That comes from a radio station like WBAI is clearly, clearly invaluable, and we need to keep this going on. 
And once again, that number again is 833-WBAI-NYC or 833-922-4692. 
Off the Hook is coming up. 
It is 7 p.m., and this is WBAI New York. 
We'll be right back. 
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Thank you for listening to Off The Hook. 
The telephone keeps ringing, so I ripped it off the wall. 
I cut myself while shaving, now I can't make a cough. 
We couldn't get much worse, but if they could, they would. 
Bundedly bump, but the best is back the worst. 
I hope that's understood. 
Bundedly bump! 
Bundedly bump! 
Bundedly bump! 
and a very good evening to everybody the program is off the hook here on wbai this is emmanuel goldstein joined tonight by kyle uh yes hello hi everyone happy okay let me just stop you right there kyle this is not that kind of a radio program we we are trying to do a serious job here uh you apparently fixed some kind of robot or something and um uh yeah a normal voice maybe yeah i'm here oh okay good good that's all i ask uh out there in skype land we have rob t firefly good evening welcome back we have uh gila good evening also welcome back and we have alex you do indeed good evening welcome well uh tonight is a very important um night for wbai uh because we are in the middle of a phone drive and i know you've heard that sentence many many times over the years but this is different this is different we have a whole new cast of characters here uh who are really really um uh working their tails off to get this place back into shape and they are doing a tremendous job it's it's the spirit here has just been incredible uh over the past couple of months uh and what we have tonight is a part of a phone drive that is only lasting i think it's less than a week and here's the thing instead of sounding like the home shopping network uh we are going to be just very upfront and honest with you um we need your support to keep the radio station going and what you get out of that is the radio station what you get out of that are programs like off the hook and so many others if you just listen to 99.5 fm in new york city you will be treated to a plethora of viewpoints and opinions music um culture all sorts of things um 24 hours a day seven days a week that is the premium that is what it's all about please support us so that we can continue to be on the air talking about all sorts of things and in our case we talk about technology we talk about um the latest in hacking we talk about privacy consumer affairs you name it anything having to do with a telephone or a computer we are interested in phone number is and this is cool we even have a new phone number 833 which is a toll-free area code by the way 833 wbai nyc how cool is that yeah 833 wbai nyc now if you don't have uh letters on your phone get a new phone if you don't have letters on your phone but if you don't um i'll help you out here 833-922-4692 833-922-4692 now you even get a human you might get voicemail if you get voicemail simply leave information to be called back uh and uh you will be and um we're asking people to become bai buddies what a bai buddy is is somebody who pledges a set amount every month can be as as small or as big as you wish it to be and what happens is in 12 months well that that figure is 12 times what it is you're pledging and it's really awesome and it's one of the the main sources of our budget right now so please um help us out by either calling 833-922-4692 833 wbai nyc or going to the website and this is also new buddy.wbai.org buddy.wbai.org on that site you'll find all kinds of information on how uh you can pledge a particular amount each month and um please tell your friends again this is only happening for a few days and it will determine and you might have heard this on some other programs it will determine how this radio station survives into the future or if it survives into the future not to sound too dire but it's um it's really important that we have enough money to pay the bills we don't have commercials we um don't really have many sources of funding our listeners are pretty much the only investors that we have and it's operated that way since 1960 we hope it can operate that way until 2060 because this kind of radio is very much alive this kind of radio is what true listeners appreciate yeah if you turn on you know uh the top 40 station uh or the easy listening station it's background music you have it on you know just to calm your nerves and i understand that wbai maybe won't calm your nerves it can but it will also make you think and these days we need thinking people to be out there to be debating discussing and um when we have a listener to our radio station they tend to stick around they tend to engage they tend to either agree passionately or disagree passionately we we like both because it's the conversation that makes things interesting now what we're going to have in the background um uh during this one hour that we are on uh is um part of a clip show that we put together on our 20th anniversary and this is going to make us seem really ancient uh because this show aired in 2008 yeah and that was our 20th anniversary so uh you can imagine how close we're getting to our 40th anniversary at this point um we're just going to step back in in time for a moment uh and and just step away for a second uh but we'll be um we'll be cutting in and out of this um uh this special piece that we put together so what you may ask is this program all about well we come here and we discuss technology technology uh gone astray technology run amok technology perhaps turning upon its masters kind of thing that happens all the time and the kind of thing that computer hackers among many others have a handle on that's why there's much we can learn through the world of hacking through the world of telephone freaks and just general education something that uh there is certainly a lack of these days technology wise we can't figure out how to make phone calls we can't figure out how to get our own credit reports we don't know what's in computer files about us we know very little hey team t how can we help you hi i'm trying to find out an area code um i believe it's in california and the name is drakes bad the area code there you uh drakes bad california yeah have you ever heard of that uh i'll check it for you thank you d-r-a-k-e-s yeah uh and a contraction across the case you have a lot of drakes you have a lot of drakes you have drakes bad number one drakes bad number two drakes bad number three all the way up to a nine up all the way up to nine i wonder which one i need uh you have them all the way up to number 17 uh-oh got them up to uh 25 they're all the same area code 916 oh they're all 916 okay all right what is that special kind of uh well i thought it was it was just a place but apparently this uh how many of them did you say i guess there's a lot of them you have a listing up tool number 36 up to number 36 it makes bad number one number two all the way up to 36 boy i guess they ran out of names for cities eh yeah right okay thanks for 916 for all of them 916 okay thank you can you connect me to uh 916 information please oh no problem sir thank you if you're the 18th have a good night you too here we go this is i mean what city please uh yes hello uh is this the 916 area code yes sir hi i'm trying to find the number for drakes bad california yes okay and what number did you need there uh well let's see um yeah i believe it's just listed as drakes bad you know i don't i don't think it's anything more than that okay sir then you need to call the operator first and ask for drakes bed drakes bad number two agent you help can we help you uh yes hello i'd like to place a call please to uh drakes bad number two california uh that's it drakes bad number two okay come on i need your help he's calling drakes bad number two california how do you get that systemville inward may help you yes operator drakes bad california what's your number drakes bad operator uh sir what number uh i was trying to reach drakes bad number two certainly thank you how can i dial that direct pardon can i dial that direct no it's a toll station we have to key it in for you you mean there's still places in the united states you can't call direct right oh boy direct dial rate uh-huh and that's it ringing now well i hope it's it ringing oh well i guess they're not home uh well so much for that all right we're gonna we're gonna step away from that that was from our eclipse show which aired on december 24th 2008 i don't know when that particular adventure that we uh we inserted in there uh actually aired but that was uh basically a step back into um uh the the kinds of things that used to exist in this country toll stations where you basically uh had to go through an operator to get a particular number to ring this kind of thing would not exist without wbai because we wouldn't have had a radio show we wouldn't have been able to document all this that is one major reason why i think you should be supporting wbai to keep this kind of thing going now there are no more no more toll stations uh we won't have calls like that but we will have all kinds of other things and we're about to feature one right now but first i just want to give out the phone number one more time 833-wbai-nyc 833-922-4692 or go to the website buddy.wbai.org and uh become a bai buddy uh if if in fact it is true say that off the hook is your favorite radio show or you'd like to pledge on behalf of that show and um that'll look good for us now what i'd like to um uh just go around a little bit ask people if they have anything they want to add uh to entice people to call up and support the radio station uh and then we'll start moving on to some um some interesting topics uh alex i believe you're first or i've got a lot i can add and you know i think it's easy for wbai listeners to become complacent in some respects and just think that the station is going to weather the storm no matter what it is because wbai has always weathered the storm emmanuel how many years has wbai been on the air right now i've heard to put you on the spot i know you're bad at math no i actually already said it we've been on since 1960 uh okay but how many years is that how many years is that that's that's 20 uh 24 i don't know uh yeah you did put 64 years there you go pretty easy to do actually wonderful well well you know for some of us but i know we appreciate that this is difficult for you but i think 64 years of being on the air uh it's kind of amazing what wbai has been through i've been listening since i was 15 or so years old um in the 90s right so the 90s i've seen wbai go through so many storms i mean literally tumultuous times where do you remember i always bring this up do you remember when we had the nypd in the hallway of 110 brought uh 110 we're on 110 wall street at the time and memory's starting to fade alex isn't it memory's starting to go with your age well you know what they say when your memory goes forget it it's 120 wall street by the way it's 120 wall street that's right exactly 120 wall street we've got the cops literally in the building i'm out you're on the air i'm out there with a cell phone and the cops are saying that everybody is going to be arrested unless they leave the station and then outside the station when we came out we were like heroes that night there was a massive amount of people that rallied around the station then the station was this was in the throes of um the corporate takeover of pacifica well it's a little more complex there was a whole uh power struggle going on i don't want to get into the details you can go back though and listen to that particular radio show i think that was uh in uh the year 2000 or 2001 it might have been early 2001 yeah uh and um uh basically we were just broadcasting what was going on in front of us as we tend to do if something is happening we will tell people what's going on and yeah that that resulted in a large amount of people coming to the station because they heard that it was being raided by the cops um so we've had all kinds of adventures like that yes we keep talking about that adventure but there are many many others that we have experienced since our first show back in 1988 uh just a just a few years ago there was a similar attempted coup and corporate takeover where you know literally people were locked out of the station and we had to file a lawsuit and then go and and uh appeal an order and i believe in the first appellate division in new york and we had people showing up into court there i mean we've been through so many storms i don't i don't want to make it seem like the only thing that happens to the station is that people are trying to take over the station that's one thing that happens but we also we occasionally have we have like 9-11 that's one thing that happened that's not that's not uh something that we like to remember either uh but we certainly had reaction to that uh perspective on that uh we we've had uh because our show is is generally on on wednesday sometimes it moved to tuesday but for for quite a while now we've been on wednesday but uh we've we've oftentimes had to talk about election results i remember 2016 was a particularly tough one uh and next week i don't know that might be a tough one too we'll just have to see but um the thing is it's it's not only the history it's not only what's what's happened in the world of both technology and just society in general um it's it's also the sounds that technology made if you were just listening now to that phone call that we were making to the toll station you'll hear all kinds of sounds there electromechanical switching things that don't exist anymore today and there are many many people who have captured those sounds and luckily we have captured those sounds both um on recording and live over the air uh when when people called us up as well uh so there's all kinds of perspective all kinds of history that we have captured and of course we've we've encoded all of it on our website um but the really important reason why you should support wbai is that other people have that chance to make history to make their own kind of history uh and that listeners can be a part of that as well i just you know i try to imagine what new york city would be like without a station like wbai it would not be the same new york city certainly not it it definitely would not and there's a sense of community i think that goes along with being a wbai listener and and and the knowledge that you're listening together with people that you're not alone when you're listening to the radio there's nobody tracking you there's nobody watching you you're not leaving an ip address anywhere on anybody else's server you've turned it you've tuned into the radio through the the miracle of physics right you're using you know terrestrial airwaves and physics to listen in on communications that nobody else knows that you're listening to and you're part of this community of listeners right now in the city that's all tuned in and listening to wbai there's something really special about that that does not exist anywhere else and the fact that this station exists for how many years was it man really again boy 64 years 64 years but let me let me also correct you on one other thing uh it's not just happening here in new york city uh first of all our signal spreads out considerably from new york city but also thanks to the internet it spreads out all around the world and thanks to archives it spreads out all throughout time so it's it's a real it's a it's a real um um a piece of history that we constantly have here at 99.5 also i i think the sense of community is there's there's two different communities that we're talking about here right now we have the wbai community and we also have the listener community for off the hook and i think they're both very very special you know we have the community that joins us every week for off the hook over time we have