Share & Litigate & Tell with Katie Nolan and Michael Cruz Kayne

Summary

Podcast Summary: Pablo Torre Finds Out — “Share & Litigate & Tell”

Host: Pablo Torre
Guests: Katie Nolan & Michael Cruz Kayne
Date: December 5, 2024

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Episode Overview

This episode is an irreverent, clever exploration of influence, originality, legal gray areas, and the existential struggle of making content in 2024. Pablo, Katie Nolan, and Michael Cruz Kayne dive into a viral legal battle between two “clean girl” Amazon influencers suing over aesthetic plagiarism, then pivot into a wide-ranging (and anxious) discussion on AI's impact on creativity, internet culture, and society’s eroding ability to tell good from bad. Throughout, the trio’s comedic chemistry shines amid pop culture references, skepticism, and relatable modern malaise.

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Key Topics & Discussion Points

1. Dateline, True Crime, and TV Aesthetics

00:00–06:00

• Casual banter about watching Dateline, the allure of true crime TV, and the archetypes seen on these programs.

• Katie describes seeing a prosecutor on Dateline who, to her, looks halfway between Ray Romano and Dan Le Batard, sparking a string of jokes about TV personas and uncanny TV aesthetics.

  “That is Dan Leb Romano.” — Katie Nolan ([01:27])

• Discussion about the recurring characters in Dateline and 20/20, and why Dateline is deemed superior.

• Playful examination of the “clean girl” aesthetic and references to popular culture/art.

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2. The Amazon Influencer Lawsuit: Can You Copyright a Vibe?

06:00–21:01

Summary

• The Story: Pablo introduces the Verge article about Sydney Nicole Gifford (plaintiff, Minneapolis) suing Alyssa Scheel (defendant, Austin) for allegedly copying her Amazon influencer content and aesthetic—down to Instagram posts, room styling, and even a tattoo.
• Amazon Storefronts: Explaining how influencers curate and monetize lists of household products.
• Clean Girl Aesthetic: Katie defines this “slicked back bun,” “beige,” minimalist internet trend, with Pablo noting Hailey Bieber as a prominent example.
• Evidence of Copying: Plaintiffs point to mirrored posts, identical product staging, matching tattoos, and hair color changes.
• Legal Angle: Discussion bridges to copyright law—referencing the Nike “Jumpman” lawsuit, where it was ruled you can’t copyright a pose or general style, only specific creative choices.

Notable Quotes & Moments

“Can the legal system protect the vibe of a creator? And what if that vibe is basic?”
— Pablo Torre ([06:30])

“It’s weird to be like, ‘hey, someone bought the stuff I told them to buy and told other people to buy it’ — that’s success!”
— Michael Cruz Kayne ([13:03])

“How can you possibly claim to originate a style that you derived from… the larger conceit of everyone trying to be Hailey Bieber?”
— Pablo Torre ([13:27])

“It’s hard to say she stole that from me when what that is… is a blank wall.”
— Katie Nolan ([14:44])

Legal and Cultural Reflections

• Referencing Nike vs. Co Rentmeester: you can’t copyright the essence or pose—only specific choices.
• The lawsuit is about monetary loss: Gifford claims Scheel’s alleged copying siphoned her income.
• The internet incentivizes homogeneity; this is an emblematic clash of blandness and “ownership” of digital sameness.
• “You can copyright anything you want”—the trio unpacks the oddity of registering social media posts as intellectual property.
• General skepticism about the case’s chances and what it means for online creativity.

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3. Behind the Influencer Curtain: Michael’s Amazon Experience

23:39–25:48

• Michael reveals he was once an “Amazon.com host,” making goofy product videos:

  “I was professionally bad at it. Like, extremely bad at selling.”
  — Michael Cruz Kayne ([25:26])

• He emphasizes how little oversight or expectation there was, highlighting the disposable, plug-and-play nature of influencer commerce.

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4. Copyright on the Internet: “If she wins, is that bad for the internet?”

25:49–26:36

• Katie warns that if Gifford wins, it sets a precedent that could choke the remix, parody, and reuse culture central to the web.
• “The internet has always existed in this weird space… the Wild West of copyright law.” — Katie Nolan

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5. AI and Creativity: Is Ben Affleck the Prophet or the Boy Who Cried Dick Wolf?

27:01–40:17

Ben Affleck on AI (clip played at [27:38])

• Affleck argues AI will never have “taste” and can only imitate, not originate, so movie-making will resist AI longest.

• Forecasts most impact on technical roles like VFX; AI will lower costs, democratize tools, but won’t replace real art "for a meaningful period of time.”

  “A craftsman can imitate, but nothing new is created… Art is knowing when to stop.”
  — Ben Affleck ([28:53])

Hosts React

• Michael is skeptical: most audiences “don’t have taste,” so if AI can meet the bar of ‘good enough,’ economic forces will push it forward anyway.

• Katie highlights generational shifts: media is now consumed with less engagement, so “AI slop will slip under the radar” ([33:56]).

• Pablo expresses hope that awards and critical appraisal (e.g., Oscars) remain a bulwark against algorithmic mediocrity.

  “If the only guardrail is popularity… the only hope is the elites who reward movies are the only hope for saying ‘this is good.’”
  — Pablo Torre ([37:46])

• The group jests about how easily procedural TV (Law & Order, Chicago Fire) could be AI-generated, given formulaic storytelling.

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6. Modern Malaise: “Brain Rot” Chosen as Oxford English Dictionary’s Word of the Year

42:27–45:39

• The term “brain rot” describes content over-consumption and a deteriorating mental state; all three relate hard.
• Banter about dictionaries competing to name words of the year (Collins picked “brat”).
• Katie confronts her own depression about information overload and malaise, reflecting how “the way I feel is the natural way one should feel living in this world.” ([41:44])

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7. Rapid Fire Finds & Sign-Off

45:57–48:13

• Each host shares a final revelation or tongue-in-cheek observation from the show:

  • Michael: Learns the OED president has the memorable name “Casper Grathwall.”
  • Katie: Quips her antidepressant may need an adjustment.
  • Pablo: Celebrates verifying Michael’s Amazon host stint.

  "Can you put that (blood pressure monitor) in your storefront so I can find it later?"
  — Katie Nolan ([48:10])

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Notable Quotes

• On Copyright & Influence:
  "You have to get this. It says nice to see you inside." — Satirizing influencer-speak, Katie Nolan ([10:13])

• On AI and Taste:
  "Art is knowing when to stop… knowing when to stop is a very difficult thing for AI to learn." — Ben Affleck ([28:53])

• On Internet Culture:
  "The internet promised a multiplying of tastes and instead incentivized homogeneity." — Pablo Torre ([16:16])

• On Modern Despair:
  "Most days, I come to the conclusion that my depression is correct, that the way I feel is the natural way one should feel living in the current world." — Katie Nolan ([41:44])

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Timestamps for Major Segments

• 00:00–06:00: Dateline/TV banter, true crime, colorblindness
• 06:00–21:01: Amazon influencer lawsuit, “clean girl” aesthetic, copyright debate
• 23:39–25:48: Michael’s Amazon.com hosting tales
• 25:49–26:36: What happens if Gifford wins?
• 27:01–40:17: Ben Affleck’s AI comments, hosts’ reactions, existential media concerns
• 42:27–45:39: “Brain rot” and the Oxford English Dictionary’s word of the year
• 45:57–end: Show sign-off, quick hits, jokes

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Episode Tone and Takeaways

• Conversational, quick-witted, self-aware, meta, sometimes melancholy.
• At ease lampooning both influencers and themselves as media workers.
• Skeptical of both legal and technological “progress,” with a persistent thread of humor and camaraderie.
• Captures the absurdity, exhaustion, and creative anxiety of “content” life in 2024.

