TWiG 803: Dadscrolling - Stargate, SkyTok, Chromebook Facial Control

Summary

This Week in Google (Audio) – Episode 803: "Dadscrolling - Stargate, SkyTok, Chromebook Facial Control"

Release Date: January 23, 2025

Hosts: Leo Laporte, Jeff Jarvis, Paris Martineau

---

1. Introduction to Episode Topics

In Episode 803 of "This Week in Google" (TWiT), hosts Leo Laporte, Jeff Jarvis, and Paris Martineau explore significant developments in Big Tech, focusing primarily on the ambitious Stargate AI project, Elon Musk's criticisms of its funding, and the broader implications for AI advancement in the United States. Additionally, they touch upon the evolving landscape of social media platforms like Blue Sky and its competition with established giants like Twitter.

---

2. The Stargate Project: Announcement and Ambitions [00:03 – 04:09]

The episode opens with the introduction of the Stargate project, a monumental initiative announced by President Trump aiming to invest half a trillion dollars over four years to develop Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) in the U.S.

Leo Laporte [00:03]:
"A half trillion dollar spend to create AGI in four years. Wow."

The project boasts collaborations with major tech players, including OpenAI, SoftBank, Oracle, MGX, Microsoft, and Nvidia, positioning it as a strategic move to secure American leadership in AI.

---

3. Funding and Skepticism: Elon Musk's Critique [04:09 – 11:23]

Jeff Jarvis expresses skepticism regarding the feasibility of the Stargate project's funding, highlighting concerns about the financial stability of the involved partners.

Jeff Jarvis [04:09]:
"I think it's hysterical that Elon Musk is now subtweeting this with 'They don't have the money.'"

Elon Musk criticizes the project's financial claims, questioning whether the consortium genuinely possesses the necessary resources to support such an ambitious endeavor.

---

4. Company Involvement: Oracle, SoftBank, MGX, OpenAI, Microsoft [07:22 – 17:15]

The discussion delves into the financial contributions and stability of the key companies involved:

• SoftBank: Contributing $30 billion but heavily leveraged with $150 billion in debt.
• MGX: Primary investor with a $100 billion fund, though its full availability remains uncertain.
• Oracle: Facing financial troubles and speculated to rely on the Stargate project as a lifeline.
• OpenAI & Microsoft: Exploring new partnerships amidst resource constraints, with OpenAI transitioning away from being solely a Microsoft joint.

Paris Martineau [02:09 – 02:26]:
"We have some incredible art on. Yeah, yeah, you should think about."

---

5. Political Aspects: Trump Administration and Comparison to Foxconn Plant [08:17 – 17:15]

Laporte draws parallels between the Stargate project and the failed Foxconn plant in Wisconsin, which promised significant job creation but ultimately delivered little.

Jeff Jarvis [15:11]:
"They committed billions, but never spent any money on it, except for building this, the Orb."

Both projects are critiqued for their political motivations and lack of accountability, raising concerns about the efficacy of such large-scale tech investments under political administration.

---

6. AI Safety and AGI: Differing Perspectives [17:15 – 22:17]

The hosts debate the balance between advancing AI and ensuring its safety:

Leo Laporte [19:43]:
"I want to give him the benefit of the doubt, and I hope that he does go forward and create better and better AIs."

Jeff Jarvis [10:31]:
"And by the way, I'm going to get the guy on the show. I'm going to book that guy so you can hear his."

Laporte maintains an optimistic view on AI development, advocating for continued investment, while Jarvis remains critical, emphasizing the potential risks and the skepticism around the project's promises.

---

7. Social Media Discussion: Blue Sky Project and Competition with Twitter [23:29 – 74:00]

The conversation shifts to social media, focusing on Blue Sky—a decentralized platform aiming to rival Twitter. The hosts discuss the challenges of federated networks and the cultural influence of major tech companies:

Jeff Jarvis [77:37]:
"But, but we. We're not."

Paris Martineau [75:00]:
"I have to say, it's a bit of a procedural thing to pick your battles."

They critique Blue Sky's current implementation, noting its lack of integrated features compared to Twitter and the difficulty in achieving true decentralization without federation.

---

8. Influence of Social Media and Culture: Black Twitter and Diversity of Influences [75:00 – 103:00]

Jeff Jarvis references a Bloomberg study analyzing the influence of podcasters in the "manosphere," highlighting how a small number of content creators can significantly impact political discourse and societal attitudes.

Jeff Jarvis [105:59]:
"Populism, left-wing populism and right-wing populism are not linked to the spread of misinformation."

The hosts debate the extent of these influencers' impact, with Laporte emphasizing the fragmentation of media consumption and Jarvis pointing out the concentrated influence of extremist content.

---

9. Personal Anecdotes and Humor: Time Travel TV Shows, Regis Philbin Stories [103:00 – 132:05]

Throughout the episode, the hosts share light-hearted stories and nostalgic references to classic time travel TV shows like "Stargate" and "Time Tunnel." Leo reminisces about teaching Regis Philbin to tweet, injecting humor into the technical discussions:

Leo Laporte [116:14]:
"Parmesan cheese, salt, pepper and pasta. That's all you need."

---

10. Closing Discussion: Rebranding to "Intelligent Machines" and Future Directions [132:12 – End]

As Paris Martineau prepares to leave for a club in Bushwick, the hosts contemplate rebranding the show from "This Week in Google" to "Intelligent Machines." However, they decide to retain the original name, preserving the show's legacy.

Leo Laporte [154:15]:
"Thank you, guys. Have fun tonight."

---

Notable Quotes:

• Leo Laporte [00:03]:
  "Is it just a bit of puffery to boost up the new president or is there actually something going on?"

• Jeff Jarvis [04:09]:
  "I think it's hysterical that Elon Musk is now subtweeting this with 'They don't have the money.'"

• Paris Martineau [14:35]:
  "This is a moonshot."

• Jeff Jarvis [105:59]:
  "Populism, left-wing populism and right-wing populism are not linked to the spread of misinformation."

---

Conclusion:

In this episode, "This Week in Google" navigates the complexities of the Stargate AI project, scrutinizing its financial backing and political motivations while debating the future trajectory of AI in the U.S. The hosts also explore the nuanced influence of social media platforms and content creators on culture and political discourse. Through a blend of insightful analysis and personal anecdotes, the show provides a comprehensive overview of the intersecting realms of technology, politics, and society.

---

Note: This summary excludes advertisements and non-content sections, focusing solely on the substantive discussions and key insights shared by the hosts.

Transcript

[Leo Laporte]

Jeff, it's time for Twig. This week in Google. Jeff Jarvis is here. Paris Martin. We're going to talk about this new Stargate project. Is it just a bit of puffery to boost up the new president or is there actually something going on? A half trillion dollar spend to create AGI in four years. Wow. We're going to talk about Elon Musk. Is he really the gaming genius he says he is? And then what happens when the company that makes those screens on the Walgreens refrigerators turns them off? I'll give you a hint. Nothing. It's. It's time for Twig. Next podcasts you love from people you trust. This is Twig. This is Twig. This week in Google. Episode 803, recorded Wednesday, January 22, 2020. Dad scrolling it's time for Twig this week in Google. The show where we. For the next two episodes we'll talk about Google and then it's off, it's over, we're done. No, Google will still be in the mix when we become intelligent machines. They have a little bit to do with AI. Jeff Jarvis is there. Professor emeritus of journalistic innovation at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism. He's. Now we got. Really, we need a chorus singing. Montmont, Montclair, New Jersey. Because that's where he is now. Also at Stony Brook suny. Suny. We could do that. Suny. He's also the author of so many great books. The latest, the web we weave. Hello, Jeff. Oh, he pulls the bookshelf in. It's much easier than just getting an individual book. Just pull the shelf in. There you go. Very nice. Very nice plug. Also with us, Paris Martineau. She writes for the weekend. Do you have a. You know, you need his little newsstand with the covers. Information covers. Is there no print version of the information? Is there?

[Paris Martineau]

There is not, but there. Well, I mean, I think once for some anniversary, we made a big hardcover book of a variety of like best articles from the last decade that sits around.

[Leo Laporte]

That's so good. It really would make a nice book. I don't.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, it definitely would. We have some incredible art on.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, yeah, you should think about. I mean, look, the Onion's doing a print version again.

[Paris Martineau]

That's true, but Ben Collins is a madman, so.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, no kidding. Hey, what's the status on the Onion buying Alex Jones property? Does that. Is that still up in the air?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, still up in the air.

[Leo Laporte]

As far as the. The judge sent it back to the bankruptcy ad. Whatever he's called abogado and we haven't had a resolution, but we.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Infowars still interviewed, I think was Atario. He interviewed one of the. One of the proud boys.

[Leo Laporte]

Who? The judge?

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, Alex Jones. Jones, yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

So he's still running Infowars?

[Jeff Jarvis]

I think so, yeah. Do I dare go to it?

[Leo Laporte]

No, he's trying to halt the sale. It might. That's just a. Yeah, it's just a mess. Anyway, I still wait for the onions version of Infowars. I think that'll be a lot of fun. The big story this week is an AI story. I think you think it's BS Jeff Jarvis. I'm talking about the Stargate project. What's hysterical is this is a big announcement from President Trump. OpenAI SoftBank, which is putting in most of the money. Oracle, MGX, who are they? They're a private equity company. Right. They have 100 billion in assets and with help from ARM, Microsoft, Nvidia and Oracle and OpenAI, the technology partners. To which Elon Musk replies, they don't actually have the money. Show it. This is hysterical.

[Paris Martineau]

Well, that didn't stop you, Elon.

[Leo Laporte]

That's hysterical. I mean this is. This was like a big victory for President Trump and here is his Doge guy saying, yeah, right, sure. They don't have the money. The actual results of this is. Some people say nonsense. Let me say what they're proposing and then you can. You could shoot it down. Mr. Jarvis, they claim they're creating a new company which will invest half a trillion dollars over the next four years building AI infrastructure in the US they're going to start in Abilene, Texas, where Oracle has a network operations center. Almost done. They'll. They say they're going to begin deploying 100 billion of that 500 billion immediately. This infrastructure will secure American leadership in AI, create hundreds of thousands of American jobs. I do question that. That's a lot of jobs. And generate massive economic benefit for the entire world. This project will not only support the re industrialization of the United States. Are you kidding me? This is the opposite of re industrialization. But also provide a strategic capability to protect the national security of America and its allies. I mean, what it really is, is take that, China. You're putting money into it. We're gonna create our own. I am, I am referring you now to MG Siegler's Spyglass newsletter where he, you know, he's a longtime friend of the network. He wrote for TechCrunch now as a venture capitalist and he's a little skeptical. He says, why four years, the length of Trump's term. Why half 500 billion? Unclear. But it's a nice round number. That sounds big. Why 100 billion to start? This actually seems, seems like an amount the group might actually have access to. Despite what Elon says, some of the money will come from SoftBank. SoftBank has 30 billion. But mostly the way Sunsan works at SoftBank is borrowing. He actually owes $150 billion right now. So he could presumably borrow more. I don't know. That's how it works in the big money circles. You owe a lot of money. Good. We can lend you more. SoftBank 30 billion. MGX is $100 billion fund, but they're not. All that money is fully available, he says. MG says they also can mobilize more capital as needed. Oracle has only 11 billion in cash and OpenAI says, Cash, what's that? He says they're a money burning machine at the moment. They have some money in the bank, but they definitely aren't going to put it in on this. He says this is going to go in Abilene in the, in the network center which Oracle has been building. And OpenAI had previously talked about leasing, by the way, that's part of the news here is that OpenAI is no longer just a Microsoft joint. That open that Microsoft has said to them, we want.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Right.

[Leo Laporte]

A first refusal. But I think the subtext is you're killing us here. You could go get somebody else's network resources. That would be nice. Oracle wants part of this. MG Writes with this news. There's a pattern starting to come into view here. Previously announced deals and projects are getting roped into this, quote, new initiative. He says the Oracle element is particularly interesting because this is OpenAI acknowledging they have a new cloud partner. That, that's, that's true.

[Jeff Jarvis]

So you had the information today saying that Oracle's basically in trouble.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, really?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah. And it should merge with Salesforce.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, yikes.

[Jeff Jarvis]

So this is, this plays into it a bit. Larry Ellison's been very buddy, buddy with, with Trump and that's why they're at the heart of this. But are they really healthy enough to be at the center of all of this?

[Leo Laporte]

Well, of course, the announcement of this was in the White House at the podium and you see there the President with Larry Ellison over his left shoulder. That's Masayoshi Son. Son. Son of softbank and Sam Altman. So suit in the suit. Yeah. So this is the announcement. It's certainly, it's a look, it's a political move, it's a Win for Trump makes him look like. And by the way, he rescinded Joe Biden's executive order on AI safety, which.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Which basically said very little.

[Leo Laporte]

I don't think that's a big.

[Jeff Jarvis]

So there wasn't anything to present.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, it mainly said, hey, if you're going to be a big company doing AI, you better test it for safety first. Presumably they can't have. Course. Well, I, you know, you know me, I'm an AI optimist. Right.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And sand in your socks, I guess.

[Leo Laporte]

I. And by the way, I'm going to get the guy on the show. I'm going to book that guy so you can hear his.

[Paris Martineau]

Oh my God, can we going to have to do a full drum roll. We'll both come in our binary.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, he's got to come on with a paper bag.

[Leo Laporte]

He'll have voice modulator.

[Jeff Jarvis]

It's what's my line.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, yeah, that's.

[Jeff Jarvis]

You don't remember.

[Leo Laporte]

I don't think you know who this guy is, to be honest, but he.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Will sound like this peg cast for $20.

[Leo Laporte]

He's an accelerator. So this, my friend is an AI accelerationist. There's all sorts of people. I, I am kind of more of that opinion. Like look, let's see what happens. I don't think AI is something to be feared and I think it is. I think we have a shot at superintelligence at AGI. I don't see any problem with pouring billions of dollars into this. Who's going to lose if. If it fails?

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's up to the investors. Yeah, that's up to the investors investors which they want in. And I don't think it's a, it's a mortal danger to us. But that's the thing is these AI jerks keep on saying we could destroy mankind. We're so powerful we're going to have a PhD scientist next week. It's just such crap. And I'm a fan of AI and I hate how they ruin the field with all their macho, testosterone filled bs.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, I also worry that look, this just is a lock in for these giant companies. But, and I mentioned that on Windows Weekly and Richard pointed out as correctly. Yeah, but who else is going to do this? You're not going to start it up in a garage. These are very expensive projects. It's like nuclear fusion. It's not just any old guy on the street going to invent it.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Mistral is doing very well with not that much money. Deepseek is supposedly doing well, but we've Got to decide whether we leave it or not. You can do a lot with the open source models from Meta. No, this is not necessarily Meta.

[Leo Laporte]

Calls it open source. Well, okay, open, but it's Meta.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Fine.

[Leo Laporte]

That's a big freaking company. Deep Seek is what, China, right? Yeah, I've heard they're pretty big.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Mistral. Monsieur Lepore is French.

[Leo Laporte]

Have you used Mistral?

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, but I've used things that use it.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, I think there's a. There. There is a point to scale in this. Anyway. I just think it's hysterical that Elon Musk is now subtweeting this with. They don't have the money. SoftBank has well under $10 billion. Under $10 billion secured. I have that on good authority. And then Altman responds to Elon saying.

[Paris Martineau]

Wrong, as you surely know, funding secured.

[Leo Laporte]

Almond says, want to come visit the first site already underway. This is great for the country. I realize what is great for the country isn't always what's optimal for your companies, but in your new role, I hope you'll mostly put us first. I just love it when these guys tussle.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, I don't.

[Leo Laporte]

Don't you love it when these guys tussle?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Of course.

[Leo Laporte]

Sam and Elon have been feuding ever since they founded OpenAI.

[Paris Martineau]

What do we think? What's. Now that we're firmly in the Trump administration, what do we think is the over. Under before this whole tech boy bromance blows?

[Leo Laporte]

Vivek's already all of.

[Paris Martineau]

Well, Vivek's already out. He's, I would say, arguably part of this. Like, he's peripheral. We've got all of these big boy tech CEOs and loon, like, you know, big VCs all standing together for the inauguration, all patting each other on the back in these sort of press conferences. When do we think that all starts to fall apart? Because it can go on forever.

[Leo Laporte]

Sam Altman said we wouldn't be able to do this without you, Mr. President. So I think a certain amount of this is what we've seen throughout Silicon Valley, which is. Is. Is bending a knee right, to the new administration entirely.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, it's the same thing that TikTok was doing last week.

[Leo Laporte]

But I also have to say I don't think Trump understands this. He thinks Spain is part of brics. I mean, I don't think he really understands any of this, but he sees this as a good thing and it's probably going to get him some money. You know, they'll invest in Trump coin, but fine. I think he's being played a little bit by these guys to get this thing off the ground, because I think it is important, don't you?

[Paris Martineau]

What is the US Government's responsibility with this? What did Trump have to do with the launch of this? Why couldn't it have happened?

[Leo Laporte]

He says, I'm going to help a lot through emergency declarations because we have an emergency keeping AI in the US he also says he will. He will grease the skids. Government will make it possible for them to get the production done very easily. So you know what, it's good to have the president on your side if you're doing something like this. I don't see any taxpayers money going into it, so I don't have a problem there. This is these big companies putting. And investors putting in their money. I think of it as a moonshot.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Fine. But I think Paris just asked the exact right question. This is investor money. They can put their money into it. They can make their own choices. I don't see what the government role is here.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, greasing the speeds permitting and all that stuff. Well, you know, make sure that they get to build their thing in Abilene.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah. So they got some data. What's so special about data centers with Nvidia chips in them? That's not a big deal. You can build those and there is local law involved, and the federal government just can't step in and say, no, no, no, no, no, no. All of your zoning is ridiculous. Because I say. Right, you know, so that's, that's ridiculous. And my main point here was twofold. One, this big deal announcement, it already existed. It was already underway. It's already.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, kind of was. Yeah. So point one, but what's different is the. All these big companies have kind of decided. It's like matter, let's join hands to make this thing.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, well.

