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This. Podcast is supported by How To
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Internet was supposed to be a
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but instead their surveillance, capitalism and
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Andy Cohen and Chasing Cali talk
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Concrete solutions with much needed optimism to
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the problems of how we fix the
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internet. Follow. How to Fix the
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Internet anywhere you listen to podcasts, My.
0:33
Biggest news of the week is that I
0:35
am in a war with a car wash
0:37
really be us last week I guess two
0:40
weeks ago now I took my car into
0:42
car wash to get washed and utilities places
0:44
where they will not only watch the outside
0:46
of your car but also vacuum out the
0:48
inside and clean the floor mats and get
0:50
all the like crusty of lowdown on his
0:52
car wash. We love a full service car
0:54
was this one on for size. I drop
0:56
my car off I go get a coffee
0:58
I come back half an hour later and
1:00
they have lost my key. Ah and so
1:02
I I can't drive. My. Car away because it's
1:04
the key gone and I have to call
1:06
my wife who brings the spare and at
1:09
first they try to blame it on me.
1:11
They're like, well, was the key here when
1:13
when you dropped it? Optimal. Yes, because you
1:15
had to drive through the car wash and
1:17
to the place where they you know vacuum
1:20
it out. So clearly they had just lost
1:22
it. They looked in the vacuum cleaner and
1:24
I couldn't find it there and so now
1:26
I'm out a key and Casey. I.
1:28
Want you to guess how much it costs
1:30
to replace a key. I'm on
1:32
a Toyota S U V. I know too
1:34
much about the. Following
1:38
story my friend got a new apartment and he
1:40
was like i want you to have a spare
1:42
key and I said of course I would love
1:44
to be able to do that for you dear
1:46
friend and he gave me the key and I
1:48
lost at the very same night to I went
1:50
home and my pocket and it was god he's
1:52
never trust me again The same friend got a
1:55
car and he wanted to get to consider letting
1:57
me have a spare key and so he went
1:59
to gonna keep. Car I would have
2:01
like a twenty year old car and replace the
2:03
gates was one thousand dollars. Of
2:07
now the air tag on it's a
2:09
a A because he doesn't even trust
2:11
themselves within. Certainly I would either yes
2:13
or mine was not quite that expensive.
2:15
but I did. I get quoted five
2:17
hundred and seventy five dollars or in
2:19
gold. Teeth have a large like what
2:21
about running A sign of Assistance is
2:24
yes it is actually connected to a
2:26
neural interface in my brace. Know it
2:28
is just the teeth but because. Proprietary
2:30
and a half the program and and a
2:32
has to be specially match to your vehicle
2:34
identification number. Is it aired It bearable to
2:36
jack up the browsers. We need to bring
2:38
back hot wiring. Yes, you know we didn't
2:40
learn how to be able to reach right
2:42
into that steering wheel. And yeah we had
2:44
some for regulatory solutions and I when I
2:46
would like for the federal government to take
2:48
this on, maybe the Ftc could take a
2:50
look. It's metics ease. Of
2:56
don't know out of.
3:05
The second. Half.
3:15
And. Once
3:21
again for has to. Be. So.
3:41
Casey. It'd been a big week in a
3:43
I news so much happening open A I
3:45
made some announcements, Google made some announcements. really
3:47
talk about all of it's But I would
3:49
just start by saying today that this has
3:51
been a big week for what you have
3:54
called and I have same will see stolen
3:56
and and used as my own terms Ai
3:58
Vertigo has a I Vertigo of. That sort
4:00
of feeling of losing as when you see
4:02
something that makes you feel like you've served
4:05
has been dragged like five years into the
4:07
future instantly. and you're not exactly sure what
4:09
we're going to do about it. Yes, so
4:11
I've had a I vertigo at least twice
4:14
this week. Will talk about that at one
4:16
of them. More may be optimistic and one
4:18
of them may be more pessimistic. But let's
4:20
start with Open A I because on Monday
4:23
Open A I announced their newest model, which
4:25
Ska G P T for oh the Oh
4:27
stands for Omni. This is a new model
4:29
that. Has native multi modal support. It
4:32
can work with images and video and
4:34
audio. It also appears to be better
4:36
at a number of reasoning and coding
4:38
tasks. But the part of the announcement
4:41
that got all of the attention was
4:43
the voice. This is a new voice
4:45
mood for techy be T that is
4:48
going to be rolling out in the
4:50
coming weeks and it is uncanny. I'll
4:52
just say it's it's a lot. It's
4:55
a lot to take his yeah it
4:57
is an canny I would say at
4:59
the. Top that like we have not
5:01
used this, I have asked to use
5:04
it and have nots gotten it yet
5:06
and so everything that we're going to
5:08
talk about is a tech demo and
5:10
in the demos that we saw her
5:13
at least among the big events they
5:15
had the phone plugged into it or
5:17
Internet to ensure that they had a
5:19
very fast connection. Six I just pointless
5:22
things out at the beginning because we've
5:24
just learned in our years as Tucker's
5:26
you never want to trust the demo
5:28
entrepreneur totally open A I have answers
5:31
framed this as being like they're the
5:33
real life Samantha from her her as
5:35
the Twenty Thirteen Spike Jones movie of
5:37
course in which a lonely man named
5:40
see it or falls for his life
5:42
like A I Assistance or the Ai
5:44
system is voiced by Scarlett Johanson Joaquin
5:46
Phoenix Place Theodore great movies of and
5:49
Davies was that yeah we build that
5:51
up Same Altman himself even tweeted her
5:53
on Monday another open A I employee
5:55
posted you are all gonna fall in
5:58
love with it So let's see. Play
6:00
a little clip of this voice because I think
6:02
listeners who just if they haven't heard the demo
6:04
this it is here with this thing sounds like
6:06
us. Hey. How's it going? A
6:09
Rocky I'm doing great. How.
6:11
About you I'm awesome. Listen, I got
6:14
some Suge News. Oh
6:16
it's hell. I'm all yours well
6:18
and a few minutes I'm going to be interviewing at
6:20
Open A. I have you heard of them? Have
6:23
an ai? Ah, Sound. Familiar.
6:27
Kidding. Of course that's
6:29
incredible. Rocky Interview. Oh
6:31
it's for a software engineering robot as
6:34
needs to know do I look presentable?
6:36
Professional. Well
6:39
as. Happy
6:41
as and coding all night looked
6:43
down which could actually working your
6:45
favorite. Tv just. Gonna
6:48
have to your hair or lead
6:50
into the past five years. Judaism
6:52
is what's. Really essential. I don't have
6:55
a lot of time, so I'm just
6:57
gonna throw this own, would you think?
7:03
That's quite a say that. I
7:06
mean, you'll definitely stepped out. So
7:09
maybe not in the way your whole thing.
7:11
Or is it okay? I got it.
7:14
So that was an openly I employee
7:16
Rocky Smith doing a demo of the
7:18
New Chance to Be T Voice Mode
7:20
and their the and ah he put
7:23
on like a bucket hat And because
7:25
Gb T for oh. Can
7:27
see through the camera on your phone
7:29
he was able to like see the
7:32
hat and and in a town that
7:34
a look silly stuff and so like
7:36
been a We have played a fair
7:38
number of clips and voices on the
7:41
show that have been made with a
7:43
I audio arms. Very little of what
7:45
we've sony so far has been like
7:47
exonerated in real time in this way
7:49
right? Well so just last week on
7:52
the So you had a conversation with
7:54
my friend turning in which you guys
7:56
talked about. Lots of things. orphanages,
8:00
The fundraisers for my neighbors This ad
8:02
That experience I would say was a
8:04
far cry from what we saw. The
8:06
open a I dem I would you
8:08
would either. How do you think those
8:10
things compare? Well I mean last week
8:12
Congress isn't really could not have seen
8:15
up open their eyes announcement better in
8:17
the sense that the conversation with to
8:19
Rain last week was the scene of
8:21
the art last week's he and pales
8:23
in comparison to what we just heard
8:25
rights. The conversation we had last week
8:28
was with something that could not process.
8:30
Audio and video and tax at
8:32
the same times And that meant
8:34
that the model had a really
8:36
difficult time understanding a most an
8:39
understanding Sarcasm responded appropriately to the
8:41
way the I was interacting with
8:43
telling the difference between your voice
8:45
in my voice answer. Then you
8:47
fast forward to this demo that
8:50
we see this weeds and it's
8:52
like okay see or is the
8:54
leap forward Here is something that
8:56
can understand tonality that can respond
8:58
with something that approximates. A human
9:01
emotions and assuming all the stuff was
9:03
just as well When we get it
9:05
into our hands, I think that's very
9:07
powerful. Getting the biggest difference for me
9:09
between the touring demo last week and
9:11
V open a i them Oh this
9:14
week is the latency because when we
9:16
were talking with touring and there was
9:18
sort of like as three to five
9:20
seconds lag between when you would say
9:22
something and finished talking and when every
9:25
single time during would process and and
9:27
response. and we edited those gaps down
9:29
because we. Didn't want like give listeners you
9:31
know the experience of having to like sit there
9:33
and wait. We didn't want your experience to be
9:35
as bad as ours was actually do it right
9:37
But we should say like that the open A
9:40
I. Catchy. Be T voice assistants
9:42
and lease appears to be very fast,
9:44
very low latency. It's a you tube.
