine. It's fine. Their

22:15

guy came over and looked at it and goes, you

22:17

guys are fucking idiots. But

22:20

I got it from Substack. Okay.

22:22

Or not Substack. Oh, no,

22:24

I said Substack. He said Substack. It was, what

22:27

was it, Stack Overflow. Stack Overflow. Yeah.

22:31

Yeah, I got it from Stack Overflow. And yeah, it

22:33

was horrible. And then guess what I learned to do

22:35

that day? Input scrubbing for

22:37

everything. And I became a better

22:39

programmer for it. I learned security.

22:42

So yeah,

22:45

this is going to keep happening. Now,

22:47

the real fun part is going to be when

22:49

these things, like we talked about with chat GPT

22:51

and open AI's

22:53

GPT models, they're basically getting

22:55

all of this information from the internet. You can't

22:57

tell what's written by the AI and what's not

23:00

written by the AI. And it just keeps sucking

23:02

itself back in and you get an orborous effect.

23:04

And yeah, everything just turns to shit. And

23:06

we just turned to mutant jelly machines to

23:09

get fine. Can't wait. Shoelaces. It's going to

23:11

be great. Let's just get to the end

23:13

game already. I'm tired. Okay. Speaking

23:15

of jelly machines, what do you got next?

23:17

I got some AI stories. Two companies based

23:20

in Texas have been linked to a spate

23:22

of robocalls that used artificial intelligence to mimic

23:24

President Joe Biden. The audio deepfake was used

23:26

to urge New Hampshire voters not to participate

23:29

in the state's presidential primary.

23:32

As many as 25,000 of these

23:34

calls were made to residents of the state in January.

23:37

They have issued a season-desessed letter to

23:39

Life Corporation that orders the company to

23:41

immediately desist violating New Hampshire election laws.

23:44

We have also opened a criminal investigation and we're

23:46

taking next steps in that investigation, sending

23:48

document preservation notices and subpoenas to Life

23:50

Corporation, lingo telecom, and other individuals or

23:53

entities. So they were

23:55

using tools from the AI voice cloning company

23:58

11 Labs, which when you play everybody. Yeah,

24:00

yeah, and everybody uses which

24:02

they have no guardrails by the way That's

24:05

why but they banned the user responsible Jason

24:08

see that's it. That's all they're doing

24:10

and no But the company says it

24:12

is dedicated to preventing the misuse of

24:14

audio AI tools and that it takes

24:16

any incidents of misuse extremely seriously Bullshit

24:18

no, we take it seriously. They just

24:20

don't do fucking shit about it. No,

24:22

you can clone anybody's voice Yeah, anybody

24:25

guardrails at all not like the ones

24:27

that are built into the more commercially

24:29

viable Ais and and even image

24:31

generators and all that all of which have guardrails

24:34

and 11 labs just got a shit ton of funding

24:36

to Yep, but yeah, no you can put anybody's voice

24:38

in there. All you have to do is check a

24:40

box It's like going to Pornhub,

24:42

you know as a 12 year old. Yes. I'm

24:44

an adult. Yeah Yeah, that's it They have gone

24:46

back to the 1990s level

24:48

of security when it comes to comes

24:50

to this stuff and just to say

24:53

that they are Dedicated to preventing misuse

24:55

of audio AI tools is a flat-out

24:57

fault-based lie Of course a

24:59

lie. Yeah, you're starting to get that outrage

25:01

that I get every now and then when I actually start to

25:03

care But get a little bit. Oh, I don't

25:05

care. I'm just saying that they're full of shit.

25:08

They're flat-out lying Yeah, so there

25:10

you go. But the FCC is not

25:12

taking this lying down Jason Thursday

25:14

they outlawed robocalls that contained voices generated by

25:16

artificial intelligence We talked about this last week

25:18

because they were considering it and we went

25:20

well How are you gonna do that when

25:22

you can't even outlaw regular robocalls and

25:25

the can't so yeah, but but they're illegal

25:27

now Jason they're illegal They

25:30

will face deep fines maxing out at more than

25:32

twenty three thousand dollars per call, which is actually,

25:34

you know Financially like if if you get caught

25:36

doing this and you don't pick up

25:38

and leave town immediately You're gonna be

25:40

in for a lot of money The

25:43

law will also give recipients the right to take

25:45

legal action and potentially recover up to fifteen hundred

25:47

dollars in damages for each unwanted call Okay,

25:50

I would like it if I went after

25:52

every single person that robocall me Well,

25:55

you know, you'd be rich if you could actually figure

25:57

out how to get a Pakistan company sued in the

25:59

United States and get any money out

26:01

of them whatsoever. Yeah. So, no.

26:05

I forgot to put this in the show notes. There was a great

26:07

article on 404 this week about

26:10

a company in Pakistan who was

26:12

basically creating fake credentials. They were

26:14

credential mill. They had university. They

26:16

were just spinning up universities, making

26:18

fake accreditation websites, a whole nine

26:21

yards. It's an insane story.

26:23

I'll find it and throw it in the

26:25

notes. But basically, there was no repercussions for

26:27

anything that they did. People were

26:30

getting fake pilot's licenses. Pilot's

26:32

licenses. Have we not learned anything since

26:35

September 11th? Apparently not. Apparently

26:37

not. They said they drew the line at medical

26:39

licenses, which I'd call bullshit on too. Yeah, I

26:41

doubt it. Back

26:43

to the AI thing, Meta plans to ramp

26:46

up labeling of AI-generated images across its platform

26:49

and Facebook, Instagram, and threads to help it

26:51

make clear that the visuals are artificial. It's

26:54

part of a broader push to tamp down misinformation

26:56

and disinformation, which is significant as we wrangle with

26:58

the ramifications of generative AI in the major election

27:00

year in the US and other countries. According

27:03

to our good old friend Nick Clegg, the

27:05

company has been working with partners from across

27:07

the industry to develop standards that include signifiers

27:09

that an image video or audio clip has

27:11

been generated using AI. Of course,

27:13

that only works for the tools that agree

27:15

to put those in, many

27:18

of which do not. So

27:20

they say they're working on tools that will be able

27:23

to detect invisible signals, namely

27:25

AI-generated information that aligns with the

27:27

C2PA and IPTC technical standards. Again,

27:30

you can take that out if you're using your own

27:32

open source versions of stuff. So there

27:34

you go. So what are they going to do about

27:36

that? Well, they're going to rely on people, people reporting

27:38

it. And we all know how well reporting anything to

27:40

Meta goes. Yeah. It goes

27:43

into the big black hole called fuck off. Yep.

27:47

So we have Meta saying that they're going

27:49

to do that. And

27:52

we have a maliciously edited video about Joe

27:54

Biden that has been on Facebook that went

27:56

to Meta's oversight board. And guess what they

27:58

said? They can stay. Why

28:00

not? Whatever

28:03

keep it So,

28:05

which is it companies what what

28:08

the fuck are you people doing? Nothing

28:11

nothing lips nothing Nothing

28:14

at all. So this is a video Joe Biden It

28:17

was edited to make it look like he was repeatedly

28:19

touching a young girl's chest In

28:21

fact, this is a video in which Biden simply placed

28:23

an I voted sticker on her shirt after she voted

28:25

in person for the first time The

28:28

oversight board said that the video is not

28:30

a violation of metas narrowly written Manipulated media

28:32

policy because it was not edited with AI

28:34

tools and because the edits were obvious and

28:36

therefore unlikely to mislead most users Which

28:39

I guess is fair if you're going by the letter of the

28:41

law But they do and

28:43

of course they did say we're concerned about

28:45

this policy because it's kind of bullshit You

28:47

should reconsider this policy quickly given the number

28:49

of elections in 2024 That

28:53

oversight board is such a joke. I so want

28:55

to be on it so bad. Are you kidding

28:57

me? They they're getting paid millions of dollars to

28:59

do fuck off So

29:02

great and get me on the board people put

29:04

me in coach I'm ready to board exactly

29:09

We have another story about a video call

29:11

deep fakes an employee at the Hong Kong

29:13

office of a multinational company transferred nearly 26

29:17

million dollars to scammers

29:19

last month after unwittingly attending a video

29:21

call with deep fakes of his co-worker

29:23

he or she's co-workers Including

29:25

the company's chief financial officer. The

29:27

employee was the only real human attending the

29:30

video call while the fake participants were impersonated

29:32

with the help of artificial intelligence Scammers

29:35

have publicly available video and audio of

29:37

their impersonation targets via YouTube then use

29:39

deep fake technologies to emulate their voices

29:42

and to lure the victim to follow their instructions and

29:45

Because the people in the video conference

29:47

look like the real people the employee

29:49

made 15 transactions as instructed the five

29:51

local bank accounts Totaling 20 million Hong

29:53

Kong dollars Wow That's

29:56

right out of a movie it's fantastic. Ah,

29:59

yeah the employee Only realized it was

30:01

a scam after independently contacting the company's head

30:03

office about a week later. Can

30:05

you imagine? You'd been sitting there for a

30:07

week going, I don't know. Hey

30:10

guys? I

30:13

transferred away 26 million dollars. Was I

30:15

supposed to do that? No?

