[00:09.660 --> 00:11.500]  FSRN is a worker-run collective.
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[00:38.080 --> 00:41.280]  That's comments at fsrn.org.
[00:41.600 --> 00:44.280]  In Los Angeles, I'm Aura Bogado.
[00:50.560 --> 00:53.960]  And you're listening to radio station WBAI New York.
[00:54.240 --> 00:57.120]  It's just about 7 o'clock on a Wednesday night.
[00:57.560 --> 00:58.360]  Time for Off the Hook.
[01:03.550 --> 01:08.010]  The telephone keeps ringing, so I ripped it off the wall.
[01:08.970 --> 01:11.010]  I cut myself while shaving.
[01:11.610 --> 01:13.530]  Now I can't make a call.
[01:14.330 --> 01:16.330]  We couldn't get much worse.
[01:17.010 --> 01:18.910]  But if they could, they would.
[01:19.210 --> 01:19.870]  Fondiddley Bum.
[01:19.990 --> 01:21.790]  But the best, it's back the worst.
[01:22.470 --> 01:24.290]  I hope that's understood.
[01:24.530 --> 01:25.370]  Fondiddley Bum.
[02:25.050 --> 02:26.210]  And a very good evening to everybody.
[02:26.310 --> 02:28.730]  The program is Off the Hook.
[02:29.510 --> 02:33.230]  Manuel Goldstein here with you on this Wednesday evening.
[02:33.530 --> 02:36.870]  And we're joined tonight by Bernie S.
[02:36.970 --> 02:37.410]  down in Philadelphia.
[02:38.510 --> 02:39.050]  Good evening.
[02:39.670 --> 02:41.270]  I called you first this time, Bernie.
[02:41.490 --> 02:42.010]  Got you off guard.
[02:42.170 --> 02:42.970]  I like that.
[02:43.050 --> 02:43.330]  All right.
[02:43.350 --> 02:44.270]  Because I came in the door.
[02:44.390 --> 02:45.830]  We're going to go in the other direction this time.
[02:45.970 --> 02:47.870]  We're being joined by Red Hacked over there.
[02:47.990 --> 02:48.210]  Hey.
[02:48.350 --> 02:49.030]  On the far left.
[02:50.410 --> 02:51.090]  And Arseny.
[02:51.470 --> 02:51.770]  Hi.
[02:51.970 --> 02:52.370]  Red Bird.
[02:52.530 --> 02:52.950]  Good evening.
[02:53.350 --> 02:54.770]  Mike and Jim on the right.
[02:55.070 --> 02:55.650]  The far right.
[02:55.750 --> 02:56.170]  Far right.
[02:58.110 --> 03:00.170]  I guess you don't want me to greet the people.
[03:00.390 --> 03:00.710]  Well, no.
[03:00.730 --> 03:02.850]  I just wanted to emphasize that you're on the right-hand side of the room.
[03:02.850 --> 03:04.430]  I'm on my left.
[03:04.710 --> 03:05.750]  Well, maybe so.
[03:05.870 --> 03:18.250]  But in any event, welcome to another edition of Off the Hook, the program that deals with technology, high technology, low technology, low intelligence, big brother, and all sorts of other things.
[03:18.530 --> 03:21.490]  Bernie, I believe you had a correction for last week, something about the cruise ship?
[03:21.950 --> 03:25.010]  Yes, you actually called that correctly, Manuel.
[03:25.010 --> 03:41.210]  We were talking about the cruise ship that was off of the coast of, where was it, near Somalia, I believe, that was attacked by pirates, real-life pirates, not music pirates.
[03:41.730 --> 03:47.070]  And the crew repelled them with an audio device.
[03:47.750 --> 03:54.190]  And you would surmise that that must be something like the NYPD used during the RNC protests.
[03:55.150 --> 04:01.910]  And I surmise it was a system that's used by some other cruise lines and by the military, which is an underwater system.
[04:01.990 --> 04:02.370]  But you're right.
[04:02.370 --> 04:05.230]  It's an audio system above the water.
[04:05.370 --> 04:07.030]  It's sort of like an audio cannon.
[04:07.250 --> 04:16.790]  And you can aim this thing and make very painful sounds and direct them with high directivity towards people's ears, hundreds of yards away.
[04:17.410 --> 04:21.930]  And apparently it was so uncomfortable for those pirates, they had to be distracted.
[04:22.410 --> 04:24.130]  How was it for the people on the boat, though?
[04:25.270 --> 04:27.730]  Well, apparently it's so directional that it doesn't...
[04:27.730 --> 04:29.870]  It's not as loud for people on the boat.
[04:29.990 --> 04:31.030]  Although there's a picture...
[04:31.810 --> 04:35.990]  I think I have the website for that here somewhere.
[04:36.550 --> 04:39.290]  There's a picture on the website of the company that makes this thing.
[04:39.370 --> 04:40.990]  And it looks like a...
[04:40.990 --> 04:41.670]  Wait, hold that up.
[04:41.670 --> 04:42.530]  Hold up to the phone.
[04:42.610 --> 04:43.190]  Let's see it.
[04:43.190 --> 04:43.650]  I'm...
[04:43.650 --> 04:44.370]  Okay.
[04:44.530 --> 04:44.870]  Here we go.
[04:45.050 --> 04:45.350]  All right.
[04:45.730 --> 04:46.110]  Oh, wait.
[04:46.150 --> 04:47.330]  Our listeners can't see that.
[04:48.070 --> 04:48.610]  Here it is.
[04:48.650 --> 04:49.150]  I'm holding it up.
[04:49.170 --> 04:50.650]  It says ATC...
[04:50.650 --> 04:52.210]  Well, I can see it, but they can't.
[04:55.190 --> 04:55.910]  ATCSD.com.
[04:56.050 --> 05:00.210]  That's in Alpha, Tango, Charlie, Sierra, Delta.
[05:00.490 --> 05:02.230]  I'm told I can't see it because you're on the phone.
[05:02.330 --> 05:02.490]  Okay.
[05:03.210 --> 05:03.930]  But you know what?
[05:03.930 --> 05:07.710]  People listening to this show in 10 years, they're going to marvel at how backwards we were.
[05:07.790 --> 05:10.510]  Just like we marvel at how backwards we were 10 years ago.
[05:11.450 --> 05:12.230]  It could be us listening.
[05:12.230 --> 05:13.230]  That makes sense.
[05:14.370 --> 05:15.170]  Well, it's just...
[05:15.170 --> 05:17.190]  It's amazing to see how technology changes.
[05:17.770 --> 05:19.030]  Well, I mean, think about it.
[05:19.110 --> 05:25.470]  With the advance of digital radio, depending on the bandwidth that's available, you know, it could be possible to listen and view.
[05:26.170 --> 05:26.670]  That's true.
[05:26.770 --> 05:27.110]  That's true.
[05:27.110 --> 05:36.010]  I would predict that in the future, you will be able to transmit, in addition to auto, you'll also be able to transmit video signals simultaneously.
[05:36.250 --> 05:37.590]  So they'll be synchronized.
[05:37.730 --> 05:38.290]  What about smell?
[05:38.290 --> 05:39.230]  Can you transmit that?
[05:39.650 --> 05:40.690]  I don't know about that.
[05:40.930 --> 05:41.330]  Why not?
[05:41.330 --> 05:42.790]  That started out as a joke.
[05:43.370 --> 05:43.590]  Television.
[05:44.150 --> 05:47.270]  All six senses, you'd be able to transmit them over the internet.
[05:47.470 --> 05:48.090]  I think that'd be...
