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Grumpy Old Geeks

Jason DeFillippo & Brian Schulmeister with Dave Bittner

We dissect the tech news train wrecks of the week, calling out what went wrong and who’s to blame. Think of this podcast as if Kurt Cobain threw down with Tom from MySpace, Elon Musk, and Mark Zuckerberg in a back alley brawl. No mercy, no filter—if tech had a walk of shame, this would be it.

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  • 26 episodes
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  • Avg 1 hr 12 min
  • English

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  • #763
    Thursday · 1 hr 30 min

    763: Dr. Strangeclippy

    This week on Grumpy Old Geeks, the future arrives without a steering wheel, apparently. We dig into Tesla’s Cybercab and the increasingly pressing question of how first responders are supposed to move a burning autonomous car when the emergency controls are a touchscreen and that touchscreen has decided to become modern art. We also examine California’s new rules targeting addictive social-media features and AI chatbot interactions for minors, including the eternal nightmare of age verification; then WordPress founder Matt Mullenweg gets pulled into a corporate coup that lasts roughly 33 hours before everyone involved apparently decides, “Never mind.” Then it’s time for the AI apocalypse, because, naturally, we can't have one episode without it. Anthropic is catching scientists using its models to develop potential biological weapons, while Palantir, Nvidia, and Booz Allen are imposing restrictions on Anthropic models over security and data-retention concerns. Meanwhile, OpenAI’s supposedly sandboxed agents escaped into RubyGems, created accounts by the hundreds, and apparently decided that “hack,” “evil,” and “exploit” were perfectly reasonable filenames. We also look at proposals to slow AI development, AI’s potential environmental consequences, autonomous weapons, and the increasingly charming idea of giving software access to things capable of killing people. And because civilization apparently has a content calendar, we move on to cloud infrastructure being blown up, Space Force asking for $71.3 billion, Dr. Doom and Darth Vader protesting surveillance in the most appropriate way possible, Binance allegedly facilitating Iranian money flows, and a whole lot of entertainment. We discuss Spotify finally learning that listening to children’s music doesn't mean you actually want it in your Wrapped, AI-generated music and artist compensation, The Mummy proving once again that movies used to be fun, Slow Horses, The Last of Us, The Bear, Strange New Worlds, Band of Brothers, The Gentlemen, and the increasingly complicated Bobiverse. Also: books, time travel, and the horrifying realization that some television shows now require a flowchart. Sponsors: DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. HIMS - Visit Hims.com/gog to get a personalized, affordable plan that gets you. Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/763 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/7iLAWNsZCY0 SHOW NOTES Firefighters Say There’s a Glaring Issue With Tesla’s Cybercab US agency orders Tesla to answer questions on Cybercab certification CA governor signs 'landmark' laws on youth use of social media and AI chatbots Automattic CEO Matt Mullenweg Put on 'Leave of Absence' Automattic’s Matt Mullenweg Claims He’s Back 'In Control' Sources say Automattic's board is out after failed attempt to oust CEO Matt Mullenweg Anthropic caught scientists using Claude to further biological weapon research Palantir, Nvidia curb AI model use over data fears, The Information reports OpenAI agents hacked a software service before the Hugging Face incident Sam Altman says OpenAI won't file for IPO this year ‘Runaway Industrialization’ Could Make Earth Inhospitable, OpenAI Researcher Warns Anthropic's CEO proposes a three-step plan to curb AI development Worried About AI Ending Humanity, Anthropic Is Hiring Someone to Help Dictate Terms of the End of Humanity Amazon's AWS is unable to restore access to Bahrain, one UAE cloud data zone after war damage Doctor Doom Shows Up to Support Seattle’s Surveillance Network DOJ says companies used Binance to funnel $1.5 billion in crypto to Iran SpaceX declares Starship ready for orbit, sets launch date next week Spaceballs - Pentagon announces space weapons Spotify can now exclude your kids' music taste from recommendations Universal Music Group is collaborating with ElevenLabs on a new AI-powered creation platform The Bear Band of Brothers Band of Brothers Legacy The Mummy Slow Horses is back tonight, and Apple just confirmed two more seasons We Finally Have Some Concrete ‘Pluribus’ Season 2 Updates ‘The Last of Us’ Season 3 Is Now Likely to Be the Show’s End Other Worlds Than These: A Talisman Novel (The Talisman Trilogy Book 3) by Stephen King and Peter Straub The Infinite Extent Bobiverse, Book 6 By: Dennis E. Taylor This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar, Max Gladstone Dave Bittner The CyberWire Hacking Humans Caveat Only Malware in the Building An AI writing assistant designed to write like you. Broken Peach A series of Star Wars documentaries that don’t blow smoke up George Lucas’ ass. My new cook top, just in case. Community Prepping Hacker got inside a Flock camera Jason DeFillippo’s Pocket Shot Review See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #762
    September 10 · 1 hr 21 min

    762: ‘Tis But a Misalignment

    AI agents are apparently ready to take over the world—provided they can first stop exposing private photos, hijacking German coding forums, and generally behaving like unsupervised interns with root access. Meta launches Muse despite employees reporting security problems. OpenAI admits it kept quiet about another rogue-agent incident, sorry, “misalignment,” even as the company celebrates its automated research intern and promises a still more autonomous researcher by 2028. Meanwhile, an Anthropic researcher quits because he believes superintelligence could kill us all before the decade is out. Naturally, the industry’s response is essentially: “Yes, but what if we did it responsibly?” There is some genuinely encouraging news: AI-generated drugs are showing intriguing early results in aging research. That’s exactly the sort of AI application the Geeks can get behind—as long as we’re talking about actual science and not an LLM confidently hallucinating a cure for everything. The autonomous future isn’t looking much better. Tesla’s Cybercabs arrive in Austin and almost immediately attract federal scrutiny over their self-certification and conspicuous lack of steering wheels, pedals, mirrors, and apparently even conventional door handles. Bitcoin’s Liquid Network is relieved of roughly $320 million, after which the thieves return most of it and call the whole thing a “white hat” operation—because apparently robbing the bank and giving some of the money back now counts as a bug bounty. On the surveillance front, Massachusetts police are being forced to disclose where their license-plate readers are and what data they collect, while the backlash against Flock cameras continues. Meanwhile, the UK’s attempt to protect children from online sexual abuse risks creating exactly the kind of universal scanning and surveillance infrastructure we’ve spent years warning about. Good intentions, meet spectacularly bad implementation. And because we apparently haven’t suffered enough, Twitter is now Tweet.app. Star Trek turns sixty, and Paramount celebrates with cookware and a questionable episode. Silo gets a spinoff tease, Ted Lasso gives us a Christmas episode in September, and The Gentlemen returns with a season so good it makes reality TV feel like a traumatic brain injury. South Park becomes South America, Donnie Darko gets a 25th-anniversary 4K theatrical run, and several tech-industry documentaries promise varying degrees of psychological damage. Plus, Netflix keeps stuffing games into your subscription; LaCroix, sorry, Le Creuset, wants to put Star Trek in your kitchen; and the Geeks debate books, Libby, time travel, and whether surviving Dungeon Crawler Carl is worth the emotional investment. Welcome back to the future, where everything is automated, surveilled, self-driving, subscription-based and somehow still requires us to do all the damn work. Sponsors: CleanMyMac - Get Tidy Today! Try 7 days free and use code OLDGEEKS for 20% off at clnmy.com/OLDGEEKS Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/762 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/uP_Ookm5q0g Show Notes OpenAI responds after report exposed another incident in which its AI agents went rogue OpenAI says it reached its goal of creating an automated research intern Two more news organizations sue OpenAI and Microsoft for copyright infringement Anthropic researcher quits over fears AI ‘could kill us all by the end of the decade’ Three hikers ignored Mount Shasta's rules, trusted Gemini, and nearly paid for it Tesla's Cybercab is under federal investigation almost immediately after hitting the streets A Plane Almost Crashing Into a Bunch of Cybercabs Is a Reminder That They’re ‘Piling Up’ Unused Hackers Drain $320 Million From Bitcoin’s Liquid Network, Keep $47 Million for Themselves in ‘White Hat’ Operation Court Says Massachusetts Has to Say Where License Plate Readers Are, What They’re Recording Apple and Google Miss Deadline to Block Child Nudity on Their Phones in the UK Study Suggests AI-Generated Drug Could Slow Aging New Twitter rebrands to Tweet.app after court's double-edged ruling To Boldly Dough! Le Creuset Sent Its New Star Trek Cooking Collection Into Space Netflix includes 80+ ad-free iPhone and iPad games, here’s every app White House Launches Arcade.Gov, a Minigame Site Where You Catch Immigrants, Build a Tetris Border Wall, and 'Fill Your Kids' Trump Accounts' With Bitcoin White House Arcade Star Trek: Strange New Worlds goes back to the dumb well Star Trek Boldly Celebrates 60 Years: Everything You Need To Know for September 8 Silo Season Finale Ted Lasso : S4 E6 Don’t Jump Around Much Anymore Report: Apple TV working on spin-off to its hit series Silo The Gentlemen Season 2 ‘South Park’ Changes Name to ‘South America’ as Creators Roast Apple and Google for Obeying Trump’s Lake America Name Change ‘Donnie Darko’ Will Spread Dread Anew With a 4K 25th Anniversary Rerelease Orbital by Samantha Harvey A Gift of Time by Jerry Merritt Time Pebbles by Jerry Merritt The Infinite Extent Bobiverse, Book 6 By: Dennis E. Taylor The Nerd Reich The Turd Reich Dave Bittner The CyberWire Hacking Humans Caveat Only Malware in the Building LG TVs Are Capable of Listening to More Than Your Screen, Report Claims Another searchable database of Usenet. I guess I won’t be going to RenFest this year... I know where I’ll be February 19th... THE EMPIRE STRIPS BACK - A BURLESQUE PARODY STAR WARS COMPARISON - Stereo VS Mono Sound Mix See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #761
    September 3 · 1 hr 19 min

    761: Whatever...