30:19

Shit. Well, it sucks for you

30:21

guys. Wow.

30:24

You know, I feel bad for them because...

30:26

I do, but I don't. Wouldn't

30:29

you double check before transferring that amount

30:31

of money? It's a video call, man.

30:34

I mean, that's a pretty high level

30:36

of sophistication. Yes,

30:39

but if I'm talking 26 million dollars,

30:41

I want it in writing, or

30:43

at least email chain. Well, no, you

30:45

don't want the email chain. I mean, the email chain is the

30:47

worst. I told you, one of

30:49

my friends got scammed out of 10,000 dollars because

30:51

she transferred a client's money out because she got

30:54

scammed on a thread. I would pick

30:56

up the phone and call the CFO. Yeah,

31:00

well, you know, there's

31:02

ways to get around that too. It's just

31:04

crazy. It's crazy. Yeah. Yeah,

31:07

biometrics now. No one can fake that. Oh,

31:10

I think we need to... Oh, yeah,

31:12

we just need to go back to shiny rocks.

31:14

We need to just trade shiny rocks. A

31:18

piece of leather with notches on it. That's what we

31:20

need to do from now on. That's it. Pelt and

31:22

furs. Well, thank God

31:24

I'm in Canada. Plenty of that shit around. Yes,

31:26

seriously. I'm rich, bitch. Oh,

31:30

man. One guy that's not rich is Khalid

31:32

Itum. He was

31:34

working at MoviePass. And

31:37

he decided to have a party at Coachella

31:39

back in 2018. And

31:41

he borrowed a bunch of money from his buddies to pay

31:44

for it, and turns out he didn't have

31:46

the money to pay him back. So what did he do?

31:48

He sent a bunch of fake invoices to MoviePass, totaling $260,000.

31:50

Must have been a hell of a party. I'm

31:54

thinking the party was probably 50 grand, and he just

31:56

figured I'm doing it in for a dollar, in for

31:59

$20. Yeah, two hundred

32:01

and sixty thousand of them exactly. Yeah, so

32:03

yep He was found guilty on two counts

32:05

of wire fraud They did try and get

32:07

him on money laundering, but that was he

32:09

was acquitted on that one Now

32:12

in this article it also says

32:14

that I totally forgot about this

32:16

the DOJ charged two chief executives

32:18

Theodore Farnsworth in Jay Mitchell low

32:21

both sounding totally like fake names They

32:24

were they were indicted for securities fraud for

32:27

engaging in a scheme to artificially inflate the

32:29

price of the company stock by misleading investors

32:32

Wait for this one Brian. This was this one

32:34

just made me chuckle. I almost spit out my morning

32:36

coffee The

32:38

false statement involved involved claims that

32:40

movie passes business model in which

32:43

subscribers could see unlimited movies in

32:45

theaters with no black updates for

32:47

a flat monthly fee of nine

32:49

dollars and ninety-five cents was Wait

32:52

for it a tested sustainable

32:54

business model Okay,

32:57

sir, it's been tested. That's for sure one

32:59

part is true Now

33:04

I think that you need to take away the toys

33:06

of the people that invested in movie pass based on

33:08

that Look, I

33:10

think it's common sense I

33:13

I think that you know, I think an

33:15

employee misleading a company that has that is

33:17

self mislead its investors I think it's a

33:20

fair play all around Everybody

33:23

got what they deserved. Is that what you're saying? Yeah,

33:25

pretty much fuck them. Okay. Well eat

33:27

him is going to be sentenced in April 29th

33:30

Here's the here's the kicker on that one. He

33:32

faces a maximum sentence of 40 years in prison

33:35

Wow Yeah,

33:37

hope that was a good part For

33:39

260 grand and we

33:41

got people stealing billions and

33:44

they just basically get a bracelet and get to

33:46

stay at home and play Call of Duty That's

33:49

insane. That is insane. I feel bad for

33:51

that guy. That's that's that's way way way

33:53

too harsh. Yeah or

33:55

maybe but C.

34:01

B time before we go to Killer

34:03

games have ship them. Of

34:06

Taylor Swift, a pop star. Taylor Swift

34:08

is threatened legal action against to Florida

34:10

student who stood up multiple social media

34:12

accounts that release time in real time

34:14

information as the whereabouts of her personal

34:16

aircraft according to the Washington Post. If

34:18

the sound similar or are familiar, it's

34:20

because it is the same guy the

34:22

did the Ilan Jet scandal of late.

34:24

Twenty Twenty. Ah, thank our guys Tracking

34:26

a bunch of people. Stuff? I don't

34:28

We all know this. He does it

34:30

to them. The information about their he

34:32

just call a certain tweets about is not

34:35

on major platforms anymore because he's been banned

34:37

from all of them. But obviously you can't

34:39

ban people from things like mastodon or telegram

34:41

or others other things of that nature so

34:43

ill during it. I

34:45

mean, to Taylor Swift's credit,

34:47

she does get. The you

34:49

know she's so big that she gets dressed or

34:52

less constantly. I'm that this is kind of a

34:54

bullshit thing. As if he was just a nice

34:56

guy I would be like okay, I'll leave you

34:58

office. But he's

35:00

not. He's gonna fight it. So I guess where

35:02

to find out of this? Legal or not? Because

35:04

it's I don't see Taylor Swift has enough money

35:06

to just let her lawyers go with us until

35:08

it's doc. Yeah, the

35:10

thing is though, it's public data. And.

35:13

It all public data. Him.

35:16

So. That. It

35:18

makes no sense that he should or could be

35:20

sued for this. You know? This.

35:22

Basically repackaging public data supplying

35:24

a person or a private

35:26

jet. And. You go in order

35:29

to his boss everywhere. The

35:31

he got out of our be

35:33

better sure man. Okay some Finally

35:35

some good news about science. You.

35:38

Hear that Jason were talking about good science

35:40

again and he monkeys die from. This was

35:42

no, didn't lie about. It. I. Not

35:44

yet. okay as far as I know.

35:47

So far so good. Yeah, so far

35:49

so good. Amazing spiral shaped contact lens

35:51

uses optical vortex to correct vision. Scientists

35:54

have developed a groundbreaking spiral shape contact

35:56

lens known as the Spiral Day After

35:58

which creates an optical gore tex the

36:01

correct vision under various like conditions and

36:03

distances. This new technology promises to transform

36:05

not just the field of ophthalmology but

36:08

also has consumer gadgets like Vr headsets

36:10

will. Ah so this thing is pretty

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cool and is apparently works really well

36:15

with your peripheral vision as well as

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your enough straight on vision so they

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can start using these things in knob.

36:22

I'm. In the applications like

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are not just like I were but

36:26

drones and dust off driving cars and

36:28

things like that. So it has a

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wide range of applications but I just

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one of the idea of zoc like

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are like I just had to start

36:36

getting reading glasses and I you know

36:38

I'm I'm told them live so I

36:40

would love some contact lenses from the

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stuff that's Do It. Yeah.

36:45

I've had glasses, Fourth, Grade of

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36:49

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36:53

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let me see it like in the right

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Vpn. Look. Around you can

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buy cars like these on auto Trader like

40:32

that girl riding a sales or the tailgating

40:34

right now others cars doubling of kids as

40:36

a living rooms or amount or traitor to

40:38

are you working amount of listen to this

40:41

added same time well multitask and pro cars

40:43

like the ones in the Gimp like a

40:45

lot of for sale on auto traitor. New.