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This summary preserves the hosts’ playful, sardonic banter and highlights the episode’s exploration of copyright, creative boundaries, and the malaise of the modern internet era.

Transcript

[Pablo Torre]

Welcome to Pablo Torre finds out I am Pablo Torre. And today we're gonna find out what this sound is. Is Ben Affleck, the boy who cried Dick Wolf right after this ad.

[Katie Nolan]

You're listening to Giraffe Kings Network. Eric ride home. Eric rode home, told me that he loves when we're on together because it seems like the three of us, there's nowhere else we'd rather be, and that we're really enjoying ourselves. Eric Reinholm, creator of such television greatness as pti. Pardon the interruption. Around the horn.

[Pablo Torre]

Yep.

[Katie Nolan]

There's got to be another.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I love those shows.

[Katie Nolan]

Oh, yeah, yeah. Of course. Highly questionable. Oh, can I show you a picture of somebody that was on date. Oh, and this. Oh, that's right.

[Pablo Torre]

Noon.

[Katie Nolan]

I was watching Dateline last night, and I saw a guy on there, and I was like, is this thing you do that? Yeah. I mean, I'm a woman, and what.

[Pablo Torre]

Crime will I be sucked into in real life? Let's find out.

[Katie Nolan]

And I said, this is the halfway point on a spectrum where the polls are Ray Romano and Dan LeBatard.

[Pablo Torre]

Whoa. That. Okay, let's just show.

[Katie Nolan]

Exactly right. Wow.

[Pablo Torre]

Looks like the disguise that they used in Argo.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

It looks fake.

[Katie Nolan]

It does. But I was like, that is. That is Dan Leb Romano.

[Pablo Torre]

That's right.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Yeah. It looks like prosthetics, circa 2002. Who was this gentleman?

[Katie Nolan]

No idea. I barely. I was falling.

[Pablo Torre]

Romano.

[Katie Nolan]

We put this on to go to bed. And I was like, hold on, I gotta take a picture of that to show Pablo. Because I told Dan exactly what I just said to you, so.

[Pablo Torre]

Soda.

[Katie Nolan]

It might. Yeah. Who I was in bed with. Yes. Not Lebatard. Well, and he didn't react in the way I wanted. I really wanted a. Like, wow. That's exactly right. So I said, I'm gonna take a picture and show it to Pablo tomorrow.

[Pablo Torre]

I. I am here to validate. That is exactly right.

[Katie Nolan]

Thank you.

[Pablo Torre]

What was that guy?

[Katie Nolan]

I have no idea.

[Pablo Torre]

I think he was in the Dateline episode.

[Katie Nolan]

I think he was either. I think he was probably, like a prosecutor. I have no idea.

[Pablo Torre]

A safe guess.

[Katie Nolan]

I truly didn't listen.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

That feels like one of the stock car. Like, that's someone who's going to be on a Dateline episode.

[Katie Nolan]

That's right.

[Pablo Torre]

Right.

[Katie Nolan]

Prosecutor and investigator. Usually somebody who's just repeating exactly what the interviewer just said to them.

[Pablo Torre]

Dateline is incredibly popular.

[Katie Nolan]

Still much better than 2020.

[Pablo Torre]

If we're taking sides, are we ranking the true. The original True Crime podcast?

[Katie Nolan]

I mean, that's Dateline. So Dateline has a recurring cast of characters like Keith Morrison. They'll host an episode. So it'll be like Keith Morrison's episode where he'll do the VO and then he'll do, like, the interstitial shots of him walking through the crime scene, and then he'll do the sit down interview. 2020 has that recurring cast, and they just sit and do the exposition throughout the episode as if they're being interviewed. And that blurs a line for me that I'm like, you're just a reporter. Why don't you just report it instead of making it look like you're being interviewed?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

That's like a producer's choice.

[Katie Nolan]

Yeah. And I think it's a dumb choice. So that's why I'm team Dateline.

[Pablo Torre]

You know Keith Morrison's face the best.

[Katie Nolan]

You know who he's Whose uncle.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Uncle. Beautiful.

[Pablo Torre]

He looks like a guy who is also wearing, like, a Keith Morrison mask at this point, which is a compliment.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

He looks like Glenn Close. Winged Victory of Samothrace.

[Katie Nolan]

What's that second one?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

It's a.

[Pablo Torre]

It did autocomplete in my Google search.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

It's a headless piece of art. Oh, yeah, It's Nike.

[Pablo Torre]

It's the goddess Nike.

[Katie Nolan]

Oh, yeah. I knew. I know art.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Yes, I know art.

[Katie Nolan]

I know all art.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

But would you show. Just because I do feel like Glenn Close.

[Pablo Torre]

Oh, the Glenn Close. Yeah.

[Katie Nolan]

Glenn Close is right.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Right.

[Katie Nolan]

Absolutely.

[Pablo Torre]

A true close call. Right wing. Victory of Samothrace. Famous Helena stick marble statue of the Greek goddess of victory, Nike.

[Katie Nolan]

It was like a new color.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I'm actually colorblind. It's blue. I think.

[Katie Nolan]

You're colorblind for real?

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah.

[Katie Nolan]

How do you get dressed?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I mean, I'm not, like, crushing it.

[Katie Nolan]

No, no. But how do you do it?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Mostly like jeans. I'm okay. So colorblind.

[Pablo Torre]

How colorblind?

[Katie Nolan]

Here we go.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

So I can see. I can see a lot of colors. Thousands and thousands of colors. But you can see, like, millions of colors.

[Katie Nolan]

I can.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Yeah. Regular people can see millions of people.

[Katie Nolan]

Don't sound as complimentary as I can see you, Muggles.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

But I could. I can see fewer colors. So I can see a lot of. Not most colors, but.

[Katie Nolan]

What do you struggle with? Greens.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

All kinds of. Okay, okay. So like the. There's red. Back to the circles.

[Katie Nolan]

Yep.

[Pablo Torre]

Okay.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

But the other. Whatever the other thing is next.

[Katie Nolan]

Blue and then that's yellow.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Green. If you told me that was blue or purple, I wouldn't know. And yellow. Green. I wouldn't know you wouldn't know.

[Katie Nolan]

What does it look like to you, the yellow?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Like, I would just. I would say either yellow or green. Being unsure.

[Katie Nolan]

It's both. So you'd be right.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Well, great. Never mind.

[Katie Nolan]

Seem color fine to me.

[Pablo Torre]

Where does this become a problem for you?