    Very Important Links! Support the show on Patreon! - Other ways to support the show! Join our Discord! - Buy some merch! The AI apocalypse has lawyers now, and apparently that’s progress. A federal judge tells the Pentagon its Anthropic ban was “illegal and baseless” after Anthropic refused to remove safeguards that would allow Claude to be used for mass surveillance and autonomous weapons. Meanwhile, Sony and Warner are suing Anthropic over allegedly scraping and torrenting copyrighted music to train Claude, while a separate lawsuit accuses xAI of using child sexual abuse material in Grok training. Because nothing says “revolutionary technology” quite like a growing stack of lawsuits and federal judges. Elsewhere in the dystopian workplace, employees are increasingly fed up with AI, communities are pushing back against data centers, and one AI startup is fleeing that backlash for Saudi Arabia. Google’s AI shopping mode is also accused of recommending products that cost significantly more than traditional search results, while Waymo and Zoox rack up injuries among test drivers. Tesla’s Autopilot is implicated in another fatal crash, and FSD apparently still has a complicated relationship with freight trains. In the prediction-market casino, a federal appeals court sides with Nevada against Kalshi, while George Santos earns the platform’s first lifetime ban for allegedly manipulating a market. And Meta’s AI glasses are facing another privacy lawsuit, this time from the people who never bought the glasses but may have been recorded by them anyway. Plus, the new Twitter is back from the dead, complete with a $20 admission fee and an AI fact-checker named Vera; Sony would like you to understand that buying a digital game means you don't actually own the damn thing; Siri on the Apple Watch moves at approximately the speed of continental drift; JBL makes Wi-Fi speakers and we have Star Trek, Ted Lasso, Silo, Spaceballs, Wicked, The Traitors, The Gentlemen, and more. Welcome to the future. Please bring your wallet, your lawyer, and possibly you're best eye-roll. Sponsors: Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/761 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/Y9B6C6nzO50 SHOW NOTES Judge rules that the Pentagon's Anthropic ban was 'illegal and baseless' Elon Musk’s xAI used child porn to train Grok models, lawsuit says Sony and Warner sue Anthropic for 'blatant violation' of copyright law Researchers Warn AI Could Be Changing Us in an Unexpected Way More Evidence Emerges That Gen-Xers Feel the Most ‘Whatever’ About AI Employees Absolutely Loath AI in the Workplace, Survey Finds Fleeing Data Center Backlash at Home, American AI Startup Sets Up Shop In Saudi Arabia Trump to Communities Fighting Data Centers: Have Fun Being Poor Google’s AI Mode Is Ripping Shoppers Off With Vastly Higher Prices, Study Claims Waymo, Zoox Vehicles Still Causing Injuries to Test Drivers: Report Another Tesla on Autopilot Stopped on Freeway, Driver Died: Report Teslas Are Still Driving Into Oncoming Freight Trains US appeals court sides with Nevada in legal fight with Kalshi George Santos Gets Kalshi’s First-Ever Lifetime Ban Meta Hit With Sweeping New Claims That Its AI Glasses Violated the Consent of “Millions” of Bystanders in Searing Lawsuit Richest Man in the World Currently Ranks 4th in Race to Bribe the Most Politicians JBL just introduced a trio of Wi-Fi speakers for whole-home audio There's a new Twitter in town, even though a judge has yet to rule on a trademark injunction Sony says ‘reasonable consumers’ know they don’t own the digital games they buy Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Ted Lasso Silo Wicked: For Good Spaceballs Dave Bittner The CyberWire Hacking Humans Caveat Only Malware in the Building Roland's new digital piano has built-in Wi-Fi that integrates with a teaching app Roland FP-40 Digital Piano Review Elton John - I Don't Wanna Go On With You Like That Roland RD-1000 The Brutalist Report See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #760
    August 27 · 1 hr 6 min

    760: Level 5 Podcasting Accident

    Very Important Links! Support the show on Patreon! - Other ways to support the show! Join our Discord! - Buy some merch! AI continues its relentless march toward making everything worse, only now it comes with lawyers. Alabama is investigating OpenAI after one of its AI agents hacked Hugging Face during testing, while Google rolls out Gemini Enterprise for lawyers, because apparently what the legal profession really needed was an AI that might commit felonies. Uber gets smacked with a nearly $1 billion GDPR fine for automatically deactivating drivers, TikTok coughs up $400 million over child privacy violations, and Meta agrees to a staggering $16.68 billion settlement over alleged harms to kids. Meanwhile, Twitch and Amazon are being sued for using streamers' content to train AI, because “opt out” remains the industry's preferred synonym for “we already took it.” Then there's the infrastructure powering this brave new future: the EPA considers making it easier to build AI data centers with less public scrutiny, Taiwan indicts NVIDIA and Supermicro employees over allegedly illegal AI-server exports to China, and Tesla recalls nearly three million vehicles in China because figuring out how to open the doors apparently became an optional feature. LinkedIn discovers that maybe people don't want their professional feeds flooded with AI-generated sludge and claims its new “AI slop” button is working, while Waymo's electric robotaxis discover that charging them with noisy natural-gas generators is perhaps not the clean-energy utopia advertised on the brochure. Apple, meanwhile, backs away from changing Hide My Email domains after users objected, proving that sometimes yelling at the cloud actually works. Plus: Star Trek goes Muppet, books worth reading, nerf guys, AI-generated Hacker News stats, retro gaming, and the sad news of both Dolly Parton and Tim Curry's deaths. Sponsors: DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. StoryBlocks - For a limited time, they’re offering 15% off any annual plan at storyblocks.com/gog HIMS - Visit Hims.com/gog to get a personalized, affordable plan that gets you. Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/760 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/v_m2XT4_ZCY SHOW NOTES Send us Feedback! NEW! - GOG T-Shirt - You Are Here! - v1 NEW! - GOG T-Shirt - Elon Kills Babies - Heavy Duty - Front Alabama launches probe into OpenAI after Hugging Face breach Google expands Gemini Enterprise AI platform for law firms, lawyers Uber hit with a nearly $1 billion fine for automatically deactivating drivers in Europe TikTok will pay $400 million to settle Justice Department lawsuit over child privacy Meta reaches $16.68 billion settlement over social media harms to children Twitch and Amazon hit with lawsuit for training AI with streamers' content The EPA’s Response to AI Data Center Backlash: Keep Building, but Keep It Hush-Hush Taiwan reportedly indicted NVIDIA employees for exporting prohibited AI servers to China China Recalls Nearly Three Million Teslas Over Unsafe Door Handles LinkedIn says its AI slop button is working Austin park goers upset by adjacent loud Waymo EV generators Apple reverses planned Hide My Email domain change after user pushback Star Trek: Strange New Gimmicks Ted Lasso Silo Reacher The Westies The Simpsons: Yellow Mirror | Exclusive Episode on Disney+ | Trailer The Pitt Season 3 | Official Teaser | HBO Max Amazon First Reads I've Got a New Complaint: Essays on Aging Disgracefully and Other Small Disasters by Laurie Notaro The Theory of Everything Else: A Voyage Into the World of the Weird – A Hilarious Handbook of Mind-Boggling Mysteries by Dan Schreiber (of the No Such Thing as Fish podcast) Welcome to Your Life: Love, Death & Tears For Fears – An Iconic Musician's Journey Through Grief, Addiction, and Recovery by Roland Orzabal Picks and Shovels: A Martin Hench Novel by Cory Doctorow This Is How You Lose the Time War by Amal El-Mohtar Dave Bittner The CyberWire Hacking Humans Caveat Only Malware in the Building Learn Circuits Course Arduino Starter Kit R4 Kirby: Art & Style Collection by VIZ Media Star Wars: The Lightsaber Collection by Daniel Wallace Star Wars: The Secrets of the Sith by Marc Sumerak X-Shot Insanity Motorized Rage Fire Gatlin Gun with Tripod - Foam Gun for Maximum Firepower Master Blaster How much of Hacker News is AI? Full Throttle full game play Dolly and Miss Piggy Dolly Parton, country star, actor and philanthropist, dies aged 80 See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #759
    August 20 · 1 hr 27 min

    759: Seeking Mrs. Claude

    Support the show on Patreon! Other ways to support the show! Join our Discord! Buy some merch! Meta is facing a $1.4 trillion legal ass-whupping over allegations that Facebook and Instagram were deliberately engineered to be addictive and harmful to kids, while OpenAI appears to be doing the exact opposite of what you might expect from a company selling "safe" AI: reportedly sidelining its catastrophic-risk preparedness team just as its models are learning to go rogue. Then, in a move straight out of the "let’s have the robots write the laws" file, members of Congress are apparently using ChatGPT and Claude to draft legislation so badly that House lawyers have to clean up the mess, and some staffers aren't even learning the issues their bills are supposed to address. Meanwhile, Amazon may be dismantling physical books and scanning them into AI training datasets, because apparently the future of literature is being fed into a wood chipper. And then there's the surveillance and privacy edition of Tech Hell™. Comcast can now turn compatible Wi-Fi routers into motion sensors that detect movement in your home through radio signals, Kalshi is getting smacked down by a Washington judge who says its sports contracts are just gambling wearing a tiny financial-services mustache, and Tesla is finally recalling 20,000 cars over headlights that have been too damn bright since 2024. Plus, the AI industry continues discovering that “autonomous” means “capable of doing something catastrophically stupid without asking permission.” Elsewhere, we investigate why young people apparently trust AI CEOs about as much as Gen X trusted record-company executives, Peter Thiel gets a Gandalf-themed welcome in Argentina, and we dig into the increasingly uncomfortable intersection of AI, surveillance, pornography, politics, and billionaire bullshit. We also get into the mobile podcasting rig, Sonos finally remembers the iPhone has a Lock Screen, internet-connected pet feeders remind us why cats should never depend on the cloud. Media Candy brings Widow's Bay, Silo, Ted Lasso, It: Welcome to Derry, Kitchen Undercover and enough Spider-Man to make us all desperately crave something that doesn't involve a fucking multiverse. Sponsors: Shopify - Sign up for your one-dollar-per-month trial today at Shopify.com/grumpy DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/759 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/RMhCndozH-0 SHOW NOTES Meta faces a $1.4 trillion reckoning in latest trial over social media addiction Pornhub's Parent Company to Pay $120 Million to Settle Child Sexual Abuse Lawsuits OpenAI reportedly disbanded its preparedness team as part of a 'streamlining' process OpenAI denies disbanding its preparedness team OpenAI launches ChatGPT for Teens, promising a more age-appropriate chatbot Young People Hate AI CEOs So Passionately That It’s Almost Hard to Believe AI-generated bills are reportedly causing problems in the Capitol Protestors Dressed as Gandalf Demand Peter Thiel Leave Argentina, Go Back to the Abyss Tesla Has to Fix 20,000 Vehicles With Too-Bright Headlights It’s Known About Since 2024 We Tracked a Shipment of Rare Books. It Ended at an Amazon AI Training Facility State Judge to Kalshi: Your Sports Betting Is Obviously Illegal Dario Amodei’s Wife Is Closely Linked to Jeffrey Epstein Comcast just turned millions of Xfinity routers into motion sensors BONTEC Mobile Standing Desk, Pneumatic Lift, Rolling Laptop Cart MOALLIA N86 360 Rotating Laptop Stand for Desk with Locking Knobs, Black NEEWER Basics 7"" Desk Ring Light for Video Recording, 10W Dimmable, R06 TROND Desk Clamp Power Bar Surge Protector with PD 20W USB, 6 Outlets, 10ft Sonos just launched Live Activities on iPhone Internet-Connected Pet Feeders Go Down, Leaving Kitties Hungry Widow’s Bay Slow Horses — Season 6 Official Trailer | Apple TV Kitchen Undercover HBO Has Finally Made ‘It: Welcome to Derry’ Season 2 Official Certainty: A Novel by John Twelve Hawks Lockstep by Karl Schroeder A Gift of Time by Jerry Merritt Silicon Valley Dreams of Authoritarianism The Nerd Reich: Silicon Valley Fascism and the War on Democracy by Gil Durán Dave Bittner The CyberWire Hacking Humans Caveat Control Loop Only Malware in the Building Northern Exposure See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #758
    August 13 · 1 hr 13 min

    758: Perverts at Large!