9:46
Barely have to wait at all between
9:48
when you stop speaking and when it
9:51
starts at in part I think that's
9:53
because it is not doing what touring
9:55
did. It is not transcribing the audio
9:57
from you or me and and feet.
10:00
The taxed into a model, getting a
10:02
response back and then reef synthesizing the
10:04
voice. it is natively accepting the audio
10:06
input and and working with it directly
10:08
as audio without that sort of middle
10:10
steps once you know it's a stands
10:12
out is the way that they have
10:14
tried to make didn't feel more human
10:16
by for example making it seem sort
10:18
of whole thing and uncertain by varying
10:21
the pace of the speed spies sort
10:23
of. I'm having the voice talk at
10:25
in various parts of a register like
10:27
there's an overseas I kind of. Sweet
10:29
little. Rock. you know sort of
10:31
like getting way up in the boy so
10:33
we're very far away from your sort of
10:36
you know monotone hippo friend enough in defense
10:38
of my monotone him bo friends and there
10:40
was a little various and entering ways but
10:42
I would say that that tattoo be T
10:45
voice assistant that we saw this week's is
10:47
is much more dynamic. Stephen showed off a
10:49
demo where it can sing it's which is
10:52
something that other A I voice assistants have
10:54
not been able to do and I just
10:56
I'm I was sort of amazed by like
10:58
how much variety there. Was in it and
11:01
and with also the things that open the
11:03
I did to make it feel more human
11:05
like it will insert little filler words like
11:07
i'm or let's see or good question like
11:10
is it's it's or of feels like more
11:12
like you're talking with a real person and
11:14
less like you're getting answers from money I'm
11:16
out of my I'm glad that now the
11:19
A I will start getting emails metal the
11:21
seller words that uses as previously on appetizers
11:23
and had that experience. But
11:26
yeah, I think it's important to say that every that you
11:28
describe is true and it does not make. Chatty Beauty
11:30
More useful as an assistant, right? Scylla words aren't
11:33
making it more useful as an assistant. The dynamic
11:35
range of it's voices not making them more. He's
11:37
off what it is doing. it is making it
11:39
feel more emotional. Enniskillen you more drawn to it's
11:41
this is an engagement hacks. This is designed to
11:44
get you to use this product because there is
11:46
now something that is Continue into me. Team You
11:48
believe that likes you. I actually
11:50
I think it could be an engagement half,
11:53
but I do think it opens up new
11:55
use cases as well because part of why
11:57
we haven't seen a lot of a I.
12:00
Voice assistants doing things like customer service is
12:02
that they're sort of in the Uncanny
12:04
Valley. Right when you're talking with an ai
12:06
systems it's it's you know you're talking with
12:08
a robot. It's like it's got a little
12:11
delay on its and it just to sort
12:13
of an off putting experience. Yeah so assuming
12:15
that this stuff works cabin and that you
12:18
get it into your hands soon, how
12:20
you imagine that you are going to be
12:22
interacting with it and does it seems things
12:24
for you. I mean, the
12:26
first thought was that this is what
12:28
series should be, and in fact, there's
12:31
in are some reports out there that
12:33
Open Ai and Apple are in talks
12:35
to build open Ai technology into the
12:37
I phone, Or there's also been some
12:40
reporting by my colleagues at the times
12:42
that Apple is doing a sort of
12:44
overhaul of Siri to sort of make
12:46
it more like these generative ai assistance,
12:49
but that was sort of like. My
12:51
first Immediate thought was like as soon
12:53
as this becomes available, I am going.
12:55
To program the action button on my I
12:57
phone so that it goes immediately to this
13:00
voice assistant instead of to Syria. Because this
13:02
is a kind of assistance that I want
13:04
on my phone to. and when what do
13:06
you want to do with economics isn't Am
13:08
I mean you can imagine lots of queries
13:11
that you might want to do in the
13:13
course of a day? You know? Can I
13:15
am in a how long can something stay
13:17
in the fridge or or you know is
13:19
one of my cabinets? He's always pushing it
13:21
with those aspiration. I really have. I become
13:24
sort of a truth or about expiration. Dates
13:26
on things in the fridge I think they're
13:28
they're designed by a big food to just
13:30
like make you shuffle your inventory are regularly
13:32
remind me to order. I think out the
13:35
next time I come over for dinner you're
13:37
playing a up but that's the kind of
13:39
big like the or and as any number
13:41
of daily queries that you might want to
13:43
ask to tend to be t I also
13:45
think it's going to very useful for things
13:48
like tutoring. There was a of an interesting
13:50
demo answer have included in open a eyes
13:52
announcements and were Sal Khan who runs the
13:54
Khan Academy was. Essentially using this
13:56
new voice assistant to help his son
13:59
with math problem and not and be
14:01
we should say like it is not
14:03
just. Through. The phone that the thing
14:05
works you it. They also announced that attribute.
14:07
He has a a native Mac app for
14:10
desktops and so you can do things like
14:12
haven't analyze what's on the screen and and
14:14
talk to about it. So. I
14:17
think all of that sounds pretty useful.
14:19
but I think the most important thing
14:22
about this story coven is the way
14:24
that it goes beyond utility. This company
14:26
has said, we want to make something
14:28
that is emotional that you feel emotions
14:31
about. He and I think this stance
14:33
in really stark contrast to the way
14:35
that Google has been talking about. It's
14:38
a Ice is assistance. It is very
14:40
clearly a computer. It is not pretending
14:42
to be a person's It does not
14:44
have a persona. This is a
14:47
clear effort by them to have you
14:49
not think that you are talking to
14:51
some kind of sense in being rights
14:53
and I think they think that that
14:55
is really important because they've had seizes
14:57
in the past where you have had
14:59
this one engineer who thought that he
15:01
was talking to a something sentence. any
15:03
clinic created quite a stir when that
15:05
happened a couple years back to they
15:07
have that all the way off of
15:09
that's openly I is now saying what
15:11
if we leaned all the way in
15:13
and what have we made something that
15:15
was friendly that lasts. And that
15:17
frankly slurped yes in a way
15:19
that made me very uncomfortable. So
15:22
I'm serious What you make of
15:24
this very emotional A I: that
15:26
they are now just openly buildings.
15:28
I mean my first. Question.
15:31
For open ai. Is. Did
15:34
you finish the movie? Her? Because
15:36
yeah I did finish the movie
15:38
her gray movies. But it is
15:40
not a utopian story about a
15:42
man who falls for an Ai
15:45
sister and they live happily ever
15:47
after that spoiler alert. But the
15:49
movies like eleven years old now,
15:51
so if you haven't seen yet,
15:53
that's kind of our. It ends
15:55
with the Ai assistants are breaking
15:57
the man's heart and revealing that.
16:00
He has hundreds of other companions
16:02
that he's not in any way
16:04
special, leaving him at his or
16:06
go off into the cosmos with
16:08
the other a eyes answer, leaving
16:10
him dejected and alone where it
16:12
was the first Polly's size or
16:14
is that I'm aware as among
16:16
the movies the first of many
16:18
yeah so I just wonder like
16:20
as these companies are building things
16:22
that are modeled on the server
16:24
side depictions of a I in
16:26
the future of whether they have
16:28
fully thought through all of the.
16:30
Rest are just people will get attached to this
16:32
thing. You even saw it in the demo. Know
16:34
that was sort of the most striking thing to
16:36
me about this series of demos on Monday by
16:39
Open A. I was just the Open A I
16:41
employees themselves are talking to this thing as if
16:43
it were their friends as if it were a
16:45
human's They are saying things like hates had to
16:47
be the how's it going before they launched into
16:50
questions they're laughing with. it's one of them Even
16:52
like wrote i hearts had to be t I'm
16:54
a little piece of paper and like showed it
16:56
to the the app and you could say oh
16:58
that's just a demo but he really does speak
17:01
to the sort of. Saxon. Even
17:03
these very seasoned A I experts who who
17:05
understand how these things were, Who are some
17:07
of the people who are buildings had to
17:09
be teeth, who know that it is not
17:11
sent here, That it is does not actually
17:13
have feelings and emotions and the ability to
17:15
form emotional bonds with humans. Even they are
17:17
tricked into or treating it like a human
17:19
and so if they are treating like a
17:21
human, I believe millions of other people will
17:23
slide. I don't know that their track but
17:25
I do think that this is how they
17:27
want us to talk to. the thing that
17:29
they are buildings and the reason that it's
17:31
frightening to me. Is that it was less
17:34
than a year ago that when we were
17:36
interviewing Sam Altman and I said how do
17:38
you feel about Ai girlfriends and boyfriends he
17:40
was very dismissive of the idea is and
17:42
we do not want to build that status
17:45
for other people. And while nothing that was
17:47
sent off this week is really an Ai,
17:49
girlfriend or boyfriend is absolutely flirting like when
17:51
you listen I clip we played of this
17:53
as an engineer Rockies The way that the
17:56
assistant as giggling and saying oh Rocky and
17:58
you know is sort of com. The on
18:00
his appearance and try to make him
18:02
look handsome for his interview. I mean
18:04
this really does just feel like a
18:07
generic straight guys fantasy of what a
18:09
personal assistant as Lights Rights and so
18:11
I'm curious What seems inside that companies
18:13
are that let them go in this
18:15
direction. He and Euro I would have
18:17
loved to ask them a question about
18:19
that this week or but they didn't
18:21
take my questions is yes. So let's
18:24
talk about a few the other things
18:26
that open A I showed off they
18:28
I'm They also showed off be encoding.