40:47

Cars Used cars, electric cars, maybe even

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fly of got okay no plan cars

40:52

but as soon as they get a

40:54

visit they'll be on out or traitor

40:56

just you. Wait. Auto Traitor.

41:04

Media can. I

41:07

get a note from John Lucas Jackson on

41:09

twitter. He says listening to the January twentieth

41:11

episodes, you're completely right On the first episode

41:13

of The Bear, it gave my wife and

41:15

I anxiety. However, you have to get past

41:18

that first episode. It's not the best representation

41:20

of the show we binged in a week

41:22

and it's A for in. It's phenomenal. So.

41:25

I give a shot cook as maybe maybe

41:27

it's just like pilot Itis you know. App.

41:30

Isn't the first is always the pilot and so

41:32

is a lower changes after that so like as

41:34

house or glass of. Yeah. Anna.

41:38

Paquin. They had a plan. The

41:41

pilot episode as boring as fuck, but. Yes,

41:44

as when I actually like the priceless

41:46

efforts of the to our that you

41:48

Our movies Now the and the initial

41:50

early pilot. Yeah love that. Ah the

41:52

show was way better. Elisha with the

41:54

show is it was good but I

41:56

got a letter they kept up the

41:59

think that. I is as of

42:01

getting back into battle. Sorry I love

42:03

the basis of those great. I

42:06

saw poor things this week. That's the,

42:08

that's the Emma Stone as an imposing.

42:11

Our Amazonia a congratulations to

42:13

her in their first born!

42:16

Really fantastic basically porn. It's

42:20

kind of a Frankenstein retelling. It's

42:22

is extraordinarily good. I learned a

42:25

great things about and I want

42:27

to watch it if. yeah, And.

42:30

So. A friend of my sadness either. An

42:33

Iguana off. Notice.

42:35

Couldn't actually A and I when I when

42:37

I talked to about it i'm a year

42:39

is really were to the shudder on video

42:41

and he's like it didn't seem like Aetna

42:43

theaters I think A when I thought I

42:45

saw i saw an oscar screener so I

42:47

get the dvd of it for and it

42:49

was obviously like either either on my super

42:51

high frame rate on film or shot on

42:53

it look I use a shot on video

42:56

which gave it is hyper realistic quality but

42:58

it was just like it was really cool.

43:00

The visuals are called a story is amazing

43:02

is based on a book that I never

43:04

read. Now I don't

43:06

have to have. but yeah, I fucking

43:08

loved it. I thought of a fantastic

43:10

and a note on oscar screen Dvds.

43:13

They. Have made these things absolutely impossible

43:16

to copy, Know how. Can

43:19

we all do Your drive? What? Yeah

43:21

well I mean in the of your eyes

43:23

turn to it with the old software to

43:25

make that than kind of work which I

43:27

don't happen to have lying around anymore right?

43:29

I did have a a dvd like I

43:31

us be Dvd drive or blu ray drive

43:34

that I bought years ago. I think I

43:36

got bogged down in a box somewhere yet

43:38

to do the first time. I get busted

43:40

out and use it in a lot and

43:42

that is so just didn't work too bad.

43:44

Either way this move when this movie comes

43:46

out check it out is really good looking

43:49

and will do. Yeah. Even just

43:51

even without the the party bitch it

43:53

was done. That. They didn't. Even that

43:55

was part of the story that added to the

43:57

story. It wasn't gratuitous in a way that you'd

43:59

think. It would be. It was just actually a necessary

44:01

part of the story line. And it was that. It

44:03

was just a great movie. I thought. Coup.

44:06

Ah, I watched Leave the

44:08

World Behind on Netflix. So

44:10

much potential. So.

44:12

Much potential. So little of

44:15

it actualized to so little

44:17

of it actually lived on.

44:19

The scene with the Tesla

44:21

was phenomenal. That was about it. So.

44:24

Much potential. So leave this movie behind is

44:27

all I gotta say. Okay, I don't waste

44:29

your time that wasn't really planning on it

44:31

now. I definitely want some now. Awesome!

44:34

Surprise news came out a Disney this

44:36

week. A surprise new sequel Tomb Wanna

44:38

will be released in theaters on November.

44:40

Twenty Seventh. Disney has announced this animated

44:42

films separate from the upcoming live action

44:44

adaptation is currently in development for Twenty

44:46

Twenty Five release. Our Motto is one

44:48

of those movies that got me that

44:50

it was one of our current a

44:52

Virus movies on your behalf so we

44:54

watched that endlessly we Listener soundtrack nonstop.

44:56

I'm very excited about this. Apparently it

44:58

was originally developed as. A

45:00

Tv series there and do it and animated series

45:02

out of it and Iger liked it so much.

45:05

Is it not left? Turn it into a movie

45:07

ticket really since a bunch of her movies have

45:09

tanked recently and we know will be when. You

45:12

go on and yeah I'm very excited lox

45:14

excited about the live action version because I

45:17

don't like does he live acts of stuff.

45:20

Maps that believe it animated. Beer.

45:23

Cops and do tasks. O'brien.

45:27

I don't know if you've noticed, but Apple released a

45:29

new gadget this week. I

45:31

have seen disobedient videos, a dumb fucks walking

45:34

around stopping in the middle of crossing the

45:36

street waving their arms around like they're moving

45:38

things because I guess they are moving things.

45:40

What is wrong with people I did you

45:42

see the video of the idiot driving the

45:45

at tesla robo car robo yeah I bird

45:47

truck with stupid things on yeah I like

45:49

I can be dead the month I think

45:51

he got pulled over I think yeah so

45:53

the I think the cops intervened on how

45:56

for. The

45:59

first off, I. The first one the first

46:01

article that I would guess everybody's talking about

46:03

this a Gizmodo article with a very quick

46:05

Betty headline we'll Apple's Vision Pro make your

46:07

real life unbearably boring Go out with The

46:09

answer to that obviously is no thanks you

46:11

thanks to better Just Love Headlines. And

46:14

he's saying outta here is hoping

46:17

that. This

46:20

guy's a against it is very

46:22

against the vision Pro I personally

46:24

am very for division pro. Ah

46:26

I'd my house while I'm working

46:28

are watching their consuming media. Not.

46:30

Out in the wild I have thoughts are that will

46:32

talk about that the second okay. And

46:35

he says Apple example exactly. Definitely be

46:37

worried that ridicule is and incoming Indeed,

46:39

Division prose is one clever pejorative away

46:41

from having is highly expensive hardware transformed

46:43

into a global jokes. Anyone who remembers

46:46

the term glasses will know what I

46:48

mean. On that note, what should we

46:50

call people who were vision prose in

46:52

public? Sound off in the comments. if

46:54

you have thoughts, here's what I think

46:56

that they are. They're vulnerable. They are

46:58

vulnerable to attack new people not understand

47:00

situational awareness. Few earning thirty five hundred

47:02

dollars worth of equipment on your face

47:05

and you will not notice when somebody

47:07

bangs you up from behind Exactly the

47:09

ah it is. It's just like com

47:11

ah yes yes you can see through

47:14

it. We know that. but you're doing

47:16

stuff it in your just as it

47:18

is worse than looking at your phone.

47:20

Is it because I'm. Yeah. Just

47:23

as millions the reviews this one just for

47:25

rubbed me the wrong with his i don't

47:27

think is gonna be a glass or moments

47:29

or it. I think this just a common

47:31

sense moment. People who were to Starbucks the

47:33

where are you walking but anyway exactly people

47:35

said the same thing about the air pod

47:37

when they came at all. everybody looks a

47:39

stupid with their airport. everybody's got their paws

47:41

now sorry that that that disappear. It's because

47:43

you know why. It's a damn good product.

47:45

All of the all of the reviews that

47:47

I'm reading our. Can't. Wait

47:49

for version to. This. Is going to

47:51

be it's it's fantastic stuff their flaws in it

47:54

because it's version one. they wanted to get it

47:56

out. but as far as. I. Can

47:58

tell everybody saying. It is.

48:00

It is a the coolest thing that

48:02

apple is put out probably ever. So.

48:06

I know that there but apple haters out there

48:08

guy see a new they're gonna say that. I'm.

48:10

Just going on what people have written. I

48:13

have not tried it so I'll iowa hundred

48:15

percent of aversion to rivers and three Guy

48:17

before hundred this thing. Yep, I'm every I,

48:19

I just. I just don't think about belongs

48:21

in the public spheres. Like not out while

48:23

you're walking and stuff. It's it's for work.