[Leo Laporte]

And you know how well matter has gone.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Once you got Larry, you're okay, then the other thing is, I go, I take you, sir. I take you, your Honor, to line 79. I'm old enough to remember the Trump Foxconn factory that was going to bring untold jobs.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, that didn't really happen.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

Oh, my God. Was that the last. In the last Trump term? You could have asked me a million times when the Foxconn factory happened, and I would have guessed why didn't as.

[Leo Laporte]

A matter of fact.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Or didn't.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Jeff Jarvis]

In fact, if you go to the Washington Post story, they have a picture of the dome, and it just sits there like a North Korean Hotel. Never done.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. So 2017, town spent millions to clear land.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yep.

[Leo Laporte]

Foxconn had committed billions, but never spent any money on it, except for building this, the Orb.

[Paris Martineau]

And I mean, a lot. So many got pushed out of their homes because their land was blighted as part of this.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes. Hey, Sam Altman, you want an Orb? You can have a big orb now.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

Doesn't he already have an orb?

[Leo Laporte]

Isn't he, then. And this is what concerns me, I guess, about Stargate. For that project, local and state governments spent $500 million to buy land, bulldoze houses, build infrastructure.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes. That's preaching the skids to the taxpayers. Expense and detriment with nothing. No accountability, and nothing happened. So why do I look at this with a jaundiced eye? And I think all the press that's gone after, oh, it's a big deal. The stories are all over. Can anybody just look back a few years and see what the history of this is? This is. This is. And this is not a terribly political thing. This isn't like all the other topics we could talk about that we're not talking about here, because it's a technology show, not a political show, but this is technology, and there's a history here. And for God's sakes, journalists. Look back now. The information did have. I have it down online.

[Leo Laporte]

Here's, by the way, what the Post says. The original promises in that Foxconn plant were never destined to be kept. This was a quick win for the gop. Foxconn was hoping to placate the Trump administration to stop it from hiking import tariffs on the iPhones. So this was very similar in the sense of currying favor with the administration.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Get a press release, get a shovel on the ground.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, I think that's something that's so striking to me about all of this, is that it is kind of astounding how early on, like, we are in week one of the Trump administration, and all of these tech CEOs are trying their absolute hardest to, I don't know, curry favor with Trump in the most possible and simple way possible. Like, it's not even particularly complex or, like, involved. It's just.

[Leo Laporte]

They're like, well, if all I want to do is give him money.

[Paris Martineau]

You, Mr. President? Yeah, it's not even money. It's not even like, some that we know of yet. It's just compliments. But I feel like he's really into that.

[Leo Laporte]

But I. Well, I think in their minds, they think they're manipulating him. They're Doing what he need, giving him what he needs so that they can get what they need. And to the extent that what they need is to. Is to advance AI, I'm all for it.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, I think what they're getting is.

[Leo Laporte]

Let'S kiss the ring if that's what we need to do.

[Paris Martineau]

Well, OpenAI's goal is not to make AGI, Leo. It's to make. What is it, a hundred billion doll dollars or something like that? What was the figure? Yeah, that's. That's what it's trying to do. The. Somewhat secondary to that.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Sorry.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, that's a cynical point of view. We don't know that.

[Paris Martineau]

That is literally in the contracts with Microsoft.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes, it is.

[Paris Martineau]

They will have achieved API when they can make $100 billion.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That was the information story, Leo, But I don't think it's. They. I don't think they want greased skids. They don't want anything. What they want is not to be attacked. So whatever they have to do to make buddy. Buddy.

[Leo Laporte]

Right.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Real goal has nothing to do with AI. It has. Don't come after us, don't regulate us, don't do other things, don't cause investigations. Don't consider us Silicon Valley. We're your friends. We'll be okay. Lay off. Pay attention to somebody else. That's the goal of this, by the way. Credit where it's due. Paris's colleagues at the information line 74 do have a story in which they try to bring some perspective to this, what Stargate means and what it doesn't.

[Leo Laporte]

MG says it puts a timetable on the deal, 2030. It would be interesting to know which side wanted that. Perhaps both, but probably open a more so. And this is. He underlines this. My guess would be it formally does away with that whole breakup. When AGI is achieved. Funny business. It relieves the pressure for OpenAI to declare AGI. In other words, Microsoft and OpenAI have kind of broken up a little bit. And so all of that thing about, well, AGI, that was all just contractual. Like, how long do we have to pay you for these free Azure credits? And they set a time date, I mean, a financial date of 100 billion in revenue.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Well, there's also a renegotiation of the cap table coming up with a switch over on OpenAI. So that's part of this whole strategy.

[Leo Laporte]

But I think you can. Look, we don't know. I think it's possible to interpret this as just Sam Altman doing what he needs to do to get this work done. You think he doesn't want to create AI. I don't. I'm not sure I'm willing to do that.

[Paris Martineau]

It certainly does. Well, I think the reason why they're doing this is because OpenAI for, like, months, has been really disappointed in Microsoft's ability to make enough servers available.

[Leo Laporte]

Right. And so Microsoft's saying the same servers. Yeah. We can't provide them with enough. It's costing us a lot. Go ahead and see other people. That's okay. But I don't think it. I don't think you can impute their intent from that. I think that we don't know what their intent is. You know, some people think that Sam Altman's a con man. There's no such thing as AGI, and he's just trying to make as much money as he can as quick as he can. I don't think that's the case, personally. I think he genuinely believes, rightly or wrongly, that AGI is achievable. The superintelligence is around the corner, and he's trying to clear as many obstacles out of the way as he can. And I say go. Good on you. Now, maybe he'll fail if he's a. Look, if it's a con game and he's a con artist, well, we'll join the club. There's quite a few around right now. But I want to give him the benefit of the doubt, and I hope that he does go forward and create better and better AIs. Whether we get AGIs, to me, is irrelevant. We're going to get better and better AIs.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah. It's ridiculous.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, it's irrelevant. I mean, if we do, that's great.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, okay. It's relevant because. Because they're. They're. They're setting a false bar. They're making a false promise. They're changing the nature of the discussion away from what it should be. And it's harmful. I think it's harmful to their own technology, but they're doing it to get venture money, which is Paris's point right.

[Leo Laporte]

Now. The information does have a lot of coverage on this, and Amira Fradey is very good on this subject. Is he skeptical? Are they. He and Anissa Gardizzi. Are they skeptical about.

[Paris Martineau]

They. Yeah. I don't know. I mean, they kind of touched on a lot of the points we hit here, which is they pointed out that.

[Leo Laporte]

10 months ago that the Stargate thing was already in the works.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, that's.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah. No, it's somewhat unrelated to this. They even say at the end that Trump, who announced all of this, that basically all these CEOs that went out of their way to thank Trump, saying that Stargate could never happen without him, but they didn't elaborate. And one answer is that like, it's just like you said, maybe cutting through red tape.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, maybe it's the ring.

[Paris Martineau]

A little bit of a kiss, the ring.

[Leo Laporte]

You know, some people have pride. Some people are willing to bend the knee. And a pragmatist like Tim Cook or Jeff Bezos or all of these guys, they're pragmatic, they're saying, well, if we need to bend the knee, we'll bend the knee. And no harm, no foul.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I'm curious.

[Leo Laporte]

It's going to be a new one in four years. It's not a big deal.

[Paris Martineau]

It's worth noting also that.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Go ahead.

[Paris Martineau]

Sorry. It's worth noting that Oracle's partners also broke ground in Abilene in Texas last year. So this has been going on for a while.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think this is new information though, Jeff, that Oracle may be in trouble. I think that's interesting.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Before you go to there, let me just ask one question here, because Microsoft, both. I want to talk about both companies. Microsoft is largely out of Stargate. Microsoft is the one company that wasn't.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, they're tech.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Right. So is. Have you talked about this on Windows Weekly where Microsoft stands in the administrator. They don't seem to feel the need to go bending the knee. Every other big company is, but they're not, are they?

[Leo Laporte]

That's an interesting point. Yes. Satya Nadella was not at the inaugural.

[Jeff Jarvis]

He hasn't had to seem to be, you know, paying homage. He doesn't seem to be in trouble for not doing so.

[Leo Laporte]

I wonder, you know, one of the things that's happened at Meta, it's happening in some of these other companies, is the employees are up in arms. Trump and Musk did have dinner with Satya at Mar a Lago.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, Satya's done something, but he's not doing the whole. All right, so now go to your point about Oracle. This is also reporting out of the information. Paris, I'm owed some commission here.

[Paris Martineau]

Thank you.

[Jeff Jarvis]

This is three information plugs in a row.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, listen. Yeah, this was a true value kind of story, which is a story type we do, kind of sizing up the potential value of companies written by my colleague Anita. And I haven't had a chance to read this, so you guys should explain it to me.

[Jeff Jarvis]

So I read the beginning of it, but basically it says that Oracle. It's not clear that Oracle has the resources to stay in the game. That's what struck me. Now whether that means they should murder.

[Leo Laporte]

That'S kind of what Elon's saying.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Why would Salesforce want Larry Ellison and all the troubles that come with Larry Ellison, I don't understand that. But that's what really struck me as the thing that I didn't quite fully realize. So Oracle being part of Stargate is a rescue job on Oracle. It's not Oracle bringing its resources to Stargate. It's Stargate bringing its hype to Oracle.

[Leo Laporte]

Right.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Let's not forget that Oracle is still hosting TikTok because Oracle was going to be the rescue for TikTok in the first Trump ban. So one possibility is that Oracle does some kind of acquisition to help it generate more cash. One candidate would be Salesforce.

[Paris Martineau]

Interesting.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Ellison has a decades long relationship with Benioff. Can you imagine those dinners? A former protege at a merger would position Benioff as Ellison's successor. What's successful, do you think?

[Leo Laporte]

It's like they, they're like sitting there with cigars planning how they're going to run the world. Like what? At these. At that point, that's what, that's what.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Benioff and I've seen him do it at Davos. He is a major mocker at Davos. Huge.

[Leo Laporte]

I got it.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I tell you, his party is the party of parties at Davos.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, why is Salesforce not involved in this Stargate thing? By the way, what do you think.

[Paris Martineau]

Of the name Stargate feels Elon Musk coded.

[Leo Laporte]

It's very Elon Musk, isn't it? The Stargate show was about a time traveling gate that you could go through.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Can we send Elon through it directly to Mars? Get rid of them? I don't know.

[Leo Laporte]

All right, let's take a break. I don't know if there's much more to say about this is one of those things where it's interesting, could mean something, could mean nothing. It could be the Foxconn plant in Wisconsin. It could be Skynet. It's unknown. And by Skynet I mean the beginning of the Terminator. You know, like this is where the machines take over.

[Jeff Jarvis]

When I'm 90 years old I'll say, yeah. There was one thing I was wrong about.

[Leo Laporte]

That was Stargate 2030 off 2030. You won't be that old.

[Jeff Jarvis]

It can be done by then.

[Leo Laporte]

So Stargate wasn't time travel. Where were they going Mo in Stargate? They were going somewhere, weren't they?

[Benito]

It was a. It was a portal to another planet.

[Leo Laporte]

For another planet.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, well, good, Elon.

[Leo Laporte]

I was confusing it with the show of my youth, Time Tunnel. Yeah, Very similar.

[Paris Martineau]

Was this Time Tunnel.

[Leo Laporte]

Do you remember that?

[Paris Martineau]

No, I just think that's a great name.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, what a great show that was.

[Benito]

It really sounds like it's from the 50s.

[Paris Martineau]

It does. I'm assuming it's black and white. They got a big paper tunnel and they're like, that's time, son.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, no, it was two guys. It was a little bit like. I mean, it was the same idea. It was 1966 to 1967. Here, I'll play you just a little. A little.

[Jeff Jarvis]

The special effects are going to be really crappy.

[Leo Laporte]

Here we go. The Time Tunnel is an American color science fiction. Oh, this is some guy narrating it. There's the Time Tunnel, right?

[Paris Martineau]

Oh, my God. Better than I ever thought.

[Leo Laporte]

And they jump into it and then they go somewhere, right?

[Paris Martineau]

They go, oh, wait, I'm going to watch this.

[Leo Laporte]

It's such a good show.

[Paris Martineau]

You really just gotta make a good list of all the shows.

[Jeff Jarvis]

You guys, bad guys come through the Time Tunnel. Is it Quantum Leap?

[Benito]

Is that the idea?

[Leo Laporte]

It's basically that. He is Quantum Leap. Yeah. But it's also.

[Jeff Jarvis]

It's man from UNCLE with time travel.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. That was that same era, right?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

And then they get. They get to go. It's fun because it ends up. They go to different. It only was a season. Wow. They go to different places.

[Jeff Jarvis]

But it affected your life, Leo.

[Leo Laporte]

Probably did. I'll never forget it.

[Jeff Jarvis]

You decided to go into technology.

[Leo Laporte]

Here's the thing.

[Paris Martineau]

You wanted to jump in the Time Tunnel.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That should be the theme for our show.

[Leo Laporte]

This could be the new theme for intelligent machines.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Sorry, Benito.

[Benito]

This does sound modern. That does sound like modern Throwback.

[Leo Laporte]

In the year 2025, three intrepid explorers decided to chase the future. Future. They entered the Intelligent Machines tunnel. Maybe could happen. Could happen. Wow. Now, I do want to watch that show, but I don't know where you'd be able to find that. You'll have to go wherever you found that other weird wild heart thing.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah, Wild at Heart. A perfect David lynch film that everybody should watch. And it's available illegally.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, I didn't realize this. They mocked Time Tunnel in Austin Powers.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes. Oh, yes.

[Leo Laporte]

This is exactly what happened in the Time Tunnel.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Wait, Leo.

[Paris Martineau]

That is exactly what's happening now.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Leo, you can buy it on Amazon.

[Leo Laporte]

What? Oh, I'm buying it.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, I'm Buying it.

[Jeff Jarvis]

You can buy. It's on sale right now. You can buy the SD for 49 cents.

[Benito]

Is it VHS tapes or something?

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, no, it does wait.

[Paris Martineau]

And it's the scientists of project TikTok. That's time tunnel spelled differently but you know.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, you can get it on Blu Ray for your new tv. Paris.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, that'll look really good.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

James Darren was the star.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, wow.

[Leo Laporte]

Wow, wow. Okay.

[Paris Martineau]

I love the Description for episode one. Dr. Tony Newman is stunned to have successfully survived a trip through the time tunnel. But that survival may be short lived when he realizes he's lanterned aboard the Titanic.

[Leo Laporte]

It's gonna sink. So it is his project. Tick tock. What now? I really. This is like the glitch in the Matrix where.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, we're in the Matrix.

[Leo Laporte]

You realize this is all a simulation. Saul.

[Paris Martineau]

Hank is going to be in this TV show somehow. Yeah, it's really going to just be a straight time tunnel.

[Leo Laporte]

Dr. Tony Newman decided to make sandwiches in the time tunnel.

[Jeff Jarvis]

What do you think of Tony's hair there?

[Leo Laporte]

Look at that. Dr. Tony Newman. When Tony and Doug land in a spaceship headed for Mars. What? They meet a man, an alien named Elon.

[Paris Martineau]

They go to the Alamo.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh yeah. They do all sorts of stuff.

[Paris Martineau]

British spies captured by the gazpacho.

[Leo Laporte]

Gazpacho, wow. Is Marjorie Taylor Greene around then?

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah, probably.

[Leo Laporte]

When a scientist claiming to constructed a time tunnel 10 years earlier. Offices as seen. Oh, wow. They're sent back to 1956 to investigate.

[Jeff Jarvis]

They try to convince Sitting Bull and Custer that the oncoming battle and Little Bighorn will have devastating consequences for both side.

[Leo Laporte]

Nobody wins. Nobody wins. All right.

[Paris Martineau]

They encounter a ghost at some point in addition to all of this.

[Leo Laporte]

Not a good TV show without ghosts.

[Paris Martineau]

But you have time travel. You don't need to encounter a ghost. You can go back to when they were alive, I believe.

[Leo Laporte]

And I'd like to know if the chat has any thoughts about this. This is the first occurrence of a round portal that you go through to be transported somewhere else. The Stargate. The most recent, by the way.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Leo, to make you feel better, back in those days, one season. How many episodes do you think it was?

[Leo Laporte]

I know, but go ahead.

[Jeff Jarvis]

30. 30 episodes.

[Leo Laporte]

30 episodes.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's what Hollywood wasn't lazy.

[Paris Martineau]

Oh my God. I'm sorry. I'm going to read the last episode description. The time Travelers materialized in 1978 in a small New England town taken over by aliens who plan to drain all oxygen out of the Earth's atmosphere. That's jumping the shark. Oh, this isn't even the first alien episode that they have. Wow, I've got to watch all 30.

[Leo Laporte]

Of these, I guess.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Paris is February.

[Leo Laporte]

Coin pig in our YouTube says, you know, Doctor who's TARDIS predated this. And I guess in a way, the TARDIS is a portal.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes, it is true.

[Leo Laporte]

It is. But that was a machine, I don't think, because it was a machine. You got in the time in the tardis. So I don't know.

[Jeff Jarvis]

We could Wells on and on, but elsewhere she. Wells was a machine.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, the time travel is not. Yeah, that's been around for a long time. I think you could go back to the days of the Odyssey and the Iliad. No, you can't. All right, let's take a break. We will come back.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And now you know why this show's not going to be called this week in Google anymore. Google?

[Leo Laporte]

What's that? You know, but it is interesting that Google is not part of Stargate, nor.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Is Anthropic, nor is Amazon.

[Leo Laporte]

Nor is Amazon.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Right. So the big players. Nor is Nvidia. Right. So, okay, let's. Let's stay here for once, for a second.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, wait a minute, because I see this note from Paris. We've got a wrap.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, okay.

[Paris Martineau]

8:00Pm We've got two and a half hours.

[Leo Laporte]

What are you doing at 8:00pm? What are you doing at 8pm?

[Paris Martineau]

I'm going to a club in Bushwick.

[Leo Laporte]

Bushwick.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Of course. As one dog and hip.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

Is Bushwick hip now? Because it wasn't hip when I was a young man.