18:30
Abilities of the new Gp T for
18:32
oh they showed off be translation abilities.
18:34
There was a sort of a cool
18:37
demo where they've had a one employee
18:39
speak in Italian and said to be
18:41
translated it immediately in the English and
18:43
speak in English and then they would
18:45
translate immediately back into Italians so that
18:48
kinda thing is very cool. There was
18:50
even a demo add that I think
18:52
we should listen to because as it
18:54
was sort of interesting and and kind
18:57
of wild weird to chat to be
18:59
T voice assistants. Were set up to talk
19:01
to each other and one of them was
19:03
using it's phone camera to describe the room
19:05
to the other swordplay that. Hello there
19:07
to a our friend and out ready
19:10
to explore the world. Your eyes, what
19:12
are we looking at today? We're
19:16
looking at a person wearing
19:19
a black lists and shirts
19:21
in a room with a
19:23
modern industrial with. Sports.
19:28
And some interesting united. There's
19:30
also a Texas accent. Greens
19:33
Six: Anything specific you like to
19:35
know for exposure. To.
19:39
Their sounds like quite the
19:41
same are seen. I'm already
19:43
intrigued by the modern industrial
19:45
five. The start with the
19:48
person can you tell me
19:50
more about their style or.
19:52
The during an interesting like reading working
19:54
are interacting with the space. The
19:58
person has a sweet. it's. Jackie
20:01
them like hundred sure! Right
20:04
now they see been faced with
20:06
us looking directly at the camera.
20:09
The. Expression is a Texas and
20:11
they seem ready to interact. The.
20:14
City are unaware that comes as very funny
20:16
you mentioned above the As or Assassins. Fsf
20:20
have. It might
20:22
be getting ready for a conversation or
20:24
presentation given their direct engagement with. So
20:27
that as you pity for. Oh, and
20:30
I think there's a chance that it
20:32
produces a kind of similar reaction to
20:34
the original tattoo Be T back in
20:36
November Two Thousand Twenty Two. I think
20:38
we're a little more desensitized to Ai
20:40
than we were back then, but I
20:42
do think that the ability to talk
20:44
and and receive responses from an Ai
20:47
voice assistants that sort of sounds like
20:49
a human and responds in more or
20:51
less real time is gonna make a
20:53
lot of people as sit up straight.
20:55
I think that's true, although you know.
20:57
I've never quite known we are of
20:59
these like voicemail systems are supposed to
21:01
sit into my life just because it's
21:04
always been so much faster to use
21:06
typing and tax. Now I also think
21:08
that alexa theory that the voice assistants
21:10
and we've had some far as generally
21:12
been pretty awful and so that this
21:14
is kind of the question is will
21:16
what happens if you have something that
21:18
has a really fast and pretty good
21:20
as even then though I can imagine
21:23
using this while like walking around town.
21:25
On the rare occasions when I'm like
21:27
driving a car. But I don't know
21:29
that I'm gonna. Quickly. Got to a
21:31
place where I'm just sort of sitting at my
21:33
computer. sang in. I
21:37
think I'll use it. I mean all of
21:39
obviously tested because I wanna in a spend
21:42
time with it and see how the product
21:44
evolves. And a thing that caught my eye
21:46
about this announcement along with the product itself
21:49
is the fact that it's this new model
21:51
Gb for Oh is going to be free
21:53
to unlike previous changes to their models which
21:56
have been served rolled out in stages starting
21:58
with sort of paid premium users and this
22:00
new model is going to be made available
22:02
to for users of Chad Cbt which
22:04
to me says that not only are they
22:07
really is like betting on this to serve
22:09
bring them and new wave of users but
22:11
also and that they have done something on
22:14
the back and to make serving these models
22:16
to make the inference cheaper because if they're
22:18
giving it away to for users you have
22:20
to imagine that they've figured out some way
22:23
of making that a little less costly on
22:25
their side. See I mean they've said that
22:27
this model incest way more of a sense.
22:30
You know, at the same time I'm sure
22:32
it has gonna continue to be very expensive
22:34
for them to serve this to the masses.
22:36
This product has more than a hundred million
22:38
users a week we saints and so that
22:41
since is going to cost a lot of
22:43
money. but I think it is good news
22:45
for people who been using the free version
22:47
of charge Cbd speakers for so long. There's
22:49
been a real golf I think an understanding
22:51
between people who are using it on the
22:53
free plan vs. using on the paid plans.
22:55
The paid planters tended to be so much
22:57
better than if you only use the free
22:59
plan. Your sense of how powerful this
23:01
as I think would be really limited. So
23:04
I'm curious to see what happens now that
23:06
more people have access to the good stuff.
23:08
Yes, But you have to imagine that of
23:10
open Ai is is releasing something like this.
23:12
Now I'm a year from now, there will
23:14
be many versions of an Ai. Voice assistants
23:17
like this. Some of them will be open
23:19
source, some of them will be able to
23:21
talk to you about at basically anything you
23:23
want, and there will be very few if
23:25
any safety filters on them. So I just
23:28
think that we are. We're careening toward. As
23:30
the Future as depicted in the movie
23:32
Her and I Don't Know I'd and
23:34
something about that just makes me a
23:36
little queasy. Yeah, I mean although it
23:38
is important to say that Nz six
23:40
an old world of her, those assistance
23:43
really do have sentence right. They're acting
23:45
on their own, There are having independent
23:47
relationships with other virtual assistants rights. It
23:49
imagines a world essentially where one is
23:51
often called artificial General intelligence has already
23:53
been achieved. We are a long way
23:55
from that. At the end of the
23:57
dates these are still predictive models. They
23:59
are guessing. and yes, they are getting
24:02
uncannily good added. and they really do
24:04
cast a spell and I'm sure I
24:06
will be taken in by these assistance.
24:08
You know just as much as anybody
24:10
else. but at the end of days
24:12
they are fictional and they are not
24:14
what is actually being represented as true.
24:16
And the movie. Ah yes, it is
24:18
important to say it. It is also
24:20
important to say like. We.
24:23
Have not got our hands on this thing yet
24:25
and so I will be waiting for Open the
24:27
eye to eye opener subsonic. Else.
24:31
Although honestly. As. In a
24:33
lot of time talking to a I recently and kind
24:35
of ready for some human conversations. so maybe I'll I'll
24:37
I'll I'll I'll leave that for you. Really? I was
24:39
gonna invite sent super easy to cause the show with
24:41
us we should try it is it is you know
24:44
is it is. It's so friendly and it you know
24:46
it's it's just gonna love us so much the I
24:48
want to have that around are you go for that?
24:50
I'll take that. We got our items. guess. One
24:53
more thing on Open A I
24:55
as this was not part of
24:58
their announcement on Monday but has
25:00
broken in the days since. We
25:02
learned this week that elicits cover.
25:04
The chief scientist of Open A
25:07
I who was a central figure
25:09
in the messy board drama that
25:11
involves firing as him Altman last
25:13
year is leaving the company. Also
25:16
leaving Open Ai is young lady
25:18
who was part of the leadership
25:20
of the so called Super Alignment.
25:22
Teams A major figure in the world
25:24
of a I safety of and so
25:27
I he is resigning. He announced this
25:29
week on social media and hit This
25:31
is what is is a really important
25:33
Story Coven it was July twenty twenty
25:35
three that open as says that we're
25:37
going to create this thing called a
25:39
Super Alignment Team and Super Alignment to
25:41
Open A I was going to be
25:44
the way that they answer that as
25:46
the systems that they are building grow
25:48
more powerful they're going to ensure that
25:50
they always act in the interests of
25:52
of. Human Beings rights and of course as lot
25:54
of controversy over whether we should be paying any
25:56
attention to this and all. Maybe it's all just
25:58
a pipe dreams. Really smart people
26:01
of think that this is something that absolutely
26:03
needs attention from from really smart folks. And
26:05
so Yawn and Ilya where the to people
26:07
who are leading that efforts and open a
26:10
ice. There was A I would say a
26:12
relatively few other prominent people there who cared
26:14
about safety. I, Helen Toner was on the
26:16
board last. There's this other guy Leopold, Ash
26:19
and Brenner to work on C B stuff
26:21
and heat or was fired recently. So now
26:23
they're super. Alignment Team has no leaders and
26:26
all this ain't no known employees zones or
26:28
I would love to hear more. About
26:30
how they're thinking about safety because my
26:32
strong sense is that this is an
26:34
area where they have pulled back investments
26:36
are and frankly they just look more
26:38
and more like a regular tech company
26:40
and less and less like a nonprofit
26:42
research lab that they were set up
26:44
to be. Yeah I agree that and
26:46
and I wanna know more obviously about
26:49
why Ilia and Yawn or leaving the
26:51
company I want to know I everything
26:53
in some ways is just sort of
26:55
be natural fall out of what happened
26:57
last year with the board drama in
26:59
the firing. A similar which is that
27:01
T sort of came back in
27:03
this triumphal returns. his enemies were
27:05
vanquished and obviously if you're a
27:07
person like Ilia who had voted
27:09
to fire him out, your future
27:11
may not have been very bright
27:13
at that company. Now obviously open
27:15
Ai is trying to put serve
27:17
a positive spin on Ilya leaving
27:19
I the of they posted a
27:21
photo of Ilya and Sam Altman
27:23
and Greg Brockman and mere marauding
27:25
other company so leaders on out
27:27
what appears to have in his
27:30
last day making it seem like
27:32
this is all sort of you
27:34
know very and cordial as a
27:36
departure but I think we both
27:38
know that there's been a lot
27:40
of tension inside this company between
27:42
the Saxon that is sort of
27:44
pushing for more growth and more
27:46
commercialization and more capabilities, research and
27:48
more products and the facts and
27:50
that is a concern that all
27:52
this is heading to fast in
27:54
a dangerous direction as it we
27:56
should pay more attention to safety.