48:26

More. Earth's been at home. the ice in

48:28

the monument do whatever Emma Stone for hims the

48:31

same way I feel about phones. Like I get

48:33

pissed off when people are walking around with their

48:35

phones because they're not looking up. How many times

48:37

do we all dance out of people's way all

48:39

day long? I'm we're out walking now to try

48:42

walking on Hollywood Boulevard. films bullshit which are fucking

48:44

phone away and pay attention Watson said he. Yep!

48:47

So ah the speaking of people walk

48:49

and run in public this is this

48:51

is acceptable behavior because it's Katie Nice

48:53

that he did a review called the

48:55

Thing no no se but Apple Vision

48:57

prefer It is a very funny very

48:59

funny review of Worth Watching I he's

49:01

he's along the east a D V

49:03

and the video with like go by

49:05

Apple stock is this new categories going

49:08

to the off it's off the hook

49:10

but he has of is very good

49:12

revelation about how he like every wearing

49:14

it for several hours I would just

49:16

kind of melded. Intuit blended into it

49:18

that it was just became natural which

49:20

is very cool. So I'm highly recommend

49:22

going to watch that video. It is

49:24

very very good. There is

49:27

a. Little bit about Blue Sky here

49:29

which are going to discuss them slightly more

49:31

lurid details later with Dave. The open source

49:33

twitter alternative is getting rid of it's wait

49:35

listed opening. It's decentralized platform to everyone one

49:37

would argue about a year too late. But

49:40

here. We are ah, the current. No, I

49:42

don't see what's gonna happen. They currently have

49:44

a little over three million users, although that

49:47

number could and should rise Now that you

49:49

don't need an invitation to join any more

49:51

of their decentralized i guess which you could

49:53

say is is a good thing compared to

49:55

a Threads which is kind of taken over

49:57

most of the steam at this point and

49:59

be. They seem to be really liking

50:01

threads. I was going to transition that

50:03

was part of like my Christmas promised

50:05

myself as as get off axis move

50:07

over to threads and I started than

50:09

got so bored and didn't care so

50:11

kind of stopped halfway but. I

50:14

still have blue sky never go on it will see

50:16

what happens I guess. We'll. See what

50:18

your market decides to? I don't think

50:20

they get a million people signed up

50:22

that Thursday and co transitioned over. I'm.

50:25

I went back to. it was second around because I

50:27

was using it a bit when I was doing boot

50:29

up. And. It was

50:31

basically John's causes blue sky. at

50:33

that point. they are. I've got

50:35

enough people to follow words like

50:37

a normal series of of you

50:39

know activity that. I

50:42

like it more than the other ones. I like it

50:44

more. The Mastodon I like it more than. Ah,

50:47

Of threads that definitely like it more than

50:49

X because X is kind of a ghost

50:51

town compared to the people that I really

50:53

is a takedown. their acts as a ghost

50:56

town was sketchy ads and continued you know

50:58

of Salt. I

51:00

do like. I like a lot of the

51:02

teachers the Blue Sky has integrated and I

51:04

like the they're open platform Og en yes

51:07

Facebook is based on Activity Pub which is

51:09

you know, same thing as Mastodon and all

51:11

that Separatists or Facebook it is still threads

51:13

which gives me the heebie jeebies. It we

51:15

may I but we always talk about critical

51:17

mass even if even if Blue Sky out

51:19

of the million that takes the for a

51:21

thread is of hundred and thirty million. See.

51:24

Here's the thing though I am. I am

51:26

Fi. I'm firmly behind the fact a Critical

51:28

Mass is bullshit anymore is far. As for

51:30

my enjoyment of a platform, I don't care

51:32

if everybody's I'm actually thought I worried about

51:34

the in the only been jailed and is

51:36

it's It's just what we discovered with the

51:39

so many. so many at different apps and

51:41

even just a what was that stupid news

51:43

app that died a couple weeks ago? saw

51:45

the problem. if you don't hit Critical Mass

51:47

is this thing's gonna fucking go away with.

51:50

See, That's the point though with this is

51:52

they've they've built the protocols are you can

51:54

spin up your own servers now. They basically

51:56

just kind of wrote the http for social

51:58

networks which you know. It

52:01

seems to be a pretty decent vibrant community.

52:03

I recommend checking out the episode

52:05

of hardfork podcast that came out today with

52:07

the CEO of blue sky on it Okay,

52:09

she does a really good job of kind

52:12

of hyping it And

52:15

I went back on it and like all the people that I

52:17

actually like are over there now So it was a kind of

52:19

refreshing to pop back in say oh, this is where you've been

52:21

hiding You know, that's

52:23

how I found out the good omens news on Like

52:26

a week before you found it on X

52:29

because Neil was posting it over on

52:31

on blue sky and There's

52:34

a bunch of other people over there But I like how

52:36

you can see how you can get customized feeds for different

52:38

moods and different things And so you can get a feed

52:40

of people that you don't actually follow It's

52:42

kind of like lists on Twitter, I guess

52:44

right? But

52:46

it's just it's kind of it's nascent enough where it's

52:49

still fun And

52:51

it just doesn't have that icky factor of

52:53

Zuckerberg or Musk, I mean, yeah, there's some

52:55

hints of Dorsey floating around

52:58

wafting around I think that might just be

53:00

the stink coming off his beard but or

53:02

this one Julie beard trimmings Yeah,

53:04

I I actually reinstalled the

53:07

app and I've been diving back in and

53:09

you know followed a couple more people this

53:11

morning so And I like

53:13

the username systems because you can basically

53:15

tie yours into your own domain Like

53:17

I am at Jason dot FYI Yeah,

53:20

so I pull my own domain because that way it's

53:22

it's portable I take my people with me if I

53:24

want to go start up my own server I can

53:27

take that list of people with me and not be

53:29

tied down to it That's the whole decentralized part of

53:31

it. That is really nice. You can't do that with

53:33

threads right now You can't take my threads followers and

53:35

pop them over to another mastodon instance They say it's

53:37

coming but they said we were gonna be able to

53:39

edit our emails for you fucking years ago. So who

53:41

knows? Right So

53:44

I'm just you know, I don't

53:46

know I'm gonna give it a shot as far as

53:49

I don't really care that much about social media Anymore

53:51

because the thing for me. Yeah, I just don't care

53:53

enough Mm-hmm. I don't I

53:55

don't need it. I don't want it. Yeah.

53:59

Yeah, I just I did You know, to keep up with

54:01

some of the people I want to keep up

54:03

with, I find it nice to be able to

54:05

pop in and just have a, have a cursory

54:07

glance around and not feel compelled to have to

54:09

post all the time because I know that that

54:11

was a fool's errand all those years ago. I'm

54:13

not an influencer. I'm not, you know, getting free

54:15

vacations to the Bahamas or Aruba to go take

54:18

photos. So just chatting with some friends. That's all

54:20

I'm using it for because I'm old now. Speaking

54:24

of old, Slack just turned 10. Crazy, eh? Yeah,

54:29

I feel like I was using it about nine years

54:31

ago. Yeah, I was

54:33

using it 10 years ago. I was on

54:35

the beta. There's an article over at Wired

54:37

called, Slack is turning 10 years old and

54:39

wow has it changed everything. And I

54:42

would say, well, that's actually not true.

54:44

Slack is kind of irrelevant now because

54:47

Microsoft Teams won that war. Microsoft Teams

54:49

won the work implementation of Slack war

54:51

for sure. I'd say Discord won the

54:53

war in general. Yeah,

54:56

Discord definitely. Slack

54:58

is one of those things where I

55:01

only have installed now because one company that

55:03

I work with is using it. Well,

55:06

it's the same reason that I didn't install it, but every

55:08

now and then I get the emails when I've been tagged

55:10

in the thread and I open it up in the web

55:12

interface. And I see the logo and it

55:14

feels so retro to me now. Slack feels old. Because

55:17

it is. Yeah, and I still

55:19

can't unsee it when they rebranded and

55:21

recreated that logo. It's a pinwheel of

55:23

dicks. The Slack logo

55:25

is a pinwheel of dicks. Once

55:28

you see it, you can't unsee it. Actually, so

55:30

far more appropriate for

55:33

Discord as a logo.

