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- [00:00]
Joseph
Yubikeys by Yubico are the original Passkeys, small, sturdy and easy to use physical security keys that prevent phishing attacks and account takeovers. Unlike basic Multi Factor Authentication or MFA methods such as text message, one time passcodes or mobile authenticator apps, Yubikeys provide modern MFA and are a proven security solution that cannot be hacked or bypassed by malicious actors. They safeguard against AI powered cyber attacks, online identity scams, fraud and account takeovers. Yubikeys help businesses of all sizes stay ahead of evolving cyber threats and regulatory requirements. They also protect individuals and everyday users by securing over a thousand accounts including email, social, password, managers, productivity tools, developer tools and more. For more information on how Yubikeys secure applications, services and accounts for both individuals and businesses, visit yubico.com 404 Media and for a limited time get $10 off your order of exactly two keys from the Yubikey 5 Series or Security Key Series using the code 404 Media 10 at checkout. Yubikeys are manufactured by Yubico, a company with headquarters and manufacturing centers in Sweden and the United States.
- [01:16]
Jason Kebler
Hello and welcome to the 404 Media podcast where we bring you unparalleled access, hidden worlds, Both Online and IR. 404 Media is a journalist founded company and needs your support. To subscribe, go to 404 Media Co as well as bonus content every single week. Subscribers also get access to additional episodes where we respond to their best comments. Gain access to that content at 404 Media co. I'm your host Joseph and with me are the 404 Media co founders Sam Cole. Hey Emmanuel Mayberg.
- [01:47]
Emmanuel Mayberg
Hello.
- [01:48]
Jason Kebler
And Jason Kebler.
- [01:50]
Joseph
It's sad to do this virtually.
- [01:52]
Jason Kebler
Yes, because of course last week we had our second anniversary party in New York where we, well, drank and then also recorded a live podcast. I can't even remember what we spoke about. I think it was mostly Q and A. But yeah, it is way easier to do it in person than it is virtually because there's ever so slightly a delay whenever you do it like this. Jason, what did we talk about in New York? It was questions mostly.
- [02:27]
Joseph
We answered questions. We put questions in a jar or people wrote questions in a jar and we pulled them out and we read them and it was really fun. Went really well. It will be out on the feed in two days so you can listen to it if you weren't there.
- [02:41]
Jason Kebler
Yeah, sounds good. Sam, what did you make of the party? As the person who, thank God, organized the vast, vast majority of it?
- [02:52]
Sam Cole
I had A blast. Yeah, I think listen to the podcast when it comes out on the feed if you were not able to get into the room because the room itself was so full that people got pushed out of it entirely. But, yeah, it was a really good time. It was great to see everybody. So cool to hear so many people listen to the podcast. I always am really excited to hear that. So thank you. And hello again.
- [03:17]
Joseph
First ever tech blog podcast, Mosh Pit.
- [03:21]
Sam Cole
True. Jason crowd surfed a little bit. It was good.
- [03:28]
Jason Kebler
All I can remember is the question about what statue you would be or something. And I'm not going to spoil the answer, but that's the only one I can remember because I answered it and then Sam immediately took the piss out of my answer.
- [03:40]
Sam Cole
You and Emmanuel both. I want to change my answer, though, to the Carlos Atticus laptop statue that just got revealed. He's holding a laptop as a saint. It's a statue that's dedicated to him.
- [03:51]
Emmanuel Mayberg
That's beautiful.
- [03:51]
Sam Cole
That's my new answer.
- [03:53]
Jason Kebler
All right, well, you'll see the episode on your feeds soon and you can listen to the whole podcast and the whole event then. As for this week, Emmanuel, do you want to introduce this first story?
- [04:07]
Emmanuel Mayberg
Yeah, I'm taking over. The first story is from Joe. The headline is Inside the underground trade of Flipper zero tech to break into cars lot. Going on there. Let's get into it. The story starts with a description of a video you saw. Tell me about this video.
