532: Crypt Bros

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.

Happy Thanksgiving and welcome to Grumpy Old Geeks. I'm Jason DeFillippo. And I'm Brian Schulmeister. So when was the Canadian Thanksgiving? That happened already, didn't it? Oh yeah, that was well before Halloween. Okay, that's what I thought. Yeah, it's a more civilized spacing out of holidays.

Yeah, I would appreciate if we did that. Yeah, the whole Thanksgiving and the Christmas madness that happens in the U.S. is just insane. Ever since I've started kind of coming up here more often, I'm like, oh, this is great. You do Thanksgiving and then you wait a little while and then you have Halloween and then you wait a little while and then you have Christmas.

Yeah, although I kind of like getting it all out of the way. Honestly, you know, we've had our Christmas tree up for quite some time now. Right. You're not supposed to do that until after American Thanksgiving. Yeah, well, you know what? Screw those people. I also have a pink tree. So what are you going to do?

We buck tradition around here. Yes. So it's been a very interesting couple of weeks here, Brian. Okay. So I started this Pivoteer newsletter talking about how, you know, you can change jobs because I've done it so many times and how to be resilient and anti-fragile. And it's – I haven't put out an issue in three weeks because, well, the universe said, hold my beer, boy.

You want to talk about this stuff? We're going to make you live it. All right. I just almost lost my house, was planning to be homeless for a couple of days there, was – that was exercise in fire drills for sure.

Okay. I've done that enough where I'm pretty good at that. You can throw me out, you know, in a dark alley and I can find a place to live in 24 hours. That wasn't the big problem. But then in the past week, 60% of my income has evaporated because I lost a whale client.

Ah, yes. That's dangerous. And it's one of those things where this was the one client that I had that I'm like, okay, CEO, founded the company, loves doing the podcast, never going anywhere. We're actually friends, blah, blah, blah, thinking that, okay, this is a good gig.

It's going to go on forever. I didn't remember that there are these things called investors and the board. So even a CEO and a founder also has bosses. Well – Yes, they do. Yeah. Those bosses pulled the rug out from them and stole their company in a hostile takeover and it's been a very, very bad week.

So, yeah. So scrambling again and it's like I've got so much material for this damn newsletter now. I just don't have the time to write it because I'm trying to pay the bills. But here's the deal. Picked up another podcast client already.

You know, check on that one. Picked up – and you'll love this one, Brian. Guess what I'm doing now? I don't know. SEO and web marketing with search engines. Oh, God. So you're a bullshit artist. Have you tried to bullshit this week? No, I'm not a bullshit artist.

I'm just bringing in clients and I get a cut of the sales. That's the way it goes. They just don't know how to do it. So I know how to do it. There we go. So I'm back to building landing pages, believe it or not. All right. Jesus Christ. What's this world come to?

But since I'm back in the real estate world, dusting off the camera, doing house photography, and I'm going to get my commercial drone pilot's license here pretty soon so I can add that on. It's just been like – it literally is exactly the stuff I teach in the newsletter, brought to life, really against my will.

It's been fun. So how's your Thanksgiving going? You know, it's not as crazy as yours. I am actually flying back to L.A. on the day before Thanksgiving. So that's going to be a nightmare anyways. That's tomorrow.

Yeah. Yeah. And that's one of the reasons we're doing the podcast this week and taking next week off because I will be in travel hell for the next few days. I have to go back because we're closing out the sale of our condo in Santa Monica. So I need to be there to handle some of the aspects of that.

So the – you know, travel hasn't been fun recently or the past 10 years anyways or 20 years even. But the amount of hoops that you have to go through now in this COVID time to travel, the testing requirements, the timing, the uploading of the documents to the websites that don't work, it is just a cluster F of massive proportions.

So good times. I am not looking forward to a relaxing or fun next six days. Oh, man. That just sucks. That just sucks. It does. It does. It's just going to be grin and bear it and get through it and think about all the money that will be in my bank account when the escrow closes.

Oh, good for you, man. That's a good thing. That's a good thing. That is a good thing. So it's worth dealing with all of this. And, of course, you know, the real fun of all of this is like I get back and I'm here for like two weeks and then the whole family packs up and goes back to L.A. for Christmas. Oh, no. So, yeah.

Oh, fun times. Fun times. Good times. But I had some interesting news across my feed, something I hadn't thought about in a long time, something that we were basically known for for quite a while, for screaming about how stupid they were and how horrible they were and how all these companies are going to go out of business because it's just a dumb concept.

And then we just never heard about them again for a long time. And this popped up. Miami votes to end electric scooter pilot program. Scooters? Scooters. Back in the news, Jason. Oh, my God. We're back to scooters. Yes. Once home to the most electric scooters in the United States, Miami is turning its back on the micromobility vehicles.

