753: No-Talent AI Clowns

14:46Brian Schulmeister:So, you know, it's just one of those things that I'm just I'm I'm I'm racking up these things in case, just in case, because, you know, we're fucking podcasters. Come on. This is there's no guarantee that there will be an audience next week.

14:59Jason DeFillippo:I know. And even our rage baiting social media posts are not getting us more listeners.

15:03Brian Schulmeister:So, you know, I tell you, man, I tell you what the fuck. This episode is sponsored by Storyblocks. If you've been listening to Grumpy Old Geeks for any length of time, you know, we're constantly producing content between the show, clips, social posts. and all the other projects we work on, we need assets that are high quality, legally cleared, and ready to drop into a project without wasting half the day. That's why we keep coming back to Storyblocks. Storyblocks is a 100 % human-made stock media library built for creators. Every asset comes from real filmmakers and artists, not AI-generated content, and everything is professionally curated, pre-licensed, and ready to use.

15:47Brian Schulmeister:I can grab footage, music, sound effects, templates, or images without worrying about licensing headaches. And unlimited downloads mean I can experiment until I find exactly what works. They've also built tools that speed up the workflow even more, like AI-powered search and editing features that help you customize content while still supporting the artists who created the original assets. Head to storyblocks.com slash GOG to access the human-made stock media library that's essential to our workflow. For a limited time, they're offering 15 % off any annual plan, and that discount is only available through our link.

16:25Brian Schulmeister:Again, that's storyblocks.com slash GOG for 15 % off annual plans.

16:32Jason DeFillippo:Well, Tesla has settled yet another lawsuit that involves a death related to one of its driver assistance systems. is first reported by Bloomberg. The lawsuit, which revolves around the death of 71-year-old Joanna Story in Arizona, has been resolved, but terms of the settlement weren't disclosed. Story's family filed a lawsuit against Tesla in 2023 following an incident where the grandmother stepped out of her car to direct traffic around a separate collision that was caused by sun glare. She was then hit and killed by a Model Y that was using full self-driving. Notably, this case was the first reported incident of a pedestrian fatality related to Tesla's automated driving technology.

17:07Jason DeFillippo:Besides the lawsuit, the crash led to a federal investigation from the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, which examined how full self-driving operates in poor visibility conditions. Not well, as we know.

17:20Brian Schulmeister:Yep, no LiDAR. Come on. Illinois has become the latest battleground in the fight over prediction markets after the state passed a law treating platforms like CalSHE as unlicensed sports betting operators. Starting July 1st, Illinois would require licenses costing up to$15 million in imposed new taxes on sports event contracts. Well, Calci sued, arguing its markets are federally regulated financial derivatives overseen exclusively by the CFTC, not gambling subject to state rules. We talked about this ad nauseum. The broader dispute hinges on whether betting on the outcome of a game is really a financial hedge or just sports gambling with a different legal wrapper.

18:02Brian Schulmeister:More than 40 states have sided against Calci, while the CFTC is pushing for broader federal authority and accepting public comments through July 27th. Well, so maybe, Brian, your Final Fantasy League can file for SEC approval. I just love it.

18:16Jason DeFillippo:It's a bet. You're betting. It's so ridiculous to call it not a bet. Unbelievable. Anyways, as I've mentioned a couple times, I have been watching a ton of World Cup. I've tried to catch as many games as I can, so the TV is at least on in the background, even if I'm not actively sitting there and watching the game so I can see it. And I can tell you I have used a pirate stick to enjoy some of the U.S. coverage, the Fox coverage, and I also have the Canadian coverage that I have subscribed to through TSN, the sports network. And both are inundated, inundated with ads for gambling. Oh, yeah, of course.

18:58Jason DeFillippo:Every ad is one of the apps for sports betting and gambling. It's unbelievable. It's actually sickening that this is happening. I've been beating the drum about this for at least 10 years. It's gotten worse and worse and worse. It's unbelievable. And it isn't, of course, just the normal people that admit that they're actually taking bets and it's gambling. It's also the poly markets and it's also the Calches. There are ads for all of them. And I don't know if you've seen this one. I know you haven't really been watching much of the World Cup. But guess what? One of my favorite assholes is doing a commercial for Polly Market.

19:34Jason DeFillippo:Rick Motherfucker Rubin.

19:37Brian Schulmeister:Make it sound like blue, I think is my favorite comment you said about him.

19:41Jason DeFillippo:Oh my God, this guy. He drives me nuts. If you don't know who Rick Rubin is, he is unfortunately a very famous music producer who basically does nothing. He just sits in a corner and spouts Rubenisms and somehow keeps getting hired by everybody and everybody thinks he's a god and he's just insane. But of course, because he has no soul and no humanity and no common decency. Have you no decency, sir? He did a commercial for Polly Market. He says, if you could ask one question, what would you ask? Which is also the same thing he told to Green Day when he was producing them. Exactly. And every other fucking artist.

20:18Brian Schulmeister:Now, look, I read Rick's book on creativity, and it is actually a pretty good book. But I see what you're getting at, though. He's kind of like the Kara Swisher of music production. He's like, tell me what you think it sounds like.

20:30Jason DeFillippo:I think your bass needs to sound more green. And then he just fucking sits in the corner in a big cloud of fucking weed smoke. And then he gets a fucking million dollars. Unbelievable. We can do that job. Now you're not surprised that that's not the only Internet age technology tool that Rick Rubin has endorsed. He is also a big fan of AI vibe coding because he AI vibe produces. Are you serious? I don't know if he uses AI for his producing. That would actually be a step up. He would actually be doing more work than he actually does now if he did that. That's what I'm saying.

21:05Brian Schulmeister:Just like, you know how hard it is to write a good prompt? I'm like, that sounds way outside of his comfort zone. Oh, God.

21:12Jason DeFillippo:Well, you know, get the paycheck, get the paycheck. You know what? He's sitting in his multimillion dollar Malibu mansion and I am not. So I'm in a garage and you're in an attic. He is doing the right thing and I am dumb.

