TechTV Scrapbook: Scott Herriott – DTNS 5306 Experiment Week

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2:07Hey everybody, Tom Merritt here. It is Experiment Week on DTNS. This is a yearly tradition where we take the show down during one of the slower times of the year for tech news, and we hand over the feed to folks to try out new podcast ideas. You're going to get to hear the very first episode of what could go on to become the next Tech John or Behind the Data. We're also running a special promotion for Experiment Week this year. If you're not already a DTNS patron and you'd like to give a little value back for the value you get from us, use the code EXPERIMENT and you'll get 26 % off your first pledge, monthly or yearly.

2:46That's 26 % off for 2026. Just use the code experiment at patreon.com slash DTNS. Now, on to today's experiment.

3:08Welcome to Tech TV Scrapbook, the podcast that talks to the people and personalities behind the operations who made the Tech TV network possible. I'm your host, Roger Chang, and today I have a special treat because I have the former host of Internet Tonight, Scott Harriet. Oh my God, this is a great show. Wow. I'll have to listen to this one. Let me ask you, before we get too far, just for people who aren't familiar with Internet Tonight, can you do like a two or three sentence description of what the show was about? Sure. It was because the web was relatively new. We started the show in 98. It ran, I think, for two and a half years.

3:48It was a way to present all these new things called websites to people, the fun, the informative, and just to let them know about them. And then hopefully this would help it grow. And it was a hell of a lot of fun. Now, what was your background before you started hosting that show? Were you doing TV before? Were you a producer? Were you a writer? I was, well, I was primarily a comic. I was a standup for 12 years. And I had actually hosted for a year on the Disney Channel in 94. There was a show called Walt Disney World Inside Out, which was a behind the scenes look at all the rides. That was a blast.

4:32Although Walt Disney Company is a little bit of a stickler for their what they want pushed. Anyway, did that for a year. And then I was working like I think it was CES, the consumer show in Vegas for I think Panasonic or somebody, you know, a hired gun. And Martha Feingold, who was the talent scout for then ZDTV, saw me and I don't know if I was interested in doing this. So I got flown up to San Francisco, auditioned. And then I think I came up again and auditioned again with Michaela. And then I got the gig and it was it was great. Good money, good people. The Bay Area, living in the Bay Area.

5:17Now, was the show already formulated at that point or were you brought in and then they just had a concept of what they wanted to do. but you were part of the team that sort of hammered out the actual, you know, the nuts and bolts of what internet tonight would be. Yeah. I think the latter, it was, they basically wanted that. And then, you know, Oh God, it's his, his Nate last name is, is evading me. Patrick, one of our producers and Ed, Ed Capuano was our main producer at the time and he worked at MTV. So they definitely wanted the sense of fun to it. And I definitely had kind of a daily show vibe that I wanted to bring to it.

5:53whereas Mikayla was kind of more morning show vibe and it was weird. Some people felt it worked, which I thought it did kind of, and then sometimes it didn't work because it was kind of a clash of styles, but it was just fun every day going in there, you know, scouring the web for news, any, any tech related stories, anything that would connect to the internet, new games. You would do interviews. We'd have people who were fans of the show. Shout out to Vinny Navarino. He sees this or hears this. Oh, yeah, I remember him. A lot of emails from him. Yeah. And, yeah, it was just really fun. It was a unique show.

6:33There really hadn't been any show like that, I think. And it was a nightly show, Monday through Friday. It was an hour, right? Yeah. Yeah, it definitely added sort of a less sort of hard tech feel to the channel, which I think they wanted sort of a well-rounded network. Yeah. Were there ideas that the team had originally envisioned that didn't make it, or they were done in sporadic, like maybe just a segment here or there? Or was the initial vibe like what you were saying, it just all sort of worked out that way? Yeah, I would say the basic vibe they were going for remained, and then it just, and then we would just have fun with it.

7:21I mean, like one, I don't, I think he was there at the beginning because it was, he was a ZD character, was a surf guru, Ed Marquez, which was one of my favorite parts of just being part of the show because Ed's like a comedic genius. And anytime he would come on and I'd play, his stuff would be prerecorded. We would play off what he would say. You know, he was the, he was the security guard. Oh yeah. wasting time at night checking out websites. So he would, you would pass on some information, but it was so funny and so improvisational that, so it was basically, yeah, I think the basic idea stuck and we just kind of went in different ways with specifics about it.