- [04:31]
Jason Kebler
Yeah, so it's first person perspective, as in, clearly this person is holding a mobile phone, I believe, in their left hand and then this small white and orange gadget in their right. And it has a little screen, it has a few buttons like a D pad. And I think some other stuff on the side has some sort of short antenna sticking off as well. And this person walks up to a nearby car, it just looks like some sort of normal sedan vehicle tries to open the door and it's locked. They then push some buttons on this little gadget, try to open the car door again, and lo and behold, it now opens. Of course, this is a demonstration of the tech that we're talking about here. And you may think, well, we've seen car unlocking tech before. What's new about that? And that's totally right. And we will get into that. But it's really about the specific attack involved here. The gadget itself, which we'll definitely talk about and sort of the proliferation or distribution of this tool, which is if it falls into the wrong hands, it really is threatening to sort of supercharge car thefts around the US Which I don't like to do a prediction and a. I really tried not to. It was more. The people I spoke to were predicting that would happen. But the writing's on the wall.
- [06:04]
Emmanuel Mayberg
So let's talk about the gadget. What is he holding in his hand? What is this Flipper Zero?
- [06:10]
Jason Kebler
So the Flipper Zero is a pretty well known or maybe infamous piece of hacking gear. Now it came out a few years ago, started on Kickstarter, raised about 5 million, something like that. And the attraction was that it's basically a Swiss army knife for hackers. So you can imagine physical penetration testers. These are people who, well, we need to check the physical security of a data center, let's say. So we have to keep people out and make sure they can't put USB keys in here and plug malware in the data center, whatever. Or corporations as well, banks, all sorts of stuff require physical security and digital security at the same time. A lot of that involves cloning keycards, like RFID keycards, or playing around with nfc, that protocol as well. And what you used to have to do was buy all of these different hacking tools, like I've had ones which can clone keycards, that sort of thing. But the Flipper Zero was bringing all of those into this one thing you could just carry in your pockets. You could do those sorts of attacks. You could also do wifi deauthentication attacks, which if anyone has been to especially defcon or maybe CCC in Germany. You've probably seen this where you keep getting kicked off the WI fi or you can't connect to the WI fi because some person is messing around and performing a WI fi attack. This gadget can do that as well. So it can do basically, well, not everything, but a lot of the things a legitimate security researcher or penetration tester would want to do if they're on a deployment. So it launched on Kickstarter, raised all this money, and now, I mean, it is in mass production. You can go to the Flipper Zero website and you order one of these gadgets, I think for a couple of hundred bucks you get it in the mail. And it's also been demonized over the past few years because it does crop up into the news every so often, sometimes legitimately, sometimes in a way that, well, it didn't really deserve to be pulled into it, into whatever story. But here, this story really is about the Flipper Zero because it is so.
- [08:25]
Emmanuel Mayberg
Accessible, it is demonized. But can we just spend like A second. Talking about Flipper zero's own branding and image. Like it is fairly like a feel good, positive, I don't know if you'd call it white hat. We covered it a lot because I think it launched when we were at Motherboard and would come up and like these kind of fun blogs that people were doing like fairly innocent cool things with it. Is it fair to say that like their own image that they put out there is fairly. I don't know. Pausey.
- [09:00]
Jason Kebler
Yeah, absolutely. And I think they're very, very smart to do that.
- [09:02]
Emmanuel Mayberg
The mascot is like this cute dolphin, right?
- [09:05]
Jason Kebler
Yeah, I'm looking at it right now and on the, because on the device itself it has this little screen and you can see the dolphin and it like almost talks to you. It looks like a Tamagotchi, like a pretty high res Tamagotchi in a way. The marketing, cutesy. It's fun, it's experimental, it's playful. And that all makes sense because the Flipper Zero and the community around it can be all of those things often is all of those things often is playful. It is about experimenting. And that is the hacker ethos at the end of the day, right. For a hell of a lot of people it's that, hey, we just want to figure out how stuff works. We want to have fun, but we also want to keep stuff secure. And that's why it's a legitimate security tool. They probably, it would probably be a very bad idea if they had dark grizzly hacker hoodie marketing, which ironically, some of the custom software we'll talk about in a bit actually does have that marketing as well. But yeah, it's a legitimate security tool, but a dual use security tool.
- [10:08]
Emmanuel Mayberg
So what's different about this implementation of Flipper zero? It's the software, right?