[05:48.090 --> 05:50.210]  See, now you're making a lot of work for yourself in 20 years.
[05:50.330 --> 05:53.290]  You're going to be sitting there and adding all these smells and images and whatnot to the radio.
[05:53.290 --> 05:55.490]  Yeah, once images come in, no one will listen to the show.
[05:55.510 --> 05:57.810]  Yeah, but we're not recording smells, so we don't have to add them later.
[05:58.250 --> 05:59.370]  We're just recording the sound.
[05:59.950 --> 06:04.270]  And by the way, folks, check out all the shows we found on the internet.
[06:04.310 --> 06:05.790]  We stuck a bunch of new ones.
[06:05.910 --> 06:09.670]  In fact, we even found one program, Bernie, you'll like this, having to do with shortwave radio.
[06:09.790 --> 06:15.330]  We were talking about shortwave radio last week, and we even played some interval signals from Radio Moscow.
[06:15.470 --> 06:17.190]  By the way, thanks, everybody, for calling in.
[06:17.450 --> 06:20.110]  I don't understand why people are still sending us answers, though.
[06:20.110 --> 06:26.190]  So, when the contest was over the air, and it was a week ago, and we already announced what the answer is.
[06:26.310 --> 06:27.970]  And people are still sending us the wrong answer.
[06:28.030 --> 06:28.950]  That's the funny thing.
[06:29.710 --> 06:32.770]  Well, TASS actually sent us the name of the song.
[06:33.090 --> 06:33.410]  TASS?
[06:34.550 --> 06:35.430]  Wasn't that TASS?
[06:35.510 --> 06:37.330]  Oh, I thought you said TASS, the Russian news agency.
[06:37.650 --> 06:40.110]  No, no, no, not T-A-C-C, but T-A-C-C.
[06:40.210 --> 06:41.590]  I know we get listened to in high places.
[06:41.890 --> 06:42.390]  Yeah, okay.
[06:43.230 --> 06:46.250]  She correctly named the song of the...
[06:46.250 --> 06:49.750]  I don't even know how I could pronounce the...
[06:50.230 --> 06:52.370]  Oh, we have a Russian here.
[06:52.550 --> 06:53.350]  Arshini, you want to give us a shot?
[06:53.550 --> 07:02.950]  I think it was called Красивая страна моя родная, which means the beautiful country where I was born.
[07:04.050 --> 07:04.410]  See?
[07:04.510 --> 07:07.550]  It's good to have Russians around, because they can say things like that.
[07:07.630 --> 07:09.090]  That sounded really good, too, by the way.
[07:09.290 --> 07:10.250]  I could never say it like that.
[07:12.490 --> 07:14.550]  None of us even knew the name of the song.
[07:14.670 --> 07:17.030]  We just knew it was the Radio Moscow Interval Signal.
[07:17.310 --> 07:17.910]  That's true.
[07:18.230 --> 07:21.950]  But we found the program from, I think, 1991.
[07:22.790 --> 07:24.370]  It was right when the Gulf War broke out.
[07:24.930 --> 07:30.990]  And we were speaking with somebody named Bob Horvitz, who was with the Whole Earth Review, and we were talking about shortwave.
[07:30.990 --> 07:35.350]  He was playing all kinds of interesting sounds that you would hear on shortwave radio.
[07:35.470 --> 07:37.370]  Do you remember the Soviet woodpecker, Bernie?
[07:37.850 --> 07:38.430]  I do.
[07:38.430 --> 07:40.410]  I was actually part of the woodpecker project.
[07:40.490 --> 07:40.870]  Were you?
[07:41.030 --> 07:48.910]  It was a bunch of shortwave listeners and ham radio operators who would listen for the woodpecker and write down what frequencies and what signal strength it was.
[07:48.990 --> 07:52.790]  And we compiled all our data and some useful information.
[07:52.790 --> 07:56.010]  And they sent me a free t-shirt that had a picture of a woodpecker with an X through it.
[07:56.110 --> 07:56.890]  And it was fun.
[07:56.970 --> 07:58.490]  This was back in the mid-'80s.
[07:58.490 --> 08:01.670]  Yeah, and what the woodpecker, basically, it came from the Soviet Union.
[08:01.990 --> 08:05.010]  It was just this sound that sounded like a woodpecker.
[08:05.170 --> 08:10.330]  It was very, very loud, very powerful, and it would pretty much block out radio that you were trying to listen to.
[08:10.490 --> 08:12.010]  And it moved from frequency to frequency.
[08:12.490 --> 08:15.370]  And we played an excerpt from it, and it just brought back such memories.
[08:15.370 --> 08:26.510]  It was actually a Soviet over-the-horizon radar system, but the Soviets never admitted to that until after the Cold War was over.
[08:26.710 --> 08:38.310]  But so this over-the-horizon radar system was wreaking havoc with shortwave listeners and ham radio operators because it was interfering with their signals, and the Soviets were just indiscriminately broadcasting the signal all over the bands.
[08:39.570 --> 08:40.750]  Yeah, pretty amazing.
[08:41.610 --> 08:46.590]  You can, if you go to our website, go to February 27th, 1991.
[08:46.630 --> 08:48.970]  That was that show that we just uncovered.
[08:49.150 --> 08:53.670]  And by the way, this important announcement to all you internet listeners, we are not on the net right now.
[08:54.270 --> 08:56.310]  In fact, the net connectivity is...
[08:56.310 --> 08:56.910]  Yeah?
[08:57.170 --> 08:57.870]  You have a question?
[08:58.750 --> 08:59.330]  No, no.
[08:59.450 --> 09:00.750]  I was just thinking for a moment.
[09:00.970 --> 09:02.450]  Let me get this word out here.
[09:03.810 --> 09:05.970]  So if you're listening on the internet, then...
[09:05.970 --> 09:06.990]  You're not hearing this.
[09:07.090 --> 09:08.090]  Oh, I see what you were going to say.
[09:08.230 --> 09:08.350]  Yeah.
[09:09.690 --> 09:10.270]  Okay, yeah.
[09:10.270 --> 09:15.670]  Okay, for those of you who might have friends who are trying to listen on the internet, call them and tell them that we're not on the internet.
[09:15.930 --> 09:18.450]  And we hope to be back on the internet soon.
[09:18.590 --> 09:19.490]  Not us.
[09:19.730 --> 09:22.570]  2600 is on, but our streaming is off.
[09:22.630 --> 09:23.890]  And I think that's somewhere over in England.
[09:24.770 --> 09:30.330]  You could even, if you're listening on the radio and you have friends on the internet, you could even try and transcribe everything we say.
[09:30.470 --> 09:30.990]  Would you do that?
[09:31.050 --> 09:31.570]  That would be nice.
[09:32.090 --> 09:32.390]  Yeah.
[09:32.510 --> 09:35.130]  I think our internet listeners would really appreciate that.
[09:35.130 --> 09:35.270]  Yeah.
[09:35.510 --> 09:38.030]  The problem is we're going to actually get people who are going to do this.
[09:38.250 --> 09:38.730]  That's true.
[09:38.730 --> 09:40.830]  We're going to get a lot of emails with a lot of transcriptions.
[09:40.830 --> 09:41.910]  We love getting the emails, though.
[09:41.970 --> 09:42.690]  The emails are...
[09:42.690 --> 09:43.490]  We keep the show going.
[09:43.650 --> 09:45.230]  No, there's no need to send us the transcript.
[09:45.390 --> 09:48.510]  We already either know or don't care to know what we said.
[09:49.410 --> 09:49.730]  But...