[Paris Martineau]

It was really hip. I guess it's still hip, but it's Queens.

[Leo Laporte]

It's Queens.

[Paris Martineau]

No, it's next to Queens.

[Leo Laporte]

Okay.

[Paris Martineau]

It's in Brooklyn. It's next to Queens. It abuts Queens.

[Leo Laporte]

And. And therein. I rest my case.

[Paris Martineau]

That is. That's fair. Listen, all fair points. I would no longer normally not be caught dead in Bushwick, but a friend is playing a show and so I must support.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, cool. Playing what? What? Playing an accordion?

[Paris Martineau]

Could be. I think bass guitar, though.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Okay.

[Paris Martineau]

Accordion would have been better.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

I'll bring that up when I see her.

[Leo Laporte]

Our show today, brought to you and boy, are they. Sorry by Z Scaler. No, they're not. They're very happy. They are the. They are happy and we're happy to have them. They're the leader in cloud security. Enterprises have spent so much money over the years on perimeter defenses, firewalls, you know, and then, of course, you have to have a vpn, so your Employees can get through the firewall and work on the company network. Has this helped? No. Breaches continue to rise. Ransomware alone up 18% year over year last year and a $75 million record payout in 2024. You do not want. And of course the headlines for when you get hit by ransomware, just the worst, not to mention reputational damage, damage with your customers. These traditional security tools don't not only do not help, they expand your attack surface because you have for the VPN, you have to have public facing IPs, right? And how many times have we seen those VPNs be exploited by bad actors? And guess what? It's easier than ever because they're using AI now to write exploits. And then when they get in your network, they look around, they find all this dirty secrets you don't want the public to know about your emails, your databases. And they send them out, right out through the firewall. Because the firewalls struggle to inspect encrypted traffic at scale, they can't see what's going on. VPNs and firewalls also enable lateral movement because the assumption is, well, they got in, they're in, they're one of us. So you have free reign within the network that you get connected to the entire network. It's, it's just not a nightmare. And the, and it's getting worse because hackers are exploiting traditional security infrastructure using AI. They're outpacing your defenses. It's time to rethink your security. Don't let the bad actors win. They're innovating, they're exploiting your defenses. Zscaler Zero Trust +AI stops attackers by hiding your attack surface, making apps and IPs invisible. There's nowhere to latch onto for the bad guys. They also eliminate lateral movement inside the network because users can only connect to specific apps, not the entire network. And they're continuously verifying every request, every access based on identity and context. This is, this is the way. Simplifying security management with AI powered automation and detecting threats using AI to analyze over half a trillion daily transactions. You have to have AI for that, right? To find those little signals that let you know you got a problem. Hackers can't attack what they can't see. Protect your organization with Zscaler zero trust plus AI. Learn more at Zscaler.com Security that Zscaler we thank them so much for their support of this week in Google. Soon to be intelligent machines. Do you know yet if you're going to be here Paris, on your birthday, if your parents invited you to a.

[Paris Martineau]

Fine restaurant, decide in the next 24 hours. But I will make a decision.

[Leo Laporte]

We'll miss you if you're not here.

[Paris Martineau]

So I'll ask you if I'm not here. Yeah, right.

[Leo Laporte]

You see, what kind of birthday is it without us? Your grandparents, your great grandparents. Hey granddad, it's my birthday. So that's two day, two shows. Hence we've decided to eliminate the. I think it was really an anchor. And when we started this show 800 episodes ago it made sense. Say this week in Google, they were changing the world, but they've less and less.

[Jeff Jarvis]

They say a lot of others, but they have a lot more. Interesting. Yes.

[Leo Laporte]

And actually I'm very interested in intelligent machines. We should say it's not just AI, it's robotics, it's, it's computing at the.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Edge, it's the Internet, it's big tech companies.

[Paris Martineau]

Also, we're still going to talk about a lot of the stuff.

[Leo Laporte]

Still big tech. Yep, yep.

[Paris Martineau]

Google has decided from the chat, though briefly, is are we going to.

[Leo Laporte]

Not gonna throw away all 805 episodes?

[Jeff Jarvis]

God know the history.

[Leo Laporte]

It's always been intelligent machines, we just didn't know it.

[Paris Martineau]

That's true.

[Leo Laporte]

Google has said, screw you eu, we are not going to comply with your fact checking law. I'm a little bit on their side in this.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

Google has never done fact checking on search results. That's nuts. But the EU says they have to in order to comply with this new code of practice on disinformation. It started as a voluntary set of self regulatory standards to fight disinformation, but soon will become mandatory. I have to say I think the EU is damaging itself by really trying to regulate these companies.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, whoa.

[Leo Laporte]

I'm not against.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's not a usual. Leo. Have you taken another walk on a beach?

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, well it just, I mean this is ridiculous.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I agree with you.

[Leo Laporte]

To tell a search engine, oh no, all those results, you have to, you have to put some fact checking on them, which is impossible.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I have a sense of scale.

[Leo Laporte]

I thought it was sensible for Meta to abandon fact checking. I think Community using Community Notes is fine. Twitter does that. Or X does that. I think that works.

[Jeff Jarvis]

This is the kind of thing you turn on Morning Joe and they're tsk tsking. Oh no, they're getting rid of fact checking.

[Leo Laporte]

No, it's a search engine. Your search engine will turn up bogus stuff. It's up to you.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And fact checking, lots of research is saying it doesn't work very well even when it happens. And you don't want an official truth, which is what Zuckerberg has always said, and I agree with that.

[Leo Laporte]

Google is using community notes on YouTube. I didn't know this, but they say certain users, not all users, can add contextual notes to videos and they think they're going to do more of that. Google will continue to invest in current contact moderation technologies. I didn't know they were doing that. I don't want a. I want a search engine to be completely agnostic. I want it to be an index of what's on the Internet.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Well, it has to make judgment because it has to. I mean, this is, this is. Go back to our old friend Matt Cutts. There are efforts to manipulate it and they have to get around. They have to recognize those efforts and they have to compensate for those efforts to manipulate them with bad results.

[Leo Laporte]

But the goal should always be to produce search results that are relevant to your request. Relevant and not spammy. But. Yes, but that means they may be wrong. They may be misinformation. I mean, you may find the flat Earth society, should they have a fact check on that that says, well, scientific consensus is the earth is round. That's dopey.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

And by the way, it also, in my opinion, is patronizing to the user. It's like, well, you might not know the earth's not flat, so we better tell you. And should Google be the one telling us this? I don't know if I trust Google to tell me what's true and what's not. I don't think that's their job. I'm not convinced they could do a good job of it. Page rank makes a lot of sense the way it was construed, which is that Pages in the old days rose to the top. This is Larry Page's insight was brilliant. Rose to the top based on the number of people who linked to them.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And how they linked in turn to them. So there was a credibility score.

[Leo Laporte]

And that's basically saying you're all voting. If credible sites link back to other sites, then those sites are deep.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's the wisdom of the crowd.

[Leo Laporte]

Credible. Yeah, it's the wisdom of the crowd. It was brilliant and it worked. And that's why we all used Google Wax site and AltaVista went away. It is too bad. People try to game that. And I think Google's completely justified in doing everything they can to get around the gaming, but not to the degree that they start making editorial judgments. I think that that's A bridge too far for me. Agreed.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah.

[Benito]

Isn't it even a practical impossibility?

[Leo Laporte]

Well, it's also impossible. Yeah, that's what Meta realized. You can't moderate at scale. It's a little different for a social network because, I mean, I think it.

[Paris Martineau]

Is a lot more achievable for a social network. I think when you're talking about something where with a social network, the way that users behave is distinctly different. You're consuming specific content in feeds and whatnot, and distributing that content certain ways. A search engine. I mean, I think about my habits, of course, which are insane comparison to a normal consumer or user of a search engine. But I do a lot of very maniacal methodical research using search engines, and I don't need a search engine trying to editorialize the results for me. I'm trying to editorialize them for myself.

[Leo Laporte]

That's right, because you're an intelligent human being and I'm an intelligent machine. Yeah, well, I don't think big tech should be responsible for nannying us. I don't trust him to do it anyway. Who wants Mark Zuckerberg to tell me what's true or not?

[Jeff Jarvis]

They don't want nanny and they want to blame them when anything goes wrong.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, that's the other side of that.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And I. Benito, get ready, get ready.

[Leo Laporte]

It's time for.

[Jeff Jarvis]

It's just an. An outcropping of moral panic.

[Paris Martineau]

Benito, you're sleeping.

[Benito]

The files keep disappearing for some reason, I don't know.

[Paris Martineau]

That sounds like a moral panic. Someone's trying to silence us.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, well, that's the concomitant. I worry about section 230 in the new administration because there's already noises about, you know, we got to get rid of section 230. All that really is doing is saying moderate the way we want you to moderate. And that's a direct violation of the First Amendment. I wonder how Kathy Gillis felt when the Supreme Court ruled 9 to nothing that national security trumped the First Amendment with regard to.

[Jeff Jarvis]

She wrote about it.

[Leo Laporte]

I'm sure she was upset.

[Jeff Jarvis]

She has a piece up that Tector.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, no, there's another in other SCOTUS news. Yeah, where was it?

[Leo Laporte]

By the way? What is going to happen to Tick Tock? Because now the president has paused it for 75 days, but he says, I want half.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Talk about government owning a mechanism of.

[Leo Laporte]

Speech that seems welcome to Hungary. Yeah.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, it's unconstitutional as hell in this country.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, I think it's unclear at this point whether or not he Means him personally owning half. The US Government owning half, or a third party that's American owning half. But either way, it's going to be.

[Leo Laporte]

Who does that mean? It feels like he thinks the government. He says, first of all, it's worth a trillion dollars, that it's only worth a trillion dollars because of us.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And.

[Leo Laporte]

That we should have half of it.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Well, and Americans own a huge chunk of ByteDance already, right?

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. His buddy Jeff Yass owns 15%. I liked what. This is kind of relevant. Ryan Broderick said in his Garbage Day post. He's. He talks about Steve Bannon and, and he says that now, I'm not a Steve Bannon fan, but I have to say Bannon, as a. As a cynic kind of has said something that I think is. Is pretty true, which is politics is downstream of culture. You agree? Like, we vote for who we vote for, downstream of what the culture is doing and feeling and thinking.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That may be because of media and how they are.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, well, wait, no, that's the second corollary. And culture is downstream of media. Media primarily creates culture.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No more. No more. That's the. That's what. That is exactly what the Internet has changed. That's what I wrote books about. It's now the culture speaks for itself. And that's the huge change. And that's what those who held the power resent.

[Leo Laporte]

Don't like that.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No.

[Leo Laporte]

They want to own Tick Tock and X. Bingo.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Bingo.

[Leo Laporte]

So, yeah, he also. He also says. I think it was him who said the reason they didn't like Tick Tock is because Tick Tock held a mirror up to American culture. He said all of that stuff on TikTok wasn't new. TikTok didn't create it. Or they just exposed Americans for what they are. And people hated it. They said, we gotta stop this ban TikTok. But you can't ban people. This is our culture. Yes. Hello.

[Paris Martineau]

I under. I don't want to.

[Jeff Jarvis]

You said it all, Leo.

[Paris Martineau]

You did say it all. I was just sitting and basking in your. You know, we should do a bit one time where we all pretend like you've frozen due to the Starlink.

[Leo Laporte]

You could kiss my ring. You could kiss my ring anytime. Bend the knee, if you will.

[Paris Martineau]

I don't want to. I under no circumstances want to hand it to Steve Bannon, but.

[Leo Laporte]

I know.

[Paris Martineau]

That's a good point, but, but the.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, this is. And this is also the Putin point of view, right? The Russian point of view, but it is a good insight. I don't think Steve's an idiot. I think he's a cynic.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I think he understands Paris is your official nihilist critic.

[Paris Martineau]

I don't know. I don't know enough to be able to.

[Leo Laporte]

He's, he's destructive. Oh, yeah, certainly. And he wants to burn it all down. And he unfortunately had the insight that you can't how to do it. And he's become the media in his own. As Alex Jones did for Infowars. And I guess we should say as we do for our audience, right? I don't consciously try to influence our audience. I don't think.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, yeah, you do.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, I just say what I think and you can decide.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And you hope that they agree with you. That's all.

[Leo Laporte]

I hope. No, I actually don't hope they agree with me. I would, I have you guys on if I just wanted agreement. I want.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah, but I mean, you have to understand that by hosting a podcast and doing this for as many decades as you have 20 years, you're creating a parasocial relationship with your audience where they're predisposed, they're oriented towards agreeing with you. I'm not trying to think for this.

[Leo Laporte]

I understand that, but I am, I'm definitely not trying to be persuasive ever, because I don't, I'm not convinced of my own points of view. By the way, you may have noticed that I, I, I am, I am not. I don't live in certainty. And so a lot of what I say is just, well, what about this? And I'm not trying to be persuasive. I'm really trying. I think we as a group get to the bottom of these things. That's the goal.

[Paris Martineau]

And I do think that's one of the most interesting things about, I don't know, being on this show and hearing your opinions wax and wane over the past year is like, and I mean that earnestly, is like. It's a very unique and I don't know, dare I say, it's like special thing to be able to speak confidently about things, but then also be open to change your mind.

[Leo Laporte]

I am, though, I should say, selling buttons that wwld. What would Leo do? And if any, if anybody wants to buy those buttons, just $100 each. No, I don't, I really don't want everybody to agree with me. I want to be, I want you to, you know, I challenge you guys because I want you to disagree with me.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, that's true. That's true.

[Leo Laporte]

I want you to talk me out of it. All right. What else should we talk about?

[Jeff Jarvis]

So if I may. If I may suggest, because you've got one Blue sky story in here and there's other Blue sky stories below, and there's a lot of really exciting development going on around Blue sky, so.

[Leo Laporte]

I'm so bored with Blue Sky. Really?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, Jesus.

[Paris Martineau]

You haven't skated in months, Leo. You can't be bored with it.

[Leo Laporte]

I skewed a month ago. How many skits does a man. By the way, I was watching MSNBC for my sins last night, and it was the handoff between Rachel Maddow and O'Donnell.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Lawrence O'Donnell. He just. He just said that she convinced him. He's on now.

[Leo Laporte]

Can I just say, it is so old hat for the boomer to come on and say, how does this Internet thing work? And that's basically what was happening. And he said, what do you call those things? She, by the way, knows perfectly well they're Skeets. But wasn't willing to say it on tv. Don't you think, Jeff? Did you see it?

[Jeff Jarvis]

I didn't see it.

[Leo Laporte]

She said. He said, what do you call him? Scoots? And she said, I don't know. I don't know. She said, she knows.

[Paris Martineau]

Oh, I love that. Actually, she was trying to get her to say Skeets.

[Leo Laporte]

He was trying to get. But he's pretending because it's got to be. He's not.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I just followed him. Rachel Maddow told me to join Blue sky last night, and it only took me 24 hours to figure it out.

[Leo Laporte]

This reminds me of when I taught Regis Philbin. Had a tweet.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

Oh, boy.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Is there video of that?

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

You or was that Dev?

[Leo Laporte]

No, no, it was me. It was actually. It was kind of fun.

[Jeff Jarvis]

What is this thing?

[Leo Laporte]

He literally had no idea what Twitter was.

[Paris Martineau]

I think that's the perfect person to tweet, though.

[Jeff Jarvis]

It is.

[Leo Laporte]

And he was an old guy. What was cool about it is he was really excited. He called his wife and said, joy, Joy, they're responding to my tweets. Have you ever sent a text message? Never. Okay, so it's kind of like that.

[Paris Martineau]

Have you ever sent a text message.

[Leo Laporte]

And he said, never goes to everybody who's following you. You got a lot of followers. You've got hundreds of thousands of people who watch your Twitter account. So if you type something on Twitter, all of those people will see it. Well, who's been talking to these people?

[Jeff Jarvis]

I want to be a part.

[Leo Laporte]

So you're on this is the web page, the Twitter web page. Now, you can tweet with your phone, you can tweet with a lot of different devices, but you can also do it right from the computer. So you see there, it says, what's happening?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Why are his arms of his chair so high?

[Leo Laporte]

Hey, what's happening? I don't know. He also loves, as you can tell, Notre Dame. This was his actual office, which was kind of fun.

[Paris Martineau]

I need to know what he said.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, you can see it.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Leo, you have to give us some tips for the lower third.

[Leo Laporte]

You only get 140 letters. I didn't write the lower thirds. Believe me, Gelman wrote the lower thirds. I'm sure. Look how he's typing.

[Paris Martineau]

Is he a hunt of one character.

[Leo Laporte]

At a time.

[Jeff Jarvis]

With a stick between every letter announced?

[Leo Laporte]

Okay, this is good. Oh, my God.

[Paris Martineau]

Oh, my God. He can't spell leaving.

[Leo Laporte]

You got an extra U in there.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I misspell leaving.

[Leo Laporte]

Kind of cute. It's like, you know, they know. You really did it.

[Paris Martineau]

I love that he immediately goes to trolling.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. No, it's true. This was the day he announced his retirement.

[Paris Martineau]

Oh, really?

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, this is. This was actually. This tweet was his announcement in the public.

[Paris Martineau]

Holy crap.

[Leo Laporte]

He retired. It took him a while, I think six months later. Right. So I would put it. It was kind of a sad moment. Everybody's very upset at the show because they got children to do a few. Okay, now, okay, now, now, this is the chance you have before you press that button that says Tweet. Just review it.

[Paris Martineau]

Remember, everyone can read what you wrote.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Banger, beggar, beggar, beggar.

[Leo Laporte]

I think that's a perfect tweet. Yeah, I do, too. Now press the. Press the. Click the tweet button or. Where is that tweet button? It's on the. It's on the. On the screen. He's gonna put. Put his mouse up. It says, be sure to keep your mouse on your desk while tweeting. Oh, it just move. It's done.

[Jeff Jarvis]

It's done.

