296: Coordinated Inauthentic Behavior

Grumpy Old Geeks. A weekly talk show hosted by Brian Schulmeister and Jason DeFillippo discussing the finer points of what went wrong on the internet and who's to blame. Welcome to Grumpy Old Geeks. I'm Jason DeFillippo.

And I'm Brian Schulmeister. We're coming up on our 300th episode, Brian. We are. What are we going to do about that? I think we're going to do something special. Ooh. Yes, but we're only going to do it special for the Patreon subscribers because we're that kind of cheap, I guess, or desperate, you know.

We talk about everybody making money off of podcasting, so we got to, too. But we're going to do something special for everybody that's been following us on Patreon. And what is that going to be, Brian? Well, apparently you're forcing me to drive out to Woodland Hills and stand around in your garage and you're going to put cameras on us. That's about it. We're going to do a live show.

Exciting stuff. So if you want to see how the sausage is made, it's terribly exciting. But if you're a Patreon subscriber, you'll have access to a live show. And I believe we'll put up a video of it after. So for people that can't make it in real time, correct? Yeah. Yeah. I think we'll probably end up just doing it on Twitch and then streaming it and giving the people who are our Patreon fans the URL.

We're still figuring out the details. I've never done this kind of thing before. So because the demand has not existed, not existed. That kind of is why. Yes. Well, yeah, there you go. So that's what we're going to do. So we're quite excited about it. And hopefully there will be a little bit of beer, but can't be a drunk episode because I'll have to get my ass back from Woodland Hills.

Well, we can Uber you home with all of that. All of that sweet cash we'll be bringing in. Right. Yeah. Yeah. No, you're going to be taking a skateboard home. That's about it. A bird. Yeah. Take a bird. So we're recording and it is election day. So I hope everybody out there, all of our U.S. listeners have done their duty and voted.

Well, this comes out on Thursday, so all the sadness will have already been wafted over everybody. We shall see. We shall see what happens. I guess we're going to we're going to find out what kind of country we are today. You know, don't ask questions you don't want the answers to. I know we should not be here, but here we are.

So, yay. I'm cautiously not too optimistic. Oh, that's fun. That's fun. Way to way to bring it home. Way to bring it on home. All right. Let's talk about shitty stuff that we know about. OK. Remember, we talked about Walmart's patent on the the smart trolley.

Yes. What everyone needs. Yeah. So I found a new one. This one is fantastic. LG is going to be pioneering self-driving shopping carts. Yeah. Fortunately, this is only starting in Korea.

So we know they can work out the bugs over there. But the use case is actually not bad for elderly people who can't push a trolley. But as I know, elderly people very well, because I used to go to an old folks home all the time and used to take some of them shopping. The cart actually is necessary for a lot of people to keep them upright while they're shopping.

Yes. They actually use it as a walker instead of bringing a walker. And I think somebody should have checked out the use case for this beforehand. And it's going to have like a smart barcode scanner. So you can actually put in your, you know, your shopping list and it'll tick them off as it goes.

It'll give you driving directions to where your next item is. I don't think they've ever gone shopping with the elderly. You have to, in order for this to lead you to your desired product, you have to enter your requests in with the smartphone app. And as we all know, elderly, fantastic, both with phones and apps.

Yeah, exactly. It's like, I can't see this thing. You know, it doesn't really work. And I guess the caregivers could do it, but then they could just do the shopping for them and say, come on, grandma, follow me. You know, it's, this is one of those things that I just don't think we need.

Nope. But that's kind of the reason we have a show. In the news.

Oh, Facebook. I, I, Jesus Christ. Well, so we had this Robert Bowers guy that murdered 11 Jewish congregants in the Pittsburgh synagogue. And yeah, and oh boy, despite long running efforts to theoretically debunk the idea of a white genocide, Facebook was still selling advertisers the ability to market to those with an interest in that myth just days after the bloodshed.

Yes, earlier this week, the Intercept was able to select white genocide conspiracy theory as a predefined detailed targeting criterion on the social network to promote two articles to an interest group that Facebook pegged at 168,000 users large and defined as people who have expressed an interest or like pages related to white genocide conspiracy theory.

Well, how the fuck is this even possible? Well, it's data. It's just data. Oh my God. That, well, I wish we could just get the names and numbers of all 168,000 people and, you know, just exclude them from the internet.

Yes, I mean, the fact that this is a dropdown option, it can't be a dropdown option. You have to search for it. Come on. Well, the fact that it is an option at all is, is ridiculous. This is, is nobody paying attention to anything over there?

No. Is anybody approving anything? Is anybody in the Philippines looking at this sort of stuff? This is data driven madness. This is data gone wild. Data gone wild. I mean, it's insane that this was even an option.

I really, my mind is blown. I don't even know what to say about it. Well, it's, it's a, it's an interest group. They have pages. I'm sure. Yes. Yeah. Well done. The fact that they have pages is still kind of scary. Yes, it is. Safe Harbor. That's what Safe Harbor gets you.

Just a platform. Just a platform. Just a platform. So in addition to that, Facebook is now opening up retail pop-ups in nine Macy's stores. So there are a hundred digital native brands and small businesses that have found success on the social network and Instagram, at least temporarily until Facebook and Instagram pull the rug out from under them.