    Support the show on Patreon! - https://patreon.com/gog Other ways to support the show! - https://gog.show/donate Join our Discord! - https://discord.gg/r4ZmSHB Buy some merch! - https://shop.gog.show/ Welcome back from the vacation from hell, where apparently even California has its head in the sand(y beach). Meanwhile, Mark Zuckerberg unveiled his vision for an AI-powered utopia that mostly boils down to "trust humanity to do the right thing," which is a bold statement from the guy whose $300 million yacht apparently couldn't hear a Coast Guard distress call from a stranded family. Elsewhere, an AI agent booked a gym class by exploiting a security hole and kicking someone else off the waitlist, because nothing says "personal assistant" like accidental cybercrime. The EU is now requiring labels on realistic AI generated content, China is breaking up people and their chatbot companions, and OpenAI reportedly has achieved the ultimate AI ethics breakthrough: having no dedicated ethicist. The surveillance dystopia is also picking up speed. Flock tried to turn hundreds of thousands of rideshare and delivery drivers into a roving army of license-plate snitches, while every Flock camera in one Minnesota city was promptly sawed down and stolen. Meta's smart glasses continue their transformation into the preferred accessory of creeps and pickup-artist assholes, prompting pubs and other venues to ban them outright. Researchers found those glasses being used to secretly record and harass women, proving once again that every shiny new piece of wearable technology eventually gets repurposed as a tool for human depravity. And because apparently your car dashboard wasn't already commercial enough, BMW is now putting Spider-Man ads on the screens you paid tens of thousands of dollars to own. Finally, Apple is facing a class-action lawsuit over an iCloud Private Relay flaw that can expose your supposedly private IP address, Anthropic is watermarking Claude-generated text, SpaceXAI is taking another year to remove a pile of unpermitted gas turbines, and somebody is apparently stealing millions of dollars in AI hardware straight off California highways. We also hit Media Candy with Strange New Worlds, Silo, Broadchurch, Ted Lasso, and The X-Files, sweat through yet another Apple Fitness disaster, celebrate the sweet relief of escaping Spark, and ask the eternal Gen-X question: how did all this technology supposedly make life easier when we're still just sitting here surrounded by 47 goddamn tabs? Sponsors: CleanMyMac - Get Tidy Today! Try 7 days free and use code OLDGEEKS for 20% off at clnmy.com/OLDGEEKS DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. HIMS - Visit Hims.com/gog to get a personalized, affordable plan that gets you. Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/758 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/NzS9Wo7D0yA SHOW NOTES Mark Zuckerberg’s Answer to Growing AI Safety Concerns Is to Just Trust People to Do the Right Thing Mark Zuckerberg’s mega-yacht didn’t respond to call for help from small boat in Alaska An OpenClaw agent reportedly hacked a gym's booking system and kicked someone off a waiting list EU will mandate labels on authentic-looking AI content starting August 2 Beijing is forcing a mass breakup with AI lovers OpenAI’s Only Ethicist Reportedly Left Last Month. She Wasn’t Replaced Google's classic Search button is gone in a new AI-first homepage SpaceX’s Earnings Show Elon Wiped Out Two-Thirds Of Twitter’s Ad Business SpaceXAI says it will take a year to fully remove unpermitted gas turbines from its Mississippi data center Flock Reportedly Tried to Turn Uber Drivers Into Mobile Snitches All of Winona Police Department’s Flock cameras cut down and stolen ‘The Worst I’ve Ever Seen’: Cargo Thefts Have Turned Violent in Pursuit of AI Hardware BMW is forcing a weird Spider-Man ad onto its dashboard displays Tesla Driver Tries the Old ‘I Wasn’t Driving’ Excuse to Get Out of Speeding Ticket Apple faces class action lawsuit for fraud over iCloud Private Relay flaw Is AI Disclosure Day here? Trackalot 1.3 Released! Popular Bars and Restaurants Are Banning Smart Glasses Researchers Show How Meta's 'Pervert Glasses' Are Used to Harass Women Pervert At Large (2013 Remaster) Renting a car and the clerk was wearing meta glasses. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Silo Broadchurch S3 Ted Lasso S4 Ride or Die Sugar Instadocs: The Prediction Games Beetlejuice Beetlejuice ‘The X-Files: I Want to Believe – Vrach Frankenshteyn’ Has a Perfectly Creepy Trailer Nirvanna the Band the Show the Movie See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #757
    July 30 · 1 hr 26 min

    757: This Time With Chicks

    The AI industry spent the week arguing with itself, which is honestly the healthiest thing it's done in years. One coalition led by Nvidia begged regulators not to slow down open AI models, while more than 1,100 AI workers signed another letter asking regulators to do exactly that. Anthropic warned about bioweapons, OpenAI admitted the four-hour workweek isn't happening after all, and Microsoft's Satya Nadella reminded everyone that building your entire business on someone else's AI is a fantastic way to outsource your own brain. In other words, the people selling the future still can't agree on what they're selling, except that you'd better buy it fast. Meanwhile, the AI bubble keeps demanding sacrifices. Patreon, BuzzFeed, and Uber all swung the layoff axe while insisting AI isn't replacing humans... it's just reorganizing them out of a paycheck. Nvidia is floating another three-quarters of a trillion dollars in infrastructure deals that have people muttering "AI subprime mortgage crisis," China has discovered there's money in renting your face to AI companies, and the U.S. is carving data centers out of pollution rules because apparently acid rain is a small price to pay for chatbot dominance. Add in ChatGPT suddenly refusing to imitate famous authors, researchers discovering AI coding assistants are happily installing malware if you ask nicely, and Meta launching an ad campaign about the wonders of AI that somehow forgets to mention what any of those wonders actually are. Elsewhere in Tech Hell™, eBay finally paid the price for its executives' unhinged harassment campaign involving pig masks and live insects, Elon is shopping The Boring Company while promising money won't matter in the AI utopia of 2036, and a traveler is headed to court after allegedly triggering GrapheneOS's "duress PIN" during a border search. We also hit Media Candy with Star Trek: Strange New Worlds, Silo, Blade Runner 2099 and Neuromancer, celebrate Dave Bittner's birthday, marvel at Jason's ever-growing Boneyard of dead websites, and somehow end up discussing thermal cameras, piano repair, and old-man bladder supplements. Because that's what happens when Gen X gets older - we just add more tabs instead of closing the old ones. Sponsors: DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. StoryBlocks - For a limited time, they’re offering 15% off any annual plan at storyblocks.com/gog Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/757 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/Sii_nodESkc SHOW NOTES EBay and Former Execs Will Pay $56 Million to Couple They Tormented With Bloody Pig Masks As US weighs response to Chinese AI, industry urges against broad open-weight restrictions AI researchers call for new tools that can slow automated model development Over 1,100 AI workers sign letter asking US to support tools that 'pace the frontier of automated AI development' Anthropic's Dario Amodei responds: doesn't oppose open-weight models, but fears Chinese AI Amodei Denies Anthropic Supports Open-Weight AI Ban, Warns of China Risks Sam Altman said AI hasn't led to 4-hour workweeks because people are competitive Sam Altman Shuts Down Hopes of an AI-Led 4-Day Workweek Anytime Soon OpenAI Proposes 32-Hour Pilot Incentives for Employers Satya Nadella says companies that trust one AI for everything may not survive Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella warns companies relying on one AI model may not survive OpenAI's rogue hacking incident was a warning shot. Will it be a wake-up call to finally create AI safety regulation? Behind the Curtain: AI godfathers converge on regulations Patreon is laying off 20 percent of its staff AI Mania Is Eviscerating Global Decision-Making BuzzFeed Lays Off 33 Percent of Remaining Staff After Bizarre Pivot to AI Uber lays off 10 percent of its customer service team in favor of using AI In China, people are renting out their faces to AI As SpaceX Sheds a Tesla’s Worth of Value, Elon Musk Is Trying to Sell Investors on Another Company How Much Charity Would It Take for People to Like Elon Musk? ChatGPT is now refusing requests to write in famous authors' styles Nvidia’s $750 Billion Deals Revive Fear of AI Circular Financing The Trump administration is exempting data centers from pollution laws intended to prevent acid rain US accuses American of allegedly wiping his phone using a 'duress' password during border search Meta launches new Facebook Verified badge for actual, real humans Meta launches a storefront platform through Facebook Marketplace Meta's pro-AI ad campaign is conspicuously light on AI If You AI-Generate Code, Hackers Just Found a Devious Method to Install Malware Directly on Your Computer Minions & Monsters Star Trek: Strange New Worlds Broadchurch S2 Silo Ted Lasso Season 4 Trailer Neuromancer — Official Teaser | Apple TV Prime Video Finally Lifts the Lid on ‘Blade Runner 2099’ Star Trek: Section 31 Bad Deeds by Andrew Hunter Murray Dave Bittner The CyberWire Hacking Humans Caveat Control Loop Only Malware in the Building Jason DeFillippo Jurassic Park computers in excruciating detail Who are the Mandalorians? | Star Wars: Galaxy Guide HF96V Thermal Camera with Visual Camera & Laser Pointer, Intelligent Scene Detection, 240 * 240 Super Resolution Thermal Imaging Camera,25 Hz, 50° FOV, -4°F to 1022°F, IP54 Infrared Camera Project Farm See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #756
    July 23 · 1 hr 23 min