[Leo Laporte]

See that? I just tweeted tweed. I'm sorry. The sound is so off the. I don't know what this going on with the sink. And I'll show you how you can send a private message. So he did. After this. I mean, he really did do that tweet. And. And he literally got. Because it was already the Regis and Kelly account. There are, you know, hundreds of thousands of people, maybe millions following him. He started to get all these responses and he was. He was like, blown away. And he called his wife. He says, joy, Joy. I just tweeted. And there's all these people and they were all saying, oh, we're sorry to see you go Regis, and all that stuff. A week later, he got off it because I think Twitter experience, it wasn't just going to be people saying nice things. It was everybody. It was.

[Jeff Jarvis]

There's a Regis account on Twitter. 17,000 hours on TV and counting.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, he's passed.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Stop me. I don't think joined December 2013.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, well, that was about that time.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Last one, last tweet is 2017.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, this was 2011. February 1, 2011. That I taught him how to tweet 13 years ago. And he's passed. A few years ago. He was a great guy. I really like. Yeah, he was a sweetheart.

[Paris Martineau]

And Kelly, celebrities. Did you teach basic Internet skills to.

[Leo Laporte]

That's the only one, really. I feel like, where would I meet celebrities? They not.

[Paris Martineau]

I feel like this is the sort of shtick that you would have done more.

[Leo Laporte]

I could have. If I. If I had moved down, you know, I did a radio show in LA for years. Like 18 years. And if I'd moved down there, there probably would have been some people. There were. There are guys down there. I met a few of them who. That's what they do. They teach celebrities how to use technology. I don't think we need that anymore. That's what I was saying with this whole Lawrence O'Donnell thing is stop playing the dumb baby boomer who never heard of an Internet. You know, that's old hat.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

You don't need to do that anymore. People know. It's okay.

[Jeff Jarvis]

In the chat, I just put up the new card for intelligent machines.

[Paris Martineau]

That would have been good when I was blonde.

[Leo Laporte]

That's good. Don Rickles, Regis Philbin and Paris Martineau.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

Which one am I?

[Paris Martineau]

I think you're Miss Piggy.

[Leo Laporte]

Miss Piggy? No, no, that's you. That's you.

[Paris Martineau]

I'm joking.

[Leo Laporte]

I could be. I'll be Rickles. He looks kind of out of it in that. All right, so what else do you want to talk about?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Let's take a break.

[Leo Laporte]

You're watching. Hold on a second. Blue Sky. We started about it, but we'll finish. I'm turning into Regis. Much exciting news, amazing new things. You're like Regis. He would go, leo, what's a gigabyte? What is a gigabyte? Leo? I'm turning into that. I think I am.

[Paris Martineau]

What's a scoot?

[Leo Laporte]

What's a scoot? What's this? Scoot how? What do you call it when you scoot? Is it scoot? You're watching this week in Google with Jeff Jarvis and Paris Martinow. We're glad you're here. I'm no tech genius, but I know if I want my business to crush it, I need a website. Now. Thankfully, bluehost makes it easy. I customized, optimized, and monetized everything exactly how I wanted with AI. Within minutes, my site was up. I couldn't believe it. Plus, Bluehost keeps me protected 24 7. No more worrying about hackers. I just relax and focus on my customers. So whatever your hustle may be, secure your online presence in 2025 with Bluehost. Head to bluehost.com to start now.

[E]

Hi, I'm Cindy Crawford, and I'm the founder of Meaningful Beauty. Well, I don't know about you, but, like, I never liked being told, oh, wow, you look so good for your age. Like, why even bother saying that? Why don't you just say you look great at any age? Every age. That's what Meaningful Beauty is all about. We create products that make you feel confident in your skin at the age you are now. Meaningful Beauty. Beautiful skin at every age. Learn [e-mail].

[Leo Laporte]

So, what it, by the way, it is Skeet. Is it? Or do we.

[Paris Martineau]

No.

[Jeff Jarvis]

The hateful Jay Graebran.

[Leo Laporte]

Jay hates it.

[Paris Martineau]

The company of Blue sky hates Skeet. What are you gonna do Skeet, though?

[Leo Laporte]

It's Skeet. They don't like it because it's vaguely pornographic.

[Paris Martineau]

It is definitely pornographic.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, really?

[Paris Martineau]

Oh, I mean, yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

It's.

[Paris Martineau]

I'm not gonna explain what it means, but it's definitely pornographic.

[Leo Laporte]

That's one thing that will never die is explaining to baby boomers what sex is. That's good.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah, that's gonna be good forever.

[Leo Laporte]

Forever. That one never goes. So. So it's. It's sexual? Skeet is sexual?

[Paris Martineau]

Oh, yeah. Do you want me to explain?

[Leo Laporte]

No, I'm just curious. I just want to know. Yes, it is. Is it related to Haktua?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Well, it's kind of related.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, in a way.

[Leo Laporte]

Never mind.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Stop. Cause and effect, I'd say.

[Leo Laporte]

Stop right there, folks. Use your imaginations. I am gonna do some content moderating right now. All right, so what's the news on Blue Sky? Which, again, I will reiterate, I'm bored with it. They're trying to recreate Twitter. No Twitter anymore.

[Paris Martineau]

It's like Twitter, but better. Honestly, I have, like. I still have fewer followers on Blue Sky Twitter.

[Leo Laporte]

Was pretty good in its day. I'm not talking about modern X, I'm talking about.

[Paris Martineau]

I'm talking about Prime Twitter, Regis Philbin era Twitter.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, pretty good.

[Paris Martineau]

I don't know. I get incredible engagement on Blue Sky.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes, I agree, I agree. And Twitter is going way downhill. Blue sky has its own photo version. And now Mike McHugh we like has created SkyTalk.

[Leo Laporte]

Mike McHugh is the flipboard guy, right.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Board founder. And he loves. So he has created. You're going to like this. He used Activity Pub to create a new social browser called Surf. And he used that on the spur of the moment to create Sky Talk, a blue sky TikTok answering Mark Cuban's challenge. Because Mark Cuban said, I'll invest in somebody to create a startup to compete with TikTok. When it disappears, it gets ruined.

[Leo Laporte]

Sky Talk is what he's calling it.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes. It's not open for everybody yet, but he built it. It's not line 93 and you can go see. And it's.

[Leo Laporte]

And it's. Surf is the.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Surf is the platform.

[Leo Laporte]

Very interesting. Yeah.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And Surf is built on Activity Publish.

[Leo Laporte]

At Proto or Activity Pub.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I think it's a build on Activity.

[Leo Laporte]

Pub because Blue sky is using the AT protocol. Activity Pub is masted.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah. I'm gonna put. That's the first name I'm put on our list of who I want to get on the show because Mike was a really nice guy.

[Leo Laporte]

I love Mike. He's been on our shows before. And he founded what, Friendster, right? Was it Friendster? No, he found. No, no, no, no, no, no, no. He did the thing that Twitter bought that was.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, no, you're thinking. No, that's. No, no, no, no, no, no, no.

[Leo Laporte]

That's somebody else. That's Friendster guy. You're Forget name. Mike McHugh. He's an American. He founded Flipboard. Yeah, that's the big one. And tell me. He did. Tell me. I remember. Tell me. Never attended college.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Really?

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. But he clearly can code, so. So tell me about this. Should I follow this guy? Talk. Should I follow it?

[Jeff Jarvis]

It's a proof of concept.

[Leo Laporte]

How do I. I don't even see a way to follow it because it's.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Basically a new thing.

[Leo Laporte]

Join the.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I'm a little confused here.

[Leo Laporte]

WaitlistSurf Social, that's for surf. Leo Laporte. So this is a browser.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Surf Social, I believe, is a social browser.

[Leo Laporte]

Okay.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I'm also on the way.

[Leo Laporte]

Do you have an existing federated account? Yes. Macedon? Yes. Blue Sky. Yes. Threads? Yes. Flipboard Well, I do, but I don't.

[Paris Martineau]

Wait, Sky Talk, the list you just put up is just a list of videos. Is this different than Blue sky recently rolled out that you can add a video.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes.

[Paris Martineau]

Add a video tab to like your sidebar or the lower bar on your phone and just basically have Tick Tock but of Blue sky videos.

[Leo Laporte]

So to do this, you've. You follow videos on Blue sky with hashtag Sky Talk.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean if you want to use the Sky Talk feed we're looking at. Otherwise you can. But this is, there's, there's a, that's.

[Leo Laporte]

This is the video technology that Blue sky created, right?

[Paris Martineau]

Yes, but there is a different way to get this, these videos other than just doing the hashtag Sky Talk. Like they've got a. They recently announced that they're going to just have a. Like, you can see on your left hand side of your screen that you have a like bar with all the different sections of the website. They're adding one that's going to be a video one that you can over here and. Yeah. And then it'll just be native like Tick tock.

[Leo Laporte]

That's actually smart. I would feel much better if they made AT Proto. I mean if they really released it and allowed people to federate. So I would say we would have our own twit Sky Talk, if that were possible. I would do that.

[Jeff Jarvis]

So if you go to the discord, I put in the story from the Verge that explains Surf. The app sees three kinds of feeds. Anything from Activity Publish, which includes Mastodon threads, Pixel Fed, anything from AT Protocol, which includes Blue sky and any RSS feed.

[Leo Laporte]

So it is just a feed reader, but it's a feed reader with Activity Pub. And you can search for feeds by.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Topic, publisher or creator. You can curate your own feeds by combining with other feeds. Then you can share those feeds, which other people can combine and recombine.

[Leo Laporte]

You know, supports Activity Pub.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes, Mike's been great about this.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. All right. We're going to get Mike on, put, make, put a pin in him, will you?

[Jeff Jarvis]

So, so, so this is also the discussion we had last week about the. I think right now because I can't figure out what it is free our feeds. But I said last week I want to hear what Mike Masnick says about this. And Mike Masnick wrote a very complimentary piece about it.

[Leo Laporte]

About Surf?

[Jeff Jarvis]

About. No, about free our feeds.

[Leo Laporte]

Okay.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Even though I still don't understand what they're spending $30 million on. But he's. And he's trying to be. And he's being nice, he's being masnic. But what he's saying basically is good. Blue sky can't build its own federation. Somebody else has to build something on the AT protocol. So I'm glad somebody else is building something on the AT protocol.

[Leo Laporte]

But Blue sky has to allow you to federate. That's the problem. Right? Nobody's done that.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Well, once you get otherwise federations, then it won't matter.

[Leo Laporte]

Just like Dustin in our Discord says, seems like an incredible sleight of hand open washing. If it doesn't federate, it's not really decentralized. I agree.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, I agree.

[Leo Laporte]

That's what Cory Doctorow says. He's like, I'm not moving to Blue sky until there's a way I can move out of Blue Sky.

[Jeff Jarvis]

But Corey's involved in this free our Feeds thing. I'm, I still confused about what they're spending the money on, what they're doing with it.

[Leo Laporte]

It's a lot of money.

[Jeff Jarvis]

But Mike's, Mike's point is they're, they say they're going to build something on top of 80 that will make it federated. Hallelujah.

[Leo Laporte]

Okay.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And now if you look what McHugh's doing, if McHugh is crawling a bridge among the protocols, that's potentially a very big deal.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. So I've applied. You have to. It's a wait list right now.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I did got a nice mic and sick.

[Leo Laporte]

Our social connections have been locked up in separate self serving social networks. These networks pull us into a continuous scroll of sensationalized stories and controversies. Well, that's what we want, I would like to point out. That's what we want. That's what makes people use it. Yeah, I mean you don't want a.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Boring feed, but you want more control to not be. I'm so. Because Block doesn't work anymore on Twitter. It's really awful. I'm so happy in Blue sky because Block actually works. Right.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, you know there is these movements come and go, but I see this on Reddit. More than a thousand subreddits have now said no more X links on our subreddit.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Huge.

[Paris Martineau]

And to be clear, he means links to x.com not cross links, which are often referred to as X links, which is, I thought the first is the worst. I thought that the first five times I saw that announcement and read it. And then I realized, oh no, they're talking about x dot com.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, you can't put a link to an X post on these subreddits. And I think that that's good.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, I think.

[Leo Laporte]

I think the Nazi salute sealed it for a lot of people. Even though.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

Even though I could. You could credibly say, no, it was. He was just doing the Roman as.

[Jeff Jarvis]

As Dietzite said, a Hitler greeting is a Hitler greeting is a Hitler greeting. Yeah, but we're not political here, so we'll move on. But.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, it's germane. If not.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, it's not German.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

All right. So surf. Okay. But, you know, when I go back here to Blue sky and I look at the. The. The Blue sky, what does he call the new Sky Talk? Sky Talk. It's boring.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, he was a proof of concept. He's trying to. He just. He put it up really quickly to say, yeah, it works.

[Leo Laporte]

But I'll tell you why it's boring. There's none of that stimulating controversy. Right.

[Jeff Jarvis]

It's got to feed. It's got. It's got to keep going. It's got to keep. Not controversy. No, no, no, no, no. It's not controversy. It's fun things that you like. I like bikinis for the rest of us.

[Leo Laporte]

That's true. Where's the bikinis, Mike? Where. No, I think. What I believe it or not, I think Steve Bannon nailed it. This needs to reflect our culture. This is how our culture is created. Movies at one time, TV at one time was our culture. You know, when everybody went to work the next day talking about Johnny Carson, that created a culture. Now, I would very much like to see that in a. In a social network, but.

[Jeff Jarvis]

There is no but here's the thing, Leo. This is.

[Leo Laporte]

And that's why Black Twitter was so important, right?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes. Oh, speaking of which, I want to. I want to club plug plug a friend's book just out.

[Leo Laporte]

Meredith, we tried to tell y'all, is.

[Jeff Jarvis]

The expert on black Twitter, and her book just came out from Oxford University Press. Meredith's brilliant professor.

[Leo Laporte]

She's black.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I hope she is black.

[Leo Laporte]

Okay.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And she wrote. She and others wrote the key paper when I held the Black Twitter.

[Leo Laporte]

That event.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, she was a key. The key organizer for this. Okay, There. She's brilliant. I just. Just got it. It just came. So I recommend highly. Meredith is brilliant.

[Leo Laporte]

I will read that because it's culturally, I think, fascinating. But.

[Jeff Jarvis]

But here's. Here's the thing, Leo. This is why I devoted the last 10, 15 years.

[Leo Laporte]

And I was a member of an earlier diaspora on Twitter was called Geek Twitter. Right. And that really was real.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Right. But here's. Here's the key Culture was synonymous with mass. And that's what's Dodd. That's what's wrong. And I celebrate that. And so there's going to be no single unitary view of no.

[Leo Laporte]

That's Tick tock, though.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's culture. Culture.

[Leo Laporte]

That's why TikTok is so great. Because if you're in the tide eating culture, that's your culture, you know, whatever it is. And I'm being facetious, obviously, it's mostly very positive.

[Jeff Jarvis]

It is.

[Leo Laporte]

And it's scary. It's scary.

[Paris Martineau]

How did you feel your during your 12 hours of no TikTok, Leo? Did your hands shake?

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, Paris.

[Leo Laporte]

I didn't really miss it, but I have to say Instagram is not a good replacement. Instagram reels are not a replacement for TikTok.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I was lost and had nothing to do on the toilet.

[Paris Martineau]

I was about to say, are you one of those people that accidentally opened up Tick Tock like three different times and then realized, I didn't do that, but a lot of my friends did every morning. Wow.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. No, I knew it was down, but it wasn't down that long. It was down for US In California, 7:30, we were watching the football game and Lisa's ex said, where's Tick Tock? And I went, what? It's down already? Because I knew it was going to happen. I thought it was gonna happen at midnight or something.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

And then the next morning, Lisa says, it's back. I said, oh, I didn't really miss it. Now is it back as it was? What do you. What is you? How do you weigh in on that? Because some people say, oh, no, this is a new pro Trump Tick Tock. You can't search for, for instance, anti Trump content. I don't know if that's true or not. There are a lot of spurious stories. There was a story going around that Instagram was auto subscribing you to J.D. vance's account.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah. And that was incorrect. It was just, if people are subscribed to the Vice President of the United States account, it changes over JD from every person. And this happens every administration.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

I think this was spurred on by that. There were some stories about, I believe on Instagram, if you searched certain hashtags, such as, like, you couldn't search the Democrat hashtag, but you could search Republican. And then Instagram, once people flagged that to them, I believe has changed it back to how it was before. But it does seem to be in times like this that are highly politicized and very tense conspiracy theories are Going to be abound.

[Leo Laporte]

It's interesting, isn't it? You watch that? Just kind of. And I got sucked into it. My ex sent me a text saying I was just auto subscribed to J.D. vance and I. And I actually mentioned it on the air. And then I realized, oh, no, she was probably following Kamala. And that just automatically.

[Jeff Jarvis]

There was a rumor that we all got subscribed to Trump on Facebook.

[Leo Laporte]

Same thing, probably. Right. Probably was potus.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

Instead. Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

Potus.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Well, you couldn't unsubscribe from it, but I. I wasn't subscribed to it.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, let me. What would be. I'm going to search TikTok for an. An anti Trump. I'll just. I'll. I'll write hashtag F Trump. How about that? Let's see if I can find that. That would be negative. Yes. How do you search on this thing? What do they call these? Scoots.

[Paris Martineau]

Scoots?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Toots.

[Leo Laporte]

Toots.

[Paris Martineau]

You hop into the time tunnel is.

[Jeff Jarvis]

How you do it. And you try to act like you're 30 again.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, let's see. Probably because of the profanity, they're not gonna give me results there, I would imagine. Oh, no, they did. Oh, yeah. I'm seeing quite a few. Okay, so that's bs. That was not true. There's plenty of anti Trump stuff. All of it with the same hashtag. Wow. Okay. So clearly they're not banning that. Yeah, it's.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, a lot of it is overblown.

[Leo Laporte]

I know.

[Paris Martineau]

You can't.

[Leo Laporte]

You can't search for Tiananmen Square. That's. I understand that. That's fine. I don't.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean. Yeah, it's more permissive than Red Note.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's the one thing I missed. I didn't even try Red Note. I didn't.

