429: On the Sauce

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, I think.

And I'm Brian Schulmeister and I don't know what day it is or what year it is or anything anymore. Time has no meaning. Hello. It's just like the old days when we worked from home. Yeah, well, except from the old days, time had meaning for everyone else. We just kind of struggled to figure it out. Now time has meaning for no one.

Yep, that's true. That's true. Yeah. Except for you stupid states that are still just going about business as usual. Thanks a lot for that, fuckers. Yep, thanks. Thanks, bros. Broskies. So yeah, the goalposts keep getting moved, don't they? Because of these sorts of things. But you know what? It's management skills 101. I'm not surprised by this.

If you've got to get bad news, you try to mitigate it. You don't tell people you're going to be indoors for three months. Once you say, two weeks. And then when you're getting near the end of that two weeks, you go, another two weeks. And another two weeks. Yeah. Oh, by the way, another two weeks.

Another two weeks. So yeah, that's kind of what's going on here. You know, schools have officially said that they're not reopening at all this year. Our mayor here in Los Angeles has said we're looking at two months, probably three from now. And I've already done more than a month, as you have.

So that's a quarter of the year gone. Yeah. Yeah. So how are you passing the time, Brian? Oh, well, you know, I have a kid. I'm walking dead at this point. I did do two virtual happy hours this weekend, because I finally decided I should do it. I have some thoughts about these. The first one I did was with a friend of the show, Mike, and a bunch of his buddies from his local.

So there's like 14 people on it. I found myself not really enjoying that one, because there were too many people. And it was all over the map. And I didn't know a lot of them. I only probably knew three to four of them, really. So the second one I did was just a couple of close friends. My buddy Greg from Australia, a friend of the show, Gamsby, and one of their close friends. That one was far more enjoyable.

So I highly recommend keeping your virtual happy hours to very small groups. That seemed to be a much better experience. I was thinking about that, because we were still trying to figure out what platform to use for the one that we're going to do. And I'm thinking, man, do we really need 50 people in a room? Because that just sounds like a nightmare. It's just cacopheless.

Yeah, we might as well just do a live show then. Yeah. Well, I mean, it's just a live show where everybody has a microphone. Yeah. Well, you know, we can mute them. We'll have God status, of course, right? We better. We better. So I've been checking different ones out. What was the one that you said you used? Blue Jeans?

I did one on Blue Jeans, and I did one on Zoom with a password, because we're not stupid. Yeah. I found one yesterday. Jack Recider from Darknet Diaries threw this one out called Jitsy. It's an open source platform. They do have a website where you can just go and start a room and invite people in, which is nice, because I'm not about to spin up my own server just for this.

Yeah. Look, look, if we're going to do anything, we're going to build a gopher site. We have priorities. Exactly. Exactly. So, yeah, we're still checking that out. So, yeah, it might just be a thing where, like, me, you, and a couple of our friends do it and then just open it up for spectators if they want to come in and they can...

I think that might be a good way to do it. Just a couple of us chatting and, you know, some of our friends are the shows. And if people want to come in and listen and, you know, they can type some stuff at us or something like that, I think that might be the way to do it. We're not in any rush. We've got plenty of time. Yeah. So, I don't know about how your social circle is doing. I lost three people so far in our household.

Oh, I'm sorry to hear it, man. I actually have not lost anyone yet. So, I do want to... I'm really sorry to hear that. I want to give a shout out to my sister-in-law. My sister-in-law is a respiratory tech. Oh, man. So, yeah. And she just got called to the front lines. She was... She's been... She's officially working in the COVID-19 wards and the hospitals in Toronto now.

Oh, man. So, we're a little worried for her, obviously. Obviously, yeah. So, yeah. So, to... We've had a couple people on our Twitter that are doubting... They're still doubting Thomas' about this. Yeah, well... Go fuck yourself. Go fuck yourself. Sorry. Yeah. No. It's been fairly somber this week around here, so.

Yeah. I'm really sorry to hear that, man. Yeah. Thanks. It sucks. It definitely sucks. And it is fucking real. So, everybody who thinks it's not, yeah. Dying a fire. And yesterday, I actually had to leave the house for the first time in a couple of weeks. I had to take my car over to the Ford dealer because...

Why? Because I've had the car for 14 months and I've only driven like 2,300 miles, but it was saying that you need to get an oil change now. And I was having a hard time starting it. And I'm like, okay, you know what? There's not going to be anybody there. I can just go in, drop it off. And then they'll do the thing and pick it up. And I posted on Twitter the other day about, hey, everybody, remember to go out and start your car every now and again so the battery doesn't die.

Because mine, like when I, if I had to just like go in and drive it around, I could tell that it was going down. And sure enough, I pull it into, I pull into the Ford dealership. I, you know, we do the eight feet apart type of thing.

And I'm like, I'm just getting the oil changed, blah, blah, blah. And it wouldn't start to go in. He's like, well, you're at least at the right place for that. It was totally dead. So I found this one over at Ars Technica. I was only saying, you know, do a couple minutes, but you basically want to do it for about 20 minutes a week.

Just drive around the neighborhood, juice it up, get the alternator spun up and get the juices flowing. You want to get the oil and transmission fluid and all that stuff really moving around. So they're, let's say about 20 minutes. There's some other tips in there that are pretty good. That'll be linked in the show notes. Yeah. I, what I've done is, uh, you know, obviously I live right here by the beach and, and basically on the weekends we go and drive up Malibu and back just for shits and giggles and for sanity, keeps the car running for sanity, sanity run.

Yeah. And the other thing I've been doing to pass the time is I am taking comedy business school by Scott Dickers, the founder of the onion. It's pretty fun. It's pretty fun. So far, there's not a lot of, a lot of yucks in it. It's basically teaching people what kind of personality you need to have to make it in comedy and tips on that and depressive morose.

No, no, no. More about how on the professional side. And it's actually a really good primer for anybody that wants to break into entertainment period. It's, I just noticed that all the tips he's giving are, you know, things I know just from working, you know, so closely with the movie business for so many years. It's like, it's, it's really good for that. It's like how to not be a douchebag and probably get work and not be, you know, needy and always ask for things.

It's like always give value instead of asking for it because people remember that kind of thing that those kind of tips. But I'm only, I'm only halfway through it so far. So I'm guessing I'm getting to the other part, but his, his how to write funny podcast is really good too. If you want to get some really solid tips on how to write comedy, he's got some, you know, basically great formulas on how to write jokes that are, you know, you're not sitting around laughing it up, but you actually, you know, use the scientific method almost to write comedy.

Right. It's really, really interesting stuff. Very cool. Very cool. Well, I hope you get funnier. I told him, I'm like, I mean, if I can get 10% funnier for this show, the problem is we do this at eight in the morning. I'm like, I'm not feeling it's hard to be funny. That's early in the morning. Yeah. Right now it's probably better than the evenings though.

Cause I find that as, as I see more and more news as the day goes on, I get less and less happy. We got to find our spot. Yeah, we do. Maybe noon. I'm thinking about noon. Yeah. Light lunch, light lunch, bloody Mary.

Get the yucks flowing. So I don't know if you've noticed, but I I'm still, you know, following the music industry a lot. And there were a bunch of albums that were scheduled to be pushed out in this time period. And all of them are being pushed back. You'd think that this would be a great time to release music, new music.