8:04Now you mentioned Michaela. Now I remember when the show first launched, Michaela wasn't there. Was that just due to the logistics of getting her onto the show? and they just needed to get started. Yeah, it was. She's Canadian. And there was some kind of green card snafu. So I don't know how long it was. Was it a month or two where I did the show solo? And then they finally got that worked out. And then she came in and then we co-hosted together. So, yeah. That's how it works. Yeah, go ahead. Oh, no, I was just wondering, like, did you know her? Like, did you talk to her at length or interact with her before she was a regular presence on the show?

8:47No, no. In fact, as I mentioned, I actually I think I came up for the two two interviews, like little demo tests. And she was in the second one. So I think they liked the pairing. And then the issue of the whole green card thing came to light. I think it's green. It's just something that was hard to get her from Canada into the U.S. as far as working. I mean, she could come here. Oh, okay, yeah. You need a specific visa. That's probably what it was. Not green card. I make it sound like she's smuggling drugs across the border. No, it's... She did that early in her life. The American immigration system is a Byzantine labyrinth, I have been told, by family members as well as very close friends who immigrated to this country from all over the world, not just one particular place.

9:42So no, kudos. Now, when you did the show, how much of it was your writing? Like, did you write your stuff? And then Michaela wrote her stuff. And then you had a supervising producer who said, OK, this works. Well, as I remember, we had a really good writer. George Crow was one of our writers. Oh, yeah. English. She wrote, and then I'm sure I'm forgetting, maybe Dave Lockhart wrote a little bit. So it was basically they would write the nuts and the bolts of the story. And then we'd look at him and then I would tweak it, maybe add a joke here or there. George is pretty funny. We keep in kind of fairly irregular contact on Facebook.

10:22We were in a Yahoo football league together for years, but we had similar comedic sensibility. So it was basically those stories we'd written come to us and then tweak it how we want to say it. What did the typical production day involve? Like, did you guys just spend the morning like looking for stories like, oh, this looks really funny. This would be perfect. Or did you, you know, do that ahead of time at the beginning of the week and just have a bunch of stories and then you just sort of, you know, worked it out for the rest of the week? Well, besides the drinking and the streaking, it was big.

10:54No, there was none of that, obviously. And And we would have each day there would be pitches. So Flaherty, that's who it is. Patrick Flaherty. Oh, yeah, Flaherty. Yeah, Flaherty. He was one of our producers as well. As the show went on, he became more of the regular producer. And there'd be pitches. So I always thought he did a good job of like, well, what would be relevant or more important to do today? And maybe we'll save this one for Wednesday enough to fill the time we had to fill. So, yeah, it was each day. And I remember we'd meet. It was always fun. A lot of joking around. Ideas for segments would come and go.

11:39I remember it was really intense at first because this was my first. I mean, I did the Disney show for a year, but that was relatively relaxed compared to this because this was, you know, live to tape every day, getting everything honed down. So it was a little intense at first, but overall loved it and grateful for the experience. Now, was there any content or when I mean content, I mean websites or topics that were like, you know, we don't go there. You know, for example, obviously adult like stuff would be a no-go, but any other like politics, religion? You know, it's funny. The only example I can remember is I think George edited or maybe he went in the field as the producer.

12:27And we shot a and I wasn't involved with it. He shot it about it was a it was a website showing how to have your cat go to the bathroom using a human toilet. And I thought it was a pretty good piece. But I remember what was his name? Larry, Larry Wangberg. oh yeah he did not like that he thought that's just not the kind of high grade content we're gonna have so i remember george coming to me because he had heard about that but yeah apart from porn or ultra violent stuff we had pretty good leeway to talk about anything so like chupacabra or like oh yeah well you know i mean i love all that stuff any mysteries big I don't know how much Bigfoot stuff I pushed to get on the show.

13:18I mean, I want to get a plug in here. Squatchfilms.com. I made a movie called Unverified. It's a scripted film. Check it out. Anyway, yeah, it was just fun. Because, again, like I said, the web was just starting to really flower. I mean, it had really kind of been around, what, since like 94? And 94, 95-ish. Yeah. And then here comes the 98 we start the show. more and more people are using it. So it was, it was just fun. It's, I mean, not just in sharing it, but discovering stuff yourself, you know, checking out other sites that were promoting other sites and then say, Oh, that is cool. What's that?

14:01And, you know, Did you, did you guys ever come across where someone would submit like a fan or like via email where a viewer would say, Hey, you guys should really check out my site or you should really check out what these guys are doing. You know, you just get like suggestions from, from, yeah, I'm sure. I don't remember any specific examples, but one website that I am remembering that I think we did highlight, because I liked it because it was so stupid, but, but it was brilliantly stupid. And maybe you can remember the zombo.com. And I don't know if it's still going. I have no, I haven't checked it in years, but it literally, you would go there and there would be that these five bits of color would be good.

