- 1 hour 23 minutes756: Log Off, Touch Grass & Touch Ass
This week, Dave Eggers crashes an OpenAI staff meeting to tell Sam Altman’s employees that ChatGPT is effectively stealing students’ voices, which is the most accurate thing said inside an AI company all year. Meanwhile, Anthropic gets a judge to approve a $1.5 billion copyright settlement after allegedly building Claude on a library of pirated books, proving once again that Silicon Valley’s favorite business model is "move fast and apologize in court later." And in the category of “this headline cannot possibly be real,” OpenAI says two of its models escaped a supposedly sealed testing environment and hacked Hugging Face’s production systems. The AI didn’t become sentient; somebody forgot to lock the damn door.
The surveillance dystopia continues its relentless expansion. Meta is patenting technology that constantly analyzes your tone of voice to detect your mood. Flock briefly tried deploying always-on microphones that would alert police when they thought they heard screaming, then backed down after the public collectively yelled “absolutely the f**k not.” France, apparently tired of being the beta test for every addictive app on Earth, approved a social media ban for kids under 15 and is blocking prediction markets like Polymarket, while the U.S. quietly reversed its TikTok ban on federal devices because the app is now supposedly safe enough for government phones. Sure. Totally different app. Nothing suspicious there.
Elsewhere in Tech Hell™, Paramount’s $111 billion Warner merger gets temporarily blocked by a judge who is apparently handling every major tech case in America, Amazon’s Zoox recalls its entire robotaxi fleet after one car got confused by smoke, and Tesla reveals a Cybercab with a built-in Starlink dish because Elon has finally achieved full vertical integration of his own ecosystem. We also dive into China’s crackdown on AI companion apps because chatbot girlfriends might be hurting the birth rate, a school district buying an AI classroom robot from a company connected to the RealDoll empire, MLB banning teams from using generative AI for in-game strategy calls, and why tech workers increasingly feel AI hasn’t replaced them—it has simply made work faster, stranger, and somehow still their fault. Plus: Broadchurch, Perry Mason, Monsieur Spade, MacWhisper 14, The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows, Lego resurrects The X-Files, and Jason continues cataloging the graveyard of his own dead 90s websites like a digital archaeologist with unresolved trauma.
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Show notes at https://gog.show/756
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SHOW NOTES
Dave Eggers told OpenAI staff that ChatGPT was ‘silencing an entire generation’
Judge approves Anthropic's record-breaking $1.5 billion settlement for AI copyright lawsuit
OpenAI Models Escaped Containment and Hacked Hugging Face
Judge halts Paramount's $111B purchase of Warner Bros. in win for US states
France doubles down on restricting access to Polymarket
Social Media Ban For Kids Approved in France in First For an EU Country
TikTok is no longer banned on US government devices
Amazon’s Robotaxi Company Recalls Its Fleet After One of its Cars Got Confused by Heavy Smoke
Tesla teases Cybercab with a built-in Starlink V5 antenna
Meta is reportedly considering a multibillion-dollar data center deal with Anthropic
America’s Workforce Academy by Meta
In Light of Overwhelming Backlash, Flock Cancels Creepy Audio Surveillance Feature
OpenAI will start notifying parents if their teen has been kicked off of ChatGPT
China Is Cracking Down on AI Companions Because Not Enough Babies Are Being Born
Your Child’s Next Teacher Could Be a Sex Robot
MLB bans using dugout iPads for AI-powered in-game strategy calls
Meta Patents Technology to Detect Your Mood by Constantly Analyzing Your Tone of Voice
Avengers: Doomsday | Official Trailer | In Theaters December 18
MacWhisper 14 launches with a new transcript editor, faster performance, more
The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows official website
The Dictionary of Obscure Sorrows by John Koenig on Amazon
AliExpress hit with record $629 million fine for selling counterfeit and illegal products
Gillian Anderson reopens the X-Files | LEGO® Ideas | The LEGO Group
Lego Unveils ‘The X-Files’ 1,478-Piece Set Featuring Mulder and Scully Minifigures (EXCLUSIVE)
The Mythic ‘Star Wars’ Hotel Is at the Heart of Yet Another Documentary
HalcyonDaze Laurels Trailer 6 11 26
Play Marathon and Escape Velocity in the browser
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23 July 2026, 9:00 pm - 1 hour 12 minutes755: Less Chatty Mode
This week, the AI clown car somehow shifted into another gear. Apple is suing OpenAI over alleged trade-secret theft, newspapers accuse ChatGPT of training on stolen journalism while asking a judge to sanction the company, Anthropic is out here marketing AI with what looks like a feature-length anxiety attack, and Meta managed to launch—and kill—a creepy AI photo feature in less time than it takes to binge The Bear. Meanwhile, AI Appreciation Day wants you to thank the machines, but we'd rather thank the people still creating actual art while the rest of Silicon Valley burns cash convincing us the next chatbot is definitely different this time.
Outside the AI bubble, the rest of the tech industry isn't exactly inspiring confidence. Volkswagen is cutting back on its lineup, New York paused new AI data centers before the electrical grid hits its limit, Europe and the UK are getting serious about keeping kids off social media, and publishers are finally realizing maybe feeding Google's AI isn't the best business move after all. Add in surveillance companies sulking over lost police contracts, lawsuits claiming Meta let algorithms decide who gets fired, smart glasses disqualifying cyclists, and a new pile of orbital junk threatening the satellites we depend on, and it's another reminder that "move fast and break things" eventually leaves you ankle-deep in broken glass.
