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Bondi Le Bon! 
Bondi Le Bon. 
Bondi Le Bon. 
And a very good evening to everybody. 
The program is Off the Hook. 
Amanda Goldstein here with you on this Wednesday evening. 
Joined tonight by Kyle. 
Hi. 
How are you doing? 
Fine. 
I'm over here. 
Yeah, I know. 
I can see you. 
And Rob T. Firefly is out there in Skypeland, looks like. 
Good evening. 
Also looks like Gila is in a different part of Skypeland. 
How are you doing? 
I sure am. 
Good evening. 
And in yet another location in Skypeland, we have Alex. 
You do indeed. 
Good morning. 
Good morning from Bangkok. 
You're still in Bangkok, Thailand. 
Okay. 
You know, Alex, it's safe to come back. 
I mean, you know, we have until January, so you don't have to, you know, be in the bunker this early. 
But please do clear out some space because a bunch of us might want to go over there, too. 
I don't blame you. 
I don't blame you. 
Actually, it's been an amazing week here in Bangkok at the Ethereum DevCon and heading back tonight. 
So I'll leave tonight and come back to New York. 
Get back by around 3 p.m. 
tomorrow. 
Okay. 
So if you're planning an entourage to greet Alex on his return, that's the time to be there. 
Okay. 
So we have a bunch of things to talk about tonight. 
We're going to try to keep it as, you know, upbeat as possible because that's, you know, in our nature. 
But, boy, we have some hard roads ahead. 
Let me start with four words, okay? 
And you'll see what I'm talking about. 
You'll see both humor and, oh, my God, in the same future. 
Four words. 
Attorney General Matt Gaetz. 
Yeah. 
That's the reality that we're facing now. 
Attorney General Matt. 
Okay. 
You know, so last week it was the show where we were in shock over the election results. 
This week it's the show where we're starting to reel from seeing what the cabinet picks are. 
You have Secretary of State Marco Rubio. 
Yeah. 
You've got Elise Stefanik who is going to be the U.S. 
ambassador to the United Nations. 
I doubt she can even find the United Nations. 
He has no diplomatic experience whatsoever except possibly negotiating over a parking spot or something like that. 
But that's it. 
And now Attorney General Matt Gaetz. 
Can you imagine? 
One of us very likely in the next year could find ourselves being indicted and the page of the person indicting us will be Matt Gaetz. 
And I don't know if I can keep from laughing at that point. 
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It's going to be hard. 
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All right. 
We have an interesting story here. 
You guys are familiar with tracking apps, I take it. 
You know, we, well, okay. 
Honestly, I'm not going to kid around here. 
I've never used one. 
I don't intend to ever use one. 
But people do use these for their kids, sometimes for their spouses, sometimes for complete strangers. 
I don't know. 
But basically, these apps allow you to monitor the location of somebody using their phone. 
And, you know, for some people, I guess it might make sense if you think your kid might be, you know, trying to make a run for it or something or is at risk for some reason of being abducted. 
But how would you feel if it was no longer a choice, if it was something that was mandatory? 
We're starting to see that. 
We're starting to move in that direction. 
I want to tell you the story of some people down in Georgia. 
Let's go back to October 30th of this year. 
That was when police handcuffed Brittany Patterson in front of three of her four children and drove her to the police station in Fannin County, Georgia. 
She was then fingerprinted, photographed, and dressed in an orange jumpsuit. 
What happened? 
Hours earlier, around noon, she had driven her eldest son to a medical appointment. 
Her youngest son, named Soren, 10 years old at the time, since turned 11, he wanted to come along but wasn't around when it was time to leave. 
So, I figured he was in the woods or at grandma's house. 
Patterson said she lives on 16 acres with her kids and her father. 
Her husband works out of state. 
No shortage of family in the vicinity. 
Patterson's mother and sisters live just two minutes away. 
But Soren, being a 10-year-old, was not playing in the woods. 
He had decided to walk to downtown Mineral Bluff, a town of just 370 people, not quite a mile from the house. 
A woman who saw him walking alongside the road, where the speed limit is 25 or 35 in some places, she asked him if he was okay, and he said yes. 
But she called the police. 
A female sheriff picked up the boy, called Patterson. 
She asked me, says Patterson, if I knew he was downtown, and I said no. 
And Patterson was upset that Soren had gone to town without letting anyone know, but says there was hardly reason to worry. 
I was not panicking as I know the roads. 
Know he's mature enough to walk there without incident. 
But the sheriff disagreed. 
She kept mentioning how he could have been run over or kidnapped or anything could have happened. 
The sheriff drove Soren home, left him with his grandfather. 
After returning to the house, Patterson scolded her son, and that, she thought, was that. 
But at 6.30 p.m. 
that night, the sheriff returned with another officer. 
They told Patterson to turn around and put her hands behind her back as three of her kids watched. 
She was handcuffed. 
The sheriff took her purse and phone, put her in the cruiser, hauled her off to jail. 
Yeah. 
Now, to Patterson, this made absolutely no sense. 
She'd grown up in the area of plenty of unsupervised time to wander and play, and she was raising her kids that way, too. 
The mentality here, she said, is more free range. 
She was soon released on a $500 bail. 
The next day, a case manager from the Division of Family and Children's Services came out for a home visit and even went to interview Patterson's oldest son at his school. 
The case manager told Patterson everything seemed fine but declined to comment to the site I'm reading from, Reason.com. 
A few days later, the Division of Family and Children's Services, the FCS, presented Patterson with a safety plan for her to sign. 
It would require her to delegate a safety person to be a knowing participant and guardian and watch over the children whenever she leaves home. 
And the plan would also require Patterson to download an app onto her son's phone, allowing for his location to be monitored. 
Yes, the day when it will be illegal not to track one's kids is rapidly approaching. 
Now, Patterson, to her credit, did not want to be compelled to track her son. 
Recalling a similar case, she contacted attorney David DeLugas. 
He's the head of Parents USA, a nonprofit that often provides pro bono legal help to parents wrongly arrested and prosecuted for child neglect. 
GoFundMe has been established to help Parents USA cover the Patterson's legal expenses. 
Now, as her counsel, DeLugas called the assistant district attorney to discuss the case. 
He recorded the conversation, which is legal in Georgia. 
The ADA told DeLugas that if Patterson would sign the safety plan, the criminal charges would be dropped. 
DeLugas responded that if Patterson had to sign a safety plan simply because her son walked someplace without her knowing his exact location, it would stop him from visiting friends or having any independence whatsoever. 
But the assistant district attorney maintained that Saren had been in danger and thus a safety plan was necessary. 
The matter was left unsettled. 
And Patterson is saying she will not sign this. 
She could face a year in jail. 
She could face a thousand dollar fine. 
She could even face having her kid taken away from her. 
Now, obviously, there's a technological and a privacy aspect to all this that is of interest. 
But the other thing that I think is of particular interest is where this happened. 
You know, we hear all these complaints and accusations hurled from from one side of the political spectrum to another. 
And if I were to read you the story without giving you the details of where exactly it took place, you would say, oh, boy, it's that nanny state again. 
The Democrats just want to control everything. 
But no, no, this is as red as red can be. 
District attorney was appointed by Republican governor Brian Kemp. 
District attorney's name is Frank Wood for the Appalachian Judicial Circuit. 
Right. 
And it's about time that we face reality and realize that when we say that the government wants to control every aspect of your life. 
You don't point the finger at just one side because it's omnipresent. 
It's everywhere. 
And Republicans are every bit as as guilty as Democrats, if not more so. 
Yet somehow we get it into our heads that Democrats are to blame for things that they do as well. 
And I just thought this was incredible. 
No one's really touched upon that aspect of it. 
But in a world where we see all these crazy accusations being thrown around where Democrats are somehow blamed for covid lately, they've been blamed for killing a squirrel. 
Well, I mean, it just goes on and on and on. 
And if you just do a little bit of digging, not too much, just a little bit, you'll see that there's examples of all kinds of bad things that are happening. 
But it's not just one side. 
It's all sides. 
And we need to recognize that. 
But mostly we need to fight this kind of thing, because forcing somebody to track somebody else is not healthy. 
And I don't understand what's gotten into the heads of the people down there where they think somebody simply walking down a road at 10 years old. 
He's now 11. 
He turned 11 since this happened only a few days ago. 
Now, how is that something that we have to go nuts over? 
You know, I think when we were all kids, we did things like this all the time. 
And just because we've we've convinced ourselves that the world is a dangerous place and that there's all these evil people out there looking to do us harm. 
That paranoia should not translate into policy. 
Yet every day we see another example of that happening. 
OK, any any thoughts, ideas? 
Yeah, it's like it's aesthetical to freedom. 
Uh huh. 
Alex. 
Well, I think that you're right, Emmanuel. 
I don't think this is a political issue at all. 
I think this is much more of a philosophical and policy based issue, because this is this is all about really the paternalism, you know, or the state essentially acting as as if it knows so much better than we do. 
Right. 
I mean, we have certain things, certain laws, I think, that are paternalistic, that we may look at that are probably helpful, like laws about riding a motor motorcycle with a helmet on. 
Right. 
You know, there's certain laws that say you have to wear a helmet. 
And so the state's telling you to do something and that's for your own benefit. 
But anytime you have paternalistic laws that that are that are put onto the books, especially if they have some kind of criminal consequence for violating those particular laws, there is this risk that gives me that there's an overreach of the government. 
And these types of laws, I think, are wrong in just so many ways. 
But I think the first one is is what really what you're hitting at is that there's this erosion of autonomy of the individual because of these laws. 
You feel like you have a choice to do things, but you're not. 
You're being forced to to make one particular choice that the state has made for you and you're forced to do it. 
And this is a particularly crazy choice as well to have to surveil somebody digitally or face some kind of prosecution. 
And it's your children of all of all of all people as well. 
It also, I think, prevents people from making the right decisions about these types of things themselves. 
It just seems like it's an automatic and knee jerk response about using these types of technologies to control other human beings. 
I could see people who are subject to being continually electronic, electronically monitored or surveilled digitally, especially with their geolocation being much more likely to, let's say, install some kind of stalkerware on their spouse's phone. 
So it normalizes this type of behavior. 
It provides this illusion of choice. 
I think it stifles people's growth and it's totally misguided intervention of the state. 
I'll stop there. 
I agree with everything you said, except for one one thing where you said it's not a political issue and it shouldn't be a political issue. 
But if this happened in New York, do you think for one minute it would not have been have been displayed by Republicans everywhere as yet another example of the nanny state running every aspect of your life? 
And yet here we have a clear example of it happening on the other side, much like Republicans are trying to control women's bodies and having the government in the bedroom. 
You know, so for some reason, Democrats are very bad at defending themselves against these unwarranted accusations where they have exclusive guilt in situations like this. 
And here's a clear example where you could you probably couldn't find a Democrat within 100 miles of this place. 
And yet this kind of thing is happening. 