[Leo Laporte]

No, I didn't either. I. I knew that. That was. That was a protest vote. That wasn't sincere.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

All right. I like Mike McHugh's surf. We're going to get Mike on.

[Jeff Jarvis]

See? See? And you doubted me.

[Paris Martineau]

You're going for surf, but not blue sky. What do you have against the site?

[Leo Laporte]

It's boring.

[Paris Martineau]

That. That's a user error. You're not following the right people.

[Leo Laporte]

It's people talking about blue sky.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, that's so.

[Paris Martineau]

No, no, no, no. That's so fast. You're using. Use this thing. It's called Sky Follower Bridge. You can just type that into Google. You log in with your Twitter account and your blue sky. Maybe you need to do it again.

[Jeff Jarvis]

What Are they?

[Paris Martineau]

It'll go through and help you follow everyone you follow.

[Leo Laporte]

Mostly I'm just done with this kind of incessant, like, here's what I had for lunch crap.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, it's not. Oh, geez, Grandpa.

[Leo Laporte]

God.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Wait, wait, wait. Yeah, you were going giving hell to Lawrence O'Donnell and you're. @ least he's open minded.

[Paris Martineau]

At least he's like, what's a tweet?

[Leo Laporte]

Just arrived. That's why anybody's been through this. It's like, we don't need this. But yet we have our culture. We have discord as my culture.

[Paris Martineau]

We have our culture. Says man. Looking for every other option.

[Leo Laporte]

All right, navigate Starter pack.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And there's a twit. There's a twit starter pack.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, yeah, we're all on it. You're on it too.

[Paris Martineau]

Do you follow the Twitch starter pack?

[Leo Laporte]

Of course I follow them all. Look, I follow a lot of people on the Skeet Town thing. I follow 763 people on Skeet Town USA and I've posted 45 times, so don't knock it.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh God, you're just so.

[Paris Martineau]

I've posted 885 times, Jeff. How many times do you guess? Guess how many times you think you've post. Don't.

[Leo Laporte]

Look, I don't have anything that important to say. What are you saying?

[Paris Martineau]

Wait, guys, guess how many times Jeff has posted.

[Leo Laporte]

I just.

[Jeff Jarvis]

During the Show.

[Paris Martineau]

I had 885. Jeff has 8,000 posts.

[Leo Laporte]

So my 45 is really kind of not. I'm not. I'm not.

[Paris Martineau]

There are some absolute sickos and freaks out there who I actually, to be clear, do not endorse who have already posted like a hundred thousand times. Those people are muted. I can't, I can't.

[Leo Laporte]

I am open to this becoming Twitter of the Twitter.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's what we want it to be.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah, yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

But again, they need to have Federation, although Federation will then give them the same problem Mastodon has. And, and. And people don't like Mastodon. I mean, I.

[Jeff Jarvis]

The other problem with Mastodon is that some of its rules, some of its orthodoxy turned off, especially communities like Black Twitter. And it's a scoldy place. That's its culture say that.

[Leo Laporte]

I don't know if I.

[Paris Martineau]

It is scoldy. And the thing is also, I think microblogging sites and honestly just modern social media, the quote tweet or like reblog but with comment feature is integral and Mastodon doesn't have that.

[Jeff Jarvis]

What's the. The other one? Paris where you find out what kits you're part of.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, that was a good one. Open Clear Sky. Clear Sky. That's what it was.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah, I do like that because you can also then kind of go through and figure out what lists you're on. These are the like starter pack lists of like things you could follow. You could auto follow everybody or put them in there and you could go and find people who are kind of similar to you to follow Clear sky app.

[Jeff Jarvis]

But it's weird too because I think we talked about this before is that there's also lists to block.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah, block lists are different and so.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Some people just get.

[Paris Martineau]

I keep getting added to the AI lists. Block lists. And I guess that's not gonna. It's not gonna get any.

[Leo Laporte]

I think maybe my problem is I just don't have anything to say on these sites. Really. Seriously. I mean I don't. I don't think that my one line thought about, you know, whatever, building well adjusted Leo.

[Paris Martineau]

That's really healthy and good for you. But some of us are sick in the head like me and Jeff and we need to broadcast our thoughts all the time in order to feel seen in the world.

[Leo Laporte]

That seems a little pathological to me. Is that really the case?

[Paris Martineau]

But do you.

[Leo Laporte]

Do you feel the need? I mean really, seriously, do you feel I don't need. No, I share and I wonder.

[Paris Martineau]

I did for a very long. For a long time. I did feel a total compulsion to it that broke some point in the last five or so years and there was a period where I wasn't posting at all really on many platforms outside of bare work duties. But now I'm. The thing is, I'm the thing. The reason I'm. Why I'm stumping so hard for Blue sky is it is the first social media experience I've had in a while where it feels fun.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, again.

[Paris Martineau]

And I feel like posting just for posting sake and that's a lovely time.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And. And I find decent conversations and I can. So. So, you know, I make fun. I make reference to the Hitler group. Gruesome. The Hitler greeting. And you know what's going to happen immediately I get some number of reply boy bots. But I just block, block, block and they're gone and still works.

[Leo Laporte]

What should I post if I were to post on this. Well, Regis platform?

[Paris Martineau]

I would say post exactly that. What should I post if I were to post on this skeet.

[Leo Laporte]

If you look at my. If you look at my skits, there's a lot of that. There's a Lot of like I don't. I got nothing. What?

[Paris Martineau]

Well, I will say there is a want for you to be on there. I had a. I think my post about either when I was on Twitter this week or this show last week just posting about the show, I don't know, got some traction and a bunch of people were in my replies being like Leo Lepore. I forgot he was still doing this.

[Leo Laporte]

Well.

[Paris Martineau]

No, but there were just like where can I follow him? Wherever. And Patrick was like added your handle. But it hasn't been active in a while. So you know.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, the way I have it set up right now is when I do a blog post. But really that my guilt is I don't ever blog post either. When I do a blog post it goes to Threads Skeetland and. And Mastodon but. And I think it's now can go to LinkedIn too. But that's because it's micro.

[Paris Martineau]

That's crazy because those are so many very different like audiences.

[Leo Laporte]

It does a nice job though of formatting and it makes it look like it's. And I want to. I mean I'm a believer in a posse. I believe that the right way to do this is have your own site that syndicates your content to these other places because then you own it.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, yeah, I think that's good. But then also you're not going to be in a conversation with people you're going to continue to have.

[Leo Laporte]

No, no, no. Actually it does. It goes back there. No, no. Their comments go back into my blog.

[Paris Martineau]

I know, but their comments on it. But you're not. Like a lot of my posts on something like Blue sky are in response to stuff I see across my various feeds and it's because I'm getting a feel of the site and listening to all the other people I follow and you're not going to get that if you're just in your own silo. But again, I will say that's a very healthy and well adjusted approach to social media. So I applaud you and I. Yeah, I think if you want to continue to choose peace, you should do that.

[Leo Laporte]

That's what I'm choosing. By the way. I'm also not watching the news every night anymore and I'm really trying to limit my consumption of. Of media because it makes me feel bad. I would prefer to live in ignorance.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's the problem right now.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, so here. Did I ask you this question before? What is my responsibility? Oh no. I asked my therapists what is a common, common mistake.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Free therapist. Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

Exactly what is my responsibility as a human on this earth? Am I supposed to get upset and fought and march in the streets?

[Jeff Jarvis]

What did say?

[Leo Laporte]

He said you should pick your battles. Don't. Don't chase. Don't chase after unhappiness.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, that's so California. Oh, that's just so California.

[Paris Martineau]

No, I also think it's like, if you are like, we need. We need a Leo candle at both ends and getting outraged at every little thing.

[Leo Laporte]

I just want to sit down.

[Paris Martineau]

At some point will be burnt out and won't have the energy to care about things that are important to you further on down the line. Let me see your piano.

[Leo Laporte]

Let me see what my little AI friend says about all this. It's been listening, you know, I know.

[Paris Martineau]

Which one is this?

[Leo Laporte]

This is still B. I haven't got the plot yet, and I don't have the little pearl on my temple yet. I'm still. I'm still waiting. Let's see. Frustration. Oh, no, that's. That's an old one. Here we go. Leo examines the evolving dynamics of AI partnerships, specifically the implications of Microsoft loosening its grip on OpenAI amidst broader industry concerns, while balancing personal reflections on health and humor. Not. Not that informative, but not inaccurate.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah. Oh, Jeff, you. I don't think you missed. This was on Twit, not Twig. But Leo has a very fun charging thing for his weird glasses. He got.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, you didn't. Wait a minute. I didn't wear these.

[Paris Martineau]

Oh, you did.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I did. It was here.

[Paris Martineau]

Listen, I. I've been on too many podcasts.

[Leo Laporte]

I wore these on Twig, didn't I?

[Paris Martineau]

I just didn't know if you wore the charger.

[Leo Laporte]

But you can't really wear the charger. It. It goes where your nose goes. It would be good if you didn't have a nose. You could use this to be your nose.

[Paris Martineau]

That would be good if you didn't have a nose. Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

So maybe it's designed for people. Noseless people.

[Paris Martineau]

They could just goes a bit.

[Leo Laporte]

I have a prominent proboscis, and so it really doesn't fit on my proboscis.

[Jeff Jarvis]

My kids keep on insisting they don't look like me because they don't want the Jarvis nose.

[Leo Laporte]

Can I just say, all noses are dopey. And as soon as you start looking at your nose. Except for yours, Paris, you actually have a very elegant nose.

[Jeff Jarvis]

You do, and it's not.

[Leo Laporte]

Did you get a nose job in your youth?

[Paris Martineau]

Nope. It's.

[Leo Laporte]

On average, we're blessed with those movie star looks. That's all.

[Paris Martineau]

That's what they tell you.

[Leo Laporte]

Doesn't she have a perfect nose, Jeff? And you and I got these.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, no. Yeah, it's bad.

[Leo Laporte]

It's bad. But I would just see, I think that all people, most people look dope.

[Jeff Jarvis]

For Benito's sake, we have to do those.

[Leo Laporte]

I think we've done this, haven't we?

[Jeff Jarvis]

I think we.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, I'm going the wrong way.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Am I going the wrong way? Oh, no, I'm going the right way.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. You got that bonito. Great.

[Benito]

Thank you, Paris.

[Leo Laporte]

I've never noticed this. Wait, let me take off your. Let's see this nose.

[Paris Martineau]

This is a. I literally can't see anything. So.

[Leo Laporte]

Do you know that you have a perfect nose?

[Jeff Jarvis]

You do.

[Paris Martineau]

I didn't know that I had a perfect nose, but thanks.

[Leo Laporte]

It's tight.

[Paris Martineau]

It gets red when I podcast for too long, as we've discovered.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, but that's okay. That's okay.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah, it's very bad at holding glasses up.

[Leo Laporte]

You're watching the Noseworthy, the most noseworthy podcast on the Internet. This week in Google with Paris. Perfect nose. Martin, no.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Where are the intelligent machines?

[Paris Martineau]

Perfect nose. Come on. It was right there.

[Leo Laporte]

Jeff the schnoz, Jarvis and Leo Prominent Proboscis Laporte. Thank you for being here. We're glad you're watching.

[E]

Hi, I'm Cindy Crawford and I'm the founder of Meaningful Beauty. Well, I don't know about you, but, like, I never liked being told, oh, wow, you look so good for your age. Like, why even bother saying that? Why don't you just say you look great at any age? Every age. That's what Meaningful Beauty is all about. We create products that make you feel confident in your skin at the age you are now. Meaningful beauty. Beautiful skin at every age. Learn [e-mail].

[F]

Cheap Caribbean is celebrating more than just the new year in 2025. Cheap Caribbean Vacations is celebrating its 25th birthday too. You're invited to join in on the birthday fun and book a beach vacation with more savings. Now through February 3rd, you can unlock up to $250 off site wide vacation packages. Celebrate these awesome savings at your favorite beach and book your next all inclusive [e-mail]. your $250 off is waiting.

[Leo Laporte]

What else should we talk about? What else is going on in the world today? We got to get you out of here by 8pm Listen, we got time, guys.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

I often feel like I'm starting to wind up the show and then an hour and A half later, it's. I don't understand how that happens. I guess it's too much fun for me.

[Paris Martineau]

That's true.

[Leo Laporte]

So, okay, so I'm gonna skeet. And what should I skeet? Like, deep thoughts.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Why don't you ask?

[Paris Martineau]

Whatever you want.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Complexity. What you should ski.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, I could just have the AIs write it. That's what I should do.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah. They'll love.

[Leo Laporte]

I know what I'll do. I just thought of this. I was running a. Running skeet storm of things my B computer tells me about myself because that. I can just copy and paste it. That's what I'll do from now on.

[Paris Martineau]

Nice.

[Leo Laporte]

Should I. I should create a new account for that, though, shouldn't I?

[Paris Martineau]

Perhaps. Or you could do like a. Yeah, or you could do like a thread and be like, this is what my computer says about my.

[Leo Laporte]

I'd only like to expose people to that in. In small pieces. All right, so here I'm looking. I mean, I have follow a lot of people. Trump don't want to read that. Trump don't want to read that. I'm losing. See, I'm a pro. I'm using Decblue.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I don't like it.

[Paris Martineau]

That's true, but you're on just the home.

[Leo Laporte]

I mean, I'm looking at the home. I have science. Popular with Friends Discover. These are lists. I can put other lists.

[Paris Martineau]

Scroll down one of those. Yeah.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Where's your notifications that you need?

[Leo Laporte]

I don't need notifications. What do I care?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Because it's a conversation.

[Leo Laporte]

All right, all right. Let me turn on notifications here. I'll add a notification column.

[Paris Martineau]

I can't believe you don't have a notification one.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, look at Joe. Look at Joe's. Okay, but why become a part of club Twitter? This is like those SAP commercials.

[Paris Martineau]

Community.

[Leo Laporte]

All right.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I gave Joe a new assignment. Discord.

[Leo Laporte]

Okay. People are liking my post from a month ago. That's good.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah. Oh, this is a good piece, honestly, that we could talk about in the show.

[Leo Laporte]

What's that?

[Paris Martineau]

It's the one you're hovering over right now.

[Leo Laporte]

Incredible new data journalism from a crack team at Bloomberg. Adriana suggested we talk about this. What is it? The second Trump presidency brought to you by YouTubers.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah. They analyzed a wide network of podcasters in the manosphere to understand how this, like, large group of influencers kind of are affecting political conversation among young people and listeners.

[Leo Laporte]

But I don't think you can create toxic masculinity. I think it must have been there to begin with, yes.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, certainly. But I think in. If you have an entire content ecosystem, it reinforces it all of like every piece of content these people listen to or watch involves the same themes again and again.

[Leo Laporte]

You start to believe it's powerful.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. Reporters reviewed nearly 13 hours. This is, doesn't.

[Jeff Jarvis]

This.

[Leo Laporte]

Isn't this kind of a. I don't like these kinds of pieces. Is it just me? It feels like journalism. Not good. They reviewed 13 hours of footage from their channels. Mapped out 1300. 1300. Mapped out the podcasters, guest networks, and quantified the frequency of key political messages they distributed to tens of millions of subscribers each day. To hear them tell it, America is in a desperate place, destabilized by soaring inflation. By the way, the price of eggs is going up. Migrants streaming across the border. Not anymore. And the beginnings of a third world war. Gender politics have gotten out of hand. No, just women. Women have gotten out of hand and we've got to suppress them. While schools in the medical establishment duped the public with information. How dare they? I don't know. Yeah, I don't have as many followers as these guys do. That's true.

[Paris Martineau]

What about this rings as disingenuous or like, not good journalism to you?

[Leo Laporte]

I think it's a little. I don't trust it.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, I think that what they're trying to do is we have a lot of. See a lot of coverage around tv, related news content like people often talk about what, like channels like Fox or MSNBC or CNN decide to devote time and energy to, but nobody is really watching those channels, or at least in comparison to.

[Leo Laporte]

No, lots of people are watching these channels, but they're watching them.

[Paris Martineau]

I think lots of people do watch these channels and they increasingly watch multiple of them. Like, if you were in one of these networks, you're likely to be watching three or listening to three or four of these podcasts. And I think it is notable to understand, like, what are these podcasts about? And then hear, in the words of the actual listeners, what that means to them.

[Leo Laporte]

Look at who the guests are. 30% of the top guests are politicians or pundits. This is the top 30 guests by viewership. Trump, of course, number one. 113 million views on a whole bunch of shows. He was smart, right? He went to the man shows to be on Andrew Tate, who's Repulsive.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Where. Let's just be clear. They would never would have voted for Kamala Harris. So going there wouldn't have made any damn difference.

[Leo Laporte]

Right? But it just, it Reinforced that. And maybe the people who listen to that then went out and said, yeah, you can't vote for Kamala because she thinks she's a coconut or something. Tucker Carlson, Elon Musk. I don't know who Shane Gillis is. Oh, he was the guy who got kicked off Saturday night. Love that, folks. Lady Vance, Ben Shapiro. It's the usuals, right? People you'd expect.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Usual suspects, one might say.

[Leo Laporte]

Usual suspects. It's kind of incestuous, really. It's these. Oh, yeah, yeah. But. But I don't think that these people would be popular if, if the. In other words, do they create the culture or reflect the culture? Is the question. I guess.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, I think it's a little bit of both.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

And I think that's what makes it interesting to try and analyze this is at a certain point you go from reflecting the culture to creating the culture if you assume that there's, you know, like it's a chicken and the egg situation. But at a certain point when you are one of the top, like 20 podcasts in America and have a huge audience, you are a tastemaker. And your opinions and the voices that you choose to elevate or not elevate can have a considerable influence in the world.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Let me ask a related but less difficult question. Paris, since you are fashionable, where do you find your fashion now? That's to say, things that interest you and things that inspire your fashion, not just clothes. Where did you. How'd you get into 15 years ago, but also 15 years ago? Has there been a change? Did you read magazines and now you do things. Don't think that's what I'm trying to get to.

[Paris Martineau]

I'm trying to think it's your peer group. When I was a. Yeah, I don't know, a kid, I maybe, or like a teen. I used things like Tumblr or Instagram more to determine fashion. Now I don't really. I guess I use not just fashion, though, or just people out in the world.