[Katie Nolan]

Do you play video games?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

It becomes a pro. I mean, the only place it's actually a problem is when you go to museums and they have those colorblind things and they're like, look at here. Do you see the number? And I'm like, there's no number there. And my kid's like, it's an eight. Know.

[Katie Nolan]

You should stop going to museums.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

My kids are mean also. That's. Those are the two problems.

[Pablo Torre]

When would you encounter the Winged Victory of Samothrace?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Well, you'd have to be, I think, at the Louvre.

[Pablo Torre]

At the Louvre. At the Louvre, Yeah.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I feel like it does. Yeah, but I feel like, headless. I feel like if you took GL close and the texture of that part.

[Katie Nolan]

Of the blouse or whatever, saying, he's wrinkly and old.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Yeah, kind of, but like. Like chiseled wrinkles.

[Pablo Torre]

He does have interesting John Carrey in this.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Yes, for sure.

[Katie Nolan]

Little. Yes, for sure.

[Pablo Torre]

John Cary and Glenn Close.

[Katie Nolan]

Yeah, I like that.

[Pablo Torre]

He is the John Cary and Glenn Close of Ray Romano and Dan Levitar.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Yes, indeed.

[Pablo Torre]

I think we're gonna start with my topic.

[Katie Nolan]

Yes, I think we should.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

That sounds great.

[Katie Nolan]

It's a lot.

[Pablo Torre]

It's a great topic. It's a great story. I'm pretty sure neither of you read the whole thing.

[Katie Nolan]

Who could have?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I read most of the headline.

[Katie Nolan]

A very long story about a beige influencer. And I don't know what to. I couldn't get any further than I started scrolling.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

And you know the little thing on the side that tells you how far you've gone? I hardly moved when I was going, and I was like, I'm never gonna make it.

[Katie Nolan]

Once I saw how small it was, I was like, this is something Pablo can tell me.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah. The headline aforementioned is influence. It is on the Verge.com subhead One Amazon influencer makes a living posting content from her beige home. But after she. This is sounding like, like a 2020 sort of setup now, but after she noticed another account hawking the same minimal aesthetic, a rivalry spiraled into a first of its kind lawsuit. Can the legal system protect the vibe of a creator? And what if that vibe is basic? So it's a landmark case. It's a great setup. I love this story. It's. It's about. Yeah. A landmark case, seemingly, in the world of influencer intellectual, proper property plagiarism. These are two Amazon influencers to define what that is.

[Katie Nolan]

Yeah, that's just people who order off of Amazon and then tell you, this is good, this is bad.

[Pablo Torre]

So they. Yes, but also they have the ability to create a storefront. This is scare quotes.

[Katie Nolan]

Amazon storefront. I think we all know what that is.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I don't know, but I can. I feel like I'm in my bones. I figure it out.

[Katie Nolan]

If I say the links in my Amazon storefront, you can go click on, like, Katie Nolan's Amazon storefront, and it'll be like, here's the jeans she's talking about. Here's like a can opener.

[Pablo Torre]

Everybody could be Oprah with her favorite things.

[Katie Nolan]

Right.

[Pablo Torre]

But only on Amazon, on Amazon, that you get a. You get a share of, profit wise.

[Katie Nolan]

Oh, yeah, that's right.

[Pablo Torre]

If, in fact, people click on your storefront to buy it from your store.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Gotcha.

[Pablo Torre]

Okay, so this storefront operator, her name is Sydney Nicole Gifford. She's 24 years old, live in Minneapolis. She sued Alyssa scheel, who is 21 years old in Austin, Texas. What the aforementioned Sydney Nicole Gifford did was hire an attorney, send cease and desist orders to Alyssa Shiel because she claimed that Scheele had participated in, quote, willful, intentional, and purposeful infringement of her copyright. Dozens of posts across platforms like TikTok and Instagram, posts in the case of C. Nicole Gifford that look like this.

[Amazon Influencer (Sydney Nicole Gifford or Alyssa Scheel)]

My vanity was needing some organization help, so I partnered with Target to share these bathroom and storage products that work so perfectly for makeup and countertop organization. This is the prettiest trash bin, so I had to grab that. Then I found this spinning turntable, which I thought would be so perfect for some of my skin care and fragrances. Sticking with all the gold tones. I also had to get this candle for the other side. I got a vanity organizer and countertop mirror. I love how all these pieces match each other and really go with the glam room aesthetic. And everything's on my Target storefront.

[Pablo Torre]

And so the plaintiff is claiming Gifford. That's Gifford. That is Gifford. There's a pattern.

[Katie Nolan]

She's got that aesthetic that we all know.

[Pablo Torre]

There's a pattern of copying, basically days or weeks. The allegation goes after she would share photos or videos promoting an Amazon product, Shield, the defendant would share her own content doing the same thing. And this is what shield's content would look like. As an example.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Oh, my God. Can't wait.

[Amazon Influencer (Sydney Nicole Gifford or Alyssa Scheel)]

Amazon Black Friday home finds that are actually worth the money. Starting off with my personal favorite. My makeup vanity is on major deal right now. This is hands down one of my favorite items, items in my entire home. It has so much storage and it is absolutely stunning and would look great in any space. Nothing makes me happier than opening this drawer and seeing how organized it is. These organizers are truly game changing. Having a towel warmer has truly changed my life. It is truly an 11 out of 10. Next are these curtains. We have them in every single room of our house. I think they look so luxe. I just can't get over how much these make our house.

[Pablo Torre]

You're familiar with this genre though, this type of person?

[Katie Nolan]

Yes, but it's just cat. I don't mean to sidetrack. That depresses me so much because the language of it, the happiest I've ever felt is when I opened this drawer. This is the greatest thing that's ever been in my life. I have three children. This is the happiest day of my life is when this Bartesian was delivered.

[Pablo Torre]

You're saying it's a bit of a hard sell.

[Katie Nolan]

It's crazy. The fact that that works on anybody makes me feel uncomfortable to just always go, this is. Oh my God, you guys. This changed my life. This is a glasses case where I put in my glasses and inside this, it cleans is a cloth that cleans my glasses. Truly, I'm a different person having found these two together. You have to get this. It says, nice to see you inside.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I am gonna buy that now. I, I do. I understand what you're saying though. That sense of like, you two can have access to the great stream of happiness you can dip your fingers in. If only you buy these, these lux.

[Pablo Torre]

Inside of this archetype, which I was not familiar with in this specific way until this story, which is the Clean Girl.

[Katie Nolan]

You've never heard of the aesthetic of the clean?

[Pablo Torre]

You're familiar?

[Katie Nolan]

Yes. I spend a lot of time online, Pablo. It's why my mentals are the way that they are.

[Pablo Torre]

Can you explain what a clean girl is?

[Katie Nolan]

Image wise? To me, the first thing I picture is a slicked back bun or ponytail with very groomed brows and dewy looking skin and everything is very clean lines. I guess for your home it would be like all the picture frames on your house like are the same size with the same matting and they all match very few colors. Yes. A lot of beige, a lot of neutral, minimalist. Yeah, it's a current, I feel like micro trend On. On the Internet.

[Pablo Torre]

Yes. It promotes, quote, unquote, self care, comfort, and looking put together.