- [10:14]
Jason Kebler
Yeah, the software and the firmware as well. Firmware just being basically a piece of software that acts a little bit lower down in the stack of applications, operating system, blah blah, blah, all of that sort of thing. So the Flipper zero is powerful, as I laid out. It can do all of these sorts of attacks. But some people want it to be able to do more. They want to really screw around with people. So some have made their own customers firmware for the Flipper Zero. And one I looked at in particular was called Unleashed. And this just allows more types of attacks and RFID attacks and all of that sort of thing. So people, because you can basically fully customize the Flipper Zero and that is part of the appeal, people have made their much more powerful firmware and then you can get more patches on, on top of that as well to do very specific things, I'd say.
- [11:15]
Emmanuel Mayberg
So how does this specific attack work and how does it compare to some of the other high tech carjacking or not carjacking, car stealing methods that we've seen in the past couple of years?
- [11:29]
Jason Kebler
Yeah. So as well as the custom firmware people are making these, I mean I call them patches in the article, I guess you could call it software, you could call it tweaks, you know, scripts, it doesn't super matter. But when you have this custom firmware, you then make and install and use these custom patches. And what I was shown is that there are a bunch of them going around which are specifically to unlock and interact with particular vehicles. So you know, I was sent one for the Kia, I was sent one for the Suzuki. And to step back a little bit, car theft is obviously a problem. On the lower end of the spectrum you have people like the Kia boys, which maybe we'll go into more detail later, but there's this phenomenon, it's on TikTok, people steal cars, they drive them around Milwaukee. I think primarily just that's where the phenomenon started. And they will smash a window, go in, steal the vehicle because there's very poor security inside the vehicle itself. Okay, halfway in between, maybe over halfway, you have people using techie gadgets to break into cars. And then in the same sort of area or a little bit further, I think you have people starting to use these flipper zeros. So usually if you're a tech focused car thief, you'll do something called a relay attack, which is, let's say you want to steal a very nice looking car that sat on a driveway but the key fob and the owner is in their house. Well, you use a couple of devices to basically extend the range of that key fob that sat in a fruit bowl on their kitchen counter or something which usually can't reach the car. But now you're using these couple of devices to relay that signal over to the car. You activate it, you can get in the car and drive away. And this has been a huge problem in the uk. UK police will upload photos of this happening caught on ring cameras or cctv. In the US it's done as well, I imagine Europe, but I can't remember off the top of my head if I've seen a case from Europe, but that's what usually happens. And in response, or perhaps in parallel, a lot of car manufacturers introduced something else called rolling codes. Which is, well, even if someone gets the signal and tries to use it to open the car or whatever, we're going to change the code every single time. So they can't just, you know, relay the signal, they get into the car or whatever. It's supposed to be a protection for that.
- [14:10]
Joseph
This is very similar to how tickets work now. Like, when we're talking about like, like barcodes to get into concerts. It used to be that there was just like one barcode, and then both Ticketmaster and AXS went into something where the Barcode refreshes every 10 seconds.
- [14:28]
Jason Kebler
Right.
- [14:29]
Joseph
And I feel like it's a very similar technology. Possibly we don't need to get into it, but it's very similar because, like, people figured out how to crack that and then basically they were like, oh, we need to like, change this constantly.
- [14:41]
Jason Kebler
Yes. So, yes, because you bring that up, that they did crack it, because that's exactly what's happened with cars as well, in that the people I spoke to, a couple of hackers, they say they've been able to essentially reverse engineer how those rolling codes work by a lot of development, a lot of reverse engineering, and apparently buying source code related to particular vehicles as well. And what the Flipper zero custom patches are able to do is basically figure out what the next code is going to be. So they push that and it's like, oh, even though the code has changed, this device knows what it is in advance. And that's sort of what makes us different to previous attacks. Emmanuel, to finally answer your question, after several minutes of me going down that rabbit hole.
- [15:25]
Emmanuel Mayberg
Yeah, I don't know if you know, but shouldn't the rolling code problem you just described be solved by now? Like, isn't there, like, common forms of encryption and like, randomly generating numbers that should not allow them to, like, reverse engineer what the next code is? Like, are they using really old software to do this?