Yeah. So Facebook is going to sell some of their physical products as the holiday shopping season gets underway. So if you happen to live in New York City, Pittsburgh, Atlanta, Fort Lauderdale, San Antonio, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, San Francisco, or Seattle, you can go check out an in the flesh Facebook pop-up.

I think I'm going to have to do that. Well, actually, the Macy's down the street closed because nobody went to it anymore. Now it's a post office. Right. So scratch that one. But if you find one, let me know. I will. And private Facebook data from 81,000 accounts were discovered on a crime form by the BBC. Oops.

Well, actually, it was by cybersecurity company Digital Shadows. But, yeah, the BBC reported on it. Most of them were from Russia and the Ukraine. Oh, OK. Interesting. Tables have turned, Putin. They also had accounts from the UK and Brazil.

But, yeah, these were, like, full-on accounts with photos and chats about – one chat about a recent Depeche Mode concert. Yay. Yay. Maybe that was me. Yeah, could be. Could be. Are you going to Moscow often, comrade?

No, no. OK. Now, I love this one. This is Unwired. Facebook walks a tightrope with Trump's anti-immigrant ad. Have you seen this ad? Oh, my God. What a steaming pile of shit that ad is. Should have made it into Moron of the Week, actually.

It really should have been in Moron of the Week. It looks fake. It honestly looks fake. The 7,000 migrant caravan crossing Mexico, marching toward our border. Dangerous illegal criminals like cop killer Luis Braquemantes don't care about our laws.

America cannot allow this invasion. The migrant caravan must be stopped. President Trump and his allies will protect our border and keep our families safe. America's future depends on you. Stop the caravan.

Vote Republican. I'm Donald Trump and I approve this message. If you were to make something to make everything just seem even worse than it actually really is, you would make that. I mean, it does feel like it's out of like some dystopian movie. Yeah, it's like from V for Vendetta, you know, showing showing all these people like banging on the gates and trying to break down the walls.

And yes. Yeah. Yeah. So basically, this is a an ad about the the immigrants that are coming from the south to take over our country. Oh, man. Yeah. I don't know what to say about this, but I will say a few things. Facebook was one of the last places to shut it down, but it was just the day before the elections.

Yeah. Yeah. CNN at least rejected it from the get go, saying it was racist, which it is. It is. Which it is. Yes, it is. NBC had to wait for some of their stars to complain about it before they took it off the air.

And Fox even stopped airing it. Fox took it off the air before Facebook did. Wow. Yeah. What are you going to do? Except when I went to watch it. Guess where I watched it? On Facebook. Yes. But it was. Yeah. What they really pulled were ads promoting the promotion of it.

You know, which I'm sure used the targeted people who believe the conspiracy theory category. See previous story on white genocide. And Facebook is pulling dozens of accounts for coordinated inauthentic behavior. A whole 30 accounts.

Ones of ones. Yeah. 30 accounts on Facebook and 85 Instagram accounts. The company says we're engaged in coordinated inauthentic behavior. Coordinated inauthentic behavior. Which is what Facebook is. I mean, that's to its core.

That is what Facebook is. The social media in general. Yes. Yeah. Yes, it is. That's funny. Well, in addition to the Facebook pop-up stores, Amazon is opening its first four-star, or as we call it, Paola store in California. Yeah. I'm very excited about this.

No, it's in Berkeley, so I won't be able to go. But if one did open up here, I would definitely have to go check it out. So, I mean, you know, brick and mortar is dying. So, now the internet companies are coming in and redoing brick and mortar. Interesting. Well, yeah. Amazon killed brick and mortar, so they're going to replace brick and mortar.

You know? Yes. I'm sorry, Bezos is just an evil genius. Kill the competition and then just completely take over. That's it. Yeah, and that is what he's doing. Now, on a slightly more depressing note, this is an interesting new report that has come out. It can get worse. It can.

On Thursday, the human rights organization Freedom House released its annual report, Freedom on the Net, which measures the level of online freedom for 65 countries and ranks them. It also provides in-depth analysis to support the numbers. The verdict for this year, the internet is growing less free around the world, and democracy itself is withering under its influence.

Yeah. We're number six. We're number six. We came in number six. Yeah, so this started in 2011. They look at 21 criteria divided into three categories. Obstacles to access, limits on content, and violations of users' rights. Each country gets a numerical score out of 100, with a lower score indicating more freedoms.

Scores from 0 to 30 is relatively free. Scores from 61 to 100 means the country is not. And the conclusion is grim. Global internet freedom has declined for the eighth consecutive years. Even the United States score has dropped, largely due to the repeal of net neutrality and fake news.

Fake news. Fake news is fake. No, come on. Fake news. We're behind Estonia, Iceland, Canada, Germany, and Australia. Yeah. We're number six. Woo-hoo. Awesome. Oh, man. So we talked about the walkout for real change last week, but we didn't actually do any follow-up on it.

Have we had any real change, Jason? I don't know yet. I think the meeting is happening. Oh, the meeting happened yesterday. I haven't seen any news about it yet. Because what happened was 20,000 Google employees and contractors said, F you, and they walked out. That's a pretty big chunk of the company.