[Katie Nolan]

Yes.

[Pablo Torre]

The most famous clean girl, if you were wondering, is perhaps Hailey Bieber. And there are such people in the Haley Bieber coaching tree. It turns out.

[Katie Nolan]

I would have said Alex Cooper.

[Pablo Torre]

Well, okay. Yes, yes. A current practitioner, a master of the forum, perhaps. Gifford is claiming, though, in this lawsuit that in the course of 70 pages of side by side screenshots, you can clearly see that she posts stuff. And then Shield, the defendant, is copying her. And we can see a couple of. Just side by side, still frames here. Again, it's the gallery wall black photo with. With a black frame. They both have this. Yeah. This sort of looks. As we cycle through, we see yet another example. Oh, this is my favorite part.

[Katie Nolan]

What? It's a tattoo.

[Pablo Torre]

So at a certain point in the story, you realize as there's this back and forth about. No, no, no. How can I possibly be held accountable for embodying an aesthetic that is not simply Giffords to claim. You learn that Shield has gotten a flower tattoo that is disturbingly akin to Gifford's flower tattoo. Same spot on their arm.

[Katie Nolan]

Lower.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I guess. What's weird about this, just from this. From at this point in the story, what I'm thinking is Gifford's first, right?

[Pablo Torre]

Yes.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

So Gifford's like, I got this tattoo.

[Katie Nolan]

What?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I mean, first of. Of the two of them, relatively first.

[Katie Nolan]

Yes.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

She is like, buy all this stuff. And so this gal goes, okay, all this stuff. And she does it. And then she's like, hey, the stuff I bought, y' all should buy the stuff I bought. Gifford, this is a success. You did. You. You did. It influenced the thing you wanted to do. You did.

[Katie Nolan]

Right.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

It's weird to me to be like, well, hang on, someone bought the stuff that I said to buy and then told other people to buy it. That doesn't seem right.

[Pablo Torre]

So at the core of it is the question of how can you possibly claim that you are the originator of a style that you yourself have derived from this larger recurring conceit of we're all trying to be Hailey Bieber. Or it turns out in this very particular archetyp, Kim Kardashian, who turns out in a bit of a twist of the story, to be established as the actual originator of a lot of.

[Katie Nolan]

Oh. Cause her house is boring. As. Have you seen Kim Kardashian's house? I know you've.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I'm sure I have.

[Katie Nolan]

I know you've been to her house, but I've seen it When I'm there, monochromatic, very sad and cold looking.

[Pablo Torre]

Neutral is the, is the, is the term that they like to embrace.

[Katie Nolan]

Boring. It's the absence of. Of like warmth. It's the absence of anything in. Of anything kind of focally interesting.

[Pablo Torre]

So it's absence of.

[Katie Nolan]

Of taste, of a personal, of a personality. It's an absence of like my, of injecting myself into my home decor. Like, listen, you're talking to a lady who's got a blank wall because she's overwhelmed by the idea of hanging anything on it. Not because I think it's like a nice cleanest that like I know I'm no expert on this stuff but like it's hard to say like that's. She stole that from me when what that is is like a blank wall.

[Pablo Torre]

Right, Right. So what's happening?

[Katie Nolan]

Or a gallery wall. It's a very common thing.

[Pablo Torre]

Right.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

We also in our house have four pictures on a wall.

[Katie Nolan]

Watch out. Did I watch out. Now I still better have a lawyer.

[Pablo Torre]

But even if we were to grant though that they're both very, very similar to each other, the legal precedent here is interesting. It references a lawsuit that it was actually a case in which Nike. So the famous. This is sports. We're a sports show.

[Katie Nolan]

Yes.

[Pablo Torre]

The famous Jumpman logo that Nike made popular of Michael Jordan extending his arm out, legs splayed. It turns out that that was originally photographed in 1984 by this guy. And this is a strange name, but it's Co CEO Rent Meester. CO Rentmeester.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I love it.

[Katie Nolan]

I love.

[Pablo Torre]

Definitely not the name a child invents for himself when he's asked at movie theater, sir, I'm Co. What's your name? Co Rent Meester says that he photographed Michael Jordan in that pose and that Nike then reshot it with Michael Jordan and did that pose in their own advertising. This is the original Co Rent Meer.

[Katie Nolan]

The leg is bent a little more than it is in the.

[Pablo Torre]

You see the right leg being bent a pad more. And Nike of course looks like this.

[Katie Nolan]

Yes, well, yes. The leg a little straighter, the arm a little straighter.

[Pablo Torre]

Perfected in that way. Optimized in that way. You might even say the judge did rule that Nike had no liability for.

[Katie Nolan]

This because you can't.

[Pablo Torre]

What Nike won on the basis of was this court finding that the images were not substantially similar because the photographer didn't own the pose. Like, how can you possibly copyright this pose? And that only creative choices like angle of photograph and camera shutter speed could be protected, which is Interesting. But the point is, a judge gets to be an art critic. And in this case, what we're waiting on is the judge to determine is the thing that these people are making a creative decision that can be protected as. As. As precedent suggests. And all of it speaks to what the people are being incentivized to do. Like, the thing about all of this is that, and this is a recurring theme, I think, on this show, the Internet and its economy promised a great multiplying of sensibilities and tastes and different ideas, and instead, it incentivized homogeneity. And so here are people just doing what this new economy is instructing them to do and simultaneously now claiming what I am doing, though, because I am doing it. I care about this. This is me. They are claiming that this is worthy of legal protection. And this will be a landmark case if, in fact, it is ruled in favor of Gifford against Shield.

[Katie Nolan]

Now, I'm no copyright lawyer, but I don't think they'll possibly rule in favor of whatever the first lady's name was that I don't even remember.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I just can't see how you would.

[Katie Nolan]

Oh, do we have more? Because I do want something.

[Pablo Torre]

If you're in the jury pool for this, you may be lucky enough to just go to trial to see.

[Katie Nolan]

Now, see, captions are, I guess, to me, a number one indicator of if you're copying. I've seen a lot of. Not to get distracted, but I've seen a lot of this on the Internet over the last year or two of someone alleging that someone stole someone else's content. And a lot of the times the nail in the coffin for me is I'll look and be like, oh, same exact caption. They took the same exact caption of the Post and posted it on there. And they're not usually in a legal battle. It's just someone going like, hey, this girl's copying everything but this. I'm. The captions, I can't read them even with my glasses.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

The captions aren't the same.

[Katie Nolan]

They aren't the same.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

They're wearing the same sweater.

[Katie Nolan]

And it looks like. But it's a sweater from Amazon. Aren't we all wearing. But are we all wearing the same sweater?

[Pablo Torre]

But it's. It's also like phone covering the face in the same way.

[Katie Nolan]

We all do that when we take a picture of ourselves.

[Pablo Torre]

Right leg angled.

[Katie Nolan]

We all do that when we're taking a picture of ourselves.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I guess the way I feel is if you go on to Instagram right now, you will find a billion people doing this exact thing. I feel like at least the first hurdle you have to clear, and I don't think this is sufficient to win this lawsuit, but the first hurdle I would imagine you have to clear is if I didn't exist, no one else would be doing this. But in fact, if both these women were like, you know, vaporized at this exact moment, murdered two ladies, you could find two new updates that are doing.