[09:49.730 --> 09:51.670]  I have no idea what I'm going to say in a few minutes.
[09:51.670 --> 09:56.730]  If you'd like to send us an email, the address is OTH at 2600.com.
[09:56.890 --> 09:57.730]  We'd love to hear from you.
[09:57.970 --> 09:58.130]  Okay.
[09:58.130 --> 09:59.170]  What's been going on this week?
[09:59.190 --> 10:00.550]  A couple of interesting things.
[10:00.650 --> 10:01.210]  The MTA.
[10:02.350 --> 10:07.170]  MTA started some new testing or new searching methods.
[10:08.070 --> 10:10.830]  It basically involves dusting people's bags now.
[10:10.950 --> 10:12.850]  So they may not ask you to open your bag.
[10:12.950 --> 10:14.890]  They may ask you to dust...
[10:14.890 --> 10:17.910]  For them to dust your bag to check for explosive residue.
[10:18.150 --> 10:20.350]  Well, swabbing is a much better way to put it.
[10:20.410 --> 10:25.010]  Dusting implies that they're either looking for dust or putting dust on your bag.
[10:25.170 --> 10:25.750]  Like dusting for...
[10:25.750 --> 10:26.590]  Planting evidence.
[10:26.870 --> 10:27.650]  That's good, too.
[10:27.970 --> 10:30.790]  When they swab your bag, aren't they leaving a residue behind?
[10:31.010 --> 10:32.650]  I would guess, yes, they probably are.
[10:32.750 --> 10:34.250]  But they're taking most of it.
[10:34.330 --> 10:39.830]  And I don't think they're going to then, you know, have you swabbed again and say, Ha-ha, we detect explosives.
[10:40.030 --> 10:44.550]  I've heard on a number of occasions people who get swabbed at one end of their trip.
[10:44.550 --> 10:45.490]  Let's say in an airport.
[10:46.250 --> 10:48.470]  Tend to get targeted when they land as well.
[10:48.570 --> 10:51.230]  As if something is on the bag that alerts authorities.
[10:51.430 --> 10:51.870]  I don't know why.
[10:51.970 --> 10:52.450]  It doesn't make sense.
[10:52.470 --> 10:54.670]  If they got swabbed the first time, why they'd have to do it a second time.
[10:54.810 --> 10:56.850]  Or they're equally suspicious on either side.
[10:56.950 --> 10:57.690]  Could be just that.
[10:58.250 --> 10:59.490]  They're looking for two chemicals.
[10:59.930 --> 11:01.130]  What chemicals are they looking for, Bernie?
[11:01.610 --> 11:03.350]  They're looking for hydrogen peroxide.
[11:04.010 --> 11:05.750]  And they're looking for ammonium nitrate.
[11:06.810 --> 11:13.150]  And hydrogen peroxide, if you go to H202.com, you'll find that it's a safe and effective chemical.
[11:14.550 --> 11:16.910]  Hydrogen peroxide is a disinfectant, right?
[11:17.030 --> 11:19.550]  And it can be used as a mouthwash if you dilute it in water.
[11:19.770 --> 11:20.830]  You can buy it at a drugstore.
[11:20.990 --> 11:22.210]  It's also an oxidant.
[11:22.390 --> 11:26.370]  And any oxidant can be made into an explosive of some sort.
[11:26.490 --> 11:30.730]  So if I bought some hydrogen peroxide and it spilled in my bag, I could be in for a world of trouble.
[11:30.890 --> 11:34.130]  What if we spill hydrogen peroxide on everyone's bag?
[11:34.990 --> 11:36.290]  If we just spray it in the air.
[11:36.970 --> 11:38.310]  How about on the steps at the subway?
[11:38.330 --> 11:39.630]  I'm not trying to cause trouble here.
[11:39.710 --> 11:40.590]  I'm just, you know, theorizing.
[11:40.590 --> 11:45.650]  This was my idea several years ago when they started with that sniffer on the Statue of Liberty.
[11:48.070 --> 12:01.310]  Putting ammonium fertilizer on the ground where people waited in line for the ferry so that essentially everybody would step in it and they'd get over to the Statue of Liberty and all of a sudden everyone would be testing positive for explosives.
[12:01.790 --> 12:03.950]  Show them the folly of this search.
[12:03.950 --> 12:10.470]  Well, the thing that really annoys me about this is civil libertarians supposedly are saying, this is a step in the right direction.
[12:10.470 --> 12:11.910]  It's not a step in the right direction.
[12:11.910 --> 12:16.230]  It's just basically the same thing done in a way that they'll get away with more people.
[12:16.650 --> 12:18.610]  You know, we're not looking inside your bag.
[12:18.690 --> 12:19.530]  We're not invading your privacy.
[12:19.570 --> 12:21.610]  But we are, you know, targeting you anyway.
[12:21.610 --> 12:24.590]  And we're going to sniff you for various chemicals.
[12:25.470 --> 12:27.090]  This kind of thing should not be tolerated.
[12:27.210 --> 12:29.130]  But yet it's apparently going to be.
[12:29.370 --> 12:35.790]  Have you noticed that more and more, when this whole thing started, the searches happened outside the subway station.
[12:35.930 --> 12:37.170]  They weren't really going on inside.
[12:37.830 --> 12:41.350]  And then in advance that they have a sign up that says you can be searched once you get inside.
[12:41.570 --> 12:47.470]  And now on every single subway I go on, they announce that, you know, your bags are subject to searched by the NYPD.
[12:47.670 --> 12:47.890]  Really?
[12:48.110 --> 12:48.910]  I hadn't heard that announcement.
[12:49.010 --> 12:51.090]  I've heard that numerous times.
[12:51.110 --> 12:53.550]  I heard look out for suspicious bags and Arab people.
[12:53.670 --> 12:54.390]  I've heard that announcement.
[12:54.590 --> 12:57.730]  No, they're announcing that...
[12:57.730 --> 12:58.090]  Really?
[12:58.310 --> 12:58.730]  Anyway, yeah.
[12:59.050 --> 12:59.130]  Huh.
[12:59.250 --> 12:59.630]  Emmanuel?
[12:59.870 --> 13:00.050]  Yes.
[13:00.550 --> 13:14.150]  Did you catch the BBC World broadcast a couple nights ago where they were talking about the London underground security and how they're now deploying millimeter wave radar systems, which basically see through people's clothing.
[13:14.550 --> 13:17.610]  And they're looking for weapons that way.
[13:19.270 --> 13:19.730]  Great.
[13:19.910 --> 13:20.930]  No, I hadn't seen that.
[13:21.030 --> 13:23.050]  But that sounds like the next logical step.
[13:23.230 --> 13:24.450]  You know who's really going to lose out?
[13:24.590 --> 13:31.770]  People who are just taking the tube to take their weapon and injure someone outside the subway system.
[13:31.890 --> 13:32.030]  Yeah.
[13:32.110 --> 13:34.890]  You know, a lot of people use weapons in non-terrorist applications.
[13:35.450 --> 13:35.990]  You know?
[13:36.190 --> 13:38.930]  I mean, you know, your normal crook is not a terrorist.
[13:39.130 --> 13:39.350]  Exactly.
[13:39.350 --> 13:42.490]  If you simply want to commit a robbery, it's really putting a crimp in your plans.
[13:42.490 --> 13:49.970]  That reminds me, you know, if you're going to use a weapon, especially a gun, don't do it in your co-op city anymore.
[13:50.170 --> 13:50.690]  Why is that?
[13:50.970 --> 13:54.770]  Well, a high-tech system, which is called...
[13:54.770 --> 13:56.310]  Let's see if I can find this quickly.