People are at home. People need to be entertained. Thanks, streaming media. The reason that these albums aren't being released is there's no point in putting out an album if you don't have a tour to follow it, because that's the only way musicians make money now. You can tell me all the stats you want about the big payments that Spotify and Pandora and other streaming media are giving to artists now.

They don't mean shit. This is exactly why no album is being released. There's no point in it whatsoever. The only point of an album release anymore is to promote your tour. And there are no tours. So we're getting no albums. Thanks.

And speaking of that, I was thinking about this last night, because as you know, I miss my sports ball. And most media companies, almost every media company in the world right now is giving limited or full access to their content in this time. And, yeah, of course, it's a brazen hope that you're going to get hooked on it and subscribe to them later.

Sirius XM has opened everything up for free for a month. When Disney gives things away for free, you know shit's real. Disney is giving shit away for free right now. Sports, nada. Huh. The MLB, the NHL, the NFL, the NBA, none of them have opened up their archives and their apps like every other media company has.

Get the fuck on the ball, ball players. I wonder if that has to do with contracts with, you know. They own everything. I guess they do. At the end of the day, they own everything. They are the arbiters of the balls. They have all the balls. So come on.

I mean, I'd happily go back and watch the Astros cheat against the Dodgers in the World Series if I had access to the MLB right now. Just to say, spot the cheater. Spot the cheater. In the news.

Speaking of giving away things for free, Eric Hundley sent this one over to me. Apple makes Final Cut Pro X and Logic Pro X free for a limited time. So what they're doing is they're extending their free trial, which is usually 30 days.

They're making it three months, which coincides with probably about how long you're going to be stuck inside. So if you ever wanted to try those out, definitely now is the time. And I've got both. I paid for both. But I live in Logic. Logic is what I do everything in.

So I was thinking about doing a few videos just to throw up there for people that want to learn the basics of podcast editing. I already have one up there where I edit an entire Grumpy Old Geeks episode. I'll put that in the show notes, too. But I learned some things since that last episode, since that was almost 100 episodes ago now.

You get a little better at this stuff as you practice, practice, practice. But definitely, if you want to try those things out, give them a shot for. Yeah. You can cut together a whole album to not release because you can't go out on tour. And you can make videos for that music in your backyard with your dogs. Yeah.

And I just love this headline. Somehow, Apple is about to release a new iPhone. So we're getting a new iPhone, apparently. Apple is expected to start taking orders for its new 4.7-inch iPhone SE as soon as Friday. A stunningly normal development in a pandemic.

Most Apple stores are shuttered. So, obviously, you can only do it online. And you'd think the nosediving economy would stop most people from purchasing something and most companies from releasing something right now. But they're going for it. It's a follow-up to the 2016 iPhone SE, a smaller budget option.

So this is about the same size as, what, an iPhone 5? And it's got the capabilities of an iPhone 6. And there you go. So it's coming. It's going to cost about $400. It's unclear when anything will ship.

But, yeah. That was actually the old SE. The new one is going to be in an iPhone 8 body and have the features of an 11. There you go. Sorry. Read that wrong. A little more modern than the old iPhone 6. A little more modern. So it's basically what I've got now because I've got your old iPhone 8.

Yep. Yep. Yep. So there you go. And as they point out, for once, when a new Apple phone rolls out, there won't be any lines. That's true. There was a leaked memo yesterday that said Apple stores are definitely going to be closed until at least mid-May. Yep. So it's probably longer than that.

I actually did buy a new Mac this week. I bought a new... Of course you did. I needed one for my video setup because these... Basically, I've got... My main machine is an iMac 5K. It's a couple years old. But when I'm doing video stuff, the screen's too damn big. So what I needed was I've been using my old laptops, my 2014 and 2015 MacBook Pros, trying to figure out which one of those work best because one has more RAM, one has more drive and blah, blah, blah.

But they're straining under the weight of bringing in modern video on them because I'm basically just pushing 1080p from a DSLR through it, through a little USB 3 dongle and it just can't keep up. It's laggy. So I needed something more modern.

I figured why not just get the best mini I can get and I loaded up. I went to, I think it was ODS, ordered 64 gig of RAM, which costs like 400 bucks compared to the thousand dollars that Apple wants for that. I'm like, no thank you. Because the Mac mini is one of the few that you can upgrade the RAM on.

It's still a pain in the ass, not like the old days. You got to like really strip the thing. But, you know, I figured I'd give it a shot. I got the new black keyboard to go with it though. So this is going to be sexy. Yeah, fancy, fancy. Yeah. And I've barely been scraping the barrel of the internet to try to actually find some tech news instead of just all Corona all the time.

So here you go. Microsoft Edge has become the second most popular desktop web browser. What? Yeah. Say what? Bleeping Computer noted that Edge is now the second most popular desktop web browser based on usage with net market share giving the software nearly 7.6% of the market in March.

Wow. Eclipsing Firefox with 7.2%. Still far behind Chrome 68.5%. I did not realize that Chrome had that much of the marketplace. Oh, yeah, man. Everybody uses Chrome. Right. It's crazy. So it's only three months old, but it's not hard to figure out why, of course.

It's a Windows default browser, which helps, as does Microsoft's overall cloud. Yep. Bundle. But on the plus side, it's a Chromium-based version now. So it is a decent rendering engine. It's basically Chrome. It's basically Chrome.

So it's just got a nice little Windows skin put on it. That's about it. So there you go. So, yay. Tech news. It's interesting. I was looking at that chart that they have in there. And of course, the browsers that we use, Vivaldi, are not even remotely anywhere on that list.

Yep. Opera's on there, but we gave up on Opera a while ago. I'm loving Vivaldi, man. It's great. Yeah, I'm fine with it. The one thing I don't like is when you open a new link in a new window, it automatically defaults to switching to that window. I hate that.

You can turn that off in the settings. Okay. You got to show me where because I looked for it. Okay. It was driving me crazy. Brian, why didn't you just read the manual? Oh, yeah. Well, you know, obviously, it must be a download somewhere for some obscure Kobe reader or something like that.

We'll get to that later. Yes, we will. Yes. Amazon. Amazon white-collar employees are fuming over management targeting a fired warehouse worker. So, yes, some frustrations are starting to spill over and some people are starting to wake up in Amazon and go, hey, maybe we're not doing things quite right.

Some Amazon corporate employees are angry and disgusted over how their company is handling escalating labor disputes in warehouses where facility workers are saying the company is not doing enough to protect them from exposure to the coronavirus. We would like that because, as we've discovered, this stuff lasts a long time on cardboard and all the stuff that we're getting is being shipped to us on cardboard.

So, we don't want the warehouse employees infected at this point. No, we don't. No, we do not. So, internal company email lists and chat groups on Thursday and Friday that recode viewed Amazon white-collar workers are expressing dismay over a report from Vice News that the company's top lawyer had referred to a recently fired warehouse worker as not smart or articulate and implied that executives should use that to help squelch worker unionization efforts.

This is Amazon General Counsel David Zaplowski. He used that language to describe the fired warehouse worker Christian Smalls in notes from a meeting on Wednesday attended by top Amazon executives, including Jeff Bezos. Now, I'm a bit torn on this. To some degree, these meetings should stay internal.

That's the point. You get to air your frustrations and grievances and you talk about high-level things and you don't necessarily need to use the perfect language, do you not, in internal meetings, one would assume. And this is a person, this is an employee who kept breaking quarantine.