55:35

Yeah, actually, yeah. It's

55:37

fun. Scott Beale just opened up a new

55:40

Discord server for Laughing Squid and

55:42

a bunch of old squiddies are over there. So that's been

55:44

kind of fun. That's actually been the most fun

55:47

I've had on, quote, unquote, social media

55:49

in quite some time. Just on our own channel. Geez. I'm

55:53

on both. I'm on both. I

55:55

even posted a meme to our meme

55:57

board yesterday. Come on, man. I'm engaged.

56:02

So yeah, it's just an interesting read if you

56:04

care about slack, which I don't anymore. I

56:07

actively dislike slack. So

56:11

I had to get some stuff from Amazon this week and

56:13

I got a couple of things that are

56:15

pretty cool that you might like, Brian. First

56:18

is called slip drive. It's basically a little sleeve

56:20

that you stick onto the back of your laptop

56:22

monitors that you can tuck a hard drive into

56:24

or a battery.

56:28

So either one and then you just run a cable to the side.

56:30

So it's a mounting place. So I have

56:32

all these little hard drives that I'm using all the time

56:34

and trying to move the laptop with all that stuff, it's

56:36

just a nice way to anchor it to your machine so

56:39

you can move it around. And

56:41

I found that I just have one that's dedicated just

56:43

to my time machine. I have an SSD for my

56:45

time machine backup that I just keep there all day

56:47

long. It's so much nicer when you're

56:49

dealing with a laptop. They're cheap. $16 for

56:52

the small one, $17 for the big one. It's basically just

56:56

like a sock that you slide your hard drive

56:58

into. Yeah, trust me, they're great. I've got them

57:03

on both my laptops now and I

57:05

love them. And to go

57:08

with that, I got the Shinki 90

57:10

degree right angle USB-C adapter, 40 gigabits

57:12

per second data transfer, USB 4, Thunderbolt

57:14

4, type C male to female connector

57:17

extender for mobile phone, switch, Steam Deck,

57:19

tablet, laptop, two pack. Okay. For

57:22

seven bucks. They're basically little right angle

57:24

connectors. So you can just

57:26

basically change the angle of your cable so it's not

57:28

sticking so far out. I like that too. Yeah,

57:31

for seven bucks, they're great. Adding

57:34

to car. Now, yeah, so

57:36

there's, as part

57:38

of my 12 step recovery program, there are a

57:40

lot of times when I have to, I don't

57:42

have to, I have taken the commitment to handle

57:45

Zoom meetings for some of the meetings I go

57:47

to. And in doing that, I found

57:49

a gadget that one of the guys turned me

57:51

on to, which is basically

57:53

because you have a webcam and

57:55

you're at a big auditorium, you have to run the

57:57

webcam to your computer. You don't have a USB-C cable

58:00

that is 50 feet long.

58:02

Right? Right. I found this

58:04

gadget called the Sewell U-Link U10 USB 2

58:07

over single CAT5E6 extender 200 foot 480 megabits

58:09

per second 4 port V 2.0. This

58:15

lets you run USB over

58:17

Ethernet. Okay. It

58:19

is awesome. So basically at the camera you

58:21

have a little box with a power cord,

58:24

you plug that in and then you just

58:26

run CAT5 across the auditorium and plug it

58:28

into a little receiver box that plugs into

58:30

your computer and boom you have a webcam

58:32

all the way across. It's

58:34

awesome. Works with any kind of USB

58:36

stuff. So for

58:39

it is a four porter. So for podcasting

58:41

you can plug in multiple mics and run

58:43

that at distance instead of having these massive

58:45

USB cables running everywhere. It is the greatest

58:47

little invention. I never knew this existed. Me

58:49

either. It is so cool. Yeah.

58:52

It's not too cheap. It is 120 bucks but

58:54

compare that to buying a 50 foot

58:57

USB-C cable which I don't even know if they make.

58:59

I don't know if they even go that far. It

59:02

is pretty cool. So along

59:04

with that I got a really

59:06

nice little retractable 50 foot CAT6

59:08

spindle like you see for garden

59:10

hoses. It works great. Right.

59:14

So I needed to have my own backpack. So I

59:17

basically have a zoom meeting and a backpack now. So

59:19

I have the camera. I have one of those Insta360 web cams

59:23

with a pivot on it so I can move

59:25

it around and stuff. Decent microphone on it gets

59:27

a job done. Run that to my laptop across

59:29

the auditorium and boom Bob's your uncle. It's great.

59:32

That's fun. Thank you for letting me be

59:34

of service. You're welcome. And also I found

59:37

a great site called Check Your Decaf because

59:39

I've been drinking decaf coffee. I know you

59:41

probably can't tell but I'm

59:43

on the decaf train now. Apparently

59:45

there's a couple different methods of making

59:48

decaf coffee. One is treating it with

59:50

methylene chloride which is the one

59:52

you don't want because it can cause brain

59:55

dysfunction. So obviously you don't want

59:57

that one. I go for the Swiss water method.

59:59

But there's a site called check your decaf where

1:00:01

you can pick your brand of decaf from a

1:00:03

listener will tell you how it's actually decaffeinated which

1:00:06

comes in hand yeah so I've actually I had one

1:00:09

brand that turns out was done with chemicals so

1:00:11

I got rid of it and moved over to a much more

1:00:14

eco-friendly brand for the so quick question on

1:00:16

this if you've switched to decaf coffee are

1:00:19

you still mainlining non decaf tea no

1:00:22

okay no no I

1:00:25

have in the mornings I have like

1:00:27

three cups of decaf coffee which works out to be

1:00:29

a third of a regular cup of coffee I

1:00:31

think which gets me through several hours and

1:00:34

then in the afternoon I just have herbal tea

1:00:37

yeah so had yeah the caffeine

1:00:39

was really screwing with me so I got

1:00:41

it down and now it's now my body's

1:00:44

readjusted to the point where the decaf coffee

1:00:46

still gives me a good enough buzz where

1:00:48

I can be chatty my

1:00:52

friends sent me this one this is a

1:00:54

great website the National Association of Unclaimed Property

1:00:56

Administrators okay so

1:01:00

what it is is you can search

1:01:02

any state it's a list of all

1:01:04

of the like the

1:01:06

state treasurer's all right who manage all

1:01:08

of this unclaimed money okay and

1:01:10

so I went in and put my name

1:01:12

in in Illinois they

1:01:15

had $12 that

1:01:18

Pizza Hut owed me from

1:01:21

the the mid 90s okay I

1:01:24

went I got a job at Pizza Hut

1:01:26

I went in for the training I sat

1:01:29

through half the training and it was Martha

1:01:31

Quinn on a videotape doing the Pizza Hut

1:01:33

training and halfway through it we're like screw

1:01:35

this let's go skate okay they actually

1:01:37

clocked me for that you

1:01:39

know our watch in the show so I had like 12

1:01:41

bucks in think in the check

1:01:43

is right I filled out the little thing check shows

1:01:46

up today I just got the notification that's coming in

1:01:48

the mail today so free

1:01:50

money so check it out it goes

1:01:53

by state so any state you lived in or done

1:01:55

have done business and just put your name in

1:01:57

Deetson and it's legit So

1:02:00

free money. I have no free money for me.