Rob, go ahead. 
In addition to everything you guys are saying, I am always kind of feeling chills crawling up my spine when things like legal requirements that are put onto people require the use of something like a spyware app on a smartphone that that would be in the possession of this kid. 
And in this case, not everyone wants to give their kids a smartphone, even today, they're ubiquitous. 
But, you know, there are there are people who question the value of that in a young person's life. 
Not everyone has access to a cell phone. 
Not everyone has the luxury of being able to buy smartphones for their children, even if they wanted to. 
And yet so many of the most private aspects of our lives more and more are tied through these devices. 
And you hear about things like divorced co-parents using co-parenting apps to communicate with one another and arrange things around the around the child. 
And sometimes that is part of conditions imposed on them by by by by a court, like a family court. 
And this just makes me question our dependence on this sort of thing and our willingness to accept something as, frankly, scary as an app that tracks your child. 
You know, you know, smartphones and the apps on them are are subverted and broken into all the time. 
And maybe you don't want that security vulnerability going on. 
Yeah. 
And also, the thing that really is the victim here is freedom where, you know, a kid can just have an adventure on his own. 
I mean, think of when you were 10 years old, you know, I you know, when I was eight years old, I grew up in Queens and well, I didn't actually grow up, I guess, at eight. 
But I was pretty grown up and I would go down and watch the trains go by on the L.I. 
double R, you know, and nobody in my house knew I was doing that. 
But it was it was I rode my bike down there. 
And yeah, it was it was my thing. 
I went other places, too. 
I'd ride all around the city. 
Well, not New York City, but, you know, around my neighborhood, at least. 
And when when we teach kids to be so afraid that if they venture more than a few feet from their home, they're in mortal danger and will be in trouble. 
You're raising very unhealthy people that will take that with them for the rest of their lives. 
Go ahead, Gila. 
I think so. 
I have so many streams of thought right now. 
But one thing just going on what you said, it's not just that we're teaching kids to be afraid. 
And unadventurous. 
We're teaching kids. 
We're teaching communities that no one is safe and that you can't see someone walking down the street and just mind your business. 
If the kid is not running up to you and saying, oh, my gosh, I can't find my parents. 
If a child is walking around the street looking OK, I mean, granted, I'm not a parent, but I feel like you can usually tell when someone is in distress. 
And if you see a kid hanging out and having a good time, let the kid hang out and have a good time. 
That's thing number one. 
We need to be more willing to watch out for each other and less willing to jump to law enforcement whenever anything is amiss. 
I think that's piece one point five. 
I'm not even sure where I'm counting anymore. 
I was thinking also about when I was a kid, I did not grow up in New York. 
I grew up in the Midwest and my mom was driving carpool home from school, four kids in the car. 
Me, my brother, two very close family friends. 
And she said, I have to go to the grocery store for five minutes. 
Do you want to come inside? 
And we all said no. 
So we stayed in the car and we took naps in the parking lot. 
She was gone for 10 minutes and then she took us out for ice cream. 
She would be arrested now for doing that. 
Crack the windows. 
I just want to put that on the record. 
It wasn't that hot outside and we cracked the windows. 
And how old were you? 
Um, I was 10, which means the other kids in the car were 12, 9 and 6. 
And did any of you know how to open a car door if things got too hot or a window? 
Yeah, but also it was late fall in the Midwest. 
We were going to be okay. 
Well, blizzard could happen or, you know, a meteorite. 
I don't know. 
But yeah, I see your point. 
We also knew how to get from the car to the store if we needed her. 
And this idea that everything has to be centralized and everything has to be followable at any given moment, that there's no way to get off the grid, you know, that now you've got airlines that are just like, hey, here's free Wi-Fi from takeoff to touchdown. 
That moment of bliss and non-connectivity, gone. 
Gone. 
But, E, I was curious. 
Is this like a site that you interact with on the reg? 
No, actually, it just came up in my news feed. 
I'm not familiar with it. 
Reason.com told this story. 
And I assume it's, you know, on the up and up, if anything is not accurate. 
Oh, no, no, no. 
So it wasn't a, so the person who wrote the story, I looked it up. 
So Lenore Skenazi is really cool, actually. 
And if you people don't know who she is, you should totally check her out. 
She's the founder of the Free Range Kids Movement because her kids were playing in the backyard without her. 
And she, like, they called the cops on her and almost took her kids away. 
So wait a minute. 
The person who wrote this article had the same thing happen? 
And that's the only reason I even saw this is because it already happened to somebody else. 
Because I did not see the story reported anyplace else. 
And it wouldn't have been otherwise. 
People are starting to pick it up now. 
But, so this woman, again, her name is Lenore Skenazi. 
She's been fighting the good fight on this for coming up on 30 years, I think. 
The rest of the site was kind of scary, though. 
So I was just curious how you found it. 
Well, I just found that story. 
But, you know, following up with what you said about where we're moving, you know, technology-wise and privacy-wise, it just makes me wonder. 
Now we have Elon Musk, who is part of this new department called the Department of Government Efficiency, if you can believe that. 
Now, I think, you know, if you thought that any of these people had any respect or took their job seriously, making up departments, and having the department, by the way, spell out DOGE, for God's sake. 
Like, I mean, do you see how they think it's all a joke? 
They're laughing at us. 
They're going to be, you know, basically taking money hand over fist from some scheme that they concoct together with their new department. 
But now this guy is going to have authority and a means of advising the highest levels of government on what policies to enact. 
You think our privacy won't be degraded even further? 
Yes, Kila. 
No, A, it absolutely will be. 
B, I didn't think about the DOGE thing. 
I'm very glad it's not called the Department of X. 
And, Salon Musk, everything is X. 
There's this concept that every accusation is an admission. 
And, you know, people are saying, oh, well, the other side wants to be tracking everybody and wants to require everybody to register every single thing they're doing. 
And they're standing in bathroom doorways and they're checking people's genitals when they walk in because that's what they want to do. 
And they want you afraid of it. 
But then you know it's coming. 
So, yeah, I'm surprised they don't just start implanting RFID chips in babies after birth so we can track them wherever they go. 
Oh, Gila, don't, don't, don't give ideas out. 
They listen. 
You think they're listening to this stuff? 
They listen, they get forwarded, and they write it down because, you know, we might be opposed to some of the potential scenarios in our heads. 
But those scenarios are, you know, realistic for them. 
And also, I'm told that not everybody knows what DOGE is. 
Does anybody want to explain DOGE very quickly? 
It's a cryptocurrency, basically. 
Do I need to go further than that? 
It's a meme cryptocurrency. 
What does that mean? 
It's based on a popular picture of a cute dog that was slapped onto a cryptocurrency to make it, you know, cool and with it for the kids these days. 
Why wasn't it called DOG then? 
Because the meme picture of the dog is called DOGE because that's just how it sort of burst into being. 
That's not a good enough answer. 
I want to know why it's called DOGE and not DOG if it's about a picture of a dog. 
But the point is, it's cryptocurrency, and it's very, very shady explanations as to just what is actually backing it, what it means. 
Not the point right now. 
They're calling a department that. 
It just indicates to me they're not taking any of this seriously. 
Kyle? 
Yeah, the conversation is kind of all over here. 
I mean, we're kind of, we've got big buckets and small buckets of topics. 
Like, you're talking a little bit towards, like, transhumanism and, like, 6G telephone standards and some of the features that have been touted around that. 
And what people are moving towards as far as enhancing their abilities through the use of technology. 
And I think the tracking thing, like, as much as it's, like, the wildest scenario is likely, I think there's more of this sort of tempered specific use. 
There are, like, the stuff around, like, requiring an app to track a child or them having, like, you know, kid-friendly ankle bracelets. 
I mean, it is conditioning a certain sort of asset tracking and, like, property instead of the individual, like someone having choice from birth, you know, on about certain things. 
And in a traditional sense, maybe last century or so, we, like, up until then, like, sort of felt it was the parents' guidance and they would be empowered until adulthood that they make the right choices around this. 
So I think there's other topics in here, too, we're kind of touching on, like, parenting and, like, even philosophical ones that, as a country, we haven't really agreed on, like, what they are, the ideals of freedom. 
Like, what is that? 
And to be an individual prior to adulthood, like, what are the choices and things that you're allowed to do? 
And then, of course, neighborhoods, like what I grew up with or, you know, in that period of time and the where, and, of course, that's different from where Gila and you may have grown up and the things you were allowed to do and not to do and the attitudes of the time were different. 
And, of course, the scale and affordability, let's say, of these technological management features that we now have ready access to, almost an overabundance of. 
And clear, actually, I think what we've been saying for a long time is a clear overabundance of these types of features. 
So that, even in the present, is inherently contextual, like, what part of the country, what part of the world, what your community standards are, what your neighborhood is even like. 
Is it an urban environment that is quite busy but also has a whole lot of supervision and, I guess, let's say, support for people that are commuting, whether old or young. 
You know, that's kind of like the Manhattan-type model. 
That's very different from a rural environment with when you're parenting and you entrust a minor to be operating equipment or going very far distances across a field or something without supervision. 
Those are different standards. 
Now, do you have to – in those environments, we're able to do a lot of these things with the abundance of technology. 
And it's presumably a choice that parents, if they're in control, presumably, they're making with as much information as possible. 
And I think we've always attested to the fact that there isn't really enough information on how capable a lot of these technologies are. 
Look, parents, I think, should always have the choice as to how they want to do this. 
But what you say, you know, it holds true for both urban and rural environments. 
You know, a kid can run a tractor, sure, but I've seen kids in the city riding subways on their own. 
So it really depends on how you're brought up, what your values are, what your level of comfort is. 
And some people may choose to have a much more supervised upbringing, but it should not ever be forced on people. 
And that's what I see happening in this particular case. 
And the thing that bugs me so much is that it's happening in a red area, as red as it can possibly be. 
And no matter what, it always somehow gets blamed on the other side when that is just not true. 
And there are so many other examples of that, but we only have the hour. 
Rob, go ahead. 
Yeah, I think what's encompassing all of this, and this covers wherever, whenever you grew up, actually, I think most of us here on this program could say we grew up in an era where we kind of saw the beginnings of the, I guess, what we would call a surveillance state trying to form. 
But I think the most insidious thing about situations like this app is it is training kids to be surveilled and to be okay with that and to accept that that is the way things ought to be. 
And, you know, one generation of kids gets that instituted as some sort of punishment. 
The next generation of kids just deals with it as a day-by-day thing that seems entirely normal, and that is what's frightening. 
Well, I mean, Alex's kid was normalizing cameras, remember? 
You know, about a year or two ago. 
Right, Alex? 
Yeah, that's funny. 
I was just about to bring that up. 
Yeah, I mean, absolutely. 
Kids these days are just so used to being surveilled everywhere they go. 
I mean, it's a completely different world. 