He was not feeling well and he kept coming into work and they were pissed off about it. What say you, Jason? You know, this is the funny thing, too. I've been reading up on the aircraft carrier captain that got fired for doing that kind of thing.

And, you know, he didn't even leak the memo. Somebody else leaked the memo. This is kind of the same thing. Things are coming out that shouldn't come out. And, yeah, internal communications, you know, should be kept internal for the most part, unless they're talking about something really egregious here. I don't, you know, this is one guy's personal opinion, whatever.

I don't, I can see why they would be a little irked. But, yeah, this shouldn't have gotten out. And, you know, he's the lawyer. What do you expect? He's not going to be tactful. You know, I'm not down with trying to use this to stop unionization efforts at all. But I understand the frustration with the employee and being pissed off about it.

So, you know, I don't see this as being that much of an issue. Yeah, I don't either, really. Personally. Yeah. Yeah. So, let's keep internal communications internal, unless there's an actual whistle to blow. I don't feel like there was one to blow here. Nope. Tempest in a teapot.

And over at Vox, they've got some nice charts, how the coronavirus has changed the U.S. employment. In six beautiful charts, yes. Big, beautiful charts. Big, the best charts. The best charts. Yes. Well, we will send them to the states that like me, but not the states that don't.

They don't get to see the charts. So, yeah, there's six of these. The first one is preliminary unemployment rate has jumped to 4.4%. Unemployment rate claims doubled the record just a week after it was set. That's the second one. Even those still employed are still seeing reduced hours.

That's number three. Number four, job listings are down substantially compared to previous years, obviously. Five, job hiring is down, but not in every industry. There's still lawyers and IT. That's booming. And, of course, gig workers, but they don't make the charts. And number six, for many office workers, working from home has become the new working.

So, yeah, just a scant month. The entire economy and the landscape of everything that we've been used to has changed. It's a new world, Brian. It's a brave new world. It is. Now, here's some interesting news. NASA is bringing back its iconic worm logo to mark the return of human spaceflight.

All right. I mean, right now, I wouldn't mind hopping on a rocket and getting the fuck out of Dodge, personally. I love the old logo. I totally love the old logo. But some people aren't very happy about it. Some people that work at NASA aren't very happy about it because they thought the old meatball logo was their thing.

That, you know, they changed over to that after a really troubling time in NASA, and they thought that was really the way to go to mark a new era. So, going backwards and going to the old logo, they find that is something that doesn't sit well with them. But me personally, I love the old logo.

I think it's just part of my childhood. I'm so glad to see it back. I just hope this thing doesn't blow up. I love it as well. I had no idea it was known colloquially as the worm logo. That's not fun. So, I can get not wanting to call it the worm logo. But I do.

I love the old logo. And you know what, NASA? Maybe look to the past because that's when you landed on the moon. Exactly. Stuff like that. Yeah. I'm fine with it. I love it. I think it looks great. I want to order a shirt that has that on it. If you ordered from Amazon, it might get here by the time we get to the moon.

At QVC, shopping is more than just checking out. It's discovering something new every day. Start with today's special value. Then explore exciting finds across the brands and categories you love.

From beauty and fashion to home, culinary, and outdoor living. Shop now at QVC.com. Media Candy So, Dan Carlin has dropped a new common sense, the first one for almost two years now.

Yeah. Episode 319, A Recipe for Caesar, in which he spends nearly two hours talking about how it's impossible to talk about anything. So, it wasn't quite what I hoped for, but it is Dan Carlin doing a common sense. So, there you go.

I enjoyed it. I totally enjoyed it. I enjoyed it. I wanted some common sense. I don't feel like I really got it. Well, that has been the problem. That's why he hasn't done it in so long, because he couldn't come up with anything that had common sense in it. But it was still fun. It was nice to hear him back. That wasn't a, you know.

I do recommend, did you ever go listen to his book, or I mean, sorry, read his book, his doom and gloom book? No, not yet. Now does not feel the time. Don't do it now. Don't do it now. You'll be like, ah, shit, it's over. Back up, go home. There's nothing left.

And speaking of podcasts, I saw this and I thought of you. I have not listened to it yet. I will, because I do love me some Family Guy. So, Stewie and Brian from The Family Guy have released a new podcast discussing the coronavirus. Now, the only reason I really put this in here, because I haven't listened to it yet, is because it's sure to piss you off.

Because let me just read this one sentence from the press release here. Stewie and Brian made a podcast. Check it out on Instagram TV. See, the funny thing about it is it doesn't piss me off, because if you did listen to it, which I did, they're just making fun of podcasts.

So, they didn't actually make a podcast, but they joke about making a podcast in the bit. So, it's more a bit about them making a podcast, so they didn't really make a podcast. They just made a video for IGTV. It was very funny. You know, it halted a little bit here and there, but it was cute.

It was very cute. I enjoyed it, actually. Well, I plan on eventually watching it. It's only like five minutes. Check it out on Quibi. Oh, we'll talk about Quibi in a second. Oh, yeah. We'll talk about that in a second. I'm continuing to work my way through The Witcher or The Idiot's Guide to Game of Thrones. It's enjoyable.

Really? I couldn't get through the first ten minutes of it. I don't mind it. It's fine. Okay. I was just like, because, yeah, swords and British accents just really don't do it for me anymore. I'd rather go back and watch Lord of the Rings. All of them.

Extended. All of them. Extended versions. I have them on Blu-ray. I can do that. Yeah. And because my kid is currently in love with Frozen, I was quite happy to hear this news. Disney is releasing a series of new Frozen shorts made completely at home. So this is pretty impressive, actually.

Disney Plus, Disney animator Hiram Osmond and actor Josh Gad, who plays Olaf, have teamed up to produce a new series of shorts, which are available on YouTube and are being moved to Disney Plus as we speak. The At Home with Olaf follows his beloved character from the Frozen movies.

But the interesting thing about this is they're doing it from home. So he's working off existing character models and backgrounds, which helps. But they're 50-second shorts, and they're made completely at home. They're working from home, which is pretty impressive, actually.

That brings to mind the story that a listener sent in about The Expanse and how all the principal photography was done, and maybe they can do the effects while they're stuck at home. And who knows? Maybe they can. Maybe they can. We'll see. So I'll be checking these out with the kiddo pretty soon.

Some news about music streaming subscription services. They grew by nearly a third in 2019, which, as you know from the intro, means fuck all for artists. It's absolutely nothing. Except they're making money. Yes, they are making money. Counterpoint research has determined that paid music subscriptions have jumped 32% in 2019 to reach $358 million.

Now, you know, again, with these numbers, there's a lot of higgledy-piggledy stuff going on here. Higgledy-piggledy. This is mostly thanks to a mix of exclusives, phone service bundles, regional price cuts, and extended trial periods, all which help the lawyers screw the artists even more because they can claim that these aren't actually subscriptions that make income.

Yeah. Yes. So there you go. Spotify still has a solid lead at the end of 2019 with 35% of subscriptions. Apple Music's listener base grew 36% to give it 19% of streaming, while Amazon's share grew by half to hit 15%, mostly, probably largely in part to the ladies in the tube because that helps.

Thanks for bringing this up. I have to add a reminder today to cancel Apple Music. Yes. I've been subscribed to it, and I've listened to it like four times because I've got Spotify. With Spotify, I get Hulu. With Apple Music, I just get a $9.99 a month bill.