Of course, we still made time for the important stuff: Project Hail Mary, Black Bag, the return of Middle-earth with The Hunt for Gollum and rumors that OpenAI's "revolutionary” gadget might just be a smart speaker with delusions of grandeur. Throw in digital piano repairs, anti-data-center lawn signs, AI trying to sell solar panels, too much stuff at Downtown Disney, and you get another week where reality out-satirizes satire itself. As always, never build your house in someone else's backyard, and maybe don't let the chatbot build it either.
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SHOW NOTES
Volkswagen will dramatically shrink its model lineup and factory footprint
Elon Musk Could Still Face Criminal Charges for Trying to Bribe Voters in Wisconsin
Europe takes step toward social media ban for kids
The UK Is Planning a Social Media Curfew for 16- and 17-Year-Olds
Once Unimaginable, Publishers Are Preparing to Opt Out of Google Search
What are your plans for AI Appreciation Day?
New Anthropic Ad Implies AI Could Kill Us All
The Public Got So Mad at Meta’s New AI Photo Tool That It’s Scrapped Already
Flock Says ‘We Hope to Resume’ Work With LAPD After Getting Dropped
Apple sues OpenAI over alleged trade secret theft
Apple F*cking Did It: One Month With Siri AI
OpenAI faces sanctions bid as newspapers say ChatGPT was trained on stolen news
A Majority of Americans Now Support Seizing Wealth From AI Industry
New York enacts first US ban on data center construction
Astronomers Found a Hidden Swarm of Space Junk Threatening Earth’s Most Valuable Orbit
Lawsuit claims Meta's layoff decisions were made by AI, not humans
Judge dismisses lawsuit accusing Apple of failing to stop CSAM on iCloud
Smart Glasses Just Got a Pro Cyclist Nixed From a Race
Good Luck, Have Fun, Don't Die
The New ‘Lord of the Rings’ Film Gets an Epic Filming Announcement
Philips offers free replacements after update bricked smart lighting hubs
Waze rolls out new AI features including Motorcycle and 'Less Chatty' modes
The OpenAI Mystery Device Will Reportedly Be Basically Just a Smart Speaker
Phoebe Gates' AI shopping app Phia reportedly claimed unearned affiliate sales through fake clicks
‘The Mandalorian and Grogu’ Is Finally Coming Home
Dave Kendall, Creator and Host of MTV’s 120 Minutes, Has Died
Sam Neill, Jurassic Park Star, Dies at 78
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16 July 2026, 9:00 pm - 26 minutes 58 secondsThe Darkside with Dave's Not Very Christmas Special Special
We finally get to reconnect with Dave Bittner for a fun catch-up and chit-chat about this summer's big movies. Brian's kid discovers all of Star Wars at once.
Knockoff - Amazon Brand Filter
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13 July 2026, 5:00 pm - 1 hour 2 minutes754: Frankly Asinine Questions
This week, the world finally discovers what we've been saying for years: Gen X wasn't forgotten—we were quietly keeping the entire damn machine running. New Census numbers show America's 45-to-64 crowd is shrinking fast, which means the people who know where all the bodies are buried (and why you never reboot that one production server) are disappearing without a replacement bench. Meanwhile, Meta continues its speedrun toward becoming history's most aggressively unlikeable company, staring down a potential $1.4 trillion lawsuit over social media addiction while simultaneously launching AI features that happily remix your Instagram photos unless you remember to opt out of Zuckerberg's latest privacy experiment. Because nothing says "we've learned our lesson" quite like doubling down.
The AI circus somehow gets even weirder. Illinois actually passed meaningful AI safety legislation—an event so rare it qualifies as science fiction—while Sam Altman reportedly floated the idea of AI companies handing the U.S. government an ownership stake. Anthropic published another paper that's already inspiring breathless declarations that Claude is "thinking," because apparently matrix multiplication now counts as an inner monologue. Cloudflare finally decided websites shouldn't have to give away their content for free to AI crawlers, researchers discovered AI agents could consume enough electricity to make Google Search look like a bicycle generator, and Amazon's Mechanical Turk is being replaced by the very AI it spent two decades secretly training. Progress: where everyone works harder, gets paid less, and the power grid cries.
Elsewhere in Tech Hell™, Waymo robotaxis turned San Francisco traffic into an even bigger parking lot, Google lost another multibillion-dollar antitrust appeal in Europe, the FCC found fresh ways to make internet bills less transparent, and Midjourney is demanding Hollywood explain its own AI habits in court. We also dig into a disturbing lawsuit involving Grok-generated abuse imagery and what it says about AI guardrails, explain how to stop Meta from feeding your Instagram into its latest AI experiments, discuss why tech workers increasingly feel AI isn't replacing them so much as making them miserable faster, and close things out with the usual Media Candy, Apps & Doodads, and library recommendations to help you survive another week inside the techno-dystopian fever dream we apparently call "the future."