[Katie Nolan]

This side by side. They're also not even selling the same products. This one's selling, I think the mirror, her most used object in her house. And, and that sweater, they're selling the same sweater.

[Pablo Torre]

So this is also just to be clear about how this all works is you see a photo of somebody and on these storefronts the products are basically tagged so that you can buy, you can shop below.

[Katie Nolan]

I want that sweater, I want that.

[Pablo Torre]

Mirror, I want this Chris Evans and knives out sweater. Kind of, kind of deal.

[Katie Nolan]

Table knit I think is the more cable knit.

[Pablo Torre]

It is worth pointing out here that the model in the product shot does look also like the same.

[Katie Nolan]

Is she stealing it? Is she stealing it?

[Pablo Torre]

So, so part of this is about a law, an alleged loss of income, right? So Gifford is claiming that she would post this thing, she'll very often would replicate it and she would be able to see in a data driven way the money taken out of her pocket because somebody else was allegedly doing the same thing and competing for the same exact.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

That just feels like the world, you know, I mean, I sell oranges. Wait, now you're selling oranges? What the. Dude, I sell oranges. But if there's enough oranges, the other guy's going to start selling them too.

[Pablo Torre]

Can sheer naked consumerism be an artistic creative choice to be protected legally in a world in which everybody who's a creator and influencer is also a storefront operator in which they're selling products as their actual main goal. That is the legal scholarship that we're watching develop, which people have, by the way, people have been waiting for because this is of course these complaints are, are rampant. It's not just these two people are the first to have this complaint. It's just that Gifford actually took the step of copywriting her stuff because.

[Katie Nolan]

And how. What do you mean by that?

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah, so here is. What do you mean, what do you mean by this? She registered her social media Post with the U.S. copyright Office, an unusual step according to the story not taken by most influencers.

[Katie Nolan]

You can just copyright anything you want. How much does it cost?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Question this post that you posted has you in it. So if you're not in the one that I made, then it's different. Isn't mine different?

[Pablo Torre]

This is her claiming that her hair was dyed from black to brown. Oh, my God. On September 27, 2023, and that the defendant, months later on December 2, 2023, also in her car, did the same thing.

[Katie Nolan]

Also in her car. I mean, listen, that's what a trend is like. I'm seeing a lot of blondes currently go brunette and be very dramatic about it. Side note, they're very. They're being very like, oh, my God, my hair is so dark. Which is like, yeah, right. That's what brunette is. But it's a trend. You know, a couple months ago, there was a trend of. I think it was called cowboy copper. Same thing with, like, nails. There's, like, nail trends, but it doesn't mean that you're copying as much as it means you're following what you're being literally influenced to do. So. I just have a hard time with all of this in general. Copyright law in general is very confusing to me.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I sympathize somewhat with a defendant because it's a human being. But the thing that I brought in to talk about today, which we'll get to later, is AI and the idea of, like, I don't. So I guess what I'm trying to think through in my own mind is where I draw the line, but I don't draw it here.

[Katie Nolan]

Does she claim, like, I was making hundreds of thousands of dollars? Now I'm making.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Right. She was making, like, 600 bucks a week. I'm gonna be mad that we're talking about.

[Pablo Torre]

So the proxy answer I will give is that they were both able to buy new homes as a result of their Amazon.

[Katie Nolan]

What's up with money? What's going on with money?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

How does money work?

[Pablo Torre]

Let's talk about that new beige homes.

[Katie Nolan]

Where in the markets that they're from.

[Pablo Torre]

Outside of Minneapolis and Austin, Texas.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Both lovely, lovely cities.

[Katie Nolan]

Well, Austin's sort of.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

It's changing.

[Katie Nolan]

It's different, but it's very different now. I don't think it's weird anymore.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I don't. Yeah, I just. I can't. Maybe I don't understand. I'd love to have Sydney on the pod. Sydney, if you're there, pop off in the. Pop off in the comments.

[Katie Nolan]

I'd love to have a house, actually.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

But I. I'm having trouble sympathizing with her only because it seems like what she does is very Is both easy to replicate, no offense. And the goal of her channel or whatever you call it is to get people to buy the stuff.

[Katie Nolan]

So there's also a sense of like, you know, entrepreneurship. Right. That people like to embody when they're influencers is like, I did it myself. I took my life into my own hands. And then sort of slamming the door behind you to be like, and don't you do it.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I used to be one of the hosts of I don't even know if it's a show on Amazon.com if you went to Amazon.com the website.

[Katie Nolan]

Yes.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

There'd be like a little. A little video in the corner with a fell who'd be like, you like spatulas? Guess what?

[Katie Nolan]

You did that.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I got a spatula you're going to freaking love.

[Pablo Torre]

That was you.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I did that for. I did that for a while. I don't know how long I did.

[Katie Nolan]

Good money, I paid pretty well. Or did you make money off of how many products were bought during.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I don't think anyone ever. I don't think I sold a single item. I couldn't believe that they didn't fire me because I would. They would give me.

[Pablo Torre]

Wait, you'd be like the Microsoft paperclip. But for Amazon.com where did you film it?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

There's like a studio in 34th Street.

[Katie Nolan]

Yeah.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

During COVID then they. You would film them in your house. But before that it was a Studio on 34th Street. And they would send me like a packet with, you know, all the, like this. This is what. These are the products. This is like the points about them that you should be making. And they also have stuff loaded in the prompter. And I would be like, I'm not going to read this and I'm not going to say that. And I guess they loved it. But I would be like, you know, this 20. They got 20 CD changer. And I'd be like, no one is going to buy this. So I'm on the thing saying that, like, don't, don't buy this. Don't buy this. I don't know why you would buy this. This technology won't exist in five minutes. And they loved it. I was bad. I was there all the time.

[Katie Nolan]

This is a fascinating chapter.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I really, I really like the people who work there. Yeah, they were nice people. The end.

[Pablo Torre]

Why did it end?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I. I got a different job and I. And I left.

[Katie Nolan]

You said, baby, I outgrew you.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

But I was very. Because they did not care what I said, which didn't make sense to me.

[Amazon Influencer (Sydney Nicole Gifford or Alyssa Scheel)]

Right?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

But they just let me say, whatever. It was very fun. And all the other people were like, professional hosts. Like, they were on the money. They knew the products. They could tell you the voltage of the oh, boy thing. I think at some point someone over there said they wanted somebody. Funny.

[Katie Nolan]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

So then I went and I gave a presentation on some product, and then they hired me. And then there I was.

[Katie Nolan]

Fascinating.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I was professionally bad at it. Like, extremely bad at selling.

[Katie Nolan]

I'm gonna find the old.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah, we gotta find.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I think go to YouTube or something.

[Pablo Torre]

You know what I mean?

[Katie Nolan]

Maybe you had a big fan who just.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I might have a super fan who clipped it all.

[Katie Nolan]

That's what I've found. Anytime I need something from my archive, there's. I have a big fan who has it saved somewhere.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

He's got it.

[Katie Nolan]

I also think that if this lady does end up winning this lawsuit.