the community that has been listening to us as off the hook and shows up at at various conferences and things around the world know us you know for off the hook um and they're also part of the wbai community and i really hope that that off the hook community that listens to us as a podcast and maybe listening to us in the future at some time calls up 833 wbai dot um the wbai nyc or 833 922 4692 and supports the station because this i i really truly believe that um we are on to something so good it needs to be preserved and we are preserving history here as well now um uh with regards to that phone number uh the 833 toll free area code uh i believe people overseas cannot call that that area code correct me if i'm wrong but i think that's the case and if you're one of those people that wants to call 833 922 4692 uh to pledge your support um well you might be better off going to the website until we figure something else out or you can try you can try calling that area code see what happens that's kind of the hacker spirit right there uh but the website is buddy.wbai.org anyone else have anything they wish to uh to add rob go ahead yes indeed um i think one thing i can do to uh to really drive home how precious and special this place is is to give a short history lesson because uh long ago there was a man called louis schweitzer he was a rich guy he was he made his fortune in the paper business and uh he was he was an immigrant he was born in russia came to the united states did very very well for himself and bought himself a radio station at one point as sort of a vanity project but he got sick of uh dealing with it he didn't like the state of commercial radio at the time he was inspired by the story of kpfa and the pacifica radio network which uh which is a non-profit organization activist run um very much uh very much like it like today it's uh it's a force in community sponsored radio and he just gave his radio station to them a rich guy gave a bunch of activists and hippies and nuts and wonderful people a free radio station to just have can i just point out first that he tried to give the radio station he was not believed when he called up several times because um uh you know giving away a a full power radio station in the middle of new york city is not a normal occurrence but that is what was happening and fortunately he called back again and was finally believed absolutely and this just goes to show how insane the story of this place's existence even is this would never happen again this would certainly never happen now um now when a when a rich person gets uh bored and disillusioned they they buy a massive social network and ruin it but no lewis schweitzer gave the pacifica network wbai for free and it has been able to survive since then solely on the strength of the listeners solely on the community that uh you know threw in what they could to keep the lights on keep the electricity flowing and keep us doing what we do here at wbai that includes our show at off the hook that includes so many other wonderful programs that have come and gone over the years and uh if everything goes uh if everything goes well it will be able to keep doing that but it can only keep doing that by the by the show of support that you can make um by calling 833 wbai nyc or going to buddy.wbai.org and uh doing what you can to keep us going and that phone number translates to 833-922-4692 for those of you who don't have letters on your phone um so yeah i think we've uh laid out the case pretty well as to why people should support the radio station uh and if you're listening to this show in the future um please call that number or go to that website i'm sure it'll still be there even if it's 50 years from now but um go ahead gila so we talked a lot about the why to support the radio station and i do want to add just really briefly to that my own experience which is that the ai has really opened a lot of doors for me experientially i didn't know what existed before i moved to new york i didn't know what existed the first few years i lived in new york and then i met someone and he said hey i do this radio show and then i started listening to it and i learned a lot of really cool stuff and now i'm on it which is mind-blowing to me on a very regular basis but in addition to the why i did want to talk really briefly about the how because when i'm not on air i work in fundraising so i did want to throw out there that the pacifica foundation is a 501c3 organization so what you donate to us is tax deductible um if you have a donor advised fund if you are old enough to be making required distributions from your ira you can make those donations straight to wbai it's a great idea saves you money in the long run um also we love our listenership if you're considering writing your will it can't hurt to include a bequest to wbai we hope we don't see the money for a long time but we know it's coming eventually and that helps us with long-term financial security so remember it's not just checks and credit cards there are a lot of different things you could do to support this station and we appreciate all of them i mean that's a touchy thing to ask people to include you in their will but that's what people do i know it's hard but um um it definitely is is is keeping things moving uh and and uh keeping this alive which um you know hopefully is alive for a very long time rob did you have something else um i did not but uh yeah that's uh i i i i can i can throw in that uh much like gila was saying getting involved with this station i was a listener to the station i was a listener to the show for a long time before i got involved and getting involved had was a life-changing experience for me it got me um interested in the audio uh production world and i've since done that professionally it's uh you know it's connected me with wonderful people some of whom sadly are no longer with us um but uh many of whom i have lifelong friendships with and that is that like this station has certainly changed my life i think it changed my life before i was even involved just based on the the material that was there the stuff that i could listen to and learn about and uh become part of well it's it's changed the lives of many listeners and certainly many staff people i remember uh the first time walking into wbai when we were at 505 8th avenue uh and uh just wandering in there i had worked in radio w usb out in stony brook for a number of years and i i wanted to check out other radio stations and this was a unique radio station and uh i'll never forget that first day you know the first person i saw was of course our our uh late receptionist fred uh and um basically got to meet all these people and and just was put to work you know uh as an engineer as as somebody in the news department eventually somebody on the air um the idea of off the hook was not mine it was basically people at the radio station that said yeah this is this is what you're talking about this is what uh you're interested in this is what your show should be and uh they were right they certainly were right and you can um um go back and and listen in the archives and and and hear all the old shows and how it transpired let's um let's just step back into uh time for a second see where our clip show is at for the modification of telecommunications instruments for the unauthorized use of telecommunications telecommunication services which in plain english means i have had a computer program on a laptop computer that allows allegedly allows someone to program a cellular telephone and that's uh bernie s talking about his uh his legal troubles uh with technology there are so many people that we have had on the air uh kevin mitnick fiber optic uh who have who have uh gone through hell in our legal system just for being curious just for playing with technology wbai and off the hook offered a voice for these people to get the word out and you know i i think um uh many of them would have suffered far worse consequences uh by being held in prison for longer or being charged with more um if they did not have the support that wbai listeners afforded them so that's um that's an incredible reminder too and we are one show we are one show one hour in one day uh there are different shows almost every hour of every other day and everybody has their own community everybody has uh their own causes and this place this place is a magical um a gathering point on the radio dial so please keep that magical gathering point here 833 wbai nyc 833-922-4692 or buddy.wbai.org uh this is basically the only week we're doing this we're not doing it next week we're doing it this week and we're not um offering all kinds of uh items and and uh premiums and things like that no this is real this is about keeping the radio station alive and that's what it's always been about but we're not kidding ourselves here we're saying that our listeners are the lifeblood and if you are listening you're a listener so please give us that support okay uh last week um alex you can maybe refresh my memory on this we were talking about some um uh some regulations involving cell phones in schools uh that involved um putting phones in pouches and it it basically was a a bit confusing to me uh mostly because i was never in school when cell phones existed but that just seemed a little weird to have these these these pouches where kids were supposed to put their phone and their phone didn't work until they took them out of the pouches anyway you've dragged your son into the studio here uh or your studio to to explain it all to us you want to you want to set this up yeah i i do indeed you know and so yeah we we promised it this is the thing with wbi right we promise and we deliver you know this is this is another reason why people should support us here right we promised this last week now sasha is here i promised an expert on phone patches being used in middle schools so that kids did not necessarily have access to their particular mobile phones throughout the day and we had all kinds of questions about how it worked do they do you have the pouch do you put the pouch somewhere how does the pouch work etc so in any event i'm going to hand it over to my son sasha who just started middle school here at a public school in new york city sasha why don't you take it away yes i am sasha and i'm going to be talking about the phone pouches okay all right and and how are you going to address this first i'm going to talk about what is it and what does it do second of all i'm going to talk about how it works and third of all i'm going to talk about how to defeat the pouches oh wow okay all right let's hear it all right so let's start with what is it so tell me tell us what is what does the phone pouch actually do what's the point of it why do they why do you have this in school the phone pouches are for so kids don't go on their phones during the lessons okay why we need them but this is from the teacher's perspective oh yes exactly well i guess they they don't want you to be distracted or using phones during the school day right yeah i mean what do we see when i when when we do drop off in the morning everybody's what are they doing looking on their phones that's right everybody's looking on their phones i think people will be looking on their phones during uh classroom time i would imagine why is that a bad thing alex why can't why can't kids look at their phones why why don't you let them do that well maybe maybe you know some people some people could consider it some kind of study aid if they were looking up the subjects that the teacher was talking about right but do you think that's what they're doing maybe they're just doing it to torture us to torture us oh you you think the teachers are doing this to torture you know sasha you're on to something there because there are some some bad teachers out there that exist to torture kids yeah i mean okay so let's assume for a moment that they have um not some kind of nefarious purpose in mind but they're they're talking they they want to help you learn by keeping you undistracted by all of these mobile phones that you can focus on the multi-variable calculus that you're inevitably doing in in sixth and seventh grade right yeah i was joking teachers are amazing yeah they're great right yeah i was joking too so we so we have an idea about you know what the idea is behind the phone pouch it's to keep you not distracted right or undistracted keep your attention on the on the list so tell us about how does this phone pouch work what what happens with it yeah pretty much there's a needle that's on one side i don't know how it fully works but i'm pretty sure something on the other side locks the needle in place and you can only unlock it by hitting it on a magnet that they give you at the end of the day okay so kyle so this is something that you brought up last week you thought that there was some kind of magnetic component to this right that was what that was one thing that i suspected um that they had a way to enclose it so that you it would be basically very hard to regain access unless you use the particular the particular um i guess thing you contact and it reminds me a little bit of retail stuff you know when they have tags on clothes or something you know they swipe it when you when you buy it and then you can go home with the stuff without setting off alarms well can i just ask a question here sasha have you ever thought of bringing your own magnet in and maybe you could um you know defeat it that way well i don't use the underpatch but the thing is these magnets are ginormous plaques they're not just small ones they're placed on a special plaque that only the teachers can hold and that won't fit into your pocket if you want a heavy magnet in your backpack i guess you can no i don't want that yeah so i guess maybe if you carried around like a very rare earth magnet or something like that you might be able to replicate this but so so you go in you put you're supposed to put your phone in this pouch i guess when you get into school at the beginning of the day is that right yeah okay so your phone is there now the other question that i believe we had kyle emmanuel the rest of us right was what happens to the pouch during the day is the pouch in the possession of the students or is it in your locker or does somebody else hold it where's the pouch the pouch is usually placed in your backpack so it's safe and they have this thing where if you lose your pouch and you have to pay twenty dollars for it and if you break it or damage it it will also be twenty dollars so if i understand this correctly your phone is still working you can still hear it ring you just can't get to it because the pouch is locked and can only be unlocked with the magnet yeah now that's good well but that's a good question though emmanuel something came up so that so let's ask that specific question right is it is the pouch in which you put the phone a faraday pouch do you know what a faraday pouch is yeah what's a faraday pouch something that blocks the signal okay very good how does he know that how does he know that who taught him he's smarter than he looks wow he looks smart what are you talking about yeah i know he is yeah so does the phone still work when it's in the pouch yeah it still works okay now let's talk about how you defeat the security on the pouch so my friend augustia from another school okay he told me how to do it because my old friend from my old school who also goes to lab figured out this trick where you put the pencil under where the needle lies and you want to push the pencil up to the needle and then you want to bash the pouch on something hard and speaking of this my friend my good new friend max he wanted to open his yonder pouch and i told him i told him um hey yeah my friend told me this trick i think we should try to test it out so we did it and after like a full-on five minutes of hitting the pouch it opened without having to use the magnet wow that's awesome yeah yeah so there there are there are