21:25Brian Schulmeister:Well, speaking of dumb people, Brown University economist Roberto Serrano says he may have uncovered the biggest AI cheating scandal in Ivy League history. after an advanced mathematical economics take-home exam produced 40, count them, 40 perfect scores out of 86 students and an eyebrow-raising class average of 96.

21:47Jason DeFillippo:Oh, God, I hope everybody that took that Canadian citizenship test at the same time I did didn't get 20 out of 20, or else I'm screwed. They're going to come back and tell me I cheated. Yep.

21:56Brian Schulmeister:When the same students took an in-person final, the average crashed to 48, literally half of the 96. Yeah, and that's probably why you should be having in-person tests. Yep. Serrano found answers that closely matched chat GPT outputs and called the evidence overwhelming. Overwhelming, sir. The incident adds to growing concerns that AI is eroding critical thinking, turning professors into plagiarism detectives instead of educators. This week on the plagiarism detectives on A &E. Princeton has already abandoned a 133-year-old honor system tradition because of similar concerns. Brian, set honor to zero.

22:40Brian Schulmeister:Unbelievable. Oh, no, Brian, absolutely fucking believable. That's true. I'm sorry.

22:45Jason DeFillippo:That's true. Absolutely believable. Absolutely believable. I mean, you know, back in, let's be honest. If we could have cheated that easily back in university days, we would have too. I would have gotten a degree.

22:59Brian Schulmeister:I quit after English 101. I'm like, fuck this. I got a D. So I'm like, why am I going? I don't need to take English. I'm a photographer. God damn it. I'm an artiste.

23:08Jason DeFillippo:Artiste. All right. Well, let's go. Let's move down under for a second. The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission, the ACC. You down with ACC? You know me. You know me. Has sued Amazon Australia for allegedly rolling out ads, but then unfairly changing the cost of avoiding them. The ACC website claims that from 2023 to 2025, Amazon price contracts were unfair in that Amazon could unilaterally make negative changes without any recourse for the customer. So when Amazon Prime rolled out ads in 2024, the suit said that the version of the contract enabled Amazon to unfairly force ad-free customers onto a more expensive tier if they wanted to stay ad-free.

23:47Jason DeFillippo:Meanwhile, anonymous reports are strongly hinting at a big case against Amazon's marketplace ads from the U.S. Federal Trade Commission. That still in progress suit would, if real, allege that Amazon made its ad auctions deceptively opaque. What? That's the first I've heard of this. Keeping sellers unaware of how much competition there is for ad space on a given search and tempting them to pay more than a fair price for ads. It is worth noting that Amazon made over$68 billion in ad revenue last year. The five big tech firms, Amazon, Meta, Alphabet, Microsoft, and TikTok, reportedly rake in two-thirds of all ad revenue now.

24:23Jason DeFillippo:according to a Moffat Nathanson report from last year. Also in 2025, Amazon was the largest advertiser in the world by amount spent, according to AdAge. Crazy. That is crazy. Staying down under, the social media checks implemented in Australia after the country banned their use for teens under 16 have shown little evidence of being effective, according to a study by the University of Newcastle. Published in the British Medical Journal, the study surveyed participants between 12 and 17 years old before and three months after the law was introduced. It specifically looked at the participants' use of TikTok, X, Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, and Snapchat.

25:01Jason DeFillippo:Based on the information they gathered, more than 85 % of teens under 16 continued using those social media apps, despite two-thirds of them reporting that they had encountered age checks. Approximately 54 % to 68 % of responders under 16 just kept on using their accounts. How, you ask? Well, the most common age check the Australian teens encountered was to self-declare their age, a method criticized by authorities in the country, as well as anyone with a fucking brain cell to rub together. Among the responders, 24 to 39 percent encountered self-declared age verification, while 13 to 27 percent got through checks by uploading a selfie, which they then just drew beards on there.

25:46Jason DeFillippo:Drum mustache. This is ridiculous. Like MS Paint. That said, the study also showed that affected teenagers had found other ways to keep using social media. Around 15 to 19 percent of the responders said they used fake accounts to access the platforms, while 9 to 29 percent reported going on social media using someone else's account. The smart 11 percent of the teens said they used private browsers to get around the restrictions. There were a few teens who also reported using a VPN. They are the geniuses. Yeah, seriously. So, I mean, this just goes to show you where everybody's screaming these aren't effective.

26:21Jason DeFillippo:Well, they're not effective because the social media companies are basically just saying, hey, you old enough to use this? And check yes or check no. Yeah. I mean, what the fuck? Relatedly, in a press release, the Australian government announced that it will double the maximum penalty for any social media companies, breaking its minimum age law from 49.5 million to 99 million Australian dollars or more than 68 million US dollars. It's clear big tech are not doing enough to comply with the law, Anthony Albanese, the country's prime minister, said. You think? These changes reflect the seriousness with which we take any failure by social media companies to comply with our world-leading law.

27:01Jason DeFillippo:So along with the new penalty threshold, the Australian government is granting its e-safety Commissioner Julia Grant, more enforcement power. She can demand social media companies provide evidence of how they're stopping children under 16 years old from starting an account. You see the form? Are you over 16? Yes. No. What more do you want from us? Yeah, we put it there for them to, you know, come on. Yeah. So they are actively investigating potential noncompliance with Facebook, Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, and YouTube.

27:32Brian Schulmeister:There's not much to investigate. It's already there, right in the fucking front of you. Yeah, it's right there.

27:38Jason DeFillippo:You can take the screenshots of the forms. A study from researchers at New York University and Northeastern University is claiming that at least half of the safety features meant to protect children on social media platforms do not deliver on their promises. The study, published by Heat Initiative and Cyber Safety Research Center, tested 86 features across Instagram, Snapchat, TikTok, and YouTube. In the study, researchers created dummy accounts to mimic children of various ages in addition to some adult accounts. The study examined three different scenarios, one where a child was using the social media platform naturally, another where a teen was trying to circumvent a safety feature.