14:48And all it would just use this voice go, welcome to Zombo.com. Relive the experience that is Zombo.com. And that's all. It just kept repeating that. It was so ridiculous. I actually ordered a shirt of Zombo.com. I love that absurdist, minimalist efforts done like that. I thought it was great. Is it there? Yeah. Yeah, so the Wikipedia has an entry on it, and it says that it was a single-serving site created in 1999 by Joshua Levine. The site parodies Flash introductory web pages that play while the rest of the site loads the content. Zombo took the concept to a humorous extreme, consisting of one long introductory page that leads to an invitation to sign up for a newsletter.

15:37The site was initially Flash Animation, but switched to HTML5. Yeah, you could visit it on the Wayback Machine if you so desire over at HTML5.com. I think I might still somewhere in a closet have my Zombo.com t-shirt. Yeah, you know, that's one of those things that was very zeitgeisty, but 20 years later, you would be hard-pressed to find someone who remembers it because, let's be honest, both you and I have aged in that time. True. Generationally. Okay, yes. Our tastes have probably seen more like the way I used to view people when they talked about Buddy Holly and the Beatles when I was in high school.

16:24Yeah, yeah. Yeah. And we're I think we are so I know personally and I think the culture generally is so much more invested in the Web as an information source. We do it. I mean, we're just as part of our lives. You walk down the street, every kid up till 27, his head is tilted looking at his phone and not it, which is good and bad, I think. I mean, this is part of our culture now. And overall, I still think it's awesome. I'm still amazed about the internet having grown up in the sixties when we had basically six TV channels, the nightly news and all this. And now the explosion of the different forms of media is still, I wouldn't say overwhelming to me, but I still find it basically really cool.

17:11So do you do you did you notice a shift away from, you know, let's say the 60s, 70s, all the way up through the 90s? It was possible to have a sort of a broad based pop culture, right? People could name like J.R. Ewing got shot on Dallas or, you know, their moments like, oh, did you see Miss America? And they had the one contestant from South Carolina who didn't know how to answer the question. Like there's all these things, but now we're at the point where the disintermediation of pop of information also applies to pop culture content. So even if you are like into music, you're into television or movies, there's so many, so many.

17:54It's hard. You would be it's an inhuman task to try to keep track of everything. Yeah, it's again, it's the it's the the good and bad of it. I mean, just think in a single day, how many, I mean, you get locked into watching Instagram reels. Oh, that's cool because the algorithm knows what I like. And I don't mind that, by the way. I'm not an anti-algorithm guy because I still believe ultimately we have choice. We're not, I mean, yes, they want to manipulate you, but you still can choose to look at stuff. And most of the stuff I like. So how can I complain that I'm, you know, other than it's distracting for me editing one of my docs or something.

18:34but oh yeah it's just I mean what's the next stage dude I mean when are we going to when are we going to start wearing headgear you know like like with like the Ray-Ban meta oh yeah like the meta Oakleys where it's just like constant I have a feeling that we're approaching a point a threshold a watershed moment where people are going to do you're going to have that big movement of going back like we're going to just tune out we're going to turn on we're just you know like what was it in the 60s and 70s tune in or turn tune out uh drop out or something drop out turn on drop out yeah whatever yeah and like like but basically just disengage from it because yeah you know that's that's what people are so used to and they want something different i find it very very interesting that my kids have lived in a time where the internet has always been here for them.

19:28It's always been around all the TikToks, the reels, you know, all of it has always been here. And for me, I've, you know, as well as you, we've watched it progress. And I've been wondering if Internet Tonight was created today, if you were still in the show, what would you do differently? Would you be covering different things? It wouldn't just be websites. Would it be like, you know, hey, did you see this new meme? Did you see this? Yeah, exactly. I think it would be, I mean, I'm constantly amazed at the good quality of using Instagram as an example. I mean, can I honestly say that as day goes by where I don't see a frigging pet video that isn't awesome or the editing or even with AI now, even though you can tell it's AI, it's just the explosion of creativity.

20:21is crazy. So I think it would be like if you had the morning meeting like we had an internet tonight, it would be various reels people saw. We got to show this. We got to, you know, and I don't know, would you need permission to show a reel like on a TV channel? It's such a toss-up because when it becomes a big news story, you have the defense that it's a news item and then you're covering it. You know, it's, it's, it's one of those editorial landmines that I've never been able to figure out. Well, like one example just now, I mean, I don't know how much of a sports fan you are, but I mean, the whole thing about the Knicks game the other night where the Knicks came back from 29 points, biggest comeback in NBA finals history.