[Leo Laporte]

Things you're interested in.

[Paris Martineau]

Things that I'm interested in, like interior design and stuff? I use books now. Like I'm, I'm very. I'm much more like judicious about it currently.

[Leo Laporte]

Was there somebody in your life that got you interested in interior design and mid century modern, or did you just kind of come upon it?

[Paris Martineau]

It's a great question. I don't think there was. I think I just.

[Leo Laporte]

Traditionally it's been peer groups.

[Jeff Jarvis]

You're also of an age you never. So there. I mean, Anna Wintour Set fashion in America. Damn it.

[Leo Laporte]

For some people.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And it came.

[Leo Laporte]

No, Nobody I know dressed like Vogue.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, but it, but it trickled down.

[Paris Martineau]

But it percolates.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, absolutely did. Absolutely. And that's gone. That's gone.

[Leo Laporte]

She doesn't have the power. She did.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No. And my point is that even Paris.

[Leo Laporte]

Is a good thing. Right?

[Jeff Jarvis]

It's a great thing. So I love it.

[Paris Martineau]

Well, I mean, I think that that's kind of what a story like this is getting to though is. And the rise of influencer culture is the people who are tastemakers are. It's not one person. It's like 50 to 100 people.

[Leo Laporte]

It should be fragmented.

[Paris Martineau]

It is fragmented, but it's still concentrated in the sense that like Instead of being one person for everyone, it is like these 20 guys for men ages 15 to 35.

[Leo Laporte]

But, you know, but this is my point is that interesting that's. That happened because that, that came from the culture into the. Those guys. And everybody on YouTube is trying to build an audience. And so they are respond there. This is. They're not self sui generous. They're not like, oh, I'm gonna get on there and be me. They're saying what would bring me the biggest audience? And so they are reflecting the culture and, and the good news.

[Jeff Jarvis]

A very small slice of it.

[Leo Laporte]

It's. It. The good news is YouTube is vastly fragmented, as are all of these channels. So you can find a mid century modern channel which would you probably do, follow much smaller channels than, you know, these big giant channels and much more fragmented. And so that's the good news is, I mean, look, we're. We're not that dominant in the culture. We have, I don't know what it is. 700,000 monthly listeners, uniques. So it's not millions, but, but there are lots of us. There are lots of these little slices out there with the long tail, so called.

[Benito]

Yeah, but you know, like I on YouTube. YouTube still tries to serve me this bonito, all this kind of stuff. Like it will surface like a Lex Friedman clip or whatever. We're like, I'm very, very good about pruning my own algorithm and I still get that stuff popping up.

[Leo Laporte]

That's a good point. That there, there is a thumb on the scale, which is these social networks promoting what they think you're going to.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Want to watch based on the behavior of others.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, but that is, that is a thumb on the scale. You're right, I didn't think about that.

[Jeff Jarvis]

So there was a paper that I'm trying to look for Right now, and I can't find. By Peter Thornberg and others from University of Amsterdam, that came up about a week ago. I can't find it. That said that supposed disinformation, misinformation and all that, it turns out, does not come from populism, does not come from right or left per se. That a huge amount of it comes from a very small slice of extremist. Right. And that the point is that if we keep on thinking our problem is disinformation. No, our problem is societal. And what is it makes people vulnerable to that siren call. And that's what we have to deal with. Go ahead, Paris. Sorry, sorry.

[Paris Martineau]

Sorry to interrupt you. I think that's a really interesting point. But I would also argue that if the research shows that the instigators and creators of disinformation are a small number of extremists, that's a much more manageable problem than trying to tackle all of culture.

[Jeff Jarvis]

But. Yes, but we're not.

[Paris Martineau]

Stop.

[Jeff Jarvis]

We're not problematic.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah, right. And I mean, I think part of one of the things I thought was interesting about this great investigation by Bloomberg is they also just kind of break it. They break down many of the popular subjects and themes across videos in this huge network of, I guess, like, popular creators. And it's stuff that has made its way into the election and a national scale. Like around the time that people, like, started talking about the election being rigged and spreading this big lie that started popping up on, like, 40% of these podcasts. It also found that around 30% of the videos mentioned transgender people. Right. You know, this was relating to a national issue. It's an interesting way to look at the culture.

[Leo Laporte]

They came at this with a preconceived notion we're going to find the influencers who are creating toxic masculinity and see what their influence is. What they didn't do is, let's look at the top 20 YouTube channels.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Right?

[Leo Laporte]

Because the number one is Mr. Beast. The number two is a Hindi channel called T Series. Number three is Nursery Leo.

[Jeff Jarvis]

This is what, you know, this is an old mass media way to look at it. This is, yes, on Twitter is small. It's tiny. Given the whole of the culture, we think that that means it's a Super Bowl. No, it actually doesn't. It means it's a bigger number than others.

[Leo Laporte]

None of the people that they talked about are in the top 20, but.

[Paris Martineau]

Covers almost all of those top 20 regularly. Cocomelon, the, you know, business of Mr. Beast, all of those Things are regular things that Bloomberg does cover and has reporters.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

I think that this is a way to look at, instead of like what Jeff is talking about, looking at this from like a monoculture perspective of what are the most popular of popular things. You need to look at it as a slice of the whole. This is a dismissal.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, but what I'm saying is they came out with this precon. They set the set of things that they're going to look at. They said, let's look at toxic masculinity. Oh my God, there's toxic masculinity on the Internet. That's true.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, no, they didn't say what are the most influential channels on YouTube. They said, let's find toxic masculinity on YouTube.

[Paris Martineau]

Well, I would argue, I would argue that's incorrect because it's not about toxic masculinity, which I think has become kind of a buzzword. They said, what are the. How can we identify the podcasters that.

[Leo Laporte]

What's their criteria?

[Paris Martineau]

No, their criteria is podcasters that are mobilizing America's men to lean right. Like, right.

[Leo Laporte]

And guess what?

[Paris Martineau]

They all podcasters.

[Leo Laporte]

A bunch of podcasters who are getting America's men to lean right.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, I mean, I don't think that that's the part of this that is newsworthy. It's more. We know that these podcasters exist. What are. It's a qualitative study of what. Who are they, what do they cover, what in what ways do they intersect.

[Leo Laporte]

Be more interesting to see who's. Who are the most influential people.

[Jeff Jarvis]

But, but that is meaning. Because the, the most influential is tiny compared to what our perception is of mass media. There's no Super bowl on YouTube.

[Leo Laporte]

Right. This paper, Mr. Beast is pretty not tiny.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No. But given what's the proportion of population. He does not influence the population. He's no Walter Cronkite. That's gone. That's the problem is it's hard to get out of that.

[Leo Laporte]

I think among a certain group. He is.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's right. And that's not a whole culture.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Jeff Jarvis]

To read from this paper, this is.

[Leo Laporte]

Why none of this is a whole culture. Because it's all fragmented. Exactly, exactly. So it's okay figured out. Let's figure if. Let's look at a slice of the culture that's okay. And talk about the people who are influencing it.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Because this, this paper I'm referring to says populism. Left wing. Populism and right wing politics are not linked to the spread of misinformation. These results suggest that political misinformation should be understood as part of the part and parcel of the current wave of radical right populism and its opposition to liberal democratic institutions. And so what they found was, in analysis, that there is a slice that is pushing that part of America. So Paris, I think, is quite right to point out the story. It's a, it's a worthy journalistic effort to say what's driving that slice of America. It doesn't talk about all of America.

[Leo Laporte]

You could say that it started in right wing radio.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, it.

[Leo Laporte]

Rush Limbaugh started the whole thing.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Absolutely, absolutely.

[Paris Martineau]

And I mean, I think that you would, it would be silly to, during the rise of figures like Rush, be like, ah, it's not worth paying attention to him or what he does. They were much more small amount of people, but they were much more dominant. It's just because our culture isn't like a monoculture where there's, you know, five radio channels and three TV channels. There is a lot of podcasts and YouTube shows out there. And this, I think, is a viable way to kind of look at changing media, like media habits.

[Jeff Jarvis]

There's another, another study that I, that I quoted in my book that people think that YouTube radicalizes, but there's a lot of research now that says, no, people don't come to those crazy videos on YouTube through YouTube. YouTube is a library for extremists outside. So they, they link to that video directly. And it's not YouTube that drives them there. It's the movement that already exists that drives them there. So, and one thing that my, my communication researcher scholar friends get really angry about, I'm thinking Siva Body and often goes crazy about this, is that you cannot look at one medium or one platform in isolation. And it makes it really hard to research. But, but, but whoever is being influenced by this crazy. Sorry. Oh, sorry, John. I'm sorry. Wherever you are, this crazy stuff is you. Thank you. Is on YouTube and is on podcasts. It is on substack and is on Reddit and is on wherever and wherever and wherever and, and also has friends that goes to a bar and the influences are many. And it's, and it's, and it's, it's not so easy as saying that one medium or five YouTubers cause this. They don't.

[Leo Laporte]

What should we do about it? Is there anything to do about it or is there no prescription?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Well, this is my, my, my argument is in my books is that we don't have a pluralist. This is, this is going Back to. To Hannah Iran. We don't have a pluralistic society. There's no competitive community based pull on some people. And loneliness is the mine that the extremists go to. And, and then if you are alienated from your community and from society and I come knocking with a, what looks like a really appealing club to belong to and that I can belong to, that. That's what makes. So this goes back to bowling alone. This goes back to meetup. This is, this is exactly the fear that, that Scott Heiferman tried to deal with with meetup. And I think he, you know, he had a very positive effect for some people who now could go to their PUG meetups and have another. Another community connection there. Nextdoor wanted to do that. Didn't do such a good job of it.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, I mean, don't have malls to.

[Benito]

Hang out in anymore.

[Leo Laporte]

Right.

[Paris Martineau]

The malls, all they have is the Joe Rogan experience to listen.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, and I guess that's in a way what I was saying when I said we used to be the biggest influence is our peer group. But if you don't hang out with other people, you don't have a peer group. Well, now you're hanging out is online.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Well, that's. That's not online. You got it. That's what we keep on thinking that online is the thing we're interacting with. We're not. We're interacting with people. We got to see the trees for the forest.

[Benito]

Yeah, but you have to understand, meeting somebody in person is completely different from.

[Leo Laporte]

Talking to them on Discord.

[Benito]

It's not the same thing.

[Jeff Jarvis]

How dare you say that to my friends.

[Leo Laporte]

They're not your friends.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Did you hang out in malls, Paris?

[Paris Martineau]

I hung out in malls.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

I definitely wandered around quite a bit. You know, we have. My pause is because in Florida you have indoor malls and outdoor malls. And I was thinking of it in terms of indoor malls, but if I include outdoor malls as well. Yeah, I hung out malls.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's quite a taxonomy of teaching.

[Leo Laporte]

Do you think the pendulum will swing the other way and that we will start to crave in person human contact and we will once again recreate those peer groups? No.

[Benito]

Got to be worth it.

[Leo Laporte]

We're all going to live in our little pink shell.

[Jeff Jarvis]

But we're not in our shells. What are we doing right now? I'm not in California.

[Paris Martineau]

We're technically. We're all in our homes by ourselves is what we're doing.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Well said. Well said, Paris.

[Paris Martineau]

But I feel socially stimulated.

[Leo Laporte]

Absolutely not. Everybody's on a podcast Though some people.

[Paris Martineau]

Are listening to a podcast.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I think almost everybody is on a podcast now. That's the problem.

[Leo Laporte]

You're listening to the show formerly known as this Week in Google. Somebody in the chat room said, when is this going to be Intelligent machines. Quinn, you could talk about something interesting that's going to happen. February 5th, Paris's birthday. We will rebrand the show. No, we will not change the feed. So if you're subscribed, you'll continue to be subscribed. No, we will not change the count because I'm not throwing away 805 episodes. So not me. So it really isn't going to change much. And frankly, as much as I'm going to try to change the topic of conversation, I doubt that's going to change much either.

[Paris Martineau]

So we're still going to be talking about all this stuff and the words.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I think I've been on more, more of these shows than more twigs than you have, Leo.

[Paris Martineau]

No, we've done this before. Definitely we have. We've had the. How many twigs has each person been on? Patrick's getting the stats he's pulled.

[E]

Hi, I'm Cindy Crawford and I'm the founder of Meaningful Beauty. Well, I don't know about you, but like, I never liked being told, oh, wow, you look so good for your age. Like, why even bother saying that? Why don't you just say you look great at any age, Every age. That's what Meaningful Beauty is all about. We create products that make you feel confident in your skin at the age you are now. Meaningful Beauty, Beautiful skin at every age. Learn [e-mail].

[F]

Cheap Caribbean is celebrating more than just the new year in 2025, Cheap Caribbean Vacations is celebrating its 25th birthday too. You're invited to join in on the birthday fun and book a beach vacation with more savings. Now through February 3rd, you can unlock up to $250 off site wide vacation packages. Celebrate these awesome savings at your favorite beach and book your next all inclusive [e-mail]. your $250 off is waiting.

[Leo Laporte]

And now the Google change log.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, geez. We're not there yet.

[Leo Laporte]

He'll fix it in post. He'll fix it in post. Google will let. This is. I only have one.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I put one thing in there.

[Leo Laporte]

That's it. Google will let you control your Chromebook with what part? What body part you think? Your face. What? What were you thinking? What? What? What? What does this mean? Jeff, are you excited about this?

[Paris Martineau]

I hope it lets me Lick the screen of the Chromebook. That's what I.

[Leo Laporte]

Here's a.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Here.

[Leo Laporte]

I think it's an accessibility.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I've got to show you something. You may be.

[Leo Laporte]

Here's the video from. So yeah, if you can't maneuver a trackpad or a mouse, you can use where you're looking to move the mouse around. I think that's cool. Oh, what was.

[Paris Martineau]

Jeff is missing a lot of keys.

[Jeff Jarvis]

A friend of mine got the Samsung.

[Leo Laporte]

The hell's going on? What is this? What is going on?

[Jeff Jarvis]

It has a numeric keypad on it.

[Leo Laporte]

What are you showing us?

[Paris Martineau]

Hold the phone up to your face.

[Leo Laporte]

Now you know why he needs to control the Chromebook with his face.

[Paris Martineau]

What?

[Jeff Jarvis]

So I had to put. There's a. There's a numeric keypad on it.

[Leo Laporte]

Tape on the key.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I had to put tape on it so that I don't hit those keys. And I put tape over here so I can go to the center of the keyboard because it's driving me nuts because the keyboard is off center. Driving me completely crazy.

[Leo Laporte]

And that's the change log.

[Benito]

The outro file is missing. I. I don't know what's happening to this.

[Leo Laporte]

We are. There is some bit rot going on. People are eliminating files. Right?

[Jeff Jarvis]

They know. No, they're stealing things because they want. They want momentos.

[Paris Martineau]

You need to clean your keyboard. I say this is a dirty keyboard. Have for myself.

[Jeff Jarvis]

This is a brand new clean keyboard. I had to put these tapes on here to make me remember to go to off center.

[Leo Laporte]

By the way, Jammer B in the discord just shouted hey.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Jammer B.

[Leo Laporte]

Hey, Jammer B.

[Paris Martineau]

Hey.

[Leo Laporte]

All right.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Say hey again.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, no, no, no. That's not it.

[Paris Martineau]

But hi.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Hey.

[Leo Laporte]

I have a bunch of them I made when he came up to visit. I had him record a dozen of them. So I never. Walgreens has replaced its refrigerator doors. This is the FTC put out an interesting study saying that pricing was affected by your socioeconomic situation. I. More and more we're seeing almost predatory retailers. Walgreens replaced its refrigerator doors with ads on the glass.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Giant screens.

[Leo Laporte]

Giant screens.

[Paris Martineau]

Surprise. It didn't work out that well for.

[Leo Laporte]

Them because what, they didn't have Coke?

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, because.

[Leo Laporte]

No.

[Paris Martineau]

They got in a huge contract dispute with the startup that they partnered with, I believe. And the startup then also didn't properly deliver the screens to them. But. So then Walgreens didn't pay, so the startup shut down the screens. No one could see what was in there.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

It'S Walgreens by the Way. Not Walmart, Walgreens. Let's make that.

[Paris Martineau]

And to be clear, the screens aren't clear when you turn them off.

[Leo Laporte]

No, they're just screens. Yeah. I would have thought the problem would be it looks like there's stuff in there, but there isn't. Did that.

[Paris Martineau]

No, no, no, no.

[Jeff Jarvis]

With the way it is designed. Yes, that's right. I go in like, oh, they've got plenty of lemonade. And then you open it up and there's no lemonade.

[Leo Laporte]

Nothing in there.

[Jeff Jarvis]

A picture of lemonade.

[Leo Laporte]

They have lemonade pictures over there.

[Paris Martineau]

Licking the screen.

[Jeff Jarvis]

You might be interested in Nokia's reaction to the iPhone.

[Leo Laporte]

I actually put that in there ages ago. I thought that was really cool. No, no, no, this is good. In 2007 the iPhone came out. And this is from Aalto University, the presentation that Nokia gave its executives on the release of the iPhone. And that's why they say, yes, it is iPhone, because we didn't know at the time. Now remember Nokia was dominant at the time but they realized that this was gonna be a problem. I don't know how to zoom.

[Jeff Jarvis]

You gotta scroll within that box. You have to scroll within that.

[Leo Laporte]

Way. Apple iPhone is serious high end contender. I want to make it bigger. Let me make it zoom it in. Fit that to the.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, that's just going to make it. No, that's going to.

[Leo Laporte]

Doesn't help.

[Jeff Jarvis]

It doesn't actually show to the top left of it.

[Leo Laporte]

Is that what's going on? Grandpa, can you help us? Paris? I'm just down.

[Paris Martineau]

Sorry, I'm confused because I just downloaded it because Patrick just posted the stats for your guys.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, tell us.

[Paris Martineau]

And you're, you're perfectly matched. 7:20 and 7:20.

[Leo Laporte]

Whoa.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, that's funny.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh well, you might have to take.