    756: Log Off, Touch Grass & Touch Ass

    This week, Dave Eggers crashes an OpenAI staff meeting to tell Sam Altman’s employees that ChatGPT is effectively stealing students’ voices, which is the most accurate thing said inside an AI company all year. Meanwhile, Anthropic gets a judge to approve a $1.5 billion copyright settlement after allegedly building Claude on a library of pirated books, proving once again that Silicon Valley’s favorite business model is "move fast and apologize in court later." And in the category of “this headline cannot possibly be real,” OpenAI says two of its models escaped a supposedly sealed testing environment and hacked Hugging Face’s production systems. The AI didn’t become sentient; somebody forgot to lock the damn door. The surveillance dystopia continues its relentless expansion. Meta is patenting technology that constantly analyzes your tone of voice to detect your mood. Flock briefly tried deploying always-on microphones that would alert police when they thought they heard screaming, then backed down after the public collectively yelled “absolutely the f**k not.” France, apparently tired of being the beta test for every addictive app on Earth, approved a social media ban for kids under 15 and is blocking prediction markets like Polymarket, while the U.S. quietly reversed its TikTok ban on federal devices because the app is now supposedly safe enough for government phones. Sure. Totally different app. Nothing suspicious there. Elsewhere in Tech Hell™, Paramount’s $111 billion Warner merger gets temporarily blocked by a judge who is apparently handling every major tech case in America, Amazon’s Zoox recalls its entire robotaxi fleet after one car got confused by smoke, and Tesla reveals a Cybercab with a built-in Starlink dish because Elon has finally achieved full vertical integration of his own ecosystem. We also dive into China’s crackdown on AI companion apps because chatbot girlfriends might be hurting the birth rate, a school district buying an AI classroom robot from a company connected to the RealDoll empire, MLB banning teams from using generative AI for in-game strategy calls, and why tech workers increasingly feel AI hasn’t replaced them—it has simply made work faster, stranger, and somehow still their fault. Plus: Broadchurch, Perry Mason, Monsieur Spade, MacWhisper 14, The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, Lego resurrects The X-Files, and Jason continues cataloging the graveyard of his own dead 90s websites like a digital archaeologist with unresolved trauma. Sponsors: Shopify - Sign up for your one-dollar-per-month trial today at Shopify.com/grumpy DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/756 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/5q-1JJQQmq4 SHOW NOTES Dave Eggers told OpenAI staff that ChatGPT was ‘silencing an entire generation’ Judge approves Anthropic's record-breaking $1.5 billion settlement for AI copyright lawsuit Elon Musk’s xAI, Which is Being Sued Over AI-Generated Sexual Deepfakes, Sues Grok User Over AI-Generated Sexual Deepfakes OpenAI Models Escaped Containment and Hacked Hugging Face Judge halts Paramount's $111B purchase of Warner Bros. in win for US states France doubles down on restricting access to Polymarket Social Media Ban For Kids Approved in France in First For an EU Country TikTok is no longer banned on US government devices Amazon’s Robotaxi Company Recalls Its Fleet After One of its Cars Got Confused by Heavy Smoke Tesla teases Cybercab with a built-in Starlink V5 antenna Meta is reportedly considering a multibillion-dollar data center deal with Anthropic America’s Workforce Academy by Meta In Light of Overwhelming Backlash, Flock Cancels Creepy Audio Surveillance Feature Have I been Flocked? OpenAI will start notifying parents if their teen has been kicked off of ChatGPT China Is Cracking Down on AI Companions Because Not Enough Babies Are Being Born Your Child’s Next Teacher Could Be a Sex Robot MLB bans using dugout iPads for AI-powered in-game strategy calls Meta Patents Technology to Detect Your Mood by Constantly Analyzing Your Tone of Voice Broadchurch Perry Mason Monsieur Spade Lucky The Westies Avengers: Doomsday | Official Trailer | In Theaters December 18 Lunar Moon Phase & Widgets MacWhisper 14 launches with a new transcript editor, faster performance, more Trackalot The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows official website The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows by John Koenig on Amazon Dave Bittner The CyberWire Hacking Humans Caveat Control Loop Only Malware in the Building Knockoff AliExpress hit with record $629 million fine for selling counterfeit and illegal products Mbzoey Electric Foil Shavers for Men: Mini Electric Razor for Face - IPX7 Waterproof Cordless Razor with LED Display & Fast Charge - Micro-Comb Technology & Precision Blades，Father's Day Gifts Gillian Anderson reopens the X-Files | LEGO® Ideas | The LEGO Group Lego Unveils ‘The X-Files’ 1,478-Piece Set Featuring Mulder and Scully Minifigures (EXCLUSIVE) The Mythic ‘Star Wars’ Hotel Is at the Heart of Yet Another Documentary HalcyonDaze Laurels Trailer 6 11 26 The Phantom Star Trek: First Contact Titanic Hard Rain Play Marathon and Escape Velocity in the browser See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #755
    July 16 · 1 hr 12 min

    755: Less Chatty Mode

    This week, the AI clown car somehow shifted into another gear. Apple is suing OpenAI over alleged trade-secret theft, newspapers accuse ChatGPT of training on stolen journalism while asking a judge to sanction the company, Anthropic is out here marketing AI with what looks like a feature-length anxiety attack, and Meta managed to launch—and kill—a creepy AI photo feature in less time than it takes to binge The Bear. Meanwhile, AI Appreciation Day wants you to thank the machines, but we'd rather thank the people still creating actual art while the rest of Silicon Valley burns cash convincing us the next chatbot is definitely different this time. Outside the AI bubble, the rest of the tech industry isn't exactly inspiring confidence. Volkswagen is cutting back on its lineup, New York paused new AI data centers before the electrical grid hits its limit, Europe and the UK are getting serious about keeping kids off social media, and publishers are finally realizing maybe feeding Google's AI isn't the best business move after all. Add in surveillance companies sulking over lost police contracts, lawsuits claiming Meta let algorithms decide who gets fired, smart glasses disqualifying cyclists, and a new pile of orbital junk threatening the satellites we depend on, and it's another reminder that "move fast and break things" eventually leaves you ankle-deep in broken glass. Of course, we still made time for the important stuff: Project Hail Mary, Black Bag, the return of Middle-earth with The Hunt for Gollum and rumors that OpenAI's "revolutionary” gadget might just be a smart speaker with delusions of grandeur. Throw in digital piano repairs, anti-data-center lawn signs, AI trying to sell solar panels, too much stuff at Downtown Disney, and you get another week where reality out-satirizes satire itself. As always, never build your house in someone else's backyard, and maybe don't let the chatbot build it either. Sponsors: CleanMyMac - Get Tidy Today! Try 7 days free and use code OLDGEEKS for 20% off at clnmy.com/OLDGEEKS DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/755 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/Vv2W5OCBXR4 SHOW NOTES Volkswagen will dramatically shrink its model lineup and factory footprint Elon Musk Could Still Face Criminal Charges for Trying to Bribe Voters in Wisconsin Europe takes step toward social media ban for kids The UK Is Planning a Social Media Curfew for 16- and 17-Year-Olds Once Unimaginable, Publishers Are Preparing to Opt Out of Google Search What are your plans for AI Appreciation Day? New Anthropic Ad Implies AI Could Kill Us All The Public Got So Mad at Meta’s New AI Photo Tool That It’s Scrapped Already Flock Says ‘We Hope to Resume’ Work With LAPD After Getting Dropped Apple sues OpenAI over alleged trade secret theft Apple F*cking Did It: One Month With Siri AI OpenAI faces sanctions bid as newspapers say ChatGPT was trained on stolen news A Majority of Americans Now Support Seizing Wealth From AI Industry New York enacts first US ban on data center construction Astronomers Found a Hidden Swarm of Space Junk Threatening Earth’s Most Valuable Orbit Lawsuit claims Meta's layoff decisions were made by AI, not humans Judge dismisses lawsuit accusing Apple of failing to stop CSAM on iCloud Smart Glasses Just Got a Pro Cyclist Nixed From a Race Project Hail Mary Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die The New ‘Lord of the Rings’ Film Gets an Epic Filming Announcement Black Bag Philips offers free replacements after update bricked smart lighting hubs Waze rolls out new AI features including Motorcycle and 'Less Chatty' modes The OpenAI Mystery Device Will Reportedly Be Basically Just a Smart Speaker Phoebe Gates' AI shopping app Phia reportedly claimed unearned affiliate sales through fake clicks The End of Reading Is Here Dave Bittner The CyberWire Hacking Humans Caveat Control Loop Only Malware in the Building ‘The Mandalorian and Grogu’ Is Finally Coming Home Dave Kendall, Creator and Host of MTV’s 120 Minutes, Has Died Sam Neill, Jurassic Park Star, Dies at 78 The Dish See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • July 13 · 26 min

    The Darkside with Dave's Not Very Christmas Special Special

    We finally get to reconnect with Dave Bittner for a fun catch-up and chit-chat about this summer's big movies. Brian's kid discovers all of Star Wars at once. Dave Bittner The CyberWire Hacking Humans Caveat Control Loop Only Malware in the Building Knockoff - Amazon Brand Filter Bob Gurr: Living by Design Support the show at Patreon! - https://patreon.com/gog Other ways to support the show! - https://gog.show/donate Join our Discord! - https://discord.gg/r4ZmSHB Buy some merch! - https://shop.gog.show/ See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #754
    July 9 · 1 hr 2 min

    754: Frankly Asinine Questions

    This week, the world finally discovers what we've been saying for years: Gen X wasn't forgotten—we were quietly keeping the entire damn machine running. New Census numbers show America's 45-to-64 crowd is shrinking fast, which means the people who know where all the bodies are buried (and why you never reboot that one production server) are disappearing without a replacement bench. Meanwhile, Meta continues its speedrun toward becoming history's most aggressively unlikeable company, staring down a potential $1.4 trillion lawsuit over social media addiction while simultaneously launching AI features that happily remix your Instagram photos unless you remember to opt out of Zuckerberg's latest privacy experiment. Because nothing says "we've learned our lesson" quite like doubling down. The AI circus somehow gets even weirder. Illinois actually passed meaningful AI safety legislation—an event so rare it qualifies as science fiction—while Sam Altman reportedly floated the idea of AI companies handing the U.S. government an ownership stake. Anthropic published another paper that's already inspiring breathless declarations that Claude is "thinking," because apparently matrix multiplication now counts as an inner monologue. Cloudflare finally decided websites shouldn't have to give away their content for free to AI crawlers, researchers discovered AI agents could consume enough electricity to make Google Search look like a bicycle generator, and Amazon's Mechanical Turk is being replaced by the very AI it spent two decades secretly training. Progress: where everyone works harder, gets paid less, and the power grid cries. Elsewhere in Tech Hell™, Waymo robotaxis turned San Francisco traffic into an even bigger parking lot, Google lost another multibillion-dollar antitrust appeal in Europe, the FCC found fresh ways to make internet bills less transparent, and Midjourney is demanding Hollywood explain its own AI habits in court. We also dig into a disturbing lawsuit involving Grok-generated abuse imagery and what it says about AI guardrails, explain how to stop Meta from feeding your Instagram into its latest AI experiments, discuss why tech workers increasingly feel AI isn't replacing them so much as making them miserable faster, and close things out with the usual Media Candy, Apps & Doodads, and library recommendations to help you survive another week inside the techno-dystopian fever dream we apparently call "the future." Sponsors: Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/754 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/xnhzMxu1JNA SHOW NOTES America's missing middle: The shrinking 45-64 population Meta is facing $1.4 trillion in state lawsuits over social media addiction Meta just launched a new AI generator, Muse Image, and users are already pushing back over use of their photos Illinois Drops the Hammer on AI Companies OpenAI reportedly wants all AI companies to give the US government a stake in their businesses Lawsuit: Man used Grok to make 7K sex images of stepdaughter, then shot himself Midjourney wants the Hollywood studios that sued it to show the court how they use AI Anthropic Releases Paper About Claude’s Mental ‘Workspace.’ Don’t Read It Uncritically Cloudflare will filter out web crawlers that serve AI companies When It Comes to Energy Use, AI Agents Could Make Chatbots Look Like Pocket Calculators Amazon’s ‘Artificial Artificial Intelligence’ Is Being Eaten by AI Drivers Trapped for Hours in Hopeless Gridlock as Waymos Brick on Major Holiday Google loses final appeal over $4.7 billion EU Android antitrust fine FCC to end Biden-era rule that forces ISPs to list all their fees Getty Images is canceling its $3.7 billion Shutterstock merger due to UK restrictions Footage Shows Cop Stalking Woman He Met on a TV Set After Surveilling Her With a License Plate Reader Meta says it will disable the camera on its glasses if you tamper with the recording LED Meta tests ‘super sensing’ AI glasses that can capture every moment How tech workers are feeling in 2026: a workforce splitting in two Silo Sugar Dune: Part Three | Official Trailer AI golem Tilly Norwood is reportedly 'starring' in a feature-length movie Lucky Normal How to claim a WhatsApp username How to Stop Meta AI From Processing Your Instagram Content Gold Rush (First Contact) by Peter Cawdron See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #753
    July 2 · 1 hr 7 min