ways to to physically get around this now it opened up did the pouch break at that point the pouch did not break okay so you were able to use it again without having to pay twenty dollars to get a new pouch yeah okay i actually have a good story for this because out of school bathrooms at my school are completely insane okay all right and i'm not talking about like the toilets or anything but um one time i went in and i was just looking in the mirror because i thought i was growing pimples i was getting scared and then these kids jump through the door and they start yelling you think you're safe in here to each other and then one of them holds up their phone and is one of the other big kids is like how did you get that and i just ran out i was really scared yeah and nowadays after i reported it after i wrote nowadays um there's a daily check where one of the teachers will go on and check the condition of the bathroom because one time they threw the whole entire paper towel roll into the toilet and didn't flush it well this is what happens in new york city public schools in in various bathrooms right i think i think we might be veering off topic here um so now as far as the phone goes though um how how does the phone get into your pad who who makes sure that there is a phone in your pouch couldn't you just not put the phone in the pouch yes very true because at the um entrance they can't do a full-on tsa check into your backpack so you can just hide the yonder pouch or just click the yonder pouch uh locked and have your phone hiding inside your backpack that's a way more easier way to do it you know you know what else would be good sasha is you get you get a fake phone you put the fake phone in the pouch so therefore you satisfy security people meanwhile you got your real phone it's like in your shoe or something and then later you you go to that same bathroom you take the shoe out put it in your backpack and then you can you know talk to anybody you want throughout the boring class not that you should do that that's a great idea man what do you think about that sasha uh i mean it's more of an expensive way but why not well we've got plenty of old phones that we can do this yeah we can we can work this out i also haven't given up on getting a magnet into the school it just involves after hours access and uh a hand cart so we just wheel it in through a loading zone and get it into a secret place where where sasha can simply you know whack the thing and open up his pouch anytime he wants but only he knows where that is we could even make this into some kind of business right you know five dollars to open up your pouch that's a great idea because you know you charge the kids to um to get access to their phones you'll you'll clean up well i was and then you can take all that money and donate it to wbai by calling what's the what's the number here sasha uh eight three three seven two two oh no that's a nine that's that's your father's like sloppy writing yeah my bad handwriting what's the number eight three three wbai nyc that's right which is nine two two four six nine two oh sasha thank you so much for all this it's um uh you've taught us a lot and you've got the hacker spirit yes something about apples and trees comes to mind i don't know why these images are coming into my head but um but but but there they are so yeah so our very special guest tonight thank you so much sasha all right um again we are in the middle of a fun drive uh please call 833-922-4692 to support us go to buddy.wbai.org become a bai buddy and donate a small amount every month let's uh check in on our clip show from uh 2008 but it's not completely unexpected it's not something that uh thank you it's not something that um we didn't see coming i have no idea what i'm talking about here such events of horror and tragedy and fear you can always bet that there are those on the sidelines who are waiting for the opportunity to use those events to their advantage that probably is a post 9-11 show where i'm talking about the patriot act or something like that but again all sorts of things happened in history and we were there uh to um uh to witness it all uh okay uh here's an interesting story uh taking place now uh at least several dozen people uh had their phones surveilled uh in this um latest chinese spying campaign you might have heard about uh donald trump's campaign was in fact targeted uh chinese hackers are believed to be behind the whole thing uh targeting both trump's phone and his running mate jd vance um earlier this week uh or last week actually trump's campaign was informed of the potential breach it was unclear what information if any was accessed uh but the former president frequently uses his personal iphone to post on social media make phone calls and send text messages to billionaires and lawmakers uh yeah i'm not making this up it's true all private communications at foreign adversaries would be quite eager to get their hands on in addition it's possible that uh hackers could access location data um roughly 40 people are for now thought to have had their unencrypted call and text data surveilled by the chinese in the spying campaign which is believed to have compromised at least 10 telecommunications providers that's according to two other people briefed on the activity in addition to trump and vance current high-ranking u.s officials are also among the targets in a statement the fbi confirmed the u.s government is investigating unauthorized access to commercial telecommunications infrastructure by actors affiliated with the people's republic of china boy this is getting interesting um so it's it's quite possible not only um uh the location information uh of of uh phones and devices uh what was compromised but maybe actually the communications itself and if if any of that is um is is leaked in the next week or so could have profound implications um or it could have profound implications in the future whatever it is though it's it's it's another wake-up call that even at the highest levels our our devices are not necessarily secure any thoughts yeah i i'll chime in right away and i say you know look i'm not surprised whatsoever that there are state actors that are interested in the presidential candidates communications especially china because china i don't think likes any of these candidates at all i mean they they certainly don't like trump they certainly don't like kamala i think that um you know the fact that they're here that they're trying to acquire certain types of intelligence that may influence the outcome of the excellent of the election is is really just not surprising you know i i feel like since 2016 this is really uh old wine in a new bubble yep have to agree um okay moving on um this is very telling cable companies advertising firms and newspapers are asking courts to block a federal click to cancel rule would force businesses to make it easier for consumers to cancel services i don't think i have to read any more than that that pretty much tells you where they're coming from you know they don't want you to be able to cancel services easily there's no other way of looking at this lawsuits were filed uh last few days actually about a week after the federal trade commission approved a rule that requires sellers to provide consumers with simple cancellation mechanisms to immediately halt all recurring charges how do you argue against that well let's see cable lobby group ncta the internet and television association association and the interactive advertising bureau trade group have sued the ftc um in the conservative u.s court of appeals for the fifth circuit the lawsuit claims the fifth circuit is a proper venue because a third plaintiff the electronic security association has its principal offices in dallas and that group represents security companies such as adt um yeah uh you know it's really hard to get into their logic here uh that um yeah i'd have to read the legal briefs to figure all this out but the gist of it is they don't want people to be able to easily unsubscribe from uh alex as a lawyer any any um ideas as to the logic behind this yeah but and i don't understand the logic of the fifth circuit uh as well i guess you know that's an that's an appellate court the fifth circuit so i don't know what they're doing maybe there seems like special rule or something where they go right into the fifth circuit but so that that's weird number one weird number two is that um i i just seems really mysterious to me i'm mystified as to the arguments against this i mean you have uh actual patents from amazon that are on the other side of this that allow you to make a one-click purchase i mean this is a big thing with amazon prime buy with one click click with one purchase so you're so so on the one hand you're allowed to buy things as a consumer a whole bunch of nonsense that you probably don't need with one single click but you cannot save yourself money you can't actually discontinue services with one click that's what these consumer affairs uh consortiums are are are against it's it's totally insane but it also brings to mind to me the reasoning behind the the very notion of a class action which is that there are a lot of uh companies out there that make a tremendous amount of money through illicit practices and the way in which to make a great deal of money is not to steal a large amount of money but to make a great deal of money illicitly is not to steal a huge amount of money from let's say one or two people because you'll get caught for that you'll be sued for that but the way in which companies make tens of millions of dollars every year year after year is by overcharging a large number of consumers for a small amount of money so if you have 10 million customers and you're overcharging them for two minutes for two dollars each you know this is a massive amount of money this is why uh this should be something in place okay well thank you uh for that for that analysis and also that's something we will never do here at wbai is overcharge or uh make it hard for you to unsubscribe if you ever uh wish to do that um that pretty much brings us to uh the close of this hour thanks uh to all of you thanks chasper for uh for for coming in and uh educating us on on um the technology at your school um that's it for us for this week you know in another week there's a good chance uh we'll be in a country that's very different than the one we're in today and uh we're either going to have an end to an election that seems to have gone on forever or we'll be at the beginning of what could be a long and possibly painful battle uh we're all feeling anxiety we're all feeling stress over how this could go and maybe that's the one thing that all sides have in common but in our last show before d-day i just want to make one thing clear we are going to be okay no matter what happens you will still be the person you are your friends will still be your friends wbai will still be there for you and we hope you will be there for us you know there may be some rough days ahead but never forget you are not alone please don't bottle your feelings up share them with the people you care about please listen to those who need a compassionate ear my hope is that um we all finally begin to heal after this uh incredibly long ordeal and that we see a lot less hatred and ignorance and fear but even if that doesn't happen we still have each other and we will see you next week stay tuned to wbai support us at either 833-922-4692 or buddy.wbai.org hang on as we as we hear the last of the clip show give each other time to deal with satellites and things like that so let's let our caller from iraq uh say the first words here let's um go into the future stay free everyone so by the way i didn't mention that um overtime is beginning on youtube got a channel 2600 we'll see you there you can call us write to us oth at 2600.com   And welcome, everybody, to Off the Hook Overtime, back for the first time in ages, I believe. 
Kyle, did you make it okay? 
I mean, I made it. 
Overtime land. 
Rob, are you in Skypeland and overtime? 
I am both of those things. 
And are we broadcasting, in fact, over, what is this, Facebook? 
No, not Facebook, YouTube, that one. 
We are broadcasting over YouTube, though we sound a little low, volume-wise. 
I'm trying not to yell, but maybe we can adjust that. 
Everything is at the max over here. 
And Gila, you're here? 
Made it. 
Okay, and Alex? 
Alex? 
Can you say something, Alex? 
It's not hard. 
Yeah, I'm here. 
Okay, all you have to do is acknowledge. 
That's all you have to do. 
Like, did we lose our sound? 
Are we back? 
You're back now. 
Okay, all right, we're back. 
I am here. 
We made it over to the... 
Yes. 
The transition was tough. 
What was the transition? 
You just had to sit there. 
That's all you had to do. 
It's hard. 
You have to go through hyperspace and everything. 
Oh, my goodness. 
And it looks like your kid Sasha is still with you. 
That's right. 
Are you here, Sasha? 
Yeah. 
Okay, well, you're welcome to stay for overtime, but I should warn you, we're going to get phone calls, and some of those phone calls are from people that, well, I don't know how to describe them. 
There might be salty language. 
Well, who knows? 
We don't know anything. 
That's fine. 
Somebody is echoing. 
I must ask you to stop that. 
Whoever is echoing. 
Sorry, it's me. 
All right. 
I just, my ear was starting to hurt from my headphones, so I unplugged my headphones. 
It should reconcile in a second, I'm assuming. 
Okay. 
Well, pain is something we all experience here at Off the Hook, for sure. 
But I hope that that is not unpleasant. 
Okay. 
So, I think everything is working. 
Is our level a little bit higher, Rob? 
Kyle's been working hard. 
I think we're sounding a little bit better, yeah. 
Okay. 
All right. 
Hopefully, the phone calls will sound good, too. 
All right. 
So, we are going to open up the phone lines. 
802-321-4225. 
802-321-HACK is our phone number. 
Yeah. 
I think we have some interesting things to cover there, and a lot of history from the past, and hopefully some support for WBAI. 
That would be nice, wouldn't it? 
Yeah. 
It really would be nice. 
Yeah. 
And I think that our community, especially of the overtime listeners, I really hope people are heeding this call and jumping in and calling 833-922-4692, because, you know, we are a real community here. 
You know, I think we all look forward to Wednesday night so we can get together, and any modicum of support will help us here. 
We'll help the station, and we'll help keep Off the Hook on the airwaves. 
And I really do think that there's something about listening to the show together that creates a very real sense of community, and it's felt through the chat function on YouTube of all places, right? 
Where, you know, everyone is cordial to each other. 
Everyone is nice. 
Everyone is friendly. 
It's a real community. 
You said YouTube? 
Everyone's friendly and nice? 
What YouTube are you on? 
Well, the chat function of the 2600 YouTube channel. 
That's where I am. 
That's where I hang out. 
Maybe it's our listeners who are special, because on most YouTube channels that I've been on, boy, it doesn't take long. 
It doesn't take long for somebody to set somebody else off. 
True. 
I think it's our excellent moderator. 
Also, the moderator, I was about to say that, Gila, the moderator efforts that Gila has put into this is, you know, worthy of commendation. 
Thank you. 
But speaking of YouTube tonight, you know, given our special guest is, has a school night, so we're only going to hang out for probably another 10 or 15 minutes or so. 
Nice. 
Nice try there, Alex. 
You don't go to school. 
So... 
But I need to escort home somebody who does go to school in the morning tomorrow. 
So I will probably have to peel off in probably about 15 minutes or so. 
You planned it this way, didn't you? 
Every week, you find some reason to peel off early. 
Okay, fine. 
No problem. 
No problem. 
Maybe we'll all bring in kids next week, and we can all peel off early. 