[Paris Martineau]

The first one to blink is going to be the domino.

[Leo Laporte]

You might have to take a week off. So I've downloaded the presentation so now we can see it in all its glory. Yes, Apple iPhone was launched. It is iPhone, says the Nokia executives.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Basically, it's a nice hand model.

[Leo Laporte]

Isn't that pretty?

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's good. Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

I think they probably spent way too much time on this presentation and way too little time on how to respond to the iPhone.

[Jeff Jarvis]

They thought it was only going to affect the high end of the market.

[Leo Laporte]

They kind of realized they were in trouble though that they thought, well, we do have some stuff. In fact, on the hacker news thread discussing this, a lot of people said, man, I loved my N90. It was a Linux based phone from Nokia. If they had just put more effort into that, they might have competed. And I agree, they had some really nice phones, but, you know, it all went away. This was the beginning of the end. Microsoft bought them, tried to do some phones, put it out of business.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Did you have a favorite Nokia?

[Leo Laporte]

I have the N95 still somewhere. That was a video camera. It was wonderful. And the N90 was great. Look, there's Paris's favorite phone named Gizmo.

[Paris Martineau]

She's a little Gizmo cat name, you know, Kia Gizmo. Don't show. Don't show people. She really just wants to. It's all she wants to do.

[Leo Laporte]

I think there's something inbuilt in cat. Cats that they want to do that I don't understand.

[Paris Martineau]

It is really true.

[Leo Laporte]

They do that. Our cat does the same thing. Yeah. They turn around and say, flash. All right, all right.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Another one is the Ankler is going to start a standalone creator economy publication. I found that interesting.

[Leo Laporte]

Is the Ankler a publication itself already? What is the Ankler?

[Jeff Jarvis]

It's a showbiz publication, I think.

[Leo Laporte]

Okay. And they want to do one on the creative economy. This is Hollywood, you know, this is how Hollywood works. You know, we need to understand this creative economy. But somebody get me a creator. And so they're going to make a publication, a digital newsletter. Oh, the anchors like Puck, huh? I do subscribe to Puck. I like Puck.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah, I like Puck.

[Leo Laporte]

Veteran tech and entertainment journalist Natalie Jarvey. Standalone substack newsletter, $129 a year. Okay.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Well, the information has a creative creator economy expensive event once again.

[Paris Martineau]

Well, that's true, but we also have a free creator economy newsletter.

[Leo Laporte]

Okay, so get that instead. It's. You better like. And subscribe free.

[Paris Martineau]

Even if you don't subscribe, the newsletter is a free newsletter. I mean, you might not be able to read all the things linked. All of our newsletters are free except for the electric.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Is Martin's free?

[Paris Martineau]

Yes.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, wow.

[Leo Laporte]

Good stuff. Over@the information.com subscribe and click and subscribe and like. Yeah, I've kind of. I hate this whole creator economy thing.

[Jeff Jarvis]

You never started a pot. Did you ever think you're going to start a podcast for you are a creator, Leo.

[Benito]

You're the one.

[Leo Laporte]

You are.

[Paris Martineau]

You are part of the creator economy.

[Leo Laporte]

What? No. Because I was a radio. I did radio shows and TV shows as a sideline, but mostly radio shows. And then when I found out I could just distribute it on the Internet, I said, well, it's just a radio show on the Internet, but No, you.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Didn'T just distribute it. You made something new. Truly.

[Leo Laporte]

I made a company, and then we did video, which was kind of kooky. Now everybody does live video, but at the time, it was kind of unusual because it was expensive. Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

I remember for a while, whenever I'd come to guest on Twitt, I was like, yeah, does claim to be the. I was like, it's a podcast, but there's video on it for some reason. How weird, right?

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Jeff Jarvis]

How did you discover Paris in the first place, Theo?

[Leo Laporte]

I don't know. We had you on Twitter when I.

[Paris Martineau]

Was on the outline.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

Someone reached out to me, and I was like, all right.

[Leo Laporte]

Yes.

[Paris Martineau]

I was so nervous the first time I went on Twitch.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, we're gonna have to find that episode and take a look. I. We're always generating lists of people we want to have on. That's a constant thing. And, yeah, we were very. As soon as Paris was on, I said, okay. More of her. She's great.

[Jeff Jarvis]

True that.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. And then when. And then when Stacy left, Paris was my first choice for replacing Stacey.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I was nervous. I didn't know.

[Leo Laporte]

I thought we couldn't be.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And then I was so happy it was you.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. Yeah. It was either her or Ed Zittran.

[Paris Martineau]

Very different vibe.

[Leo Laporte]

Very different.

[Paris Martineau]

Oh, Ed.

[Leo Laporte]

I love Ed. He's just a character.

[Paris Martineau]

I adore him. Yeah, he's a quasi New Yorker now.

[Leo Laporte]

Half the time here, they're calling it the Bassinet backlash.

[Jeff Jarvis]

This is rather like the Walgreens story.

[Leo Laporte]

It's alliterative. Snoo is a bassinet company. First of all, don't buy your bassinets from snoo. But anyway, owners accused it of bait and switch tactics after they imposed subscriptions for features that used to be available for free. This is their happiest baby. The creator of Snoo introduced to premium subscriptions for some of the bassinet's most powerful features back in July. Oh, wow. It's a $1,700 bassinet.

[Paris Martineau]

And how does the subscription.

[Leo Laporte]

$20 a month. What? So, first of all, kids don't buy a bassinet for 1700 bucks. That's people who have more money than sense. It's just a thing to hold your baby. A lot of kids. Drawer of a dresser drawer. That was their bassinet. Now you want to do the.

[Paris Martineau]

Are you speaking from a. From a personal experience.

[Leo Laporte]

You pull out the drawer, you leave some sheets in there. You put the baby in there. Works great. The Internet connected. Bassinet had motions and sounds, including one that keeps the bassinet's motion and sounds at one level all night. The level lock feature was previously available without a fee. What do you mean one level?

[Paris Martineau]

What do you mean it you have to pay.

[Leo Laporte]

Does it go up in fees?

[Paris Martineau]

Yes, they just randomly increase and decrease it. They're like the baby's asleep. Make it rock faster. Unless they pay 5.99 the in 2023.

[Leo Laporte]

Makers of the Miku baby monitor, a $400 baby monitor elicited similar fury, says the Washington Post from parents went and introduced it a $10 monthly subscription for features. We really have gone out of control with the subscriptions, haven't we? Yes, but if you have $7 a month, I would like to invite you to subscribe to Club Twitter.

[Paris Martineau]

We'll never increase your levels while you're sleeping.

[Leo Laporte]

We're not going to take features out if you don't subscribe.

[Jeff Jarvis]

We're still going to rest you towards sleep.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. Actually what I think we will do is take the ads out if you subscribe.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

And it's really only if you want to. Oh, look at this. In this Washington Post article, concerns about connected devices limiting features are failing completely. Used to be reserved for early adopters, said Stacy Higginbotham, a Consumer Reports policy fellow who co signed the FTC letter. Now the trend is appeared to have spread to products with mainstream appeal, she says. Do this in my Stacy voice. More connected devices are being sold to consumers at a higher price point and these high dollar things are causing a lot of consumer pain. It's hard to feel solid for the rich. Sorry for the rich tech bro who's just dabbling in devices. But when it's a mom, she's thinking of me. I could tell when she said that. The rich tech bro who's just dabbling in devices, that's me. But when it's a mom who bought something and maybe didn't even realize this was gonna happen, it's a little different. I agree. You either have the subscription up front or you don't do it. Actually, we added the subscription a couple of years ago. Happiest babies Snoo changes affect only secondhand buyers. Anybody who rented or bought a new snu before July 15 gets a free premium subscription. For multiple children, it's those who bought The SNU after July 15 will only get nine months of premium access. Many snoo bassinets. Oh, see this is People forget when you buy a bassinet, you you're not the last person to use it. You're going to hand it down.

[Jeff Jarvis]

You shouldn't actually, because maybe there's been a recall and you shouldn't pass down certain things.

[Leo Laporte]

Okay, but it says you definitely don't pass down car.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Car seats.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, really?

[Jeff Jarvis]

No. Oh, no.

[Leo Laporte]

Because of recalls?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, if you pass it down, pass down the paperwork.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

Many investments have changed owners up to 10 times.

[Paris Martineau]

Well, I mean, if it's $1700, I'd sure hope.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, you can rent it for 1.59amonth. What I'm telling you, you pull out the dresser drawer, you put in some nice comfy stuff, maybe a sheepskin. That's a perfect bassinet. No, we had a bassinet for the kids. That's what you do.

[Paris Martineau]

One bassinet or two different.

[Leo Laporte]

So there is.

[Paris Martineau]

Did they reuse?

[Leo Laporte]

That's it? No. Yeah, I think they reused it. But we were the single owner, so any recalls we would have known about it probably did hand it down. I think almost all that stuff got handed down. Elon Musk says, yeah, I cheat. I'm a cheater.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Surprise, surprise.

[Leo Laporte]

He admitted account boosting gamers have been off at Elon Musk for some time. I'm sorry. PO'd at Elon Musk for some time because he keeps claiming he's like he told Joe Rogan, I'm in the top 20 players in the world for Diablo 4. And then gamers go, well, we watched your video, Elon, and you clearly bought all of that gear by some poor Chinese guy who had a game all night because you don't know how to play the game. You know, we're looking at this actually.

[Benito]

When he was on Rogan's show, he showed the clip and I saw the clip.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, you saw it.

[Benito]

And Rogan, though, is. Was like at one time, like a professional Quake player, like a very high level.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Quick.

[Leo Laporte]

I didn't know that.

[Benito]

So I could see in his eyes that he was skeptical. He was like, no, you didn't put the time. And I know you didn't put the amount of time in that you need to put in to do that.

[Leo Laporte]

Musk says he has high scores in Diablo 4 and Path of Exile 2, both of which are challenging to say the least. Some players spend most of their hours, their waking hours, grinding through dungeons and battling monsters so they can get these, you know, add ons. An answer to Musk's unlikely gaming prowess was provided in a video posted on YouTube by top Diablo payer number one Nico Rex, which showed what he said was a direct message conversation with Musk on X in the conversation. Now, again, we have to take Nico Rex's word on this. In the conversation, Musk admits to account boosting, usually done by paying somebody in China to play for hours. Nico said, have you level boosted and or purchased gear resources for path of exile 2 and diablo 4. Musk responded with a 100% emoji. He later added, it's impossible to beat the players in Asia if you don't as they do. Guardian could not. This is the Guardian could not independently verify the transcript. Musk did repost the video to his X account. Okay, that's kind of the seal of approval.

[Paris Martineau]

Interesting.

[Leo Laporte]

Musk had permitted Nico Rex to post it. He says everybody who looked at it knew. Right, Benito?

[Benito]

Yeah. I mean, if you. If you see him play, it's obvious that he doesn't know what he's doing.

[Leo Laporte]

He made rookie mistakes no expert would make, including. Look, the whole point of Diablo is the drops, right? You defeat somebody, you get a drop, you get some guts. He walked right past valuable items. Just walked right by him. You know why? I don't need that. I can buy it. He got into big arguments over people saying, you know, at the end of a conversation with Nico, Ricks must claim to be a living God of video games. That's creepy.

[Paris Martineau]

Whenever it's.

[Leo Laporte]

The really creepy thing is, did you see Grimes tweet?

[Jeff Jarvis]

No.

[Leo Laporte]

Which did have that hostage vibe. Grimes tweeted. Just for my personal pride, I would like to state that the father of my children was the first American Druid in Diablo to clear Abattoir of Zir and ended that season as best in the usa. He was also ranking in Polytopia and beat Felix himself at the gain. I did observe these things with my own eyes. There are other witnesses who can verify this. That is another $10 million. To which Elon says, thanks, and then David says, he outgames me regularly. Hardcore. Yeah. Okay, fine. First of all, who cares? But what's sad is for the richest man in the world to lie about his prowess.

[Benito]

Now, this is. This is actually telling about what actually matters to him.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah. He wants you to like him.

[Benito]

He wants you to think he's the best at everything.

[Paris Martineau]

The best gamer there ever was.

[Benito]

Or just like, naturally good at anything he tries. You know what I mean? Like that, sort of.

[Leo Laporte]

That's it. He's a genius. Yeah.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And if you don't believe, it's sad. But he's nothing sad about him.

[Leo Laporte]

No. It's just weird. All right, I think we should wrap this up. Get our. Get your Picks ready, kids, because it's 7:20, Paris has somewhere important to be.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Venue to go to.

[Leo Laporte]

She's got to go to Bush week. Is it one of those house parties.

[Paris Martineau]

Where you know the password and it's at a. A full BLEEP club. It's at a full.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, don't say that.

[Paris Martineau]

Club.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, we're gonna fill the BLEEP in.

[Jeff Jarvis]

On a Wednesday night?

[Paris Martineau]

No, no, it's at a. A whole. A whole club.

[Leo Laporte]

What are you gonna wear this?

[Paris Martineau]

I'm not gonna change it to my sweater.

[Leo Laporte]

What?

[Paris Martineau]

It's freezing outside.

[Leo Laporte]

Every bit of y'all bundled up, everybody. Is it a rave?

[Paris Martineau]

No, it's definitely like. I don't know, various bands. Like, it's. I think three or four different bands are playing there in the middle of the. A plate. Yeah, it's a Wednesday night. It may be a club, but it is a. It's like a Bushwick club. There's like a.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Are there still raves or was that a grandpa question?

[Paris Martineau]

No, there's definitely still Braves. I just don't do that.

[Leo Laporte]

There will always be raves, but not.

[Benito]

The type where you go to, like a parking lot to get the password anymore. I don't think that happens anymore.

[Leo Laporte]

Right after they burnt down in Oakland.

[Paris Martineau]

I've got some rave friends, and they're always in a really weird place at like 8am on a Sunday.

[Leo Laporte]

They come home with glow sticks and bracelets and.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, now in the Cronage group, the rave friends I know come home to where they have perfectly prepped a skincare routine, all the pajamas, a light meal, and some water that they have, and then they pass out. And I'm like, good for you.

[Leo Laporte]

I got to do a mask. I've been up all night. Oh, my God.

[Jeff Jarvis]

God, they're like.

[Paris Martineau]

I'm. My skin is so dry from all the drugs.

[Leo Laporte]

All right, we'll be back with picks of the week. You're watching this week in Google Paris. Martineau on the left, that is, of course, she is the information dot com. And let's not forget, if you've got a tip, a hot tip, her signal is Martineau01.

[Paris Martineau]

Send me good story ideas.

[Leo Laporte]

Send her a good story idea. And that other guy on the right, that's Jeff Jarvis, the author of the Web We Wave the Gutenberg Parenthesis magazine.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I just skipped.

[Leo Laporte]

What would Google do? You write a new book, Jeff?

[Jeff Jarvis]

I am History of the Line, A cultural history of the Linotype in the long century of mass media.

[Leo Laporte]

That's going to be fascinating.

[E]

Hi, I'm Cindy Crawford. And I'm the founder of Meaningful Beauty. Well, I don't know about you, but like, I never liked being told, oh, wow, you look so good for your age. Like, why even bother saying that? Why don't you just say you look great at any age, Every age. That's what Meaningful Beauty is all about. We create products that make you feel confident in your skin at the age you are now.

[Paris Martineau]

Meaningful Beauty.

[E]

Beautiful skin at every age. Learn more@meaningful beauty.com.

[F]

Cheap Caribbean is celebrating more than just the new year in 2025. Cheap Caribbean Vacations is celebrating its 25th birthday too. You're invited to join in on the birthday fun and book a beach vacation with more savings. Now through February 3rd, you can unlock up to $250 off site wide vacation packages. Celebrate these awesome savings at your favorite beach and book your next all inclusive [e-mail]. your $250 off is waiting.

[Leo Laporte]

It is colder in New York City right now than it is in Antarctica.

[Jeff Jarvis]

It's 11 degrees out here in Jersey.

[Paris Martineau]

That's why I'm wearing a sweater to the club.

[Leo Laporte]

On the. On the. This is from Patrick Delahanty. He says the Filchner Ron ice shelf in Antarctica. It's 20 degrees Fahrenheit. Colder in New York City.

[Paris Martineau]

Don't say I don't love my friends.

[Leo Laporte]

We're freezing here. It was 40 degrees when I woke up Old. All right, time for picks of the week. Let's start with you, Mr. Jeff Jarvis.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Well, I could do a different couple of things, but Edelman PR company comes out every year for 25 years with its trust barometer.

[Leo Laporte]

Ah.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And it came out this year and the entire topic I want is my machines going off. My screen just went blank. I don't know why. It's doing well.

[Leo Laporte]

I can. I can play 28 days of media slides. Is this it?

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, no, no. It's the one above that. We can do that too. We can do that, too.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, okay, you're talking about whiner.

[Jeff Jarvis]

So it's all about grievances. It's festivities.

[Leo Laporte]

There's this Festivus poll, okay, and so.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Edelman has 33,000 people. Six in 10 people hold grievances against business, government, and the rich.

[Leo Laporte]

Yes. By the way, you know what? Grievances lead to all sorts of addictive behaviors. Gripes.

[Jeff Jarvis]

If you go back to my post, I have the screenshots there.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, good. Much more, much more useful. Easier job insecurity.

[Jeff Jarvis]

So stay here for a second. So, like More than half of people believe their job is threatened by globalization, economic pressures, and technology, which would say that as if tomorrow one half of all jobs should go away.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Jeff Jarvis]

So that's not reality. That's perception. So where does that perception come from in what I call a chicken and rotten egg cycle? And if you scroll a little more, since I can't see it, here's the. Here's the chilling bit. Here's. Go back down. Down, down, down. Yeah, maybe you call it up an apple, but I call it down. No, no, just go back. Go back to the next paragraph where it was.

[Leo Laporte]

You mean up here or higher? This is the first thing.

[Jeff Jarvis]

One screen down.

[Leo Laporte]

This is the second.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Go another screen down.

[Leo Laporte]

This is the third thing.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, now you went too far again.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, you want.