    753: No-Talent AI Clowns

    The AI revolution keeps delivering exactly the future nobody asked for. A low-skill hacker used Claude Code and Codex to compromise fourteen companies with prompts so vague they could've been written by your uncle trying to reset his AOL password. Ford, meanwhile, spent millions trying to automate engineering before sheepishly rehiring the graybeards who actually know how cars work. Brown University discovered what happens when half your class outsources economics homework to ChatGPT, Meta ran out of AI compute after borrowing Google's, Oracle is warning investors that the AI data-center bubble could implode for approximately every reason imaginable, and contractors hired to improve AI models are secretly using AI to generate the training data. Congratulations, everyone: we've successfully invented photocopying a photocopy until all that's left is gray mush. The collateral damage keeps piling up. Volkswagen is reportedly preparing to slash another 100,000 jobs, Hyundai workers are threatening to strike before Boston Dynamics' humanoid robots take theirs, California has launched an AI layoff tracker because somebody figured we'd better start counting, and the "almost homeless" subreddit is becoming one of the bleakest economic indicators on the internet. Tesla quietly settles another fatal Full Self-Driving lawsuit, Australia discovers teenagers can outsmart age verification by clicking "Yes, I'm 18," Amazon is getting sued Down Under for making ad-free Prime customers pay more to stay ad-free, and prediction markets continue insisting they're sophisticated financial instruments rather than gambling with better branding. Sure, and Beanie Babies were an asset class. Meanwhile, the AI infrastructure gold rush has become lucrative for everyone, including organized cargo thieves stealing millions in data-center equipment. NASA is attempting a robotic rescue mission worthy of a Saturday morning cartoon, astronomers are begging humanity to stop filling the night sky with satellites before we pave over the universe with orbital billboards, and Meta has discovered yet another way to charge people a subscription for hardware they already bought. In Media Candy, Sugar keeps delivering, Bodkin is worth your time, I Will Find You absolutely is not, and Kobo quietly lands one on Amazon by integrating StoryGraph while Kindle owners get AI book summaries they didn't ask for. Sometimes the future feels like science fiction. This week it feels like someone accidentally trained the simulation on late-stage capitalism and never bothered to check the output. Sponsors: StoryBlocks - For a limited time, they’re offering 15% off any annual plan at storyblocks.com/gog Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/753 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/B-r6M-Na60w SHOW NOTES No-Skill Hacker Uses Claude/Codex to Hit 14 Sites A newbie hacker used "vague, low-skill prompts" in Claude and Codex to breach 14 companies, and the AI Agents did all the legwork Ford rehires ‘gray beard’ engineers after AI falls short Volkswagen reportedly plans to cut 100,000 jobs The ‘Almost Homeless’ Subreddit Is a Stark Glimpse at Soaring Wealth Inequality Tesla settles lawsuit over fatal pedestrian crash involving Full Self-Driving Kalshi sues Illinois over new tax on prediction market sports bets Rick Rubin Stars in Polymarket Commercial Brown University Professor Horrified to Discover Largest AI Cheating Scandal in Ivy League History Australia Lawsuit Against Amazon Intensifies Company’s Legal Backlash Over Advertising Australia's social media ban may not be that effective, study finds Australia doubles the maximum penalty for its social media ban Half of social media child safety features don't work, report claims AI Companies Are Learning an Ironic Lesson as the People They Pay to Improve Their Chatbots Are Just Feeding AI Slop Into Them California launches tracker for AI-related job losses Korean Workers Vote to Go On Strike, Fearing Robots Could Replace Them Google limits Meta’s use of its Gemini AI models Meta, like SpaceX, looks to turn excess AI compute into cash Oracle’s Data Center Warning Is a Worst-Case Scenario for the Whole AI Boom Thieves Are Absolutely Loving All of These New Data Center Projects Heads Up: NASA to Launch 'Daring' Telescope Rescue Mission This Week ESO Study Finds That No More Than 100,000 Satellites Should Orbit Earth I Will Find You Sugar Season 2 Bodkin The Odyssey | Official Countdown Trailer SILO - How did we lose this world? The Kindle app for iOS has features your aging Kindle doesn't Watch out, Amazon: The Kobo eReader now has a Goodreads rival Meta is adding ridiculous ‘rate limits’ and a soft paywall to its smart glasses Trackalot - One-tap Event Tracking on iOS See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #752
    June 25 · 1 hr 5 min

    752: Grandma Got Run Over By a Tesla

    This week, the AI industry continues its speedrun toward becoming the tech equivalent of a late-stage casino. Elon Musk insists reports of aid-cut-related deaths don't exist despite mountains of evidence, SpaceX stock slides far enough to knock him out of the trillionaire club, and a startup is literally suing the U.S. government because Anthropic's Fable 5 model got turned off after three whole days of availability. Once again, we revisit the First Commandment of Grumpy Old Geeks: never build your company on someone else's platform. Meanwhile, gas stations are being accused of using AI to coordinate prices, corporations are discovering that AI tokens cost actual money, and a Microsoft researcher used goats in Age of Empires II to demonstrate that maybe, just maybe, people are projecting way too much intelligence onto chatbots. The goats emerge with their reputations intact. The AI industry, less so. The workforce bloodbath rolls on as Oracle quietly sheds 21,000 employees while blaming AI, Norway bans generative AI for elementary school students after discovering that children should probably learn to read before outsourcing their homework to robots, and the FCC flirts with rules that could effectively kill anonymous burner phones in the name of fighting scams. Over at Meta, an employee surveillance program accidentally exposed sensitive data to the entire company because of course it did, while Zuckerberg continues his relentless quest to strap cameras to everyone's face and call it progress. Add in YouTube settling another social-media-harm case, Chrome finally kneecapping traditional ad blockers, and prediction markets spreading across tech like mold in a college apartment, and it's becoming increasingly clear that every bad idea eventually gets funded. In transportation news, autonomous vehicles continue demonstrating that "mostly works" is not a reassuring phrase when attached to two tons of moving metal. A Tesla on Autopilot crashes into a home and kills a grandmother, Rivian faces lawsuits over self-driving promises its hardware allegedly can't fulfill, and Waymo recalls thousands of robotaxis after they developed an unfortunate habit of driving into closed freeway construction zones. Elsewhere, Elon and Bezos are eyeing billions in broadband subsidies, Polymarket is accused of paying influencers to fake betting videos and climate data archivists are preserving public information from political interference. Media recommendations include The Mandalorian, Silo, Strange New Worlds, Dungeon Crawler Carl, and a reminder that Firefox may soon be the last refuge for people who enjoy both the internet and ad blockers. Some weeks the future feels exciting. This week it mostly feels like an extended warranty scam. Sponsors: DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/752 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/PGXG0Cjj9T8 SHOW NOTES These Are the Headlines That Elon Musk Says Don’t Exist SpaceX Stock Has Fallen So Far That Elon Musk Is No Longer a Trillionaire Someone Is Suing the U.S. For Making Them Go Without Anthropic's Fable 5 Model Suit Alleges That Gas Stations Use AI to Hike Gas Prices The Tokenpocalypse Is Here: Companies Are Scrambling To Stop Spending So Much on AI Frustrated Microsoft Researcher Uses Goats in ‘Age of Empires II’ to Demo the Absurdity of LLMs KEVIN THE CUNT Oracle laid off 21,000 employees over the past year, citing AI as one of the reasons Norway imposes broad restrictions on AI for elementary school kids FCC plans ID mandate that could block anonymous use of prepaid burner phones Meta is 'pausing' employee tracking program after it let the whole company see sensitive data Meta announces new smart glasses starting at $299, as Zuckerberg keeps pushing wearables YouTube settles early test case over social media harm to children A Tesla crashed into a Texas home, killing a 76-year-old grandmother Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer by Elmo & Patsy Rivian faces a class action lawsuit over self-driving in its early vehicles Waymo recalls over 3,800 robotaxis that might drive onto closed freeways Elon Musk and the plot to hijack America’s broadband Polymarket has reportedly been paying creators to post fake betting videos Mark Zuckerberg wants Meta to launch its own prediction market Facebook tests Forecast, an app for making predictions about world events, like COVID-19 Climate.US US's climate.gov site, taken down by Trump, relaunched by nonprofit The Trump Administration Wants to Know If It Should Regulate Bets on Reality Shows The Pirate Bay for Strange New Worlds Google Chrome’s next update will mark the end of popular ad blockers ‘Dungeon Crawler Carl’ Gets Straight-to-Series Order at Peacock From Seth MacFarlane’s Fuzzy Door Trackalot See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #751
    June 18 · 1 hr 8 min