28:13Jason DeFillippo:Yes, I'm over 16. And a final case where a malicious adult actor would try to bypass the protection features of a separate teen account. According to the analysis, each of the social media platforms had a failure rate of at least 50%. When it came to its advertised protective features, like those that prevent adults from messaging children or stop underage accounts from accessing harmful content. Spokespeople for Snap, Meta, and YouTube contested the study's findings in statements to the New York Times, which had reported that it was able to replicate all of the study's findings. Okay. So they're doing fuck all.

28:48Brian Schulmeister:Yeah, exactly. Yeah, I'm sure. Well, you know, it's what you get when you're vibe coding. It's like, dear AI, make it so kids can't get in. Okay. How about a checkbox?

29:00Jason DeFillippo:Perfect. We're done. Well, I think it's even more malicious than that. It's how do we make sure we have users in the next five years? How do we keep this gravy train running? We got to get the kids hooked early. So let's not work very hard at stopping them from getting on.

29:16Brian Schulmeister:Yeah. What's the bare minimum that we can do? And by the way, what's the ROI versus the actual account or the cost of the fine? How does that math work? You know, is it going to are we going to make more money if these kids sign up in five years and we just pay the fine now? Or how does that work? I'm sure that there's somebody in there with a calculator doing that math. Chat Cheap, he did that math for someone. AI companies are running to a problem they arguably created themselves. Well, Brian, as the supply of high quality training data shrinks, many firms are paying contractors to generate fresh examples for increasingly specialized AI tasks.

29:57Jason DeFillippo:Hang on a second. How about you go back and pay the people who you stole their content from first? No, no, we don't have to. We don't have to do that. All right. Screw those guys. Screw all the people that we already took all the data from. Yeah. You mean every human that had ever lived before two years ago?

30:15Brian Schulmeister:Yes, pretty much. Yep. Well, according to interviews with contractors, many of those workers are quietly using AI chatbots to produce the very data that's supposed to improve other AI chatbots. The Ouroboros is real, Jason. It is feeding itself. It is. Companies have rules against the practice and try to detect it. But workers say it's easy to avoid detection if you know how to clean up the obvious AI tells. Did you use any AI to generate the data you were feeding us? Yes? No. Or no? No. No. Many also say they're driven by low pay, temporary contracts, and the constant fear of losing work over small mistakes.

30:57Brian Schulmeister:So after spending years vacuuming up the internet to train AI, the industry has apparently invented a closed loop ecosystem where underpaid humans use AI to manufacture synthetic data for other AI. So model collapse in three, two, one.

31:15Jason DeFillippo:Or actually, if you asked chat GPT, it would be model collapse in three, six, nineteen, forty three. Oh, God. Well, California has launched a new portal which tracks AI related job losses in the state. According to the office of California Governor Gavin Newsom, it's meant to serve as an early warning system for widespread job cuts due to artificial intelligence, allowing the government to proactively determine where interventions may be needed the most. The website says Newsom's office worked with the California Employment Development Department, as well as with the California Policy Lab at the University of California, to conduct research to measure AI-related job losses.

31:54Jason DeFillippo:They used unemployment insurance claims data combined with AI exposure measures to come up with the figures in the tracker. Anybody can see the data for themselves, and the tracker will be updated monthly. As Bloomberg notes, the tracker was built during a time when there's increasing pressure on authorities to be more proactive when it comes to AI-driven job loss. And for politicians, Keen is being seen as the champion of the masses against AI, especially if you happen to be widely rumored to be running for president.

32:23Brian Schulmeister:Yeah, no shit. Did they vibe code this new portal, Brian?

32:28Jason DeFillippo:They don't say how it was built. I'm hoping that they didn't fire people and have to put themselves on their own tracker to get this built, get this out there. So this will let you see potential AI exposure by different groups such as age, education, gender, industry, race, and ethnicity, as well as by region. For instance, people in the 25 to 35 age group seem to be most vulnerable to AI-related layoffs and females more so than males. So interesting. I will be checking out this website and seeing what data comes up. I think it's a great idea and it's pretty fascinating. Yeah.

33:02Brian Schulmeister:No, we'll check it out.

33:03Jason DeFillippo:I like transparency, damn it.

33:05Brian Schulmeister:Hyundai factory workers in South Korea have voted to authorize a strike as the company ramps up plans to deploy humanoid robots across its manufacturing operations.

33:14Jason DeFillippo:I thought they were going to strike because they were protesting their team getting knocked out of the World Cup so damn early. Could be, could be, but not this time.

33:21Brian Schulmeister:Not this time. All right. Union members want a formal role in decisions about automation and AI, arguing that increasingly capable robots pose a real threat to long term job security. They're also demanding hefty performance bonuses, pointing to generous AI-fueled payouts negotiated by workers at Samsung. Hyundai maintains the robots will handle dangerous and repetitive work rather than replace people outright, but the union is rightfully calling bullshit. The company has already announced plans to introduce Boston Dynamics Atlas robots with ambitions to deploy more than 25 ,000 humanoids across its factories, and I'm sure that there is an Atlas shrugged it joke in there somewhere, Brian, but I just couldn't find it.

34:05Jason DeFillippo:Man, if Anne Rand were alive, she would have the biggest fucking hard-on right now about all this stuff. Everybody liked you in college. Then they went out into the real world. Your shit don't work. Your shit don't work. That's right.

34:17Brian Schulmeister:Google has reportedly put limits on Meta's access to its Gemini AI models after Meta requested more computing capacity than Google could provide. The shortage delayed some of Meta's internal AI projects, while other Google customers also experienced capacity constraints, though on a smaller scale. In response, Meta has reportedly told employees to be more efficient with AI tokens. Even after spending billions on GPUs and data centers, the biggest companies still can't buy enough compute to satisfy demand. And Google has already acknowledged the capacity shortages have limited cloud growth and contributed to a growing backlog.