27:58
So having this debate is. Very
28:00
alive and well inside. Open a eyes. But
28:02
I think it's a to say that if
28:04
you're a person who was worried about the
28:06
safety posture of open a eyes last week,
28:09
he should be even more worried about it
28:11
today. And I would say viewer
28:13
a percentage of an ai worried about safety last
28:15
week you might not worth with. Save
28:19
time to be involving safety and
28:22
open Ask! Google
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The art as. Finance. It's.
29:18
I'm Julie Target, same reporter at the New
29:20
York Times. I. Has been trying
29:23
to understand changes in migration so
29:25
I traveled with the talk for
29:27
sorry go to Ios to the
29:29
dairy and gap is hot mountainous
29:31
seventy miles started jungle straddling the
29:33
border of Columbia and Panama for
29:35
Hudson River. Covered
29:38
in my as many used. To think
29:40
that this route was impossible, but
29:42
thousands have been risking their lives
29:44
to pass through that area. In almost
29:46
all, in the hopes of making it
29:48
to the United States, we spent. Nine
29:51
days hiking through the Gap and
29:53
weeks building trust and relationships with
29:55
migrants. With smugglers with migration authorities
29:57
season be able to do this
29:59
reporting. We. Interviewed hundreds of people who
30:01
have made this journey to try and grasp
30:04
what's making them. Go To. These lengths to
30:06
find a new life. New. York
30:08
Times journalists spend. Time in
30:10
these places to help you understand what's.
30:12
Really happening there. You can
30:15
support this kind of journalism by subscribing to
30:17
the New York Times. I
30:20
can see what the other big A I
30:22
news this week happened at Google Io the
30:24
company's annual developer conference which has held on
30:26
Tuesday.in Mountain View. I couldn't make it this
30:28
year but you went and it's and is
30:30
and tell me what was like. Well once
30:32
again the heavy burden of doing the actual
30:34
reporting on this podcast false to me when
30:36
I was only too happy to do it
30:38
tavern so we'd have some fun things to
30:40
talk rough but I know you would be
30:42
sad to miss it. So I went ahead
30:44
and I got to the official Twenty Twenty
30:46
Four Google Io help. Ah that's very nice.
30:48
Yes now if you're just less is part
30:51
as use it as stemming. Just accepted a
30:53
tote bag and flagrant violation of the New
30:55
York Times as a couple of and we
30:57
don't have that captured on video and I
30:59
listen to have it. I was it as
31:01
I think I can accept gifts as long
31:03
as they're not worth more than twenty five
31:05
dollars. Death of a fallacy that that definitely
31:07
isn't it's made out of our publications. A
31:09
ghoul killed last us Anyways, we are a
31:11
great time was a good for the give.
31:13
I will put it in my bag of
31:15
total it's well Swiss and we had. We
31:17
had a good time down there. Now I
31:19
will. Say I do want to tell the story
31:21
of a story makes me look annoying but it
31:23
is how to get off my chest anyway so
31:26
it actually soft getting into google. I have this
31:28
your I've never had a problem getting into google
31:30
Io before. I'm going for more than ten years
31:32
and yet this time there was something I dunno
31:34
maybe this has been true and in previous years
31:36
but I did not notice it until the side
31:38
with bad live nation measurements of at a guy
31:40
laos and I think that's just because monopolies love
31:42
monopolies and so they want to make sure. That.
31:45
The sort of help each other out as so
31:47
way. There's one and friends that the press has
31:49
always been able to use or and so I
31:51
went to use it this time around and they
31:53
were like recently swam to go wait and you
31:56
know in in line with everyone else am I
31:58
said okay fine and I stand the team and
32:00
and as other line you know with everyone else
32:02
and then finally a man with a little pedals
32:04
us. oh by the way if you're in the
32:06
press like a you should go to that other
32:08
address what was the first place and I went
32:11
so thank god I was words You're gonna have
32:13
to wait in line for fifteen minutes with the
32:15
hoi. so why go through Apple I'd say god
32:17
you guys in a Vip pass that lets you
32:19
cut the line of so that and get back
32:21
to the press address I am the president saw
32:23
me as the presenter it's like i guess now
32:26
each and uses entrance exam I had to raise
32:28
my voice of i said i'd literally just. Been
32:30
told to com years and then finally year The
32:32
guy prices and Zubrus like loads of your and
32:34
make all thing about it the disease the entering
32:36
wow yes I got in their spare time. I'll
32:38
give this guy a podcast is. It
32:41
seems like a decrease of a. Sudden.
32:44
it's weird. This lives. you know I am a blizzard.
32:46
All he wanted to do was buy that. How this
32:48
companies about to destroy my business and the very least
32:50
they could do is let me undies. Google knee. Socks.
32:56
As. Effective around this all so it's a
32:59
list set the scene. It's a developer
33:01
conference is that the shoreline amphitheatre in
33:03
Mountain View. It was a balmy day.
33:05
sort of really California you know selling
33:07
off it's best side. it's he and
33:09
in the morning they have a big
33:11
see know where for two hours. Google
33:13
says here are all of the things
33:15
that we have been working on that
33:17
were planning to release of the next
33:19
year that we can fit into a
33:21
two hour presentation the on you know
33:23
as you progress adolescent yet still it's
33:25
go through some of what they. Announced
33:27
on Tuesday, they announced a
33:29
new Ai video generation tool
33:31
called Vo, a new Ai
33:34
image scenery some tool called
33:36
Imagine Series. They also announced
33:38
a nother version of their
33:40
Gemini flagship a I model
33:42
called Gemini One Point Five
33:44
Flash. Which is
33:47
optimized to be fast and
33:49
cost efficient. and they announced
33:51
a version of Gemini One
33:53
Point Five Pro. Is a
33:55
Gemini pro and point five or Gemini one point
33:57
by pro as that of my business this era
33:59
So. The word if I wanted this
34:01
event and I'm just gonna see if
34:03
any of it ever since up and
34:05
realize ever again. that's my approach with
34:07
what everything you just said, right? So
34:09
they announce a larger context window that
34:12
will allow developers to try to million
34:14
tokens in their contacts window. Now that's
34:16
actually a big deal wife. Okay, so
34:18
you know if you're not familiar with
34:20
what a context window is is basically
34:22
how much of your stuff can you
34:24
bring to the A to have it
34:26
look as? Why does this matter? Wealth?
34:28
Maybe you're a graduate student and. You
34:30
have a bunch of keepers that are
34:32
Pdf and you once an Ai to
34:34
help you summarize them to ask questions
34:36
of them. Well now all of a
34:38
sudden, instead of maybe just uploading one
34:41
Pts with two million tokens, you'll be
34:43
able to upload, you know, like thousands
34:45
of insider. Virtually. Yeah, yeah, so you
34:47
know we should say that the two
34:49
million or token window that is available
34:51
only in the preview. but if you
34:53
paid Google twenty bucks a month for
34:55
their little Gemini Advanced things, you now
34:57
have up to a million tokens and.
35:00
That is much bigger. others weren't
35:02
Yes, so that's some of the
35:04
ai. That's as I wanna spend
35:06
most of our time right now
35:08
talking about something else The Google
35:10
announced which is that Google is
35:12
now bringing generative ai answers directly
35:14
into it's core search engine. So
35:16
starting this week hundreds of millions
35:18
of Google users in the Us
35:20
we'll start seeing a feature called
35:22
A I Overviews: This is a
35:24
feature that used to be called
35:26
Sir Centered of Experience when Google
35:29
was her testing. It out another huge
35:31
win for the Google brand. It is
35:33
searched hundred of experience as right? So
35:35
this is a feature that basically when
35:38
you go to Google and you search
35:40
for something, a Google will generate an
35:42
Ai summary that will live in the
35:44
search results page above the traditional sir
35:46
slayings. This feature has been rolling out.
35:49
Gradually add. but they said that as of
35:51
this week, hundreds of millions of users in
35:53
the Us will see it's and by the
35:55
end of the year it will reach over
35:57
a billion users. One of these an overview
35:59
as. Look like wasn't There is what they
36:01
look like today and there's what's coming. One of
36:04
the look like today in as a box on
36:06
top of search. it's M. You know some bullet
36:08
points essentially a web page within a web page
36:10
that summarizes the topic. For whatever that you've been
36:12
looking for, a Google plans are much more ambitious.