The other aspect I wanted to bring up of this story that I find just so absolutely offensive is the fact that the district attorney was going to force some kind of safety plan on the parent and sign a safety plan. 
And I guess that plan could be audited. 
And if the parent did not keep to the safety plan, then I guess the charges could be brought again. 
But the whole idea of having the state intervene in such a specific way about how you were bringing up your child and forcing some kind of electronic surveillance of that child is so anathema to personal autonomy and freedom. 
And it's really shocking to me. 
It really is. 
I find that to be one of the more offensive aspects of the story. 
Kyle, quickly, we have other stories. 
I just would add that I think because it would be something that is imposed on a large scale because of the attitudes that everyone expressed so eloquently about the variation and the expectation people have to be able to choose in their lives. 
And I think that there would be a lot of blowback or backlash to it. 
So I don't think it's a huge risk, but I think it's important to be aware of how we're using these things and how we're conditioning, of course. 
And I think we're also uniquely positioned because of our experience of having memories prior to things being networked kind of universally and now when it's kind of quite common. 
So it is cool to share about what we grew up with and that kind of thing. 
All right. 
Moving on, we have this story concerning Twitter, now known as X. 
Some of us still won't call it that, though. 
But when they unveiled their newest terms of service, which go into effect two days from now, November 15th, users quickly picked up on one change. 
And here it is. 
By submitting, posting, or displaying content on or through the services, you grant us a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free license to make your content available to the rest of the world. 
Now, that includes the right to analyze any of that content, including, for example, for use with and training of our machine learning and artificial intelligence models, whether generative or another type. 
So basically, by continuing to use the platform, users will agree that Twitter slash X can use their data to train its AI models. 
And using content to train AI has become a major issue as the technology booms. 
On Twitter, artists and others in creative roles are fretting about their work being used, not just on that platform, but to train computers that could someday replace human creators entirely. 
Other users say they're concerned about personal information in their tweets being used that way. 
Some users said on the site they've already begun deleting photographs of themselves from their feeds. 
And if users have an issue with those terms, they might end up in a federal courtroom that's favored by conservative activists and is already presiding over two lawsuits involving Twitter. 
According to the update, all disputes related to the terms will be brought to the U.S. 
District Court for the Northern District of Texas or State Courts in Tarrant County, Texas, about 100 miles away from Twitter's new headquarters or X's new headquarters outside of Austin. 
They say any user who continues to use their products or services on or after November 15th would be agreeing to the updated terms. 
In a somewhat related story, the Guardian is no longer using Twitter, is no longer using X. 
They said, we wanted to let the readers know we will no longer post on any official Guardian editorial accounts on the social media site X, formerly Twitter. 
We think that the benefits of being on X are now outweighed by the negatives and that resources could be better used promoting our journalism elsewhere. 
This is something we have been considering for a while, given the often disturbing content promoted or found on the platform, including far right conspiracy theories and racism. 
The U.S. 
presidential election campaign served only to underline what we have considered for a long time, that X is a toxic media platform and that its owner, Elon Musk, has been able to use its influence to shape political discourse. 
X users will still be able to share our articles and the nature of live news reporting means we will still occasionally embed content from X within our article pages. 
Our reporters will also be able to carry on using the site for news gathering purposes, just as they use other social networks in which we do not officially engage. 
Social media can be an important tool for news organizations and help us to reach new audiences. 
But at this point, X now plays a diminished role in promoting our work. 
Our journalism is available and open to all on our website, and we would prefer people to come to TheGuardian.com and support our work there. 
Thankfully, we can do this because our business model does not rely on viral content tailored to the whims of the social media giant's algorithms. 
Instead, we're funded directly by our readers. 
And, yeah, that is the key. 
That is the key. 
I guess it's a parallel to what we do here at WBAI. 
Imagine if we were subjected to the whims of the algorithm. 
We're not. 
We don't care about the algorithm. 
But this is really something rather dramatic, as it's one of the bigger sites to leave the platform. 
And we're seeing, both based on those new terms of service and the recent political developments, we're seeing a mass exodus. 
And most of those people seem to be winding up on a site called Blue Sky, which is very similar to the way Twitter used to look and is fairly easy to use. 
And I'm wondering if that is going to be where people wind up. 
Now, I know there are people who want to go to Macedon as well. 
I don't see why there can't be both. 
But, you know, I've been doing a little bit of experimentation on all three. 
And right now, the biggest engagement that I see, the most response and back and forth is on Blue Sky. 
I don't know why that is. 
It's certainly not on Twitter. 
I'm not sure if the reason for that is because I'm being what they called a shadow band, where basically your posts aren't seen by very many people. 
They have a number that shows you how many people have read your comment, your tweet. 
That number used to be in the thousands, and now it's maybe 50. 
So something happened. 
Either everybody left or there's some kind of a band in place. 
I don't really care. 
I don't want to be part of this. 
While I'm still on the platform, I'm engaging less and less and moving more and more towards these other alternatives. 
And I'm finding a lot of enthusiasm. 
I'm finding a lot of people that really are into this. 
There are a couple of speed bumps. 
There are apps that will allow you to migrate your followers to the new platform, to Blue Sky. 
But it doesn't quite work as well as you might want it to. 
For instance, if I followed Alex on Twitter, and his username was Alex, and I said to this app, yeah, show me where Alex is on Blue Sky. 
It will show me everybody who says Alex. 
And that's not really what I need. 
And I have to have some faith that whoever took the same handle as you is also you. 
And if that's not the case, then I'm going to wind up following the wrong person. 
That's going to clear out after a while. 
We'll figure it out. 
But alternatives are definitely needed. 
And not being beholden to something as negative as what Twitter has become is so essential for us to be able to communicate freely. 
I'm wondering what you guys have had any experience with this, Rob. 
Yeah. 
I mean, I could speak to the engagement end of it. 
But, you know, there are a few of us behind the scenes who work on the Twitter and Mastodon accounts for this program. 
And I have been noticing for a long time that, as you were saying, the engagement on Twitter had taken a nosedive. 
You know, we post, you know, when our show is live and when we're doing overtime and things like that and some other things. 
But people have not been interacting with it on Twitter for a long time. 
Mastodon, it is a lively crowd. 
And people really seem to appreciate our presence. 
And, you know, it goes to it speaks to, like, the presence of these silos and algorithms and things that we've all kind of been at the mercy of on social media for so long. 
And when something gets entrenched, it feels like, you know, on the organizational level that it can do anything, like, say, take all the content and feed it to the AI slot bots. 
And it's it's sad. 
And, you know, I I deleted my personal Twitter a while back. 
But one hobby I had in the heyday of Twitter was starting up other little Twitter accounts for little art projects and things. 
And, you know, I I have to chase all these down and make sure I delete them before the deadline, because I don't want that stuff ending up in the AI mills. 
Anyone else? 
Yeah, I question. 
I question whether we we need an alternative to Twitter. 
I just I just don't see this type of engagement providing much interaction or I don't have joy or any kind of level of sophistication to somebody's life. 
I find that the whole thing to be pretty repulsive and especially with what Twitter has become. 
It's it's been really, really bad lately. 
You know, all the content that is is being propelled on it. 
And, you know, and I I'll tell you, leading up to the election, I had gone to a couple of places in Pennsylvania where kind of the alt right would congregate. 
I went to one of these freedom festivals on a weekend and it was maybe a couple of weeks before the election. 
And it's it's one of these really kind of alternate right type of festivals. 
And I like to go every year or so just to see what people are thinking and talking about. 
And at one of the stages where there was a speaker talking about how the election was going to be stolen, he was telling everyone that they need to get on Twitter. 
And it wasn't it wasn't true social or gab or anything like that anymore. 
It was Twitter. 
It was you got to get on Twitter. 
You got to get on Twitter because Musk's our friend now and will be heard. 
And so it it's just there are these gathering spaces from which I just feel nothing good ever comes. 
So do we really need an alternative? 
Well, I mean, you're kind of contradicting yourself there, because if we don't have an alternative, we just have Twitter. 
You know, so and you also mentioned a couple of alternatives that exist, true social. 
And what's the other one, gab? 
Yeah. 
And I forgot about those. 
They must be worried now because, you know, right wing extremism was was was their domain. 
And now Twitter's kind of taking that over as well. 
I think we need alternatives. 
I mean, don't we need alternatives to right wing radio? 
You know, you need other places where people can communicate. 
If you're saying that social media in and of itself is unhealthy. 
Yeah, I agree with you on that. 
If you take it too seriously or get too embedded in it, but to not have any outlets for all the people that are disgusted by what's been going on lately. 
I think that would not serve us. 
So I think, you know, yeah, let's let's have alternatives. 
Let's do it right this time. 
Let's protect ourselves. 
I know our friend Corey Doctorow, he won't use Blue Sky. 
The reason for that. 
And, you know, I do understand this. 
It's not set up the way that Mastodon is, where it's decentralized. 
And if if if if one host goes nuts, you can just go to another one. 
Blue Sky, you're dependent on the people running Blue Sky. 
And they could go Elon someday in the future. 
And he doesn't want to go through all that again. 
Now, maybe there's a way to protect Blue Sky from that happening. 
I happen to like the interface. 
I happen to think it's, you know, like I said, it has the most engagement for me right now. 
But I certainly don't want to go through this again. 
And what what Mastodon has right now is is is quite nice. 
It's just it's it's a bit of a hurdle for a lot of people who don't have a whole lot of technical skills. 
So we make that easier and maybe we incorporate the two somehow. 
We've got something really good. 
But, yeah, I think we can all agree. 
Twitter's a lost cause unless, you know, it somehow falls out of Elon's hands and someone else wants to put in the time to rebuild it. 
But I'm glad we have alternatives. 
Gila, did you have something? 
I did, actually. 
I agree that I think it is important to have an alternative, but that does give me two thoughts. 
First of all. 
I mean, I don't know if that's a moment that's going to be replicable again in the same way, because social media has balkanized itself in so many different ways that there is not necessarily going to be a place where everybody's going to be. 
Part number one is part number one. 
Part number two is to Emmanuel, your point about. 
Left wing like talk radio. 
As a concept, and we need more of that. 
Do you remember Air America? 
Oh, yes, I do. 
I do. 
I'm not saying the left is particularly good at it. 
I'm saying that we need alternatives. 
We need alternatives. 
We need alternatives, but I think it's like herding cats. 
Well, I mean, look, it's when you take on a simplistic point of view, and most of that point of view revolves around my way or the highway. 
Anyway, it's fairly easy to get other people to agree with you on that, but if you're more nuanced and you believe in one thing but not the other thing that somebody else believes in, and you have all these different patchworks of opinions, and yet you somehow want to get everybody under a big tent, it's a lot more difficult than having that simplistic viewpoint. 
And I think that is why, on so many levels, the left is behind the right, because they do the simple thing, and they just prey on people's emotions and prejudices, and they get a lot of people following them. 
And the other side, it's a lot more work, and it doesn't always pay off. 