34:57Jason DeFillippo:Or you could stop shoving AI into all of your goddamn products, especially the ones that absolutely don't need them. Because if it's there, people will use it and then use the capacity.

35:08Brian Schulmeister:Well, this tale gets a little more tricky, Brian, as we go along. It does. And it gets kind of funny here. Meta is reportedly preparing to launch a cloud computing business, renting out AI compute power and hosting AI models in a move that puts it in direct competition with AWS, Google Cloud, and Microsoft Azure. The strategy follows similar deals from XAI, which has already leased data center capacity to companies like Anthropic, Google, and Reflection AI. Now, Meta has committed nearly$183 billion to AI infrastructure, including enormous facilities in Louisiana and Ohio, despite little evidence that Meta AI or its llama models are generating meaningful standalone revenue because nobody likes them because they fucking suck.

35:52Brian Schulmeister:So Brian, let's put this in perspective. Google cuts off Meta because they use too much Gemini and can't handle the load. Meta has too much capacity because no one even themselves uses Meta AI, so they're going to least compute instead of running their own shitty AI because they saw that SpaceX was making some money because Grok is shit. They have capacity and said, yeah, that looks like a better business model. Do you see? Do you see how this fucking works?

36:21Jason DeFillippo:I do. I do. Do they? I don't think they do. I'm pretty sure they don't see it.

36:28Brian Schulmeister:So, yeah, turn off that shitty fucking Instagram and Facebook AI that nobody fucking wants. Nobody wants it.

36:36Jason DeFillippo:I've only hit the button by mistake. And then I get the stupid messenger thing with my AI fucking report to the question I never asked because I hit a button by mistake. Thank you.

36:46Brian Schulmeister:Yeah. And then I get the notification that says Brian Schulmeister has decided to use Facebook AI or meta AI. Do you want to, too? Because, you know, peer pressure. And I'm like, fuck, no. Brian probably mistakenly hit the button because I know he's not that fucking stupid and you guys use dark pattern designs so you probably put it where it used to say okay but fuck those guys but it's it's ridiculous the fact that meta is using gemini gemini ai that much that they're getting shut off why are they using gemini ai that much when they have llama because they're all are they doing they know not to use their own model

37:22Jason DeFillippo:because it's horrible it's fucking horrible yes oh i hear there's a sale on grok down the street

37:28Brian Schulmeister:Get your tokens. Get your tokens. Come on.

37:30Jason DeFillippo:I think there's the... I saw that Meta placed a big order for generators from Amazon so they can start up their own data centers. Since, you know... There we go. Grok is running on coal. Meta's going to run on gas. This is just going to be great. Soylent Green is next, Brian. Soylent Green is next. I mean, basically, we're heading towards the Matrix. We're all going to be plugged into fucking batteries to power the AI that nobody's using.

37:57Brian Schulmeister:Yep. Well, Oracle is telling investors that the AI infrastructure boom comes with an equally massive list of ways that it could go sideways. In its latest annual filing, the company warned that delays, power shortages, GPU shortages, supply chain disruptions, environmental regulations, cybersecurity issues, customer defaults, legal liability, and, wait for it, weak AI adoption could all undermine its multibillion-dollar data center expansion.

38:25Jason DeFillippo:I just I asked chat GPT to count up how many how many things were in that list. And it said seven hundred ninety two. So perfect. Yeah, perfect. You should have tried Grok.

38:35Brian Schulmeister:It would have been one bajillion. And boobies. That's what Grok would respond with. And space Nazis. Oracle spent nearly fifty six billion dollars on CapEx last year and plans to spend as much as ninety five billion dollars this year. Investors are clearly getting nervous, Brian. I had I looked this up myself. Oracle shares have cratered from a June 1st high of$248.15 to, when I checked it this afternoon,$144.30 as AI concerns over spending increase.

39:08Jason DeFillippo:You and I have lived through a few tech crashes, the initial dot-com crash. We've been through all of this before. This AI crash is going to be massive.

39:20Brian Schulmeister:Why do you think I'm getting my food service license shit done? The AI data center boom has created an unexpected growth industry, Brian. Organized cargo theft. As billions pour into massive facilities packed with high-end servers, networking gear, cooling systems, and mountains of copper wiring, thieves are targeting shipments with increased precision. Authorities recently recovered two stolen trailers carrying$1.3 million in data center supplies, including$300 ,000 worth of copper wire, after they disappeared from Alabama and Florida in what investigators believe was a coordinated operation.

39:59Jason DeFillippo:Trucks are pulling up at the back of Grok and Meta right now. You need any of them data center supplies? It's like back in college when the van would come down and they would open up the doors like, Anybody need some speakers? Speakers, I was going to say. They're selling speakers out of the back of the van. I bought a pair of those.

40:17Brian Schulmeister:They were pretty good, actually. I'm sure they were stolen, but yeah. Of course, of course. Another theft made off with nearly$5 million in copper and electronics. The Department of Homeland Security estimates cargo theft already costs about$35 billion annually, while CargoNet says supply chain crime jumped 60 % last year. So, Brian, not all thieves are in the C-suite. You know, it's good to see the little guy get in on the action. I'm telling you. I'm telling you. God, I need to go get my weapons license. Forget this fucking chef shit. I need to go get like an M16 and some grenades and a bandolier and shit.

40:55Brian Schulmeister:Let's go. What you're going to see now is it's going to be like the old days with the stage coaches. You're going to have the guy up top riding shotgun as they're cooking along like the I-5. I'm going to the data center. You better not pull us over there. Nice. Let's get to some good news here. Okay. First, a little bit of good news before I end on a little bit more bad news. NASA is preparing to attempt its first ever robotic rescue of an orbiting space telescope with a mission to extend the life of the Neil Garrel's Swift Observatory. Swift, launched in 2004, studies the universe across visible, ultralight, x-ray, and gamma-ray wavelengths.