- [15:48]
Jason Kebler
You would think that, and I often think that sort of car manufacturer security is similar, almost like industrial control systems or airplanes sometimes, where they just use these very antiquated ways of going about things. And the actual patches I was sent again, the Kia and the Suzuki, which are not luxury vehicles, obviously. I've spoken to people who've sold tech to break into luxury vehicles specifically. If you go through those scripts and other screenshots I was sent, it actually shows there was no encryption on those. So of course it varies from car model to car brand to manufacturer, manufacturer or whatever. But the hackers who go by Daniel and Darrow, they have this PDF which is a couple of pages, but it has like 200 different models of vehicle and maybe a dozen or so brands overall. You know, not just the Kia's and the Suzuki's, but I think there's Ford on there. Fiat as well. I'm bringing up now Skoda, Citroen, Peugeot, Mitsubishi, Honda is in development. So whereas the Kia boys were obviously targeting Kias and I think Hyundai is as well because the security was crap, this seems to be a potentially bigger issue because it's unlocking all of these other cars which have presumably better security.
- [17:18]
Emmanuel Mayberg
One of your sources mentioned the Kia boys as well. Why is that?
- [17:23]
Jason Kebler
So my source, one of the people I spoke to who's sort of in this community and they were the one that was actually reverse engineering some of these patches, they mentioned the Kia boys because they think that eventually they will become flipper boys again. Kia boys, they break into Kias and Hyundai's railroad. Low tech. For a long time you've been able to get phone unlock, sorry, not phone unlocking, car unlocking technology, but it's been pretty expensive. You try to go buy one of these online and if you don't get scammed, which I think could be a big thing, it's going to cost you potentially thousands of euros or dollars to buy a device like this, like a code grabber or a relay attack tool or something like that. What the Flipper Zero potentially could do here is that, well, it's just 200 bucks. So somebody with not as much money to spend but who still wants to mess around with cars like the Kia boys could potentially get a Flipper Zero and mess around with it that way. And I should just say that Straight Arrow News covered this particular attack before they tested it out and they verified it worked on a vehicle, which is very interesting. And that made my job a little bit easier with this article. But this was focused much more on the trade, which is that you go to Daniel or Darrow, the two hackers who are selling this tech. One for Flipper Zero, one for a Raspberry PI and you have to pay them between 600 and $1,000. So still an investment. People I spoke to, that software's leaking out, they're reverse engineering it so you don't have to pay the money anymore. And there's this looming threat, well, maybe it's going to leak and it was sent to me. So clearly it is leaking. I'm not going to post it online. So then everybody can just unlock cars. That would be an insane thing for a journalist to do. But I wouldn't be surprised if this trickles out very, very soon. And that is why it could apply to communities like the Kia Boys, for example, because they might get hold of it eventually.
- [19:27]
Emmanuel Mayberg
Yeah, it's like, in case it wasn't clear at the moment, the software is fairly exclusive, both in the price and just like who has access to it. But it's software. It is not hard to imagine that it leaks and becomes more widespread. Finally, you mentioned that Flipper Zero, for good reason, I think is, let's say, aggressive in explaining what its technology does and defending its brand. So I'm not super surprised about their reaction to the article, but I thought the article was very clear and very fair about what the Flipper zero's role in it is. And yet they had like a pretty wild response to the article. You want to talk about that?
- [20:19]
Jason Kebler
Yeah. So initially when I'm reporting and writing the article, I ask Flipper Zero for comment. I actually explained to them in my email saying because I wanted to make it clear to them I'm not a random journalist covering this. I've been covering hacking and cybersecurity for like 10 years. And I said, I understand that this tool, this is not what the Flipper Zero is designed for. It's for legitimate security researchers. I already know all of that context. So basically as a wink, wink to them, you don't need to patronize me by telling me that sort of thing. They then gave a very, very thoughtful statement which reiterated, yes, it's a dual use technology, it's used by security researchers. But they very rightfully said that this is much more about the car manufacturers and their poor security. And I totally agree with that. We publish a story, a few outlets, aggregate it, Gizmodo and that sort of thing, other sort of technology websites that would cover a sort of car hacking thing. And then Flip zero comes out, which with a pretty. Well, I mean, you said it's expected. I guess I'll say unusual blog post. And they have the headline, can Flipper zero really steal your car Spoiler? No, it can't. And then they do like a mocking tweet. The media is talking about how Flipper zero is on the dark web can break into like really sarcastic and over.
- [21:45]
Emmanuel Mayberg
And there's an image of their, you know, mascot dolphin pulling a hacker in a Guy Fawkes mask out of the garbage. And I was like, is that Joe? Is that Joe supposed to be in an image? But no, I guess it's like the hacker and there's people in cars around it looking angry. Yeah, just.