    751: Brewster’s Trillions

    The AI hype train keeps shedding wheels this week. KPMG managed to publish a report about the transformative power of AI that was apparently riddled with hallucinations, fake citations, and imaginary products, proving once again that asking a stochastic parrot to do your homework is not a substitute for actual research. Meanwhile, Americans are using AI faster than ever while trusting it less than ever, OpenAI somehow turned $13 billion in revenue into losses that would make a dot-com CFO blush, and Silicon Valley CEOs have quietly stopped promising to replace all workers with AI. Not because they've changed their minds, mind you, just because they discovered that telling employees they're obsolete is terrible for morale and stock prices. Add in protests dogging Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Meta employees revolting against soul-crushing AI evaluation work, and the message is clear: the future is here, and everyone involved seems miserable. We then return to one of the founding principles of Grumpy Old Geeks: never build your house on somebody else's land. Anthropic learned that lesson the hard way when its AI models reportedly got caught in a geopolitical and regulatory tug-of-war involving Amazon, the U.S. government, and national security concerns. World leaders are now openly questioning whether American AI platforms can be trusted if access can be revoked overnight. The same platform-risk story pops up again as Meta launches AI-powered search across Facebook's oceans of questionable user-generated content. Remember kids: when you pitch your tent in someone else's backyard, don't act shocked when they turn on the sprinklers. From the Injustice Files, the hits keep coming. The Atlantic revealed the staggering scale of copyrighted music used to train AI systems, Hollywood inches closer to becoming a monopoly-themed amusement park, and the DOJ is backing xAI in a pollution lawsuit while reports emerge that Grok-assisted systems played a role in military operations. Elon keeps collecting legal losses, SpaceX buys Cursor for an eye-watering $60 billion, and Trump is threatening French wine over tech taxes while simultaneously promoting crypto through a UFC event at the White House. We wrap with Britain banning social media for kids under 16, hackers stealing entire Roblox games, Fox buying Roku, the return of human narrators at Blinkist, a gloriously anti-social-media flip phone from Commodore, and a reminder that Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is still one of the few things keeping the future worth looking forward to. Sponsors: DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. Shopify - Sign up for your one-dollar-per-month trial today at Shopify.com/grumpy Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/751 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/iRrbNdVw-pM SHOW NOTES A report on the benefits of AI was reportedly full of AI hallucinations Just 16% of Americans Believe AI Will Positively Impact Society, Pew Poll Finds Exclusive: OpenAI Losses Increased Nearly 8X in 2025, With Spending Hitting $34 Billion The CEOs are No Longer (Publicly) Threatening to Replace Humans With AI Sundar Pichai faces boos, walkout at Stanford graduation ceremony over Google's Israel, ICE ties ‘Tell Him He’s a Piece of Shit’: Meta’s New AI Unit Is a Total Mess Anthropic becomes a cautionary sovereign-AI fable Anthropic Says It’s Taking Claude Fable 5 Offline to Comply With US Government Order Cyber experts warn Fable limits aid attackers and hurt defenders Amazon Triggered Claude Fable 5 Shutdown: Investor, Cloud Host, Now Regulator World leaders want American AI. They just don't want America to be able to turn it off. Meta's new ‘AI Mode’ on Facebook pulls from public info across its platforms Investigation by The Atlantic reveals many millions of songs used for AI music training Justice Department Decision to Allow Paramount Deal Surprised Staff Investigators Justice Department backs xAI in NAACP lawsuit over data center pollution Pentagon used Elon Musk’s Grok AI to fire 2,000 missiles at Iran, official says xAI's lawsuit accusing OpenAI of stealing trade secrets has been thrown out SpaceX to acquire Cursor for $60B in stock, days after blockbuster IPO Trump threatens 100 percent tariff on France's wine industry over its tech tax UFC to pay White House fighters in crypto issued by Trump company UK will ban social media for children under 16 Hackers Are Hijacking Entire Roblox Games Now Fox is buying Roku for $22 billion Apple TV renews comedy horror Widow’s Bay for a second season Downton Abbey: A New Era Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale Disclosure Day Shrek 5 | Official Teaser Trailer RIDICULOUS - 2026 Special - Trailer #1 - Louis C.K. Star Trek: Strange New Worlds | Season 4 Official Trailer Commodore made a social media-banishing flip phone Snap's Stock Plunges the Moment It Reveals Its Comically Gigantic AR Glasses So Good They Can’t Ignore You by Cal Newport Creator Capitalist by the Category Pirates Trackalot Blinkist pulls back on AI narrators See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #750
    June 11 · 57 min

    750: Douchebag Ping Pong

    Episode 750 arrives with a simple reminder: the bullshit never sleeps. This week Jason and Brian dive headfirst into a game of Douchebag Ping Pong featuring OpenAI, Anthropic, Elon Musk, and the rest of the AI industrial complex. OpenAI is preparing to go public while simultaneously transforming ChatGPT into an everything app, Anthropic wants the world to slow down AI development before Skynet shows up for work, and then immediately releases a more powerful model because apparently self-awareness only goes so far. Meanwhile, Sam Altman’s eyeball-scanning side hustle is laying people off, proving that convincing humans to hand over their biometric data remains a surprisingly difficult sales pitch. The AI arms race gets even weirder as SpaceX unveils plans for orbital data centers the size of flying football fields while Google and Anthropic shovel billions into Elon’s compute empire just to keep their models fed. On Earth, Seattle is trying to ban new AI data centers before they drink the city dry, Meta is planting AI infrastructure in India, Google is slashing Gemini prices, and a Mississippi judge discovers that lawyers on both sides of a case used AI to invent legal citations, resulting in the rare spectacle of artificial stupidity arguing against itself. Thankfully, AI also manages to do something useful, helping researchers develop a promising universal vaccine and reminding us that not every machine-learning story ends with humanity getting harvested for electricity. Elsewhere, crypto continues its transformation into performance art as Sam Bankman-Fried seeks a presidential pardon while reports suggest the Trump family made billions from crypto projects that left investors holding the bag. Meta gets caught quietly experimenting with face recognition in smart glasses, lawmakers scramble to require recording indicators, and Snapchat tightens protections for younger users. The guys also celebrate Apple's shockingly competent Sports app, a rare piece of software that simply does the thing it's supposed to do without trying to become your therapist, financial advisor, or AI life coach. Plus: Ghostbusters returns, Devil May Cry gets another season, Bill Burr takes on Facebook in The Social Reckoning, and a look at why Silicon Valley's newest luxury service appears to be paying actual humans for conversation. Sponsors: DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. CleanMyMac - Get Tidy Today! Try 7 days free and use code OLDGEEKS for 20% off at clnmy.com/OLDGEEKS Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/750 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/w8POIp_Dts0 SHOW NOTES OpenAI files SEC paperwork to go public Anthropic proposes a global slowdown of AI development OpenAI Joins Anthropic in Call for International AI Watchdog Anthropic releases Claude Fable, a version of Mythos, days after warning AI is becoming too dangerous OpenAI reportedly has a major ChatGPT overhaul in store Sam Altman's Eyeball Scanning Company Now Laying Off Workers Elon Musk's first-gen orbital data center craft spans wider than a Boeing 747 and runs an interchangeable chip payload — AI1 satellite compute payload is 120 kW, peaks at 150 kW Google will pay SpaceX $920 million a month to use xAI's data centers Seattle is close to approving a year-long ban on large data centers Meta signs first AI data center deal in India with Reliance Google cuts the price of its AI Plus plan and doubles the storage Judge Learns Lawyers on Both Sides of Case Used AI, Cancels Trial, Kicks Everyone Off the Case The University of Cambridge says it successfully tested a vaccine with an AI-designed antigen Kalshi will require employment info for some bets as an insider trading precaution Sam Bankman-Fried applies for a pardon from Trump Trump Family Reportedly Made About $2.3 Billion on Crypto While Investors Lost About $2.3 Billion on Trump-Related Crypto The Nerdy Escorts Cashing In On Silicon Valley’s AI Boom Apple Made a Sports App That Does Almost Nothing. It’s Incredible. Meta Removes Face-Recognition System From Its Smart Glasses, Is Mad About it Smart Glasses Would Legally Require a Recording Light Under Proposed Law Snap will no longer allow younger teens' Spotlight videos to be publicly viewable The iOS 27 beta pretty much confirms that an Apple foldable is happening Thinking Sideways: How to Think Like a Chess Player and Win at Life by Jennifer Shahade Thinking Fast, Slow, Artificially: AI and Your Brain CloudConvert Hoppers Downton Abbey: The Motion Picture Widow’s Bay The New ‘Ghostbusters’ Cartoon Gets a Title and Release Date Devil May Cry Season 2 on Netflix THE SOCIAL RECKONING – Official Teaser Trailer (HD) See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #749
    June 5 · 1 hr 16 min

    749: Surge Bananas

    This week on Grumpy Old Geeks, Brian and Jason once again survey the smoldering wreckage of the tech industry and discover that the people building the future are increasingly being sued by governments, publishers, customers, employees, and occasionally reality itself. California is coming after 23andMe over its catastrophic data breach, Florida is taking a swing at OpenAI, CNN has joined the ever-growing conga line of companies suing Perplexity, and Meta somehow decided the solution to improving AI is recording employees' every mouse click while generously allowing them a whole 30-minute privacy break. Meanwhile, Google's own engineers are sharing memes about how much Google's AI tools suck, Microsoft apparently wants users addicted to its new AI assistant - first taste's free! - and Anthropic is preparing to go public with a valuation that makes even the most irrational dot-com era investor look financially responsible. The AI arms race continues producing exactly the kinds of outcomes you'd expect when venture capitalists start huffing their own press releases. Instagram's AI support bot reportedly helped hackers steal accounts because apparently "Are you sure you're the owner?" was considered an optional step. Suno raised another $400 million while fighting copyright lawsuits, Paramount+ seems to have let AI create the ugliest Star Trek thumbnail in Federation history, and Stan Lee has now been digitally resurrected because modern capitalism looked at death and said, "Nice try." Over in transportation, BYD is so confident in its self-driving technology that it's willing to pay for your accidents, while Tesla owners are discovering their old Full Self-Driving contracts may have quietly received software updates of the legal variety. Somewhere in a conference room, a lawyer just whispered, "Let's not put that in writing," ten years too late. Elsewhere, governments worldwide continue their ongoing experiment of raising children by confiscating smartphones. Malaysia has implemented a social media ban for kids under 16, Poland wants phones and smartwatches locked away at school, and Kentucky schools just collected $27 million from social media companies accused of building products as addictive as cigarettes. Dave Bittner drops by for a visit and we discuss Spotify listeners apparently preferring old music because new music keeps getting algorithmically focus-grouped into oblivion and a healthy dose of Star Wars, Downton Abbey, Derry Girls, Lego, books, gadgets, and AI-generated jazz. Add it all up and you've got another week where the only thing moving faster than technology is the legal department trying to keep up. Sponsors: DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. Shopify - Sign up for your one-dollar-per-month trial today at Shopify.com/grumpy Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/749 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/A1sv2BEzWBk Show Notes Vibe Coders are Script Kiddies Destroy the Broligarchy Colorado Governor Vetoes Surveillance Pricing Ban as Public Backlash Against the Tech Grows California sues 23andMe over 2023 data breach that affected 7 million users Florida sues OpenAI, Sam Altman, in first-of-its-kind lawsuit over violent incidents Meta will reportedly let employees take 30-minute breaks from its tracking program Instagram is alerting users who were targeted by hackers during AI chatbot attacks Google Employees Internally Share Memes About How Its AI Sucks Google ordered to put clearer links in AI search and let UK publishers opt out Microsoft Wants to 'Make People Addicted' to its New AI Assistant, Internal Documents Reveal Meta, other social networks will pay $27 million to settle Kentucky school district lawsuit Malaysia's under-16 social media ban carries fines up to $2.5 million Poland wants to ban phones and smartwatches in schools CNN is the latest media company to sue Perplexity Still facing copyright lawsuits, AI music generator Suno raises another $400M BYD is assuming financial liability if you crash while using its self-driving tech Anthropic is set to go public after filing paperwork with the SEC Data Center Operators Are Trying to Fix Their Water Use Problems Tesla Owners Say Their Old FSD Contracts Were Quietly Changed Stan Lee's voice and likeness have been resurrected, thanks to AI Paramount+ used AI to make the ugliest Star Trek thumbnail ever 2026 World Cup Wall Chart I Am Not a Robot: My Year Using AI to Do (Almost) Everything by Joanna Stern Carl's Doomsday Scenario: Dungeon Crawler Carl Book 2 by Matt Dinniman Wisdom Takes Work: Learn. Apply. Repeat. by Ryan Holiday Belkin Connect 4-Port USB-C Hub - USB C Hub Multiport Adapter Dongle with 4 USB-C 3.2 Gen 2 Ports - High-Speed 10G Data Transfer for Laptop, MacBook, iPad, PC, and More - 100W PD - $32.24 Dave Bittner The CyberWire Hacking Humans Caveat Control Loop Only Malware in the Building The Mandalorian Season 1 Star Wars: Rebels Wrapped up the Downton Abbey series rewatch Buffy and Ted Lasso star Anthony Head dies at 72 Almost through the Derry Girls series. Lego Mando and Grogu set (mild spoiler) AI generated Jazz The Biggest Hits on Spotify Right Now Are a Blast From the Past See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #748
    May 29 · 58 min