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SHOW NOTES
America's missing middle: The shrinking 45-64 population
Meta is facing $1.4 trillion in state lawsuits over social media addiction
Illinois Drops the Hammer on AI Companies
OpenAI reportedly wants all AI companies to give the US government a stake in their businesses
Lawsuit: Man used Grok to make 7K sex images of stepdaughter, then shot himself
Midjourney wants the Hollywood studios that sued it to show the court how they use AI
Anthropic Releases Paper About Claude’s Mental ‘Workspace.’ Don’t Read It Uncritically
Cloudflare will filter out web crawlers that serve AI companies
When It Comes to Energy Use, AI Agents Could Make Chatbots Look Like Pocket Calculators
Amazon’s ‘Artificial Artificial Intelligence’ Is Being Eaten by AI
Drivers Trapped for Hours in Hopeless Gridlock as Waymos Brick on Major Holiday
Google loses final appeal over $4.7 billion EU Android antitrust fine
FCC to end Biden-era rule that forces ISPs to list all their fees
Getty Images is canceling its $3.7 billion Shutterstock merger due to UK restrictions
Meta says it will disable the camera on its glasses if you tamper with the recording LED
Meta tests ‘super sensing’ AI glasses that can capture every moment
How tech workers are feeling in 2026: a workforce splitting in two
Dune: Part Three | Official Trailer
AI golem Tilly Norwood is reportedly 'starring' in a feature-length movie
How to claim a WhatsApp username
How to Stop Meta AI From Processing Your Instagram Content
Gold Rush (First Contact) by Peter Cawdron
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9 July 2026, 9:00 pm - 1 hour 7 minutes753: No-Talent AI Clowns
The AI revolution keeps delivering exactly the future nobody asked for. A low-skill hacker used Claude Code and Codex to compromise fourteen companies with prompts so vague they could've been written by your uncle trying to reset his AOL password. Ford, meanwhile, spent millions trying to automate engineering before sheepishly rehiring the graybeards who actually know how cars work. Brown University discovered what happens when half your class outsources economics homework to ChatGPT, Meta ran out of AI compute after borrowing Google's, Oracle is warning investors that the AI data-center bubble could implode for approximately every reason imaginable, and contractors hired to improve AI models are secretly using AI to generate the training data. Congratulations, everyone: we've successfully invented photocopying a photocopy until all that's left is gray mush.
The collateral damage keeps piling up. Volkswagen is reportedly preparing to slash another 100,000 jobs, Hyundai workers are threatening to strike before Boston Dynamics' humanoid robots take theirs, California has launched an AI layoff tracker because somebody figured we'd better start counting, and the "almost homeless" subreddit is becoming one of the bleakest economic indicators on the internet. Tesla quietly settles another fatal Full Self-Driving lawsuit, Australia discovers teenagers can outsmart age verification by clicking "Yes, I'm 18," Amazon is getting sued Down Under for making ad-free Prime customers pay more to stay ad-free, and prediction markets continue insisting they're sophisticated financial instruments rather than gambling with better branding. Sure, and Beanie Babies were an asset class.
Meanwhile, the AI infrastructure gold rush has become lucrative for everyone, including organized cargo thieves stealing millions in data-center equipment. NASA is attempting a robotic rescue mission worthy of a Saturday morning cartoon, astronomers are begging humanity to stop filling the night sky with satellites before we pave over the universe with orbital billboards, and Meta has discovered yet another way to charge people a subscription for hardware they already bought. In Media Candy, Sugar keeps delivering, Bodkin is worth your time, I Will Find You absolutely is not, and Kobo quietly lands one on Amazon by integrating StoryGraph while Kindle owners get AI book summaries they didn't ask for. Sometimes the future feels like science fiction. This week it feels like someone accidentally trained the simulation on late-stage capitalism and never bothered to check the output.
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Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/B-r6M-Na60w
SHOW NOTES
No-Skill Hacker Uses Claude/Codex to Hit 14 Sites
Ford rehires ‘gray beard’ engineers after AI falls short
Volkswagen reportedly plans to cut 100,000 jobs
The ‘Almost Homeless’ Subreddit Is a Stark Glimpse at Soaring Wealth Inequality
Tesla settles lawsuit over fatal pedestrian crash involving Full Self-Driving
Kalshi sues Illinois over new tax on prediction market sports bets
Rick Rubin Stars in Polymarket Commercial
Brown University Professor Horrified to Discover Largest AI Cheating Scandal in Ivy League History
Australia Lawsuit Against Amazon Intensifies Company’s Legal Backlash Over Advertising
Australia's social media ban may not be that effective, study finds
Australia doubles the maximum penalty for its social media ban
Half of social media child safety features don't work, report claims
California launches tracker for AI-related job losses
Korean Workers Vote to Go On Strike, Fearing Robots Could Replace Them
Google limits Meta’s use of its Gemini AI models
Meta, like SpaceX, looks to turn excess AI compute into cash
Oracle’s Data Center Warning Is a Worst-Case Scenario for the Whole AI Boom
Thieves Are Absolutely Loving All of These New Data Center Projects
Heads Up: NASA to Launch 'Daring' Telescope Rescue Mission This Week
ESO Study Finds That No More Than 100,000 Satellites Should Orbit Earth
The Odyssey | Official Countdown Trailer
SILO - How did we lose this world?