Yes. And you can't upload all your music, and so the music matching doesn't work because I have a large library. Boy, Apple Music really shit the bed on that one. Yeah. Yeah. So our counterpoint is predicting that streaming music would grow another 25% in 2020, but coronavirus enters, and people are actually listening to more radio and TV right now for news and such things rather than streaming, apparently.

Or podcasts. We'll see what happens. As we found out. Or podcasts, because we've taken a hit. Everybody's taken a hit. I've seen some stories where people are like, oh, we're only down 1%. I'm like, I don't believe you. One little bit. I don't believe you. They're saying that because they have lots of advertisers, and they don't want to actually tell anybody that it's really bad out there.

We usually get around 13,000 downloads an episode, and we are down to nine. Yeah. Well, people aren't commuting, and people that are not at home alone don't have the time to listen to podcasts. Yeah, because that's the thing. We discussed this on Twitter with a bunch of people two days ago, and I talked to a couple friends who have podcast networks, and they're like, we all agree, you know, podcasting is a very personal medium.

You don't really sit around the old radio and listen to the podcast. It's like you get into these characters by yourself for the most part. So I'm sure there are. I know we have some fans that, you know, have a household where everybody listens, but that's rare. And I'm sure that's with everybody else out there, too.

And also, you know, we're not the biggest pick-me-up in the world, so maybe people are looking for something brighter nowadays than us. That's true. We're going to keep going, no matter what. So I've been watching Making the Cut with Heidi Klum and Tim Gunn. Okay. This is Apple original now.

They got all the big bags of money since they left Project War. I can't even say Project War. I told you it's early. And I got to say, I love it. My roommate and I have been digging into it. We watched the first four episodes in one day because we forgot that it was on.

And we're like, oh, let's just watch them all. And I love Heidi Klum and Tim Gunn. Their dynamic is it's very much like, you know, the Top Gun – or not Top Gear guys. But with fashion. And they changed it. So it's cool. I have next to no interest in fashion.

And I was hooked and loved Project Runway for like the first eight seasons. You'll love this. You'll love it then. It's actually better than Project Runway was because they got – it's a new spin. They brought in like really like highly qualified designers that – like a lot of them have their own lines already.

And it's a million-dollar prize and they got to like show who can build the next massive brand. It's more about building a brand for business than it is just for amateurs and stuff. And they have seamstresses so they don't have to sew because they're like, this isn't a sewing competition. This is a design competition.

So seeing these people be able to actually do something and have it sewn so you're not sitting there watching people sew. So there's some sewing but not much, which is great. But the first four episodes they're in Paris and they have these really cool cut scenes with Heidi and Klum just bouncing around Paris.

It's fun. It's fun. And the next episodes take place in Tokyo because they have the bags of money from Amazon. So why the hell not? You know? Tim Gunn actually was a guest on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, the NPR show that I listen to every week. And he said that obviously production has stopped because they can't travel around anymore.

Oh, no. Hopefully that's for season two and not this season. That would suck. Yeah, that would suck. I already found out that Empire had to shut down and they're only doing 18 episodes instead of the 21 that they had planned. And so they had to cobble together an ending for the entire series.

With stuff that was shot. Yeah. And people that have seen it was like, they tried. It doesn't really work. But I'm like, have you seen this season or the last two or three seasons? Nothing works on that show. It's horrible. But it's like watching a train wreck. We have to watch it every week just to see what's going to happen.

Right. And I just like the title of this again. Somebody over at Engadget did a review of Quibi. And the title is Quit Trying to Make Quibi Happen. Nobody asked for Quibi. Nobody that is except for Jeffrey Katzenberg, the founder of DreamWorks Pictures and famed Hollywood producer.

So where other mobile video startups failed, like Samsung's long-forgotten Milk video and Verizon's own Go90, I've never even heard of those, Katzenberg figured he could succeed by pouring money. He's raised $1.75 billion so far into top talent and well-produced shows.

And as the reviewer points out, eh, who cares? It's fine. But why would anybody want to pay $5 a month, with ads, by the way, to watch short videos on your phone that you can't even throw to your TV or any other device if you wanted to?

They basically put the locks down so you can only watch it in their app on your phone. That's it. Nowhere else. So he's basically saying it's not really worth it at all. Who gives a shit? I saw a tweet this morning about Quibi disabled airplay.

Well, let's see about that. And they had an old overhead projector and they put their phone on it. They were just displaying it on the wall. It was too funny. Life finds a way. It does. It does. So I signed up for Quibi yesterday. It took a long time because their sign-up system was completely broken for a long time and it finally, finally worked.

I don't get it. I just don't get it. You know, I think they would have had a shot if this whole coronavirus thing didn't happen. But, you know, lower intention spans. You're waiting for – you're on a train for 15 minutes.

You watch a quick show. Take a dump. But bad timing. Well, the thing is I watched a couple shows on it, some of the original stuff. And since they only have a few minutes, it feels really forced. Like they're trying to put in so much story in these little vignettes and it just doesn't feel right.

It just – there's something about that timeframe that makes it feel weird. I mean the version of Punk'd was pretty interesting. That one was at least funny and had the right amount of content in it. But the original content stuff – I guess Punk'd – they are doing Punk'd as original content.

But it just didn't really feel right. Yeah, yeah. Scripted. That's what I mean. So I don't know. I'm going to – I've got 90 days. I already canceled it in Apple. So I think you still get the free 90 days. So I'm going to – I think part of the other problem with Quibi right now, and we touched on this a bit on our last show, is they banked so heavily on the cult of personality of celebrity, the cult of celebrity.

And as we were discussing, we're kind of all fucking over celebrities right now. Yeah. Like that mystique is gone and the idea that we're just going to watch Chrissy Teigen do something because she's Chrissy Teigen, we could give a fuck right now.

Yeah. Everybody's a celebrity now. That's it. And yeah, but also they're not just banking on celebrity. Do you know what the advertising budget for Quibi is for the first year? No idea. $455 million.

Well, it's good to be the king. Yeah, no doubt. No doubt. And so we got the numbers on their first day. 300,000 downloads, which brought them up to number three on the Apple App Store. And I saw this over at TechCrunch. And they have a nice little graph. So Disney Plus, first day, 4 million downloads.

Quibi, 300K. HBO Now, only 45K. But Jason, it's 300K more than ever before. Exactly. It's a record-breaking download day, Brian. It's a record-breaking download number. Here's the fun part, though. 300,000 downloads, they didn't make a cent because everybody's just got a free trial.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. It just – I don't get it. I just don't get the form factor. You know, I would like to see the Steven Spielberg one that only lets you watch at night like the horror one. Right. Or I – no, it's – Well, they are doing fun things with technology that way, aren't they?

Like, you know, time-setting things so you can only watch it at certain times. And they have some, like, groundbreaking, apparently, core innovation called TurnStyle, which allows you to seamlessly switch between portrait and vertical mode. I played with that. They actually do a really good job with that, I got to say. Yeah. So they've got some good tech, and they're playing, you know, some fun tricks.

But at the end of the day, it still comes down to – is the content compelling? Yeah. Here's the one thing about that. Okay. I can watch a video, and I can turn it portrait or landscape. But the actual user interface on my phone only works in portrait.