It often doesn't, but, you know, in the end, I think history will judge one side much, much more favorably than another. 
You know, one thing, though, I do want to say in closing of this story is that while I understand deleting accounts, I think maybe not deleting the account so much, deleting the tweets, sure, but deleting the account, if people want to find you, and they only know your Twitter account, how are they going to find you? 
And maybe somebody else will take your name on an alternative. 
So maybe we can come up with some kind of a uniform way that we install a pointer. 
I mean, imagine how pissed off Elon will be when the majority of Twitter accounts are nothing but pointers to another social media site, and nothing else. 
Yes, Rob? 
Well, that problem has kind of been solved since before all this mess got to this point, because a lot of us, including me, including 2600, including lots of other things, have their own website on their own domain. 
And, like, I have my own website, it's my name, and from there, you could see all my other social media crap that I'm on, and that list is always changing. 
When I delete something, it falls off the list on my site. 
When I add something, I add it there, and that's always the place where people know they can find me, and that's been long established. 
And I think it may behoove folks to bring back the era of people having their own little corner of the Internet rather than their own presences on other people's corners of the Internet, and depending on that, to just be there. 
Okay, I didn't want to let this story slip by. 
We only have two minutes left, but I think it's important to mention this, that the menstrual health and period tracking app Clue has said it will not disclose users' data to American authorities following Donald Trump's re-election. 
That message comes in response to concerns that during Trump's second presidency, abortion bans that followed the overturn of Roe v. 
Wade in 2022 will worsen, and states will attempt to increase menstrual surveillance, I can't believe I'm not even saying these words, in order to further restrict access to terminations. 
Basically, in a statement on TikTok, female and male staffers at Clue, based in Berlin, stand together with arms crossed, along with a text on screen that reads, We have never and will never disclose any members' private health data to any authority. 
If we are ever subpoenaed, we will not comply. 
You know, I want to hear words like that more often, because that is true courage. 
Because I always hear, yeah, we protect your privacy, but if we're subpoenaed, we will fully comply. 
No, don't. 
Stop complying. 
Start resisting. 
It's never been more important than this. 
Alex, I'll give you one second to respond to that, but we're out of time. 
Yeah, I think other apps, anything that stores personal information like that, of such a sensitive nature, should also realize everyone always has that choice. 
You can always fight back a subpoena. 
You don't have to comply, and you have to be forced to comply through a motion to compel. 
So I think it's very brave of them. 
I like to see others standing up in the same way. 
Okay. 
We are out of time. 
This has been Off the Hook. 
Write to us, OTH at 2600.com. 
And we are all going over to YouTube now for Overtime. 
Go to Channel 2600 on YouTube to see us there for Overtime. 
We'll see you next week. 
Good night. 
  And welcome, everybody, here on YouTube. 
Hi. 
That was the voice of Kyle, who has made it over to the YouTube side of things. 
Yep. 
And it looks like Rob T. Firefly and Gila are out there in Skypeland. 
And maybe you could verify that we are also on YouTube, so that we don't spend the whole hour talking to ourselves. 
We are indeed on YouTube. 
And also, welcome to the people who are here. 
Yes. 
And I have to mute my YouTube, because the lag is killing me here. 
I'm sorry to hear that. 
It looks like we also have Alex. 
I'm happy to see Alex. 
I thought he wasn't going to join us for YouTube, being in Bangkok and all. 
Yeah. 
I'm here. 
I'll probably drop in like 10, 15 minutes or so. 
I just want to say hello to everybody. 
What time is it in Bangkok, if you don't mind me asking? 
It is exactly 12 hours ahead. 
So it's 8 a.m. 
here. 
Wow. 
The sun is out. 
And it's Thursday, too, right? 
It is. 
It's Thursday. 
So it is tomorrow here. 
It's the morning. 
Okay. 
Can you tell us what Trump has done on Thursday? 
Because, you know, it'd be nice to have some advance warning. 
Yeah. 
It's a weird thing to be in the morning here when you turn on the news, turn on the television, and then you start seeing the news from yesterday, and it's, you know, watching CNN, and it shows the evening. 
It does feel kind of weird if you're watching something in the past. 
It's odd. 
You feel like you know more than we do because you're in the future. 
Well, I often feel like that. 
I know. 
That's the attitude you carry to any conversation. 
That's definitely true. 
Rob, I believe you had something as well. 
Yeah. 
No, I just jumping in on what we were speaking about on our radio hour, we were mentioning Blue Sky. 
And while we were talking about that, a listener over on Mastodon, who's known as Dr. 
47, graced us with a link about how Blue Sky is now owned by crypto grifters. 
What the hell is that? 
Um, just, uh, just, uh, uh, they've raised a $15 million Series A financing led by, uh, a blockchain, uh, capital type group. 
And, uh... 
Is this good or bad? 
I can't figure it out. 
Crypto grifter. 
I don't know how to take that. 
It is, uh, it is being roundly described on this blog post, which is, uh, talking about it, um, by a prominent, uh, programmer known as JWZ that, uh, it is a completely bad thing. 
For crying out loud, folks, can we get anything right? 
You know, all we need to do is communicate. 
Ah, yeah, Gila, please. 
You have no sound, Gila. 
Sorry, I was turning my fan off. 
Um, so I also wanted to follow up on something we were talking about on the radio hour. 
Um, and actually, I'm kind of glad that I'm not talking about it on the radio. 
I'm talking about it here because I'm no longer beholden to FCC regulations. 
Uh-oh. 
Here we go. 
Uh, let's talk about period apps for a second. 
Uh, because obviously I have a slightly different perspective on this than the rest of the panel. 
Um, some of you may remember a few months ago when I said, don't use them. 
Get yourself a pocket calendar and a pen. 
Maybe a red pen. 
Mark it for yourself. 
That is most of what I'm saying. 
So I was thinking about two things. 
First of all, if it's a German company, are they subject, like, does subpoena power have the same regulations internationally? 
That was thing number one I was thinking about. 
Thing number two is if they won't comply with the subpoena, they still didn't say they're not selling the information to anyone. 
And number three, and most importantly, if you are a person who is actively in your reproductive years now and actively getting a period, I implore you to find a better system for tracking your cycle than using an online tracker. 
But if you are not a person who is actively dealing with a menstrual cycle and you felt like getting on one of these period tracking apps and just fucking shit up just to see, that might be real fun. 
And there's actually a movement that's spreading on social media to get men, specifically, to make up fake data to mess it up when they invariably try to get it. 
But the app people are pushing for this is indeed called Flow, I am sorry to say. 
But yeah, this is a fun little piece of hackery civil disobedience that I would encourage anyone who is not an actively menstruating person to pull off. 
So that's my case. 
Well, it's great to be included. 
So, wow. 
All right. 
I wasn't sure if that was a good thing or a bad thing when you were pointing it out because you looked a bit angrier when you were saying it. 
So messing up the data. 
I've always been in favor of messing up the data because if you don't give them accurate data, they can't be certain as to where you are, what you are, who you are, any of that. 
And that's what we all want. 
Exactly. 
If so, people are actually referring to this as tracking the manstrel cycle. 
Get it? 
You know, you could have said most of that on the radio and hopefully next week you will. 
Yeah. 
But the fuck shit up part was kind of what I was waiting for here. 
So, again, the people are referring to it as tracking your manstrel cycle for the day. 
And also, yes, so the more realistic you can make it, the better. 
But it doesn't have to be. 
Seriously, just make it up. 
Right. 
But get the stuff in there to cross the wires sooner rather than later. 
All right. 
Good advice. 
Good advice. 
Alex, are you packing? 
It looks like you're packing. 
I am. 
I have to leave today. 
Is that how you fold a shirt? 
I mean, who told you how to do that? 
Well, I'm trying to be most efficient here. 
I'm rolling everything in because I have a bunch of stuff I'm bringing home and I got to pick up a suit. 
You know, there's all these custom tailors around Bangkok, one in my hotel. 
And I decided I had to wait three hours last week after going through all that traffic while I was on the air in order to get onto my room, into my room, rather. 
And so I went to some tailor and had a double-breasted suit made. 
And you're just getting it now? 
I am. 
Yeah, I'm getting it today. 
Hang on. 
You've been there a week. 
You're leaving today. 
And now you're getting a suit. 
Well, it was me. 
It was a handmade suit. 
I'm sure it is. 
That's not the issue. 
The issue is you're leaving. 
What do you need the suit for? 
Oh, I mean, I'm going to wear it at home. 
I'm going to wear it in New York. 
You went to Thailand to get a suit to wear at home? 
Yeah, I did. 
Well, I didn't intend to get a suit. 
You know what's crazy is you live a stone's throw away from the garment district in New York City, too. 
I do. 
You do not have to go to Thailand for this. 
Well, I didn't. 
But the sad thing is, you know, a custom-tailored suit, a bespoke suit in New York, would run you a hell of a lot more. 
And I had time to kill. 
So, you know, why not? 
Why not just go get a suit made? 
I know you're not really in favor of suits, but, you know, some of us have to wear them sometimes. 
Well, you know, I'm not going to get into that, but just, okay, you know what? 
It's, it's, you live your life. 
That's, that's great. 
I'm happy for you. 
Yeah, I don't know how I'm going to fit it into the, this small suitcase. 
Which would have been the next thing I would have brought up is, do you have a means of carrying it back? 
Or are you going to fold it like you just folded that shirt? 
Which I got to say is an abomination. 
You do not save anything by doing that. 
You're wasting space. 
It's going to be wrinkly. 
I would say do it again. 
Wasting space. 
I don't know why I brought a sweatshirt with me. 
You know, that was idiotic to bring a sweatshirt to Bangkok. 
To provide humor to the people there. 
That, why else? 
Yeah, I guess so. 
I guess so. 
Well, I, I would like to do it, but why don't we do one phone call? 
Okay. 
And, um, uh, and then I'll drop after that. 
Cause I got to get in the shower, get in meetings and things in, uh, 52 minutes here. 
It's too bad. 
You couldn't have gotten the suit so that you could wear it to the meetings. 
Yeah. 
I guess I could wear it home. 
That would really, you know, wrinkle it up though. 
Got like 21 hours worth of flying ahead of me. 
Well, you'll be the best dressed person on the plane. 
Yeah, that's true. 
That is definitely true. 
All right. 
Our phone number is, uh, 802-321-4225-802-321-HACK. 
Uh, if there's anything you would like to say to us here at Overtime, we would love to hear from you. 
Um, yeah. 
And, uh, we have, we have a bit of listener mail. 
Uh, this is from Entity Incognito, who tells me it's somebody who doesn't want to be identified. 
Um, and hopefully I didn't blow their cover by saying that. 
Uh, now that Elon Musk is going to be part of Trump's administration, how long until the NSA has unfettered access to all traffic going through Starlink, assuming they don't already? 
Good question. 
Good question. 
You're giving these people a lot of power, a lot of control, a lot of access. 