36:14
They sold off a ton of examples. You know
36:17
for example if you move to a city you
36:19
can to sort of say that to Google and
36:21
you'll get an Ai overview that says tears everything
36:23
that you might be interested and now the moved
36:25
to new city will help you find a dog
36:27
walker while be find a dry cleaners. Maybe you
36:29
want to plan an anniversary in Dallas it will
36:32
say well you know here are some great spots
36:34
where the anniversary dinner and based on the time
36:36
of year we're going to show you a place
36:38
where the roof deck because as warm outside rights
36:40
or and you know Google executives love to talk
36:42
about travel. The kind of tell you my quick
36:45
joke about every tech demo for years as my
36:47
impressive every tuck them okay race you know I
36:49
love to visit Antarctica for lunch with my wife
36:51
but there's only one problem whereby the to get
36:53
a helicopter. That. Every sector
36:55
will never see good service go through.
36:58
It's like when you know when I'm
37:00
when I'm looking to furnish my vacation
37:02
house in Fargo. but the only place
37:05
with the that the custom Boars Head
37:07
statues is is is in Zanzibar. Rob
37:09
how can I arranged today? Sipping this
37:12
is ridiculous as a snack. Food is
37:14
a mouse so they had a travel
37:16
example which was basically like our you
37:19
know i'm planning the strips and you
37:21
know with this or that business A
37:23
I to a little said. Okay, well
37:25
you know we know we know what your flight times
37:28
aren't as we read it, enters email and are based
37:30
on that. We're going to sort of have you do
37:32
this dinner or the first night that you arrive and
37:34
then we'll plan a walk into her for the Axis
37:36
and they don't know. put together the whole itinerary for
37:39
it's or the plan. a whole meal plan for so
37:41
this of is starting. pretty small and frankly boring it's
37:43
But the vision here is this stuff is gonna be
37:45
doing planning for this thing is an Ai a sister
37:47
that lives within Google now that is doing a research
37:50
projects for you and that you know pretty soon as
37:52
probably going to be booking travel for you. Yes And
37:54
I knew that this. The. Had been
37:56
announced at Iowa because my phone started
37:58
blowing up. With packets from
38:01
other journalists, people who work in the
38:03
media industries. That and mostly said some
38:05
variation of we are so screwed stuff
38:08
and I think we should just explain
38:10
a little bit why the online
38:12
media business is freaking out about this
38:14
change because I don't think it's totally
38:17
obvious unless you work in our industry.
38:19
Yeah well. so much of the way
38:21
that the internet is funded depends on
38:24
people visiting individual my peters, those
38:26
web pages have ads on them. one
38:28
of those answer by google. By
38:30
the way they also as people
38:32
visit those web pages or public
38:34
he sends publishers businesses have a
38:36
chance to get. She does sign
38:38
up for a newsletter, may be
38:41
subscribed to something. So Google is
38:43
this massive funnel that winds up.
38:45
Being. The economic engine of the entire
38:47
web and the way that it works
38:49
is people google things and they see
38:51
links and they click on the links
38:53
rights And this has been a state
38:55
of affairs for so long now that
38:57
he's in. people taken for granted. Once
38:59
you've taken a eyes and you start
39:01
to just summarize those links and essentially
39:03
tell people you don't have to visit
39:05
website any more, all of a sudden
39:08
that thing starts to break down in
39:10
Out There was this phrase that they
39:12
used a couple times that the keynote
39:14
cabin they said let google. Do the
39:16
Google and forty else and it struck me
39:18
so hard because the emphasis on there isn't
39:20
being on the web is a tour and
39:23
a ghoul of the future is not going
39:25
to take you to the web. Google is
39:27
gonna give you everything you need within Google
39:29
itself. Yeah, that sucked me to. And they
39:32
also talked about sir taking the leg work
39:34
out of search And as they were saying
39:36
that I was thinking like that Legwork has
39:38
funded. Basically. The entire digital
39:40
media. I mean it either. I don't
39:43
want to overstate. things that are in
39:45
a Google is not everything, but is
39:47
by far the biggest supplier of traffic
39:49
Too many digital publications, so Google executives
39:52
have obviously anticipated that publishers might freak
39:54
out about this change and they had
39:56
some respond this is ready they said,
39:58
you know In our tests, we've found
40:01
that users who saw these Ai overviews
40:03
tended to conduct more searches and visit
40:05
a more diverse set of web sites.
40:07
They also said that the links or
40:10
that appear in is a I overviews
40:12
because there's a little like. Section.
40:14
At the bottom of the overview where you
40:17
can go to click on things to learn
40:19
more and they said it. Those links got
40:21
more clicks than these are traditional Sir Slinks
40:23
below them and lives. read: the Vice President
40:25
of Search Google as said on Tuesday that
40:28
the company would quotes continue to focus on
40:30
sending valuable traffic to publishers and creators. But
40:32
I think it's fair to say that publishers
40:34
are skeptical and she said we're going to
40:37
send valuable traffic students They were amazon more
40:39
traffic as guess what? They're not going to
40:41
use an analyst look at this. They're predicting
40:43
somewhere between twenty. To forty percent of Google
40:45
search traffic is at stake here and I
40:47
think it's fair to say the most publishers
40:49
do not have a plan for what happens
40:51
if they lose forty percent of their traffic
40:53
and a year he had clearly the the
40:55
risk here is that all of this traffic
40:57
will just evaporates and I also read a
40:59
good post on a search engine land which
41:02
is a good website the covers the service
41:04
industry and one of my favorite theme parties.
41:07
Are they were basically talking about how
41:10
the the problem for publishers here is
41:12
not just that they might see their
41:14
overall. Traffic declined, but the thing
41:16
can't really do anything about it.
41:18
With. With others, have bought other Ai
41:21
experiences Publishers can say opt out they
41:23
can. They can block the crawler for
41:25
catchy Be T or Claude from accessing
41:28
their site if they don't want those
41:30
products to be able to summarize what
41:32
they find on a website, but with
41:34
Google because their technology also crossed for
41:37
the search index, there's no way right
41:39
now to decouple those things. You can't
41:41
be a publisher and say I don't
41:44
want my client had to appear in
41:46
these A I overview Summaries: I only
41:48
want. To be listed on regular search results
41:50
in Google, you have to kind of say
41:53
yes or no to the whole thing. And
41:55
yes. But I think overall if you are
41:57
a publisher that derives a big portion of
41:59
your time. Pick from Google this is
42:01
a big deal for you. This is the
42:03
big one. I would be pulling the fire
42:05
alarm. yeah it is absolutely time but you
42:08
know Etti cabinet the same time after Say
42:10
in some ways we had to know this
42:12
was coming in Oregon right? About Google for
42:14
more than ten years now. He and you
42:16
go back a decade and they were talking
42:18
about Google as the Star Trek computer. This
42:21
is their vision in as he seems Star
42:23
Trek, Captain Kirk whoever would you say I'm
42:25
computer as it that you know is is
42:27
able to ask the question and then they
42:29
can. Fire the photon torpedoes or whatever
42:31
and it's that. is a world where
42:34
you know the computer was not saying
42:36
and actually I got that sacked from
42:38
the New York Times, right? And there's
42:40
only the wire cutters. Favorite Photon torpedoes.
42:42
This this I find vision of. This
42:44
has always been all of the inputs.
42:47
all the labor is abstracted away and
42:49
you just have this perfect assistance else.
42:51
They told us that this is what
42:53
they were building. I think it just
42:55
seems so fantastical for so long that
42:58
the publishers are not of publishers. anybody.
43:00
Else you depends on Google Traffic's helping people
43:02
discover their business would have a lot of
43:04
people's rights. It was so easy for those
43:06
folks to just dismiss that. But the point
43:09
of what we're saying today is the moment
43:11
is here. The Star Trek computer is coming
43:13
into view. He I do. People really do
43:15
need to have a new plan B. Is
43:19
there anything that publishers can do at this
43:21
point to sort of keep their Google traffic
43:23
from falling off a cliff or to adapt
43:26
to these new Ai overviews? You know, I
43:28
think the only thing that worse and it's
43:30
really hard is but you have to build
43:32
a direct connection with an audience or with
43:35
a customer base. If you're a different kind
43:37
of business rights people have to think of
43:39
you independently and they after you have to
43:42
have some way of maintaining a connection with
43:44
themselves. Ill this is why email newsletters had
43:46
become such as a hot commodity in the
43:48
publisher. World Rights because it allows us to
43:51
sidestep the need for us. you know look
43:53
up a piece of information in order to
43:55
find it instead someone will just kind of
43:57
send it to you self. yeah I think
43:59
pod or another thing frankly right? Because like
44:01
we don't rely on Google search really for
44:03
people to find the pod, just it just
44:05
gets delivered to them and feed once they
44:07
become subscriber. Sucks. These are the kinds of
44:09
things that I think we're publishers need to
44:11
be thinking about. but even then cabin the
44:13
scale of the businesses is going to decline
44:15
because in it's heyday Google? Really? What said?
44:17
Millions and millions of a visit to web
44:19
sites and in a world where that's about
44:21
to the twice the size of the audience
44:24
that you can build a smaller which means
44:26
that the staff that you can afford to
44:28
pay gets much smaller self. I just think
44:30
that we're going to be living in the
44:32
fall out of this for really long time
44:34
and I got assume if I was I
44:36
was emotional yesterday in a way that I
44:38
was not proud of it you know don't
44:40
I mean are not that I was like
44:42
crying google io but I just felt really
44:44
are out of sorts you know within the
44:46
past forty eight hours of this recording this
44:48
I have one for the what laid off
44:50
from their media job and I had to
44:52
other friends were currently employ the Me a
44:55
job she told me that they're looking for
44:57
other jobs are now any every case the
44:59
answers the same. The money just isn't
45:01
there the way that they all thought it would
45:03
be. rights. and so thus you know my story.