- [22:07]
Jason Kebler
But then. Yeah, so there's the sarcasm and, like, the defensiveness, which is okay. I don't know. Thought the article was pretty fair. I thought your statement was great. And then they go through some technical stuff, which they say it relates to certain vulnerabilities. But my understanding is that it relates to. Actually to a different. It relates to the rolling codes. And they don't seem to fully understand it relates to rolling codes, essentially, without getting too technical. So I don't know. It seems very defensive about it. And again, I kind of get why the Canadian government tried to ban Flipper Zeros before. They've had to deal with some very, very crazy stuff. But, hey, this is a legitimate concern now because criminal hackers are making this for the Flipper Zero. And I'm afraid that's just a fact.
- [22:51]
Joseph
Yeah, I wanted to talk about this because, I don't know, I just think about this stuff a lot. Like, I really, really think about how our work is perceived and also how we are in this mess. This mess being like, total collapse of trust in the media and that sort of thing. And it's stuff like this. It's like, this is a really bad blog post by them. It's very damaging because they're a very popular product, as we've just discussed. And there are a lot of people who have no idea how journalism works. They have no idea how the information ecosystem works, et cetera. And this blog post is very much in the vein of fake news. This has nothing to do with us. This is totally wrong. And that, like, you multiply that across, like, the entire, like, every politician's been doing this for many years. Lots of. Lots of companies have been doing this for years. Like, anytime that there's any sort of, like, negative coverage of anything there, the sort of gut reaction is like, this isn't our fault. This is like journalists sensationalizing something. And it's like, this was a very thoughtful article that was very clear about the issue. It's a very serious issue. And it's like, I think Flipper Zero is very cool. Like, I. I have long thought that this is a very cool company. I've long thought that this is, like, a very cool device that's being used for, like, really interesting security research. I still believe that. But it is, like, really disappointing to see a response like this because the response is one that is like, it's just not in good faith. It's like, not. It's not a good response. And it's very disappointing. Like, I think it's fucked up. And I don't know, like, maybe I'll see Flipper Zero representative at some hacking conference at some point and they'll be like, why did you say something mean on the podcast? But it's like, this is super damaging. Like, it's really damaging to trust in journalism, to trust in, in this sort of thing. And I understand that there are politicians who like, blow stuff out of proportion and that are trying to ban them and that, like, they really want to make sure that their product is seen as something that is like a force of good and a force of research and a force of, like, STEM tools and teaching kids about stuff like this. And it's like, yes, these car manufacturers used bad security for their, their key fobs, like, a long time ago, but this is like a factual article that describes something that is happening. You can't just like, stick your fingers in your ears and close your eyes and be like, blah, blah, blah. This is old. This is not happening because it is happening. It's. It's a really disappointing response.
- [25:44]
Jason Kebler
Yeah, I agree. Especially as you say, they are a legitimate actor in this space and they do really good stuff. Then to have a response that isn't as good faith kind of just undermines all.
- [25:55]
Emmanuel Mayberg
Before we move on.
- [25:58]
Jason Kebler
To tease it.
- [25:58]
Emmanuel Mayberg
Somewhat, our next story is about nostalgia. And when I think about the Flipper Zero, I always think about this Casio watch that I just posted in Slack. Did you guys have this? Did you have a naughty kid at school that ever used one of these?
- [26:15]
Joseph
The calculator watch. The calculator watch.
- [26:18]
Emmanuel Mayberg
No, not the calculator. It's like, it can copy the, whatever, the RF signal of a remote.
- [26:24]
Joseph
Oh, it's the TV remote watch.
- [26:26]
Emmanuel Mayberg
Yeah, so there was always a kid in class who could like, turn off the TV if we were watching something, or like, turn off the air conditioner. I always, it's kind of like always reminds me of the Flipper Zero. It's a proto Flipper Zero.
- [26:38]
Jason Kebler
Yeah, definitely the same sort of vibe. We should all get these. Just wear them, they're cool. Well, since you teased the article, Emmanuel, I'll just take you to the next one. When we do come back, it is about nostalgia, specifically the 80s and of course, AI slob. We'll be right back after this.
- [27:08]
Joseph
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- [30:51]
Jason Kebler
All right, and we are back. This is one that Jason wrote and I believe with Matthew Golt as well. Yes. I opened the link to check that the headline is 80s nostalgia AI slob is boomifying the masses for a past that never existed.