Per the Miami Herald, city commissioners voted on Thursday to end the multi-year pilot that allowed companies like Bird and Lime to operate shared scooter rentals within the city's core. They have until 5 p.m. on Friday, November 19th, so this has happened already, to collect their scooters. If they do not comply, they will impound all the vehicles.

Basically, they just said, you know what? These things aren't safe. No, they're not. Go figure. And they aren't. And that's the point of view that swayed the commission's vote. So Miami is done with them. I'm curious to see how many will be out and about in Santa Monica when I get back into town.

A lot. They had already disappeared in droves last time I was there. They're back. Oh, great. They came back. I guess they had to do something with the ones from Miami. Yeah. Seriously. Oh, they're transplants. But you'd think that Florida would be like, safety? What's that? Strap a gator on it and you're fine.

You know? You know, it's the old person vote, right? Oh, yeah. It's all the old people walking up and down the Miami streets that are sick of those young whippersnappers. Get off my sidewalk. Oh, that's interesting. That's interesting. Yeah. They came back. You know, I thought COVID had killed them. But apparently there were a few left in storage.

So they're scattered around my neighborhood here and there. But not as many as it used to be, for sure. I see a couple of people riding around. But the ones I generally see riding around are privately owned. People actually bought these for themselves and scoot around on them.

But here's the difference. Those people. Some cost fallacy. But they also wear helmets. The people who own the scooters are actually safer because they have their protective gear on. They're literally wearing motorcycle gloves and helmets and aren't riding on the sidewalks. They're doing it the way they should do it.

Because they're using it as a legitimate form of transportation, not as part of a pub crawl. Exactly. Yes, exactly. They're not slamming a six-pack and going for a tool on their bird. Yes. And, Brian, I don't know if you've noticed this, but tis the season for spam.

Oh, Black Friday is here. And I've gotten so many emails from companies that I thought had gone out of business, never wanted to hear from again. And I'm sure several of them that I have unsubscribed from several times. Yes, the never being able to unsubscribe.

When you unsubscribe now, it just gets you off their weekly mailer. It doesn't get you off their seasonal mailers. Yeah, yeah. Oh, you unsubscribe from, yeah, that one. And we're still going to send you stuff. Come on. We got your email. We can't just throw it away. That would be, you know, bad business.

That would be bad marketing. Not to mention illegal, but, hey, there's no such thing as the internet police. No internet police. Yeah. That's right. In the news. Brian, we've gotten a lot of email about this topic, and I just wanted to cover it real quick.

Just do a hit and run on it. It's about Zillow, because everybody knows that we love to talk about AI, and Zillow got kicked in the nuts with their home buying AI, and the algorithm basically screwed them out, like out of just billions of dollars in market value.

This is kind of an ongoing story right now, and I'm kind of living it with my roommate, who is a real estate broker, and, you know, it's been covered in the news, so I just wanted to touch on it real quick. It is a bad, bad thing, but there's more stuff that's coming out, and that's why I've kind of been saving it.

Just the home buying side that Zillow was doing, it was just one facet of it, but there's another side with market manipulation that's going to be coming out probably pretty soon with class action lawsuits against them. That's where it gets juicy, so. I'm just kind of putting that one on hold right now, putting a pin in it.

But, yeah, it's pretty interesting that their home buying algorithm kicked them in the balls. And here's the thing. I don't believe it was an algorithm at all. I think it was people. I really do. Look, there's no way that an algorithm was given license to purchase properties.

I'm sure there was an algorithm in use that kicked things up, and then a person reviewed them and said, okay. Exactly. Exactly. It was just basically – it's basically a search bot that just sat there and said, okay, show me the houses that are coming up for sale. And then people took over, and the people made bad decisions.

It wasn't the algorithm that did it. They're just doing that for – to shift the blame. The real blame comes from the managers and the people on the – you know, with boots on the ground that actually paid for these properties. So, this is just shifting blame. AI is people. AI is people.

Motherfuckers. And then I saw this story, which I thought was actually kind of funny. Tesla's app server went down for a few hours at one point a couple days ago, leading to a worldwide app outage that left owners unable to connect to their cars. Gasp! Yes.

For those people who just use their phones instead of having the key card on them, that meant they were screwed. Now, I can also open my BMW with my phone app. But you know what's a lot easier? The little tiny fob that's in my pocket that I take with me everywhere.

Yeah. That's why they give it to you, Brian. This entire story and all the outrage that took place on Twitter, because that's where Elon Musk lives, is all, as your favorite phrase is, is a bit of a tempest in a teapot because you've got a fucking fob.

Yeah. Use it. We gave you a key for a reason. Yeah, the other one is just for convenience. But if that doesn't work, reach in your pocket, get the fucking key. Yes. Okay. I think we're done with that story. That was a quickie.

Damn. Yep. So, back into drone news, something new that we haven't seen in a while. Zipline has started doing deliveries with Walmart in Pea Ridge, Arkansas. Okay. Yep. These are the ones that are kind of like the model airplanes with the parachutes on them.