And they are some of the worst people in the world. 
Uh, you know, at this point, just sitting back with fascination and seeing how bad it's going to get, that's, that's kind of going to be my life, I guess. 
Um, because not much we can do to stop it. 
Yeah, it, look, look what, look what the lengths and, um, value they'll, the lengths will go to and the value they'll put on your speech. 
You know, look at what it's becoming. 
And I think the point about it, um, being, uh, a time to maybe reflect on where you're, the, the cost benefit, you know, things that are really easy to use that are, um, actually not something you can control. 
Uh, they take about as much work. 
That's something that's come up for me that in all of this, it's a lot of work to do that, uh, to make accounts. 
It takes as much work, uh, to go to, uh, some tutorial and learn how to build a website as, as Rob was pointing out. 
Um, and you in the long run will control that and learn a heck of a lot. 
So that stuff, I mean, we talk about in, in is one of those areas that I think this, um, this whole, uh, moment really is beckoning. 
It's, it's, it's calling for, uh, people to be really thoughtful about, um, what the companies that are doing this benefit from what they're doing with your speech. 
You're placing it on this platform because some high status, um, uh, individual, not even like in your sort of working professional class, like, uh, influencer or somebody or a news organization validates that platform. 
Um, and even the government validating it for their public relations at messaging. 
And often these are all cited on, um, other media so that they can, especially traditional media, like TV, they refer to these platforms for different, what it used to be for different brand sort of identification across media platforms. 
And it, it, it, it, in being where those entities are, it makes it more, and I always felt it was more of like social commerce. 
And for me, I just want to put it out there. 
Like none of this ever worked and none of it ever worked for me like to socialize or to use it as it was intended. 
Like I, it still doesn't. 
And I don't think that it never will, but most people, it doesn't to curate my social life and organize all of that. 
And all one place, like it just doesn't really work fundamentally. 
Like I, I think even if there's inherent loneliness, like forging human relationships the old way and, and by chance or, you know, honing other sort of, uh, life skills, I think I'll be a better person. 
Much in the same way, like building your own site, it gives you a certain amount of independence. 
You gain a lot of skills in the process and you get the result you're looking for with more reliability instead of sort of riding the wave with these tech entrepreneurs. 
And, and, and they're, um, sort of ever changing mission, especially when investment dynamics speak like hit and I don't know, like it, it's, I don't have much more to say about it. 
And then that is, I think very, um, constructive and I'm, I'm amazed at how tame and like resigned people are to allow these things to be validated as the go-to. 
Because they don't see alternatives. 
They don't see a way out. 
What you're saying makes a lot of sense. 
It's like, like society cosplaying sheep, like for real, like people realize it, they know it. 
We've talked about it. 
There's information abound and they're still just kind of like, let's talk about this and make a little bit here and carve out like this whole idea of like a personal brand is like a farce. 
But it's part of that whole like ecosystem that is, as I said, like social commerce and we, we already know that that's, that's what was monetized around engagement and stuff and, and to fuel ads and, and, and the like. 
The real problem. 
Um, so these, these federated platforms that are, that are different and structurally more aligned with running something yourself, I think in the long run are, are the way to go or are, will have more social benefit in these small peculiar ways. 
Sorry. 
I, I, I think the, the, the real problem though is that, um, and, and this is really on us as well as on the platforms, but we pay more attention to the person speaking the words rather than the words themselves. 
So that way, you know, if, um, if you say something doesn't mean anything, nobody's nobody responds, maybe one or two people. 
If an influencer quote unquote says something, all of a sudden it's trending because they said it and that's not the way it should be that, but we embrace that kind of thing all the time on so many different levels. 
And maybe we have an opportunity now to do something a little bit different, but, and, and, but think about the entities that are perpetuating it. 
They are like large media companies. 
They're already gatekeepers and controllers of speech. 
And we keep giving that control back to them. 
We're, we're, we're like in what, an artificial, uh, walled town square. 
And we're, we, by just like railing against the, the way it works by it not being actually a free place or a place that is a true reflection of the commons. 
Right. 
Civil commons. 
Right. 
What shall we say? 
Um, it, I think is itself, it's self-defeating. 
Like you're not, you're not ever going to be satisfied with it. 
And they're only going to, it is only ever going to be a mediated speech environment. 
And it, and the trick of convincing you that, oh, I, I'm on here and I have this many followers. 
Therefore my speech is more valid or I have more reach is totally, and always has been an utter joke. 
Yeah. 
It's, I mean, it might be good for like a business. 
That would be interesting. 
If it was, um, if that information wasn't given to you, you did not know how many followers you had. 
You did not know how much of a reach you actually were getting for the words that you spoke and nobody else did either. 
But if your words meant something to them, they would help spread your words around. 
Maybe you'd realize that a lot of people are saying the things you're saying, but you wouldn't be able to carry that as like proof that you're more important because you're not more important. 
If you're a celebrity, you're already a celebrity. 
Enjoy that. 
But let's have a level playing ground for everybody who is speaking on a particular platform. 
We have not gotten that right yet. 
And I'm, I'm just hoping the destruction of Twitter will lead to something a little bit better. 
Can I just point out, Kyle, I think we might've turned the ringer off on the phone, which is why we don't hear the phone. 
No, you have a call. 
Oh, I didn't hear the ring. 
Okay. 
I didn't either. 
It is off though. 
I just saw it. 
So I was right. 
It was off. 
All right. 
So, uh, sorry about that folks. 
If anybody called and went somewhere else, um, we have a call. 
Good evening. 
You're on off the hook over time. 
Go ahead. 
Hi, I'm Manuel calling from a Linux box. 
Hi. 
We seem to have a hum on this line. 
Is that, is that our line? 
No, I think that was, that was just that retarded stop and shop. 
No, it was just that, that we, I don't know that the retarded stop and shop. 
Right now I'm in the aisle. 
So yeah. 
What the hell are you talking about? 
Another thing you heard. 
Um, no, I'm hearing a hum now. 
Uh, hold on. 
Before we continue with rebel, is that our hum Kyle? 
Is that his hum? 
It's our hum. 
Yeah. 
Okay. 
So I'm going to continue talking to rebel and the hum, and you're going to try and get rid of the hum and we'll just see what happens. 
Uh, okay. 
Go ahead, rebel. 
What's on your mind? 
Okay. 
You're calling from a Linux box. 
You're calling from a Linux box. 
It finally happened. 
It finally happened. 
You fell in. 
Um, yeah. 
All right. 
Let me tell you how to get out. 
All right. 
Are you in route or are you as a directory? 
No, no. 
I'm here. 
Okay. 
Um, rebel's trapped in the Linux box. 
So we, the hum is not helping. 
Linux Mint with Cinnamon Edition. 
Uh-huh. 
Anybody feel free to step in here and help rebel. 
Apparently he's trapped. 
Um. 
Um, I just don't know. 
Somebody told me I, I want to use asterisk, but that's too complicated. 
Is there any, like, phone things for Linux? 
Like, where, if they had Google Voice, like, you had Google Voice and your phone number, did Linux have something similar? 
Uh, gosh. 
Um, I'm, I'm not the person to ask about that. 
Rob, looks like you might know something. 
I, I didn't hear the question. 
You didn't hear the question? 
When were you going to mention that? 
Okay, wait. 
Did we, I think we fixed the hum? 
Maybe. 
Uh, well, we either got rid of the hum or we got rid of the hum and rebel. 
Rebel, are you still there? 
Uh, no. 
You didn't get rid of us. 
No, I didn't say us. 
I said, okay, the hum is gone. 
Thank you, Kyle. 
What'd you do? 
Uh, a button on... 
Hang on, Kyle's explaining what he did. 
What'd you do, Kyle? 
A button on our new compressor. 
Oh, you need to ground the phone. 
You know, Rebel, I'm, I'm, I'm, I'm going to turn you off. 
There. 
I can't seem to allow other people to speak. 
I'm sorry, Kyle, for the third time. 
What'd you do? 
A button I unpressed on our compressor was needing to be pressed. 
You know, just because it's a compressor doesn't mean you have to press everything. 
All right. 
Uh, Rebel, you're back. 
Yes. 
Okay. 
Maybe you should have grounded the phone. 
You know, maybe you should be grounded. 
You ever think about that? 
I'm sorry. 
Well, I'm taking the ham radio test tomorrow. 
You're taking the ham radio test tomorrow. 
Okay. 
Wow. 
Yeah. 
Um, I mean, you know, even if I don't pass it, it's just, uh, for the knowledge and for, you know, just, uh, because, you know, just learning the, the electrical and radio, uh, theory. 
I am sure you'll pass it. 
And if you don't pass it, you'll pass it next time. 
But it's good, good on you for taking the test. 
Right. 
Um, yeah, it's really complicated. 
The, the, all the things in the, you know, the, you know, but, uh, you know, but, uh, you know, but like how antennas work and everything. 
Yeah. 
It's complicated if you're, if you're trying to, you know, make everything work and it's, there's a, you know, you're in the middle of a storm or something, but you're taking a test, the questions have all been asked before. 
All you have to do is read through the material and, uh, you'll get it. 
Okay. 
Um, let's see what else. 
Um, um, yeah, so Linux. 
I like Linux. 
It's a very, it's a very efficient computing experience. 
Okay. 
Uh, gosh, no one ever said that before. 
Um, yeah, I guess it is. 
I guess it is. 
Welcome to Linux. 
Yeah. 
And, um, I like the, you know, I got a nice, I tell you about the all in one computer I have, right? 
Yes. 
The, uh, it's like a terminal sort of. 
Yeah. 
It's like, you know, I have a, you know, everything, all the intelligence is inside the monitor. 
With a one gigabyte solid state drive. 
One, one terabyte. 
One terabyte, one terabyte solid state drive, right? 
Wow. 
It's 16 gigs of memory. 
We're at 16 gigs of RAM. 
That is impressive. 
Yeah, we're all happy for you, uh, as far as it's concerned. 
And, uh, and I, and I, you know, have this nice, you know, keyboard that, you know, with ambient lighting, you know, just like that. 
And it sounds like a terminal. 
Um, uh, now when I go on the, the links, rather, I used to use the LYNX. 
This is all so you could get links to run, isn't it? 
Right. 
All right. 
Well, not only that, but now I use the LYNX browser, which is easier, but, but it did when you type links, it just, you know, you have to use a pull down menu. 
It's not like links, LYNX, where you type links, LYNX, and then it just gives you a menu welcome to links and all this sort of stuff. 
It just, the, the, the LYNX is a little easier. 
Hang on. 
Uh, we're saying goodbye to Alex. 
Uh, he's gone. 
Okay. 
I thought he'd say something before he left, but he just, he closed his terminal. 
Okay. 
I'm sorry. 
Continue rebel. 
Yeah. 
Uh, the, the links, LYNX, uh, can you make links, LYNX do things like, you know, when I type links, it just says, welcome to links. 