- [31:07]
Joseph
So Jason, Stranger Things ass videos. AI videos, right.
- [31:14]
Jason Kebler
What is the latest AI slop then? What is this meta that we're seeing now?
- [31:19]
Joseph
It's interesting because these are not new. Like people have been making these for a few years. It's just that they've caught on recently because, I don't know, they've hit, they've hit the algo in a certain way. But basically it's like imagine you're watching Stranger Things or the Goonies or something like this. It's like very prototypical, like 80s TV show slash movies, like teen, Teen After School Special vibes. And so they start basically with like, have you heard what's going on in 2025? Like, they have. They're always scrolling through their phones and they have this thing called Instagram and it makes people upset. And they're like, wouldn't you love to go back to 1985, you know, where we drink Coca Cola and have a nice time out of glass bottles and I don't know, it's just like, it's nostalgia porn. It's like you can imagine it. Maybe we'll play a little clip here. You made it back. How's 2025? I heard no one talks face to face anymore. And everything's lived through something called social media. I heard people don't even know their neighbors anymore. They don't knock on doors. They just talk through something called Instagram.
- [32:31]
Jason Kebler
What the hell is Instagram?
- [32:33]
Joseph
Heard in the future. No one even goes outside anymore. Everyone just stares at screens all day. But these are going wildly viral and they're just like really annoying and really upsetting. And they're, they're, they're a type of AI slop that is super. Just like, it seems innocuous on its face, but it is something where it like imagines this false past that didn't actually exist. I was born in the 80s, but I don't remember them because I was born at the end of the 80s. But as I understand, like the 80s sucked ass. It's like mortgage rates were like 1 million percent, unemployment was like 25%. You know, there, there was various. It was not like a good time there. There's all sorts of like. It was also as many periods in American history are, was like not the most progressive of era eras for like cultural things. It was the era of Reagan. It just like was not like a good time. But like these AI slob videos sanitize all of that and they just remind you, like, don't you want to live in, in the Goonies and Back to the Future and things like that? And they're not like hiding that they're AI in any way, shape or form. So these are not like, I don't think that they're tricking people. I think that people understand that this is not deliberately. Well, you know, I think that people understand like, oh, this is like a fantasy type vibe. But it's like, I think I describe it as like astral projecting to just like a shitty past that never existed. And it's, it's kind of like emblematic of the type of AI sloth that we're starting to see go viral where it's like not intended to trick people, but it's just like allowing people to live in a fantasy world that lets them kind of like ignore the. All of the decisions that have led to the current situation that we're in. And then also it's like we laugh. We laugh and we laugh and we laugh and we laugh at Mark Zuckerberg's shitty Horizon Worlds metaverse that no one uses and that no one goes into, and where people don't really have good legs and where they spent billions and billions of dollars. And it's like, yes, like, let's laugh at that. It's very stupid. But like, what we're seeing is that you don't need the headset and you don't need the metaverse to allow people to transport themselves into this like, nostalgia reality. That's very similar to the stupid, not very good book Ready Player One. Even worse film, I feel that's just like full of references. It's just like, here's a reference to a bunch of old shit and it's like 1 million views. It's not cool. I don't like it.
- [35:30]
Jason Kebler
So let me read out this quote and then Sam, let me throw to you because I feel like you were one of the first ones out of us to see these. But the quote is from the article that Jason and Matthew wrote. These videos, like a lot of AI Slop, do not try to hide that they are AI generated and show that there is unfortunately a market for people endlessly scrolling social media media looking to astral project themselves into a hallucinatory past that never existed. This is Mark Zuckerberg's fucked up metaverse. Living here and now on Mark Zuckerberg's AI Slop app. I know you touched on that. I think you just put it very, very well. Sam, how did you first see these and what was your reaction to them?
- [36:10]
Sam Cole
I mean, I think I saw them like everybody else did, which was in my algorithm. And I didn't really think much of it when I first saw it. I was like, oh, that's more bait. Basically, it's just like engagement bait from AI Slop creators, which Jason has covered quite a bit of. There's like a bunch of other versions too. There's like a 90s one that I've seen. There's several versions of the 80s ones. There's. Wasn't there like a 2003 one, which I think is super funny because like, I do recall 2003 and it wasn't that cute.