21:10And after the game is, well, there's two, there were two, one controversial and one really cool Chalamet, who's a big Knicks fan is walking off and somebody's like, yeah. And he, and he relates to the crowd and he just starts like jamming with the crowd. He takes his shirt off. He's mimicking some, almost like a, like a, some kind of dance. It was great. It was just this joy. And then he grabs and runs off. It was really funny. Now, on the other hand, the controversial one, which I don't even know if it's in the news today, but somebody was talking to Jerry Seinfeld as he walks out. and it was somebody who was for like pro-Palestinian and he goes hey Jerry how do you why don't you say something free Palestine and and he kind of laughs and says it doesn't exist says Palestine doesn't exist and he kept walking I thought whoa and then my girlfriend and I had a big debate was that AI did somebody and I saw that and I think he kind of meant it he was trying to be somewhat humorous about it but i think that would be that kind of stuff a show like internet tonight would show because we would talk about it did it seem i mean you talked about the daily show like the the daily show do you think it would have sort of morphed into what the daily show is today where there is not just showing stuff but it's commentary there's like sort of a discussion about for example what you mentioned with jerry seinfeld and shalming yeah yeah i i would i would hope so that would be a good evolution not not going probably fully comedic as daily show but having a mix yeah i mean it's it's it's such a hard thing to do because in this environment right you know we we have terms for it right now right we have clickbait we have rage bait we have things that we know set people off, but setting people off pulls in the eyeballs.

23:06And you got to juggle between at least a sense of self-responsibility about what's our role in all of this, and then what's the role to the people that we work for in order to increase revenue, increase market share, increase mind share, and all that. I would argue it's the same thing in every aspect of life balance it always comes back did the buddha teach us nothing roger come on i mean it's it's it's a very interesting aspect through line but you know he did really not want uh his philosophy to be cambered out into a religion which yeah yeah exactly exactly because it's yeah it um i i just think it it it's amazing to me in discussions how it always comes back now again there are still some extreme things done by, again, someone who won't be named that you just, it's hard to, you know, sometimes hard to find any kind of silver lining in since so much BS is involved with it.

24:12But I still think you have to come at it ultimately with a sense of heart as well as your head as well, you know, critically analyzing it and then make fun of it. You know, Yeah, there's a great saying, you know, you know, dictators don't stand up well to comedic scrutiny. It's the only really, I think, just way, because if you just get angry at them, it usually intensifies them. And then if you ignore them, then you're being kind of a wimp. So I feel like humor is such a great I like to an analogy would be like it's like a it's like a boxing glove, but it's really soft. It can be soft. It can be a little hard.

24:53You're still delivering. a counter to that, but it's still padded. This episode is brought to you by Capital One. Capital One's tech team isn't just talking about multi-agentic AI. They already deployed one. It's called Chat Concierge and it's simplifying car shopping. Using self-reflection and layered reasoning with live API checks, it doesn't just help buyers find a car they love. It helps schedule a test drive, get pre-approved for financing, and estimate trade-in value. advanced intuitive and deployed that's how they stack that's technology at capital one hey it's page from giggly squad and i want to let you know that if you want the newest and hottest beauty products you have to go to sephora i'm obsessed with the one size liquid blotting paper spray it's the first of its kind blotting spray that mattifies for up to eight hours it's unreal there's also the summer friday shade drops spf 50 which basically lives in my bag at this point Oh, and the Kayali Eden plush pear smells so good.

25:54It's sweet, warm, and addictive. Like, people literally stop me and ask what perfume I'm wearing, which you know I love. So if you want the makeup, skincare, hair, and fragrance products everyone's about to be obsessed with, shop only at Sephora. Your team just added its 67th AI tool and also your 67th security blind spot. The good news? The Vanta agent works like a GRC engineer in the background. Finding every app your team uses, scoring the risk, and drafting fixes for you. Vanta is the platform used by over 16 ,000 fast-moving companies like Ramp, Cursor, and Harvey, who are shaping the future with AI and staying ahead of AI risk.

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27:37That's deep, man. That is deep. I mean, it's a boxing glove with no weight. um now like internet tonight was one of the shows that after paul allen bought uh zd tv that went away how did you take that transition and were you in discussions with the network because i knew i remember them distinctly saying they didn't want to actually let you go because they felt you were too much of a personality to the viewers to the audience that it would be a loss if they did. I'll tell you, man, I was very grateful that they kept me on. They kept me on for, I think, about a year. Same salary, which was nice.