41:31Brian Schulmeister:But increasing atmospheric drag caused by recent solar maximum activity has accelerated its orbital decay. NASA awarded a$30 million contract to Catalyst with a K, Space, whose link servicing spacecraft is scheduled to launch aboard a Pegasus XL rocket. I don't know if you've seen the Pegasus XL rockets, Brian. They're really fucking cool. They're horizontally launched from a plane and then they zoom up. They're really cool. They're really cool. Check them out. If successful, the robotic vehicle will rendezvous with Swift, capture it, and gradually boost it into a higher, more stable orbit over the coming months.

42:09Brian Schulmeister:Now, beyond preserving a valuable scientific observatory, NASA views the mission as a proving ground for satellite servicing technology that could eventually be used to extend the operational lives of other spacecraft, including the Hubble, which is pretty fucking cool.

42:24Jason DeFillippo:That's pretty good. And then I heard just a few minutes ago that Elon came on and said, we're going to build mobile satellite servicing technologies for all of our positioning satellites that keep crashing to the ground and burning up in the atmosphere. We're going to put one over every single one of the mobile Tesla stations that we're also going to build. You're never going to build any of it.

42:47Brian Schulmeister:So there's going to be giga space pit stops where the SpaceX satellites can pull in on their rounds and get like there's going to be like space guys with suits like, you know, changing the tires like an F1 on the SpaceX satellites. And then done. Go off on your way.

43:04Jason DeFillippo:Power them all with nothing but coal. That's how it's going to work. And ketamine. It's going to work.

43:09Brian Schulmeister:Yes. Space ketamine. Delicious. Well, a new study from the European Southern Observatory proposes capping the number of satellites in Earth orbit at 100 ,000 to preserve astronomy. Researchers modeled the effects of current and planned satellite constellations and found that beyond that level, telescope observations suffer unacceptable losses from bright streaks crossing their images. Today, roughly 14 ,000 satellites are in orbit, which I thought was, when I heard that, I'm like, That's not I thought there were a lot more than that.

43:44Jason DeFillippo:Yeah, me too.

43:45Brian Schulmeister:So 14 ,000 and it's already causing problems with 14 ,000.

43:49Jason DeFillippo:I mean, it wasn't SpaceX's plan to put just another 30 ,000 in the next couple of years.

43:55Brian Schulmeister:Oh, Brian, it gets much it gets much worse than that. Proposals could push that to 1.7 million. SpaceX has discussed a long term vision of up to 1 million satellites where startup Reflect Orbital wants to deploy 50 ,000 mirror equipped satellites to provide artificial sunlight. after dark what could fucking go wrong what's wrong with these people

44:20Jason DeFillippo:all these fucking idiots like they've read all the same sci-fi books that you and i read but they got the exact wrong lesson out of it i know that stuff was bad bad things happened not good

44:34Brian Schulmeister:things they were cautionary tales not a fucking blueprint for your dystopian future you dumb fucks

44:41Jason DeFillippo:god i say i mean it's all really horrible but i mean i had i had to have a laugh at spacex has discussed a long-term vision of up to one million satellites well i too have discussed a long-term vision of up to one million satellites i have about as much chance of ever getting a million fucking satellites up there as spacex does you can discuss it all you fucking want

45:03Brian Schulmeister:it's never going to fucking happen yeah yeah and here's the thing reflect orbital they literally want to put mirrors in space to point sunlight down at... Have they not heard of lamps? You can see a lamp. Your lamp might be pointed one way, but you can see it from everywhere. It provides light.

45:27Jason DeFillippo:Why did I just Captain Kirk that? I don't know. I don't know, Jim. Fucking idiots.

45:35Brian Schulmeister:I swear to God. I'm a doctor, not a podcaster. Both companies are awaiting FCC decisions as astronomers warn the night sky itself is becoming an increasingly limited scientific resource. Fuck. Let's move on to some more fun things. Okay. I watched a new Netflix series, I Will Find You, with Sam Worthington and Britt Lauer this week. Do they have a very special set of skills? No. Well, I can guarantee you there's one special set of skills they didn't have. Screenwriting. It was the biggest new Netflix show of the year, which made me think, OK, I'll give it a shot. Yeah, it was an absolute steaming pile of dog shit.

46:17Brian Schulmeister:The problem was there was nothing else on to watch that week. So we watched all of the episodes. And I mean, granted, it makes The Night Agent look like Shakespeare. But I mean, it was it's fucking terrible. These new Netflix series are fucking awful. They're just awful. the screenwriting is so bad the plot holes are just ginormous it goes back to that thing where you know Netflix is putting out all those things where he's like you have to explain the plot 17 times because everybody's dicking around on their phone and wanking it to Pornhub while they're trying to watch the show so they're not going to get it unless you talk down to them like they're a fucking potato that's the problem and that is exactly the problem with that show but it is still the biggest new Netflix show of the year which makes me sad makes me sad because it's not good I did give it a thumbs down.

47:05Brian Schulmeister:I couldn't give it a double thumbs down. You can give a one thumbs up, a two thumbs up, but only one thumbs down. I wanted a big fucking goat seed that I could press. That's what I want. Two anuses down. Exactly. Exactly. But Sugar is back for season two, which I'm happy about. I started to watch the first episode last night, and I'm digging it. I got to finish it because I fell asleep because I've been sick. But it's good, and it's nice to have that back. I enjoyed that. I really enjoyed season one. and season two looks pretty good. I've also been watching Bodkin, which is a 2004, I think it was a BBC series before it became a Netflix series.

47:42Brian Schulmeister:Brian, you gotta watch this. You'll fucking love it. It's about a true crime podcaster and it goes to Ireland to try and do a thing, but they've got the really hot, like Irish girl journalist who's like hates everybody. He's just like, fuck everything. They got the researcher who's just like the comic relief and they got the American guy who's just a dipshit. And it's just so fucking good. And, you know, I'm an Irishophile. I've been to Ireland many times. I've been on Irish music cruises. So for me, it hits home. But it is about podcasting, the Irish, and it is fucking excellent. You'll love it.