[Pablo Torre]

Right.

[Katie Nolan]

I don't think that's good for the Internet. I mean, the Internet has always kind of existed in this weird space where you sort of are taking and recreating or taking and spinning forward or taking and elaborating or parodying. It's all kind of in this. And it's always been a weird place with copyright law, if I'm remembering correctly, where it's like kind of the Wild west of the law has had to evolve all of how it works.

[Pablo Torre]

Yes. Like, even just, like, copying tweets.

[Katie Nolan]

Right. I don't think the world is better if only one lady can advertise being basic good news.

[Pablo Torre]

Is that Alyssa Shield, who is the defendant.

[Katie Nolan]

Right.

[Pablo Torre]

Whose name perhaps you were searching for. She has decided to pivot to a new aesthetic.

[Katie Nolan]

Well, that's usually an indication of guilt, I feel.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

She's hosting a podcast called Alyssa Shield Finds out.

[Katie Nolan]

Oh, no.

[Pablo Torre]

Michael.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Yes.

[Pablo Torre]

It's your turn on the main stage.

[Katie Nolan]

Oh, Michael, it's your turn on the main stage.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I don't have, like, an article behind this. This is just like, a video that I saw.

[Katie Nolan]

Right.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

But anyway, I saw on the Internet, Ben Affleck articulating what the future of AI will hold for, like, filmmakers, etc. And it sparked a lot of thoughts among me and my fellow artists. Roll the clip. Can I do that? No, I don't have the power. I thought I had it.

[Katie Nolan]

And you might know. Here, look at that.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

How do you see it? I mean, is it a benefit or.

[Pablo Torre]

Is it a real threat? Is it possible that a Netflix could say, you know, we're going to do our own.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Excuse me, James. Bond thing out there with a bunch of actors that are completely recreated for.

[Pablo Torre]

This market or that market.

[Ben Affleck]

A, that's not possible now. B, will it be possible in the future? Highly unlikely. C movies will be one of the last things if everything gets replaced, to be replaced by AI. AI can write you excellent imitative, imitative verse that sounds Elizabethan. It cannot write you Shakespeare. The function of having two actors or three or four actors in a room and the taste to discern and construct that is something that currently entirely eludes AI's capability and I think will for a meaningful period of time. What AI is going to do is going to disintermediate the more laborious, less creative and you know, more costly aspects of filmmaking. That will allow costs to be brought down, that will be lower the barrier to entry, that will allow more voices to be heard. That will make it easier to. For the people who want to make Good Will Hunting to go out and make it look. AI is a craftsman at best. Craftsmen can learn to make stickly furniture by sitting down next to somebody and seeing what their technique is and imitating. That's how large video models, large language models basically work. A library of vectors of meaning and transformers that interpret it in context. Right. But they're just cross pollinating things that exist. Nothing new is created.

[Pablo Torre]

Not yet. Not yet.

[Ben Affleck]

Yeah, not yet. And really in order to do that look craftsman is knowing how to work. Art is knowing when to stop. And I think knowing when to stop is going to be a very difficult thing for AI to learn because it's taste and also lack of consistency, lack of controls, lack of quality. AI for this world of generative video is going to do key things more. I wouldn't like to be in the visual effects business. They're in trouble because what costs a lot of money is now going to cost a lot less. And it's going to hammer that space. And it already is eventually. My hope for AI is that it's an additional revenue stream that can replace DVD which took 15 to 20% out of the economy of filmmaking, which is. And there should be negotiated rights and digital rights say if you want to. Because what do people want to make 5 minute, 30 second TikTok videos where they look like the Avengers?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Well, great.

[Ben Affleck]

You can, you know, just like you used to be able to buy your Iron man costume at the store, you're going to buy your Iron man pack and you and your buddies are going to look like Iron man and Hawkeye, like you know, on Twitch. That's, that's what's going to really happen.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Most of the comments, like, once you see the video once on Twitter or whatever, then it starts feeding you, quote, tweets of the same thing. Uniformly. Pretty much the comments are, ben Affleck is brilliant. And this is like, you know, he's really articulated what's going to happen. I feel so much better about AI but I don't feel. When I watch this, I'm like, dude, what are you. I love Ben Affleck. Let me just. At the base of this, I love Ben Affleck. I think he's handsome. I think he's talented. I think he's smart. I think he's so wrong about this.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah. A lot of the responses when I first saw this, Ben Affleck, shockingly smart, a prophet of. Of the way media is going to go. And you are actually saying all that.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

First of all, Benefic knows more about the movie industry and films than I will ever know. But he. The thing he says AI can't have is taste. And I think that also, most people don't have taste. Yes, most people don't know the difference between a good joke and a great joke. Yes, most people don't. I'm in comedy, so I. I know those things. I can't tell the difference between, you know, a. A house that's been painted well and a house that's been painted exceptionally well. Because I don't know about that. When people watch TV shows, you can lower the bar quite far and they'll still go, this show is awesome. This is my favorite show. And A.I. i believe, can get to that level.

[Katie Nolan]

I agree with you.

[Pablo Torre]

What you're saying is that in a world where standard of success is just popularity, that what he is saying will not happen, has already happened, and it will happen more because the guardrail on popularity is not quality.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Yes, exactly. And I'm not even. Not necessarily popularity, but only. Only important in so much as that correlates with where the money goes.

[Pablo Torre]

Exactly.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I mean, like, in order to make a living in this industry, I fear that AI will make that incredibly hard to do in the near future because people who pay money to have things made are very incentivized to make that happen. If I could press a button or with a prompt, write a movie that's going to save me $200 million, I'll spend $199 million trying to make that. That's what worries me.

[Pablo Torre]

The thing that's happening now, though, is that whenever I see AI and it seems like it's discernible and obvious. AI generated. It feels like an indictment of AI.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Yes, totally. Totally true.

[Pablo Torre]

So right now it feels like to be AI is to indicate that you are getting like, subprime, like, poorly made work. It feels like. My hope is that AI becomes stigmatized to the point where it comes associated with bad things. And what you are indicating, which I find very hard to disagree with, is that our ability to discern bad from good is actually less relevant to whether something will succeed as a commodity.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I worry that that's. That that's the case. I think that idea that, like all AI does is imitate whatever you know, it can't create anything brand new. The whole. What we've been talking about with Burfany and the other one is that really everything is imitated. Almost everything you do for your entire life is an imitation of something you already saw. And a computer will be able to imitate more. Integrate and imitate more things.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I don't hold myself like, so special that a computer couldn't eventually do what I don't think a computer would come up with. Burphany. But I think other than that, I'm replicable.

[Katie Nolan]

I also think that, like, we. The shortening of the attention span is discounted in the way that Ben speaks about. Mr. Affleck speaks about it.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Thank you.

[Katie Nolan]

In that, like, he is thinking about it from an actor's point of view. And when he watches a movie or Shakespeare and two actors creating this, I think like a lot of media being consumed now is almost like a second screen consumption. And I don't think that people are paying as much like discerning attention to what they're consuming. And that's obviously not the ideal. And an ideal situation. You're putting your phone down, you're watching a movie. I think younger generations were seeing less and less willing or capable of doing that. And so I think like, AI Slop can slip in under the radar a lot more easily. I also will say when people say Ben Affleck sounds smart. We've had Ben Affleck sounds smart a lot of times. He. Remember when he was on Bill Maher and everybody was like, what?