I was pretty amazed at how many people actually walked out. Well done, Google employees. Yeah. I mean, we only had a couple hundred for the military contracts for AI to make the drones smarter. But this is actually pretty impressive.

Right. We'll see if there's actually any real change. But yeah, they came up with five points that they really want taken into account. And they call this the transparency, accountability, and structural changes they want. An end to forced arbitration in cases of harassment and discrimination.

A commitment to end pay and opportunity inequity. A publicly disclosed sexual harassment transparency report. Nice. A clear, uniform, globally inclusive process for reporting sexual misconduct safely and anonymously. And finally, a commitment to elevate the chief diversity officer to answer directly to the CEO and make recommendations directly to the board of directors and to appoint an employee representative to the board.

That's a lot they're asking for. That is. That is quite a lot. And all of that make pretty good sense to me. Make Google great again. Damn right. Well, Google is trying to do something, at least with their Chrome browser, to make things great again on the web.

They're stepping up their fight against websites that use shady pop-ups and redirects to ensnare users. As of December, Chrome 71 will block all ads on the small number of sites that consistently use these tactics, whether they're producing a fake system errors or trying to steer you to unwanted sites. It won't yank ads right away when Google determines that your site sucks.

But there won't be much time after Google flags you. In an abusive experiences report, site owners will have 30 days to mend their ways. That's pretty cool. I'm on the fence with this one. And I don't know if I want my browser getting that into what they're showing me because it's a slippery slope.

Because once they start saying, okay, well, these people are bad and we're just protecting you from the world at large, where do you draw the line there? And, you know, we know Google. That line moves around a lot. Well, you can use Firefox, I suppose.

Oh, God. Don't. No, no. Or Opera, like we do. Yeah, that's true. Oh, that's right. I don't use Chrome. Never mind. Neither do I. So, but, you know, it's not like Google isn't doing this with their own search engine, which is how most people find anything anyways.

So, it's just another step forward and just baking it into their product. And you'll have the option to disable the filtering. Okay, yeah. Because, I mean, they do do some things right now that I do approve of. If there is malware on a site, they will block it. Yeah. That's different from, you know, pop-ups and redirects.

That's a little different. I agree. It's just a, you know, a hair difference, but it's one of those things where I just don't know. It makes me a little uncomfortable. Okay. I'm with you. I found a really interesting article over on Slate by this guy, Charles Seif, who I've never heard of before.

But it's a great thing about Twitter, which I thought was really interesting. Humans are getting more bot-like on Twitter. So, instead of bots getting better and seeming to be more human, what we're discovering is humans are starting to act more and more like bots in this gigantic echo chamber of shit that is Twitter.

How so? What's the behavior that we're emulating from the bots? Well, he does some really interesting data analysis in terms of, like, how often people are tweeting versus bots. Because it used to be you could just look at frequency and figure out, okay, this has got to be a bot because they're tweeting every fucking 10 seconds.

Crazy people are starting to do that, too. Sleep patterns. Like, bots would be tweeting 24-7 or, you know, there would be no eight hours or six hours off for sleeping. Crazy people are doing that. They're staying up and they're not sleeping normally and they're tweeting all the time. So, all these sort of analysis systems that they used to use to determine if an account was a bot or not, they're not working so well anymore.

I'm wondering if this can be, like, a meth discovery feature. Because if these people aren't sleeping, they need something to stay awake. And if they're crazy, I think this might point to meth. People are just using crystal meth to stay up all night and tweet. That could be. Yeah, look into that science.

And listener Jason sent this over as well as finding it myself. Cities ban e-scooters in the name of public safety? Bird says, no way. Okay. Bird has sued the city of Beverly Hills because they put in a temporary six-month e-scooter ban while they figure out what the hell to do with it.

And Bird is saying the city is basically harassing them and taking their property, issued over 950 citations, and demands to pay over $100,000 in fines. Right. Yeah. And they're saying that Beverly Hills hasn't provided any proper documentation and justification for those seizures.

So, unfortunately, I think Bird might have a case here. They might have a point, which pains me to no end. Because the city should be able to do whatever the hell they want to do. And if the city decides they don't want them there, then that's that. But, unfortunately, I don't know what's going to happen here.

Well, there's a state law that's supposed to supersede the city's laws, which is the crux of their claim. Yes. We'll see how that plays out. Oh, Beverly Hills. Who the hell's riding scooters in Beverly Hills? Do they have, you know, Bird Bentleys now? Can you get your whole Rolls Bird?

They're all encrusted with diamonds. Yeah, seriously. So, AMC, smelling blood in the water, has decided to raise their rates. They know MoviePass just is, you know, dead man walking. So, they're starting to raise their rates in certain markets, which is interesting.

Well, because you can't, they were pricing themselves out of business. Like, this was, there was never any way this was going to work. So, of course, they're raising their prices, especially now that they don't have a competitor anymore. That's the whole thing. It's like, you know, they ran MoviePass out of business easily.

And they've got 500,000 subscribers already where they thought it was going to take, you know, over a year to get that many. And it's just like, whew, everybody's subscribing now. And they're like, uh, yeah, well, we might need to raise our rates a little bit. It's not too much. It's $22 a month from 20 in a couple states and then going up to 24, of course, here in California, in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New Jersey, and New York.