It's not like a quadcopter drone. This one, like, flies over your house and does a strafing run and drops your goods, hopefully somewhere where you can get it. And hopefully they don't confuse them with, like, one of the ones that they use in Afghanistan. Yeah, that would be bad. That would be bad.

But, you know. But more accurate. Oh, shit. That's true. Probably they are. Much better delivery. Yep. Yeah. Much better delivery of that payload. But, yeah, it's interesting to see that these things are still going because you haven't heard about this stuff for a while.

I know Zipline was big in Africa delivering vaccines, which is a really good use of the technology because it's, like, out in the wilderness, you know, taking vaccines and drugs to far-off places that, you know, would take forever to get to or you couldn't even get to.

But this is Arkansas. Pretty sure they can get to the store, but I don't know. It is Arkansas. All right. And then NFTs have been in the news a lot this week, and mostly because of things that we like, which is people trolling the hell out of these people, which is just great.

There's a really funny article over at Slate called How to Troll an NFT Owner. You know, it gets into things like tell them that they're basically – so these are just really like beanie babies, right? The other one I saw was NFTs are essential oils for men. Yeah, that one was awesome.

That one really made me laugh. So, you know, it gets into all the foibles of them and the problems of which we've discussed ad nauseum on this podcast. And I did find this one funny, this little sentence in here. But ultimately, many crypto boosters think that what may seem like a weakness in the technology is actually a strength.

NFTs make it possible for art to be both profitable and freely available. Yes, it is possible for you to spend a lot of money on something that everybody else can also have. Free. Great. I mean, I get the theory there.

The artist is going to get paid. But as we've talked about, this is like becoming a YouTube star. The chances of you being the artist that's actually going to make any money is so infinitesimally small. It's unbelievable. Right. Yeah. Like we covered. You're going to be lucky.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. We covered last week the numbers. The numbers is like there are no people that are selling NFTs on a reasonable scale where you could actually make any money. The big people who are making out with this are money launderers and ransomware guys who are trying to, you know, burn some crypto to hide it from the governments.

And Matthew the Swede sent us a link saying if Swedes know how it's done. And this is the NFT Bay, which shares a multi-terabyte archive of all the pirated NFTs available ever anywhere. It's being called the billion dollar torrent because it includes all the NFTs on the Ethereum and Solana blockchain, blockchains, blackchains, whatever.

So done with all these stories. So it's funny. I almost went and got this because I was going to go to my storage unit and raid my old chia farm because I've got a 16 terabyte, a couple 16 terabyte drives sitting around there collecting dust. Then I'm like, you know, no, I really just don't give a shit.

Yeah, why? Exactly. What I love about it is the person that packaged this thought was thoughtful enough and knows enough about the etiquette of the Pirate Bay and things of that nature that they included, you know, the lovely little text file that explains everything that's in the drop that you've got here, which says this handy torrent contains all of the NFTs so that future generations can study this generation's tulip mania and collectively go.

So what the fuck, we destroyed our planet for this? I saw somebody else that took one of the NFT drops and then took them all and made a collage that was a, you know, like one of those larger images and made of smaller images.

And it was basically an image of somebody. Like the Truman Show artwork. Yes. Which, by the way, we worked on. I remember. Yeah. With somebody right clicking. It's just a hand right clicking. So good. Fucking genius. It was genius.

Oh, my God. And a hat tip to Pedro about this story, continuing on with this sort of stuff. And this is kind of sad news. Not that I particularly like the name the Staples Center because, you know, why in Los Angeles? But I've been there many times and it's been the Staples Center for forever as far as I'm concerned, as long as I can remember.

Yeah. It's not anymore. Now it's the crypto.com center. No, it's not, Brian. What? You've been out of L.A. for a while. Guess what everybody here calls it? What? The crypt. Oh, I have that. Now, see? Now I'm on board.

That's catchy. That's right. Everybody here just calls it the crypt. Yeah. Well, the crypto.com, which is a Singapore firm that, of course, you know, allows users to buy, sell and pay with cryptocurrencies, has paid over $700 million for 20 years to be called.

Well, what they were hoping was the crypto.com center, but it's now just the crypt. Just the crypt. $35 million a year. That's among the priciest deals ever. I do hope that they got all of the money up front. Yep, seriously. Because I can't imagine that crypto.com is going to be around for 20 years and being able to pay all that much money.

And it did immediately make me think of the Enron Center. Yep. Which is now long gone and is basically called the Minute Maid Center now. What was that? Pets.com Park? Yep, that one too. The home of the Philadelphia Flyers, which was Wachovia Center, which is now Wells Fargo Center.

Yeah. So good luck with that. Have fun. Yeah, seriously. This will be gone in two years. The crypt. I love that. Yep. God bless you, L.A. I love you. We do some things right here. You do. You do. It's really good. And we've got some news about right to repair.