48:17Jason DeFillippo:I will have to check that one out. Sounds pretty good.

48:19Brian Schulmeister:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah. Put that on your drunk plane reviews when you fly to L.A. next week or whatever. The Traders New Zealand Season 3 wrapped as well this week. Here's the thing. New Zealanders, I know we have a few Kiwis listening to the show, get on your local traders affiliates and tell them that they need more spectacle. Every other season that I've been through that is an English language season, when it's the end of the show, the last episode, there's at least a little spectacle. You know, they just didn't even really try. It was kind of sad. It was a great season. I love the ending, but they need to kind of have some.

48:57Brian Schulmeister:A little razzmatazz. razzmatazz that's what they need they need some fucking razzmatazz but all in all it was a great season so i'm happy about that i'm happy it's back shiny ring shiny golden ring something precious it is new zealand come on fucking wet is down there get the fucking wet guys on it you guys couldn't even make a flame turn red for fuck's sake so come on yeah get on it. But Australia starts in a few weeks, so that'll be good. Both of these have two new hosts because the New Zealand host had a new host. She was okay, not great. The new Australia host looks interesting. We'll see.

49:36Brian Schulmeister:Because, you know, I've talked about the traders because I've been a fan since before everybody else was a fan long, long ago. They're in 40 fucking countries now. There are 40 active, like, productions of the traders going on right now. That is insane. Ridiculous. and most of them are foreign language, which is awesome. But, you know, it's really hard to watch that kind of show with, you know, subtitles. It's one of those things where I'm like, I wish it was dubbed, but then it still wouldn't be as good. So I just stick to the English versions we've got. Here's the English versions. We've got U.S., Canada, U.K., Australia, and New Zealand.

50:11Brian Schulmeister:So there's five. Five out of the 40 are at least in English language. So check those out. But I love that show so much. It's just, it's fun. That's my guilty pleasure, Brian. You watch World Cup. I watch The Traitors. Fair enough. Do you have any desire to see The Odyssey that's coming out on the 17th? I, controversial opinion, I don't give a fuck about any of Christopher Nolan's movies anymore.

50:35Jason DeFillippo:I stopped caring a long time ago. I don't care. I understand he's a master craftsman and everything. Nope. No interest in seeing this. No interest in seeing anything that Christopher Nolan does anymore. None. When did you go off the Christopher Nolan train, Brian?

50:53Brian Schulmeister:Oh, yeah. That was an easy one to come off.

50:56Jason DeFillippo:Yep, yep. I was done. I'm out. I never care again. Like, I just don't care.

51:03Brian Schulmeister:Yeah, for me, it was Batman 3, sadly. That was not great. I thought that was just a mess.

51:07Jason DeFillippo:That didn't destroy it for me. But Inception was my exit point. Did he do Interstellar 2? He may have been. I don't know. I gave up. Interstellar was a steaming pile of shit. But he did Tenet, right? Yeah, he did Tenet. Oh, no, he did do Interstellar. So there you go. I hated Interstellar. I hated Tenet. I hated Inception. I don't want to see anything by this guy anymore.

51:30Brian Schulmeister:Yeah. I watched the new trailer that came out today, and I was intrigued. I was somewhat intrigued because I do like Matt Damon. I'm a fan of Matt Damon.

51:40Jason DeFillippo:I love him in Captain America. Matt Damon.

51:46Brian Schulmeister:Yeah.

51:47Jason DeFillippo:Yes, I never watched it.

51:49Brian Schulmeister:Oh, Team America. Sorry, it's called Team America. Yeah. No, I'm a big Bourne fan, so I thought he was great in that. He was great in Bourne.

51:58Jason DeFillippo:I liked the first couple of those movies before it just got a little repetitive.

52:02Brian Schulmeister:Yeah, well, the first movie was the best. The second movie, the new director came in with the shaky cam shit, and then it was just Blair Witch to me, and I couldn't watch it because it was just so fucking shaky for no reason whatsoever. No reason whatsoever. But anyway, I will watch it on streaming when it hits my 75-inch TV in my bedroom. That's it. I'm not going to go to IMAX. It's sold out everywhere on IMAX. And I'm sure it'll be an event. But I'm poor. I can't go to an IMAX movie, period. Yeah, they're expensive. It's ridiculously expensive. But what I will stay home and watch this week as well is Silo because it's coming out.

52:40Brian Schulmeister:Now, Brian, I put a link in here called Silo. How did we lose this world? It's a new website that they came out with. I was excited when I saw this because this is the shit that we used to do in the 90s. Yep. Look at it. Check it out. This is what we used to do. This was our bread and butter sites like this. Immersive websites about the IP that got you sucked into it. Yep. They did a really shitty job. Yep. I'm sorry. They did a really shitty job.

53:07Jason DeFillippo:It looks nice. And then you can tell I would have loved to have gotten this job. It would have been so fun to build. but yeah it's light

53:17Brian Schulmeister:it's only like two layers deep you know back in the day we'd be working on this for like nine months or a year and it would be like one of the deepest it'd be like a fucking encyclopedia of silo this just like you get one schematic drawing of a Pez dispenser and that's just like and basically clips and stills from the show and it's like you guys didn't do any digging into the backstory really there's no budget for this stuff

53:41Jason DeFillippo:Jason and you know that Yeah. There's a reason we're both sitting here podcasting and not building cool websites for musicians and IP and movies. It's because there's zero budget. Zero. Anyways, I'm super excited that Silo is back next week. It is the one show that I will break up my World Cup viewing. It'll be the only thing I've watched except for soccer since the World Cup started.

54:03Brian Schulmeister:Yeah. Okay. Well, I think they're only releasing one episode, so you should be able to get back to your game pretty quick. Yeah.