[13:58.390 --> 14:00.850]  ShotSpotter, which started out in California.
[14:00.850 --> 14:02.350]  It's an acoustic system.
[14:02.350 --> 14:04.210]  It listens for the sound of gunshots.
[14:04.370 --> 14:17.770]  And there are several of these, generally, towers that detect the sound of gunshots and triangulate it and notify the police immediately upon the shots ringing out.
[14:17.770 --> 14:21.690]  Co-op City area is going to have them installed.
[14:22.310 --> 14:27.670]  Does anyone remember the Sergeant New York military defense system?
[14:27.990 --> 14:28.330]  Yeah.
[14:29.070 --> 14:37.070]  That was based on the same sort of technology, where it could actually tell where the rounds were coming from and then shoot back in that direction right away.
[14:37.070 --> 14:38.530]  It was a miserable failure.
[14:39.710 --> 14:40.150]  Wow.
[14:40.290 --> 14:41.150]  No, I didn't know about that.
[14:41.950 --> 14:42.750]  Sergeant New York.
[14:42.850 --> 14:43.190]  Look it up.
[14:43.710 --> 14:44.070]  Okay.
[14:44.410 --> 14:45.770]  Let's type in miserable failure into Google.
[14:45.910 --> 14:46.990]  I'm sure it'll bring up everything.
[14:46.990 --> 14:47.790]  Well, that'll bring it.
[14:47.930 --> 14:48.030]  Yeah.
[14:49.130 --> 15:02.430]  Did you hear about in England, they're starting to put in the system for reading license plates as cars are driving by to supposedly check for stolen vehicles and things like that?
[15:02.570 --> 15:08.050]  Except the weird thing about it is they're going to be placing these devices like every quarter mile.
[15:08.530 --> 15:14.670]  So it sounds more to me like it would be something where if someone's speeding, they could automatically issue a ticket because they'd be detected.
[15:14.910 --> 15:16.690]  I mean, if it was every, you know...
[15:16.690 --> 15:17.570]  Here's the thing, though.
[15:17.750 --> 15:20.210]  They could give you a toll like EZPass or something like that.
[15:20.450 --> 15:23.190]  I was just going to ask if EZPass uses OCR like that as well.
[15:23.450 --> 15:24.730]  Well, I don't know if they...
[15:24.730 --> 15:26.030]  How fast can this possibly go?
[15:26.170 --> 15:27.930]  They've had this for some time in London.
[15:28.010 --> 15:30.550]  The last two years, they've had congestion pricing.
[15:30.790 --> 15:33.030]  You go into the center city and it costs you some.
[15:33.910 --> 15:35.250]  I've heard we're going to get it in New York.
[15:35.390 --> 15:35.950]  I'm very excited.
[15:36.710 --> 15:36.870]  Yeah.
[15:37.070 --> 15:37.650]  No, they...
[15:37.650 --> 15:39.430]  Bloomberg put the kibosh on it in New York.
[15:39.470 --> 15:39.950]  No, no, no, no.
[15:39.990 --> 15:41.690]  We're not talking about a toll on the East River Bridges.
[15:41.690 --> 15:44.090]  We're talking about a charge to get into lower Manhattan.
[15:44.350 --> 15:45.630]  Oh, that's not what I'm talking about.
[15:45.750 --> 15:46.250]  But this...
[15:46.250 --> 15:48.350]  Well, in this particular subset, it's what we were talking about.
[15:48.410 --> 15:49.250]  What you're talking about is different.
[15:49.490 --> 15:49.690]  Yeah.
[15:49.890 --> 15:57.590]  So they plan on installing these devices, which is supposedly meant to find, you know, wanted vehicles for whatever reason they're wanted.
[15:57.890 --> 16:00.510]  But it just seems like overkill to put them every quarter mile.
[16:00.510 --> 16:01.350]  Well, obviously, that's...
[16:01.350 --> 16:02.650]  Yeah, they're not looking for stolen vehicles.
[16:02.730 --> 16:05.730]  They put them every quarter mile because, you know, if you steal a vehicle...
[16:05.730 --> 16:06.990]  You'll show up somewhere.
[16:06.990 --> 16:09.150]  Yeah, you'll drive a mile and then you'll be seen.
[16:09.250 --> 16:15.170]  But what's interesting about that is my smart car, which I got from Canada, in Quebec, you don't need front license plates.
[16:15.290 --> 16:16.470]  So I don't have a front license.
[16:16.590 --> 16:19.250]  In fact, I have a witty saying instead, my license plate area.
[16:19.450 --> 16:22.690]  So are they just checking as you're approaching or are they checking as you're passing?
[16:22.870 --> 16:24.070]  I mean, there are a lot...
[16:24.570 --> 16:27.150]  You always need the rear license plate to be there.
[16:27.310 --> 16:29.370]  So it would make sense just to check the rear one.
[16:29.850 --> 16:30.210]  Okay.
[16:30.370 --> 16:32.070]  I guess we should assume that's what they're doing then.
[16:32.250 --> 16:36.210]  All over Europe, they have cameras that give out speeding tickets.
[16:36.990 --> 16:39.290]  So, I mean, are these going to be like more cameras?
[16:39.970 --> 16:40.590]  Yeah, they have...
[16:40.590 --> 16:41.690]  Well, it would be everywhere.
[16:41.810 --> 16:47.350]  In England, in fact, it's required that they warn people if a camera is in the area, speed camera ahead.
[16:47.650 --> 16:48.450]  It's required.
[16:48.930 --> 16:51.230]  And, you know, it also tells people not to speed, I guess.
[16:51.410 --> 16:53.770]  But there's some kind of ruling that says that.
[16:54.050 --> 16:55.290]  So, yeah, that's nothing new.
[16:55.410 --> 16:58.410]  But I think this is getting a little bit more technologically advanced.
[16:58.590 --> 17:00.430]  You know what's a good strategy for traffic calming?
[17:02.530 --> 17:06.010]  Signs that say speed camera ahead are probably a lot cheaper than speed cameras.
[17:06.010 --> 17:06.470]  That's true.
[17:06.650 --> 17:07.170]  That's true.
[17:07.290 --> 17:08.370]  Until people figure it out.
[17:08.690 --> 17:13.910]  In Philadelphia, they recently deployed red light cameras for the first time, actually last year.
[17:14.150 --> 17:25.390]  But they found that in the past year since they deployed them, that the accident rate at the two intersections where they've installed them has actually increased rather than decreased because people slam on the brakes and they see the camera and then there's rear end collision.
[17:25.390 --> 17:48.070]  But more interesting is the Pennsylvania legislature, in its wisdom, enacted as part of the law that was going to authorize these red light cameras throughout the state, made it illegal to divulge any traffic or accident statistic information from where these red light cameras are located.
[17:48.070 --> 17:58.610]  Now, obviously, these things are there to generate revenue, not to increase safety because they are not... they do not make an intersection safer as has been proven in many cities, including Philadelphia now.
[17:58.910 --> 18:07.330]  But it's actually illegal to release accident statistics for those areas from the red light cameras.
[18:07.470 --> 18:09.670]  So it's kind of interesting what they're hiding.
[18:09.670 --> 18:23.790]  They've got quite a few of those cameras in Manhattan and it doesn't seem like they're actually effective as far as getting people to stop, but it is not considered a moving violation when you do get a ticket, which is quite interesting because all they want you to do is pay a fine.
[18:23.950 --> 18:25.930]  So it's very obviously a revenue generator.
[18:26.190 --> 18:26.770]  Yeah, totally.