Apple has done it about Face, probably just to get ahead of the regulations, which are coming anyways. But they're also saying in this article that there was a lot of internal pressure, that Apple employees were up for this as well and said we should be doing this. So they will start selling parts and tools direct to consumer and offer repair guides.

So good. That's great. Still, good luck getting those things open and changing anything. Yeah, that's why you have to get the tools. But there was also a shareholder lawsuit that people aren't covering, too. So there was a lot of stuff going on behind the scenes. This was inevitable. This was going to happen. Yes. Well, I'm glad that they're doing it.

And the fact that the biggest company in the world is doing it is a good thing. Yeah. The problem here is also that they're only doing it for iPhone 12s and 13s. The generation of phones that don't really need, like, battery replacements, things like that yet.

So, you know, it's getting ahead of it, but we'll see. And, Brian, we have reached – what was it in the Terminator, the day that the Skynet became sentient? Judgment Day. Yeah, Judgment Day. We've reached Judgment Day. OpenAI makes GPT-3 generally available now.

Sweet. We don't have to do our own podcast anymore. Well, we still have to read it. Here it comes, everybody. Yeah. Crypt, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep, deep. There, done. Apple pie, book of face, tube of you.

Yeah, so I signed up this morning. I haven't gotten my dirty little paws on it yet, but oh, you know I will be. Oh, you know I will be. Coming to you soon, The Pivoteer Daily. Exactly. Change your job. Don't be a pussy. Come on. You can do it.

Done. Fuck everybody. Yeah. How come nobody's seeing my tweets? Oh, we're going to talk about that in a second. Oh, that's going to be a fun one.

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Media candy. The Orville. I finally found out when it's coming back. Brian, and it is March 10th, 2022. I did the deep research of going to Seth MacFarlane's Twitter account where he says in his bio, The Orville, New Horizons, coming to Hulu, March 10th, 2022.

So there we go. Okay. That's all I had to do. That's all I had to do. That's interesting. Yep. Okay. Ah, and 25 years ago yesterday, Brian, Star Trek First Contact came out in theaters. That was the website that pretty much launched my career for the next 20 years.

We melted an SGI that day. Literally, we burned the hard drive to the ground. And this is on 5.7 million hits. That's it. And these are hits, not visits, because there were more graphics per page in this website.

I mean, it was ridiculous. The tables that we had to do to make the Akutagrams were insane. I threw in a graphic in the show notes that you can see, Brian. I was very bummed, though. Our good friend Dave Riegler, who worked on it with me, did not get credit in the Hollywood Reporter ad that came out.

But yeah, that was one hell of a day. So that means I've known you for over 25 years, because when I moved to BoxStop and started working with you is when I started working on First Contact. That's right. That's right. And I see BoxStop is credited there. Yep.

Yep. For, yeah, because contractually they had to be, sadly. Even though, yeah. But I will let you know that the site lives on on my iPhone. I'm still using all those audio samples. That's good. That's good. Yep. Yeah.

No. So I have literally known you for more than half my life now. Yeah. Yeah, you have. And shortly after you left, BoxStop, I left as well and started my own illustrious career, which reminds me that, you know, around the same time, this came up, and I watched this last night, the Jagged documentary, the Alanis Morissette documentary about Jagged Little Pill.

I started working with her just after that album, but so many familiar faces in the documentary. And some people I'm still friends with, some people I'm Facebook friends with and lost touch with, but it was so great to see so many familiar faces from so long ago.

I could easily talk about this documentary for two or three hours. I could get snarky about it, but actually, when it was done, I just felt a sense of gratitude of living through that period and living through that life, not just with her, with all the artists that I work with.

I'm so happy I'm not doing it anymore because I'm old now, but I did just, you know, I put down the remote and I kind of just sat there and I grabbed myself a little splash of whiskey and I just sat there and went, God, what a privilege it was to live the life that I lived back then, how fun it was and how exciting and being around such creative people and such creative environments, going on tour with artists, going into the studio with them.

Man, it was a good time. It was a good time. Back when building websites was fun. Yeah. And, you know, as far as the controversy about the documentary, I don't get it, but I do get it. You know, I think the thing that pissed Alanis off was it was a pretty linear documentary, but then they break the linear structure to go back and revisit the kind of controversial part of her being 15 and 16 and basically saying, yeah, I was 15 and these people basically raped me.

And there was no reason to return to that after they got past it chronologically, but the director decided, let's hit that point again and let's hit it hard. And I think that's the thing that pissed her off. Yeah, it makes sense. Makes sense. Makes sense to me. And speaking of things that pissed me off, Star Trek Discovery season four is here.

For some people. For some people. Yes. That was a big brouhaha because it was announced and then it was like, oh, sorry, only in North America. You, everybody else has to wait. Yep. So. So what'd you think? It looks good.