So, if you've already subscribed, you'll get it for a little while. But, yeah, it's going to keep going up. And the other 35 states are not affected by the price increase. So, it's only going up where people actually use it. Right. Because they need to make more money. Okay.

Way to go, AMC. They got the data. Yeah, they do. They do.

Media Candy. I finished House of Cards Season 6. Why? Because I'm a completionist. And I wanted to see how it was going to end and what they were going to do. And they didn't know what they were going to do, obviously, because this is just an unholy dumpster fire.

It made no sense. It made no sense. The recap over on the Vulture, and I'm so glad I didn't try to watch it. Yeah, yeah. That was eight hours of my life. I'm never getting back. And it was so, like, slapdash and slipshod and whatever half-assery you want to, you know, put into the...

Slapdash. It was terrible. It made no sense in spots. The plot was all over the place. So many loose ends. And it's like, oh, God. The one thing that I came out of this with is, I know Kevin Spacey is a filthy kid toucher, but he was really good and made the show.

Without him, the show was nothing. Nothing at all. I mean, the show was basically pure Spacey personality. He nailed that character and made it really interesting. So I was just shocked that they even decided to bring it back. Well, you know, I'm glad they did for the people that were working on it, so they got paid.

What I would have rather Netflix had done, just give them the money and not release the episodes. Right. Because I think it's worse for Netflix that they actually release these episodes. And in fantastic movie news, the Deadwood movie has finally started production!

I know you're very excited about this. You love it. Cocksuckers! I knew that was coming, too. Of course! Legend! Cocksucker! My favorite scene of the whole thing. Did not watch it. You still haven't seen Deadwood? I have not seen Deadwood. Oh, man.

Well, that's your own damn fault. It is one of the greatest series ever made. It's only three seasons. And now we have the movie coming. So there's no excuse to not check it out before the movie comes out. Well, I will fire up my HBO Go at some point and check this out. I do believe it's also an Amazon Prime video.

So, yeah. There are many places to watch Deadwood. I caught up with... Well, I didn't catch up with The Good Place because they're on season three, which is currently airing. So I have to start watching those. But I got through season two, and I thoroughly enjoyed the show. Oh, yeah. No, and it keeps going on season three.

Yep. You guys got me into it, fuckers. And now I have to watch it every week. I think I'm up to episode seven, so... Yeah, I got to start catching up now. I also finished Daredevil season three. Loved it. It was fantastic. See? Told you. It was very, very well done.

I'm very happy with the show. I like it a lot. They took it in a completely new direction, and they didn't screw it up. It was good. Exactly. No, like I said, my favorite season of Daredevil so far. It's three, one, two. I think I'm with you. It was very good.

Loved it. Especially after the, you know, the depression fest of Jessica Jones. It's like, the way they ended this was just, I thought, flawless. Yeah, it was a very nice ending. Won't ruin it for anyone. Nope. But if you're on the fence, go by all means watch it. It was absolutely very, very, very good.

And something else I am strangely excited about, 80% of the Spice Girls are reuniting for a tour. Oh, I saw this in the notes. Please do explain. While Mel B recently announced that she will be entering rehab, that hasn't derailed plans announced this weekend for most of the Spice Girls reunion tour next year.

Victoria Beckham, Posh Spice, will not be coming along, but that's okay because she's admitted that even when they were doing it the first time around, her mic was never on. That I did not know. So the other girls can actually sing. And look, I don't know why I was living in London when Spice Fever hit.

They're fun. It's just, I enjoyed it. I don't mind it. And I kind of want to go see the tour. Okay, you're scaring me now. You're scaring me. Right now, they've only announced UK dates, but here's hoping that we'll get something over here. So I can go and geek out and I don't know.

I can't explain why. It's just, you know, I liked it. It was stupid pop when I was living in London and it took over the country at the time and I got swept up in it too. It was fun. Okay. Okay. You might want to find somebody that can go with you so you just don't look like a predator in that audience because you're of a certain age now where if you go by yourself that you might seem a little out of place.

Well, everybody that's going to be going to this will be of my certain age. That's the thing. It's been a while. That's true. It has been. It's been a moment. So I think I'll be okay. Yes. And in more cool music news and, you know, reclaim some of my cool hit factor here, Dead Can Dance has unveiled a video for The Mountain and the whole album, Dionysus, is actually out now as we speak and you can stream it everywhere and it is phenomenal.

Okay, cool. I'll go check it out because I haven't heard it yet. Yep. And the video is pretty damn cool as well. So the link is in our show notes for that. And as everybody knows, I am a huge fan of the band Lush and in particular, Mickey Bereni, and she has announced her new project, Perushka, Perushka, however it's pronounced.

And the first single has been released with an album coming next year. And I love the song. So we have the link in the show notes for that as well. They've got a premiere over at Stereogum. So you can go listen to the new song and it is very, very good. Awesome. I will check it out. And this is an article from Rolling Stone that I saw getting passed around in the podcast news lists and things like that.

It's Spotify can't keep losing more than $1 billion a year. Can podcasts... Why not? Yeah. Why not? That's how our entire show is talking about companies that just lose money. True. True. I mean, it's the Uberification of business. Come on. You just keep losing money until you go out of business.