1:02:02

Unfortunately, I just checked. Okay. Did you check all

1:02:04

the state? But I've really only been in one

1:02:07

in terms of living. Okay, but

1:02:09

you lived in New York for a while, but I don't really have

1:02:11

a property Okay,

1:02:14

gotcha, okay. Well, I got money. All right. Good

1:02:17

for you. Everybody should I'll take it ever now

1:02:20

Yep, and this morning I was

1:02:22

googling I wanted to Check

1:02:24

my internet speed because I've recable everything and

1:02:27

everything is hardwired now So I was trying

1:02:29

to get to speed test net which is

1:02:31

the internet speed tester. I always use. Oh,

1:02:33

yeah by ukla Ukla

1:02:35

yeah, and by the way, there's the do you have

1:02:37

the hack on the app for your phone that turns

1:02:40

it into Satan cat mode? No, I have the app

1:02:42

on my home. I don't have the hack Okay,

1:02:45

you got go look for the Easter egg. It

1:02:47

turns it into basically a satanic cat Mode

1:02:49

and it like it gives you a Gregorian chance

1:02:51

and fire while checking it. It's awesome So

1:02:55

I basically just typed in speed test

1:02:58

and it popped up with the thing from Google

1:03:00

saying would you like to test your speed? I'm

1:03:02

like, okay. Boom. What's it? It's like built into

1:03:04

Chrome now. Yeah to Google to test

1:03:06

your internet speed. It's like, okay Basically

1:03:09

did the same thing But I still probably end up going

1:03:11

to speed test because I like them because you can compare

1:03:14

to other providers in your area Plus your gory and chance

1:03:16

who knew? Exactly. Exactly. That's

1:03:18

only for the app though on the

1:03:20

phone sadly But yeah,

1:03:22

it the link is in the show notes for that

1:03:25

It's just a how-to on on how to do it

1:03:27

Which is basically go to Google and search for internet

1:03:29

speed test and click run speed. There you go Not

1:03:33

rocket surgery the

1:03:35

dark side Welcome

1:03:42

to the dark side with Dave with podcast

1:03:44

super host Dave Fittner Dave is the host

1:03:46

of the cyberwire podcast for all your cyber security

1:03:48

news the co-host of hacking humans with Joe

1:03:50

Kerrigan discussing how humans are mean the co-host

1:03:52

of caveat with Ben Yellen because people are

1:03:54

nosy and host of control loop because Industrial

1:03:56

machines have feelings too. I we

1:03:59

should actually Rebrand this to shit shower

1:04:01

and shave with Dave Things

1:04:14

that everyone's life needs for true happiness Fulfillment

1:04:21

Yes Well, we missed you

1:04:23

last week Dave. Well, thank you.

1:04:25

I appreciate you allowing me to take

1:04:27

the break Just

1:04:30

you know just wasn't quite up to

1:04:32

it wasn't feeling myself and needed

1:04:34

to take a little time so good to be back

1:04:37

and Lots

1:04:39

to talk about today Christopher

1:04:41

writes in I am rarely highly critical of

1:04:44

this podcast But how did you decide not

1:04:46

to call this week's conversation with Dave shooting

1:04:48

the shit with Dave? I

1:04:51

won't be dumping the show anytime soon but

1:04:54

I rarely Understand

1:04:56

how you can get through such a massive

1:04:58

load of bathroom discussions without squeezing out a

1:05:00

new title to the segment Still I couldn't

1:05:02

wipe the grin from my face Okay,

1:05:05

Christopher put the time Yeah,

1:05:11

very nice nicely done sir, I couldn't

1:05:13

wipe the big grin from my face, okay

1:05:16

Christopher put the time Yeah,

1:05:22

very nice nicely done sir Yes,

1:05:25

and Kevin writes in from the last show Dave's

1:05:27

bathroom dilemma reminded me when I worked on

1:05:29

the same floors the trading desk in the

1:05:32

Hemsley building Helmsley building in

1:05:34

New York City I got to work early on purpose

1:05:36

so that I had a chance of using the bathroom

1:05:38

before it was defiled I trained myself

1:05:40

intensely not to have to use the bathroom

1:05:42

during the rest of the day after lunch

1:05:44

She was like watching a herd of elephants

1:05:47

complete with newspapers held by their trunks God

1:05:49

help those who had to use those hot

1:05:51

Unventilated bathrooms later in the day. Luckily. I

1:05:53

got a passcode to the bathrooms of a

1:05:55

different floor. I guarded it with my life He

1:06:00

gives us a link of how to poop at work bathroom

1:06:02

etiquette and types of poop All

1:06:05

right. I will check that out

1:06:07

with great interest Bear

1:06:11

down on that day Yeah,

1:06:15

I Did

1:06:17

have a little bit of Star Wars news too that

1:06:20

Not so much news is just a revelation

1:06:22

that I didn't realize happened I

1:06:25

did not realize Pedro Pascal was not in the

1:06:27

Mandalorian season 3 at all That

1:06:30

was not him. It was just his voice Yeah,

1:06:34

and he's going to be doing the same for season

1:06:36

4. He's literally phoning ever take off the mask who

1:06:38

cares Mm-hmm. Yeah. Yeah

1:06:41

So I had no idea he it

1:06:43

fooled me So does that

1:06:46

mean he's not gonna be in the movie? I

1:06:48

think he'll be doing the movie But it's

1:06:50

too much money to do the movie

1:06:54

Do much upside potential. Yeah, I

1:06:57

want to don't want to miss out on that check. So Mm-hmm.

1:06:59

Hopefully busy doing last of a season 2.

1:07:02

He's busy doing everything He's the man of

1:07:04

the moment right now. Yeah for sure I

1:07:06

think he's gonna be in the new fantastic

1:07:08

for remake which I'm sad about

1:07:10

because I hate the fantastic for and don't think

1:07:13

it Should ever be remade, but that's just me.

1:07:15

Why do you hate the fantastic for? Nobody's

1:07:18

ever done it, right? That's true Well,

1:07:20

I think no one's ever done the movie, right?

1:07:22

Yeah, that's what I mean. Yeah, it's true And

1:07:24

I I don't understand

1:07:26

why there must be something

1:07:28

about the fantastic for that Makes

1:07:31

them impervious to having a good movie because so many

1:07:33

have tried and no one's been able to do it

1:07:35

I don't and I'm not sure what that is Yeah,

1:07:39

no, I like them in comic

1:07:41

book form I remember

1:07:44

they were in one of the first Spider-man

1:07:47

comics he went and met with the

1:07:49

fantastic for I just like

1:07:51

the silver surfer Yeah, I

1:07:54

didn't never care for the silver surfer ever Maybe

1:07:57

that's it too. I just don't I've never been a fantastic

1:08:00

I was never a superhero comic

1:08:02

book fan. Yeah, that was more of a GI Joe

1:08:04

guy. I liked the

1:08:06

thing a lot. I thought he was cool.

1:08:09

I don't know why. I think

1:08:11

he was, I don't know, sort of...

1:08:14

We need to hulk, but what should we do? Right. Happy

1:08:17

Green. Exactly. I was

1:08:19

saying he's sort of the thinking man's hulk. But

1:08:22

that's... I mean that's... But

1:08:24

they've changed the hulk into being a thinking man. That's

1:08:26

true. That's true. The hulk is now a genius. And

1:08:29

I guess he always was, but not

1:08:31

when in hulk form. Yes. Whatever.

1:08:36

See, this is why we stick with Star Wars. Yeah,

1:08:38

exactly. It's

1:08:41

much more consistent. A

1:08:44

million people were just listening going, stay in your lane. That's

1:08:47

right, exactly. Shit, shower, shave in Star Wars, god

1:08:49

damn it. That's right. Stay

1:08:51

away from superheroes. Oh

1:08:54

man. Well, speaking of bathrooms,

1:08:56

there was some news going around about how

1:08:58

three million smart toothbrushes were used in a

1:09:00

DDoS attack, which never happened actually. Yeah.

1:09:04

Did you guys get to cover this one? Yes.

1:09:06

And I have a lot of thoughts about this.

1:09:09

Oh go, do tell. And I want to

1:09:11

unpack this because I think there's a lot

1:09:13

at play here. So,

1:09:18

we covered this twice. We

1:09:20

covered the story and we covered the retraction.