So either you're going to be scrolling sideways to try and find a show, or you still have to turn your phone if you have it, like – because I have it on my nightstand, on a little stand, and I was watching. But when I wanted to go look at a new show, I had to turn my head 90 degrees just to be able to figure out what I was going to watch next.

Right. And finally, I think everybody on the planet has probably seen this now, some good news with John Krasinski, episode two, with the cast of Hamilton. I was going to put this in before because I watched episode one when that came out, and I thought it was thoroughly enjoyable.

I think somebody needs to order a microphone from Amazon, please, or Adorama, preferably. The link will be in the show notes for that. It's fun. It's very fun. But the Hamilton bit at the end of this one is just – it's just so epic. Just so epic.

And I was talking to a friend of the show, David Teeter, last night, and he's like, can you believe people are actually putting into the comments, how did you get everything to line up so well on a Zoom call? It should have been out of sync. And, of course, post-production, people, post-production. But if you haven't seen those yet, obviously go see them.

They're pretty fun. Links will be in the show notes. At the library. So I tried to find something to read that wasn't dystopian. And I wanted to take a break from even just sci-fi in general.

And I've always been weirdly drawn to Jenny Slate. I don't know why. I don't even watch any show that she's really ever been on except for Muppet Babies because of my kid and she's the voice of the nanny. I watched her stand-up special and I was torn by it.

But it came up as an ad as I was browsing. She's got a book called Little Weirds. So I went, well, why not? And she recently had like a big breakup and it really kind of threw her for a loop and destroyed her life for a while. So she wrote this book as she was recovering from her breakup.

And it is weird. That's all I can say about it. It does say it on the tin. Yes, it does what it says on the tin. She is a crazy, crazy woman. But I actually ended up enjoying it. Once I let myself settle into it and realized that this was just stream of consciousness, weirdness, it kind of did what it needed to do for me.

It took me out of thinking about what I was thinking about. So if you like really, really, really weird stuff, go for it. Maybe. You would hate this, Jason. Like, don't ever, ever try to read this. You would lose your mind and probably throw your Kindle across the room.

But if you're open to complete and utter randomness, maybe this is the thing for you right now. That's my review. Okay. Yeah, I'll pass on that one. I'm still working my way through all the Sandman comics right now. Finally, finally going to finish it. But yeah, it's just hard to get into a novel right now.

One thing I was thinking of doing was starting at the very beginning of the Discworld series and just doing the whole thing. Ooh, that's interesting. I mean, it'd take a while, but where the fuck are we going to go? I already own them all, so might as well. It's like...

Yeah, me too. So we've talked in the past that I have a very curated Facebook feed, and you referred to it as Schulmeistering your feed, which you're doing now. Which I have done, and now my feed, there's like nothing on it.

Nobody talks. It's like, okay. It is going to be really easy to maintain and curate now, because nobody says anything. Right. Well, I mean, I have some, I would call them eccentric friends occasionally. So normally, I don't see a lot in the way of conspiracy theories making my feed, but some of my more eccentric musician friends, particularly in the UK, have been posting a couple things recently, and it's kind of annoyed me.

I wonder why. And I felt the need to step in and say, this is not true. Which didn't go over well, but, you know, they'll get over it. So, yeah. So UK carriers would appreciate you not setting their cell towers on fire right now, people. We've got enough going on that you don't need to go burn down cell towers, because you believe that 5G is causing the coronavirus.

Yeah. It is not. My roommate showed me this yesterday, and she's like, do you think this could be true? I'm like, no, this is the fucking stupidest thing I've ever heard in my life. Or worse, that 5G and the coronavirus are the tools of a shadowy new world order to turn us all into mindless zombies.

Yes, there's a lot of logical leaps that need to be making here if you want to buy this. Some of the quote unquote evidence is that the virus broke out just weeks after the first 5G rollout in China. So, obviously, it's to blame. The general implication is that 5G phones and networks are creating a form of radiation sickness that will wipe out billions.

So these are all over the place if you want to go see these moronic conspiracy theories. Unfortunately, people are buying into this. Some notable entertainer on Twitter who's got 2 million plus followers retweeted this theory and says that when 5G was activated in China, people dropped dead.

Another theory suggests that 5G, which was created by Bill Gates, administers sinister radiation to keep us at a low vibrational state, which is designed to depopulate the world. But in the very next line, it claims that the whole world, which is dead, will now be vaccinated against the virus.

It's gotten stupid. So stop it. People are actually burning down towers. Give me a fucking break, people. Look, here's the bellwether on this. If Woody Harrelson is behind it and says it's true, then just ignore it, please. He smokes a lot of pot. Yeah.

And I don't know if I've talked about it much on the show, but as you know, I used to listen to the Adam Carolla podcast every day. Because, you know, back in the day, I used to just sit and listen to podcasts at home while I worked alone in my house. I have completely stopped recently because Adam Carolla, you know, he's been questioning the coronavirus since day one.

And as I said, as we said at the top of the show, we don't have any time for people that think this isn't a thing anymore because it's ridiculous. And I don't really give a shit what Adam Carolla thinks because Adam Carolla has no education whatsoever who gives a shit. But Dr. Drew, who is a doctor, has been doing the same thing for quite some time now.

I've stopped listening to any of their shows. And Dig has put together what they call a brutal supercut of Dr. Drew being completely wrong about the coronavirus. The last two months, he's been going on multiple news programs, podcasts, everything. He's got, you know, 15 podcasts of his own or whatever.

And he's been downplaying it, saying it's no big deal, saying media has been blowing it up, blah, blah, blah. Fuck you, Dr. Drew. The thing that really drives me crazy is that Dr. Drew has been running around going, the media. If Dr. Drew isn't part of the media, then who the fuck is?

He has 10 podcasts, four radio shows, two TV shows. He is the goddamn media. Now, since then, he's issued an apology. He's done a mea culpa. But much like Brian Williams, I'm fucking done. You made a ton of money. You lied. You're a doctor.

You abused that position. I'm out. Continue to be a doctor? Fine. Should you get any more TV shows? Fuck no. Fuck that guy. Well, he is on Fox, so. Yeah, he's pivoted. Yeah, he's gone down the Oz hole.

So I saw him, like I was flipping around. Because I like to watch the Fox morning show here in L.A. in the morning, because it's about L.A. It's not political or anything like that. And the TV was still on. It was a good day, L.A., I think. I think that's that one. Yeah. But it's a fun show.

But then the TV got left on, and then I walked in on Dr. Oz interviewing Dr. Drew. Two fucks dicks together. It was, I was just like, my jaw was on the floor. I'm like, what did he just say? I'm like, I always expected Dr. Drew to be the voice of reason, not, I don't know. I grew up listening to Dr. Drew on Loveline.

He was always like straightforward, here's the real deal, voice of reason. But he's gone batshit insane recently. I don't know what they're putting in the Kool-Aid over there at his TV studio. But he needs to stop drinking it, and he needs to take a media vacation for quite some time.

Because, yeah, he's lost all credibility in my book, too, unfortunately. Sad to sad day. Feedback Loop. Welcome to our drunken edition of Feedback Loop, because we can tell a lot of you have been hitting the sauce. Yeah, the amount of feedback has increased, and the misspellings in them has as well.