- [36:52]
Jason Kebler
What were they showing?
- [36:53]
Sam Cole
Like they were like the game we're playing Game Boy sitting in the living room and the movies are on in the background of the TV.
- [37:01]
Jason Kebler
It's just, who was playing a Game Boy in 2003?
- [37:04]
Joseph
Dude, they're starting to do them. They're starting to make them for the pandemic they're making. They're like, remember 2020 when you logged on with your boys to Warzone and.
- [37:12]
Jason Kebler
It'S like, hell yeah, Animal Crossing time.
- [37:14]
Sam Cole
And like, Joseph, remember yesterday?
- [37:16]
Joseph
Yeah, yeah. Remember yesterday when things were so simple?
- [37:20]
Sam Cole
Yes, actually, yeah. I mean, yeah. Let alone the 80s being like the height of the AIDS epidemic. Let's ignore that, I guess. And also like Challenger and Chernobyl happened. The 80s were.
- [37:34]
Joseph
I don't know.
- [37:35]
Sam Cole
I know what my parents were up to in the 80s and it wasn't like sipping soda pop at the sock hop. Like, it was not wholesome.
- [37:42]
Joseph
Have any of you seen Heavy Metal Parking Lot?
- [37:45]
Emmanuel Mayberg
No, I have. I. That's what I thought when I saw the videos. Like, that is the genre that it's trying to AI generate.
- [37:51]
Sam Cole
What is that?
- [37:53]
Joseph
Heavy Metal Parking Lot is. I believe they're outside of a Pantera show, possibly at RFK or. No, I think it's RFK Stadium or it's like the Capitol center in Maryland. And literally it's a documentary. It's basically like they're making TikToks. But in 1980, there's that one.
- [38:14]
Emmanuel Mayberg
There was like high school in the 90s and there's like, like 711 in the 80s. They're all the same genre.
- [38:23]
Joseph
Yeah, they're just talking to drunk people in a parking lot before a metal show and everyone's like, has mullets and is wearing like jean jackets and going like woo. Like a lot. It's very good. Watch. But that's the. It's this. As Emmanuel just said, it's. This is it. This is it.
- [38:43]
Emmanuel Mayberg
I'm gonna, I'm gonna attempt to give a voice to Matthew Galt, who co wrote this piece because I talk to him about this all the time and I feel like this is his perspective and it's one that I agree with. And that is that part of what is alarming about the virality of these is that they are not clearly right wing coded. But nostalgia is inherently a regressive desire that we express because it is literally about looking to the past and saying things used to be better rather than looking forward and accepting change and trying to make that change better. Right. It's like. And again, I don't think this is embedded clearly in the videos, but like Make America Great again is a nostalgic movement and statement. And I think that is always what is kind of toxic about this. Looking back and romanticizing the past.
- [39:52]
Jason Kebler
Well, at the same time that these are going viral, or rather these are going Viral now on TikTok or whatever. These AI generated ones, I don't know over the last couple months. If you care to log on to Twitter X, you'll have some right wing grifter account post a video being like, remember what they took away from you. They being, I don't know, the left or black people or something. I'm not entirely sure who they're railing against.
- [40:21]
Joseph
Immigrants. There's a lot, there's a lot of that now like straight up, straight up where they're like, look at the. Here's a chart of like immigration and here's a chart of like something else and like crime or something. And they'll be like, look, look at this.
- [40:35]
Jason Kebler
So they have that and then they've been making videos like this, which I can't remember if they're AI generated or not, but it would just be a white blonde woman sat on a car drinking some soda or Something like that. And there's obviously a connection between those coming from right wing grifters and then people making this connection. AI slop, which is going viral. Which just brings me to another question, Jason. Do we know who's making this AI slop? Because you've looked a lot into who makes this and often it's young men in India who are doing it to make money in game meta's platforms. Do we know who's making this yet or not?