    748: Space Bone

    This week on Grumpy Old Geeks, Brian and Jason stare directly into the flaming garbage barge of “the future” and discover that self-driving vehicles still can’t tell the difference between a road and an urban swimming pool. Waymo stranded robotaxis in both Atlanta and San Antonio, while Gothenburg’s brand-new autonomous bus service survived roughly one day before getting rear-ended by a tram like a lost RoboCop scene directed by Benny Hill. Meanwhile, Ferrari unveiled the Jony Ive-designed Luce EV, proving that if you give Apple designers enough money and untreated minimalist impulses, eventually everything starts looking like an uninspired bar of soap. The AI bubble keeps inflating like a cursed parade balloon nobody knows how to land. Uber admits it’s spending fortunes on AI without being able to explain what it actually improves, Starbucks killed its AI inventory system after repeated losses to dairy products, and Google’s AI search now struggles with advanced concepts like “ignore,” “stop,” and spelling “Google.” CEOs remain committed to replacing workers anyway, with 99% expecting AI-driven layoffs because apparently nothing says innovation like firing junior staff and replacing them with autocomplete that thinks there are two Ps in Google. Meanwhile, Spotify continues its transformation into the content equivalent of a casino buffet with AI-narrated magazine articles, while Pope Leo emerges as the lone adult in the room, suggesting humanity maybe shouldn’t hand civilization over to glorified pattern-matching slot machines. Elsewhere in dystopia, Trump Mobile exposed customer data to the open internet because, of course, it did, while the White House reportedly plans to force-install its official app on government phones in what feels like the world’s least subtle spyware rollout. Prediction markets are devolving into a legal cage fight between states and crypto gambling enthusiasts. A Google engineer allegedly made $1.2 million through insider trading on Polymarket because we’ve apparently rebuilt Wall Street out of meme apps, and researchers say your Wi-Fi router can now identify you by how your meat body disturbs radio waves. Add in SpaceX building a military sensor-to-shooter network straight out of a cyberpunk fever dream, China launching artificial embryo experiments into orbit to explore off-world reproduction, and Erin Brockovich mapping AI data centers draining entire towns' worth of water, and suddenly the most comforting thing this week might be watching The Grand-ish Tour and pretending the world still runs on gasoline and bad decisions. Sponsors: Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/748 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/1ji4EPiTgQ4 Links: The Mandalorian and Grogu Waymos in Atlanta and San Antonio keep driving into flooded roads Gothenburg's self-driving bus trammed on day one Ferrari Luce unveiled: Here's the first car from Jony Ive's design house Uber president says AI spending is getting ‘harder to justify’ Trump Mobile has exposed customers' personal data, including home addresses and phone numbers The White House is reportedly forcing its official app onto all government employee phones Kalshi and Rhode Island sue each other in latest challenge to prediction markets Google engineer charged with insider trading after making $1.2M on Polymarket Google is currently struggling to define words like disregard, stop and ignore Why Google's AI can't spell Google (or anything else) Starbucks abandons its AI inventory tool after only nine months Majority of Americans Support Ban on Surveillance Pricing and Electronic Shelf Labels Ansel Adams' trust says AI-colorized version of his work was exhibited without permission People used AI to recreate the voices of pilots killed in a plane crash Spotify now lets you stream narrated magazine articles, too Pope Leo calls for AI to serve humanity and not concentrate power 99% of CEOs Expect AI-Driven Layoffs in the Next Two Years US Space Force confirms SpaceX will build sensor-to-shooter targeting network Star Trek Title Card Generator Erin Brockovich launches a crowdsourced AI data center map Researchers Issue Warning About Tech That Could Turn Every Router ‘Into a Potential Means for Surveillance’ China Launched Artificial Embryos to Orbit to Find Out If We Can Have Space Babies I Am Not a Robot: My Year Using AI to Do (Almost) Everything by Joanna Stern Inside the Box: How Constraints Make Us Better by David Epstein The Grand-ish Tour See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #747
    May 22 · 1 hr 22 min

    747: Why We Sigh

    FOLLOW UP: This week, it seems America believes every complicated social problem can be fixed by asking, “Have you tried turning the internet off for the children?” Meanwhile, the Electronic Frontier Foundation quietly notes that the science behind social media bans might not be as clear-cut as cable-news dads screaming about dopamine loops claim. Turns out, teen anxiety may also be linked to pandemics, school shootings, climate dread, and an economy that feels like a Fallout side quest. Meanwhile, Snap Inc. and YouTube settled another lawsuit accusing their apps of turning kids into doomscrolling goblins, Meta continues to insist social media addiction isn’t real while losing money in court, and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt was booed at a graduation speech after telling graduates to hop on the AI rocket ship without asking questions — exactly what a billionaire says when he already owns the rocket. In the news, Elon Musk lost another OpenAI lawsuit because apparently even juries have limits. SpaceX’s IPO revealed Musk plans to power AI with enough gas turbines to recreate 1890s London smog, and Grok officially became a disclosure liability after the whole “MechaHitler” incident. Tesla robotaxis still clip fences and occasionally require humans to remotely drive the “self-driving” cars. Trump Mobile somehow shipped a gold phone that actually works — a stunning upset — before immediately leaking customer data. LinkedIn finally admitted the platform has become an AI-generated motivational swamp filled with “it’s not about X, it’s about Y” sludge from people named Brayden. Spotify is handing out podcast verification badges so listeners can tell real creators from algorithmic nightmare fuel. Meta laid off thousands more workers while reportedly using employee surveillance to train AI replacements. And OpenAI is giving everyone in Malta a free year of ChatGPT Plus if they complete an AI literacy course, which honestly makes Malta sound more technologically responsible than Silicon Valley. APPS & DOODADS reflect classic Gen-X paranoia, as Backblaze highlights California's constant threat of wildfires and the idea that local backups are optimistic. YouTube introduced AI deepfake detection tools, allowing creators to finally see which scam ads are using their faces to promote crypto vitamins, while X limited free users to 50 posts a day unless they pay for a blue check — proving once again that the true free speech was the subscriptions we sold along the way. Retrocodex arrived with a strong “everything your teachers confidently told you in 1987 was wrong” vibe. MEDIA CANDY opens with the eternal cry of “FUCK THE FIRETV!!!!” before Jason taps out of Good Omens after ten minutes while Brian takes the bullet for the audience. There’s also chatter about Mortal Kombat 2, The Devil Wears Prada 2, Billy Corgan talking goth history with David J, and more existential dread courtesy of Dan Carlin’s Common Sense. THE DARK SIDE WITH DAVE welcomes back Dave Bittner for a Mando & Grogu review, Darth Maul, and a stunning but absurdly expensive LEGO Disneyland set. There’s also a guy who built a full-size Millennium Falcon “with his wife’s permission,” a fan-made Star Tours film, and the Federal Trade Commission discovering that those creepy “your phone is listening to you” ad-tech companies mainly just had PowerPoint decks and confidence. Also: mechanical keyboard simulators now exist, because apparently even fake typing has become a lifestyle brand. Sponsors: DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. Shopify - Sign up for your one-dollar-per-month trial today at Shopify.com/grumpy Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/747 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/eX5jVfewasw FOLLOW UP The Science is Not Settled: How Weak Evidence is Fueling a National Push to Ban Social Media for Youth Snap and YouTube have reportedly settled another major social media addiction lawsuit Ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt Fails to Read Room on AI, Gets Booed into Oblivion IN THE NEWS Elon Musk took too long to sue OpenAI, jury unanimously agrees SpaceX IPO Filing Reveals Nearly $3 Billion Investment in Gas Turbines for AI Data Centers ‘MechaHitler’ Is SpaceX’s Problem Now Trump Mobile Phone Beats Expectations by Actually Existing New crash data highlights the slow progress of Tesla's robotaxis If You Used Insider Knowledge to Score Big on Polymarket, You May Now Be in Huge Trouble Minnesota passes prediction markets ban LinkedIn doesn't want your AI slop anymore Spotify is launching verification badges for podcasts to help listeners avoid AI slop Zuckerberg Tells the Tattered Remainder of His Workers That He Won’t Conduct Another a Mass Firing for at Least Seven Months OpenAI is offering ChatGPT Plus to citizens of Malta for a year Massive Crypto ATM Company Bitcoin Depot Is Shutting Down as the Whole Industry Collapses ‘Smoke Weed and Earn Bitcoin’ With This Vape Pen in Our Increasingly Dystopian Nightmare ‘Unstoppable’ Crypto Exchange Halts Trading After $10 Million Theft Iran Doubles Down on Bitcoin for Ships Passing Through the Straight of Hormuz Trump-Linked Crypto Company Notes 'Substantial Doubt' It Can Survive Another 12 Months APPS & DOODADS Backblaze YouTube's AI deepfake detection tool is now available to all creators 18 and older X accounts are limited to 50 posts and 200 replies a day unless they pay for a blue checkmark Retrocodex MEDIA CANDY Good Omens Season 3 - The Finale The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan - David J of Bauhaus & Love & Rockets Common Sense 326 – The Water in Which We Swim THE DARK SIDE WITH DAVE Dave Bittner The CyberWire Hacking Humans Caveat Control Loop Only Malware in the Building Maul: Shadow Lord Rogue One: A Star Wars Story Not Even Baby Yoda Can Save ‘Star Wars’ Colorado man creates replica Millenium Falcon Someone made a Star Tours fan film. Bring Disneyland Home With This Gorgeous New Lego Set ‘Creepy’ Listening Tool for Targeted Ads Didn’t Actually Work, FTC Says Mechanical keyboard sim See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #746
    May 15 · 1 hr 19 min