And, uh, or is it just the way it is? 
Well, I mean, um, uh, if links is a command line, uh, program, just type man links, M-A-N space and links, you, you should get all the documentation that there is. 
Right. 
And if not, then, uh, I'd look online and, and you'll probably get everything you need to know and more. 
Sometimes links does not work with, it all only works with like Google, like you can go to google.com and everything. 
But if you go to like americanalians.com or your banking.com, like Citibank.com, any place where you have to like enter a password or get some like personal information or it does not work. 
It says, please update your browser. 
If, you know, I mean, they don't like, cause when you go to a website, they know what browser you're using. 
That's true. 
Your, your browser tells them. 
So they don't like, they don't like, uh, uh, browsers that don't, you know, that don't support Java. 
And so can I make links support Java? 
You know, you're asking questions that none of us know the answer to because we don't, we don't use this program. 
But, but if there are people out there who do know this, uh, we'll certainly, um, uh, well, Gila will certainly read their comments there on the chat here. 
Do you have any other projects upcoming after, uh, all these six? 
Not, I mean, projects that's been to computers? 
Not really. 
I mean, um, I don't know. 
Not really. 
I mean, I just, you know, using, I have on my laptop, I have windows 11 and on my regular desktop, I have links. 
I mean, uh, uh, uh, uh, uh, um, I have a Linux, uh, that's great. 
Yeah. 
It's always, I like to stretch, you know, and learn new systems like you're doing. 
And that's always, um, it's always nice to have like an eclectic environment. 
It makes you think a little bit more. 
It's again, different work, but it's, um, uh, opportunity also to like build some skills and be self-taught, which is, I'm, I hate to say it. 
I mean, there's, it's all this, I guess, knowledge out there in the, um, the ability of using search engines kind of puts people on a course to being independent. 
If you learn better from others, it can feel a little bit like a knowledge desert, uh, cause you don't know what questions to ask. 
You don't know what to search for with the tools because you're not even familiar enough to know what you're curious about. 
You may have an interest in something, but it'll take, it can take a while to, um, forge the kind of interpersonal and, um, uh, I guess, uh, inquisitive route for yourself on whatever project, but like you're, uh, finding here, you've met that challenge. 
You've, you've, uh, completed and done one project and now you have a whole bunch of other questions and new kind of, um, things that you can now do and just, uh, take stock of your abilities. 
And I encourage other people to do that, have a diverse number of, of, um, machines and tools and, and environments to compare and then also to do different things. 
Some are better at others, some OS's. 
And I mean, just when I was growing up, a lot of the, the OS's had different implications and there were different camps. 
And this was since the hobbying days of personal computers, you know, there would be people that liked one or the other system, but learning them all and being familiar and well-versed in them all is, I think a healthy and very hacker thing to do. 
So good luck with your, your lab and maybe you're, um, going to be doing some, some other stuff with your computers. 
And, you know, uh, I'm, I'm not usually one to suggest this, but in the absence of, of, uh, people around to ask specific questions about, um, basically you can try, um, artificial intelligence. 
If you ask the question in the right way, as specifically as possible, um, artificial, like, you know, Gemini, for instance, will give you some fairly helpful answers or suggestions. 
Have, have you tried using something like that? 
I use Google. 
I go, when you Google, I type the question into Google, their artificial intelligence comes up and, and, and answers the question, I guess, in a, in a decent way. 
And I have learned a little bit from that. 
Yeah. 
If you go to just Gemini.google.com, if you, if you just want solely the artificial intelligence response, uh, you can have a nice long conversation that will give you examples of code and things to try. 
Oftentimes I've gotten some good suggestions that way, but you can also be scared wrong. 
So don't take it too seriously. 
Yeah. 
I'm very curious about that. 
You've been, you've been experimenting. 
I want to tinker with that a little bit too, and just, um, be a little more comfortable because I haven't actually inquired about that, but I am, um, specifically with related to integration and sort of moving, moving parts and getting different software systems and like checking electrical stuff. 
I think this is something that, um, and just engineers and software developers and software engineers and, and electrical engineers know maybe off, off top of their heads. 
But I think that tool specifically can, um, help you answer really complex technical questions or even with like vintage stuff. 
You, we've, um, you know, got like old, just kind of crazy setups with old machines. 
Yeah. 
Well, very specific stuff. 
Like for instance, we were trying to, um, um, figure out the difference between one really old model of hardware. 
That's no longer made, hasn't been made in decades, but what's the difference between that and another really old bit of hardware that's no longer made, you can't ask anybody that unless, you know, there's some crusty engineer somewhere who talks about nothing else. 
But I asked that question and within five seconds, I had a very detailed answer as to what the difference between these two very hard to find bits of hardware were. 
Exactly. 
And for a specific piece of software development or an architecture or something you're working on, or you're curious on about working on, and you want to be more expert than say you are, which is exactly like the, the comfort zone of every, every hacker. 
I think, um, that, that tool can really be freeing. 
And I'm, I really want to see that, like, um, that that would have taken, um, let's say, uh, uh, uh, more investment in power structures and hierarchies of knowledge that maybe privileged access to people that were only in academic, only certain academic programs or under certain, um, uh, uh, research or, or, um, uh, private organizations, that kind of stuff that only kind of was in these certain cloistered pools of knowledge, like it would be very hard to get information. 
And that, that was the emergence of like having hacker meetings or hackers gathering information online to learn about bigger systems. 
And I just encourage people to like, use this stuff to punch above your weight, like big time, like way above your weight. 
Cause it's, it's, I think good enough. 
And I think learning how to check your work with it, using it to aid what you are working on in every way while you still like, while maintaining, if at all possible, like some control and discretion, which is another kind of freaky thing about the whole, uh, integration of the tools you're talking about E, but they are just sort of tools. 
So you can maybe curate or compartmentalize those conversations. 
I'm not sure. 
I think it's all very interesting. 
Um, and, and we'll accelerate what projects people find our priority. 
Very good, Kyle. 
What are you doing with yourself? 
You going to school now? 
Does it sound like he's a professor? 
I don't know. 
I'm just wondering, you know, I'm just wondering, wondering what he's doing this day. 
Is he in college? 
Wow. 
Answer that however you wish, Kyle. 
Well, um, I am not in school right now. 
I hang out around schools. 
I don't say it like that. 
I know. 
I mean, you guys are both going down a bad road here. 
No, at the radio stations. 
Right. 
And we're involved with universities and things. 
I've been to like lectures and stuff like that. 
But I think the, you know, the conference being on a campus and some of the like academic, academic, um, aspirations are to me inspiring. 
And, and that was always something around hackers giving talks or hackers sharing in an article like that. 
It was always very academic. 
And even though like public speaking of standing in front of people was just like so big time, like so daring and take so much guts. 
And to be like, to, to be coherent with that and to share something you're really excited about. 
And, um, it, everything I like first saw in like H2K2 videos and then saw myself personally, like in the audience, it was always so well put together and felt extremely serious and extremely academic. 
And, um, I like that, that in contrast to some of the frivolousness and I know there's good reason for fun and all of that, but the, like, as I said, the sort of resignation and, um, uh, indifference and, uh, distraction and, and, uh, let's say escapism to me is, uh, at a point really, really, really, really, really counterproductive. 
Uh, especially when there are so many interests and tools of those interests to control and mediate your speech and the speech environments. 
And to me, it's just like all sort of connecting in my like growth and in my like interdisciplinary understanding of the world. 
So yeah, it might sound a little more academic, but I don't know. 
It's all the same themes. 
I hope that answers your question. 
Let me just talk about, uh, Heather and Nell. 
Okay, no, no, uh, Rebel, uh, we, we have to move on to other people. 
There's other people here. 
We've been on for a long time. 
Thanks for calling. 
Yeah, well, thanks for calling and best of luck with, uh, Linux and all that. 
I'm glad to see you're, you're, um, uh, doing fun things. 
Um, our phone number, 802-321-4225. 
If there's anyone else out there who'd like to, uh, speak with us. 
Hey, I don't know, uh, you guys, have you been to, uh, the 2600 website today? 
Anyone? 
Anyone? 
Yes? 
No? 
I know Kyle has. 
You're right next to me. 
Um, guys, you have voices. 
You can speak. 
I have been to the 2600 website today, yes. 
Did you see what's on there now? 
The, the, the cover has come to life. 
I did not see that. 
I guess you didn't look closely enough. 
Go, go to the website right now. 
Rob. 
Wow. 
Okay. 
I'm, I'm looking at it now. 
Oh my God, look at that look of shock on their faces. 
Yes. 
And everybody should go to it now. 
Uh, and there's two places you can click. 
You can click on the cover itself on the upper right hand part of the, um, uh, the website, uh, to go to the store where the cover, where the cover and the rest of the issue are being sold, or you can click on full page and get that image full page. 
Um, yeah, it's, uh, it's kind of some of the cool things that, uh, our people are up to and we want to celebrate that. 
We want to do more things like that. 
And, um, you know, I'm feeling, I'm feeling a lot of inspiration coming from a lot of people. 
Yes, Kila. 
Um, so, uh, the end was scary. 
And if I can't sleep tonight, I would like to know if someone at 2600 will like send me a glass of warm milk or something. 
Cause I think that'd be scarier if we did that, but yeah, I'm just saying this, this is, this is a nightmare fuel, man. 
If I can't sleep, you guys are, you guys are responsible. 
Well, if you've seen the cover of the, of the current issue, uh, a lot of people have commented on it and said, this is really an awesome cover. 
Uh, well, um, yeah, um, now, now you can see for yourself what that cover can do in addition to just look like a nice cover. 
It is an awesome cover, but. 
But what? 
It's all scary at the end. 
Yeah, but you know, life is scary. 
For your next trick, figure out how to print this on the paper magazine in a way that does this. 
I like flip book style. 
I think I know where you're going with this. 
Yeah. 
I'm not sure how to do that. 
Exactly. 
Flip book style. 
But, um, yeah, go to, uh, 2600.com. 
Um, and, um, and, um, see the cover on top of the, uh, the page. 
We have a phone call. 
We have a phone call. 
Good evening. 
You're on off the cover down. 
Go ahead. 
Hey, I'm sorry. 
I missed Alex. 
Um, if he's, uh, if he has gone in fact, cause I had some, uh, possibly useful, uh, packing tips about his suit. 
You know, one, you could put it on and take it off once he's on the plane, put it in a plastic bag. 
The other is invest some of the savings on the suit and buy a bigger suitcase so he could fit the suit. 
But if he's gone, he's gone. 
The other thing, uh, I want to comment on, you could rightly say that life is scary. 
Well, it couldn't, your comment is very fitting, uh, as, as of last Tuesday, but, uh, specifically, um, you know, aside from everything else, aside from the evil that this, you know, whatever it's going to be called, I would call it the regime, uh, rather than the administration that is already, uh, uh, compounding it, it's evil, uh, you know, concerning Musk, it's a gigantic conflict of interest that, I mean, aside from the ways that a new government department is innately going to propagate, and these are the people who want to save the money, right, and save your taxpayers' dollars, yeah, so they can, they can get some more. 