That's how it works. So, but they say, can podcasts rescue as a business model? As we know from Betteridge's Laws of Headlines, we say no, but this guy makes an actually good point. They don't have to pay anybody when somebody's on Spotify listening to a podcast.

Which is kind of bullshit, I think. It is kind of bullshit. I don't... I think we should be getting paid for plays on Spotify. Yeah, well, that ain't going to happen. And as long as... Here's the deal. As long as Spotify is actually passing through our show and not adding ads into it, fine.

Whatever. As long as they, you know, tell us how many people listen and we can add it to our ad sales, that's fine. But you start wrapping it with ads, which I'm sure they're going to do, then there's a problem. You know? I think it was iHeartRadio used to do that. And whichever the one that Midroll bought did it to, there's so many companies that do that and people just take their shows off of them.

Then they have to, like, create their own content and try to become the Netflix of podcasting, which we know probably won't work, because it still hasn't yet. Anyway, this is just an interesting take on how this works, because, you know, people are going to keep paying for their Spotify subscriptions, maybe.

And then they get content that they could get for free if they just went over one app, which I don't understand. I don't know. It's kind of silly. Yeah, it is a little bit silly. I'm not sure how many people are actually really listening to podcasts on Spotify anyways. I mean, I know they're promoting it and all that, but we know from our own stats that there's like four of our listeners are.

Yeah. Yeah. Not many people at all. It just doesn't. They have redesigned the app to, like, bring podcasts a little bit more to the front and center. But it's still not a great podcast app by any stretch at all. Well, it's not even a great music listening app, to be honest. That's true. So it's always been the ugliest thing we had.

Bring back an RDO. That was a nice interface. It was, actually. At the library. So I finished The Laws of Human Nature by Robert Greene. And what did you think?

Oh, it was fantastic. It's an unbelievably cool book. And even better, on Saturday, I got to go to his house and hang out. And we shot a show for the Jordan Harbinger show. And it actually came out today. We're recording on Tuesday. And the show came out today.

So they'll be linking the show notes to that. And then the show notes are at, actually, I keep forgetting. We have a new domain. GOG.show slash 296. So pop on over and get that. Fantastic interview. Robert is so cool and so smart. And, you know, the fact that he's recovering from a stroke and could still do the show with us was amazing.

So a huge thank you to Robert Greene. It was just phenomenal to get to sit with him for an hour and a half and just listen to him talk because he's one of my favorite authors. I've read all of his books multiple times. And this one is just a masterpiece. Highly recommend it. Excellent. The Winklevoss twins.

Winklevi. Winklevi. You know, I don't know why, but every time. And this is weird because we just talked about The Matrix last show. So it's two shows in a row. I'm going to mention The Matrix. Every time I hear their name, I think about the dreadlocked ghost twins from The Matrix. Me too. That always really isn't you too.

I do too. Every single time I hear Winklevi and I see the dreadlocked twins from The Matrix in my mind's eye every time. That is so funny. I do too. OK, that's great. I thought it was just me. So I'm not. I'm not the only crazy one. Anyways, they're in the news again because, you know, they're cryptocurrency bros.

Like, they are the basically the Wikipedia page for crypto bro. Yeah, they are. There they are. So they're in the news because apparently they got shafted by an ex-convict named Charlie Shim, who apparently stole 5,000 Bitcoins in 2012, now worth roughly $32 million.

Yeah, yeah. What took him so long to try and track down those Bitcoin is what I don't know why it took so long. The figure was lost in a larger dispute over an investment in BitInstant, which I've never even heard of. And the lawsuit was prompted by learning of his spending spree since leaving prison for his part in selling Bitcoin to Silk Road drug buyers.

In the space of the past year, he bought a $2 million Florida house, two powerboats and two Maseratis, despite saying he went to prison virtually broke. Is anybody involved in cryptocurrency on the level? I don't think so. I don't think so at all. So they're all just crypto bros.

Yep. Yep. We got another moron of the week. Something that we predicted. HQ Trivia, the company behind HQ Trivia, the once viral game show app created by the same guys who invented Vine, is facing a pivotal moment because people are stopping playing the game, which is what happens to all of these games.

Yep. Trivia games are just a black hole of just pain and suffering. We've covered so many trivia games. So many of them. Over the course of this show of the past like five and three quarter years. And they all have, they shark fin. They go up, everybody plays them and then boom, done.

Because these companies can't write questions fast enough. It's crazy. They can't. And it's just the nature of the beast. It's what happens. People get super into something. They play it for a while and then they stop. And that's just the way it works.

And that's what we were saying when this company was raising millions upon millions upon millions of dollars. It's a fucking trivia game. Yep. That's all it is. People are going to stop playing it eventually. And that is exactly what's happening now. And they're having a bunch of other problems as well. There was a big boardroom battle between the two.

The fact that a fucking trivia game has a boardroom is ridiculous to me. But they do. It's a fucking trivia game. Anyways, I just this is this kind of this is the reason we started doing this show because I see companies like this make millions upon millions of dollars, have a goddamn boardroom.

And I'm sitting there going, how, why, who the fuck thinks this is going to be a long term thing? They did. So, yeah, man, we're in the wrong business. I know. Let's go start a fucking trivia game. Seriously, we can do it.