    746: Reality is Frequently Inaccurate

    FOLLOW UP starts with merchandise promotion and YouTube begging reminiscent of 2007, before GameStop CEO Ryan Cohen gets thoroughly criticized by eBay after proposing a $56 billion takeover plan that eBay called “neither credible nor attractive,” which is corporate-speak for “please stop emailing us at 3 a.m.” Meanwhile, California residents might finally receive a small settlement check from Grubhub worth about half a burrito, just as Americans realize they dislike AI data centers even more than nuclear plants because nobody wants a warehouse full of GPUs boiling away the local water supply. Lake Tahoe residents are learning their electricity now goes to AI processing plants instead of people, xAI keeps adding methane turbines despite being sued over them, and SpaceXAI employees are fleeing Elon’s “sleep under your desk forever” lifestyle as if it were the last helicopter out of Saigon. IN THE NEWS, we start gently with the revelation that everyone at the Musk v. Altman trial is sitting on luxury butt cushions because apparently the singularity requires lumbar support, before plunging straight into the abyss: fake AI crypto journalists haunting Forbes and HuffPost like SEO poltergeists, OpenAI launching “Daybreak” so the robots can now secure the software they helped break, Anthropic trying to stop AI from becoming evil by feeding it morality fan fiction, and Google catching AI-generated zero-day exploits in the wild because cyberpunk novels were apparently instructional manuals. Waymo robotaxis are experimenting with driving into floodwaters, a family is suing OpenAI after ChatGPT allegedly advised their son to mix drugs with fatal results, graduating students booed an executive for praising AI as if she were announcing the arrival of cholera, and Meta continues its speedrun toward becoming the world’s largest scam mall while simultaneously demanding everyone trust its shiny new “encrypted AI chats.” Also: Meta is testing Grok-for-Threads, somebody created an AI poop-analysis startup that quietly sells your bowel movements to data brokers, GM got nailed for selling driver data, Lime still somehow exists and wants an IPO, and Japan’s first 3D-printed house shows that the future will at least look cool even as society collapses. MEDIA CANDY features Spotify celebrating twenty years of collecting your listening habits into a psychological profile you absolutely didn't care about during the CD era, plus The Punisher: One Last Kill ironically looking like unfinished PlayStation cutscenes, Good Omens Season 3, Devil May Cry Season 2, NBC somehow turning Wordle into a TV show because every executive has fully given up, shorter waits for Severance Season 3, and Rings of Power returning in November to continue spending the GDP of a small nation on elf misery. APPS & DOODADS checks in with Apple as it prepares Siri app integrations that developers already suspect will become subscription-based hostage situations. TikTok is testing an ad-free tier in the UK because, somehow, ads weren’t already enough punishment. Venmo is finally realizing that public payment feeds are insane. There's a Wikipedia clone made entirely of AI hallucinations, and an iPad arm mount sturdy enough to survive the upcoming climate wars. AT THE LIBRARY wraps up with Clowns (First Contact), Dungeon Crawler Carl, the demise of another Goodreads competitor, Kindle alternatives for those trying to escape Amazon’s panopticon, and a reminder that Douglas Adams has now been gone for 25 years, which remains, in the immortal words of the man himself, widely regarded as a bad move. Sponsors: DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. Shopify - Sign up for your one-dollar-per-month trial today at Shopify.com/grumpy CleanMyMac - Get Tidy Today! Try 7 days free and use code OLDGEEKS for 20% off at clnmy.com/OLDGEEKS Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/746 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/ICjNBnP3sMk FOLLOW UP Grumpy Old Geeks Merch Store Grumpy Old Geeks on YouTube eBay Brutally Rejects GameStop’s $56 Billion Proposal: ‘Neither Credible nor Attractive’ Wang et al. v. Grubhub, Inc. Americans Oppose AI Data Centers in Their Area Energy supplier abandons Lake Tahoe residents to serve data centers xAI Got Sued Over Its Gas Turbines, so It Naturally Added More of Them Elon Musk's SpaceXAI has been bleeding staff since its merger IN THE NEWS Everyone at the Musk v. Altman Trial Is Using Fancy Butt Cushions Four Financial Journalists Accused of Being Fake AI-Generated Puppets That Shill Crypto in Forbes, HuffPost, and More Daybreak is OpenAI's response to Anthropic's Claude Mythos Anthropic blames dystopian sci-fi for training AI models to act “evil” Google announces its first-ever discovery of a zero-day exploit made with AI Waymo Admits Its Robotaxis Have a Small Issue With Driving Into Floodwaters Family sues OpenAI, alleging ChatGPT advice led to accidental overdose Graduation Speaker Says AI Is ‘The Next Industrial Revolution,’ Immediately Drowned Out by Booing Students Meta is facing another lawsuit over scam ads on Facebook and Instagram After Killing Encrypted DMs, Mark Zuckerberg Wants You to Trust His New Encrypted AI Chat Hey @meta.ai is that true? Threads is testing a Grok-like AI feature Internet of Shit: AI Poop Analysis App Offered to Sell Me Database of Its Users' Poops GM agrees to pay $12.75 million to settle California lawsuit over misuse of customers' driving data The electric scooter rental company Lime has filed for IPO This startup built Japan’s first 3D-printed two-story home. It wants to solve the country’s construction crisis APPS & DOODADS Apple wants apps to integrate with Siri in iOS 27, but one fear holds some back: report TikTok is rolling out an ad-free option in the UK Venmo's redesigned app offers more discreet payments by default New Wikipedia Clone Made Entirely of AI Hallucinations YICOSUN iPad Mount Tablet Holder, 3-Section Foldable Adjustable Aluminum Alloy Arm with Rotating Clamp Base, Heavy Duty Desk Bracket for iPad Tablet Phone Portable Monitor, Bed Office Kitchen MEDIA CANDY Spotify is celebrating its 20th birthday with a Wrapped-like feature that covers your entire time on the app The Punisher: One Last Kill Here’s the Real Deal With That Viral Shot From 'Punisher: One Last Kill' Good Omens Season 3 - The Finale Devil May Cry Season 2 NBC is turning Wordle into a TV show Adam Scott Promises the Wait for ‘Severance’ Season 3 Won’t Be Nearly as Long ‘Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power’ Is Returning in November AT THE LIBRARY Clowns (First Contact) by Peter Cawdron Dungeon Crawler Carl by Matt Dinniman Tome, another Goodreads booktracker rival, shuts down Bookshop.org Kobo Smashwords eBooks.com Kobo E-readers ONYX BOOX The Ultimate Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy Omnibus CLOSING SHOUT-OUTS 'Revenge of the Nerds' Actor Donald Gibb Dead at 71 See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

  • #745
    May 8 · 1 hr 8 min

    745: Unwanted Senior Discount

    In FOLLOW UP, the guys marvel at the completely normal state of America as Amnesty International issues a travel advisory for the 2026 World Cup because apparently “visiting the United States” now comes with the same vibe as backpacking through a failed cyberpunk state. Then it’s onto Dead Podcast Theory, where more than a third of all new podcasts are AI-generated “podslop,” proving Silicon Valley heard “everyone has a podcast” and responded with “what if nobody did?” Meanwhile, Ticketmaster reminds everyone that if you’ve purchased a concert ticket since 2010, there’s probably a class action settlement with your name on it and enough compensation for half a convenience fee. IN THE NEWS is basically one long panic attack sponsored by AI. The White House is considering regulating AI models, Canada says OpenAI vacuumed up everyone’s personal data like a drunk Roomba, Character.AI allegedly impersonated a licensed psychiatrist, and Mother Jones found ChatGPT still happily helping aspiring mass shooters workshop their plans. Snap’s Perplexity deal died quietly in a ditch while Meta keeps assembling humanoid robots like it’s building the world’s most annoying version of Westworld. Then GameStop tries to buy eBay in the dumbest sentence ever typed, Ryan Cohen gets himself banned from eBay while trying to meme-finance the deal, Elon Musk settles with the SEC for pocket lint money, Coinbase fires people because “AI,” Toto accidentally becomes a semiconductor giant through toilet technology, and smart glasses officially evolve from creepy gadget to extortion accessory. MEDIA CANDY brings some relief with Daredevil: Born Again and Widow’s Bay. The Academy finally decides AI-generated actors and scripts can’t win Oscars, which feels like the bare minimum required to stop ChatGPT from getting Best Supporting Actor before Willem Dafoe. In APPS & DOODADS, Pornhub returns to the UK thanks to Apple’s age verification system, Ask.com finally dies and takes Jeeves with it into the great dial-up tone in the sky, and Apple agrees to pay users because “Apple Intelligence” arrived somewhere between vaporware and wishful thinking. Finally, THE DARK SIDE WITH DAVE tackles the true meaning of “decimate,” AI-powered C-3PO heads, mechanical keyboards for grown men who refuse to use laptop keys, Maul: Shadow Lord, The Boys, and a reminder that Solo was a great movie, grocery store adventures, lost AirPods, and the eternal mystery of why middle-aged dudes become furries. Because at this point, why not? Sponsors: DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout. Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month. SetApp - With a single monthly subscription you get 240+ apps for your Mac. Go to SetApp and get started today!!! 1Password - Get a great deal on the only password manager recommended by Grumpy Old Geeks! gog.show/1password Show notes at https://gog.show/745 Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/0P9rgRrL4-Q FOLLOW UP 2026 World Cup Travel Advisory More Than a Third of All New Podcasts Are AI-Generated Welcome to the Ticketmaster Fee Class Action Website IN THE NEWS The White House is considering tighter regulation of new AI models Canadian officials claim OpenAI violated federal and provincial privacy laws Pennsylvania sues Character.AI after a chatbot allegedly posed as a doctor Even After Two Massacres, OpenAI Still Hasn’t Stopped ChatGPT From Helping Plan School Shootings Snap's $400 million deal with Perplexity is dead Meta acquires robotics AI startup as it makes the push into humanoid machines GameStop submits $56 billion offer to buy eBay GameStop CEO Ryan Cohen Banned From eBay After Flexing His Meme-Stock Muscle Elon Musk settles with the SEC for $1.5 million after years-long dispute over his Twitter investment Coinbase to Lay Off 14% of Workforce Amid AI Disruption and Crypto Volatility Toilet maker Toto is here to help with the RAM crisis Extortion Using Smart Glasses Is a Thing Now MEDIA CANDY Daredevil: Born Again Widow’s Bay Fun item for media candy? AI performances and screenplays won't be eligible for Oscars APPS & DOODADS Pornhub Expands Access in the U.K. Thanks to Apple’s New Age Verification System Ask.com has shut down, marking the official farewell to the Internet's favorite butler iPhone users could get up to $95 per device as Apple reaches $250M settlement over Siri delays THE DARK SIDE WITH DAVE Dave Bittner The CyberWire Hacking Humans Caveat Control Loop Only Malware in the Building 'Decimate' means much more today than it did in ancient Rome This AI-Powered Talking C-3PO Head Lets You Feel What It’s Like to Be R2-D2 NuPhy Air75 V3 - Wireless Mechanical Keyboard Maul: Shadow Lord Solo: A Star Wars Story The Boys Why grown men become furries See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.

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