1:09:24

And as

1:09:27

our listeners know, the primary,

1:09:29

I would say,

1:09:32

function of the Cyberwire Daily

1:09:34

podcast is... Shareholder

1:09:37

value. Aggregation...what's that? Shareholder

1:09:39

value. Well, I

1:09:42

stand corrected. But

1:09:46

we do aggregation, analysis,

1:09:48

and synthesis, okay? Probably

1:09:51

in that order. And we don't do very

1:09:53

much original reporting. So,

1:09:56

a typical report

1:09:58

from us would say... the BBC

1:10:01

reports that such and such and such and

1:10:03

such happened or the Washington Post reports that

1:10:05

such and such and such and such and

1:10:08

so with this toothbrush story similarly we reported

1:10:11

it that way and I want to say

1:10:13

it was like I forget cyber

1:10:15

news or someone had

1:10:17

done an English translation of the Swiss

1:10:19

newspaper that had originally reported on this

1:10:22

and so that's what we referred to

1:10:26

and I'll admit

1:10:28

that in our morning

1:10:31

production meeting there

1:10:33

was something about the story that struck me

1:10:35

as odd which was I kept

1:10:39

thinking why would these toothbrushes be on

1:10:41

Wi-Fi because most devices like this are

1:10:43

Bluetooth right there's no reason for

1:10:45

it to hit your Wi-Fi but

1:10:47

the flip side of my thinking was well these

1:10:50

days it's so much cheaper for everything to have

1:10:53

a microcontroller in it than

1:10:55

any kind of dedicated hardware

1:10:58

that it makes sense that something as

1:11:00

silly as a toothbrush would have so

1:11:03

much more processing power than it needs just

1:11:05

because it's the cheapest way to build something that

1:11:08

it could be a potential target for something

1:11:10

as simple to do as

1:11:12

DDoS right so

1:11:15

we went with the story and

1:11:18

the next day when it turns out

1:11:20

that it was it never happened

1:11:23

and I have to credit researcher Kevin Beaumont

1:11:25

he was the first one I saw who

1:11:28

just was posting on social media

1:11:30

was on bass it on saying the

1:11:32

toothbrush story did not happen did not

1:11:34

happen it's a made-up story and sure

1:11:37

enough that's what it ended up

1:11:39

being it was what seems to

1:11:42

have happened is that some folks

1:11:44

from Fortinet which is a security

1:11:46

company spoke about this

1:11:48

in a hypothetical way and

1:11:52

somebody ran with that as if it had

1:11:55

actually happened and now you

1:11:57

got a game of telephone going and it

1:11:59

snowballed And here we

1:12:01

are today. So

1:12:03

the day after when it became,

1:12:07

when the realization happened that

1:12:09

this was not actually a real story,

1:12:11

we covered that. And

1:12:14

in our coverage, I've tried to make

1:12:16

light of it by saying that the,

1:12:19

yesterday's extremely fun story about

1:12:21

toothbrushes turns out to not

1:12:23

be true, which

1:12:26

is so. So

1:12:28

I've been thinking about this a

1:12:30

lot, just in terms of how

1:12:33

we do our own coverage, to

1:12:35

what degree are we responsible for

1:12:37

the coverage that we link

1:12:39

to, how

1:12:42

much culpability do we have for

1:12:45

having gone along with

1:12:47

the crowd in reporting this, should

1:12:50

we have had more scrutiny, is

1:12:52

that our job? And I'm

1:12:55

not sure. And I was curious to check in with

1:12:57

you guys to see what you thought. Yeah,

1:13:03

that's a lot to unpack. Over

1:13:07

a stupid toothbrush. Well, I mean, everything

1:13:10

that you've just said also applies to this

1:13:12

very show right now. Yeah.

1:13:15

It's the same thing. We don't go out

1:13:17

and do research. We don't go

1:13:20

out and do reporting. We don't go out and

1:13:22

talk to people. We delete every single

1:13:24

email that comes from every single PR person telling us

1:13:26

that they have somebody that wants to talk to us.

1:13:29

So we get no firsthand information. We do

1:13:31

the same thing. We aggregate. Jason

1:13:33

and I decide which stories we think are

1:13:36

interesting to talk about or too big that

1:13:38

we can't talk about them. And we use

1:13:40

other people's reporting. We don't verify. We

1:13:42

don't do anything. We just do that. Same

1:13:45

thing that you do. Is

1:13:49

it worthwhile? I think so, just because there's so much

1:13:52

news out there and you

1:13:54

find an aggregator that aggregates things that

1:13:56

you're interested in. Be

1:13:58

a tech, be it's... Whatever, be

1:14:01

it Star Wars. There are Star Wars aggregator

1:14:03

sites out there, certainly sci-fi ones. And

1:14:07

they say, I like to think of us

1:14:09

as curators. Yeah, curators, exactly. And that serves

1:14:11

its purpose. I mean, what else is a

1:14:13

record label, really? They were a curation service.

1:14:16

Same with movies to do. A mob-funded scam?

1:14:18

That's what... Well, you

1:14:20

know, tomato, tomato. But

1:14:24

does it serve a purpose? Yes, but do I

1:14:26

think that we need to do a clearer job

1:14:28

perhaps telling people that we are not journalists? Or

1:14:31

certainly when organizations get big enough? I think so.

1:14:34

Because I think that line is blurred, and

1:14:36

purposefully so, often. That's

1:14:40

my thoughts on it. Yeah,

1:14:42

shit happens. That's how I kind of

1:14:45

look at it. You know how you

1:14:47

were feeling last week, like you just

1:14:49

didn't have it any day. I see.

1:14:52

So this was not the right week for me to

1:14:54

ask you guys this question. These

1:14:57

deep inwardly-facing questions, perhaps

1:15:00

we should say for another time. I know.

1:15:02

Here's the deal. I don't know

1:15:04

if Jason did. No,

1:15:07

because if you look at the

1:15:09

vast majority of stories that you've done, how many thousands

1:15:11

of stories have you covered in your tenure as

1:15:13

the host at the CyberWire? Dave? Well,

1:15:16

it's funny you should say that, Jason. We

1:15:18

just did. Just yesterday, we

1:15:20

celebrated our 2000th episode. I

1:15:22

saw, and I liked your post about that.

1:15:27

Average the number of articles that you cover on

1:15:29

each episode, multiply that by 2000, that's

1:15:32

a lot of stories. You get one through, and

1:15:34

everybody loses their shit. Come on, everybody has a

1:15:36

bad day. I think the other point that I

1:15:39

would make, I agree

1:15:41

with Jason, shit happens about that. I think the

1:15:43

other point that we should make as an argument

1:15:45

for both Jason and myself, and you, Dave, is

1:15:48

we've been doing this for so long that we

1:15:51

have bullshit radar built

1:15:53

in. We know. We

1:15:55

are adding our own journalistic spin to this

1:15:57

to some degree, because we've just... been

1:16:00

living it for so long. Like Jason and I just

1:16:02

earlier in this episode, we started to read some of

1:16:04

the articles and some of the points were like, that's

1:16:07

bullshit. They are lying. We

1:16:10

have, I can, we can go back into the archives

1:16:12

and present the other 17 times this

1:16:14

company has lied about the exact same thing because

1:16:16

we've done it for so long. So to

1:16:19

some degree, we become trusted voices in

1:16:22

these fears, right? Yeah. And that is

1:16:24

journalism to some degree. Yeah,

1:16:27

thinking back, I can think of

1:16:29

one time when I know

1:16:31

that we got something just

1:16:34

factually wrong, like we were just mistaken.

1:16:36

We, and it wasn't a big deal.

1:16:38

It wasn't a fact that,

1:16:41

you know, really had any implications,

1:16:44

but it was something that

1:16:47

the work we did was incorrect and we

1:16:49

corrected it the next day. And

1:16:52

we were corrected this the next day. But that's

1:16:56

what, but people do. I mean, yeah,

1:16:59

real news organizations do that. Daily. Yeah.

1:17:01

Daily. There's a whole section in the

1:17:03

paper that is just like fixes and

1:17:05

addendums and blah, blah, blah, blah. Yeah.

1:17:08

The we fucked up section here. Fixed.

1:17:10

Okay. Yeah. So there's another element though

1:17:12

that I want to touch on here, which

1:17:14

I think is worth talking about

1:17:18

in some of the back and forth about this over

1:17:20

on Mastodon. And it was between Kevin

1:17:23

Beaumont, who I said was the person

1:17:25

who initially started calling this out. And

1:17:29

there's a security researcher named Patrick Howell

1:17:31

O'Neill, who I think

1:17:33

was really a voice of reason here,

1:17:36

who was pointing out that he'd

1:17:38

seen way more people

1:17:41

complaining about the incorrect

1:17:43

story than the

1:17:45

actual coverage of the

1:17:47

story itself and people just

1:17:49

piling on. And, you

1:17:52

know, some

1:17:54

people were complaining about the lack of

1:17:56

high quality news sources and how everything's

1:17:59

just aggregation. and there's

1:18:01

so little original reporting anymore and all that's

1:18:03

true and I'll admit you know reading that

1:18:05

kind of stuff is a little you

1:18:08

know hard to swallow sometimes when they're looking

1:18:10

at what you do. But I think there

1:18:13

is this impulse

1:18:23

that I've seen in cyber

1:18:25

in particular and it's not exclusive

1:18:28

to cyber but I think lots

1:18:31

of people in cyber have this

1:18:33

impulse towards smug superiority and

1:18:37

I think this

1:18:39

comes from them being used to doing

1:18:41

like intellectual sparring

1:18:44

for sport with each other

1:18:46

right? It's like

1:18:48

the comic book guy on The

1:18:50

Simpsons. Exactly, exactly and when you're

1:18:52

right about something and when a

1:18:55

group of you together

1:18:57

decides that someone else was wrong

1:18:59

about something it is

1:19:01

those idiots you know ha ha ha look at

1:19:03

those idiots those you know they don't know anything they

1:19:05

don't know you know they

1:19:08

don't understand how whatever technology is that

1:19:10

we're discussing works and

1:19:13

on the one hand I get

1:19:19

it and I get being in a

1:19:21

group and I get feeling you know

1:19:23

like you're part of something and I

1:19:25

get all that and I there

1:19:27

was a time when I certainly probably

1:19:29

took part in that now that time for

1:19:32

me was probably when I was about 15 so

1:19:35

but I see lots of

1:19:37

people who still do it and I think this

1:19:40

is one of those cases where it's

1:19:44

a bad impulse and and the

1:19:46

piling on for

1:19:48

something that in the long run as Patrick

1:19:51

Hall O'Neill points out a year

1:19:54

from now nobody's gonna remember this

1:19:56

didn't impact anybody this didn't

1:19:58

affect anything there's no danger here.