That sounds great. 
Let's do it. 
But let's take some phone calls, and, you know, and hopefully Rebel doesn't take too much of the first one. 
Well, let's see. 
Good evening. 
You're on Off The Hook Overtime. 
Hi, Emmanuel. 
Calling from a pay phone. 
That would be Rebel. 
Sasha, how do we explain Rebel to you? 
You know what? 
There's no explanation for this. 
You'll just have to listen. 
Go ahead, Rebel. 
What's on your mind? 
Okay. 
I'm in store. 
I have a new laptop because my laptop was 10 years old, and I had to get rid of it, so I got a new one. 
So Windows 11 laptop. 
And I got an all-in-one desktop. 
I think I might have told you this. 
I don't know if I did. 
It sure feels like you did, but, yeah, you know, this conversation seems to have always been happening. 
I got an all-in-one desktop because I like the fact that it doesn't have a tower. 
It looks more like a computer terminal. 
Okay. 
All right. 
I think you mean a thin client. 
A thin client? 
That's like the industry jargon for this. 
But you mean like a client, like a console or like just a head, like a monitor and a keyboard and like input devices and a screen. 
No box. 
Yeah, just a monitor and a keyboard and, of course, my mouse. 
But it's like a computer, like a deck terminal or an IBM terminal, except mine have a mouse. 
Now, mine, I'm going to put Linux on it because Linux is kind of like, you know, better than Windows. 
I've heard good things about it. 
Yeah. 
Linux Mint and distribution. 
Now, I'd want to put links on it so that I could, you know, link. 
This is all the battle for links that you've been involved in all year. 
Yeah, but you know what I'm also going to prefer if you're reading an article from a newspaper and you don't want to go to the website and see all the pop-up ads and whatnot. 
Yeah, and I mean, ad networks themselves have been attributed to various kinds of exploits and malware as sort of a delivery system. 
So you're right to want to like control how you navigate and move about the information superhighway, as it were. 
I mean, it's basically playing around with how the public internet is displayed. 
Right. 
Now, I'm studying radio. 
I'm taking... 
Oh, hold on. 
Wait a minute. 
Why should we hold on? 
Hold on. 
Somebody's calling me. 
Someone's calling you. 
Oh, well, by all means. 
We'll wait for this call to be finished. 
Tell them you called a radio show. 
Yeah, put us on hold. 
We're on hold. 
Can you put him on superhold? 
You mean Hank... 
I don't mean... 
You know that. 
That hold, right. 
Press the button. 
You know what? 
802-321-4225 is the phone number that is open now before somebody redials. 
So please, let your fingers do the walking. 
So yeah, Sasha, that's Rebel. 
He's called us every week since we went on the air the first time, and there's no stopping him. 
And the phone's ringing, so let's take this phone call. 
And good evening. 
You're on off-talk overtime. 
Yeah, I don't know why I hung up on you by accident. 
I don't know how that happened, but I do know. 
I'm very disappointed in our other listeners. 
I just want to... 
Okay. 
All right. 
I got a phone call, and then I said, can you call me back? 
And they said, okay. 
And then I hung up, but I hung up. 
Anyway, yeah. 
So not to take up too much time with this, but yeah. 
So Lynx and then Linux. 
I think the deal is just getting used to a new operating system, getting used to a new user interface. 
You know, it's just, you know, if somebody's not technically inclined as, you know, you guys are, you know. 
No, don't say that. 
Whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa. 
Yeah, we don't know what we're doing. 
Don't say that. 
Everybody here has a story of trying out something they've totally been out of their depth with. 
And in my years, I'm going to say this now, like in all my years, you know, however you want to say it, whatever. 
Yeah, here we go. 
I've spent a fair amount of time involved and around all kinds of different hackers. 
And I think in my experimenting and projects and all of that, being involved and taking on tasks and projects has always meant you have no idea what you're doing. 
You're out of your depth. 
People say it'll never work. 
All of that is rubbish when you have the sense of accomplishment and achievement, when you figure out how to work around something or how to fix something or how to break something or how to do something new or do something in a new programming language. 
All of those milestones are your personal achievements and they build your hacker character, I guess, as it were. 
So don't say we're experts. 
You are the expert now on this process and someone might be inspired by what you're doing. 
So we don't like that because it really does put us on some like false pedestal. 
Yeah, it's not right. 
We are regularly out of our depth trying to do something we have no idea how to do. 
And invariably, there are 10 experts who would do it 10 other ways and are disappointed in how you're approaching it, but they're not doing it. 
You're in it. 
You're working on something. 
You're passionate about it. 
Don't steal that passion away from yourself because there are so many in the peanut gallery out there willing to do it in the comments. 
It's, you know, they'll drag you down, but what you're doing is worthwhile to you. 
So I just want, I hope you feel empowered. 
All right. 
But I guess when I have to learn all the commands and, you know, the things like that. 
That's fine. 
It'll take time, but you can share it and teach it to other people after having gone through all of that. 
Why are they called commands? 
Doesn't that seem so dictatorial? 
Well, I mean, you know, a friendly operating system, it would be requests, you know? 
Suggestions. 
Yeah. 
Type the request to list files. 
I'm going to write a letter about that because this has bothered me for a while. 
Just, it's too, it's too military, you know? 
I don't take commands and I don't issue commands. 
Well, I would come in like, okay, well, I'd like come in like, when I remember when I was in college, we wrote a program that me and somebody else said, I don't know how DEC works, but there would be like 10 computers in the library and 10 computers in like the computing center and then another group of computers in another thing. 
And it'd be like, I guess it would be, this was like in the early nineties, each would be a node of something like the 10 computers in the library would have one number of something. 
And then another computer would be, we have another number. 
Is that the way it worked? 
I don't know. 
Well, it's early multi-user systems, I think are what you're describing. 
And a lot of what we do now, what you can do on a multi-user installation like Linux or any of the different distributions you mentioned, you can have multiple users and they essentially have a client or are part of a node on that, but it's much more transparent. 
You don't see it in the same way as you would having walked into or stepped back into time going through those computer labs where it's physically a monitor and that's port 8 and 9 and 10 and they're all physically there in the computer lab. 
But it's very much the same structurally. 
I mean, the software is all derived from some of those early ventures into creating multi-user operating systems. 
So it's quite, I don't know, quite expected in your learning of this and the history. 
That's definitely what was going on. 
And modern implementations are just that, a modern version of all of that. 
With that, Rebel, we want to wish you all the best with your new technology. 
Yeah, I remember you'll be at the meeting. 
There's a 20, you know, there's 26 meetings this Friday. 
That's right. 
The meetings are, Rob, you want to tell us about the meetings? 
Yep, the meetings happen throughout much of the world on the first Friday of every month. 
And our local one at the Citigroup Center on 53rd and Lexington, well, now it's called The Hue, happens right in the food court there at this Friday evening. 
And, you know, that's a good place for us to hang out. 
It's, I think, where I met most of you who are on this program with me and you, Rebel. 
And, yeah, worth checking out if you haven't, worth going back if you have. 
And I believe the list of meetings has been updated to include all the November changes, additions, that kind of thing. 
Go to 2600.com slash meetings to get all that information. 
Rebel, best of luck with your new technology. 
And please keep us updated. 
We're going to open up the phone lines for another call. 
And hopefully, Alex, you can stick around for one more call so that Rebel isn't the only voice that Sasha hears. 
Not that we don't enjoy talking to Rebel. 
And, Kyle, you made that a very interesting conversation, I think. 
802-321-4225 is our telephone number. 
Please, anyone out there who wishes to call in and be a part of it, part of the conversation, please call us now. 
802-321-4225. 
And while we're waiting for that phone call, just another little plug for buddy.wbai.org. 
If you'd like to throw in some support, keep our radio station up and running. 
Or you can give them a call at 833-WBAI-NYC. 
That's right. 
And we have another call. 
Good evening. 
You're on Off the Hook Overtime. 
Hi, gang. 
Tim in Connecticut here. 
How are you guys doing? 
It's Tim in Connecticut. 
Where are you this week, Tim? 
Connecticut. 
Oh, now I get it. 
Okay. 
You've been telling us the whole time. 
Wow. 
Of course. 
Uh-huh. 
Let's see. 
I wanted to say that the front cover of Volume 41, Number 3, Autumn 2024, is just amazingly outstanding. 
Yeah. 
You know, that's been the consensus I've heard from many people that that's a gem. 
Yeah. 
It's so far away from the norm. 
It's just, wow. 
It took a lot of work, I'm guessing. 
Yeah. 
The covers take an awful lot. 
Our cover artist does tremendous work. 
And it's just every issue we're blown away by. 
Every time I look at that cover, I see something else. 
And I start looking deeper. 
I fall into it. 
Every corner of it, it just is meticulous. 
I feel very much the same way. 
And it's truly, it's impressive what dedication each part of the production and the community that goes, the hard work that goes into that. 
It's really outstanding. 
I think it's a testament to trying on new tools. 
You know, like, there are new things out there. 
We can fight them in some sense, but we can also play with them and integrate them. 
That's the spirit. 
And I'm so inspired by that playfulness on the cover artist team and just the imagination that comes out in that. 
I'm feeling the same thing. 
So it's great to hear that. 
Go ahead, Alex. 
And there's so many different pieces of logic that I question. 
Like Charlie Brown talking to the shoe saying, operator, I would like to report a singularity. 
So in talking to the shoe like Get Smart, Agent 99, or report a singularity, you know, all the questions. 
Go ahead, Alex. 
Hey, by the way, I got my USB Hope stick. 
Oh, good. 
And boy, that is so nice. 
There's a lot of talks there. 
And yes, we do have those available. 
I know if we've been on all the time since they became available. 
But yes, all the Hope Talks from Hope XV this summer available at the 2600 store. 
And you get not only all the talks, but you get four different languages subtitled, which we've never done before. 
And they're all pretty good. 
Alex, I think you have something to say. 
Go ahead. 
That's right. 
Kohler had mentioned the cover of 2600. 
And Sasha has been admiring it, by the way, for the last few minutes here, coincidentally. 
So I want to open it up and ask for your observations, Sasha, on this cover. 
What do you think about it? 
Well, my observations are, I think it's very weird, because Bart Simpson turned into a time printing machine. 
And it seems that there's a McDonald's sign on, like, a really sweaty guy. 
And what's going on there? 
And then there's a random elephant fighting a woman. 
And then Star Wars. 
And then Darth Vader swinging in. 
Yeah. 
You picked up a lot. 
There's a lot there. 
And it means different things to different people. 
And our cover artist will never reveal exactly what it means. 
Yes. 
Not unless maybe we find him. 
We interrogate him directly. 
It won't work. 
It won't work. 
It's been tried. 
OK. 
All right. 
We'll see. 
Tim, do you have any other comments or thoughts? 
No. 
Other than the quality of that 256 gig stick is just amazing. 
Those are great things to have. 
And of course, once you push everything down onto your hard drive, that's a heck of a stick to just simply use it day to day. 
A lot goes into selecting those, because as you know, as anybody knows, a lot of the sizes and the constraints, they change. 
And we do spend a fair amount of time finding what the best hardware is. 
And I know E puts it through its paces, makes sure that it will work the way we intend so that everybody gets something that's consistent. 
And the real credit goes to Jolie over at Internet Society, who did a phenomenal job, not only putting all this together, but capturing it in all three speaker rooms. 
It was simply a staggering job, but one which he tackled and was victorious in getting it all done. 
Gila, you had something? 
Um, I did, but it can wait until we're off the phone with Tim. 
Okay. 
Because he's just pushing some stuff from the chat. 
Sorry, I was just... 
Fair enough. 
Alex, you had something else? 
Yeah, we just wanted to say goodnight to everybody, because it is getting late over here, and we very much appreciate the hospitality for Sasha tonight on WBAI and on Off the Hook Overtime. 