[Pablo Torre]

Right, right.

[Ben Affleck]

You're not listening to what we are saying. You guys are saying if you want to be liberals, believe in liberal principles. Right. Freedom of speech, like, you know, we're are endowed by our forefathers with an alien. All men are created. No, Ben, we have to be able.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

To criticize bad ideas. And of course we do.

[Ben Affleck]

No, liberal doesn't want you to.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Is the motherload of bad ideas.

[Ben Affleck]

Jesus.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

So we have, we have ideas like, like blasphemy.

[Pablo Torre]

It is.

[Ben Affleck]

It's an ugly apostasy.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Or how about the more than a.

[Ben Affleck]

Billion people aren't fanatical who don't punish women, who just want to go to the store.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

The things. But you're saying all mus.

[Ben Affleck]

And you're painting a. The whole group religion with that.

[Katie Nolan]

Ben Affleck, when he's doing well, is a. A great mind and a great talent. And I wish that he would get his together. I wish he would figure out what's going on with him. Ben Affleck, he would, you know, better.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I don't know. I don't know about that. I don't know what you're talking about and I don't want to.

[Pablo Torre]

An eagle back tattoo in the.

[Katie Nolan]

I always forget.

[Pablo Torre]

And a philosopher in the street.

[Katie Nolan]

Yes, exactly.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Do you guys remember when he made the movie the Town? You know, have you seen the movie the Town?

[Katie Nolan]

Yes.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Have I talked about this on this podcast before? I'm having deja vu.

[Pablo Torre]

I don't think so.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Okay. Well, the Town's so good.

[Katie Nolan]

Yeah.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

When I saw the Town, this is my first thought, My first thought after the Town, I turned to my wife.

[Katie Nolan]

And I said, let's rob Fenway Park.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I said, ben Affleck's gonna be president of the United States.

[Katie Nolan]

He's very smart.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

That's how I felt. Very talented. I really do love him. I just think he's wrong. I think he's maybe insulated from these fears because of his stature in the industry.

[Pablo Torre]

Right. As a guy who worked inside of a pop up window on Amazon.com what you're saying.

[Katie Nolan]

I found his perspective interesting. I just think he's so. He seemed very sure of the fact that AI was coming for everyone around him's job, but couldn't do what he does. And I think that's always a tough perspective to sell anybody because to me I'm like, if it's. It's going to be able to do everybody. Like he said, it's coming for the CGI people.

[Pablo Torre]

Yes.

[Katie Nolan]

But it cannot.

[Pablo Torre]

We've conceded that the CGI people are definitely screwed.

[Katie Nolan]

Right. And I just think, I just think that attitude has never historically panned out where you're like, yeah, it's coming for everybody else. It will not come for me. It can't do what I do. I think like, I think he's right in the sense of like the art of acting at its highest form. But I also think to what you were Saying is that, like, the average person cannot tell the difference between incredible acting and fine acting or, like, decent acting or, like, barely. You can tell when it's bad acting most of the time. Well, I don't think most people are like, wow.

[Pablo Torre]

Like, so I was thinking about this the other day, actually, as somebody who tries to make things that are good first and foremost, as my main standard of success, is really good. Yeah. And you're wondering, do I think this podcast right now is good? It's a real, it's a real, it's a real concern of mine. But what I'm saying is that I. This is where I'm like, where are the guardrails?

[Katie Nolan]

Yeah.

[Pablo Torre]

If it's an open field in which it's just sheer popularity and the money follows the Amazon storefront, you know, revenues. What I'm hoping for is like, truly, I thought this. I'm so glad the Academy Awards exist. I'm so glad that there are things, institutions that signal, in a very obvious way, reward this. It's good. There's a critical appraisal behind this which leads me into this incredibly unpopular position of awards shows being the thing that'll save us. The elites who reward movies that I very seldom think are the best are the only hope we have for signaling in a market way, this is worthy of your eyeballs. Because everything else is just left for, again, an open, boundless focus group in which people are, like, clicking on stuff.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Yeah. But I, I, I, I hope that you're right about that. But I think the enemy to that is, you know, some studio making a film with AI and then paying Alana, whatever the first woman's name is, to make a, to make a video saying how good. How good that movie is. Do you know what I mean?

[Pablo Torre]

Right.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

So once you've got once Kim Kardashian and Gwyneth Paltrow and some third person say this movie's good because they've been paid X dollars to say it. Joe Blow is not going to care what, you know, the Hollywood elite that haven't been paid have to say against it. Do you understand what I'm saying?

[Pablo Torre]

Well, the question is, like, can AI plausibly write an episode of, like, Law and Order? Can it write an episode of Chicago Fire?

[Katie Nolan]

Yes, I feel like, for sure, easily. Yes.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I would be surprised if right now it can.

[Katie Nolan]

Truly, I'd be surprised if right now it isn't.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Which isn't to say it's going to write good episodes of it. But I don't think most people who watch Those shows, because those are procedural. So it's like. It's pretty much the same kind, right?

[Katie Nolan]

Yeah. Yeah.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

So, you know, we change the name.

[Katie Nolan]

We change the job, but you're interviewing the guy, the guy that saw the suspect the night before, the guy that saw the victim. Then you're moving to the. That part of it, the investigation. Then you move to the interrogation part, then you're moving to the court part.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

And then it's over and again. Is it going to write episodes as good as the professional writers who are writing those episodes right now are writing them? No. But will the net gain of profit to the company making those be enhanced by scrapping all those people and making a slightly worse show?

[Pablo Torre]

Is Ben Affleck, the Boy who Cried Dick Wolf.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Holy moly.

[Katie Nolan]

My goodness, I hated that. Can I be honest? I hated this. How is anyone not depressed? Every day I sort of come to this conclusion where I'm like, is this your topic? I think so. Again, I know this is a symptom of my depression, but most days I come to the conclusion that my depression is correct, that the way that I feel is the natural way that one should feel living in the current world that we live in. Maybe given what I'm trying to do with my life, maybe that's what is influencing it. But the more I look at, like, oh, so the website that I used to go to to hear people's opinions that I value is now mostly bots and other content machines trying to get eyeballs on the most offensive or polarizing topics. Misinformation and people being paid to do things, but not disclosing that they're being paid to do things. All of that has kind of, like, muddied the waters in a way that's very difficult for me to just go like, oh, everything's fine. This is fine and good. This is fine and good. And we're going in a. In a direction I feel is a good one.

[Pablo Torre]

Have you considered buying the mirror in Burphany's Amazon storefront?

[Katie Nolan]

It's in my cart currently. She said it changed her life.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

It's on your storefront and I can.

[Katie Nolan]

Buy it, and I'm hoping. And you can buy that from me. I'll take a picture in it and post that, and you can buy it.

[Pablo Torre]

As long as you don't show your face.

[Katie Nolan]

Not trying to make an ad for depression. I just don't feel like, how does everybody not also have it?