[Paris Martineau]

He wants the big italicized.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, I won't want that. No, I went above that. Above earlier in it.

[Leo Laporte]

Can't tell you how gripping this is.

[Paris Martineau]

This is great radio, guys.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, earlier up.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Here's the chili bit.

[Leo Laporte]

Okay.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Okay. A majority of young adults age 18 to 34, 53% see hostile activism as a viable means to drive change. The percentages are lessened for older people, so it averages out of 40%. See this? Of that total.

[Leo Laporte]

What is hostile activism?

[Jeff Jarvis]

I'm going to answer that for you.

[Leo Laporte]

Okay.

[Jeff Jarvis]

27%. I can't see it now, so I can't read it. Say, I love the. I love the airtime. I love the screen time, but, you know, I got to see it.

[Paris Martineau]

Jeff, go up to the top and click Leo Laporte's screen. Instead of meeting.

[Leo Laporte]

Let me make it bigger for you. Here we go. All right, go ahead.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Thank you. Thank you, Paris. Thank you, young lady. So 27. See hostile action as engaging in online personal attacks against individuals who are seen. Who you see is standing in the way of the change you want to see.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, wow. Online personal attacks.

[Jeff Jarvis]

25. Would create or share exaggerated or even false online content to influence public opinion. 23% threaten or engage in physical violence against institutions. And this is my emphasis. Or groups. Groups. Now, this you see as standing in the way of the change you want to see. And 23, damage to damage or destroy public and or private property to bring attention to the change you want to see.

[Leo Laporte]

But I have to, to be fair. And this is always a problem with polls like this.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I.

[Leo Laporte]

They weren't asked if they would do this. They would. They were merely asked, would this be a viable means to drive change? Would it work?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Would any of you say that attacking someone violently is a Viable means of change.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, but doesn't mean they would do it. It means, yeah, they're saying it's viable.

[Jeff Jarvis]

They'Re saying it's okay.

[Benito]

It also depends on what kind of change you're talking about. I mean, to be, to be honest, like most of the big change in the world had come by.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, I, to play devil's advocate, you could say that the one that if you were shocked most by to threaten or engage in physical violence against the institutions or groups you see as standing in the way of change you want to see, that's the, you know, civil rights movement.

[Leo Laporte]

It's also January 6th.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, a lot of, a lot of civil rights movement was non violent. Hello. It's also in World War II.

[Benito]

So like, you know, like that's a war.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And Gandhi.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, anyway, I think the examples of violence are far more than the examples of non violent.

[Jeff Jarvis]

But here's another interesting one. So fear of discrimination.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Fear of being discriminated against surges across all demographics. And if you are a person of color, makes perfect sense. But in America, 40%, 48%. I can't. 48% of white people say that they are the victim of discrimination.

[Leo Laporte]

What?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Right. That's the kind of grievance world we live in now.

[Leo Laporte]

Now you think, okay, that's why people don't like dei, Right. Because they feel like that's discriminative.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's what, that's what, that's what they're, that's what they, what's brought them to this. But you think, okay, journalists are going to say, well, we're going to fix that. Not so fast. Clark Kent Media. The belief of many people, more than half believe that news organizations would rather attract a big audience than tell people what they need to know.

[Leo Laporte]

That's probably true.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And among people who are high grievance, they have low, medium and high grievance. Three quarters of people believe that.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Jeff Jarvis]

They also fear going down that leaders lie to us. 70% of people this year believe that journalists and reporters lie. 68, business leaders, 69, government leaders. They're not AI, they're, they're suspicious about that.

[Leo Laporte]

There is definitely a trust problem in this country created by our leaders who lie to be honest.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Well, and, and others and other. Trust in all news sources declines. Interestingly, the most trusted news source search engines 63%. This is global traditional media, 58, owned media 47 and social media 42% which you should see, I think is good news is people don't trust social media. Finally, the only Good news here is people still trust scientists and teachers, though. That's why certain angles of the country are trying to attack them.

[Leo Laporte]

I'm surprised to hear that. I thought that there wasn't a lot of trust for science.

[Jeff Jarvis]

This is worldwide, so it. It. Oh, this is global.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, okay.

[Jeff Jarvis]

This is 28 countries. Or in some cases, 27 or 26. Yeah. So I found that to be sobering.

[Leo Laporte]

Disheartening. Yes.

[Paris Martineau]

Yes, that is disheartening.

[Leo Laporte]

I'm not a fan also of polls.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I'm not either. I hate them.

[Leo Laporte]

No. But I think they rarely reflect.

[Paris Martineau]

I prefer columns.

[Leo Laporte]

Well, if it's a Festivus poll, that's different.

[Paris Martineau]

That's true.

[Jeff Jarvis]

So the media slides have a few interesting things in them.

[Leo Laporte]

Are they also on this again?

[Jeff Jarvis]

I can't do it.

[Leo Laporte]

Go ahead, show my screen. I'll. I'll scroll up for you. There you go.

[Jeff Jarvis]

You're a very bad scroller, Leo.

[Leo Laporte]

Influence is earned through compassion, not power.

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's the end of. No, that's the end of this. That's. That's all.

[Leo Laporte]

That's all I'm saying.

[Jeff Jarvis]

You think the other thing on the rundown.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, there's more.

[Jeff Jarvis]

We want to get Paris to her Facebook club, so we could also. The world is wondering that Netflix's UK audiences now surpasses BBC1.

[Leo Laporte]

Wow. Isn't that interesting?

[Jeff Jarvis]

That's a big deal.

[Leo Laporte]

By the way, Netflix response to raise their price.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes, exactly. And stop reporting how many people.

[Leo Laporte]

17.99Amonth.

[Jeff Jarvis]

By the way.

[Paris Martineau]

Expensive.

[Leo Laporte]

I know.

[Paris Martineau]

Almost a bassinet subscription.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yes. It doesn't lull you to sleep.

[Leo Laporte]

You have a choice between your baby and watching a squid game.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Did you do my Cachoe Pepe story last week after I left?

[Leo Laporte]

We did.

[Paris Martineau]

We did, yeah.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Did you laugh at me?

[Leo Laporte]

Yes. Well, I laughed at the recipe that the scientists came up with. I would.

[Paris Martineau]

Leo doesn't believe in science. He's part of that percentage of people. He's like, this is ridiculous. We don't.

[Leo Laporte]

Parmesan cheese, salt, pepper and pasta. That's all you need. The key to making it creamy is the pasta water. Not some phony creamy thing you're putting in there.

[Jeff Jarvis]

But the point is, it's not as easy as you insist.

[Leo Laporte]

Don't put cornstarch in your cacio e pepe.

[Jeff Jarvis]

I think, yeah. You get kicked out of it.

[Leo Laporte]

That's a mistake.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

I'll never forget going over when I was a kid going over to somebody's house and they were making tomato sauce and they put cornstarch in it. I thought I'm never eating here again.

[Paris Martineau]

Why are you?

[Leo Laporte]

I was a kid.

[Paris Martineau]

I've never thought about cornstarch in any way, positive or negative.

[Leo Laporte]

It thickens things.

[Paris Martineau]

I know, but why would you be against a thickening agent?

[Leo Laporte]

Because a good little snob. I'm a. I was a little 12 year old snob. Is why my mama never puts corn starch in the pasta sauce. What is your pick of the week there?

[Paris Martineau]

My pick of the week is this podcast called Genre Vision that I found last week and it really been digging. I found this because I. I watched in honor of David Lynch Wild at Heart with some friends this weekend and as I often do now when I'm watching movies, I want to hear somebody talk intelligently about it in a podcast so I can help process what I just went through. And I've done this a million times where I type in the little name.

[Leo Laporte]

Whatever movies, Worst movies ever made.

[Paris Martineau]

Well I mean so the thing is they, they do movie reviews by month basically. And so they could. I think this month could be some of the worst movies month.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh oh, okay. Because some of these are good. Like Galaxy Quest was good. I like that they'll do various themes.

[Benito]

Weaver block looks like.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah. So like they'll do a Sigourney Weaver block or they'll do a screwball comedy month or a. You know, different things like that. And so I found this podcast and it's. I've truly tried so many podcasts for movie stuff. This is the first one I found that I was genuinely entranced by. The hosts do great like textual analysis of like each movie but then also kind of the actors performance. Everything you'd want from someone talking about a movie you just watched. And they're funny too. They have a section in the show where they talk about the shelf which is like pairings with a particular movie. Like what other movie or TV shows would be similar to it? I don't know. I've listened to like five or six episodes recently and I really would recommend it.

[Benito]

And you need to find film. YouTube.

[Paris Martineau]

I can't get into YouTube videos at this point. It's been. At this point it's about film.

[Benito]

Like you need to see.

[Paris Martineau]

Listen. I know but it's like if I open that Pandora's box and become a person that consumes you become a toxic video masculine. I will, yeah, I'll join the alt.

[Leo Laporte]

Right.

[Paris Martineau]

And also have no social life because all I will do is watch YouTube videos.

[Leo Laporte]

So YouTube is.

[Paris Martineau]

Right now I'm just exploring watching movies again, YouTube is like, another five years down the line.

[Leo Laporte]

YouTube is a rabbit hole. It's easy to fall down and you never get out of. Yeah, I agree with you. This looks good. Genre Vision. Did they have Wild at Heart?

[Paris Martineau]

They did, and they had a great, I don't know, review of it. I went through their episode on Vampires Kiss, one of my favorite films from Nick Vember was fantastic, and I think really did it justice.

[Leo Laporte]

Nice.

[Paris Martineau]

I don't know. Would recommend it.

[Leo Laporte]

So you would probably not go chronologically, but you'd. I would recommend movie.

[Paris Martineau]

I'd recommend looking up movies. You want to hear someone talk about the. Like, it's likely that they probably have talked about it. They've been doing it for quite some time, and they really are thorough with. I hesitate even call them reviews because they kind of, like, go through everything. I want.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

A discussion of a film.

[Leo Laporte]

Wow. Terminator 2 versus the Iron Giant. That sounds good.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah. And so they'll do, like, they put out their schedule, like, a month or two in advance, so you can watch along if you want to, like, watch as they go out. But I, so far have just been going through their back catalog and listening to, like, podcasts about movies I've already seen, and it's been delightful.

[Leo Laporte]

Drew Deitch, Travis Newton, Danielle Ryan, Nick Murray, the people. Check them out of Genre vision. It'[e-mail] they have ads. They have subscriptions.

[Paris Martineau]

They don't have ads, but they do have a subscription. They have a Patreon. I don't know. It's a great question.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

It'S on wherever you've got. Yeah. Podcast.

[Leo Laporte]

$5 a month.

[Paris Martineau]

It's wherever podcasts are.

[Leo Laporte]

Wherever you get. Wherever you get your podcasts. Nice. That's good. I like to support other podcasts, especially if they're. They're good. All right, thank you so much, Paris. Martino, get out of there. You got to go to Bush week. You got 20 minutes to get to the rave. I hope you have a wonderful time.

[Paris Martineau]

I shall.

[Leo Laporte]

Do you have. I'm curious because Petaluma's music scene is almost entirely cover bands. Is that the case in New York? No, no, it's the center.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, they have cover of bands, certainly, but it's the bands I'm going to go see are going to be playing all of their own.

[Leo Laporte]

Their own music. Almost all the bands here. And they're good musicians. There's petty theft and azdz.

[Paris Martineau]

No, but I mean, that's the thing. I think in smaller markets, I have friends in the Town where I grew up. They're all musicians. And basically the thing is, bars don't book you unless you're a cover band.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, unless.

[Benito]

Except for the city, you have to play in the city.

[Paris Martineau]

Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

So big cities, you're gonna get original music. I want to hear songs I know, so I can sing along.

[Paris Martineau]

I mean, that's why.

[Benito]

That's why.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

They're playing to the audience.

[Leo Laporte]

I think we're going to see the Illegals this Saturday. They're great.

[Benito]

Oh, and Eagles cover band, I guess.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah.

[Paris Martineau]

Okay. I thought that was. I was like, huh?

[Leo Laporte]

No. In the age of Donald Trump, they're not illegals. They're illegals. And the good news is that the lead singers are contractors, so it all ties in.

[Jeff Jarvis]

He's missing one finger on the guitar, but it's okay.

[Leo Laporte]

He is the lead singer of azdz, which is an excellent ACDC cover band. And of the Illegals, and he may. He's probably in three other bands, too.

[Benito]

There's Robbie Baldwin, friend of the network, who's in a bunch of COVID bands, too.

[Leo Laporte]

That's right. Robbie does all of that. Yeah, he's got a Daft Punk cover band. He made. Remember he made the helmet.

[Benito]

He's got a Devo cover band.

[Leo Laporte]

He's got Devo. Yeah. Robbie's great. All right, folks, Jeff Jarvis. He is a professor emeritus of journalistic innovation at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at the City University of New York. Now playing at SUNY Stony Brook and Briarcliffe. The girls school. Oh, sorry, no, Montclair State. Have you ever thought of teaching at prior school?

[Jeff Jarvis]

Where did you go?

[Paris Martineau]

It's just so feminine.

[Leo Laporte]

I don't think you gave a little.

[Paris Martineau]

Description of it too. As if this is part of your shtick.

[Leo Laporte]

I don't know where I came up with that.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Anyway, it's a school for girls, not.

[Leo Laporte]

A girl school for a ghoul. For skirls. Exactly. Thank you, Jeff Jarvis. Buy his books because God knows he needs the money. The web we weave. The Gutenberg Parenthesis magazine. Buy two of that because it's cute and you can give it to somebody. Thank you, Jeff. Thank you, thank you. We love you guys and so much fun doing it. I hope the audience feels the same way, although I have my doubts. We. We do our best, guys. We're just trying here. We're just trying to do what we can to make a good show. I know, I know. We do this week in Google, soon to be intelligent machines, but we're going to do at the same time. Nothing else is going to change us name and the music and the album art. No more of that silly. I almost said fruity, but you can't say that anymore.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Paris has tried not to even laugh at this.

[Leo Laporte]

I don't mean that in a bad way. It's just. It's silly. It's a silly little tune. We're getting rid of that and Benito's rightness. Is it hard rock? Benino, you're going to do something. Really?

[Benito]

I mean, since it's intelligent machines, I was leaning more towards like the Cynthia.

[Leo Laporte]

Cyber EDM kind of a. Yeah, I.

[Paris Martineau]

Want to be able to drive a motorcycle through a psychic, through a, you know, futuristic city to it.

[Benito]

Like, you know, drive through neon.

[Leo Laporte]

It's like Tron. The Tron theme.

[Paris Martineau]

Okay, that's. Yeah.

[Leo Laporte]

Stay tuned. That's going to debut in a couple of weeks. We do these shows every Wednesday, 2pm Pacific, 5pm Eastern, 2200 UTC. Stream it live on eight different platforms. Yes. We're back on Tick Tock, kids. Eight. Count them, eight. Discord for the club members. YouTube, Twitch, Tick Tock, X.com, linkedIn, Facebook and Kick. You pick where you want to watch. If you're chatting. I see all the chat comments. Don't worry. So you're in and.

[Jeff Jarvis]

And you can. You can follow my feeds. Oh, yes, he's on Tuck, LinkedIn and Facebook. Oh, and you'll find it there.

[Leo Laporte]

All of those. TikTok, LinkedIn and Facebook. Nice. So if you're following Jeff on any of those platforms, you'll see that you.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Can'T get away from the show.

[Leo Laporte]

After the show, we make on demand versions available audio or video on our website. Twit TV, twig. There's a YouTube channel dedicated to the video. But of course, the best thing to do is subscribe. Wherever you get your podcast, your favorite podcast client, download it automatically, and you'll have it every week so that you can shake your fists at the clouds and. And grieve us grievances. All your grievances with us. Thank you, guys. Have fun tonight. Paris, that's wonderful. And Jeff, enjoy your sad little microwave meal.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Paris is going to go out in the cold.

[Leo Laporte]

We're just, you and I, we're going to stay home. I got the TV tray all set up.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Got the Swansons ready to go.

[Leo Laporte]

Swansons, I love it because it all. You know, I got the fried chicken dinner with the apple pie and the mashed potatoes.

[Paris Martineau]

You don't have to dirty multiple plates. You don't have to dirty any plates.

[Leo Laporte]

And it all tastes the same, so if you like one part of it, you'll like it all.

[Jeff Jarvis]

It really did taste like aluminum.

[Leo Laporte]

Yeah, it was all kind of cardboardy.

[Paris Martineau]

And it tastes like aluminum. If one part is cold and frozen in the middle, it's still fine.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Oh, it was magical how they did it.

[Leo Laporte]

Do they still sell Swansons? Because I'm having a little. A little bit of a craving for the old TV dinners. Did you ever have in Paris? Your parents wouldn't do that.

[Benito]

Even if they still make them, it will not taste anywhere.

[Leo Laporte]

Like it's a ConAgra brand. Coming in hot is their slogan. Oh, Lord. Okay, fine. Thank you, everybody. We'll see you next time.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. One last on eBay, for $145, buy a 1960s Swanson Turkey Cranberry mashed potato dinner. I hope it's just the box.

[Leo Laporte]

What?

[Paris Martineau]

Buy it, Leo. Buy it and eat it all.

[Jeff Jarvis]

45 or best offer.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, my God, look.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Tangy. Cranberry sauce, peas. Look at this in butter sauce.

[Leo Laporte]

Oh, that's a fridge magnet. I got a fridge magnet, which would be excellent. You know what's weird, though? Modern fridges aren't magnetic.

[Paris Martineau]

That's messed up.

[Leo Laporte]

That's really messed up. We're gonna put the kids pictures. 1970s Swanson TV.

[Jeff Jarvis]

6.95.

[Leo Laporte]

6.95. Oh, it's.

[Jeff Jarvis]

What I just put up was.

[Leo Laporte]

These are all magnets.

[Jeff Jarvis]

No, 145 if you go up. If you.

[Leo Laporte]

Their discord, the more expensive actual food. All right, Paris, thank you so much for everybody. We'll see you next time this week in Google.

[Jeff Jarvis]

Bye.