[18:26.890 --> 18:29.970]  And you can tell how many people go through because it flashes whenever somebody goes through a red light.
[18:30.170 --> 18:31.990]  So, Bernie, let me ask you this.
[18:32.150 --> 18:38.830]  To find out where these red light cameras are in Philadelphia, you simply look at what intersections you can't get any data for, correct?
[18:39.670 --> 18:41.410]  Well, no, you can tell.
[18:41.570 --> 18:44.050]  I mean, you can just type in red light cameras in Philadelphia.
[18:44.230 --> 18:45.070]  There's only two intersections.
[18:45.630 --> 18:48.230]  Grant Avenue and Roosevelt Boulevard is the most famous one.
[18:48.350 --> 18:50.630]  It's been dubbed the most dangerous intersection in the country.
[18:51.270 --> 18:54.150]  And now it's even more dangerous now that there's red light cameras there.
[18:54.850 --> 19:01.770]  You know, we had the most dangerous intersection in Long Island, but they built traffic lights and signs and things like that.
[19:01.790 --> 19:02.490]  I knew this would happen.
[19:02.530 --> 19:04.010]  We'd lose it to a place like Philadelphia.
[19:04.170 --> 19:04.530]  It's a real...
[19:04.530 --> 19:05.110]  It's an embarrassment.
[19:05.730 --> 19:07.650]  Okay, we have important news on the Patriot Act.
[19:07.730 --> 19:08.470]  Bernie, I believe, what?
[19:08.470 --> 19:11.850]  But we can finally say the Patriot Act is going to be permanent.
[19:11.970 --> 19:13.690]  Is that the glorious news?
[19:13.990 --> 19:16.410]  It looks like that's the deal that's coming.
[19:17.450 --> 19:22.190]  The House and the Senate have struck a tentative deal on the expiring Patriot Act.
[19:22.290 --> 19:23.650]  It was supposed to expire this year, I believe.
[19:23.650 --> 19:39.930]  It was a three-year law that was passed with great haste right after 9-11 and had all these draconian anti-civil rights or anti-privacy rights and constitutional rights provisions in it.
[19:40.050 --> 19:44.190]  And it looks like virtually all the provisions are going to be made permanent.
[19:44.190 --> 19:50.230]  A couple of them will be made to last seven more years instead of, you know, to make it a 10-year thing.
[19:50.630 --> 20:00.170]  So this is your last chance to contact your legislature and say, you know, don't keep this Patriot Act going if you don't like what it's doing to your rights.
[20:00.170 --> 20:03.090]  Well, okay, they struck this deal.
[20:03.650 --> 20:06.370]  Now, is it too late for us to derail the deal?
[20:07.210 --> 20:08.830]  No, it hasn't been voted on yet.
[20:08.930 --> 20:15.190]  But this is all the, you know, most of this politics stuff in Washington goes on, you know, before they actually vote, all the negotiations.
[20:15.570 --> 20:30.510]  But if there's enough public backlash against this, and I think there should be because there's some serious anti-privacy provisions in there that really have nothing to do with countering terrorism and have everything to do with surveilling really anybody the government wants to,
[20:31.090 --> 20:38.550]  even if it's not directly related to terrorism, or even indirectly related to terrorism, that it's a cause for concern.
[20:38.770 --> 20:55.850]  And I'm really surprised that the ACLU and other, the NYCLU and other organizations aren't really pulling out all the stops on this, because this is the last gasp of anyone's chance, anyone's hopes, that the Patriot Act will be sunsetted after three years,
[20:55.850 --> 20:57.290]  as was originally promised.
[20:59.750 --> 21:16.650]  Well, according to the story I'm looking at, GOP leaders have already made plans for a House vote on Thursday, and a Senate vote by the end of the week, and that supposedly would put the centerpiece of Bush's war on terror on his desk before Thanksgiving.
[21:17.210 --> 21:23.550]  So, and that's a month before the expiration date of the Patriot Act, so it doesn't look good, I gotta say.
[21:24.190 --> 21:30.990]  Yeah, call your legislators, call your representatives, call your senators, fast, because time is running out.
[21:31.810 --> 21:44.470]  And we're talking about things like, you know, sneak and peek warrants, we're talking about being able to access all sorts of private information about people without warrants, all kinds of really nasty things.
[21:44.630 --> 21:53.250]  I'm curious, and I'm not exactly sure how you would study this, but I'm curious to know if there's any evidence that these things actually stop terrorism.
[21:53.250 --> 21:53.810]  Of course.
[21:53.930 --> 21:55.150]  How many terrorist acts have there been?
[21:56.770 --> 22:00.130]  Every terrorist act that there has not been is because of the Patriot Act.
[22:00.290 --> 22:00.970]  The U.S.
[22:01.090 --> 22:02.790]  government is committing terrorism all the time.
[22:02.790 --> 22:06.390]  Now imagine if there's one terrorist, I said Patriot Act, one terrorist act.
[22:07.750 --> 22:08.750]  Wow, a good parallel.
[22:09.350 --> 22:10.610]  Per second, all right?
[22:10.670 --> 22:13.830]  Think how many terrorist acts those are that have been prevented by the Patriot Act.
[22:13.890 --> 22:15.430]  This is Bush logic, you see?
[22:15.490 --> 22:16.090]  I can do it too.
[22:16.110 --> 22:16.690]  That is a lot.
[22:17.130 --> 22:18.790]  Yeah, quite a lot, so think twice.
[22:19.590 --> 22:20.670]  Please, people, please.
[22:21.450 --> 22:25.430]  I know the internet's not there right now, but it will be, and you'll be podcasting and all that kind of thing.
[22:26.770 --> 22:29.830]  Call your senators, call your representatives, visit them.
[22:29.830 --> 22:35.190]  Don't threaten them, but visit them, you know, and make your point as strongly as you can.
[22:35.290 --> 22:35.890]  But politely.
[22:36.150 --> 22:37.270]  Politely, but strongly.
[22:38.090 --> 22:38.970]  Carry a big stick.
[22:39.150 --> 22:40.830]  No, don't do that, but you know what I mean.
[22:40.950 --> 22:42.750]  Walk firmly, whatever Roosevelt said.
[22:42.870 --> 22:44.370]  Speak softly and carry a big stick.
[22:44.470 --> 22:46.870]  Okay, don't speak too softly or they might not hear you.
[22:46.930 --> 22:47.710]  Speak in a moderate...
[22:47.710 --> 22:48.550]  It's really a poor...
[22:48.550 --> 22:49.090]  It's a poor example.
[22:49.090 --> 22:49.930]  Carry a small stick.
[22:50.170 --> 22:53.830]  Yeah, speak in a moderate tone of voice and it's best if you don't carry any sticks at all.
[22:53.890 --> 22:54.510]  Carry a popsicle stick.
[22:54.570 --> 22:55.910]  Speaking softly worked in the 40s.
[22:55.990 --> 22:56.710]  I don't think it works anymore.
[22:57.770 --> 22:58.930]  Speaking of crazy laws.
[22:58.930 --> 22:59.630]  Yeah, crazy laws.
[22:59.730 --> 23:03.550]  There was an amendment to the Illinois Identification Card Act.
[23:03.830 --> 23:04.270]  Okay.
[23:04.490 --> 23:12.230]  And in it you will see a bunch of the typical sort of things that you would see in something that would be called the Identification Card Act.
[23:12.250 --> 23:17.150]  Like you can't display or possess a card that's not yours and you can't make them.
[23:17.870 --> 23:18.310]  Whatever.