I mean, what kind of conflict of interest is a billionaire who's basically become rich with the stupidity of people who invest in his bankrupt schemes and government subsidies, SpaceX, SpaceX, and also Tesla, get tens of billions of dollars from the U.S. 
government to develop whatever, whatever it is that they're doing, and he's going to be in charge of patrolling government waste? 
I mean, this is beyond a joke. 
It's a bad joke. 
It's not funny, and, uh, you know, we'll see, we'll see how bankrupt the, the, the regime, the regime is, because we'll see somebody stops him. 
I mean, in spite of, uh, Trump, uh, I don't even want to say his name, in spite of the aspiring dictator, uh, already saying that they should, he should do recess appointments while Congress is in session, by the way, he wants him to go off the reservation again so that he can make his own appointment, and they can give up their, their, their power of supervision. 
So we'll see what kind of principle these people may still have. 
And, you know, we'll also see, yeah, we're also going to see, like, um, if people stand up to him at all, including the people who voted for him, because at some point, you know, unless we're all completely wrong, uh, this is going to become unsustainable, and people are going to start realizing this is an awful, awful thing that we're doing. 
And, uh, what now? 
What do we do? 
I mean, I don't want to be pointing the finger saying, I told you so. 
I want to see what, what, uh, people come up with and, uh, you know, get behind that. 
And, okay, we had our fun, put an end to it now. 
And let's, uh, let's get on with, uh, you know, things that actually make sense. 
I totally agree with you, but the evidence seems to suggest that we are in January 1933. 
You know, that's, that's what it seems so far. 
And it's just, we... 
I mean, you know, I like, I like to draw parallels. 
It's nothing like that. 
It's nothing like that. 
But it, you know, I'm not saying it couldn't, it couldn't evolve into that. 
But it's, you know, there are many, many fascist regimes that have, uh, that have started in this world and, uh, there are similarities between all of them. 
And I see the similarity here as well. 
Uh, but, um, uh, you know, Germany and that, that part of the, uh, you know, the century, that was a unique situation for that. 
And, um, uh, particularly horrible, um, maybe in 10 years, we'll be in a situation like that. 
I don't know. 
I, I, I pray, I pray nothing like that ever happens again. 
I think, unfortunately, it's going to take a lot less. 
Give it two years and this country will be unrecognizable. 
You know, I, obviously, if I'm talking with you, I still have hope and I think we can do something. 
But the signs don't point in the, in that direction for now. 
The other thing I want to say is that, and then, you know, I'll let someone else speak. 
Uh, I love how Trump said, I say this name again. 
Uh, oh, God saved me so that I could do this. 
Yeah, God saved Hitler and Mussolini and Stalin from attempts on their life, too. 
You know, I don't believe in God, but if he did exist, obviously, he has a very wicked sense of humor. 
You know, it's like, yes, I'm going to save you so you can kill millions and millions. 
I'm not suggesting that it's going to happen here. 
But whatever happens, it doesn't look good. 
And we have to organize and we have to resist and we have to seriously start making people think because this is the problem. 
You know, it's, I am writing a book about this a while back already because, you know, it's, it's been going on. 
Whatever you say to people, they pick up their phones. 
People don't think anymore. 
So, you know, when Trump asks again, I say this goddamn name again. 
Yeah, you now hold the record. 
You've said it more than anybody. 
Today than you were four years ago. 
Four years ago, we were in lockdown because this fucking idiot couldn't even see that a pandemic was in the offing. 
He called it the Chinese disease. 
He let the Chinese appoint somebody to the WHO. 
He withdrew. 
It was a fantastic candidate from England. 
All this you can, you can look up. 
Can you, can you explain that to me? 
I mean, you know, there, uh, COVID was under Trump's watch now, you know, yeah, it wasn't his fault that COVID happened, but it was his fault that we had a very poor response to it compared to many other countries in the world. 
And it's estimated that 300,000 lives could have been saved. 
Had we done a better job, a million in this country were lost altogether yet somehow Democrats are blamed for COVID and they don't defend themselves, you know, and, and, and Cuomo gets more blame when he did a far better job than, than, uh, certainly DeSantis ever did, even though the same amount of people died in both States and certainly better than Trump ever would have done yet. 
Somehow it's on the Democrats that COVID was a disaster and led to more disasters, including the inflation that we're suffering through right now. 
Also the Democrats fault, which, you know, is a, is a global thing. 
It's just, it boggles my imagination, how they get blamed for everything. 
You know, in, in a few words, people have shit for brains. 
That's really what the problem is. 
Nobody uses their brains anymore. 
If it's still there indeed, because, you know, I'm, I'm just, I'm just taking it to the question, which the bastard even dare to ask, are you better off today than you were four years ago, four years ago, objectively, November of 2020, we were in lockdown. 
Do you remember what people had to go through in order to vote? 
It was a nightmare. 
And, and just to that. 
So of course we're better off today. 
Well, actually I have to disagree. 
We've through, through no space. 
I have to, I have to disagree with you on, on that because four years ago today, I think I was happier than I am now. 
So in that regard, in that regard, I think I, I was better off then, but for everything else, yeah. 
But we're talking two weeks ago when the busser was asking the question. 
Okay. 
Yeah. 
Two weeks ago. 
Definitely. 
Yeah. 
Definitely better off then. 
Yeah. 
Better off now. 
Better off now than now. 
Not that I'm a big fan of Biden. 
No one is. 
He was the lesser of two evils on a lot of fronts, but he did bring the economy back. 
He did bring inflation down. 
He restarted the economic life of this country that had been basically killed, you know, Trump denied the existence of a pandemic until it was impossible to deny because people were dying. 
Now there was, there was a last country on earth who had, who said there is a pandemic. 
There was, there was a, um, a headline in the, in the wall street journal, the wall street journal had a headline saying the next president is going to inherit a terrific economy. 
And that, think about that. 
That's, what's going to happen. 
Trump is going to get a great economy and he's going to take all the credit for it and Biden will get none. 
It's a lot better now. 
It's a lot better today than it was two weeks ago, you know? 
Yeah. 
That's so, so things like that keep happening and it's just, it is so frustrating, you know, to see it repeating. 
Let's hope the next person who calls us is something more constructive to say, uh, I don't have much more to offer than this, but keep up the good work and let's keep organizing and let's keep talking because that's what we have to do. 
All right. 
Thanks for your call. 
So much. 
Take care. 
All the best. 
Bye. 
You know, the other thing that gets me, since we're going on this tirade here, um, everybody seems to point to, um, uh, all the different reasons why, um, Harris lost the race. 
None of these were reasons that were brought up beforehand by these same people, but now all these people, they know, they know exactly why she lost. 
Well, you know, if you knew that much, could have said something, but you're full of crap because, um, these, these reasons that contradict each other, you know, not pro-Israel enough, not pro-Palestine enough, you know, embraced all these far left, um, um, policy, what far left policies are we talking about? 
Human rights, you know, free treatment, your, your, your, your kids are going off to school and coming back a different sex. 
That's what they're saying. 
And it literally was believed. 
And somehow Democrats got blamed for something that wasn't ever happening. 
You know, this whole thing with, with, um, uh, girl sports, again, non-issue, something that is very rarely happening. 
And if it is happening, it needs to be dealt with by the people who are in the sports, not politicians who have no business trying to, trying to find out who's in the locker room. 
It's, it's disgusting. 
And I don't know how they won with this, but they did. 
And I think that's, that's the real issue. 
Okay. 
Another phone call. 
Good evening. 
You're on off the govert time. 
Good evening, everybody. 
Tim in Connecticut here. 
Hey Tim, how you doing? 
Not too bad. 
Not too bad. 
I was wondering if, uh, you guys happen to see what Jamal Simmons, the former communications director for Kamala Harris, uh, made mention recently about suggesting that Biden stepped down, allow Kamala to become the 47th president and for the length of, uh, whatever's left just to implement some policies. 
And if nothing else, just screw up Trump's merchandise, which will all say 47th president. 
Yeah. 
You know, I, I love the idea, but I just, you know, again, if Republicans did that, it would be genius. 
Everybody would love it. 
Democrats do that. 
They'll be widely condemned. 
Uh, and honestly, I think it would just come off as I'm not taking things too seriously, even though, you know, Trump is making, uh, uh, doge departments and crap like that. 
Uh, but I love the idea of, of them, you know, sticking it to him however they can. 
What I really would like to see though, um, is, um, uh, fast tracking of judges so that, I mean, you know, the Supreme court just gave all the power to the, the presidential spot, right? 
Uh, if Kamala was in the chair, she might be able to implement some, you know, why, why can't Biden implement those same things? 
Agreed. 
Yeah. 
He should, he should just do that. 
And I think he's got the guts to do it. 
And, you know, for what Congress has to be around for, they need to be around, not on vacation. 
This is an emergency. 
They need to be here and they need to make things happen before they can no longer happen today. 
For instance, um, what, uh, Kathy Hochul is doing, um, tomorrow, supposedly it's going to be announced that congestion pricing is back. 
It's going to be $9 instead of $15. 
Now I know a lot of people are against it. 
It's going to affect me a lot, but I love it. 
I love the idea of, uh, of, of money going into the MTA and of less cars in lower Manhattan and of sticking it to Trump because if it's in, if it's already in place before he gets into power, he can't stop it. 
If, if it doesn't happen until after, I don't know why it's this way, but if he is in power, he can stop it. 
That's, it's just kind of. 
What it'll do is he won't stop it. 
He'll just take credit for it. 
Well, that'll be the day. 
Uh, but, uh, you mean take credit for, for stopping the program or take credit for the program working? 
Take credit for the program working, just like he'll take credit for having a, a great economy and, uh, you know, better than anyone, uh, any other economy on the planet. 
Yeah. 
You know, I, I think the, the goal should be to frustrate him on every level imaginable unless he actually somehow, uh, does something that's good. 
And I don't see that really happening. 
Uh, you know, another thing I, uh, going back to my tirade before a lot of people say that they were better off four years ago because they had more money in the bank. 
They had more money in the bank because of the paycheck protection program, PPP, which many of us are familiar with. 
And that is something that Trump signed. 
True. 
He signed it, but it was brought to him by Congress and introduced by a Democrat. 
So, you know, somehow he gets credit for that. 
People think they were better off under him when actually they were simply surviving under a pandemic that he made worse. 
It's, you know, it's pointless to keep going over this because it's too late. 
But, um, the facts do need to be known. 
Well, I mean, all I can do is sit back and go, I could be angry, but apparently there's enough people of voting status that, uh, want to stand behind Trump. 
So I don't have people who didn't vote on the backside. 