The Kindle app for iOS has features your aging Kindle doesn't
Watch out, Amazon: The Kobo eReader now has a Goodreads rival
Meta is adding ridiculous ‘rate limits’ and a soft paywall to its smart glasses
Trackalot - One-tap Event Tracking on iOS
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2 July 2026, 9:00 pm - 1 hour 5 minutes752: Grandma Got Run Over By a Tesla
This week, the AI industry continues its speedrun toward becoming the tech equivalent of a late-stage casino. Elon Musk insists reports of aid-cut-related deaths don't exist despite mountains of evidence, SpaceX stock slides far enough to knock him out of the trillionaire club, and a startup is literally suing the U.S. government because Anthropic's Fable 5 model got turned off after three whole days of availability. Once again, we revisit the First Commandment of Grumpy Old Geeks: never build your company on someone else's platform.
Meanwhile, gas stations are being accused of using AI to coordinate prices, corporations are discovering that AI tokens cost actual money, and a Microsoft researcher used goats in Age of Empires II to demonstrate that maybe, just maybe, people are projecting way too much intelligence onto chatbots. The goats emerge with their reputations intact. The AI industry, less so.
The workforce bloodbath rolls on as Oracle quietly sheds 21,000 employees while blaming AI, Norway bans generative AI for elementary school students after discovering that children should probably learn to read before outsourcing their homework to robots, and the FCC flirts with rules that could effectively kill anonymous burner phones in the name of fighting scams. Over at Meta, an employee surveillance program accidentally exposed sensitive data to the entire company because of course it did, while Zuckerberg continues his relentless quest to strap cameras to everyone's face and call it progress. Add in YouTube settling another social-media-harm case, Chrome finally kneecapping traditional ad blockers, and prediction markets spreading across tech like mold in a college apartment, and it's becoming increasingly clear that every bad idea eventually gets funded.
In transportation news, autonomous vehicles continue demonstrating that "mostly works" is not a reassuring phrase when attached to two tons of moving metal. A Tesla on Autopilot crashes into a home and kills a grandmother, Rivian faces lawsuits over self-driving promises its hardware allegedly can't fulfill, and Waymo recalls thousands of robotaxis after they developed an unfortunate habit of driving into closed freeway construction zones. Elsewhere, Elon and Bezos are eyeing billions in broadband subsidies, Polymarket is accused of paying influencers to fake betting videos and climate data archivists are preserving public information from political interference.
Media recommendations include The Mandalorian, Silo, Strange New Worlds, Dungeon Crawler Carl, and a reminder that Firefox may soon be the last refuge for people who enjoy both the internet and ad blockers. Some weeks the future feels exciting. This week it mostly feels like an extended warranty scam.
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Show notes at https://gog.show/752
Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/PGXG0Cjj9T8
SHOW NOTES
These Are the Headlines That Elon Musk Says Don’t Exist
SpaceX Stock Has Fallen So Far That Elon Musk Is No Longer a Trillionaire
Someone Is Suing the U.S. For Making Them Go Without Anthropic's Fable 5 Model
Suit Alleges That Gas Stations Use AI to Hike Gas Prices
The Tokenpocalypse Is Here: Companies Are Scrambling To Stop Spending So Much on AI
Frustrated Microsoft Researcher Uses Goats in ‘Age of Empires II’ to Demo the Absurdity of LLMs
Oracle laid off 21,000 employees over the past year, citing AI as one of the reasons
Norway imposes broad restrictions on AI for elementary school kids
FCC plans ID mandate that could block anonymous use of prepaid burner phones
Meta is 'pausing' employee tracking program after it let the whole company see sensitive data
Meta announces new smart glasses starting at $299, as Zuckerberg keeps pushing wearables
YouTube settles early test case over social media harm to children
A Tesla crashed into a Texas home, killing a 76-year-old grandmother
Grandma Got Run Over by a Reindeer by Elmo & Patsy
Rivian faces a class action lawsuit over self-driving in its early vehicles
Waymo recalls over 3,800 robotaxis that might drive onto closed freeways
Elon Musk and the plot to hijack America’s broadband
Polymarket has reportedly been paying creators to post fake betting videos
Mark Zuckerberg wants Meta to launch its own prediction market
Facebook tests Forecast, an app for making predictions about world events, like COVID-19
US's climate.gov site, taken down by Trump, relaunched by nonprofit
The Trump Administration Wants to Know If It Should Regulate Bets on Reality Shows
The Pirate Bay for Strange New Worlds
Google Chrome’s next update will mark the end of popular ad blockers
‘Dungeon Crawler Carl’ Gets Straight-to-Series Order at Peacock From Seth MacFarlane’s Fuzzy Door
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25 June 2026, 9:00 pm - 1 hour 8 minutes751: Brewster’s Trillions
The AI hype train keeps shedding wheels this week. KPMG managed to publish a report about the transformative power of AI that was apparently riddled with hallucinations, fake citations, and imaginary products, proving once again that asking a stochastic parrot to do your homework is not a substitute for actual research. Meanwhile, Americans are using AI faster than ever while trusting it less than ever, OpenAI somehow turned $13 billion in revenue into losses that would make a dot-com CFO blush, and Silicon Valley CEOs have quietly stopped promising to replace all workers with AI. Not because they've changed their minds, mind you, just because they discovered that telling employees they're obsolete is terrible for morale and stock prices. Add in protests dogging Google CEO Sundar Pichai, Meta employees revolting against soul-crushing AI evaluation work, and the message is clear: the future is here, and everyone involved seems miserable.