[23:18.810 --> 23:39.270]  And then there's this extra section in there that says, It is a violation of this section for any person to possess, use, or allow to be used any materials, hardware or software specifically designed for, were primarily used in the reading of encrypted language from the barcode or magnetic strip of an official Illinois Identification Card or Illinois Disabled Person Identification Card issued by
[23:39.270 --> 23:40.330]  the Secretary of State.
[23:40.650 --> 23:41.670]  Blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
[23:41.850 --> 23:44.130]  And then there's a couple of other things in there.
[23:44.130 --> 23:54.350]  But I just wanted to point this out as one of the typical things that you can find, I guess, in these sort of laws that completely don't understand, you know, the technology.
[23:54.690 --> 24:07.730]  And Bernie, I think you pointed out another example of where encrypted language or some similar term was used when it's actually just encoded onto the, you know, some data encoded on the magnetic stripe or the barcode.
[24:07.730 --> 24:17.070]  And then suddenly things like magnetic stripe readers and barcode readers become, you know, something that you could, you know, potentially be convicted of a felony for possessing.
[24:17.330 --> 24:24.630]  Now, some states do actually encrypt the data on the barcode so that when you read it with a sort of naive barcode reader, you get gibberish out.
[24:25.390 --> 24:28.110]  I don't know if this is one of those states or not.
[24:28.310 --> 24:37.570]  How do you, you know, discriminate between a magnetic stripe or a barcode reader that can decode this and that cannot if it's all, you know, if it's all done in software?
[24:37.790 --> 24:38.850]  I'm not saying it's a good law.
[24:39.190 --> 24:40.910]  It's a pretty stupid law, but...
[24:40.910 --> 24:49.950]  The bottom line is you can't differentiate it and it just gives a wide berth to the government in selective prosecution and that's what they want.
[24:51.650 --> 24:52.050]  Okay.
[24:53.050 --> 24:54.810]  What happened today in Tunis?
[24:55.610 --> 24:58.670]  Tunis and Tunisia, there's some kind of big internet meeting going on.
[24:58.750 --> 24:59.850]  I believe, Mike, you've been following this.
[25:00.010 --> 25:22.710]  Yeah, the World Summit on the Information Society, the first one happened a couple years ago in Europe and it was so much fun that they're doing it again in Tunis right now and they're having a conference to talk about the future of the internet, the governance of the internet and how to protect the freedoms that are on the internet and they're doing this in Tunisia,
[25:22.910 --> 25:38.410]  which is kind of a repressive regime and so that civil society, some of it came to make its views known and they were trying to, you know, meet and the Tunisian government, the Tunisian police came and stopped them.
[25:38.730 --> 25:39.510]  And one of the things that...
[25:39.510 --> 25:40.830]  Wait, wait, stop the...
[25:40.830 --> 25:41.130]  Stopped who?
[25:41.450 --> 25:42.490]  Not the UN.
[25:42.850 --> 25:43.030]  Okay.
[25:43.170 --> 25:51.890]  But the sort of a number of independent international organizations that were trying to have a meeting.
[25:51.890 --> 26:11.450]  There were 30 local and international human rights bodies and about 70 plainclothes policemen, this is according to The Guardian out of the UK, physically prevented representatives from a number of non-governmental organizations from entering the Goethe Institute at the Place d'Afrique in central Tunis.
[26:11.570 --> 26:19.870]  They were meeting to review plans for an alternative citizen summit in the capital after their booking at a conference venue was canceled at the last minute.
[26:19.870 --> 26:22.310]  So it sounds like somebody didn't want them to be there.
[26:22.610 --> 26:22.990]  No.
[26:23.610 --> 26:24.130]  There's...
[26:24.130 --> 26:27.810]  One of the people quoted is the World Association of Community Radio Broadcasters.
[26:28.130 --> 26:36.210]  So some stations like WBAI said that they were physically pushed away from the Institute.
[26:37.150 --> 26:41.230]  Quote, I saw one person frog march down the street and one colleague pushed over.
[26:41.650 --> 26:46.110]  So this is the meeting where they are talking about freedom on the internet.
[26:46.510 --> 26:46.850]  Yeah.
[26:46.850 --> 26:51.090]  Well, obviously, somebody gave orders to the authorities to keep certain people away.
[26:51.910 --> 26:55.050]  But let's look at that meeting that happened over there.
[26:55.170 --> 26:59.490]  Now, I know one of the major issues was United States control of the internet.
[26:59.710 --> 27:10.430]  And this all came to a head when the XXX top-level domain was brought into conversation, I believe, earlier this year.
[27:10.590 --> 27:11.650]  Well, it's been an issue.
[27:11.830 --> 27:12.990]  At the behest of the Bush administration.
[27:12.990 --> 27:13.510]  Well, no.
[27:13.630 --> 27:17.350]  Actually, at the behest of the Bush administration, it was quelled.
[27:17.990 --> 27:21.050]  The XXX domain was supposed to be for adult sites.
[27:21.590 --> 27:25.070]  And the Bush administration said, wait a minute, we're not going to have any of that.
[27:25.430 --> 27:33.590]  And even though the rest of the world seemed to want something like that, apparently what the Bush administration says goes for the entire internet.
[27:33.590 --> 27:34.770]  Is that the understanding?
[27:34.770 --> 27:42.230]  Well, this Bush administration apparently has been successful in keeping all pornography off the internet, at least for now.
[27:42.590 --> 27:48.610]  But there are other issues in controlling who controls.
[27:48.850 --> 27:55.890]  It's not really control of the internet per se, but control of the domain name system, which is a very important part of the internet.
[27:56.310 --> 28:01.230]  It's run by this body called ICANN, which is selected by the U.S.
[28:01.550 --> 28:02.110]  Department of Commerce.
[28:02.110 --> 28:04.750]  Might as well call them I will, because they follow the orders of the U.S.
[28:04.850 --> 28:05.070]  government.
[28:05.350 --> 28:05.770]  Right.
[28:06.890 --> 28:14.710]  So it's a very corrupt body in and of itself, but a lot of countries don't want the internet to be controlled by the U.S.
[28:15.010 --> 28:16.350]  Commerce Department very sensibly.
[28:16.510 --> 28:17.910]  What, they don't trust our government?
[28:17.910 --> 28:19.290]  I can't imagine why not.
[28:19.890 --> 28:20.930]  Or you should invade them.
[28:21.610 --> 28:27.090]  Okay, but so now if they control to that degree, let's say the U.S.
[28:27.310 --> 28:31.130]  government doesn't want a particular country to have net access, what could they do?
[28:32.730 --> 28:36.290]  Well, they control who gets the domains.
[28:36.510 --> 28:42.710]  So they could assign, say, the IQ domain for Iraq to Ahmed Chalabi if they want.
[28:42.950 --> 28:44.990]  They can do all this stuff.
[28:45.250 --> 28:49.970]  So they could basically prevent people in those countries from using the internet normally.
[28:50.170 --> 28:50.450]  Right.
[28:50.510 --> 28:51.130]  It would be very difficult.
[28:54.150 --> 29:06.250]  However, this very important meeting, which was going to start today, although there's several hours' time difference, so it was actually over by the time many of us woke up, they were going to have this discussion about whether the U.S.
[29:06.450 --> 29:18.130]  was going to continue to control ICANN or not, and they decided before the meeting started that they were just going to kind of stick with the status quo and they were going to have a forum where they will discuss the issue over the years to come.
[29:18.630 --> 29:21.450]  I want to present an opposing viewpoint here, okay?
[29:21.630 --> 29:22.390]  I figured you might.