Give you a hole in the market right now. There is. There is a hole in the market. We just got to make it look good and get out fast. Get out really fast. Oh, I found this over at Torrent Freak. It's called using Googled images can result in license demand and legal threats. Now, says it right there.

Yeah. And and and what's your point? Well, it turns out that there are a lot of stupid people out there who have never, never heard of copyright. And there's a there's a I don't know if it's a search engine. It's more of a firm that is called Pixie, which is a service for photographers that they go out and fight and find image theft.

And so they'll send you demands for fees. If you take my image, they're going to stick up for me, get some fees, take a cut. And if it does, if you don't pay the fee, then it can escalate into legal action. Right. And I just have to I have to put this in here.

Torrent Freak spoke to a person who was recently targeted by a Pixie license request. He prefers to remain anonymous, fearing more repercussions. But we'll call him Frank. He was utterly surprised when the email came in and he says, I had no idea you could get in trouble for taking a picture off Google search results.

Forehead slap right there. No, I totally understand this. Why? An entire company that makes gazillions of dollars called Pinterest. That's their entire business model. I know. I know. If you've got something in the universe that exists like Pinterest, why are we surprised that people think that you can't just steal shit?

You actually make a very good point. I know. It's infuriating, though. It's absolutely infuriating. It's driving you crazy. There should be like Pixie does not have to go out and find things. They just have to type in Pinterest dot com. Yeah, that's true. It's all right there.

It's all stolen. It's all being used illegally. Yeah, I'm kind of tempted to throw my library up there and see if I can get a few extra bucks because I know my stuff has been stolen hand over fist over the years. Yep. Oh, God. And another moron of the week. Oh, God.

Brian, we've read enough science fiction to know that if we're not alone in the universe, we probably don't want to meet. We may not want them to find us. We probably don't want to meet the other people who are out there because if they can get to us, we're toast. We know this.

We know this because if they can get to us, they are so far advanced technologically than we are that they are not going to come by and say, oh, hey, bro, what's up? Let's go have a beer. Here, have some light drive technology. Exactly.

So there's a new study over at MIT where they're supposed to be smart people. But this guy, James Clark, he did a feasibility study and this is getting pretty big news where he just wants to basically point a fricking laser into space to let everyone know where we live.

Yeah, we all both just read, I think, last year, The Three-Body Problem, which details this in charming detail about how this could go very, very wrong. Exactly. And they call it the dark forest in the book. And that's the theory that there is a lot of life out there, but nobody wants to draw attention to themselves because there are other people out there who may just come and take you over and destroy you.

Yes. So and we have a special guest of honor today. I'm going to put I'm going to put an image that I posted in the show notes here that I showed to you this morning. Yes. Dr. Drew Pinsky is our special moron of the week. Guest of honor. He did a live Instagram chat this morning while driving with AirPods in his ears.

And the phone is like basically in the console in between the, you know, the driver's seat and the passenger seat. So the picture I posted is him just looking down at his phone while driving. And he did a whole Q&A.

Completely illegal. Completely. A hundred percent illegal. A hundred percent dangerous. And a thousand percent stupid. Dr. Drew should know better than that. Feedback loop. All right.

After our drought last week on Patreon, everybody stepped up. Woo hoo. They did. OK. So we have new Patreon subscribers, Mark and another Mark and Kira, who says, you are all awesome. Figured I'd rather spend money supporting you than a credit monitoring service that was crap anyway.

Stay grumpy. Nice. And Jesse. Thank you. And Rodvan Alst. Love that name. Great name. And Guillermo Ramos. Another great name. And so he says, you guys are awesome. I wish I could give you more. But if you guys want some spicy beef jerky, I can send you a few bags. And we are taking Guillermo up on that because I want me some ghost pepper jerky.

I think that's going to be great. We are taking him up on that. And I did do an informal Facebook poll with my friends saying a listener wants to send me food. Should I eat it? And the results were mixed. But we'll trust you, Guillermo. Yeah. Well, I'll let Jason eat it first. Yeah. I actually should Google him and see if he has a competing podcast.

Exactly. Jared also sent us a message over on Patreon saying two things. One, there is one DMV office that I've found that doesn't make you want to gouge your eyes out. The DPS office in Huntsville, Texas is awesome. I've been in and out in under 20 minutes. And that is including the commercial driver's license paperwork I have to do every time.

The only reason it takes that long is because the system runs slowly. Okay. But I don't think I'm going to move to Huntsville, Texas. I'm not moving to Texas for a driver's license. Just for the convenience of a DMV. So I'm glad you're having a good time. But I'm not moving to Texas for that. But thank you. And he sent us a link.

Downtown Brian introduces first ever self-driving trolleys. So I checked this out. And it does run a very specific loop. So it's, you know, it's kind of, I'm kind of okay with the self-driving stuff that's dialed in like this so well that doesn't have to deal with other traffic or different roads or whatever.

It just does this one loop and that's all it does. And it seems to be going well. So good enough. Yeah. That's the kind of, the same kind of thing that they have in Vegas with the self-driving trolley there. A little minibus. The one that Penn Jillette was on, on the initial run. And then the thing got in an accident in the first hour.