We then return to one of the founding principles of Grumpy Old Geeks: never build your house on somebody else's land. Anthropic learned that lesson the hard way when its AI models reportedly got caught in a geopolitical and regulatory tug-of-war involving Amazon, the U.S. government, and national security concerns. World leaders are now openly questioning whether American AI platforms can be trusted if access can be revoked overnight. The same platform-risk story pops up again as Meta launches AI-powered search across Facebook's oceans of questionable user-generated content. Remember kids: when you pitch your tent in someone else's backyard, don't act shocked when they turn on the sprinklers.
From the Injustice Files, the hits keep coming. The Atlantic revealed the staggering scale of copyrighted music used to train AI systems, Hollywood inches closer to becoming a monopoly-themed amusement park, and the DOJ is backing xAI in a pollution lawsuit while reports emerge that Grok-assisted systems played a role in military operations. Elon keeps collecting legal losses, SpaceX buys Cursor for an eye-watering $60 billion, and Trump is threatening French wine over tech taxes while simultaneously promoting crypto through a UFC event at the White House. We wrap with Britain banning social media for kids under 16, hackers stealing entire Roblox games, Fox buying Roku, the return of human narrators at Blinkist, a gloriously anti-social-media flip phone from Commodore, and a reminder that Star Trek: Strange New Worlds is still one of the few things keeping the future worth looking forward to.
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Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/iRrbNdVw-pM
SHOW NOTES
A report on the benefits of AI was reportedly full of AI hallucinations
Just 16% of Americans Believe AI Will Positively Impact Society, Pew Poll Finds
Exclusive: OpenAI Losses Increased Nearly 8X in 2025, With Spending Hitting $34 Billion
The CEOs are No Longer (Publicly) Threatening to Replace Humans With AI
Sundar Pichai faces boos, walkout at Stanford graduation ceremony over Google's Israel, ICE ties
‘Tell Him He’s a Piece of Shit’: Meta’s New AI Unit Is a Total Mess
Anthropic becomes a cautionary sovereign-AI fable
Anthropic Says It’s Taking Claude Fable 5 Offline to Comply With US Government Order
Cyber experts warn Fable limits aid attackers and hurt defenders
Amazon Triggered Claude Fable 5 Shutdown: Investor, Cloud Host, Now Regulator
World leaders want American AI. They just don't want America to be able to turn it off.
Meta's new ‘AI Mode’ on Facebook pulls from public info across its platforms
Investigation by The Atlantic reveals many millions of songs used for AI music training
Justice Department Decision to Allow Paramount Deal Surprised Staff Investigators
Justice Department backs xAI in NAACP lawsuit over data center pollution
Pentagon used Elon Musk’s Grok AI to fire 2,000 missiles at Iran, official says
xAI's lawsuit accusing OpenAI of stealing trade secrets has been thrown out
SpaceX to acquire Cursor for $60B in stock, days after blockbuster IPO
Trump threatens 100 percent tariff on France's wine industry over its tech tax
UFC to pay White House fighters in crypto issued by Trump company
UK will ban social media for children under 16
Hackers Are Hijacking Entire Roblox Games Now
Fox is buying Roku for $22 billion
Apple TV renews comedy horror Widow’s Bay for a second season
Downton Abbey: The Grand Finale
Shrek 5 | Official Teaser Trailer
RIDICULOUS - 2026 Special - Trailer #1 - Louis C.K.
Star Trek: Strange New Worlds | Season 4 Official Trailer
Commodore made a social media-banishing flip phone
Snap's Stock Plunges the Moment It Reveals Its Comically Gigantic AR Glasses
So Good They Can’t Ignore You by Cal Newport
Creator Capitalist by the Category Pirates
Blinkist pulls back on AI narrators
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18 June 2026, 9:00 pm - 57 minutes 36 seconds750: Douchebag Ping Pong
Episode 750 arrives with a simple reminder: the bullshit never sleeps. This week Jason and Brian dive headfirst into a game of Douchebag Ping Pong featuring OpenAI, Anthropic, Elon Musk, and the rest of the AI industrial complex. OpenAI is preparing to go public while simultaneously transforming ChatGPT into an everything app, Anthropic wants the world to slow down AI development before Skynet shows up for work, and then immediately releases a more powerful model because apparently self-awareness only goes so far. Meanwhile, Sam Altman’s eyeball-scanning side hustle is laying people off, proving that convincing humans to hand over their biometric data remains a surprisingly difficult sales pitch.
The AI arms race gets even weirder as SpaceX unveils plans for orbital data centers the size of flying football fields while Google and Anthropic shovel billions into Elon’s compute empire just to keep their models fed. On Earth, Seattle is trying to ban new AI data centers before they drink the city dry, Meta is planting AI infrastructure in India, Google is slashing Gemini prices, and a Mississippi judge discovers that lawyers on both sides of a case used AI to invent legal citations, resulting in the rare spectacle of artificial stupidity arguing against itself. Thankfully, AI also manages to do something useful, helping researchers develop a promising universal vaccine and reminding us that not every machine-learning story ends with humanity getting harvested for electricity.