Hang on. 
Has everybody voted? 
Yes. 
I have. 
Okay. 
Tim has voted. 
Rob T. Firefly has voted. 
Uh, Sasha, have you voted? 
Wait, why are you nodding your head? 
What are you, 10, 11? 
How old is he? 
Yeah, he's 11. 
He's 11. 
Can 11-year-olds vote? 
They can? 
I think they have a kid's vote somewhere. 
I didn't know that. 
Well, that's right, they did. 
I didn't know that. 
Wow. 
Okay. 
Yeah, they did like an informal survey of students. 
Now, I was continuing my interrogation here. 
Alex, have you voted, or are you about to vote, or are you going to vote? 
I'm about to vote, and actually, this kind of brings up next week, too, because I'm actually going to be flying out. 
Oh, my God. 
So, another excuse for not being with us next week. 
Yeah, that's right. 
But I'm going to be flying out to Bangkok. 
You don't have to do that to vote. 
You can vote right here. 
Yeah, next week. 
But I think I'm going to be in the air during the next show. 
However, I think the internet connection will be sufficient so that I can join the show wherever I am in the middle of the flight. 
Also, they're a day ahead, so you'll still be here when we're on the air, because you'll be there a day ahead. 
Do you understand? 
Guys, I'm going to jump off. 
Yeah, I've got to explain time to Alex here. 
But thanks for your call, Tim. 
That's true. 
And Gila, you had something to add. 
Or was this something we were going to add before? 
Yes. 
Waiting for Tim to leave. 
Something Tim can't hear. 
Okay. 
So, number one, Alex and Sasha, before you guys go. 
And I quote, hope Sasha returns as a guest. 
Smiley face. 
I concur. 
I just wanted to let you know that you've got fans in the chat, my dude. 
And if Alex can't make it, you know, Sasha is a good fill-in, I think. 
Mm-hmm. 
Yeah. 
Absolutely. 
Also, Alex, you remember the time you tried to do the show from the plane to DEF CON? 
Yeah. 
And what an utter cluster that was? 
Yeah. 
They had to do an emergency landing, because the sound was so bad. 
It was bothering everybody, including in the cockpit. 
I'm going to be on a different airline, in a different class. 
I should be on Qatar Airways. 
I think it's going to be a lot better than, like, you know, an economy class flight. 
I've actually done video calls with colleagues on the same airline while they've been in flight. 
So, I think we should give it a shot. 
If it stinks, you know, we cut it off before it ruins the show. 
But I think we should give it a shot. 
Well, bump yourself up to first class. 
That will guarantee that you at least have, you know, all the technology that's available. 
There you go. 
Yeah. 
Well, I'll be in the class next to it. 
So, that'll be fine. 
I mean, aren't you going to basically have, like, your own little roomette on the plane if you're in business class? 
Yeah, you do. 
Yeah. 
If you're in first class, you get a room and a bathroom and a den. 
That would be nice. 
It would be nice. 
Yeah. 
No. 
But, in any event, everybody, we're off. 
All right. 
So, we love you all. 
We'll talk to you soon. 
And, hopefully, I'll hear you all next week when I'm in the air. 
Or, maybe I'll be in the lounge in Doha. 
I don't know. 
We'll have to figure out the timing. 
But, I'll see you then. 
Okay. 
You know, Thailand's to the west, though. 
Why is it going east? 
I don't think he has a sense of direction. 
Depends. 
Why is he still here? 
I'm talking about him behind his back, and he's still here. 
There we go. 
All right. 
Fire. 
Plus, hub and spoke. 
Like, it's, I don't know. 
If he's taking one airline, they're going to go to their hub. 
Well, if you left on the west coast, you definitely wouldn't go through Doha. 
Transfer everybody else that's going to the destination via their hub to that flight. 
I think the plane is a mistake, but that's just my view. 
Go ahead, Gila. 
Okay. 
A couple other things. 
Number one, the Manchester 2600 meeting is not meeting in two days. 
It's meeting in a week and two days. 
So, if you're in Manchester and listening to this before November 8th, 2024, Manchester 2600 is meeting on November 8th, 2024. 
Does this have something to do with All Saints Day? 
Fun Socks, let us know. 
I don't know. 
But I'm passing on the message, as promised. 
Number three, I also voted. 
I was getting to you. 
But I did want to share a very cool tool for our listeners in the five boroughs that comprise New York City, which, if you go to vote.nyc, there is a wait times map for early voting locations. 
Okay. 
That shows color-coded red, yellow, or green how long the wait time is at your early voting location. 
And is it red in many places? 
I have never – I have not yet seen it red, honestly. 
I mean, currently the polling places are closed. 
They're closed at 8 o'clock. 
But our early voting location yesterday, we breezed in, breezed out. 
The thing that took the longest was we didn't have our barcode things. 
They weren't sure what – what's it called? 
Where were we in? 
So, looking up our – thank you. 
Looking up our address information took, like, an extra minute. 
It was very easy and prevented us from having to go to our normal polling place, which is in a high school and certainly gives me traumatic flashbacks. 
I – so, am excited not to have to do that. 
Also – oh! 
November 8th is the first birthday of the Manchester 2600 meeting. 
That is why they're beating that day. 
I see. 
Okay. 
All right. 
Thank you, Fun Socks. 
Also, as a reminder, if you're looking for your local meeting, always check out 2600.com slash meetings. 
All the information is there. 
Hang on. 
Something doesn't add up here. 
How can November 8th be their first anniversary since November 8th can never be the first Friday? 
That's true. 
I'm assuming that November 8th is the day they got together and said, hey, let's do this. 
On the second Friday instead of the first Friday. 
Meetings are on the first Friday. 
This is an exception. 
It's the second Friday this time because it's the anniversary. 
But if the anniversary is also the 8th, it wouldn't be a Friday for one thing. 
Something's fishy. 
I'm going to get to the bottom of this. 
Zap, I know it's late, but if you'd be willing to call in and clarify this for all of us, we'd appreciate that. 
I'd just like to put dots on top of the T's. 
You know what I mean? 
You're looking for your jots and tittles is what you're saying? 
Yeah, it's just I like things to be neat and tidy. 
802-321-4225 is our telephone number. 
Kyle, okay, you want to explain to us what kind of device you've got? 
Oh, no, I put it away. 
You put it away? 
Oh, I thought it was going to come out. 
No, no, I was just playing around. 
I was cleaning up my soldering station, my workbench, as it were, and I found a bunch of old stuff. 
I had a TV Be Gone Pro that needs a new battery, and it's a very strange battery. 
So I got to talk to the chief over there at the TV Be Gone firm. 
Oh, I think I know him. 
Yeah, or just search around. 
I was looking for that, but I desoldered it and put the battery somewhere safe. 
But I also found this toy that I had bought a while ago just to practice soldering. 
It's like a kit, you know, like a toy kit, and this kit is a voice changer. 
So it's just like really basic, and I was playing around with that. 
But I had built the whole thing, and basically it never worked. 
I don't know what happened. 
And then since I had cleaned up my workspace, I was able to play around more after getting frustrated that I couldn't make it work after fixing some of the input wiring because it came with like a really tiny microphone. 
Anyway, so I was fixing up all the connections to adapt to some like, let's say, unbalanced audio equipment so I could play around. 
Like we have a megaphone speaker from announcements at One of the Hopes a while ago. 
It didn't sound like that, though, did it? 
Like Darth Vader? 
The announcements? 
Yeah. 
No, no, those were all prerecorded. 
We played those from like small players. 
But in this case, I just used it as a like mono input, and the kit had an amplifier itself. 
So I was tuning that, getting the audio to just try it, and I cleaned it, like I said, cleaned up some of the connections. 
So now it works, and it was fun to play around with, and I thought it would be spooky for Halloween. 
It scared me. 
Yeah, well, the funny thing is like I fixed it after it's sitting around complete. 
And like there were some traces that were pulling off, so I had to like push wire through and do some like some weird kind of jumps to the resistor. 
And anyway, like it works consistently now. 
And like the joy a silly little toy brought me. 
I was like giggling and kind of beside myself from how dumb I was, like all the sounds I was making with my voice and just being silly. 
But it entertained me. 
Oh, it entertained me, too, believe me. 
It kept me going for a while. 
I think the neighbors were also amused, and yeah. 
And then you caught me. 
You were like, did I hear Robot Kyle come back on the microphone? 
And I was like, oh, you heard that? 
Well, I dreamed about it, too. 
So it's quite possible that it was just in my head. 
But apparently you were also messing around with it still. 
Yeah, yeah. 
And now I can make proper threats. 
So anyway. 
Good, good, good. 
But 802-321-4225, if there are any more callers out there. 
If there are not, we're going to wrap things up and maybe a little bit early this night. 
That's what happens sometimes when we're off the air for three weeks or off overtime for three weeks. 
People don't come streaming back quite as quickly. 
But here's your chance. 
802-321-4225, anything you want to get off your chest or talk about, ask us about tomorrow's Halloween. 
Yeah. 
And Friday is 2600 meeting day in most places and All Saints Day, whatever you're supposed to do on that day. 
We accept email to, O-T-E-H at 2600.com. 
And your feedback, ask us stuff that we're not talking about or that we're not, you know, big picture, small picture, grand scope, or maybe a non sequitur or a side quest. 
Whatever you want to do, we're ready for it. 
I forgot to talk about Guy Fawkes Day. 
Yeah, what are we not talking about? 
I knew there was something happening on Tuesday. 
I just had it in the back of my mind. 
But, yeah, it's Guy Fawkes Day. 
It's basically, you know, a day of revolt. 
Let's put it that way. 
No, November 5th. 
Oh, upcoming, right. 
5th of November, next Tuesday. 
First week of November. 
Remember, remember. 
Yeah. 
I don't know what I'm supposed to remember. 
But, yeah, I remember Guy Fawkes Day is on Tuesday. 
Okay. 
Well, not much else. 
Are you supposed to remember the fire and gunpowder plot? 
Gunpowder treason plot. 
Yeah, yeah, yeah. 
No, that's important. 
It's just about what we make it mean now. 
Last time I got to say the phone number. 
802-321-4225. 
I guess I'll say it one more time. 
802-321-HACK. 
And we'll give it two minutes. 
Absolutely. 
So, have you guys voted? 
Kyle has voted. 
Si, me gusta. 
I'm not sure exactly what you're saying, but, yes, he did. 
And I vote on Election Day. 
Yeah. 
I just like to do it that way. 
Well, what's the extra significance of not doing it early? 
Because it's Election Day. 
I want to be part of Election Day. 
Okay. 
Why don't I have Thanksgiving dinner in October? 
I'm not Canadian, so there's no reason for me to do that. 
You know? 
Why don't I celebrate New Year's in February? 
You know? 
Dates exist for a reason. 
Do you give exit polls? 
I mean, you... 
No one has ever asked me. 
And the other thing... 
They never ask you? 
I never get a voting sticker. 
I ask. 
They never have them. 
You know what I've been getting? 
The last couple of elections, I've been getting stickers with my absentee vote. 
Yeah, you get the sticker before you vote. 
They're designed by local contestants, I think. 
We have a phone call. 
Contestants? 
Yeah, I think they've done this in a couple states. 
But, like, people submit their art to be the voting sticker. 
Oh, really? 
Wow. 
Yes. 
Anyway, I don't know why... 
Well, that's fun. 
...went there. 
But, yeah, we have a call. 
Anyway, if you're out there and you haven't voted yet, please do vote. 
It's important. 
It's vital. 
Sticker or not. 
Yeah. 
All right, let's see who this is. 
Good evening. 
You're on Off Look Overtime. 
Go ahead. 
Good evening. 
Can you hear me? 
We hear you just fine. 