Yes, it has. I'm glad you're all having fun out there, everybody. Indeed. So over at Patreon, Elizabeth, David, Elwood, multi-sweetness, Lars, Nathan, Eric. And Eric writes, just became a supporter after listening for a couple months. I'm now a true believer. Open to my Patreon account with a password from 1Password, paidwithprivacy.com, and all while using my shiny VPN.

Can't thank you enough for being the voice of reason in an unreasonable world. Oh, you're very welcome, Eric. And Craig also is a new Patreon subscriber, and he writes, I love your show and all that Brian and Jason do. This is all I'm able to give right now, but I wanted to make a donation to help support you guys. Keep up the great work. Well, we shall.

Thank you. And over at PayPal, we've got Elwynn, Daniel, Breed, William, Nikolai, Peter, Doug, and Doug says, hat tip to my father-in-law. No, no, hold on. What? Sorry. Sorry about that. Doug, and a hat tip to my father-in-law for translating the Chinese characters, Mr. Zhang Hun, who donated the show, but it only came in with the Chinese characters, so I sent him off to my father-in-law, who said, thank you for the awesome show.

Nice. And Stefan says, hey, love your show. Soothing voices, great content, excellent media recommendations. Greetings from Dusseldorf, Germany, home of Kraftwerk. Ja, the Kraftwerk. Ah, yes. Yours truly, Stefan. All right. Well, thank you, guys. I love Kraftwerk.

Thank you. I actually looked at Facebook the other day, and we got a bunch of comments, but then I couldn't figure out how to actually get to them, because Facebook sucks. So thank you for everybody who wrote us on Facebook. Over at Twitter, Brian writes in, while listening to GOG and your love for MASH, mine too, just rewatched it.

Look for the show Letterkenny on Hulu, adult-oriented humor out of Canada. Give it a few shows. First season is set up for the other seasons. Hysterically awesome. Jason may even like it. A lot of people have been recommending Letterkenny to us over the years. I keep meaning to get around to it.

You'd think this would be the time, but, you know, three-year-old, so. Yeah, I've seen it. It's very good. So, yes, I think friend of the show, Bob Fogarty, turned me on to that one when we were having drunken nights in San Diego one time. Very funny stuff. Very funny stuff. I am a fan.

And disgruntled Cincy Sports Fan writes in, regarding Zoom bombing, I noticed when I logged into my Zoom account two days ago, my previous settings to allow no passwords were changed and locked by Zoom. And they set a random password that can't be removed. It can be changed, though. Looks like enforced passwords from now on.

Well, in a follow-up tweet, disgruntled Cincy Fans writes, and now they've removed all of that. Shrug. People can get back to war-dialing Zoom rooms. Maybe it was a test before mass rollout. We'll see. And Derek sent us a link to somebody that could have made more on of the week.

Live streaming from a moving car. And this is somebody over on Twitch TV, DJ Jim Boy. Yeah, I've seen that a lot in LA back when there were moving cars. Yeah, back when cars actually left the driveway. Yeah. And Nate 1.0 writes in, I know how much y'all enjoy a good AI story.

Big names, 31 charges, including genocide, convention violations, and much, much more. This is a PDF of a court case. It's a legal brief, which I would not call a good story. It really isn't. But it's actually kind of hard to figure out. But we'll have the link in the show notes. I couldn't even...

I'm looking at the brief, and I couldn't even find a good title because it's like... I know. That's why I didn't put a title in there. Yeah. Yeah. It's a bit rough to listen to, to read. I started, and then I was just like, am I really going to read a legal brief right now? And I went, no.

But thank you for sending it in. Yeah. The crazy part, it's like the AI organization, Inc., and a bunch of other people versus Google, Barack Hussein Obama, Joe Biden, Hunter Biden, Hillary Clinton, Eric Schmidt, Nancy Pelosi. It just goes on and on and on. Larry, oh, God. Yeah.

And the Chinese Communist Party. Of course. So I think this might be one of those cuckoo ones. So... Maybe. This might actually be fun to... RoboBees. It's got RoboBees micro-insect drone and xenobots. Endangering the world... Oh, endangering all the world's people on 5G networks.

Masking genocide with AI technology. Oh, this actually might be a pretty good read if you're stoned. Ooh. Maybe I'll try it later. I don't smoke the wacky tobacco, so... Yeah. And Homeworker writes us, thanks to Grumpy Old Geeks for reminding me what alcohol is.

Living in lockdown SA. I'm assuming that's South Africa. We have a complete ban on selling and transportation of alcohol. Oh, God. Oh, my God. I'm so sorry. I'm so sorry for your loss. I am, too. Jackal writes in, WWIV BBS Apple IIe in South Miami and then a multi-line Wildcat BBS on a 40-meg full-height drive for me back in the late 80s.

Tandy 1000XX. I guess this is all... This is like you trying to read photo stuff. I actually remember all of that. I think WWIV was the BBS software I used, actually. So thank you for that memory jog. Gotcha.

He says, Good times with war dialing and also zipping through TimeNet, Mnet, and hacked MillNet through universities. Well, you might want to not mention that hacked MillNet thing unless you know the statute of limitations has run out. Yeah. And Rico writes in, Hope you're staying safe. Here is a story for your next episode.

And this is a link over at the register. Cobalt coding volunteers sought a slammed mainframe slow New Jersey's coronavirus response. Governor Murphy says his staff is doing a heck of a job. But literally, we have systems that are 40-plus years old, and there'll be lots of postmortems. And one of them on our list will be, How the heck did we get here when we literally needed cobalt programmers?

Yes. Apparently, most of these unemployment websites were based on cobalt. There's no T in cobalt. Cobalt. Sorry. I was just reading the cobalt that he put in at the end. You're correct. Yes. Yes. Cobalt. So, yeah. So, the entire systems were based on cobalt, and they're all getting slammed and need patches, and nobody knows how to program in cobalt anymore.

So, let me tell you how you got here, Governor Murphy. You got there by not updating your systems or investing in any technical infrastructure for 40 years. That's how you got there. Matt B. writes in, Maybe not swans of dolphins, but, and yes, this is where the alcohol starts to come in.

So, and this goes, this is Landudno, Landudno, goes from ghost town to goat's town. And it's an article over at the Guardian about a town that has been taken over by goats. In Wales. In Wales.

It's the Landudno. Yes. And Joe writes in, Thanks for the blast from the past. I started with Bunker Ramo, which had a System 7 with a 12K core magnet memory board so you could see the magnets. It also had a button on it that was actually, see, this is, yeah, this is all getting very difficult to read.

It also had a button on it that was actually was marked bootstrap to boot from. I then worked at IBM for 20 years doing field repair. When I stated I would work on the XT-80 PC, I feel like I'm reading an Amazon product description right now. And PC Junior, also industry systems. I worked up to RS600 and PC servers.

My first game was a cassette game from the TRS-80. And also, if you had an IBM PC that couldn't find anything to boot from, it went to basic, which was burned in the chip, which had a game Gorillaz. I also got to start with an 8-inch floppy in the 3274 controllers and the Bunker Ramo banking systems. All good times.

Thanks. Made it through. I don't remember the game Gorillaz. Me either. Yeah. You have to look that one up. Yeah. Incognita writes in, I'm an Uber driver and have been delivering food during this pandemic as I need the money. Uber is taking 35% from these poor merchants.