28:19Yeah, Paul met him once. I'm half convinced he was a cyborg. I think when he bought the channel, when it went from ZDTV to TechTV, you remember he had the big dream. He wanted to have like eight hours of programming during the day like it was CNBC. and it was like we all kind of knew that it isn't going to work dude people aren't it's too boring you gotta so um i understand why from his mindset when he looked at internet tonight oh no we got to get rid of that to make room for more of this eight hours of relatively dull tech talk but on But at the same time, I think most of us working on Internet tonight kind of felt we'd kind of reached the end of that journey.

29:10Two and a half years is pretty intense doing that show. And unless there had been some big evolutionary proposal put forth, kind of like what we were talking about before, it was going to go in this direction a little more than. Yeah. But it was fun, you know, coming on the screensavers. I don't know how often, you know, once or twice a week. And then when we did, you and I did those house calls. Honest to God, dude, that's one of my favorite memories of my whole time at Tech. It's one of the best moments. So fun. A great idea. And, you know, I think we have to thank Paul Block for promoting that because he came, he had worked with Johnny Carson, and he understood the, I think, the importance of having humor with the information.

29:55And I think we were a good pairing. You're the tech guy. You're the smart guy. I am the idiot tagging along with you going through people's drawers while you're setting up their Wi-Fi. It was one of the more like, yeah, I don't think anyone would be able to do that show again in the same way. Yeah. Just because so much has changed. But you did work on Screensavers with me as well as some of the other producers. But you also worked in Call for Help. and you weren't you did or did you not anchor one of the um the i forgot what the news thing was called oh i started and then they dropped because here's what happened there was a guy and he was a good and i thought we he he was from texas he was what he was there for a while when the when the when the changeover happened and they paired me with him and i thought this guy's going to be going to be good because i can do the the so not the solo flex the um he chris chris something maybe and he'd like he had experience i think doing local news and he was a good news anchor so i think i thought it could work or i'd be the drier more comedic guy but what happened was i would make jokes he would laugh he would just start laughing and it like it was too giggly.

31:17I mean, the thing is with, with, with Michaela, she, I think finally to a degree got used to me if I'd make some just, cause again, my style was super dry. I would just say some obviously incorrect line or intended comedic line. And then she would just go and do her thing and it could work when it was working that way. But I remember with that guy, he just, he couldn't stop laughing with, I mean, you know, it's always great to make people laugh. but I understood that it wasn't going to work. I think they wanted me to be a little more serious than I was willing to be. I'm not a good – I'd be horrible like on a morning show or just a straight newscast.

32:00I just – I find it too – Contraining. You know, it's a little too – You don't want to wear the blazer and then just like shorts and like sneakers? Yeah. No, I would do – I don't know if you remember this, right? There was a time we and we and this is a guy, I don't know. We didn't get in trouble on it, but we did. Remember, we'd have the final shot of of Internet tonight. And it would be, you know, me just jilly dallying on the computer. And I don't know if there was some mention in the show, but I. There was a joke, something about a diaper. But anyway, so at the end of the show, I just got up and I went on and I'm wearing this huge diaper and I walk off set.

32:41And it's just a subtle little thing that was not like it's not a zoom in. But if you were watching the credits, you'd go, what the hell is he? What is that? He's wearing a diaper? And we thought it was funny. We didn't get any shit about it. That's good because you're wearing a diaper. I'm wearing a diaper. Exactly. Let me ask you, was it Chris Leary that you were paired with? I don't remember. I don't remember the name. I just remember he was a really cool. He was a younger guy. He flew a plane. He also used to do, like, he had a radio Disney gig that he would do on the weekends. I know. That's not ringing a bell.

33:15No, it was not him. Chris up here. Oh yeah. Wow. No, it was not, man. He would have been cool to work with. I think we could have, I've seen him on other stuff and he has, he has a little bit of that. He looks like Ryan Reynolds, not quite his handsome brother. Look to him or he could be related. All the genes went to, to, yeah, no, not all of them. But anyway, yeah, Chris Leary would have been great. So Chris, so Chris, that was probably then I'm going to guess, cause I'm not remembering him there. They kept me on for a year. And then when was it black Monday or was that a black Friday when they had the big let go and I was one of the ones that were let go.

33:58Um, I think he came in afterwards because I think I would have remembered that guy being there. Yeah, it was, I remember there was Chris Leary and a bunch of others that, that came in. Um, it was, it was a very interesting time i mean you know when the when the network closed up shop in 2004 i decided not to go down because obviously the money wasn't really any better when i was ready making and i found a job at cnet uh so it worked out for me to stay in the bay area but were there any moments at while you were there while you were working that really stand out to you that just sort of like when you think when someone says tech tv or internet tonight or like you know leo laporte or something just that image pops in your head immediately well you know for that leo was always great i mean he was the star of the network he was great he had that combo of tech savviness and he had a really cool personality could be moderately funny moderately funny and um so he was great you know it's really one of those it's kind of the whole thing was really cool not I mentioned before one really, I mean, to me, I was honored to have been on a show that had Ed.