Can you hear us? 
Yes. 
Excellent. 
Uh, good evening. 
I voted and my... 
I got confirmation my ballot was received by the county. 
Cool. 
That's one thing. 
Um, this has been a wild month. 
And I'm glad to... 
Glad to hear you guys tonight. 
Here are all you. 
Well, we're glad to hear our listeners. 
And I think, um, everybody should, uh, try and reach out to as many people as, as they can in the days ahead. 
Because it, it might be a rough ride, you know? 
Yeah. 
Yeah. 
It, it's been, it's been kind of a wild month. 
Is there anything in particular, is there anything in particular, um, that sticks out or that you want to talk about or? 
Uh, just some of the online moderation, trying to do some of the online moderation has been, uh, I'm not sure how many other people online at the moment do any of that, but it's been, people have been kind of testy about stuff. 
So. 
Yep. 
I, I've noticed that for sure. 
And when you say online moderation, you mean just, uh, filtering for yourself or is it, is it for other people? 
Uh, other people as well. 
Some of the, some of the, some of the matrix chat rooms have been kind of rambunctious. 
Yeah. 
Yeah. 
So. 
It's, it's been a, it's been a rodeo. 
It's been, I've never seen anything like this. 
I think everybody can say the same thing. 
They've never seen, uh, a campaign that went on for this long and has been, um, this, um, uh, this full of vitriol and just, um, I don't know, uh, something we'll all be glad is over and hopefully ends in a good place because, uh, we've seen, we've seen all kinds of presentations and, um, uh, proposals and threats, dark promises and things like that. 
And, uh, wow. 
I, you know, either way, no matter what side wins, um, the other side is not going to take it well and it's not going to be easy. 
The transition. 
My hope is that, as I said, you know, we start talking to each other and, um, you know, all of this ugliness fades as it inevitably will do at some point. 
I, I just hope it fades so much sooner, you know, than it could. 
Yeah. 
Agreed. 
Um, hope was excellent this year. 
Thank you all. 
Thanks for, thanks for being there. 
Yeah. 
Where, where are you speaking about, uh, matrix stuff from, uh, our events specifically? 
Uh, no, no, no. 
Yeah. 
Cause I know everyone was super complimentary. 
I haven't been back on since, uh, everybody tore down. 
And I just know that there were so many stories about the great talks that people saw and there were hiccups definitely with, um, kind of some of the, uh, scrappiness around, uh, scrambling to test things, uh, uh, PA and, and other stuff, but it wouldn't be hope wasn't scrappy. 
It was, it was definitely worth the effort and people put in so much, um, for that. 
Hang on. 
Rob, Rob has something. 
Go ahead, Rob. 
Yeah. 
Just on, on the subject of what you were saying, caller, I think everyone out there, um, I think most of us probably partake in some manner of online communities, forums, gathering places where, where we can, you know, share a little fellowship. 
And I think times like this really reminds us how important it is, the work that our moderators and, uh, folks like that, uh, the work they put in and, uh, what they're going through at the front lines of all this stuff. 
So if, uh, if you're, if you're out there listening and you use, you know, any kind of online forums, sites, social media, whatever, where people are doing some moderating for you, just, uh, maybe show them a little extra appreciation this time of, uh, this time of year. 
Yeah. 
Thank you. 
Um, that's, um, yes, very much. 
So, um, I'll free up the line for somebody else to call in. 
Just wanted to say thanks and talk to you later. 
And have you voted? 
Yes. 
You have. 
Great. 
Uh, yeah, yeah. 
Um, my state, I can do mail-in ballots. 
Actually, yeah, you told us this already. 
A few weeks ago. 
Uh-huh. 
And you got verification that it was received. 
Yeah. 
Great. 
Yeah. 
Uh, well, actually I had to go check. 
They didn't send email this year, but, um, I, I definitely made sure that it got received. 
So that was. 
It feels good. 
It feels, if people out there who have not voted, um, and are eligible to, it feels really good to have done that. 
If you're voting for something that you truly believe in, uh, or if you feel you're making a difference and you are making a difference, particularly those people in swing states, but also all states, because local elections are hugely important. 
You know, uh, New York state, particularly Long Island, basically decided the house makeup last election, 2022. 
Uh, so while there weren't major, um, uh, candidates, major races, um, um, on the national level, there was definitely an effect. 
So, um, it's never a good idea to not participate in my opinion. 
Yeah. 
Um, I've been voting since 92, the first year I was able to, so I haven't missed one yet. 
Great. 
Um, and I am in a swing state, so. 
Wow. 
It's definitely valiant this year. 
All right. 
Well, I hope, I hope your vote counts. 
Thanks. 
Um, so far we're doing okay. 
You saw about some of the ballot boxes on the West Coast. 
Yeah, there's, there's some idiocy going on and I don't think that's the last of that. 
We'll see. 
Um, yeah. 
Yeah. 
Like I said, some, some rough rides might be ahead. 
Well, thanks. 
Everyone have a good night. 
All right. 
And, uh, talk to you later. 
Take care. 
Bye. 
You know, I, I think that, that is what a lot of us are feeling. 
I really do. 
Go ahead, Gila. 
Uh, Gila. 
What I was going to say. 
Sorry. 
Um, so while we were away, we were in a swing state and. 
We meeting Gila and I. 
Yes. 
We meeting Rob and I. 
Um, and watching TV was nearly impossible because like, we just wanted to, you know, see the weather forecast and we couldn't do it because it was all, all political ads all the time. 
I was, you know, I'm just like Christmas is in two months. 
It's time for Christmas ads. 
And one of the things that upset me the most, in addition to just the fire hose of vitriol was there was an ad. 
It wasn't for anything. 
It was an anti Harris ad and they kept pronouncing her name wrong. 
They all do that. 
They all do that. 
I don't know what they're trying to prove, but they all. 
I know what they're trying to prove. 
What is it? 
What's the point? 
It is two pieces, which is first of all, I don't care enough about who you are to learn how to say your name right. 
And number two, and significantly more insidiously, as far as I'm concerned, your name is weird. 
You are weird. 
You don't belong here. 
Interesting. 
Yes. 
And speaking of the person whose name can be somewhat difficult to pronounce after a while, it does get frustrating. 
And I'm sure that when vice president Harris was younger, people were like, it's an interesting name. 
Can we call you Molly? 
That would be easier. 
Oh, wow. 
That must have been something being in a swing state. 
And I mean, the TV must not have been the only thing that was different there with all the hysteria, getting people to vote your way. 
I mean, you know, that state, that vote could could swing the whole thing. 
No, absolutely. 
And here's the other thing. 
Speaking of could swing the whole thing. 
I grew up in a state that apportions electoral votes. 
It is one of two states that are not winner take all in electoral college. 
So that's got to be Nebraska, right? 
How did you know? 
Because it's Nebraska. 
And what's the other one? 
Maine? 
Maine. 
And I don't sound like I come from Maine. 
No. 
But it's fascinating to see because there have been a couple times in the last few elections where the second district has gone blue and they've had to give out that one electoral vote. 
So there's this whole movement in the Omaha area, they're calling it the blue dot campaign, and people are like putting blue dot signs on their yards. 
They did a human blue dot in a park. 
But the thing I don't understand, do not get at all, if the electoral college has to continue, why is every state winner take all? 
I think the way Nebraska does it makes a lot of sense. 
Thank you. 
Just answered your own question there. 
Look, the way it's not making any sense, it benefits Republicans every time. 
Yeah. 
Every time. 
In 2000 and 2016, they're not going to change. 
And I know there are a couple of plans on ways to make the crazy system that exists now not as crazy. 
But we're certainly not going to get there before Election Day this year. 
And, yeah, I'm worried about that. 
I think it was the governor of Nebraska who refused to sign a bill that would have made it a winner take all. 
Was it not? 
That is not what happened. 
I'm sorry. 
So what happened was they were trying to push through a bill to make it a winner take all state. 
Right. 
And the thing about Nebraska is that it's a unicameral state government, an officially nonpartisan unicameral state government. 
And one state senator was like, no. 
And he broke the majority and they couldn't do it. 
And then everybody just gave up. 
And he was a Republican. 
For now. 
Was he? 
Yes. 
Yes. 
So that's incredible. 
And I've seen so many instances of Republicans breaking ranks. 
Not nearly enough. 
A small minority and almost all of them have had to pay a price. 
But never has there been a time where that is needed, where people have to stand up and defy what they're being commanded to do. 
I have to say, you know, I don't know for sure, but I think if the shoes were on the other foot and Democrats had this crazy dictatorial, fascistic candidate running, I don't think they'd fall in line as quickly. 
Because Democrats are constantly arguing with each other and thwarting each other's efforts. 
I know this. 
And I just don't think that would happen. 
I don't think it's in the nature of the conversation. 
And what we're seeing here is basically just two different views of how things should go. 
One, follow the commands, follow the leader. 
And the other is think for yourself and hopefully reach the same conclusion. 
And let's get as many different people, different kinds of people involved, even those with different names. 
You know, and I think we're at a real crossroads here in our country where, you know, how is it going to go? 
Are we going to? 
Hey, I saw something today that was really kind of funny. 
In a car, automatic car, D goes forward, R goes backwards. 
I never thought of that before. 
Two things. 
Number one, Tim in Connecticut, everything you've said about voting in the chat is amazing. 
I'm not going to read it all out loud, but I do love it. 
But he says, my father used to say, if you don't vote, you can't complain. 
And that is very, very true. 
Number two, a listener named Larry has a suggestion. 
Emmanuel Goldstein, 2028. 
Oh, please. 
I'm just reading it. 
I'm just reading it. 
Okay. 
I'm not going to say I don't deserve that, but you don't deserve that. 
Believe me. 
We have a phone call. 
Someone's been waiting very patiently. 
Actually, we don't know they've been waiting patiently. 
They just have been potted down. 
So, but here we're potting them up. 
Good evening. 
You're on off the hook overtime. 
Go ahead. 
Speak up. 
I would, I would say that maybe they've been waiting impatiently because they're no longer there. 
Well, we're sorry. 
Or you have a phone that doesn't work and we can't hear you. 
Um, you can call back. 
802-321-4225. 
Hey, we're getting on a good conversation. 
We lose track of everything else. 
So. 
Try semaphore. 
Um, I have one other thought. 
And this is something that is irking me. 
Okay. 
And I feel the need to say it. 
And that is. 
Okay. 
There are times when there's a binary choice and there's a viable third option. 
Right? 
If you don't want Coke and you don't want Pepsi, you can go get RC and that's fine. 
Now is not the time for that shit. 
And. 
This is why I held this for overtime. 
Um, if you think that Jill Stein is, you know, vibing with your thing. 
No, it is not helpful to anyone right now. 
A protest vote is not helpful to anyone right now. 
She's not out there for anyone but herself. 
If she did, she'd do like everything more than every four years. 
Don't vote a third party right now. 
We cannot afford for that to happen. 
Um, and. 
Dude, if you're going to LMAO in my chat, I will ban you. 
That's fine. 
I don't really care. 
Don't look at the chat while you're talking to the radio. 
Sorry, it caught my eye. 
Yeah. 
Um. 
It is, it is so incredibly important. 
Um, also, did you know there's a Project 2025 comic book? 
Uh, you know what? 
I'm, I'm in no mood for that. 
Just a bunch of, in the fight against Project 2025, a bunch of, um, comic book artists got together to, like, share the most inflammatory bits. 
Okay, that's not what you said. 
I thought it was a, I thought they made a comic book. 
You mean it's anti-project. 
It's an anti-project, yes. 
Okay, that's, that's a little better. 
It's actually really, really cool. 
Look that up if you can. 
Um, also, another chat comment, which is not about third parties. 
Again, there may be times to try to overhaul the system and try to work in ranked choice voting and a viable third party system. 