- [41:15]
Joseph
Well, so that's what I was going to say. It's like the people who are consuming it are not boomers. They're like gen. Like, we make fun of boomers for getting tricked by AI or whatever. And it's like, this is Gen X Elder millennials. And they're like, remember when we used to play outside and know our neighbors and stuff? And it's like the people who are consuming this could easily get to know their neighbors. They could become like a force for good in the community. They could talk to each other and, like, have a nice time. But instead they're like. Many people are like, posting on Nextdoor about how, like, the kids are being too loud and they're calling into their city council meetings and they're like, making it harder for, like, people to play pickleball at the, at the park or whatever. So there's that, but then there's the fact that the people who are making this are one. We don't know everyone who's making it, but I found one account that had, I think 800,000 followers on Instagram, and it does only this. And it is a guy. It is a digital nomad who's in his 20s who lives in Bali, and his entire thing is, I'm trying to become a billionaire. It's like, these people don't give a. Of course they don't give a. I'm on all of these discords where this stuff is made and people are like, this is popular now. Here's how you make it, here's how you script it. Like, people are eating it up. Let's make it and let's put it out there. It's like there's not even. It's just so cynical. It's so. It's without any sort of like, political. It has a political undertone to it. But like, the people who are making it are making it because it performs and because they saw one thing that performed and they're like, I'm going to make 40,000 of these. Now.
- [42:56]
Jason Kebler
For those who may be new to the AI, Slot phenomenon. I'm sure people have seen it and we've obviously spoken about it on the pod before, but quite a long time ago at this point. Just could you explain that dynamic a little bit more in that there's a meta almost like a video game where oh, this is the thing that's really strong on the algorithm. Now what are just some other examples of what's been in the meta before?
- [43:19]
Joseph
I mean, well, Jesus is always in there.
- [43:21]
Jason Kebler
Like a reliable choice.
- [43:23]
Joseph
Religious content is a very reliable choice. Another thing that's done that doesn't necessarily require.
- [43:30]
Jason Kebler
And supported by subscribers. If you do wish to subscribe to 404 Media and direct.
- [43:38]
Joseph
Them on your.
- [43:38]
Jason Kebler
Own, you'll get unlimited access to our articles and an ad free version of this podcast. You also get to a lot of like.
- [43:47]
Joseph
People will like this podcast, just maybe Kaleidoscope like video games.
- [43:51]
Jason Kebler
Another way to is by leaving a five star rating. That stuff really does help us out.
- [43:57]
Joseph
Am I the asshole for content?
- [43:59]
Jason Kebler
We'll see you again next week.
- [44:01]
Joseph
Have seen a lot of just like really bizarre like horror stuff, like grotesque things. It grabs your monsters, jump scares like things like that that are AI generated. There's a lot of like, you know, spongebob content, a lot of Mickey Mouse content, a lot of like we've talked about it before, but a lot of like basketball players like LeBron James, Steph Curry, AI generated and put in like weird situations. And like this is just sort of the latest one. And you know, a lot, a lot of times it's like it's someone who, who has a lot of accounts and posts a lot of stuff and they see which performs and then they make more of it. And then when other people in this space see that stuff performing well, they hop on that same bandwagon and then the platform gets flooded with just like tons and tons of either images or videos that are very similar and at some point there's diminishing returns because something else becomes popular and so they, they pivot off of it to the, to the next thing. So it's, you know, meta just basically means like this is the strategy of the moment and we'll, we'll pivot off of it when things don't work. And the way that they make money is if you go viral, you often get like a fraction of ad revenue if you're on YouTube or you get paid out through these like bonus programs on TikTok and on Instagram where it's like, it's basically the same thing. You, it is a portion of ad revenue, but they don't call it that. But you basically get paid by view and by engagement and it can add up to very real money.
- [45:44]
Jason Kebler
Yeah, I guess we're going to see what the next meta is going to be. I'm not going to make any predictions. Who knows at this point? We'll leave that there. But if you're listening to the free version of the podcast on Nowplay us out. But if you are a 404Media subscriber, a paying one that is, we're going to talk about how Citizen, the crime awareness app is pushing alerts written by AI basically with no human oversight, which is not good. You can subscribe and gain access to that content at 404 Media cat. As a reminder, 404 Media is journalist founded and supported by subscribers. If you do wish to subscribe to 404 Media and directly support our work, please go to 404 Media co. You'll get unlimited access to our articles and an ad free version of this podcast. You'll also get to listen to the Subscribers only section where we talk about a bonus story each week. This podcast is made in partnership with Kaleidoscope. Another way to support us is by leaving a five star rating and review for the podcast. That stuff really does help us out. This has been 404 Media. We'll see you again next week.