They are making food for free in fear of giving up the program and losing all the business. So fucked up. Yes, it is. It drives me absolutely insane. I've never liked Uber, but I've never disliked them more. Fuck Uber. Restaurants are all offering discounts right now to get your business to try to stay afloat.

And let's be honest. It's a goddamn public service because cooking three square a day for a family is rough. And Uber is gouging them. Lower your damn fees. Everybody that's listening, call your restaurants directly. Ask them what's best for them and get it that way. Yeah. And if you can, maybe just go pick it up.

A lot of restaurants will take it out with tongs and put it on the sidewalk and you can pick it up with tongs, go home, spray it down with Lysol. Doesn't taste delicious, but hey, you know how it goes. Yeah. And John writes in, and I assume this one might be a little alcohol enabled as well. Hello. First of all, I really like your show.

Thanks for it. However, the my roommate thing is really starting to annoy me. Brian, please restrain Jason from thinking that it's all about him. It's not, and we really don't care about you tossing 20s to your grocery friends or your roommate conspiracy theories.

Really, get a grip. I would also like to say that both of you are very happy that Apple bought Dark Sky app. Well, I'm not, and you shouldn't be too. This is just another shitty move from Apple. I am an Android user, and I also used to use Dark App on my phone and Dark Sky API on my home lab setup.

You shouldn't be such an Apple fanboys. I was expecting more from the GOG. I hope Apple get busted on the EU anti-competition law or something else because I'm pretty sure that what they have done is illegal, at least in Europe, since have paid for the app, and I will not be able to use it soon. Fuck Apple.

Kind regards and sorry for my grumpiness. Well, you know, we're grumpy too. Understood. You'll probably get to still use your app. You just won't get updates. And my grocery friends are very happy with the things that I do for them. So I'm sorry you're so grumpy, sir.

Go have another cocktail. Linda writes in, Hi, Jason. I tried to donate money through PayPal tonight and received this error. Cannot read property transactions of undefined. I tried several times and got the same result. Well, I hope that sorted itself out. Give it a shot again, hopefully.

Yeah, we're getting donations, so it's working for people. Yeah, maybe try a different browser if that's what's going on. Thank you for the shows. I enjoyed the shows pre-COVID-19, but now more than ever, of the 30-plus podcasts that I regularly listen to, yours is the one that I want to hear right now. Well, good. Hopefully you're hearing it.

Things are pretty stressful, and you guys helped me to feel grounded when I really needed it. Thanks. Since I'm able to work from home, I want to donate to fill in the gaps for people who can't right now and keep your show going. Much appreciation, Linda. Well, thank you, Linda. Hopefully you can give it another shot, and hopefully it'll work.

If not, try Patreon. Yep. And Donovan writes in, really enjoyed you guys just kicking back during the security segment and talking old-school geek shit in show 428. It reminded me once again why I enjoy listening to you guys, since I lived through the same times as you did. I turned 50 this past January.

Something I wanted to share, and not for the show unless you want to. Why not? We've got time to kill. But a few years ago, I wrote an article from my website about my journey of PC ownership. I thought you also might find it interesting. Also, I ran a BBS when I was 16, Wildcat. Now, Wildcat rings a bell.

I'm going to have to Google this shit. I'm going to figure out what I used. And even started one as a commercial venture in 92-93 for the company I worked for. Unfortunately, the commercial internet was right around the corner and pretty much killed the BBS. Anyways, here's the link to my story, and it's my personal journey of computer ownership, and we'll have the link in the show notes.

Keep up the great content, guys. Thank you. Matt from Australia writes in, Hey, Grumps, I know all we talk about nowadays is in relation to COVID-19, so here is yet another story. The attached article shows some interesting traffic and travel stats, primarily for Australia, but with some from around the world thrown in.

Since we all have gone on lockdown, it makes for an interesting read. It's called The Lockdown Effect from ABC in the Australias. Yeah, I tossed that to my good buddy, Greg, who's living in Sydney right now, and he's like, Yep, we're all in lockdown. Nobody's going anywhere. So, some good maps there.

Mike writes in, Shows to recommend. Devs on Hulu. Mentioned on show, but if you haven't caught it yet, worth the watch. Mythic Quest Raven's Banquet on Apple TV+. It's a great comedy with game development setting. And he writes in, Financial reminder for guests. Venmo slash PayPal isn't a bank and not FDIC insured.

Don't leave money there. This is the type of moron my city has to deal with. And this is a link for the LA Times. Surfer fined $1,000 for ignoring coronavirus closure in Manhattan Beach. Yeah, I'm not that far from you. I'm just up here in Santa Monica. And I've seen on my bike rides along the beach, not on the beach anymore because they close the damn beach.

I've seen cops dragging people up off the beach on a fairly regular basis. So we have a lot of idiots. Yeah, yeah. And I've been to Manhattan Beach. And, you know, the surfer guy isn't the only kind of moron you have down there. But he's the kind that's getting the attention right now. Danny writes in, I guess babysitting duties are over and the kids will have their Easter vacation back after it was canceled in order to keep them busy during the break.

My girlfriend's niece was only doing a class a day at this point. And this is Zoom banned from New York City schools due to privacy and security flaws. Now, Brian, this annoys the shit out of me because there's no reason that they should ban Zoom. Nope. You know, put a goddamn password on and let your kids learn.

They should have a password on it anyway. And, you know, I think Zoom actually did a really great public service by giving the service away for free for education. Yep. I agree. I agree. Yeah. I mean, it's got flaws. They're working on it. And if you get Zoom bombed, it's your own damn fault for not setting a password at this point.

Simple solution, people. Simple solution. Yeah. I mean, there were some issues with their installer and their software. Yeah, yeah, yeah. They're working on that. But, you know, you don't throw out the baby with the bathwater on this one, I think, because kids got to learn. What are you going to do now? You're just going to sit home and just let them watch Disney Plus?

Oh, yeah, yeah, probably, I guess. Yeah, but no sports because none of that's free. John writes in, in episode 428, you guys were talking about iPads and how you didn't know how to use a lot of the features. I call BS on BS saying that there is no manual. And he gives us a link to the iPad user guide in the iTunes store.

You're welcome. Well, I looked in the iTunes store for this. The first three customer reviews. One star. A table of contents would be helpful. One star. Please just produce a PDF of each user manual. And, oh, God. And another one, one star from Ridiculous.

This is ridiculous. I have access to just 35 pages of the manual. I can't even print the pages. Are you fucking kidding me? So, I want to know why this isn't installed on the iPad by default. Why would I have to, why would I even know to go to Apple Books and search for it? It makes no sense.

Put it on the iPad. You can auto-update it when you release a new one. I think you have the programming skills to do that since you made the fucking thing. I agree. And Michaela writes in, regarding the South and self-isolation. She gives us a breakdown of how people have to drive down South and says, thank you, Jason, for actually acknowledging that people have to drive down here.

I keep hearing about that damn article with people not taking it into consideration. And you're welcome. Because I think people need to really figure out that not everybody has their same living situation. So, don't group them in with the stats. At least, you know, make concessions for people that have to drive 20 miles to go to the store before you just condemn them.

But there are a lot of people that are going to be condemned. But, you know, sometimes people just got to drive somewhere. I do like how you condensed her entire message down to the part that compliments you. Of course. Yeah. Hey, man. God mode. That's right. And Donovan writes in, coronavirus versus the muttonheads.