You know, the problem I have with it and somebody tweeted something about this and I can't remember who it was or the exact wording. It's not Star Trek. Nobody follows orders. Everybody just does whatever the fuck they want to do. That's not fed. That's not how the Federation works.

Right. Unless you're Captain Kirk. Yeah. Yeah. Nobody follows orders. Everybody just does whatever they want. There's, there's no repercussions for breaking the rules for any of these characters. Well, because it usually works out. That's the problem.

Yeah. Because it always seems to work out. So it's sci-fi and it's action adventure, but it's not fucking Star Trek. Yeah. I'm with you on that one, bro. Yep. I just called you bro. What's wrong with me? I know. That's fucking weird. Yeah. This isn't Grumpy Old Geeks anymore. Let's go meet at the crypt, bro.

Let's go to the crypt, bro. Fucking Christ. Bro-y Old Geeks. Yeah. I watched it last night and yeah, I, you know, I wasn't going to, but you put it in the notes. So I kind of felt like I needed to for work. Yeah.

For work. So it's, I don't know. I just, I did not get into it. I still don't, I still don't like it. That's a thing. Yeah. I don't know where they're going to go with it. It's, it's just, everybody does whatever they want. And that's not, that's not the Star Trek I know. Yeah. I mean, like we were just talking about first contact, you know, compare the two.

Oh, this is the one thing somebody on, on discord actually pointed out too. The old cast, like the bridge crew, it was an ensemble. It was an ensemble cast, right? Yeah. Everybody worked together. They were a team. It was like a great band.

This is not, this is a bunch of individuals. It's a bunch of solo artists running around, breaking the rules. Exactly. It's like you put a bunch of lead singers in a room and see what they come up with and it's going to be garbage. Yeah. We are the world. Exactly. Fuck you, Bob Geldof. Yeah.

I think, I think this is the, we are the world of Star Trek. Yeah. It's just, it's not great. I mean, I'll probably still watch it because I'm a sucker, but yeah. Yeah. So I saw this over at the Hollywood Reporter and it's, the title is, I was reading it because it said dope sick.

And the title is scenes from a marriage, dope sick, cowboy bebop showrunners on adapting source material for TV. And then I got to the part where they talk about foundation and said it took two hours for showrunner David S. Goyer to outline the thousand year journey depicted in Isaac Asimov's expansive book series in his pitch to Apple TV plus.

And yeah, he kind of laid it out for him and, you know, it took him, took him a couple of tries at bat to get this thing through. But I'm reading this and I'm just like, yeah, they took plenty of liberties with the material and there was one plot point Goyer wouldn't budge on.

There's a character called the mule who is one of the great villains of modern literature. And because the mule is so phenomenal, prior attempts to adapt foundation always wanted to bring the mule in from day one. When I sat down with Apple, I said, we need to earn the mule. And so that's why it's going to be a multi-series dealio, I guess.

But I see, I dropped the books before I got to the mule, but. Ah, it's great. Absolutely phenomenal. That's what you've been saying, but. He's right about the fact that you have to earn it. You do have to earn it, but they've broken so many. They've broken so many plot points from the original foundation now.

You know, I finished the series, obviously. It's good sci-fi, but it. Is it? I have to just, I have to just start calling it not foundation. Yeah, but is it good sci-fi? I found myself. I don't know. Like really. I don't know anymore. Yeah, I don't think it is.

I actually, like when I, when I was done with the last episode of the season, I'm like, this was kind of shitty. This was kind of like really shitty. So. I hated the last episode. Absolutely hated it. It was awful. It was just flat out awful. Sorry. It was awful.

Yep. What do we got next? I watched Wheel of Time. It's a Jeff Bezos attempt to take on Game of Thrones. Yeah. Another three episodes in. Love it. Hated it. Ten minutes. I love it. I like it. It's so much better than what was that stupid one that was on HBO.

Absolutely horrible one from the big, huge director. Oh God. I don't know. There's so many horrible ones now. Yeah. It's better than most. And given the bad taste in my mouth from the last season of Game of Thrones, I'm okay with this. I liked it. I thought it was fun. I'm just sick of people with fake British accents riding around on horses with magical powers.

I'm sick of that shit. I mean, seriously. I got to tell you, though, the redhead kid guy, that's not a fake British accent. And I could not stop thinking this ties in a little bit with my time in the music industry. I could not stop thinking of Chris Martin.

Chris Martin from Coldplay so desperately wanted to be an actor. This guy has the exact same mannerisms, almost the exact same accent. I was like, oh, if Chris Martin could go back in time. This is his wet dream. That's too funny.

Yeah. No, I just – I couldn't get into it. I tried. I tried because I saw many tweets and said, thank God Wheel of Time didn't suck. And I'm like, yeah, it did. Oh, I think it's a lot of people that have read the books that are saying that. So maybe this is a more faithful adaptation than some of the stuff we've been watching.