So yeah, we got some PayPal action. Carlo from Italy. Thank you very much, Carlo. William and Ivor and David set up new recurring payments. I like that. Ivor is back. Yeah, he is. So thank you so very, very much. Well, there's a surprise. I know.

Well, no, he sent us a nice message saying, anyways, it's all good. It's all good. Okay. We're good. Water under the bridge. Yes. Mark wrote us over on Facebook. Please don't change your announcement to bi-weekly. Your listener is wrong. You are semi-weekly. Thanks. Good catch, Mark.

And we're probably still not going to change it because that takes work. Yeah, we're lazy. Over on Twitter, Tommy Pickles writes in, could blockchain voting fix democracy? Today it gets a test run. Well, like we mentioned before, betterage always wins. So that would be a no.

Yeah, and we talked about this. This is over in West Virginia with the company called VWATS. Oh, that's right. VWATS. VWATS. So we'll see what happens. Sounds kind of German, actually. I don't think anything's going to change at all. No. Right Film Sleep Repeat sent us a couple different things, some of the stories that we had already done.

But this is a, he says here, behold, the might of SSD encryption. This is a link to the register where they talk about solid state of fear. Euroboffins bust open SSD BitLocker encryption. It's really, really dumb. Okay.

Security experts frantically facepalming at stupid design. So apparently this stuff is very easy to break. And Kevin writes in, no, scooter firm pushing for law change. And this is Bird in England trying to get that law that we talked about before from ye olde days repealed so they can actually start having birds on the streets of jolly old.

So we'll see how that goes for them. And I'm just surprised that they don't do it anyway because it's Bird. I know. It's Bird. It's what they do. But the laws are a lot stricter there. And, you know, they don't put up with this work. But what's strange is, I mean, the Bobbies don't carry guns.

So, and our police have guns. Why does Bird think, maybe that's why, because that's why they're going to start doing it is because they can't shoot them over there. But over here, the cops can shoot people. But, you know, we'll see. We'll see how this goes. I don't know. And then I got a lot of feedback about this thing that I'm still perplexed by.

This canning and selling of air in a sci-fi thing. A lot of people wrote in about the Lorax. Thanks, Scott, Stewart, Quantum Leap, all who wrote in about this stuff and about 20 other people as well. Total Recall. I forgot that there was an air sales in that as well.

But again, that's a movie, not a book. Derek wrote in Canned Air Ringworld, which is a book by Larry Niven. But I don't think I've ever read that one. So that can't be it. And it's driving me crazy. But thank you, everyone, for trying. Let's let it go. I've read Ringworld, and I don't remember Canned Air being a thing in it.

But it's been a long time since I read that book. Yeah, I may even have read it. I'm not even sure. I can't even remember. I think you're just making shit up at this point. You know, for some reason, I feel like it may be. It's in something like the three-body problem. There was something in there about that. I don't remember. I don't know.

Brian drinks a lot. It's okay. Oh, well, it stuck in my mind. So Quantum Leap also wrote us about voice memos. The first thing I do when I change my GSM provider is beg them to deactivate voicemail. I did not know that was an option. Yeah, and I'm just wondering why. Yeah.

Why would you do that? Well, because you were complaining about it last week. Okay. People that send voice memos. Oh, that thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, but that was just, that's an iMessage. That's not voicemail. That's a different thing. Yeah, no, voicemail's fine, you know, because that's a thing. But it's when you send, when I should be getting a text in iMessage, and then I have to listen to you talk.

That's it. Yes. Because if you're calling me, then I can pick up and talk to you. That's the whole point. Yeah. It's when people use voice memos as a replacement for a text message. Yes. And Nerd Rewind sent us a link saying a good read because you often talk about how the lack of consistency in monitoring and removing bad accounts from Twitter and Instagram, and this is a link over on ABC News.

I posted on Instagram about my anti-Semitic trolls and their persistent abuse, and Instagram deleted my post. Nice job. Sounds about right. Sounds about right for these. There's no consistency. There's no nothing. It's insane. Yeah.

Lunatics are running the asylums over there. Give me a break. Yeah, pretty much. Thanks for the link. Yeah, that's exactly kind of what I'd expect. And over on GOG.show, Justin writes in, first off, you're both amazing. I'm grateful for all the time and effort you put into this podcast. The new format is great. The two shows a week are wonderful. Woo-hoo!

Could you please tell me what website you use to invest in microstock? If you have a referral code, please send it my way. That would be M1 Finance, and the link will be in the show notes at GOG.show slash 296. Yes, and if you are thinking about signing up with it, please do use the link, because it doesn't just help us.

You get $10, too. Well, it helps you. We should have a contest. I'll put your link and my link, and we'll see who gets the most. We'll see who gets the most. Okay. It's a popularity contest. And Jason writes us, Lyft drivers sue argue that their employees rather than contractors.

Massachusetts, California lawsuits seek to resolve vexing employee question. Yeah, this has been going on for a while, and so far, we've been getting screwed left, right, and center, and the courts are upholding the fact that they're just contractors. So we'll keep, I guess, lawsuits keep coming, but nothing seems to be changing.