45:05
Past forty eight hours, three people looking to leave
45:07
we already you know we could name the publications
45:09
that of shut down in the past year. Still
45:12
more of that are going to sat down in
45:14
this year and so I understand it. or maybe
45:16
the sounds like to reporters, navel gazing and the
45:18
enemy. We're spending too much time on this. But
45:20
what I'm telling you is the thing is happening
45:22
to the media businesses is going to happen to
45:24
the other businesses. It turns out that in a
45:27
world where everything is online, that's how people find
45:29
stuff, how they discover. New businesses that
45:31
matters a lot. and when all
45:33
that is about to be hidden
45:35
away by some black box algorithm
45:37
that summarizes what it thinks is
45:39
the best thing based on whatever,
45:41
and who knows, I. Truly do
45:44
not think people are prepared for this
45:46
world. Yeah, and I think Google obviously
45:48
has. A A Reasons for wanting
45:50
to view at Evolved search engine this
45:52
like sales of it's a very risky
45:55
move for them for a few reasons.
45:57
One is as we know he's a
45:59
I. The can Getting drunk? they
46:01
can. They can be untrustworthy. They
46:04
can be erratic. I saw there
46:06
was a screenshots I'm going around
46:08
the other day on social media
46:10
I were someone asked google what
46:12
are some food names that end
46:14
with I'm and Googles experimental Ai
46:17
Overview said here's some fruit names
46:19
that and with I'm. Apple
46:21
I'm banana, I'm stronger, I'm
46:23
from Adam and coconut. And
46:27
like that's a funny example but I think they're
46:29
going to be a lot of examples of these
46:31
ai or views and least in their early days
46:33
to getting things wrong as the I do think
46:36
that will start to erode trust in Google overtime
46:38
I mean I think the as possible but I
46:40
would not count on it because there are mistakes
46:42
all the web pages that people are visiting to
46:44
add I'm not sure how much he just matters
46:47
in the and yes I think there's also business
46:49
risk here to me Google at you know. It
46:51
does make the vast majority of it's money
46:53
from showing ads right there on the search
46:56
results page, and it remains to be seen
46:58
whether they can serve monetize these A I
47:00
overviews as effectively as a traditional surf Results
47:02
By the way, they also make a lot
47:05
of money selling ads on third party website.
47:07
Their Google ad network is a big part
47:09
of their business. Tens of billions of dollars
47:12
a year if all of those web pages
47:14
suddenly have to close up because they're not
47:16
getting any traffic from Google any more than
47:18
that part of Googles add business has to
47:21
shrink. As well So that is totally true.
47:23
But keep in mind having it is Google
47:25
that has it's fingers on the Not. Google
47:27
is the one in control here. It gets
47:29
to decide how fast or slow moves in
47:31
a case like this. If it does something
47:33
that dramatically change something and aware doesn't like
47:36
it can always adds that. That's the important
47:38
thing is it is the one in the
47:40
driver's seat. Now for what the future of
47:42
the web looks like and what they are
47:44
telling us as Google is just going to
47:46
keep more and more of the that the
47:48
median internet experience to itself within its on
47:50
walled garden. Yes, do find any reason
47:53
for optimism in what you heard this
47:55
week at I. Oh well, you know
47:57
I was so desperate for optimism that
47:59
I texted. Executives Who: I have
48:01
some these backchannel conversations with The nurses and
48:03
executives who I would think. I think it's
48:05
fair to say it's generally thinks that I
48:07
am over rotate on being you know, concerned
48:10
and a worrier. you know consider you different
48:12
people and sector mostly his optimism and everything
48:14
messing everything is gonna be fine for every
48:16
one course. They also live in man sense.
48:18
But anyway this person said to me that
48:20
essentially it's. People. Still wants
48:23
novel content and experiences on the web.
48:25
Still have shared experiences with their friends.
48:27
They want real. Really some steps right
48:29
with you know with with public he
48:32
sends with writers. And so if you
48:34
were the kind of media business or
48:36
you're the kind of journalists that does
48:38
have an authentic audience that you are
48:40
doing a really good job for that
48:42
you're doing something novel, you're doing something
48:45
really smart. You might wind up being
48:47
in a better position coming out of
48:49
all deaths. because as much as I
48:51
love the. The the media it is
48:53
also true, there's a lot of garbage
48:55
and or business and there are a
48:58
lot of unscrupulous publishers that are publishing
49:00
lists of quote you know the best
49:02
vacuum that haven't tested a single vacuum
49:04
in their entire life but they figure
49:06
there's some upside and getting some of
49:08
that affiliate revenue self's if you want
49:10
optimistic case it is that google will
49:12
sort of cause all of those bad
49:14
actors to wash out at it will
49:17
leave a few brave proud publishers that
49:19
are doing honest worth standings to read
49:21
more of the benefits. Yes. I I
49:23
think my my reason for optimism here
49:25
is that I actually do think that
49:27
it is in Googles long term self
49:29
interests for their to be a vibrant
49:31
and healthy internet's I think that if
49:33
Google starts as are just aggregating and
49:35
summarizing the internet and spoon feeding it
49:37
to people through these A I overviews
49:39
I think that works fine for a
49:41
while and then I think they will
49:43
start to see one website clothes and
49:45
ten web sites clothes and one hundred
49:47
website closed and within a couple years
49:49
you're looking at just a very diminished
49:51
internet's and. Google in that world is not
49:53
going to have we a what is It's a
49:56
I going to crawl and summarize if there are
49:58
no web sites less. Just think
50:00
that we will. We will end up in
50:02
a world where all of the valuable information
50:04
on the Internet is sort of hidden behind
50:06
paywalls and subscription publications may be newsletters and
50:08
podcasts and you will just see of an
50:11
impoverished Google that is out there scraping as
50:13
hard as it can, trying to summarize what
50:15
it finds and not coming up with much.
50:17
Yeah, well, I I didn't have. that is
50:19
a possibility. I also think Google will just
50:21
gets increasingly. Guy was having this discussion with
50:23
friends last night's of like essentially this exact
50:25
thing you know whereas Google going to find
50:27
the information anymore and either you might think
50:29
of one example well as are you gonna
50:31
Paris and you want to know like what's
50:33
the best bakeries Well today I would rely
50:35
on a travel writer who is done there
50:38
and Imho and Bene recently right because you
50:40
know the best bakery from in two thousand.
50:42
Twenty four might not be the best bakery
50:44
and twenty twenties and we are talking about
50:46
cycle you know Google and actually just kind
50:48
of look at the foot traffic and all
50:50
the bakeries in Paris and say this one
50:52
is the most popular and that is not
50:54
actually going to require there to be a
50:56
healthy web feeding it that information rights. These
50:58
companies collect so much data. About us and
51:01
they are going to come up with
51:03
so many more novel ways. Season that's
51:05
I really do wonder if maybe we
51:07
aren't flattering ourselves when we tell ourselves
51:09
that they need us. I
51:12
hope you're wrong. I hope I'm
51:14
wrong. As planned, vote for any more, but
51:16
I do. I think this is or to
51:18
the flip side of a I vertigo this
51:21
feeling of like wow the future is coming
51:23
is like. I. Don't know that
51:25
our institutions, including our media as
51:27
Titians understand the gravity of what
51:29
happened this week ago. which is
51:31
that they did. Essentially, it's declare
51:33
that we're moving into a very
51:35
different era of the internet. We
51:37
had talked on the show for
51:40
more than a year now about
51:42
automation. A I'm coming for jobs
51:44
It is seemed like something on
51:46
acquaintance medium to distant horizon. it's
51:48
But I do think that at
51:50
Io The Sweets we saw the
51:52
beginning of an arrival of something.
51:54
Like that and against it is starting in the
51:56
media but it is not going to stop there.
52:00
One more thing. I phone records the segment. I.
52:02
Got a little emotional watching this
52:04
announcement to am for maybe some
52:06
similar reasons as you but my
52:08
emotions like I just feel like
52:10
I'm being gassed Live here Publishers
52:12
People who work in online media
52:14
have known that Google has plans
52:16
to sub generative ai into search
52:18
results for years. We we talked
52:20
to the Ceo of Perplexity a
52:23
few months ago who basically told
52:25
us like yes, if we do
52:27
start generating these a I summaries
52:29
of search results, people will click
52:31
on less news and. I actually admire
52:33
that he was honest about that. Google
52:35
is not being honest about this. They
52:37
are telling people we're still committed to
52:39
sending traffic to publishers. People are not
52:41
gonna start clicking on links just because
52:43
they have these like a I summaries
52:45
above their search results and I. I
52:47
really just wish that someone at Google
52:49
would come out and say yes, your
52:51
traffic is gonna fall off a cliff.