1:20:00

An interesting

1:20:04

story caught someone's imagination and they

1:20:06

wrote about it and

1:20:08

they exaggerated and we all talked about

1:20:10

it and turns out there wasn't much

1:20:13

to it. But, yep,

1:20:15

nobody died. The

1:20:18

other thing I was trying to figure out if

1:20:21

there'd been any really important

1:20:23

cyber security stories where somebody got

1:20:25

it wrong and everybody jumped on

1:20:27

board and I was thinking of

1:20:29

Bloomberg's The Big Hack. Remember

1:20:31

that one? Oh yeah,

1:20:34

that was one. Back in 2018, Bloomberg had

1:20:37

that story where they said that China was

1:20:39

using this little tiny chip inside of computers

1:20:43

and systems and it

1:20:47

turns out nobody could find any evidence of

1:20:49

it at all. Yeah, that was exactly just

1:20:51

TikTok. They

1:20:55

didn't need a chip, they had a social media app.

1:20:59

But that was one that was, there was

1:21:01

just tons of coverage about that when it

1:21:03

first came out because it was certainly newsworthy.

1:21:05

Well, the thing that struck me about

1:21:08

everything that you've just said, Dave, is you were talking

1:21:10

about how you used to act like this when you

1:21:12

were 15. I think we've been

1:21:14

saying for a while that the problem

1:21:17

with the internet and the way it is

1:21:19

now and the anonymized social

1:21:21

media is it's so easy to

1:21:24

be that vindictive, freaky 15-year-old.

1:21:28

And people have just that

1:21:30

way now. That's the default way that

1:21:32

people seem to act online these days.

1:21:38

People say things that they would never, and if you

1:21:40

were all at a conference and you were getting a

1:21:42

drink together at the bar and having a chat, you

1:21:44

would never talk to each other the way that people

1:21:46

do online. But they do. Yeah,

1:21:50

that's true. And I suppose

1:21:52

some of it is the lack of social cues,

1:21:54

some of it's the lack of social norms, some

1:21:56

is the lack of social consequences. Yeah, consequences, I

1:21:58

think, is the big one. There's complete

1:22:00

lack of consequences and again, you know,

1:22:03

we'll lose listeners here again. Thanks Trump a

1:22:08

Lot of this came from those four years it was

1:22:10

just you you can do whatever the fuck you want

1:22:13

I didn't push back on that a bit because that people

1:22:15

were like that before that None of

1:22:17

them bad. I'd say I think it's

1:22:20

the same I don't think I don't think that

1:22:22

really changed much people were assholes online long before

1:22:24

he came around go back You play a well,

1:22:26

I know I said just go back to here.

1:22:28

Well coming on the internet And

1:22:32

now now this week we've got Twitter showing up

1:22:34

on blue sky same thing By

1:22:36

the way, I've been playing around with blue sky. We got

1:22:38

it. We talked about it earlier in the show

1:22:40

Well, this is a this is

1:22:42

an episode out of time. We're doing this

1:22:45

out of the wrong order There is a

1:22:47

very vibrant furry community on on blue sky

1:22:49

Dave. Oh boy. Okay very

1:22:51

vibrant All right. Well, Dave is

1:22:53

sticking with his furry mastodon and that's it

1:22:58

Okay, yeah, I

1:23:00

Don't worry you can get emptying Jason.

1:23:02

It's tempting They have customized feeds that

1:23:04

you can subscribe to and

1:23:06

I was shown like six different furry feeds

1:23:09

I'm like, well, let me go check those

1:23:11

out and they're very entertaining There's

1:23:14

a very good turns out that all along Jason

1:23:16

has been the real furry here. Well, he might

1:23:18

be the most dedicated He

1:23:22

has found his community apparently on the new

1:23:24

sky. There's the craftsmanship that goes into those

1:23:26

outfits. I'm telling you Craftsmanship

1:23:30

they're expensive too. I know

1:23:32

we bought you one well You

1:23:41

know what to get Jason now Dave no

1:23:44

hand me downs Yeah,

1:23:46

at least well laundered please. Yeah Take

1:23:49

it to the dry cleaner. That's for sure Uh,

1:23:52

all right. I think we've killed it gentlemen Nice

1:23:58

attempt at a serious topic though, Dave, I'll get I

1:24:00

know. Maybe next week. That's

1:24:03

two fur coins for you. There you

1:24:05

go. Alright, thanks guys. Talk to you soon. We

1:24:08

started out with a segment called Shit, Shower, and Shave with Dave. What

1:24:10

do you want? We

1:24:12

brought it full circle. We got serious in the middle.

1:24:14

It was like a serious donut. Housing

1:24:19

shoutouts! Over

1:24:21

at Patreon, we got no new signups this

1:24:23

week. What's wrong with you people? Did

1:24:26

you know that for just $3 a month you

1:24:28

can get the show early and in high res? Most of

1:24:30

the time? Sometimes. Sometimes? We

1:24:33

make it? Usually. It's usually

1:24:35

at least a little bit early. Maybe half a day. It's either half

1:24:37

a day, anywhere between half a

1:24:39

day and five minutes early. Depending

1:24:43

on how much crap happens to me that day. Yeah. Caveat

1:24:46

emptor, but it's only $3 a month

1:24:48

and it keeps us going. So please,

1:24:50

please do consider signing up over at

1:24:52

Patreon. patreon.com/GOG. And over at PayPal, we've

1:24:55

got Levi, Jonathan, and Ralph. Over

1:24:57

at the tip jar, we've got Christopher, Christian, and Jeff. Light

1:25:00

week. Light week. No reviews. Still

1:25:04

no reviews. What the hell, guys? We're slowing down out

1:25:06

there. Should shower and

1:25:08

shave with Brian and Jason. Coming soon. I'll

1:25:12

do a second shoutout to Anthony at

1:25:14

notehost.ca/heycafe. One of the reasons maybe we

1:25:17

didn't get any PayPal or Patreon is

1:25:19

my email crapped out at some point, but I contacted him

1:25:21

really quick and he fixed it. So thank you so much

1:25:23

for that. Appreciate it. All right. Thanks,

1:25:26

Anthony. And I have a weird

1:25:28

one today. I found

1:25:31

out that my old website

1:25:33

spewed when we first met. I

1:25:35

had two interns. I had Steve

1:25:38

Lappin and Ward Bones. Steve unfortunately

1:25:40

died during COVID. And I

1:25:42

just found out Ward Bones, my

1:25:45

other intern, died in 2022. Nobody ever

1:25:47

told me. That's

1:25:49

sad news. It is sad news. It's very

1:25:51

sad news. Very sad news. And

1:25:53

next month will be the 30th

1:25:56

anniversary of that website. Oh, my

1:25:58

God. 30 years ago I started

1:26:00

that website. website with my girlfriend, Missy, in an

1:26:02

apartment outside of Chicago. Strange

1:26:05

road since then. Can you

1:26:07

believe that we were building websites 30 years ago? We're

1:26:09

going to have to update our bios. 60

1:26:12

years of combined experience. Yeah,

1:26:14

no doubt. Oh, it's terrifying. Oh,

1:26:16

speaking of people passing away, I forgot