Well, here's – well, let me ask you this. You should probably figure this out. Is the book series done? Because I think that was the downfall of Game of Thrones is that George R.R. Martin never even finished the damn books. A hundred percent. That was the problem there. So I have no idea. I've never read the series, never even thought about the series.

I've heard about it a lot of times. But usually this sort of thing isn't – I get my fill of this sort of thing from Lord of the Rings. That's all I need of like running around in medieval shit with magic. Yeah. But speaking of a series from books, we got The Expanse in like two weeks.

I know. I saw that. But you were not excited about that. You told me you said you were done with it as far as you were concerned. I'll watch it because it's only half a season. I'll finish it out for sure. Might as well. Yeah, I didn't get giddy about it. You know, my panties weren't moist, but I just – I'll still watch it. But yeah.

Thanks for the visual. Meet you at the Crypt, bro. You're welcome, bro. And Barrett wrote in, just watch four hours at the Capitol. That was a tough watch. Really hated how they gave the traders a forum to speak. I agree with that 100%. That was, I think, my review of that. Really felt like the Capitol Police should have used way more force.

Anyway, on a happier note, Jason might enjoy a choice of weapons inspired by Gordon Parks to geek out to some good photography goodness on HBO Max. Yeah, I had that in my watch list. I was actually going to watch it last night, but I wasted an hour of my life watching Discovery. Yeah.

Silly me. Silly me. I saw this one, and we get back to the NFTs, and this – you know, we've had boy bands forever. But now we have the NFT band. Universal Forms Metaverse Band Based on Bored Ape Yacht Club NFTs.

I just fucking give up, Brian. I give up. Let them do what the fuck they want. It's, you know, it's just a pre-monetized, non-artsy version of Gorillaz, which was based on comic book characters. And it was a virtual band until it became an actually very, very, very, very, very good real band.

You know, they're just cashing in like everybody else. Why not? Go ahead. Who cares? Okay. I don't give a shit. I'm never going to listen. I'm not going to buy any of the NFTs. Well, you can't. They haven't even thought about the music yet. They haven't even thought about the music yet. They have a band manager, and they're trying to figure out what they're going to do for music.

Like, this is all just fucking publicity play to sell some fucking NFTs. That's why I'm just shaking my head. I'm like, they just didn't even think anything through it. It's like, okay, let's put out a press release. It's literally just a press release. Ups and doodads.

Brian, it's Black Friday season, month, several months. However they do it nowadays. My wife is losing her mind. Clickety-clackety-click. Click, click, click. Deal, deal, deal. Bye, bye, bye. Retirement going out the window. Nah, it's okay. She's taking on the Christmas shopping duties, and thank God for that.

I don't want to do it. I came across the Buy Nothing project. Two chicks started this back in 2013. One of those hippy-dippy, don't-buy-anything-new, gift-and-re-gift kind of things. Yep. And then I noticed the URL.

It's bnponfb.org. I'm like, okay, Buy Nothing project on FB? On Facebook? Really? Turns out that their entire organization is run off of Facebook groups. Ooh, somebody go grab bnponmeta.org right now.

True that. Well, I guess Facebook will still stay the same. But if they want to get ahead of the times, they really should. They can swap around the Oculus headsets. But I'm like- Look, it 100% makes sense that they're on Facebook. It's so much easier. They don't have to set up any of their infrastructure.

Everybody's there already. You've got the- Theoretically, you've got face recognition. You know who it is. You know what they look like. You know where they live. You know if they're local to you, so you can swap things easily. I get it. You know, just be aware of the fact that at some point, Facebook will sweep your business out from underneath you.

Well, not even that. It's just the irony that Facebook is built on advertising to buy shit. For me, that was the ironic part. Right. Yeah. No, I just thought it was very funny. But if you're into that kind of thing, go for it. Hey, it's a great thing to do.

I love that idea. I think buying nothing is ridiculous. It should be the buy less project. Yeah. My friend Mickey Crimmel long ago did a project called Neighbor Goods, which I thought was a great project, and you basically put up, you know, the stuff that you're willing to loan out to your neighbors.

Like, I got a leaf blower that anybody could come and borrow. I got a weed whacker that anybody could come and borrow. Things like that. And sadly, it didn't get the traction that I thought it deserved. But same kind of, you know, mentality, I guess. I saw this headline, and I just kind of shook my head, and it says, yes, you do need a smart earwax remover.

And the Spade Mini is on sale for under $40. I have seen advertisements for this and similar products. I had no idea earwax removal was such an issue. I do feel like we've just gotten to the Home Shopping Network commodification on the internet right now where, you know, it's like all those commercials where they show, like, how difficult it is for some people to make pasta, apparently.

So, therefore, you need this special pasta dish. I know. You know, because they, like, pick up the thing, and it spills all over the floor because they're fucking morons. And no, that never happens to anybody. And no, it's not that difficult. It's so funny. Somebody gifted me one of those pasta pots with a built-in strainer.