[Pablo Torre]

So the reason I know you're not alone is because there is a topic in our Portfolio of topics that we could have selected on today's show that does fit entirely with this.

[Katie Nolan]

Which is it? Because that's the one I picked.

[Pablo Torre]

Yep, I picked that one though.

[Katie Nolan]

I picked that one.

[Pablo Torre]

It's that the Oxford English Dictionary has selected its word of the year. It's word of the year. This is a thing that all dictionaries do because dictionaries are brands too. And the Oxford English Dictionary's word of the year is brain rot. And of course, in the two words.

[Katie Nolan]

Famously in the phrase of the year.

[Pablo Torre]

I guess challenging literal dictionary.

[Katie Nolan]

Is it hyphenated?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Jeff? Oxford.

[Pablo Torre]

It is not hyphenated.

[Katie Nolan]

So two words.

[Pablo Torre]

It is brain rot though. And if you're wondering the other words of the year that of course have.

[Katie Nolan]

Been selected, Gaslighting, I believe was last year or two years before.

[Pablo Torre]

There's always a thematic summary of sorts.

[Katie Nolan]

You guys see that?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

See what I did?

[Katie Nolan]

You guys see that?

[Pablo Torre]

I'm sad I not good enough at hosting.

[Katie Nolan]

No, you were busy. You were.

[Pablo Torre]

I was trying to scan a QR code to access the full version of the Washington Post story, which is owned by the company that Michael Cruz Cain used to host a show inside of a pop up window for.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

That's right. And I think I go.

[Katie Nolan]

You go, no, it's. Did you guys know the aliens were supposed to come today? Did anyone see that?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I'm so glad I didn't keep going.

[Pablo Torre]

I know.

[Katie Nolan]

Dan said December 3rd they said the aliens were coming.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Who's they?

[Pablo Torre]

Who is.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

No clue.

[Katie Nolan]

And it's coming from Dan too, which.

[Pablo Torre]

Is like the guy who thought that vase and V were two separate sorts.

[Katie Nolan]

Of pottery guy who sent me a. An Instagram video clearly AI of a cabin with snow falling and cartoons and was like, we should go here. And I was like, damn, that's not real. Not a real place. That's very fake.

[Pablo Torre]

Yep, yep. Y.

[Katie Nolan]

But anyway, he said the al that they are saying the aliens are supposed to come today. So I said, I'll be on the roof with the sign that says take me.

[Pablo Torre]

Oh, yeah, yeah. Got an ID4. Hold on.

[Katie Nolan]

Yeah, we were doing something.

[Pablo Torre]

Aliens.

[Katie Nolan]

No, no, stick to the other thing you were googling.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

This year you're in a Google. You've googled. You've googled yourself into a pretzel.

[Pablo Torre]

The Oxford English Dictionary chose brain rot, a term that describes the over consumption of material or content to the point that it deteriorates one's mental state. Katie Nolan is the picture, it turns out next to the word brain rot.

[Katie Nolan]

Yeah.

[Pablo Torre]

In the OED Thanks. First used in 1854. Walden nailed it. You knew that?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I knew that just from laughing about this already.

[Pablo Torre]

Oh.

[Katie Nolan]

I was like, wait, really?

[Pablo Torre]

How dare you prep for this show?

[Katie Nolan]

Oh my God. I was so impressed.

[Pablo Torre]

How dare you prepare for this show.

[Katie Nolan]

It's my article. And I was still impressed that you knew it.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah. So there are these like. I love that every dictionary, a dictionary organization, what it's called in the Washington Post. I love that they all have these councils, like a hall of fame, like voting committee that decides what's the word of the year. And Casper Grathwall.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Hell yeah. Is that one of the influencers? That's one of the women.

[Pablo Torre]

Casper Grathwell, also in his homeowner era, president of the Oxford Languages, said that brain rot speaks to one of the perceived dangers of virtual life and how we are using our free time like a rightful next chapter in the cultural conversation about humanity and technology. Contrary to contrary. Casper Grathwall Collins dictionary named as its word of the year. Brat.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

That feels right that Oxford and Caspar Grathwald would say brain rot. And Collins, which is a dictionary that sounds kind of lo fi. Would be like our words boobs, y'.

[Pablo Torre]

All. At the end of every episode of Pablo, Tori finds out a show about finding.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

We're already at the end.

[Pablo Torre]

It's only six hours Katie hates. Which is we say what we found out. So, Michael, let's start with you to give Katie a little bit of time.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Because I've got something at the ready. I would say I found out that the fellow who runs the Oxford English Dictionary is named and I believe I'm getting this right. Ding dong. Primple pants.

[Katie Nolan]

Primple pants.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Something like that. And I was surprised. I was surprised by that.

[Katie Nolan]

Yeah.

[Pablo Torre]

Yep, yep, yep, yep.

[Katie Nolan]

It's misinformation. You're actively participating in the misinformation that's making me feel like I'm dying. Actively.

[Pablo Torre]

How dare you slander addiction.

[Katie Nolan]

How dare you.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

What? Can you say his real name again?

[Pablo Torre]

His name is Casper.

[Katie Nolan]

Oh, sorry. Different name.

[Pablo Torre]

Grathwall.

[Katie Nolan]

We've had some all time names here today.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Casper Grathwall.

[Pablo Torre]

Casper Grathwall.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

That's. Well, that's what I learned today. Casper Grathwell.

[Pablo Torre]

Yep. Okay.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I'm not gonna forget it now. I would have forgotten it before, but now I'm not gonna forget it.

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah, he's up there with Burphany and the names you'll never forget. Katie Nolan.

[Katie Nolan]

What did I learn? The Wellbutrin's not doing it. That maybe I need more mgs you know, that's.

[Pablo Torre]

I think what I learned today, Doctor, is in the comments. Yeah, sound off, sound off.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Pop off in the comments safely, if you're a doctor.

[Pablo Torre]

What I found out is that on this show we can actually validate Michael Cruz Cain's finest career credit.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

Okay, let's see. It's squeezing, it's taking my blood pressure. It's got a bunch of numbers on there that I personally don't know the meaning of. 98, that's a number. You guys have heard of that one? 111, also 115. I'm supposed to be selling this. So far this checks out. These are all real numbers.

[Katie Nolan]

Good.

[Michael Cruz Cain]

And now he. Everything you could possibly know about my blood pressure. Let's see. Hypertension, stage one and stage two. So if you don't see me when we come back, it's because I'm at the hospital or on the Internet Googling what those things mean. I'm hopeful that putting this on my wrist is why it gave me that reading, but honestly, I might have a real problem live on camera for you, America and the world to watch.

[Katie Nolan]

Is it not supposed to go on the wrist?

[Michael Cruz Cain]

I don't. I have no idea, no idea where it's going.

[Pablo Torre]

You don't know how to use the Omron evolve without a second d. Bluetooth blood pressure monitor.

[Katie Nolan]

Can you put that in your storefront so I can find it later?

[Pablo Torre]

Yeah, I also just placed a bet and it sounds like Michael. Yeah, take the under. I guess this has been Pablo Torre Finds Out a Meadowlark Media Production and I'll talk to you next time, Sam.