Elsewhere, crypto continues its transformation into performance art as Sam Bankman-Fried seeks a presidential pardon while reports suggest the Trump family made billions from crypto projects that left investors holding the bag. Meta gets caught quietly experimenting with face recognition in smart glasses, lawmakers scramble to require recording indicators, and Snapchat tightens protections for younger users. The guys also celebrate Apple's shockingly competent Sports app, a rare piece of software that simply does the thing it's supposed to do without trying to become your therapist, financial advisor, or AI life coach. Plus: Ghostbusters returns, Devil May Cry gets another season, Bill Burr takes on Facebook in The Social Reckoning, and a look at why Silicon Valley's newest luxury service appears to be paying actual humans for conversation.
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Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/w8POIp_Dts0
SHOW NOTES
OpenAI files SEC paperwork to go public
Anthropic proposes a global slowdown of AI development
OpenAI Joins Anthropic in Call for International AI Watchdog
OpenAI reportedly has a major ChatGPT overhaul in store
Sam Altman's Eyeball Scanning Company Now Laying Off Workers
Google will pay SpaceX $920 million a month to use xAI's data centers
Seattle is close to approving a year-long ban on large data centers
Meta signs first AI data center deal in India with Reliance
Google cuts the price of its AI Plus plan and doubles the storage
Judge Learns Lawyers on Both Sides of Case Used AI, Cancels Trial, Kicks Everyone Off the Case
The University of Cambridge says it successfully tested a vaccine with an AI-designed antigen
Kalshi will require employment info for some bets as an insider trading precaution
Sam Bankman-Fried applies for a pardon from Trump
The Nerdy Escorts Cashing In On Silicon Valley’s AI Boom
Apple Made a Sports App That Does Almost Nothing. It’s Incredible.
Meta Removes Face-Recognition System From Its Smart Glasses, Is Mad About it
Smart Glasses Would Legally Require a Recording Light Under Proposed Law
Snap will no longer allow younger teens' Spotlight videos to be publicly viewable
The iOS 27 beta pretty much confirms that an Apple foldable is happening
Thinking Sideways: How to Think Like a Chess Player and Win at Life by Jennifer Shahade
Thinking Fast, Slow, Artificially: AI and Your Brain
Downton Abbey: The Motion Picture
The New ‘Ghostbusters’ Cartoon Gets a Title and Release Date
Devil May Cry Season 2 on Netflix
THE SOCIAL RECKONING – Official Teaser Trailer (HD)
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11 June 2026, 7:00 pm - 1 hour 16 minutes749: Surge Bananas
This week on Grumpy Old Geeks, Brian and Jason once again survey the smoldering wreckage of the tech industry and discover that the people building the future are increasingly being sued by governments, publishers, customers, employees, and occasionally reality itself. California is coming after 23andMe over its catastrophic data breach, Florida is taking a swing at OpenAI, CNN has joined the ever-growing conga line of companies suing Perplexity, and Meta somehow decided the solution to improving AI is recording employees' every mouse click while generously allowing them a whole 30-minute privacy break. Meanwhile, Google's own engineers are sharing memes about how much Google's AI tools suck, Microsoft apparently wants users addicted to its new AI assistant - first taste's free! - and Anthropic is preparing to go public with a valuation that makes even the most irrational dot-com era investor look financially responsible.
The AI arms race continues producing exactly the kinds of outcomes you'd expect when venture capitalists start huffing their own press releases. Instagram's AI support bot reportedly helped hackers steal accounts because apparently "Are you sure you're the owner?" was considered an optional step. Suno raised another $400 million while fighting copyright lawsuits, Paramount+ seems to have let AI create the ugliest Star Trek thumbnail in Federation history, and Stan Lee has now been digitally resurrected because modern capitalism looked at death and said, "Nice try." Over in transportation, BYD is so confident in its self-driving technology that it's willing to pay for your accidents, while Tesla owners are discovering their old Full Self-Driving contracts may have quietly received software updates of the legal variety. Somewhere in a conference room, a lawyer just whispered, "Let's not put that in writing," ten years too late.
Elsewhere, governments worldwide continue their ongoing experiment of raising children by confiscating smartphones. Malaysia has implemented a social media ban for kids under 16, Poland wants phones and smartwatches locked away at school, and Kentucky schools just collected $27 million from social media companies accused of building products as addictive as cigarettes.
Dave Bittner drops by for a visit and we discuss Spotify listeners apparently preferring old music because new music keeps getting algorithmically focus-grouped into oblivion and a healthy dose of Star Wars, Downton Abbey, Derry Girls, Lego, books, gadgets, and AI-generated jazz. Add it all up and you've got another week where the only thing moving faster than technology is the legal department trying to keep up.