Right now is not the time. 
Yeah, I, I couldn't agree more. 
Um, it's, it's sad. 
I mean, you know, I voted third party, uh, in the past. 
Uh, but sometimes you have to look at the big picture. 
You have to look at the entire chessboard. 
And realize that if you do vote for a third party, especially in a swing state or a close race, um, that could tip the balance in a way you definitely don't want to go. 
And if you get that result, um, it has profound implications for the future of democracy, period, in our country. 
And, and don't listen to me. 
Listen to the people, not only that have worked with Trump in the past, in, in his administration, his own administration, people he picked the words they are saying, listen to, to the words he says, the words that the people around him today are saying. 
It's not just us saying that bad things will happen. 
I mean, that, that Madison Square Garden hate fest. 
Oh my God, that was, that was painful. 
Um, on the other hand, if you vote in someone who is not going to do that, then, then you have a chance to protest and be heard. 
It bothers me, you know, that there's always some kind of protester at Kamala Harris's rallies. 
In fact, there was one today and she handled it amazingly. 
I thought she said that, um, you know, unlike Trump, we, you know, we don't hate people who disagree with us. 
And if I'm elected, they will have a seat at the table as the guy is being escorted out for disrupting the, um, the rally. 
Whereas, you know, Trump will say, uh, you know, I'll, I'll, I'll pay for your lawyer bill if you beat the guy up or, or horrible stuff like that. 
So you got to think about, you know, where do you have the most chance of having your voice heard? 
You might feel that sitting this out or, um, uh, voting for, for some third party, uh, is, is the answer, but it actually moves you further back and put you in a position where you will feel it worse than most because, um, you're standing for something that is not the norm right now. 
And, um, if you wind up with somebody in charge that doesn't tolerate dissent of any sort, where do you think you're going to fit in? 
You know, and as for Jill Stein, I'm sorry, we have a caller who's hopefully still waiting patiently. 
I'm sorry about this. 
Just, you know, enough said there's a picture of Jill Stein sitting at a table with a bunch of other people and Vladimir Putin, you know, that's the kind of thing she does. 
She hangs out with dictators. 
She's a phony. 
She has destroyed the green party. 
You know, I had such high hopes for the green party. 
And, uh, God, what she has done is just, it's, it's, it's sad. 
It's really sad because we need a green party. 
Just not this one, not this one. 
All right. 
Shall we take this phone close? 
Hopefully it's still there. 
We're so sorry. 
Good evening. 
You're on off the cover time. 
Go ahead. 
Yeah, no, I'm still here. 
Um, I just wanted to say a couple of things in response to what you were just saying. 
Sure. 
Go ahead. 
But on Jill Stein, that woman, I just, I find her really annoying. 
It's like, she just seems to just vanish. 
Like, election is on Tuesday, right? 
After the election, you're not going to hear a peep about this woman again for another four years. 
And then she just resurfaces again. 
The next election, she just comes out of nowhere. 
And she does the same thing. 
This is all she does. 
I didn't, last time I heard about Jill Stein was four years ago. 
And then this is all she does. 
You know, she's just a very annoying woman, in my opinion. 
I think if, if Trump, if Trump wins, she might actually find a place in his cabinet, just like Tulsi Gabbard. 
Uh, and, um, um, believe me, she won't be espousing green, um, talking points at, at that stage. 
But, um, you know, I, I've seen so many people basically just sell themselves out thinking that they're going to get something out of it. 
And all you have to do is look at the people that have made that decision in the past and look how many of them have paid a heavy price for that. 
Not because of anything, um, uh, that was done to them by the opposition, but by Trump himself and by his people. 
It's, it's, it's really kind of scary and sad. 
And by the way, you were saying, you don't think Democrats would, would fall in line, you know, the same way the Republicans are falling in line behind Trump. 
I'll tell you something. 
I'll take it further than that and tell you this. 
I don't even think there's another Republican that can get Republicans to fall in line like this. 
That hate fest, that thing you call the hate fest. 
I was actually there last week. 
Well, one of my friends works at Madison Square Garden. 
And so he got me a ticket and I went inside this thing, inside that thing, that, uh, that hate fest. 
Oh my God. 
Um, it was just amazing. 
I mean, he was, it was just, it's just, it's not, it's, I've been to a lot of, um, rallies. 
I've been to a lot of political rallies, but this is different. 
This is like, he's like a God. 
I mean, I don't know any other Republican that can arouse those type of emotions in people. 
He's like, like he could, I almost feel he could literally sit through all of them right there, shoot yourself in the head and they would have done it. 
Like he just, you know, he's like a God to these people, you know? 
So I don't even think any other Republican can do this. 
I think he's just a very sort of once in a generation kind of person, because I don't know any, even George Bush or whoever else was there before, I don't think they worshiped him like this. 
It wasn't like this. 
Oh, definitely not. 
They definitely didn't. 
You know, it seemed like the worst thing in the world then, but, uh, you know, now it's, uh, boy, I'd give anything for those days, but would you, would you describe this as, as a cult then? 
It is a cult to me. 
It is a cult. 
I mean, and there's no need, you can't argue with these people. 
Like I don't even try to, um, reason with these people. 
I don't even get out there and try to like argue with them and say, cause a lot of them are just, they're just way down that rabbit hole. 
There's nothing you can possibly say that would change their mind. 
It's not even worth trying. 
And they're saying these things, they're just not true. 
Like things are just completely provably false. 
Right. 
Like eating cats and dogs. 
Yeah. 
They believe it's true. 
Yeah. 
Well, whatever he says, they will believe in. 
And he basically makes up anything he wants. 
It doesn't, you know, facts don't matter anymore. 
Uh, they, as you say, they will believe anything he says. 
And the other thing that really kind of bugs me is that they're nice people. 
You know, if you didn't know they were doing this, you would get along with them just fine. 
It could, you know, I, I, I say that it could really happen to anyone where you buy into something that makes absolutely no sense. 
I don't, I don't understand his allure because if you had to point to somebody who is most definitely not one of you and not on your side, I could not think of anyone who fit that position more than Donald Trump yet. 
They all say he, he talks like one of us. 
He's not one of you. 
He's a billionaire. 
He lives in, in mansions. 
He doesn't hang out with you. 
He doesn't understand you. 
He's never been in a grocery store in his life, you know, and he just says the magic words and you follow along. 
I think it's, you know, I, I, I drew an analogy on my other show, uh, to, um, um, uh, a recent NFL game I went to where I was standing in line for the, for the port-a-potty after the game and the, the hatred that I heard from the people behind me talking about jets fans, they were bills fans. 
They were talking about jets fans as if they were all evil people. 
I realized this, it's as simplistic as that. 
It's like one team versus another team and they will follow their team into hell if they have to, uh, you know, it's, that's what this has become. 
And it's, it's ridiculous. 
It's, and I just hope at some point they snap out of it. 
And, uh, I hope it's not too painful when they do. 
So this dude, I saw this dude who said he came from, uh, that Madison square garden rally. 
He said he came from Ohio and he literally used his last, he, he closed out his bank account. 
He has no money. 
He's unemployed, has no money. 
He closed out his bank account to get, to pay for transportation to come to see this man. 
Like, and, and who is he going to blame for being bankrupt? 
It won't be Trump. 
It'll be the Democrats. 
Anyway, y'all have a good night. 
I just wanted to chime in a little bit. 
Glad you got out safely. 
And, um, it's great to have your perspective. 
Is anything else that was weird in that place that we might not have heard about? 
Nothing else was weird, but I got to tell you when that comedian did that, I instantly knew, instantly knew it was going to be a problem. 
Like I knew immediately. 
And by the way, I don't think the cameras really caught the reactions of the people in the crowd because they, they thought that was hilarious. 
And I don't see the joke. 
It's not funny. 
Like even no, no matter how you feel about Puerto Rican, let's say you even didn't like Puerto Ricans or whatever. 
It's just not a funny joke. 
You know what I mean? 
I just, so it's just not a funny joke to say, regardless of how you feel. 
You know, it's obvious that this was something that was okay in their camp. 
They, they picked this guy out. 
They knew the kind of material he would do. 
As you say, the crowd laughed calling Puerto Rico garbage, you know, and then the ultimate irony is that, that Biden goes and, and, uh, speaks off the cuff and calls Trump supporters garbage in response to that. 
And now he's the one getting targeted for being hateful when he's not even the candidate. 
And, and he was quick to, to, uh, uh, to, uh, backtrack on what he said. 
And Kamala Harris was very quick to say, this is not what I agree with at all. 
And she is very sincere about that, but they are getting traction. 
If you look at, at, you know, the news today, that's the top story. 
It should not be the top story at all. 
We're forgetting about the horrible things. 
And that was only one horrible thing that was said at that rally. 
There were so many others. 
It's six hours long. 
If you can sit through six hours of this garbage, yeah, I said it. 
And then, uh, you know, you will hear all kinds of horrible things. 
Oh God. 
It was so many, so many. 
Hang on. 
Gila, you have something? 
I was thinking about throughout my lifetime, all the stuff that has disqualified politicians and how far, how much the world has changed. 
Remember Howard Dean? 
All he did was go woohoo. 
And that was, that's what I'm thinking. 
No, he went. 
Okay. 
Yeah. 
But you know what? 
Trump has done more than that. 
That's what I'm saying. 
Dan Quayle. 
Dan Quayle. 
Misspelled potato. 
Uh-huh. 
And all of a sudden, everybody's like, well, this man is too stupid to be in national politics. 
Yeah. 
But didn't he remain in national politics far too long after that? 
I mean, he was still the vice president at the time. 
Yeah. 
He was so harmless. 
I don't think there's any procedure for getting rid of a vice president, but like the stuff that is being said now, which is infinitely worse than putting an E on the end of potato. 
It's not factual. 
Like, what has happened? 
There's nothing he can do that will change them. 
They just, whatever he does, they don't care. 
There's literally nothing. 
There's literally nothing. 
Yeah, well, it's an interesting study. 
And, you know, we've said this many times over the years, but the people who say it can't happen here, whatever it they're referring to, they're wrong because anything can happen anywhere and nobody is immune. 
And we're seeing that firsthand here. 
All right. 
You have a good night. 
Thanks so much for your call. 
Take care. 
I think we're going to close it out with that. 
That was a good call. 
You know, that Dan Quayle incident brings to mind, whatever happened to the kid that he was correcting in that classroom. 
I want to know, what did that kid go on to do? 
Maybe he's a potato farmer. 
Who knows? 
Maybe he teaches spelling. 
Anything's possible. 
Or maybe he is voting for Trump. 
You know, anything. 
Anything is possible in this world. 
The thing that always got me about Howard Dean, I always felt so bad for that guy because a mic that I don't think he knew was on happened to catch him doing a little Yelp of Triumph when he was up on a stage at a rally for his own success with people holding up signs with his name on them. 
Any single one of us, I think, would have a similar reaction if we were in that situation and had like a crowd of people cheering us on and waving our names around and wearing t-shirts with our names on and stuff. 
I think that would be a pretty, you know, we'd be pumped. 
We'd be stoked. 
And we'd probably let out a nice, yeah. 
Yeah, and there have been plenty of strange, like, power yells coming from that rally at MSG. 
So, like, it's a thing now, apparently. 
I don't know if people are being ironic, but yeah, it just seemed like much was made of nothing, kind of like Biden's reaction, I mean, or rebuke of the garbage comment becoming, you know, a gotcha for them. 
I just can't believe they're actually getting traction with that because he's not the candidate. 
He speaks off the cuff. 
He's famous for this kind of thing. 
Don't vote for him. 
And yeah, don't vote for Biden. 
And they have done so much worse. 
The candidate, their candidate, has directly said much more horrible things, such as people like us, people who oppose him, are the enemies of the people, and bad things should happen to us, and things like that. 