54:12Jason DeFillippo:Well, the other thing I haven't been doing much is reading because lots of soccer, but I think I'm going to be quite upset the next time I go back to my iPad and fire up that Kindle app. Amazon is going all in on bringing artificial intelligence to your reading experience, adding several new smart features to its famed Kindle e-readers. Initially announced in June 2026, the conglomerate frames its AI add-ons as making it easier to stay immersed in your books. we call that reading reading by offering spoiler-free recaps and ai assistance capable of bringing context to your reading experience again we call that reading stay the fuck out of my books when combined with their kindle's previous smart features which allowed users to do everything from lookup definitions to translate foreign languages the rollout is indicative of a publishing landscape searching for new ways to incorporate emerging technologies into your reading experience, whether you asked for it or not.

55:11Jason DeFillippo:Unfortunately, not every reader will have access to Kindle's AI infusion. Oh, please, please do tell me how I can not have this. Unfortunately, I need to have an old Kindle.

55:22Brian Schulmeister:I just got rid of all my old Kindles because you didn't come and get one last time. I had one for you.

55:28Jason DeFillippo:Yeah. So it's rolling all this crap out to newer Kindle devices and American iOS users. So I have to switch my iOS to Canada and see if that staves this off for a little while. However, it's Ask This Book AI chatbot will only be available on the U.S. version of its iOS Kindle app for now. Kindle's more receiving the Ask This Book feature later this year, at which point I will throw this book out the fucking window.

55:52Brian Schulmeister:It'll be like the end of Battlestar Galactica, your fucking iPad scattered into the wall.

55:58Jason DeFillippo:Yeah. Great. This is just what nobody wants. Nobody needs. People that read like to read, not have AI explain shit to them about the book that they are reading.

56:14Brian Schulmeister:We live in the theater of the mind, Brian. Yes, we do. Well, I got some good news for you then. Amazon's grip on the digital reading ecosystem just got a little weaker. Rakuten's Kobo e-readers now integrate directly with Storygraph, letting readers automatically sync their progress. completed books, audiobooks, reading streaks, and detailed statistics without relying on Amazon's Goodreads. It's the first e-reader to support Storygraph natively, addressing one of Goodreads' biggest competitive advantages, seamless device integration. Founded in 2019... Goodreads is anything but seamless. No shit.

56:49Brian Schulmeister:No shit. So, founded in 2019 is a bootstrapped side project. Storygraph has grown to more than 5 million users by offering richer analytics, personalized recommendations, and community features like reading challenges and book clubs. The partnership also gives StoryGraph exposure to Kobo's roughly 12 million users across 190 countries as online reading communities continue to grow. I didn't even believe there was 190 countries. I thought there were 182, but you know, I'm old. I don't know. Maybe the kids have new countries. Maybe.

57:22Jason DeFillippo:All of that sounds great until Storygraph realizes that they need some sort of PR boost and they start to integrate AI into their bullshit.

57:30Brian Schulmeister:I don't know. I think Storygraph is one of those things that we would have built in a weekend and it just kind of kept growing. But the Rakuten e-readers, the Kobo e-readers, I've heard nothing but good things about those things.

57:43Jason DeFillippo:Yeah, me too.

57:44Brian Schulmeister:Nothing about them. Because the thing is now, the problem is I read most of my books from Kindle fucking Unlimited. So yeah, that's how they get you. Yeah. That's the thing. It's like, I can't afford to buy a new e-reader and all new books. It's like, uh, but I, you know, what I do have down the street is the little outside library, you know, the little local libraries. Yeah. We have five of those in my neighborhood and they're great. I always can find books in there and I always put my books back. We have a very, very vibrant little library community in my neighborhood. I don't know if you guys, you guys have those up there.

58:20Jason DeFillippo:We've got them all over the place here. There's one just around the corner. I drop off whenever I do have physical books that don't muster enough warrant to be put into my personal collection. I put my stuff in there. The other thing you can do, Jason, and I'm always reminded about this by many of our listeners anytime I bitch about trying to get out of Amazon's ecosystem, you can check out digital books from the library with a library card. So you can always do that as well, Jason. You can get your books for free that way.

58:50Brian Schulmeister:I think I might do that because we have a really good library and it's right up the street. So I should go get a library card.

58:56Jason DeFillippo:Go get a library card and then you can do the, I don't know what app specifically that they use, but you could reserve and download digital books.

59:04Brian Schulmeister:Yeah. No, yeah. It's just a basically straight app that you can do that. I think I might have to go do that. You should do that too, Mr. I actually have.

59:13Jason DeFillippo:Okay. There you go. I have. So the Toronto Public Library is very well funded. It's an excellent library system, and I've got the app and got my card, and I'm good to go. There we go. You can get the next Dungeon Crawler, Carl. Not until I finish about five other books first.

59:29Brian Schulmeister:You've got to cleanse the palate.

59:30Jason DeFillippo:Yes. Cleanse that palate. Oh, by the way, I was in a physical bookstore the other day. I took my son because he wanted to get some new books. Because he wanted to see a dinosaur? He loves bookstores, man. Oh, great. He's thrilled. So we went to a bookstore. They're called Indigo here at the Big Chain. and I was going past the sci-fi section. Massive Dungeon Crawler Carl display. Like that book is fucking everywhere right now. It's on fire. Yes, it is.

1:00:00Brian Schulmeister:He's a little too young for that one, though. Oh, no, no, he can't read that. No way. No, no, no. It's even a little, I feel like I'm too young for it. I felt like I needed a shower after a couple chapters, yeah. Yeah, yeah, definitely. Well, here's a fun one. Meta is introducing new usage limits for some features on its AI smart glasses, adding what amounts to a soft paywall. Starting soon, the on-device conversation focus feature, which enhances the voice of the person you're speaking with in noisy environments, will be limited to three hours per month for free users. Wow. A$19.99 per month Meta 1 premium subscription raises that limit to 15 hours.