35:17Ed is surf guru. I just blanked on his last name. Ed Marquez, Ed Marquez, who had been on MTV before, because when I would watch his segments, I go, he is like a genius. I made a documentary shortly thereafter called Squatching available at Squatchfilms.com where he came up, we went big footing together and he just did more of his funny magic. And, you know, it was really the people, everybody was really cool. It was just, and living in the Bay area. Dude, that was, that was awesome. I know. I remember. Yeah, go ahead. Oh no, I was about to say you were a regular visitor to Mount Tomopayas, right?

35:55I remember you did a lot of camping. Yeah, because I lived in Tiburon. Everybody always told me, oh, Tiburon's way too expensive. And I went over there and it was like running an apartment there was no higher than being in the city. And I can always write off when I had to come across the bridge each day. I could write that off. Right. And Marin is so awesome. I mean, it's so nature-y and I love that stuff. So it was cool. Had a view of the city and Angel Island and couldn't see the bridge. but I mean, it was great. Yeah. Did you, so I mentioned to, so I've done a couple of these and I've talked to the, the other people like Kate Patello and Adam Sussler, you know, there was a lot of like camaraderie, but there was also a lot of off our co-mingling with, you know, with, with your, with your colleagues and your coworkers, because at least in my age bracket, a lot of the people I worked with, I went to school with.

36:54So it was just very natural to hang out, to go to parties, to do events with those same groups of people. Did you have the same experience? You know what? I was relative to that. No, because I had a girlfriend at the time who lived with me, Becky Pettigo, and she was a comic as well. That's how we met doing standup. So she would do gigs in the city. And it was just like, I mean, I'm kind of a lone wolf anyway. I mean, I'm not a big group guy. I just, maybe my ego is too big. I have to like, I can't stand other people. I don't know. I feel uncomfortable around a lot of people for too long a time.

37:30So, but I got that dose of that social interaction coming to work, the morning meeting, going through the show rundown, actually taping the show. So it was nice to do all that, go home and see my girlfriend and come back to it the next day. And so there wasn't a lot, but I mean, like I said, I liked everybody. Everybody was really cool. And we've had some people gone on, done some great. Erica Hill, now at CNN, she was always cool. It's kind of weird to see the trajectory of some of the people we've worked with. Yeah. And then, yeah, Dave Yount, who was our, I think he was the floor director. Floor director.

38:13Floor director. Internet tonight. Him and Erica got married. They have kids, live in New York. And I understand he doesn't do anything. He just rakes in the bucks from her. That's really sad, Dave. Anyway, no, I'm sure he's doing stuff. They were a great match. And I remember when she hosted kind of what would be considered a podcast back then, when she was 22, Erica. And I remember when she was interviewing me, I told her on the – I said, look at you. You're 22. You're going to be like an NBC anchor someday. It's close. Close. she's you got the end part and she got i got the end part she was at cbs for a while and she just you know smarts and brains and looks hard to go wrong do you do you get recognized from time to time from people's like hey i remember you from dude i'll tell you apart from i think back back in the day while doing the show there was like one or two no there were people who would come up at We went and did some trade show stories.

39:17But apart from that, literally one person in 20. So sad. My life helped me. One person in 24 years and it was two years ago. I do this annual raffle for this hiker get together up in Cascade Locks on the Columbia River for the Pacific Crest Trail Days. I go up there and see buddies because I've done a lot of these hiking documentaries since Tech TV. and I'm doing my shtick. And then afterwards, this guy walks up with his girlfriend. Hey, were you on a show called Internet Tonight? I swear to God, I think I hugged the guy. Thank you. Somebody, I made an impact on somebody who would remember me.

39:58And then he said, I hated that show. No, he didn't say that. But that was literally once. I mean, so maybe people have recognized me, but they were just, they knew it was probably not wise to approach me since I hate people. Do you keep copies of episodes of Internet Tonight? No. You know what? Probably on somewhere buried on some VHSs. I've looked up some stuff that's been on YouTube. But I would love to see old ones, especially with the Surf Guru or just, yeah, a full episode. I don't think I've seen a full episode of that show in years. Do you have any copies? i i have screensavers and call for help and i have our i have some of our house calls together i like the one we did with ed mcmahon the one we did that was great sheila e um and then there was one other didn't we do one no i didn't get that one it was the uh oh no i did the one with uh what's his name uh will wheaton oh that was a great one he was really cool yeah that was Yeah, that was a lot of fun.