Much worse than saying the people that are saying these racist things are garbage. 
You know, it's not what Kamala Harris would say if she said that. 
She's very clear, and that's all that matters. 
Yeah. 
So did you know that if he doesn't win, it's the Jews' fault? 
Oh, yeah. 
Yeah, no, it's definitely a Jews' fault. 
Yeah. 
Yeah. 
But the other thing I was going to say is that that young man's name was William Figueroa. 
And as of five years ago, he now lives in Florida, where he is the manager at a big box store somewhere in Florida. 
Please do not praise my OSINT skills. 
How the hell did you find that out so quickly? 
I literally searched Dan Quayle potato kid. 
Wow. 
What a thing to be called. 
Dan Quayle potato kid. 
I was just trying to figure it out. 
BuzzFeed News tracked the dude down in 2019. 
So that was the first. 
Again, I started on the show as the research department. 
And this is why. 
We have another phone call. 
Yeah, this is why you need to support independent media and journalism. 
We said we were going to stop, but Kyle said we should take this one, so we're going to take this one, and then we're going to stop. 
Good evening. 
You're on Off The Hook Overtime. 
Go ahead. 
Good evening, everybody. 
Good evening. 
How are you? 
You know who this is? 
Now I do. 
And now I know why Kyle said we had to take this call. 
This is Zap from the UK, correct? 
Zap from London. 
I'll make it brief. 
I was summoned. 
It's good to know we can still do that. 
That's a very Dracula thing to say there, Zap. 
It's Halloween. 
Is it Halloween there already? 
Yes, it is. 
It's already Halloween. 
Yes, we've got daylight saving time, so it's not as late as you think. 
How do you guys celebrate Halloween in London? 
We've Americanized it, so it's the same as America. 
The kids go around trick-or-treating, and the adults go around getting drunk. 
Well, what did you do before? 
Nothing, really. 
I don't know. 
Halloween comes from Scotland. 
Oh, it does? 
I think. 
Wow. 
Okay, I didn't know that. 
It was just the young ewes causing havoc. 
Yeah, I saw it in a documentary. 
Yeah, it's just an excuse to cause mayhem, as usual. 
Well, we have Mischief Night. 
Isn't that a Midwest thing, Gila? 
Mischief Night? 
Yeah, I think it's Mischief Night is where it's originated from. 
Is that Halloween, or is that the day before Halloween? 
It's the night before. 
Sometimes it's called Devil's Night. 
Devil's Night. 
Okay, so you've got the 30th and the 31st, and then All Saints Day. 
I guess you asked for forgiveness on that day or something? 
I don't know. 
Yeah, I don't know. 
It's Mexican Day of the Dead. 
Yeah, yeah, that time. 
They are. 
Guy Fawkes Day is... 
And then a couple of days later. 
Yeah, Guy Fawkes Day on Election Day. 
That's going to be something. 
That's a proper British holiday. 
No, the British one is, was it Guy Fawkes Day? 
November the 5th. 
Yep. 
Yep. 
Bonfire Night. 
Right. 
Anyway, I was going to say, the reason I'm phoning is to do with Manchester 2600. 
Oh, yes, the controversy. 
Explain. 
Yeah, it's run by women. 
Oh, I'm not sure where you're going with that. 
Which means it's excellent. 
But you should know that Gila has a look of ash and horror on her face. 
So please follow that up. 
No, I'm kidding. 
They're lovely women. 
But I believe it's because it's half term and one of them is a mother. 
Now, I don't have to explain about the birds and the bees, do I? 
No, but we were confused by it being November 8th being the anniversary because that wouldn't still be the first Friday ever. 
November 8th, it's impossible for it to be the first Friday. 
So we just said it didn't add up. 
But it's the nearest one to the first Friday and they come up to a year and they're celebrating. 
They've got a cake and they just decided to have it a week later for whatever reason. 
I'm not too sure. 
Okay. 
I believe it's to do with half term, but I'll find out and maybe phone in next week to let you know. 
Okay, maybe we can all celebrate. 
We're going to need something to celebrate. 
Well, the UK, well, Bournemouth was, I think, in September's birthday. 
I don't know how many years they've been running now. 
Version 2. 
Manchester is now version 2. 
London is still version 1. 
Been running since 1993, I believe. 
We do this in the UK. 
Sometimes they just don't have the meeting on the first Friday for whatever reason. 
It's our B-sides, inconvenient, and everyone just votes to say, let's have it the week after. 
Sure. 
That's definitely, it's just, we can't change it in the magazine or the website for one meeting. 
No, I'm not expecting to. 
If people understand that. 
I'm not expecting. 
Yeah, they communicate amongst themselves. 
Yeah, they follow the Twitter accounts of all the groups. 
There's an American guy, I think he's called Chaz, known as the Gay Leather Biker on Twitter. 
He knows about the meeting. 
He's not going to be on the first, and he's coming the following week, but I can't have it on the 15th. 
I already asked. 
You just have a meeting every damn Friday. 
That's what it sounds like we're heading towards. 
Well, we have it every, some meetings are like twice a month, because they have the mid-month meeting occasionally. 
Because, I mean, Cheltenham, they're very social. 
They do rock climbing and other things. 
They meet up quite a lot. 
Bournemouth, they're pretty good. 
They've got a lot of students there. 
And Manchester is starting to be more social. 
Good news, might have two more meetings starting up. 
In December, there might be the Birmingham meeting. 
And I heard rumors of Southampton starting up. 
Oh, those would be great. 
And, you know, if anyone in Canada is listening, I don't know what the hell happened up there. 
There's not a single meeting in Canada. 
They all disappeared. 
So, you know, since COVID, I hope they survived COVID. 
But I know there are hackers in Canada, because a lot of them come to Hope. 
And there are so many good cities up there to have meetings in. 
So I hope that we have a dozen meetings in Canada before long. 
I really do. 
Starting in the northwest. 
I'm just happy they've got one in Spain. 
Oh, yeah. 
In Madrid. 
There hasn't been a Spanish one for a while. 
So they're getting strong. 
We have meetings in Colombia. 
We have meetings in Mexico. 
I think there's a meeting in Peru. 
And Argentina. 
I think there's one. 
And I was going to say, I think the Sydney meeting would actually be today, on Thursday, because they're like 24 hours ahead. 
Right, right. 
So they're already having their meeting on Thursday or something. 
Or maybe it's later on today. 
Well, for them, it's Friday. 
In England, we're already in. 
Yeah, I was going to say, in England, we're already on Thursday. 
You guys are still on Wednesday. 
We're still Wednesday. 
And it is, I think, Thursday mid-morning in Australia, I think. 
Someone will correct me if I'm wrong. 
Mm-hmm. 
So, yeah, their meeting will be happening in a few hours. 
Are you sure? 
Well, actually, wait, that doesn't make sense. 
No, that doesn't make any sense, because it's Thursday. 
So, no, their meeting won't be until Friday. 
So, yeah, it's not going to be for a while. 
Yeah. 
Do you know if there's any meetings in Israel? 
There were before the pandemic. 
And we had made a special exception to not be on Friday, and we had asterisks, but then they never came back after COVID. 
Oh. 
Yeah. 
And I think Egypt was on Thursday as well, and I think that disappeared as well. 
Okay. 
Well, I mean, we can be flexible as far as days and times and things like that, so we just have to be told. 
Yeah. 
Anyway, everything else okay over there? 
Yeah, how's, how's, how's Marriott, England doing? 
More or less. 
I don't know if I'm going to a meeting on Friday. 
Otherwise, it's still getting complicated, but there should be a meeting on Friday in London. 
Uh-huh. 
Should be one in Bournemouth. 
Uh, I'm trying to think of how children should have you having one. 
Uh, those are just the English ones. 
There's, of course, a couple in Scotland, and there might be a few in Ireland. 
Oh, really? 
Okay. 
I'd like to know about those. 
Uh, I don't know. 
I think there's one in Dublin, and there's one in Belfast. 
Okay. 
Yeah, you... 
But they don't, they're not organized. 
Okay. 
Doesn't take much to organize. 
They're going to have discords. 
It doesn't take much to organize. 
Yeah, however, they're lazy. 
Mm-hmm. 
Yeah. 
I'm not sure how they'll, how they'll react to that, but, um, yeah, if, if you want to start a 2600 meeting, all you have to do is, um, go to the website, 2600.com slash meetings, uh, click on the link for guidelines, and then email us, or write to us on Twitter. 
I believe the account is 2600 meetings, and, um... 
You can... 
Yeah, there's the 2600 meetings, um, Twitter account, uh, which we still use for that, and, um, or you can email meetings at 2600.com with, uh, details. 
We just like meetings to be on the first Friday, just so that it's easy to know when meeting day is. 
And, um, uh, they have to be open to everybody. 
No admission charge, no age restriction, things like that. 
And, um, and, and, and, and you can't basically say, this is my meeting, and you're not allowed to come. 
You can't say that. 
Uh, if, if somebody is acting badly, then the venue itself will take care of that, but that's not something that we expect. 
Yeah. 
Or, or, uh, meeting people to, uh, be handling. 
Uh, sometimes we do. 
We just drag them around the back, sort of, and they soon get educated. 
Uh-huh. 
In a nice way. 
Yes, yes, definitely. 
Well, Zap, good hearing from you. 
Yeah, they don't get back. 
Yeah, um, so I hope you, uh, have a fun Halloween, and, um, hope we survive next week. 
Certainly will, Troy. 
Cool. 
Yep. 
Uh, just, just, uh, uh, say something. 
Um, I think Manchester are going to their old venue. 
The details are on their Twitter, which is, uh, 2600 Manchester. 
Okay, well, do ask them to contact us if they are having any venue changes, because we don't always check everybody's Twitter account or webpage. 
Um, so we need to. 
Yeah, yeah, yeah. 
No, I'll, I'll tell them that I was on the radio promoting their meeting, and they'll sort things out. 
They're pretty good like that. 
Okay. 
Yeah, we, we, we met, uh, we met at least one of the people that, um, uh, runs the meetings. 
You met Rosie? 
Yes, at DEFCON. 
Rosie's the one with the children, as far as I know. 
Uh-huh. 
But yeah, it was Rosie you met. 
Cool. 
Um, yeah, um, and I hope everyone in America votes, because I think you have to see something soon. 
Yeah, we, uh, we got that thing coming up. 
All right. 
Yeah. 
Well, it'll be interesting to see what we're, what kind of mood we're in next week. 
So, uh, this might be the last time we're fairly normal. 
And thank you very much for taking the call. 
I appreciate it. 
I know you said you didn't want to take another one, and I've been chatting too long. 
Yeah, well, you're Zap. 
Of course we have to pick the phone up. 
Thank you for calling, Zap. 
Thank you, people. 
Yes. 
You're welcome. 
You're the boss. 
I thought I would. 
Wow. 
Very well. 
All right. 
And that was the last call. 
I don't care if the Pope calls. 
We're not picking up. 
Um, all right. 
So, um, that's it for us. 
O-T-H at 2600.com is our email address. 
If you have anything to say, um, any final words from you guys on Skypeland? 
Yeah. 
Um, as, as, uh, Zap was saying, it's always good when meetings, when the 2600 meetings all over the world have their own sort of, uh, web presences, social media, whatever. 
You can find our own for the New York meetings at nyc2600.net. 
That's right. 
Let's let us know if you have a Mastodon, um, um, uh, instance or, um, account or, uh, blue sky or, um, Twitter or webpage, whatever. 
Or we'll, we'll spread that around. 
Yeah. 
And to rebuild anything, you have to deconstruct something or everything. 
Wow. 
Yeah. 
I'm going to chew on that for a while. 
I don't know. 
I thought it was cool. 
We'll see you next week. 
Good night.