[29:23.850 --> 29:41.650]  It sounds like, from Mike's description, that ICANN is, at best, at worst, or rather at best, has the potential to become a sleeping Nazi-like giant, which may or may not be the case.
[29:41.710 --> 29:55.190]  But the alternative is essentially letting any country control its own internet and essentially keep dissidents out, keep dissidents from access, much like China does now, anyway, without ICANN's help.
[29:56.650 --> 30:10.270]  And I'd like to point out that ICANN also kept some people from taking control of some South Sea Islands internet registration, Indian Ocean Islands registration, if you can remember that, Emanuel, some years back.
[30:11.550 --> 30:12.190]  Okay.
[30:12.830 --> 30:14.170]  I'm talking about you.
[30:15.190 --> 30:18.550]  What was it, Kurgulan Island that you attempted to gain control of?
[30:18.570 --> 30:19.150]  What did I do?
[30:20.930 --> 30:21.870]  94 and 95?
[30:22.030 --> 30:23.190]  I have no idea what you're talking about.
[30:23.350 --> 30:25.970]  You didn't try to take over Kurgulan Island's registration?
[30:26.150 --> 30:26.570]  I did?
[30:26.810 --> 30:27.130]  Yeah.
[30:27.610 --> 30:28.830]  Well, this must have been in another life.
[30:28.950 --> 30:29.510]  I have no...
[30:29.510 --> 30:30.930]  What was their top-level domain?
[30:31.550 --> 30:32.350]  I don't remember.
[30:32.450 --> 30:34.950]  Well, no, I don't think I tried to take over anybody, to be honest.
[30:35.150 --> 30:38.210]  I mean, you know, if you have evidence that I did, please let me know, and I'll...
[30:38.210 --> 30:40.350]  I'll be listening to a lot of archive shows.
[30:40.530 --> 30:46.970]  Yeah, I mean, you know, I've done a lot of things in my life, not all of which I'm proud of, but I don't think taking over, you know, South Pacific Island...
[30:46.970 --> 30:48.050]  I think it's in the Indian Ocean.
[30:48.110 --> 30:49.510]  Okay, so, you know, I don't think that's one of them.
[30:49.610 --> 30:50.450]  I don't think that's one of them.
[30:50.470 --> 30:53.890]  Well, anyway, but the point is ICANN stopped you, or whoever.
[30:54.350 --> 30:54.670]  Okay.
[30:56.010 --> 31:00.830]  But ICANN is not necessarily the sleeping Nazi giant that Mike would have you believe.
[31:00.950 --> 31:04.090]  Well, you brought Nazis into the thing, so you lose just based on that.
[31:06.330 --> 31:07.690]  But Godwin's Law applies.
[31:08.150 --> 31:08.990]  But the U.S.
[31:09.070 --> 31:09.770]  government is very happy.
[31:09.770 --> 31:11.990]  They say the internet lives to innovate for another day.
[31:13.410 --> 31:14.350]  That's that U.S.
[31:14.490 --> 31:15.790]  government always innovating.
[31:16.650 --> 31:19.410]  You know, now, let me ask you a technical question here.
[31:19.810 --> 31:26.170]  If the net was controlled, if, say, there was, you know, the military controlled their version of the internet, the U.S.
[31:26.270 --> 31:42.790]  government controlled their version, the AOL had their own version, every country had their own version, could all these different internets, as George Bush would say, live together and be able to manage their own policies independently of the other internets,
[31:42.930 --> 31:44.490]  yet still be able to exchange email?
[31:44.930 --> 31:47.250]  We're just talking about top-level domains.
[31:47.390 --> 31:53.530]  We're just talking about resolving a domain such as 2600.com to an IP address.
[31:53.710 --> 32:02.330]  So as far as the structure of the internet goes, it would still be based on IP addresses, numbers, things that don't care about, you know, policies such as this.
[32:02.330 --> 32:02.890]  All right.
[32:04.150 --> 32:12.850]  So you'd have to get away for everything to be integrated so that whenever DNS servers need to find a domain, they know where to look.
[32:13.410 --> 32:18.290]  But the internet, as far as an infrastructure, would still be one thing.
[32:18.710 --> 32:22.610]  It would still be a bunch of routers talking to each other with numbers.
[32:22.970 --> 32:23.210]  Okay.
[32:23.350 --> 32:24.650]  So is that a yes or a no?
[32:24.810 --> 32:27.030]  Would such a system be able to work?
[32:27.910 --> 32:28.510]  Technically, yeah.
[32:28.790 --> 32:29.450]  Technically, it would.
[32:29.610 --> 32:29.910]  Okay.
[32:30.050 --> 32:33.190]  I mean, one other thing that bothers me is, yeah, we get all the .coms and the .nets.
[32:33.410 --> 32:35.050]  And for some reason, that's assumed to be the US.
[32:35.050 --> 32:36.610]  I don't think that's really fair either.
[32:36.830 --> 32:41.050]  I know it's not always true, but the vast majority of cases, it is.
[32:41.870 --> 32:46.430]  And I think, you know, a more equal system where .us on everything, I think, would be, you know, fairer.
[32:46.990 --> 32:47.490]  Don't you?
[32:48.810 --> 32:52.290]  The US government and ICANN have never been about fairness.
[32:52.590 --> 32:53.910]  Well, I mean, you know, .gov, for instance.
[32:54.110 --> 33:03.770]  .gov is always US gov. Yeah, it's a... It used to be only the federal government, and then they started letting state and local governments in, and it confuses me to this day.
[33:03.870 --> 33:06.610]  Yeah, and .mil certainly is military for any country other than the US.
[33:06.670 --> 33:11.810]  So I think there does need to be some redefining of just what the internet is all about.
[33:13.030 --> 33:13.430]  Okay.
[33:13.430 --> 33:15.950]  Well, there's going to be a forum to discuss it.
[33:16.250 --> 33:16.950]  In Tunis?
[33:17.210 --> 33:18.190]  No, not in Tunis.
[33:18.370 --> 33:18.830]  Where then?
[33:18.970 --> 33:23.650]  Its first meeting is likely to be held in Athens, Greece early next year, according to the BBC.
[33:23.970 --> 33:24.210]  Okay.
[33:24.210 --> 33:31.470]  But again, we're just talking about the internet as far as a human level, as far as we perceive it, but as far as the computers care, they don't know the difference.
[33:31.530 --> 33:36.990]  Well, it just seems to me like we're heading in that direction because there's so many people that are outraged by the way certain things are run.
[33:37.510 --> 33:42.550]  And, you know, I say, okay, if you're outraged by that, then just split off and have your own net.
[33:42.550 --> 33:44.170]  Well, things would become a complete mess.
[33:44.390 --> 33:56.470]  I mean, you can't have, you know, one domain resolving to one IP address in one country and another domain resolving to another IP address and other things wouldn't... Well, obviously, you have to not use the same domain, just like you don't use the same telephone numbers,
[33:56.490 --> 34:00.530]  but, you know, people do have different policies for telephone networks in different countries.
[34:00.530 --> 34:00.630]  Right.
[34:00.690 --> 34:06.290]  But, for example, one of the examples that you gave was, you know, .coms and .nets being primarily in the United States.
[34:06.510 --> 34:12.270]  If, you know, some other country said, okay, we're going to start our whole new DNS... No, you just get rid of Totally, because it's not a fair system.
[34:12.450 --> 34:16.670]  It's not a fair system to have, you know, just one .com or .mil belong to the U.S.
[34:16.790 --> 34:17.070]  military.
[34:17.330 --> 34:20.270]  Well, I think at this point in the game, you can't really get rid of what already...