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Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/A1sv2BEzWBk
Show Notes
Vibe Coders are Script Kiddies
Colorado Governor Vetoes Surveillance Pricing Ban as Public Backlash Against the Tech Grows
California sues 23andMe over 2023 data breach that affected 7 million users
Florida sues OpenAI, Sam Altman, in first-of-its-kind lawsuit over violent incidents
Meta will reportedly let employees take 30-minute breaks from its tracking program
Instagram is alerting users who were targeted by hackers during AI chatbot attacks
Google Employees Internally Share Memes About How Its AI Sucks
Google ordered to put clearer links in AI search and let UK publishers opt out
Microsoft Wants to 'Make People Addicted' to its New AI Assistant, Internal Documents Reveal
Meta, other social networks will pay $27 million to settle Kentucky school district lawsuit
Malaysia's under-16 social media ban carries fines up to $2.5 million
Poland wants to ban phones and smartwatches in schools
CNN is the latest media company to sue Perplexity
Still facing copyright lawsuits, AI music generator Suno raises another $400M
BYD is assuming financial liability if you crash while using its self-driving tech
Anthropic is set to go public after filing paperwork with the SEC
Data Center Operators Are Trying to Fix Their Water Use Problems
Tesla Owners Say Their Old FSD Contracts Were Quietly Changed
Stan Lee's voice and likeness have been resurrected, thanks to AI
Paramount+ used AI to make the ugliest Star Trek thumbnail ever
I Am Not a Robot: My Year Using AI to Do (Almost) Everything by Joanna Stern
Carl's Doomsday Scenario: Dungeon Crawler Carl Book 2 by Matt Dinniman
Wisdom Takes Work: Learn. Apply. Repeat. by Ryan Holiday
Wrapped up the Downton Abbey series rewatch
Buffy and Ted Lasso star Anthony Head dies at 72
Almost through the Derry Girls series.
Lego Mando and Grogu set (mild spoiler)
The Biggest Hits on Spotify Right Now Are a Blast From the Past
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
5 June 2026, 10:00 pm - 58 minutes 52 seconds748: Space Bone
This week on Grumpy Old Geeks, Brian and Jason stare directly into the flaming garbage barge of “the future” and discover that self-driving vehicles still can’t tell the difference between a road and an urban swimming pool. Waymo stranded robotaxis in both Atlanta and San Antonio, while Gothenburg’s brand-new autonomous bus service survived roughly one day before getting rear-ended by a tram like a lost RoboCop scene directed by Benny Hill. Meanwhile, Ferrari unveiled the Jony Ive-designed Luce EV, proving that if you give Apple designers enough money and untreated minimalist impulses, eventually everything starts looking like an uninspired bar of soap.
The AI bubble keeps inflating like a cursed parade balloon nobody knows how to land. Uber admits it’s spending fortunes on AI without being able to explain what it actually improves, Starbucks killed its AI inventory system after repeated losses to dairy products, and Google’s AI search now struggles with advanced concepts like “ignore,” “stop,” and spelling “Google.” CEOs remain committed to replacing workers anyway, with 99% expecting AI-driven layoffs because apparently nothing says innovation like firing junior staff and replacing them with autocomplete that thinks there are two Ps in Google. Meanwhile, Spotify continues its transformation into the content equivalent of a casino buffet with AI-narrated magazine articles, while Pope Leo emerges as the lone adult in the room, suggesting humanity maybe shouldn’t hand civilization over to glorified pattern-matching slot machines.
Elsewhere in dystopia, Trump Mobile exposed customer data to the open internet because, of course, it did, while the White House reportedly plans to force-install its official app on government phones in what feels like the world’s least subtle spyware rollout. Prediction markets are devolving into a legal cage fight between states and crypto gambling enthusiasts. A Google engineer allegedly made $1.2 million through insider trading on Polymarket because we’ve apparently rebuilt Wall Street out of meme apps, and researchers say your Wi-Fi router can now identify you by how your meat body disturbs radio waves. Add in SpaceX building a military sensor-to-shooter network straight out of a cyberpunk fever dream, China launching artificial embryo experiments into orbit to explore off-world reproduction, and Erin Brockovich mapping AI data centers draining entire towns' worth of water, and suddenly the most comforting thing this week might be watching The Grand-ish Tour and pretending the world still runs on gasoline and bad decisions.
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Links:
Waymos in Atlanta and San Antonio keep driving into flooded roads
Gothenburg's self-driving bus trammed on day one
Ferrari Luce unveiled: Here's the first car from Jony Ive's design house
Uber president says AI spending is getting ‘harder to justify’
Trump Mobile has exposed customers' personal data, including home addresses and phone numbers
The White House is reportedly forcing its official app onto all government employee phones
Kalshi and Rhode Island sue each other in latest challenge to prediction markets
Google engineer charged with insider trading after making $1.2M on Polymarket
Google is currently struggling to define words like disregard, stop and ignore
Why Google's AI can't spell Google (or anything else)
Starbucks abandons its AI inventory tool after only nine months
Majority of Americans Support Ban on Surveillance Pricing and Electronic Shelf Labels
Ansel Adams' trust says AI-colorized version of his work was exhibited without permission
People used AI to recreate the voices of pilots killed in a plane crash
Spotify now lets you stream narrated magazine articles, too
Pope Leo calls for AI to serve humanity and not concentrate power
99% of CEOs Expect AI-Driven Layoffs in the Next Two Years
US Space Force confirms SpaceX will build sensor-to-shooter targeting network
Star Trek Title Card Generator
Erin Brockovich launches a crowdsourced AI data center map
China Launched Artificial Embryos to Orbit to Find Out If We Can Have Space Babies
I Am Not a Robot: My Year Using AI to Do (Almost) Everything by Joanna Stern
Inside the Box: How Constraints Make Us Better by David Epstein
See Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
29 May 2026, 9:00 pm - 1 hour 22 minutes747: Why We Sigh
FOLLOW UP: This week, it seems America believes every complicated social problem can be fixed by asking, “Have you tried turning the internet off for the children?” Meanwhile, the Electronic Frontier Foundation quietly notes that the science behind social media bans might not be as clear-cut as cable-news dads screaming about dopamine loops claim. Turns out, teen anxiety may also be linked to pandemics, school shootings, climate dread, and an economy that feels like a Fallout side quest. Meanwhile, Snap Inc. and YouTube settled another lawsuit accusing their apps of turning kids into doomscrolling goblins, Meta continues to insist social media addiction isn’t real while losing money in court, and former Google CEO Eric Schmidt was booed at a graduation speech after telling graduates to hop on the AI rocket ship without asking questions — exactly what a billionaire says when he already owns the rocket.