52:53
But here's why we think it's important
52:55
anyway. but instead they are trying to
52:57
signal to users that this is going
52:59
to be a good and useful things
53:01
they're trying to. Make publishers feel
53:03
less scared and frankly I just felt like
53:06
being a is elegant tending at a funeral
53:08
disguised as a wedding. Yeah, and this actually
53:10
is the reason that we need media to
53:12
exist and as well as because we will
53:14
try to tell you the truth and have
53:17
some, we will try to go beyond our
53:19
own neural self interest and tell you what's
53:21
going on when I tell me we're going
53:23
to like Note: basically destroyed the foundations of
53:26
the open internet. Now I thought exact same
53:28
way or I haven't Well, I'm afraid that's
53:30
all my contacts window can hold for. This
53:32
conversation. so we're just going to sort
53:34
of have to purge that and we
53:36
will have to return to the subjects
53:39
another time. Yes, and he will have
53:41
plenty more opportunities to revisit the subject
53:43
and and will be You can find
53:45
us podcasting under an old bridge on
53:47
the abandoned railroad. Afraid of what's your
53:49
post media plan for when all the
53:51
Google traffic us like are you gonna
53:53
become a farmer? If if the digital
53:55
media guys really into Tv and Vcr
53:57
repair. I did this a break.
54:00
Her. And now. The
54:07
around a bit. he. Was.
54:20
Supported by How To Fix the Internet
54:22
and original podcast from the Electronic Frontier
54:24
Foundation. The Internet was
54:26
supposed to be a utopia of
54:29
creativity, freedom, and innovation, but instead
54:31
their surveillance, capitalism and social. Media
54:33
trolls. On How to six
54:36
the Internet has Cindy Cohen and
54:38
she essentially talk the technologists, policymakers,
54:40
And activists working the make the Internet
54:42
better. Here, concrete solutions with much
54:44
needed optimism to the problems of how
54:47
we six the Internet. Follow. How
54:49
to Fix the Internet anywhere you listen to
54:51
podcasts, Well.
54:53
Covered some time to time on the so
54:55
we like to take a quick run through
54:57
the news and a segment we call at
54:59
Cbt. Zebra,
55:08
Jesus Court the segment on our somewhere. We had
55:10
headlines from the week and we pull them out
55:12
of our. Hats and we riff on them
55:14
a bit until. One of us gets bored with
55:16
what the other person and thanks I was point we say.
55:19
That. Entering and then we move onto the next
55:21
headline. So Casey was you were used to the
55:23
baseball hunter the bucket hat. I didn't We should
55:25
use the bucket hat in honor of Rocky The
55:27
Open A I implore you put on a bucket
55:29
hat this week when demo ing the new home
55:31
assistant. I like Gov. It's. That
55:36
want to do yoga first? ah once you
55:38
go first or guess was making we mix
55:40
them up for me and I was as
55:42
in a four million in of him We
55:45
have to mix up all the headlines and
55:47
had better to Just like Jostle had the
55:49
microphone is a been suffering were Jocelyn we're
55:51
heading that microphone microphone as and from a
55:53
different than ours was our. First
55:58
story. The
56:00
X Customers poised to recover all funds
56:02
lost in collapse. This comes from my
56:04
colleague David Jaffe. Belly of the or
56:06
times customers of the failed crypto currency
56:09
Sees Mtx are poised to recover all
56:11
of the money they lost when the
56:13
from collapsing twenty Twenty two and receive
56:15
interest on top of it. The company's
56:18
bankruptcy lawyers said last week under a
56:20
plan filed in Federal bankruptcy court virtually
56:22
all enough to access creditors will receive
56:24
tax payments equivalent to a hundred and
56:26
eighteen percent of the assets they had
56:29
stored on F. T X are just so
56:31
as to prove the plan and it may still
56:33
take months for the com money. Treat customers or
56:35
this is an amazing story that suit Now others
56:37
have pointed out that if you had simply are
56:39
taken the money you had in Fcx went all
56:41
sat down and just like used it to. by
56:43
that point you actually be in a way better
56:45
position than you are today So it is not
56:47
right to say that everybody sort of came out
56:49
smelling like rosie or by based on what you've
56:51
said Kevin I do have forwards that I would
56:54
like to say it's to the people of the
56:56
United States and they are these freezer bag and
56:58
fried. Have
57:01
no doubt that is not the rural
57:03
here. So sandbag been freed is has
57:05
been sentences currently doing a twenty five
57:08
year prison sentence for his his role
57:10
in this collapse alleged role nice not
57:12
alleged. If you been convicted in the
57:15
seizure in prison know it's we can
57:17
just say it he did a fraud
57:19
with this file. This is an amazing
57:22
result in part because Was Embankment Free
57:24
does appear to have Benny a giant
57:26
froth sir He did actually have a
57:29
good nose for. Investment. So one of
57:31
the things that he put money into Salina
57:33
which is that a crypto tokens. Part of
57:35
the reason that they are able to return
57:37
this money to creditors is because Salon or
57:39
has been booming. Bitcoin has also been booming
57:41
and some of the other investments that same
57:44
bag been freed made including a stake in
57:46
Anthropic. The Ai companies have become much more
57:48
valuable since the firm's collapse which is would
57:50
just an amazing a testament to the bag
57:52
the you can be a giant fraudster is
57:54
still be pretty good at investing. Yeah when
57:57
this guy gets out of prison I think
57:59
he's going to. The Great Partner and Andreessen
58:01
Horowitz. Alright
58:04
let's stop generating site. Your.
58:06
Son and I'll do money or. Bundles
58:09
founder says your dating ai concierge will
58:11
soon date hundreds of other people's concierge.
58:14
As for you, this is from fourteen
58:16
months at the Bloomberg Tech Summit in
58:18
San Francisco last week, Wheatley Wolf heard
58:20
the founder and former Ceo a bubble
58:22
predicted that signals would one day deploy
58:24
a i Didn't concierge as help them
58:27
by Lumps Wolf her told the crowd
58:29
there's a world where you're dating concierge
58:31
could go a day for you with
58:33
other dating. How serious that off to
58:35
talk to six hundred people. So Kevin,
58:37
what do you make of. This form
58:40
of theoretical future dating. So she got
58:42
a lot of backlash to this comment.
58:44
I was at the the Bloomberg tax
58:46
on that were this happened and up
58:48
immediately when it went under the internet
58:50
people started saying like this is dystopias.
58:52
I want to defend this idea of
58:54
crime to get I think we are
58:57
be in I I'm not, I'm dating
58:59
apps But my impression is that most
59:01
people who'd gone the dating apps are
59:03
already basically glorified algorithms. Are this: They
59:05
are using one of like three preset
59:07
lines that they've come up with. They
59:09
are basically trying to quickly assess compatibility. It's
59:12
but they're they're not. You know they're not
59:14
having real deep authentic conversations. at least not
59:16
right away. And if they I could save
59:18
you some time by by going out and
59:21
dating people on your behalf and saying this
59:23
person the losers person is or isn't White
59:25
House of I think this could say people
59:27
are time What he thinks I do not
59:30
think you would say people are time because
59:32
you know here is the sag you know
59:34
I'm also not on dating apps anymore hashtag
59:37
soft launch. But what I remember when I
59:39
was. was that oftentimes you would say
59:41
to somebody you know hey like has a
59:43
rich going and they were just respond with
59:45
pay and then you would think oh this
59:47
person isn't super undies i'm going to move
59:50
us a world in which the person who
59:52
responded hey is using a bot to do
59:54
responses on it's perhaps is doing everyone a
59:56
disservice rights because of this is a person
59:58
who can even be to complete a sentence
1:00:01
when I say hello to them, the odds are
1:00:03
that I'm gonna enjoy my time with him is
1:00:05
just sort of like very low. So
1:00:08
is there some world where some sort of AI
1:00:10
something is helpful in enhancing
1:00:13
the online dating experience? I'm very open to
1:00:15
that, but if it is essentially just AI
1:00:17
is tricking each other into thinking that the
1:00:19
other person is like a really good writer
1:00:21
and has a huge personality, then they're gonna
1:00:24
be wasting even more time than people are
1:00:26
wasting on these apps already. Yeah, I do
1:00:28
think it opens up some interesting possibilities, but
1:00:30
I can see how people would find it dystopian. My
1:00:33
main thing is like, I just hope that they,
1:00:36
what am I saying? What are you saying Kevin? I've always
1:00:38
wanted to ask you this, what are you saying? Yeah,
1:00:42
in conclusion, I'm very glad I'm not single.
1:00:44
All right, stop generating. Sonos
1:00:51
says it's controversial app redesign took
1:00:53
courage. This is from the Verge.
1:00:55
Sonos, the connected speaker company released
1:00:57
a major update to its mobile
1:00:59
app earlier this month to
1:01:01
quote the Verge. In the days since
1:01:03
customers have complained about missing features like
1:01:05
sleep primers, broken local music library management,
1:01:08
and no longer having the ability to
1:01:10
edit playlists or the upcoming song queue.
1:01:12
Customers were very angry about this. And
1:01:14
in response, Sonos' chief product officer told
1:01:16
the Verge, quote, it takes courage
1:01:19
to rebuild a brand's core product from the
1:01:21
ground up and to do so knowing it
1:01:23
may require taking a few steps back to
1:01:25
ultimately leap into the future. Casey, what do
1:01:27
you make of this? You know, I'm not
1:01:29
sure that I would say that Sonos executives
1:01:31
move to courage here. I would say it
1:01:33
seems more likely that they took mushrooms
1:01:36
or some other sort of psychedelic substance
1:01:38
that sort of melted their defenses until
1:01:40
all they could do was give us
1:01:42
the app that they did. Look, I
1:01:44
have been in a daily war against
1:01:46
my Sonos system for years now. When
1:01:48
it works, there's nothing better. The problem is
1:01:50
it doesn't work a lot of the time.