And, uh, when my neighbor sees the gas prices go up or inflation go up or, or Biden just gives, uh, uh, billionaires, uh, uh, so many tax cuts that he just ruins the economy again. 
And I'm sorry, uh, if Trump does that, like the $2 trillion that he gave away in the first presidency. 
Yeah. 
And on the subject of gas prices, they've, you know, they're super cheap and they have been for a while, $2.29 for regular. 
I mean, how much lower it's going to, it's going to be, you know, approaching 20th century prices, uh, even before that, you know, like, like 1980s or something. 
Um, but you know, different States, you know, Texas, for instance, much more expensive than New York, Texas is run by Republicans. 
New York is run by Democrats. 
So, you know, how come Democrats still get blamed? 
I don't get it. 
Yeah. 
Well, I think that's part of the, we won't stoop to their level of, of just saying any that's nonsense. 
And I dare you to prove me wrong. 
All right. 
Yeah. 
Sometimes you got to stoop. 
Sometimes you got to, you got to play on the same field. 
All right. 
Maybe I'll let somebody else, uh, chime in. 
Okay. 
Thanks for your call, Tim. 
Sure. 
Have a great night. 
All right. 
Bye. 
Bye. 
All right. 
Yeah. 
Let's talk about something else. 
I'm just getting frustrated because it just seems so obvious to me and it just, we, we, we don't seem to learn. 
I'm happy to talk about something else. 
Yeah. 
All right. 
I have so many, um, I don't know, thoughts on this, but it just, it is, um, it is something to be, I think, vigilant over and to plan, I guess, plan, make, maybe some of these ideas are good. 
And that's why they're being, they're surfacing. 
Um, wait, we're talking about the same thing now. 
Yeah. 
I thought we were going to talk about something else. 
No, I'm, I'm, I'm with it, but I just don't have anything. 
Gila has something else. 
Yes, Gila. 
Okay. 
I have something else and this is just fun and ridiculous and silly and an importance of the reminder of checking the DNS before you decide to publicize a website. 
Oh yes. 
I know the story you're talking about. 
Go ahead. 
I know you do. 
So as everybody, as most people know, cause I think you have to have been hiding under a rock, not to know this by this point, but the first movie of the two that is being made out of the musical wicked is coming to theaters worldwide a week from Friday on the 22nd. 
And obviously there are tie in things all over the place. 
And Mattel has rolled out a line of dolls of the characters and they very helpfully printed the URL for a website on the packaging. 
Now the movie's called wicked. 
So they decided to put www.wicked.com on the packaging. 
Let me tell you that that is not the URL. 
Well, the movie URL is wicked movie.com because wicked.com was already taken by a site that you decidedly do not want to, um, direct your children to. 
So apparently now Mattel is like, Oh my God, we're so sorry. 
We didn't do this on purpose. 
If you have the packaging, you should like destroy the URL. 
I would save it because it's probably a collector's item. 
I'm sure. 
Um, but also, I guess the other question is if these things are in fact intended for children, do we need the URL on them? 
And if they are in fact for collectors, then why are we freaking out about who's going to protect the children? 
So I was just entertained by, and I also got to explain cyber squatting to a friend of mine this morning who had never heard of the concept by no means. 
Am I suggesting by the way, that the adult media producer, wicked films is cyber squatting. 
On the domain that should belong to the wicked musical. 
I have a lot of thoughts about the wicked musical. 
None of them are good, but, um, you know, just make sure you're checking your stuff before you send it on that note. 
Uh, we have a couple of porn sites ourselves that we have to get rid of. 
Uh, let me, let me explain what I mean. 
Uh, we, we don't actually have porn sites. 
We have porn domains, uh, back in the days, I think it was hope X. 
Um, we, uh, we went all in on the letter X and turned out that was about the time when, uh, the XXX domain, uh, top level domain was, uh, made available. 
And we were able, uh, to not only get 2600.xxx, but we got two other sites that had a whole bunch of X's and nothing else. 
I think one had like 30 X's, uh, dot XXX and one had like 60 ridiculous number of X's, but it was cool because you could put it in a URL and it looked like the URL was censored. 
Yet it would go to 2600.com. 
So it was neat for that effect, but it's expensive and we're sick of it. 
We don't want to, we don't want to keep having to pay for this every year, even when we don't use it anymore. 
Um, so we're either going to just let it expire or if somebody wants it and can offer us a fair price, uh, we'll, we'll listen. 
OTH at 2600.com. 
If you run a porn site or something, or if you want to run a porn site, you have to join some kind of adult community to do this. 
But apparently they let anybody join because they let us join. 
Uh, and, uh, we don't have to have material. 
We are not a community of adults. 
Well, no, I mean, you know what I mean? 
Adult in that context. 
I don't know how they got the word. 
I actually don't know what you mean. 
I don't know what you mean. 
Maybe you're not an adult then. 
Can you tell me? 
No, I'm not going to explain. 
It's for adults only. 
Uh, but yeah, so we have two of those domains and, um, yeah, it would be, it'd be nice if some, you know, like porn king somewhere said, yeah, I could use those. 
Honestly, I can't imagine how you could use them because who would type that many X's? 
It just looked really cool. 
X, X, because we would replace www with XXX. 
So it'd be X, X, X dot, and then 60 X's dot X, X, X. 
And that worked, but it's no longer cool. 
It's just expensive. 
So, um, yeah, if you want it, it's yours. 
Uh, yes, Gila, go ahead. 
I'm not raising my hand because I want to buy the domain from you guys. 
I just want to clarify that. 
If this was an auction though, if this was an auction, you would have already bought it. 
Sold. 
That's how it works. 
Fantastic. 
Okay. 
Uh, did have a listener question I wanted to pass along, which is how many domain names does 2600 have currently? 
Oh, if only we knew that, I mean, seriously, it's like we should have kept the list somewhere. 
Uh, but now it's anyone's guess. 
I mean, you tell us, you probably have a better idea than we do. 
Let's say it's, um, more than enough. 
It's more than anyone ever need. 
And, um, we just lose track of them sometimes. 
They're in different countries, all domains you could possibly imagine. 
Uh, anything with 2600 or close to 2600. 
Um, yeah. 
So, um, we're trying to clean house a little bit. 
Well, we, we might want to go shopping for some new ones too. 
Yeah. 
Yeah. 
So, you know, you got to make room. 
And a lot of people run domains for us too. 
Like they control the domain, but they point it to us and various other things like that. 
Like it was so nice of the military 2600.mil went to us for a while. 
No, I'm kidding. 
That never happened. 
We wanted it to, but it never happened. 
Yes, we do want that to happen. 
Yeah. 
I don't know if we still want it to happen, but yeah, it would be cool. 
It would be neat. 
If there's anyone in the military that has, uh, connections and yeah, we can talk about that. 
You know how to find us. 
Yeah. 
Uh, any phone calls on the line? 
I'm waiting for one, but the line is open. 
The line is open, but only for the next two minutes because, uh, we're about at the end of our hour here. 
Our heart. 
Uh, yeah. 
And 802-321-4225, uh, is a phone number. 
Um, hello. 
Uh, there's nobody there. 
Yeah. 
Hello. 
Yeah. 
Um, OTH at 2600.com is our email address. 
Uh, anything else we need to tell people, check out the cover on 2600.com. 
It's really cool and scary. 
There, there were, uh, suggestions, um, to my, my, I think facetious comment that you should, you should find a way to print it in the magazine, um, so that it'll move like that. 
And a lot of people suggested a 3D lenticular lens, actually 47 suggested that. 
So if you remember those old, uh, lenticular lenses that would, you would tilt it and it would change the image. 
Um, maybe that would be a fun way to animate. 
How was that going to get into a printed magazine? 
It was so costly. 
I mean, it sounds fun. 
It might be a cool, like, uh, limited Etsy run or something, but not practical for a scale. 
Unless somebody covers the cost. 
Yeah. 
If you want to fund it though, we can talk. 
Yeah. 
I wonder if there's a way you can, you can print the image and it'll look like nonsense without the lens and then just have people supply their own lens. 
Oh, like you do like two glossy pages with it that then can be interleaved somehow, but I don't know. 
You'd probably have to like laser cut some, some slits. 
Okay. 
Well, while you folks are dreaming in fantasy land, did we have a phone call come in? 
This is not a core business activity. 
Sounded like we might have. 
There is a call. 
There is a call. 
Good evening. 
You're on off the cover time. 
Go ahead. 
Hello. 
Speak up. 
Uh, we need words, not tones. 
Anyone there? 
No. 
Did you say that was rebel's number? 
It may or may not be rebel. 
So, um, better not do that. 
I just want to say that the phone line is now open for another minute. 
That's it. 
And if that happens again, it's closed. 
Uh, yeah. 
Okay. 
So how about, uh, how about those? 
Those payphone booths. 
Yeah. 
Yeah. 
No, a lot of crosstalk. 
That's what I hear on the line. 
A lot of crosstalk these days. 
I could mention, um, just an amusing anecdote that, uh, yesterday I was in Times Square, um, waiting for a length of time. 
Yeah. 
No, that's not it. 
Okay. 
You let me know. 
But, uh, no, there, there was a, you know, they have all the animated, uh, screens everywhere, the huge billboards. 
And one of them was, uh, for clear channel. 
And I happened to glance at it just as a windows update pop-up, uh, happened across this, uh, huge billboard. 
Um, but unfortunately somebody clicked it before I could get a photo. 
Did they actually click it? 
You saw a little pointer, uh, move to the box and they clicked it? 
Yeah. 
Yeah. 
Someone, someone somewhere moved a mouse and clicked on the, uh, you know, install windows update or whatever. 
They could be listening. 
If you're listening, we want to hear from you and tell us what that's like to see your, your activity on a computer show up in Times Square on a big billboard. 
Yes, Gila. 
Was that the same billboard that was having a different issue two days earlier? 
Oh no, that was, that was a different billboard. 
It would explain why they need an update, but okay. 
I guess they're having all kinds of problems. 
So, so on Sunday, we were also in the area. 
It's very theatrical weekend. 
And, um, one of the billboards like wraps around building was mostly entirely black. 
And there was one little frame of picture dead center because somebody had not like hit full screen on whatever was running. 
It was very funny. 
Oh, wow. 
They had to click the little thing on the bottom right to make it full screen. 
Or just like double click on it or whatever. 
But yeah, nothing, it was just a lot of black space. 
Yeah. 
The malfunctions are so much more fun to look at than the actual ads. 
That is true. 
All right. 
You know what? 
We're going to pack it in because we don't have a call and, uh, we're, we're, we're tired. 
So, um, thanks everybody. 
Um, OTH at 2600.com is our email address. 
We will be back next week, seven o'clock on WBAI, eight o'clock here on overtime. 
And, um, until then, uh, stay, stay safe and, uh, let us know what, what you notice and any ideas or feedback. 
Yes. 
Go forth and, uh, abuse technology. 
Yeah. 
That's what it's there for. 
Good night.