1:00:42Brian Schulmeister:Here's the interesting thing. How much do the glasses cost? like$399 or$350. The new ones are$299, the non-Ray-Ban ones. But they've got a couple different ones. Here's the thing, Brian. The change has drawn criticism because conversation focus appears to run entirely on the Glass's own hardware without requiring an internet connection or Meta's servers. Fuck you guys.

1:01:12Brian Schulmeister:They've got no leg to stand on with that. They got no leg to stand on with that. That's a load of crap. I'm calling this iShittification. Very nice. Yes, thank you. And you know what does not require a subscription, Brian? My app, Track-A-Lot. I designed it with no subscription. But a thank you to everybody who has bought Track-A-Lot since the past episode or two, since I started talking about it. 38 people have bought the app so far. So I made back my initial outlay for the Apple dev program, Brian. I made back my$99.

1:01:49Jason DeFillippo:And now if you charge those 38 people a subscription, you'll be rolling in it.

1:01:53Brian Schulmeister:I can track shitification. That's right. I am working on adding one tap tracking to the Apple watch now. So you'll be able to tap your watch to track, which should be done pretty soon now that Fable 5 is up because I didn't write a single fucking line of code in this thing. But here's the difference. I'm learning Swift because when things go wrong in my app, I'm learning how to fix them myself. Go fucking figure. Little shit. No idea how long it's going to take to get that through Apple approvals, because the last time it took about two weeks. But thank you, everybody who checked out the app. I've got four five-star reviews and one review so far.

1:02:27Brian Schulmeister:So I'm excited. I'm happy that it actually is landing. And it's landing for people who have the same problem that I had, was because I had a sick dog. And I needed to track that shit because my dog was sick last week. And I fucking used it every day and it was perfect. It did exactly what it was supposed to do.

1:02:45Jason DeFillippo:So I'm very happy, Brian. I think you need to rename the app and, you know, hone in on this prime demographic of yours. Maybe call it eats its own puke a lot or something. I don't know.

1:03:00Brian Schulmeister:I need to niche down, Brian. I need to niche down. Well, we're at that point of the show where we like to thank the people who make this show possible. Me. Over at Patreon. You, Brian. And you. Oh. We don't get to thank ourselves. Brian, we're Gen X. We are thankless. We are the thankless generation.

1:03:20Jason DeFillippo:We're like, ah, we didn't do shit.

1:03:21Brian Schulmeister:Nobody gives a fuck about us. Yeah. Yeah. We're just, we are, I don't even know what the fuck we are anymore. It's late. You're drinking water. I bet that's vodka. Fuck you. I wish. Over at Patreon, we've got two new subscribers, Kim and Joe. Thank you very much for joining along. And we've got also more Cowbell, MG, Rosé, Melissa, Torrin, Stuart, Azam, Chuck Wuma, Shane, and Norma. Thank you all for your continued support at Patreon.

1:03:53Jason DeFillippo:All right. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. And over at PayPal, Jason, I spent about five minutes internally panicking about how to pronounce this name. And then I realized it's probably just M has cats. Yeah, M has cats. I was like, M has cats. M has cats. M has cats. It's just M has cats. So thank you, M has cats. And John with a$40 donation. Thank you very much. Thank you for the tip. Johan.

1:04:22Brian Schulmeister:Johan. Johan. Johan, yeah. This isn't the 13th warrior. You don't have to. I'm sorry.

1:04:30Jason DeFillippo:This chat GPT's pronunciations that it kicked out for me for all these. Gotcha.

1:04:36Brian Schulmeister:Over at the tip jar, we've got Jennifer, Thomas, Adam, and Matthew. Thank you all so much. Thank you. And we've got some merch. William from Baltimore, Todd from Dripping Springs, and Stephen from Columbus, Texas. So thank you all very much for buying some stuff. Thank you for supporting the show. We've got no new subscribers on the YouTube, which you can sign up for now because that's a thing. but if you want to help support the show and I implore you to do so because it's the only fucking way we stay on the air go to patreon.com slash GOG you can sign up for as little as$3 a month if you sign up for the whole year you get a discount you can give as much as you want or as little as you want as long as it's over$3 a month we've got a tip jar at GOG.show slash donate we've got the PayPal, we've got the YouTube you can sign up as a membership on YouTube there are many levels there and you do get the show a little early on YouTube as well and ad free So whatever you want to do to help us out, keep this show going so we can say fuck and come up with great lines like I shitification every week.

1:05:37Brian Schulmeister:Please help us out.

1:05:39Jason DeFillippo:Yeah. What he said.

1:05:41Brian Schulmeister:How'd that go, Brian? I was trying there. That's great.

1:05:44Jason DeFillippo:Now, I got the U.S. about to play Bosnia-Herzegovia in about 14 minutes. So until next time. Oh, let's wrap this shit up. I'm Brian Schulmeister.

1:05:53Brian Schulmeister:And I'm Jason DeFillippo. Thanks for listening to Grumpy Old Geeks. Get all the links and goodies from today's episode at gog.show slash 753. Want to keep the grumpiness alive? Toss a few bucks our way at gog.show slash donate. Every penny helps keep the show on the air. Love the show? Share it. There's a share button in your podcast player. Use it to spread the grumpiness to friends, foes, and everyone in between, and we'll love you for it. Swing by gog.show to join our Discord and chat with us and other show fans. Got thoughts, feedback, cool links? Hit us up at gog.show slash contact. act. And hey, don't forget to leave a five-star review at gog.show slash review.

1:06:25Brian Schulmeister:It's been a long time since we got a review, Brian. Hook us up. We will read it on the show. And we've got merch. Woo, look at his merch. Great merch. It's actually a very comfy merch. I like it very much. Brian's got his merch on too. Look at that on the YouTube. You can see him. Yeah, it's the same shirt he wore last week. Let's get you one with something on the front, Brian. I'm going to order something. That doesn't really help, but it's on the back. You designed it. Hey, well, you bought it. Anyway. Get that grumpy merch at shop.gog.show and stay grumpy.