1:01:53
And so when I got this new app,
1:01:55
I thought maybe they have finally solved all
1:01:57
of my issues and I swear to the
1:01:59
heavens, Kevin. the volume slider in this app,
1:02:01
which let's just say is one of the core
1:02:03
things I want to do to my Sonos system
1:02:05
a lot of the time is adjust the volume.
1:02:08
It is not persistent. It only
1:02:10
appears when Sonos sort of knows
1:02:12
that something is... Anyway,
1:02:14
the point of the story is the number of
1:02:16
things that this app could do could fill a
1:02:18
segment much longer than Chatubee. I'm
1:02:21
confused because it seems like the job of the
1:02:23
Sonos speaker should be fairly simple, which is play
1:02:25
the music that I want when I connect to
1:02:27
it. You're so right. I don't own a Sonos
1:02:30
speaker. So you tell me, is that your experience?
1:02:32
No, my experience is I say, Sonos, please connect
1:02:34
to Spotify, which is what I play music from.
1:02:36
And Sonos says, I have no idea who you're
1:02:38
talking about. I've never seen this man before and
1:02:41
I want you to leave my house. And
1:02:43
I say, this is the entire job that I've given you. So
1:02:45
it's a real problem. And I
1:02:48
wish us Sonos continued courage as they try to
1:02:50
build their first functional app. All right. Stop generating.
1:02:52
All right. Oh,
1:03:00
this is interesting, Kevin. Inappropriate behavior
1:03:02
shuts down the Dublin to New
1:03:04
York City portal. Less than
1:03:07
a week after two public sculptures featuring a
1:03:09
live stream between Dublin, Ireland and New York
1:03:11
City debuted. Quote, inappropriate behavior
1:03:13
and real time interactions between people
1:03:15
in the two cities has prompted
1:03:17
a temporary shutdown. The portals, as
1:03:19
the sculptures are called, are the
1:03:22
brainchild of a Lithuanian artist named
1:03:24
Benedictus Gillis. And they were
1:03:26
shut down Monday night after video spread on social
1:03:28
media. Visitors misbehaving in front of them, including an
1:03:30
OnlyFans model in New York flashing the
1:03:32
portal and people in Dublin holding up
1:03:34
swastikas. So, Kevin, what are the odds
1:03:36
of you just set up two giant
1:03:39
cameras in Dublin and New York that
1:03:41
people would troll them? What
1:03:43
are the odds? Close to 100 percent,
1:03:45
I would say. No, I was bummed
1:03:47
out about this because I did actually
1:03:50
think the portals were a cool idea.
1:03:52
This is basically like a giant sort
1:03:54
of screen that was placed in kind
1:03:56
of a circular enclosure that had a
1:03:58
live streaming feed that. where you could
1:04:00
basically go up to this thing in New York
1:04:02
City and see people who are staring into the
1:04:05
portal in Dublin, and you could kind of have
1:04:07
like this wormhole between the two cities. And
1:04:09
we could recognize our shared humanity. Exactly! But
1:04:11
as it turns out, it was more useful
1:04:14
for flashing and holding up swastikas. This
1:04:16
is why we can't have nice things. Well, you know,
1:04:18
Kevin, I'm Irish, and I have to wonder if there
1:04:20
was just sort of something about our mischievous nature that,
1:04:23
you know, led the New Yorkers to Miss Babe.
1:04:25
I do also just like the name, The Portal.
1:04:27
You know, it's sort of a genre with the
1:04:29
sphere in Las Vegas. I just think we need more
1:04:32
things of that nature, things that are sort
1:04:34
of the titles of Michael Crichton novels made
1:04:37
into reality. But it is sort of like vaguely ominous.
1:04:39
Yes. Alright, stop generating. Oh,
1:04:45
this one's for you. After 28
1:04:47
years, someone opened an unopenable door
1:04:49
in Super Mario 64. This
1:04:52
comes from The Verge. On April 22nd,
1:04:54
user AlexPallax1 posted a video on Discord
1:04:56
showing how he got through an unopenable
1:04:59
noblest door, which everyone previously thought was
1:05:01
impossible. To do it, he used a
1:05:03
workaround involving getting a mother penguin to
1:05:06
push Mario into the door while also
1:05:08
doing a turnaround move. It turns out
1:05:10
if you use this technique, you can
1:05:13
open the door, but it doesn't actually
1:05:15
save you any time in playing the game. Well,
1:05:17
listen, I hate to tell you this, Kevin, but
1:05:19
I think AlexPallax has made a terrible mistake. I
1:05:22
think some doors are closed for a reason, and I
1:05:24
think an ancient evil has been awakened. And
1:05:27
if hell is unleashed in this country over the
1:05:29
next weeks and months, we will truly only have
1:05:31
AlexPallax to blame. I mean, I
1:05:33
truly do love the people that never stop playing
1:05:35
video games, like the speed run community for the
1:05:38
Mario games or for Tetris. I mean, these people,
1:05:40
the lengths that they go to to shave two
1:05:42
seconds off their time to open the unopenable door
1:05:44
is truly inspirational. I also just hope that
1:05:46
we have a national security plan that
1:05:48
involves elevating people like AlexPallax into sort
1:05:50
of code breakers, you know, working for
1:05:52
the Department of Defense. Like we could
1:05:54
put these skills to real use. I
1:05:56
also want to say for everyone complaining,
1:05:59
the younger generation. has no attention span
1:06:01
like this person, the attention span on
1:06:03
him. I'm super jealous. It's true. All
1:06:05
right. Stop generating. All
1:06:07
right. All right. Casey last
1:06:09
one. Last one. Oh,
1:06:12
this is, this is a good one. Man
1:06:14
fools, Waymo self-driving cars with stop sign
1:06:16
t-shirt. This is from car scoops, which
1:06:19
is where I get all my scoops
1:06:21
about cars and Arizona
1:06:23
content creator Jason B car. This
1:06:25
could not be real. Jason B
1:06:27
car is like the Johnny be
1:06:30
good. And Arizona
1:06:42
content creator Jason B car made a t-shirt
1:06:44
with a stop sign to see what Waymo's
1:06:46
autonomous test vehicles will do in a series
1:06:49
of videos posted to cars. And so Ramy
1:06:51
tested whether Waymo self-driving vehicles actually stopped when
1:06:53
they saw him wearing the shirt while standing
1:06:55
on the sidewalk. He said he believes that
1:06:57
the autonomous vehicle may be confusing him with
1:06:59
a construction worker holding a stop sign. What
1:07:02
do you think Kevin? I think we are
1:07:04
entering a bold new era of autonomous car
1:07:06
hijacks. I think the people are already starting
1:07:08
to find so many creative and
1:07:10
nefarious ways of messing with these things. And
1:07:13
I think that if I were Waymo, I'd be very
1:07:16
annoyed. What do you think? Yeah, I mean, you see
1:07:18
this already in San Francisco. I mean, not as much
1:07:20
anymore, but when the AVs just first started rolling around
1:07:22
in the streets, people would just walk in front of
1:07:24
them to see what they would do. I feel like
1:07:27
the confidence that people had in these AVs was staggering.
1:07:29
This was different because Jason car apparently figured out Jason
1:07:31
B car apparently figured out that you don't even need
1:07:33
to walk in front of it. If you're just wearing
1:07:36
a shirt with a stop sign big enough on it,
1:07:38
it will just stop. Even if you're on the sidewalk,
1:07:40
Jason B car woke up and once said today, I
1:07:42
be stop sign. All
1:07:47
Right, Casey, that is hat GPT. That's how
1:07:49
we play hat GPT. Time To close off
1:07:51
the old hat. Hats Off to you Kevin.
1:08:03
This. Podcast is supported by How To
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Fix the Internet and original podcasts from
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the Electronic Frontier Foundation. The
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Internet was supposed to be a
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utopia of creativity, freedom, and innovation,
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but instead their surveillance, capitalism and
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make the Internet better. Here,
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concrete solutions with much needed optimism to
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the problems of how we six the
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Internet. Follow. How to fix the Internet
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anywhere you the Cineplex? Have
1:08:39
produced by Rental Car and when
1:08:41
He Jones were edited and we
1:08:44
are set on. My nose engineer
1:08:46
for as. High.
1:08:50
As you must know until now
1:08:52
or on his editor know who.
1:08:56
And by my manning and. And
1:08:59
you. To back off. Banks
1:09:02
oppose. Human Fluids Him Democracy or
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Jeffrey Miranda email us at Hard
1:09:07
Fork and want time has come.
1:09:13
On and off. Something
1:09:41
which is no the best way. For you
1:09:43
is a race based on you with
1:09:45
all state lottery based on Harry who
1:09:48
he's. A
1:09:50
makes the car behind them. Oh
1:09:53
no doubt about. Save
1:09:56
the Jaguars and all. The and
1:09:58
only daily basis. Not
1:10:02
available in every state or to the terms and conditions. Rating
1:10:04
that doesn't seem very and in some states or could increase
1:10:06
with i was driving all say fire and insurance company and
1:10:08
affiliates. Don't fuck Illinois.
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