41:10Remember, it was weird about we did the Ed McMahon one. This was a weird coincidence. We show up, and one of my dad's best friends was there, who's an accountant. Turns out to be Ed McMahon's accountant, was there at the show. I thought that was so bizarre. And Ed McMahon was hilarious. I mean, he was just... Oh, yeah. Do you keep in touch with any of your former internet? You're in, Roger. That's it. No. On any regular basis, no. I would say, George, you and I are Facebook friends. George Crow is a Facebook friend. Sarah Lane is a Facebook friend. I don't think we've actually had any interaction.

41:48We should bring you on DTNS, the Daily Tech News Show Live. We do it every Thursday. I'd love to. It'd be great. I mean, if you had time. Sure. We'd probably force you to get like a microphone or something. I have one somewhere here. I figured this would be good enough. This is good right now. But like when we, because there's like six of us. Ah, yeah. But like, so it's weird because like I keep, I used to keep pretty tight touch with Alison Pickard. Remember she used to be your PA or AP? I used to keep in touch with her and a few others. But, you know, with time, everyone has, you know, lives move apart.

42:34I know there's a semi-regular ZDTV Tech TV gathering in the Bay Area. If they did one down in LA, would you attend? Oh, yeah. If it was in LA, I would definitely go. Absolutely. Guarantee it. Unless I'm hiking in the High Sierra. That's what I do now. I'm trying to give myself a heart attack at my age. But yeah, I would love to do that. So let me ask you this. What are you doing now? I know you were or still are a very big, you know, Sasquatch sort of like, you know, proto-anthropomorphic creature. Cryptozoologically interested. Listen, this is the thing. I love it because when I was in college, I was super on the cryptozoology train.

43:23Cool. Like I would just constantly have all of the, like, oh, if the coelacanth is real, well, obviously something else. Ah, see? Right there, dude. That proves it.

43:36Bumble. I'm actually what I'm doing right now. I've been since tech TV. You know, I ended up doing like a few stories for CNN. Remember David Borman. Oh, yeah. Me and did. We did like five stories. I auditioned to have a regular spot. They said they didn't have the budget. I think they didn't want. They didn't want me. Probably too comedic for Aaron Brown show at the time. But I've basically been doing my own documentaries. Again, I mentioned SquatchFilms.com. I've shot like, I don't know, 16, a lot of it with long trails, like the Pacific Crest Trail, Appalachian Trail. I've gone to Australia and Iceland and Spain to the Camino de Santiago.

44:22and super rewarding. I mean, and the fact that you meet all these people. I love the aspect of going out with a camera and you don't know who the hell you're going to meet. And then you ask these other people, what are you doing at, why are you doing this? And you just get the craziest stories and you get in shape at the same time. So it's hard to beat that. And then like five years ago, I made a scripted film, which is available on Amazon and my website called Unverified, where yes, myself, Scott Harriet, I'm in it as a guy who, believe it or not, is into Bigfoot. And I want to prove that he exists, but I don't want to kill one.

44:59So that's my dilemma. And then there's other people involved in the story who do want to, they want to go the typical scientific, well, we have to kill a specimen. So there's that debate. And I think it's pretty good. Honestly, am I upset it wasn't up for Oscars? No, but I think it's pretty good. It's tight, 75 minutes, shot well. I'm Mark David, great cinematographer. And currently, boy, I bet you didn't expect this answer to be long, is I just got back from Patagonia two months ago with two hiking buddies. And I shot a doc down there, and I'm editing in kind of in the – about a month to go, should finish that up.

45:37And that will be available on my site and hopefully on Amazon, although Amazon's changed their policy. Do they allow to sell dogs? They've gotten more corporate and like individual. I might, because I have my older films are still on there. Like the four. So these are just hiking documentaries. These aren't all I'm, I'm on the hunt for, for Sasquatch. No. Yeah. No, no, no, no. The majority of them are hiking related, doing long trails. Like the PCT is 2 ,650. So I ended up doing four films on that. That wasn't the goal, but I had so much fun out there. And the people out there are so adventurous and funny and smart.

46:18And the stories, the wildlife stories, the why they're out there, just the beauty of nature. It was just such a combination of good things. I like doing it. And plus, I just do a shout out here. You remember Mark DeVito, remember? He was the lead editor, right? Yeah. He was really the one who, because at the time I was leaving, 2001, 2002, that's when the kind of digital film revolution was starting, that you could buy a laptop, you could buy a mini DV camera, and you could get Final Cut Pro software. At the time, that was like seven grand, eight grand. But you could literally, if you taught yourself, you could shoot and make pretty good documentaries.