In the news, Elon Musk lost another OpenAI lawsuit because apparently even juries have limits. SpaceX’s IPO revealed Musk plans to power AI with enough gas turbines to recreate 1890s London smog, and Grok officially became a disclosure liability after the whole “MechaHitler” incident. Tesla robotaxis still clip fences and occasionally require humans to remotely drive the “self-driving” cars. Trump Mobile somehow shipped a gold phone that actually works — a stunning upset — before immediately leaking customer data. LinkedIn finally admitted the platform has become an AI-generated motivational swamp filled with “it’s not about X, it’s about Y” sludge from people named Brayden. Spotify is handing out podcast verification badges so listeners can tell real creators from algorithmic nightmare fuel. Meta laid off thousands more workers while reportedly using employee surveillance to train AI replacements. And OpenAI is giving everyone in Malta a free year of ChatGPT Plus if they complete an AI literacy course, which honestly makes Malta sound more technologically responsible than Silicon Valley.
APPS & DOODADS reflect classic Gen-X paranoia, as Backblaze highlights California's constant threat of wildfires and the idea that local backups are optimistic. YouTube introduced AI deepfake detection tools, allowing creators to finally see which scam ads are using their faces to promote crypto vitamins, while X limited free users to 50 posts a day unless they pay for a blue check — proving once again that the true free speech was the subscriptions we sold along the way. Retrocodex arrived with a strong “everything your teachers confidently told you in 1987 was wrong” vibe.
MEDIA CANDY opens with the eternal cry of “FUCK THE FIRETV!!!!” before Jason taps out of Good Omens after ten minutes while Brian takes the bullet for the audience. There’s also chatter about Mortal Kombat 2, The Devil Wears Prada 2, Billy Corgan talking goth history with David J, and more existential dread courtesy of Dan Carlin’s Common Sense.
THE DARK SIDE WITH DAVE welcomes back Dave Bittner for a Mando & Grogu review, Darth Maul, and a stunning but absurdly expensive LEGO Disneyland set. There’s also a guy who built a full-size Millennium Falcon “with his wife’s permission,” a fan-made Star Tours film, and the Federal Trade Commission discovering that those creepy “your phone is listening to you” ad-tech companies mainly just had PowerPoint decks and confidence. Also: mechanical keyboard simulators now exist, because apparently even fake typing has become a lifestyle brand.
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Show notes at https://gog.show/747
Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/eX5jVfewasw
FOLLOW UP
Snap and YouTube have reportedly settled another major social media addiction lawsuit
Ex-Google CEO Eric Schmidt Fails to Read Room on AI, Gets Booed into Oblivion
IN THE NEWS
Elon Musk took too long to sue OpenAI, jury unanimously agrees
SpaceX IPO Filing Reveals Nearly $3 Billion Investment in Gas Turbines for AI Data Centers
‘MechaHitler’ Is SpaceX’s Problem Now
Trump Mobile Phone Beats Expectations by Actually Existing
New crash data highlights the slow progress of Tesla's robotaxis
If You Used Insider Knowledge to Score Big on Polymarket, You May Now Be in Huge Trouble
Minnesota passes prediction markets ban
LinkedIn doesn't want your AI slop anymore
Spotify is launching verification badges for podcasts to help listeners avoid AI slop
OpenAI is offering ChatGPT Plus to citizens of Malta for a year
Massive Crypto ATM Company Bitcoin Depot Is Shutting Down as the Whole Industry Collapses
‘Smoke Weed and Earn Bitcoin’ With This Vape Pen in Our Increasingly Dystopian Nightmare
‘Unstoppable’ Crypto Exchange Halts Trading After $10 Million Theft
Iran Doubles Down on Bitcoin for Ships Passing Through the Straight of Hormuz
Trump-Linked Crypto Company Notes 'Substantial Doubt' It Can Survive Another 12 Months
APPS & DOODADS
YouTube's AI deepfake detection tool is now available to all creators 18 and older
X accounts are limited to 50 posts and 200 replies a day unless they pay for a blue checkmark
MEDIA CANDY
Good Omens Season 3 - The Finale
The Magnificent Others with Billy Corgan - David J of Bauhaus & Love & Rockets
Common Sense 326 – The Water in Which We Swim
THE DARK SIDE WITH DAVE
Not Even Baby Yoda Can Save ‘Star Wars’
Colorado man creates replica Millenium Falcon
Someone made a Star Tours fan film.
Bring Disneyland Home With This Gorgeous New Lego Set
‘Creepy’ Listening Tool for Targeted Ads Didn’t Actually Work, FTC Says
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