Yep. And Lens Digital writes in, love your podcast regarding your question about can-to-air. There's another one. There's a book by Russian sci-fi writer Alexander Baliev called The Air Seller. Okay. Yes. But did not read that, so can't be it. Yep, and there was a movie based on it, too.

So, yeah, not the one, but. Yeah, no. Lawrence writes us, kind of a two-parter comment and question. Was listening to your most recent episode when the talk of rear window ads came up? While I agree they are ridiculous, blocking the rear window is not the issue. I drive a truck with a dump body on it.

Dead body? Dump body? No, it's a dump truck. He drives a dump truck. Like, got it. And there is no rear mirror because it wouldn't see anything anyway. Awareness is key, and I will admit that this seems to be in short supply nowadays. On to the question. Is it weird? I can hear your voice in my head as I read this back to myself.

Thanks for the awesome show, and I'm excited for the witty responses. Have a good one, boys. Thank you. Yeah. No, it's not weird at all. And, you know, I used to drive a van. I was a delivery driver, and there was no rear view mirror in that, so I couldn't have that. But what I did have was special mirrors so I could see more, so I could see behind me better.

And the cars that are having their windows removed don't have extra mirrors on it to see out that. It's basically that right-hand blind spot. So, yeah, because it turns out it wasn't the back mirror, but it's the passenger side rear window if you have a Ford.

Well, and all of this is, like, focusing on the distraction to the driver of the car with the ad in it itself. I'm thinking about the distraction to everybody else. Like, there are reasons that we don't have video advertisements and video billboards. They're too distracting.

Well, we do have video billboards. Drive down Sunset Boulevard at night. You can't see from all the video billboards. Oh, really? I haven't been down Sunset in ages. They're blinding. They are blinding. You can't see anything. And yet, think about all the poor bird scooter riders and lime scooter riders. I know. They're scooting along, and then they see a great ad, and then, boom, accident.

Who do they sue then? Yeah. Roy writes in, Hello again from becoming sunny Wellington, New Zealand. That's right. It's going to be spring down there soon. Absolutely loving the double dose of GOG every week. Long may it last.

Regarding the canned air, here we go again. God. Oh, God. Ben Elton wrote a play called Gasping. The screenplay is available, but I saw the play on stage. It's still not a book. So, yeah. We're trying here. We're trying, guys.

I really do appreciate this. Man, people are really going the extra mile to try and figure out what the hell you read. Can't you just look in your Goodreads account and, like, go through that? I stopped doing Goodreads. Oh, see, this is a case to be made for keeping up with your Goodreads account.

I know. I know. So now we got Brian about the bottled air being sold to people in a movie slash book. This probably wasn't what you're thinking of or looking for, but there's a newer movie. Dr. Seuss is the Lorax. Yeah. No, not it. So, got it. Also, Colby, Jason, David, and Andrew, all of whom wrote about all this sort of stuff.

Thank you. Yeah. Not getting it. So many. And Andrew did have a recommendation here if you're looking for a book to read, which is fun, but also touches on nightmare scenarios that you talk about on your show. I'll recommend Dima Zales' The Last Humans series. Not heard of that, so I'll check that out. Yeah, I think it might be real news, because we might be the last humans at this point.

Especially with a goddamn laser beam shooting out into space. And over at iTunes, a geek leader writes in, Great geeks. I've been listening for a while and finally decided to write a review. Jason and Brian are hilarious and bring rare honesty to the show. I agree with almost all they say about technology, and being a web developer from the 90s, I have a similar perspective on many things.

The show is a must-listen for me, and I've gotten several of my geek friends hooked as well. Keep doing the great work. Thank you very much. A geek leader, you are leading your people to the promised land. Thank you. If you want your question or comment read on the show, head over to gog.show slash support, and send us your feedback or questions that we can read on the air.

And if you're so inclined, please head over to gog.show slash iTunes, and toss us a five-star and snarky review. Closing shout-outs! Closing shout-out to a friend of the show, MXV. He just posted his pictures from the Jawbreaker and Naked Raygun show in Chicago, which I'm very jealous about because the word on the street is this was Naked Raygun's final show because everybody's old and sick now.

And Naked Raygun was a staple to my youth. They were my first punk rock show, I have to say. Nice. And I'm sad I wasn't at the last one. But he's got some great photos up there and a good write-up, so go check it out. Yeah, the timing was just a little bit off. I figure in another two months you're going to be back in Chicago. Of course, man. Well, actually, I'll be back in the spring.

I'm going to ride out winter this time. That's a smart move. Two winters in a row, I'm fine. Although, I could use a little winter weather here in L.A. because it's still like 80 degrees and it is November. November 6th. Yeah. Yep. It's insane. But I get to wear all my shorts, I guess.

Until next time, I'm Jason DeFillippo. And I'm Brian Schulmeister. Thanks for listening to Grumpy Old Geeks. To support the show and keep us on the air, go to patreon.com slash GOG. Toss us a buck a month and we'll love you forever. If you'd like to give a one-time or recurring donation, you can also go to GOG.show and click the PayPal button in the sidebar.

Show notes for this episode are at GOG.show slash 296. From there, you can find links to old episodes, leave feedback, ask questions, and get links to stuff we like. Stay grumpy. I'm Donald Trump and I approve this message. At QVC, fall shopping is more than just checking out.

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