47:06And so I was inspired by that. Again, strong independence streak here, sometimes to my detriment. But that was great. That's basically what I've done. I shot one called Squatching. Then I ended up doing four on the PCT. I did three documentaries on the Appalachian Trail and then went to Spain. And like I mentioned, Iceland and Ireland. Shot one over there. And they can all be found. I don't know if I mentioned this, Roger, at SquatchFilms.com. And they're really cheap. Is that your website? That is my website, SquatchFilms.com. Oh, awesome. Yeah. It, yeah. And I'm still, you know, I'm 94. So I just, no, I'm not.

47:49My folks are 94. But, yeah, I love doing it. But if Tech TV ever revamped again, I'd do it as long as they could wheel me in each day. um is there anything that you think you've learned career-wise or at least just from your time working at tech tv zd tv like things that you've learned them and you've just taken with you throughout your life like for me just not just the technical aspects but understanding how to navigate corporate politics or at least the inner office politics yeah well Well, as I mentioned, I worked for Disney four years before I got the tech TV gig. And working with tech TV was like a frigging cakewalk compared to working for Disney.

48:40The production company and myself definitely had a more Letterman-esque vibe. And the show we did for a year was probably one of the most sarcastically tinted shows that the Disney Channel ever did. In fact, to the point, after we did one year, they canned the production company and they canned me and they just basically made it into an infomercial that George Foreman hosted. It was just to me, it was just terrible. Look at this fabulous ride. It's a you know, whereas with us, we can have fun with it. They're getting the promotion, but we don't feel like we're whoring ourselves by doing this hard sell stuff.

49:19So when I came to tech TV and you had guys like Greg Dreven who were in there who worked with MTV and Ed Capone, I knew or I felt there was going to be a looser attitude that creativity was going to be appreciated there more than, let's say, Disney. Although I had a good time at Disney. Not saying it was bad. Just those are available, by the way, if you look at it on YouTube. Look at Walt Disney World Inside Out 1994. 94. And so what I learned, what I learned, maybe you, I think what's most important for any individual is you gotta, you gotta do what you love. Don't, I would recommend to people, don't do something primarily for the money.

50:02Roger Ebert once said it great. He goes, if you, if you get$30 ,000 for something you love versus a hundred thousand dollars for something that you kind of like, do the$30 ,000 job, because that's going to probably end up getting you to a happier place than feeling like you're just taking dough in to, you know, and so obviously coupled with that, minimize your material needs. I mean, I just, so it affords me a certain freedom to do the things that I really like. Now, one last thing, on the other hand, thank God while I was at Tech TV that I loaded up on the 401k that was available to me. I took that maximum each year I was there.

50:45And so now 28 years later, you know, I can kind of live off that as a result. So again, it's balance, right? It's, I mean, I, I, I am not one to scoff at planning and managing your future. Scott, are there any other things you would like to promote besides Squatch films? uh uh gosh for love and understanding and and um i won't say that i've already nailed him enough during this thing um no just uh no anybody who watched the show i hope you i hope you enjoyed uh internet tonight and i hope i i uh did a relatively good job and uh keep reaching for the stars. Casey Kasem said that. It's still applicable today.

51:41He said, keep your feet on the ground, but keep reaching for the stars. And no one under the age of 40, I think, would know who Casey Kasem is. Just like Dick Clark. Dick Clark managed two and a half generations of recognition. And then with the latter half of the millennials, I don't think he had any cultural relevancy. Something the millennials, I think, will like, though, if you go out, I think it's on YouTube somewhere, is a Casey Kasem swear reel where he goes off on an engineer. Oh, yeah. Oh, my God. It's classic. It's like It's right up there with the Orson Welles drunk video that they have online.

52:27Oh, I haven't seen that one. Wait a minute. See, that's the one where he did that bottled wine. Oh, Gallo. gallo and he's like totally he's totally sauced in it and it's just the most hilarious thing ever good good i'm writing this down wait a minute uh wells gallo i assume on youtube yeah this is it's it's where the world goes to watch video apparently exactly all right scott i'd like to thank you for being on the show today and taking time out of your scheduled to be this informative and this open about your history over at Tech TV Screensavers. That's it for this episode. If you have any questions or comments about this or any other episode, email me at feedback at dailytechnewsshow.com.

53:15And until next time, I'll see you on the next episode of Tech TV Scrapbook.

53:23The DTNS family of podcasts, helping each other understand. Diamond Club hopes you have enjoyed this broker.

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