Yeah. And I finally figured it out that that's what it was. And I'm like, and I tried it, and I'm like, well, shit, this is actually fairly convenient. But it did not replace my strainer for any way, shape, or form. But this is a thing you put in your ear that has a camera on it so you can go hunting in your head for your earwax.

Yeah, great. Another internet of things, you know, debacle just waiting to happen. Look, first off, in general, earwax is there for a reason. There are occasions when you can get buildup, and it can be a bit too much, and that can be problematic. And usually, that's a medical condition.

I had that at one point in time in my life. They sell this great little liquid that you drop into your ear, and it dissolves the earwax, and the earwax runs out. And you probably will have to do that twice in your entire life, maybe. Maybe, maybe. Maybe. I've never had to do it. Otherwise, leave it alone.

Yeah. And, you know, if nothing else, your AirPods will take them out. Oh, God. Yes. The AirPods. The AirPods, which are on their way out, it seems, because kids are going back to the wired headphones, according to the Wall Street Journal. And my first thought was, slow news day.

Then my second thought was, betterage? Are AirPods out? Well, probably not. No. And then I was thinking, I kind of miss cabled headphones. Here's the thing. And I've read the article. Maybe not this article, but there's copycat articles out there now, of course, because that's what happens.

And I've walked the streets now, because I walk to commute to work and back, and I've seen kids pass by a couple, like, I think two high schools on my way. Yeah, more wired headphones than I've seen in a long time. But the article gets into, maybe the reason is because they're fucking expensive, and kids lose shit, and parents aren't going to replace it anymore.

Ah, good point. Good point. Yes. Yeah, you can get a good deal on wired headphones. Yeah, they're cheaper. Well, the sad part is- Significantly. Yeah, significantly cheaper. I'm very bummed, though, because Sennheiser stopped making those wired earbuds that we both really liked.

You can't get those anymore. I got, like, one pair left, and I'm hanging onto them for dear life, because they're the best-sounding earbuds that I've ever had. Yeah, they're phenomenal. I love them. Yeah. Yeah, and the other thing is, of course, the power issue, and kids are on their headphones all day long, every day.

True. And wired AirPods will- or unwired AirPods, you know, the normal AirPods that don't have wires. Yeah. Those will run out of juice pretty quick for a kid. Yeah, you only get, like, three hours on them. Mm-hmm. So, that doesn't really do it. But, yeah.

So, that's the way it goes. I, you know, I'm fine with it. I totally don't care either way. I don't care either way. I've got my AirPods, and they're great for my commute, and they're great for workouts and biking and things of that nature. I have wired pair of headphones.

I always have those for plane flights, which used to be an issue, but for the last two years hasn't been, but maybe will be again now, thankfully. I got both. I got them both in my bag all the time. Yeah. I think for, you know, for travel, I've got the Bose QuietComfort 2s. So, and those actually require physical batteries, believe it or not.

But, you know, you can swap those out, which is kind of a nice thing, honestly, being able to just juice it up when you need to. But they last a hell of a lot longer than AirPods. But, yeah, I'm fine with that. Good for them. Whatever. I just don't think it's a big deal. I don't think it's a thing.

That's why I said slow news day. I'm like, Wall Street Journal, really? And I found this one and I sent it to basically everybody I know. It's called Super Agent Automatic Cookie Consent. It's a browser plugin that clicks those stupid little cookie pop-ups for you.

Have you installed it and tried it? Yep. It's wonderful. It is wonderful. It is wonderful. I've gotten, like, maybe two of them so far. Actually, you know what? You know what? Those two were on my phone. They weren't even on the... Yeah, yeah. No, I haven't seen any more on my computer at all.

They're great. Yep. It's awesome. Yeah, it's free. Go get it. It's free. You'll never see one of those pop-ups again. Where was this 10 years ago? Or however long those damn cookie pop-ups have been plaguing us. I'm curious. Did you set yours to yes or no?

I didn't set it for anything. I just installed it and let it run. Okay. I set mine to no. So I'm curious to see if functionality on any sites I visit is going to go down. I should go back and actually set that, I guess. But I'm lazy. But I did pay for Twitter Blue this week.

Okay. The $2.99 Twitter version that lets you, you know... Turn Twitter into MySpace? Wait, can you do Twinkly Background? Can you set your top five friends now? No, you can't. Can you set your top five friends? No? And surprisingly, there's still ads. There's still fucking ads.

Well, they never said that they were going to get rid of all the ads. That's why when they announced Twitter Blue, everybody started scratching their heads. They're like, who needs any of this? All we want is an ad-free version. Yeah. I mean, the things you can do... With a regular timeline. That's all we want. Yeah.

I mean, you can get the regular timeline for free. Just click on latest tweets and keep it there. Yeah. And it doesn't flip back every time like it used to. Okay. So it pretty much stays now. It sticks. But you can post longer videos if you want.