I am a full-time commercial truck driver, big rig, so I continue to work full-time. Hey, you're a hero right now, man. Keep it up. Keep it up, man. Keep safe. And travel constantly in the southeast region of the U.S., meaning I'm mostly in, okay, well, I'm doing my thing now where I'm God-moding. Sorry to say what you've probably heard about many folks in the Deep South is true.

A high percentage of folks I've encountered in the last week seem to be completely ignorant about COVID-19. I passed through a tiny town in Georgia and saw a picnic going on in a small park. At a warehouse yesterday morning where I delivered, the attendant just ran right up to me within 18 inches or so, and I had to tell her to please back off.

A group of other drivers were waiting at an engine store, all within three feet of each other. I cannot know how extensive this lazy stupidity is, but it doesn't look good. Yeah. Well. Yeah. Yeah. Well, do your best. Stay safe. Wear those masks. And keep our stuff coming.

Here's a new rule, I think. If somebody does come up to you within, you know, your circle, your sphere of influence, as it were, you should have the legal right to either kick them in the cooch or kick them in the balls. Say, back up. Boom. Think that. A little sack tap with your steel toes.

I'm not going to sign off on that, but okay. Steel-toed sack tap. That's it. And Jason writes in, N95s can be stored in a paper bag. The plastic blocks sweat evaporation, and these things do get nasty.

Also, a good place to store them is in the car if you have one. Sun and heat are poison to viruses. Of course, hide the mask, else a broken window, no mask. Stay grumpy. We actually, when we come back, we put our masks in a Ziploc, but we also leave them out in the sun on our patio.

So we get double. So hopefully that'll do it. I haven't worried about it because we are literally doing full-on lockdown. We are not going anywhere for two weeks. No grocery stores, no nothing. And that's kind of what they're recommending to do here in California right now.

Yeah, we unfortunately have to do some runs every now and again because my roommate's 92-year-old mom needs supplies. And it was nice. We found her optometrist actually came in and fixed her glasses because she broke them and she couldn't see.

So he came into the office and repaired them for her. Very cool. Yeah, it was really nice of him. Because that's one thing that terrifies the shit out of me right now. If I break my glasses, I'm screwed. So, well, it's not that I won't be able to drive or go anywhere. I won't be able to watch Netflix.

I can't see. Or Quibi. Or Quibi. Well, Quibi I can see because I can hold it up to my nose. But, oh my God. Eric writes in, although I did like your Apocalypse playlist, here's mine so far. And it's a link to the Pandemic playlist. He says, I know it's on Apple Music. How lame, but I'm locked in.

No, you're not. Break free from the chains. I checked it out. He's got some good stuff on there. Cool. Yeah, I'll take a look. It's not as chill as your playlist, you know, over at GOG.showslashalone, which I have to say, I listened to it and I really enjoyed it.

I mean, I just had it going on in the studio the other day when I was remodeling some stuff and it was a really good playlist. Well, you know, the thing about it is it's really eclectic. It's all over the map stylistically. But the thing is, even though we all kind of picked songs based on their titles, they're all really good songs.

Yeah. So, yeah. I sent you one the other day to add. I don't know if you did or not. Yeah, it's in there now. Cool. Cool. I'm keeping it updated. Awesome. Dougie writes in, remember that great example of a website I shared called linksautos.com? Oh, how could I forget? Oh, yes.

Well, the owner's message to staff during the COVID-19 pandemic is, watch Netflix, drink beer, and avoid excessive masturbation. It's generally good life advice. Yeah, it is generally good life advice. So, we've got a link to the note in the show notes.

It's pretty funny. And Martin sends us a link to YouTube. Dude makes solid gold AirPods. Can't imagine they sound very good. No, I don't think they would. Working from home for several weeks. So, in the gaps, I'm taking part in a trading competition. 1K to 10K. I pledge to give at least 10% of any gains I make to charities.

That's nice. That are supporting the coronavirus effort. Also, if I do make gains, I pledge to give 1% of them to you guys. Wish me luck. Good luck. Great luck. Come on. If by some miracle I make the 10K, that's 100 bucks coming your way and a grand going to charities. Grump on, guys.

Love your work. Stay safe. Thanks, man. Awesome. Thank you. Over at iTunes, Grumpy Old Goth Girl sends us a review and the title is just a heart emoji with five stars and says, stay safe and grumpy, my friends. Well, we shall. I didn't know you could use emojis in titles for reviews.

That's kind of fun. Yeah, that's fun. And we got another five star with the title, here's a review. And this is from Zero Distraction. And he says, I tried to give this podcast 10 out of 10 stars, but there were only five available. Oh, thank you so much. Both of our iTunes reviews came from Canada this week.

Oh, yeah. Good. Excellent. Very nice. All right. If you want your question or comment right on the show, head over to gog.show slash contact and send us your feedback or questions that we can read on the air. Please try to do so before you've had your sixth beer. And if you're so inclined, please head over to gog.show slash iTunes and toss us a five star and snarky review.

And don't forget those stars on Overcast. I'm so sad. I looked at it the other day and reply all is right on our butt. And we cannot be beat by the podcast, which I affectionately call it shit you already know. Closing shout outs.

I want to do a couple podcast shout outs right now. I want to talk about Unstructured with our friend Eric Hundley. It's a great show, great interviews, and he does some really interesting stuff that a lot of other podcasts don't cover with, you know, FBI people and government people and spies and things like that. It's a really good show.

Definitely check it out. And he even has Idiots Like Us on. We both have guests. Speaking of another show that has Idiots Like Us on it, I want to talk about Follow Your Different with Chris Lockhead. We've been on there a couple times. Well, I've been on there like three or four times and I'm coming up to do it again. You've done it once.

Yes. Your episode was really good, though. I highly recommend it. Well, thank you. And also, Dark Net Diaries by Jack Recider. It's always fantastic. Always fantastic. Great stories. And his latest one was really, really good. I actually listened to it twice.

So links for all those shows will be in the show notes. And if you have any podcasts that you like, drop me an email, jpd.me. I'll check them out because I'm still listening to podcasts because, you know, I don't have a kid. You can. I got dogs. I don't have a kid. They don't care.

And I don't so much have a shout out. I just figure, judging from the feedback again, you're all a little bit in the bag at this point. So here's something a little fun for you to do. Pop a beer. Google O'Reilly Auto Parts. They're an auto part company that's, I know they're out here on the West Coast.

I'm not sure if they're all in the place, but yeah. So go to their website and in the search bar, search for 121G. You're welcome. Well, definitely go do that. Definitely. That's pretty good. That's pretty good. Until next time, I'm Jason DeVillipo.

And I'm Brian Schulmeister. Thanks for listening to Grumpy Old Geeks. To support the show and keep us on the air, go to gog.show slash donate. Toss us a few bucks and we'll love you forever. Or if you can't right now, that's totally fine. Your support really keeps us going and we really appreciate it. Show notes for this episode are at gog.show slash 429.

From there, you can find links to old episodes, leave feedback, ask questions, donate to the show, and get links to stuff we like. And apparently, stay drunk.

At QVC, fall shopping is more than just checking out. It's discovering the brands you love across beauty, fashion, home, and culinary all in one place. Whether you're getting ready for crisp mornings, cozy nights, or everyday moments, QVC has what you need for the season ahead.

With brands like Laura Geller, Philosophy, Ninja, and so many more. Shop now at QVC.com.