You can... You get free... More things for me not to watch. Yeah. You get ad-free articles on a bunch of different publications, which is nice. So I made a list of all the news publications that I follow. So I can just, you know, get those in a thing and then I can pop through those if I want.

No big deal there. But here's the thing that has me scratching my head, Brian. Mm-hmm. Since I signed up for Twitter Blue, my engagement with my fellow readers has gone through the floor. It's like the algorithm has delisted me.

And... I have thoughts. Please bring them on. Well, I looked through your tweets from last night. And if you're looking for engagement, I'm not entirely sure that pretty angry tweets about obscure punk bands from 30 years ago is going to get you a lot of engagement.

Well, see, that's the... I'm just saying. Everything that I was posting last night was because I was trying to get people to say something. But here's the thing. The algorithm check that I did, I did... I actually posted a tweet that said something like, you know, algorithm seed check.

And I posted a bunch of stuff that should get people mad at me for saying it. And nothing. Nothing at all. You don't use hashtags. You don't tag anybody on your posts. You don't do any of the things that people do for engagement. I usually don't have to because, I mean, I've only got like 3,000 followers.

But I usually get like anywhere between five and ten pieces of engagement per tweet. And I got zero. And I've gotten zero since I moved to Twitter Blue, which is interesting, I think. Here's a simple test. Cancel Twitter Blue and see what happens. But I'm stuck for a month.

I'm stuck with it for a damn month. So, but it was also interesting that I paid through... So, Apple got a dollar of my $3 because I had to pay through the... Using my phone through Apple's payment scheme. So, it's interesting.

It's interesting. So, they only get two bucks. Okay, Karish Slisher. No, I'm just saying. I'm just... I'm pointing out facts here. That's all I'm doing. I'm just pointing out facts. No, you're just doing the it's interesting thing. Remember? Oh, Jesus Christ. That's all Karish Slisher ever says. It's interesting. Yeah, it's interesting. Except I'm putting in my opinion and facts and actually saying something else.

It's interesting. She doesn't do. What do you think? It's interesting. Yeah, Brian. What do you think about my engagement problem? What do you think? Well, I think it's interesting. What do you think? I can't believe she's like the biggest podcaster in the fucking world. Anyways. Jason wrote in, says, hey guys, I remember you saying how much of a pain smart light bulbs are because you still have switches in your house.

Amazon just came out with these cheaper smart light switches. And he's got the link over there. Amazon basic single pole smart switch works with Alexa neutral wire required certified for humans device. And it says, I tried a few of them, a dimmer and a regular, and they are fantastic. Keeps the switch in your house and you can use the lady in the tube if you want to set up routines, et cetera.

And you still have the wall switch. So human beings who come to visit, you know how to turn on the light. Love the show. Fantastic. I'm going to check these out. That is a good solution that will make my wife happy because she hated the fact that like I would turn on lights and then the switch wouldn't know where the hell you were.

And if you switch to the switch, it wouldn't switch to the switch and blah, blah, blah. So. Can't do the switch to the switch to the other switch. Yeah. It's just a need. If the switch knows what state it's in, then perfect. I love that. That's fantastic. All right. Let us know. Over at Patreon, we've got Benjamin and Jed.

Thank you, guys. Thank you. Over at PayPal, we've got Tom, Michael, Michelle, Andrew, John, another Tom, another Jean-Andre, a Joseph, a Mark, and a Christopher with a big old $50 fucking bop kiss. Thank you. Thank you very much, Christopher. We appreciate it. Over at Stripe, we've got Theodore L, Ross W, and Karen B.

Thank you all. Thanks to everybody who is helping us keep the lights on because we really could use it right now. Jason needs some cash. We got some iTunes ratings. We got a five-star from... Obviously, he had a stroke and collapsed on his keyboard.

Entertaining way to kill an hour. They hate everything about the internet, but there isn't much to be helpful, so can't blame them. Accurate. Yeah. And Gabriel Pagan wrote this one in four stars. This is a five-star show. Gave it four stars just to annoy Jason. Fuck you, Gabriel. I love how he piled onto your week.

It's the best. I know. Until next time, I'm Brian Schulmeister. And I'm Jason DeFillippo, and happy Thanksgiving to everybody in the United States of America. Ate some turkey and have some stuffing. And thank you for listening to Grumpy Old Geeks. If you enjoyed the show, visit gog.show slash donate to help us keep the lights on, and we'll love you forever.

You can also help us out by sharing the show with your friends and enemies. It's easy and absolutely free. Show notes for this episode are at gog.show slash 532. From there, you can find links to everything we talked about in this episode, as well as links to our swag and Discord channel if you want to buy some stuff or chat with us and other show fans.

You can also head over to gog.show slash contact 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 review and toss us a snarky review and preferably five stars, Gabriel. Stay grumpy and we're taking next week off.

So you guys have to live without us for a little bit. Don't be sad. We'll be back.

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