[34:20.270 --> 34:20.750]  You can't change things?
[34:20.810 --> 34:21.250]  Of course you can.
[34:21.250 --> 34:22.610]  Well, .com is available to anyone.
[34:22.810 --> 34:24.410]  I mean, anybody on the internet.
[34:24.410 --> 34:27.610]  Okay, but .edu, .mil, .gov, you know, all the good ones.
[34:27.610 --> 34:29.630]  They're reserved for United States.
[34:29.630 --> 34:31.550]  I just don't think that's fair to the rest of the world.
[34:31.790 --> 34:34.450]  I mean, okay, the United States started the internet.
[34:34.590 --> 34:35.190]  That's what they'll say.
[34:36.410 --> 34:39.310]  It doesn't mean that, you know, inequities have to carry on forever.
[34:39.310 --> 34:40.470]  I don't know, just an idea.
[34:41.510 --> 34:46.090]  I think we should abolish domains completely, and people should be forced to memorize IP addresses.
[34:46.270 --> 34:47.430]  And make those your social security numbers.
[34:47.470 --> 34:47.930]  That would be cool.
[34:48.090 --> 34:49.890]  Yeah, or maybe a phone number, or maybe both.
[34:49.890 --> 34:52.210]  Everyone was assigned an IP address at birth.
[34:52.750 --> 34:53.330]  Just one?
[34:53.470 --> 34:55.630]  We'd need to use IP version 6, I think.
[34:55.970 --> 34:57.810]  All right, let's get into that in the future.
[34:57.810 --> 34:58.490]  It's the mark of the beast.
[34:58.790 --> 35:00.510]  We got this story about 100 times.
[35:00.670 --> 35:02.910]  Mysterious signals jamming garage door openers.
[35:03.550 --> 35:13.150]  Hundreds of automatic garage doors in the Ottawa area have suddenly and strangely stopped working due to a powerful radio signal that appears to be interfering with their remote controls.
[35:13.750 --> 35:16.350]  I wonder if it's the Soviet woodpecker at work again.
[35:16.750 --> 35:19.050]  The phenomenon began suddenly last weekend.
[35:19.690 --> 35:25.130]  A strong signal was blocking garage door openers all over the neighborhood in a 25-mile radius.
[35:26.450 --> 35:30.510]  Angolan ambassador Miguel Puna is one of those affected by the problem.
[35:30.510 --> 35:33.610]  He can no longer open his embassy's electronic gate.
[35:34.190 --> 35:35.310]  That's a big problem.
[35:35.330 --> 35:36.630]  It's not something you laugh about.
[35:36.630 --> 35:39.810]  It was the Canadian spy service going after the Angolans.
[35:39.890 --> 35:42.750]  Not only in this gate, says Puna, but even other gates.
[35:42.930 --> 35:44.510]  We are having a lot of problems.
[35:44.690 --> 35:45.770]  I don't know why this is funny.
[35:45.850 --> 35:46.690]  This is not a funny story.
[35:46.770 --> 35:48.330]  The Angolans cannot get into their gates.
[35:48.970 --> 35:52.210]  This could cause security concerns, he says correctly.
[35:54.570 --> 35:55.630]  Where did they find this?
[35:55.630 --> 35:57.890]  When the Angolans are retreating to their base.
[35:58.130 --> 35:58.690]  Why are you laughing?
[35:58.770 --> 35:59.310]  Can't get through.
[35:59.310 --> 35:59.990]  All right.
[36:00.330 --> 36:08.790]  The door doctor has received more than 100 calls from irate customers who can't operate their doors using the remote.
[36:08.930 --> 36:09.530]  The door doctor.
[36:09.630 --> 36:09.730]  Yeah.
[36:10.230 --> 36:15.290]  It installs LiftMaster, one of the most popular door openers in North America, which operates by radio frequency.
[36:15.590 --> 36:22.370]  The signal is transmitted on the 390 megahertz band, which is used by virtually all garage door openers on the continent.
[36:23.010 --> 36:25.730]  It's also the same frequency used by the U.S.
[36:26.170 --> 36:28.910]  military's new state-of-the-art land mobile radio system.
[36:29.950 --> 36:31.190]  So, I don't know.
[36:31.990 --> 36:45.510]  See, in the United States, at least, under the FCC, these garage door openers would have no right to open their garage doors if there is harmful interference because they're supposed to accept any harmful interference because they're unlicensed devices.
[36:45.630 --> 36:51.090]  So, basically, we'll know when the military is operating in our area because your garage door will be unable to open.
[36:51.090 --> 36:53.210]  If you have one of those garage door openers.
[36:53.330 --> 36:56.130]  Well, I mean, everyone on the continent who has an automatic one, apparently.
[36:56.850 --> 37:03.410]  Well, maybe we can construct a kit and have a garage door opener that operates on cellular frequencies or something.
[37:04.090 --> 37:04.490]  Infrared.
[37:04.670 --> 37:05.850]  Yeah, that might be kind of fun.
[37:06.530 --> 37:07.510]  Or voice activated.
[37:08.810 --> 37:11.330]  Okay, I think it's time to look at some letters.
[37:11.510 --> 37:14.070]  And again, we'll be taking phone calls, 212-209-2900.
[37:14.130 --> 37:18.230]  Apologies to all those people who can't hear us on the internet because I assume the internet is still down.
[37:18.370 --> 37:20.890]  But that's just the way it goes sometimes.
[37:21.090 --> 37:21.490]  The whole internet?
[37:21.810 --> 37:22.970]  Well, no, our internet.
[37:23.110 --> 37:23.290]  Oh.
[37:23.730 --> 37:24.710]  The one that we have.
[37:25.310 --> 37:26.690]  It's being cleaned for Thanksgiving.
[37:27.530 --> 37:28.470]  Yeah, that must be it.
[37:29.190 --> 37:31.930]  Okay, OTH at 2600.com is our email address.
[37:32.110 --> 37:46.250]  We had a lot of people write in on Bernie's ticket woes of last week where he had to pay a huge ticket for not, for not, for buying my ticket and getting on the train.
[37:46.390 --> 37:47.610]  Yeah, I'm trying to figure out how to phrase it.
[37:47.810 --> 37:50.050]  You bought the ticket, but you didn't cancel your ticket.
[37:50.190 --> 37:52.250]  You didn't put it in the other machine and stamp it.
[37:52.350 --> 37:57.270]  And you didn't know you were supposed to do that because in most systems in the United States, that does not work that way.
[37:57.430 --> 37:57.750]  It does in Europe.
[37:58.010 --> 37:59.450]  And there is inadequate signage.
[37:59.610 --> 38:00.990]  I'm told it works that way in Portland.
[38:01.410 --> 38:02.830]  I'm told it works that way in a couple of places.
[38:03.190 --> 38:03.390]  Yeah.
[38:03.850 --> 38:20.530]  The New Jersey light rail system in the area of Jersey City, Hoboken, et cetera, uses the same validation system, according to this writer, very much like the trolley system in Oslo, Norway, Amsterdam, many other major European cities, but very different from anything we have used in New Jersey and New York.
[38:21.410 --> 38:22.850]  Is that true, New Jersey people?
[38:22.950 --> 38:23.310]  It is true.
[38:23.530 --> 38:24.350]  I've been on it.
[38:24.450 --> 38:25.370]  And you knew to cancel your ticket?
[38:25.370 --> 38:26.090]  I did not know.
[38:26.130 --> 38:27.550]  I had to have a friend tell me, quite honestly.
[38:27.610 --> 38:27.830]  Oh, really?
[38:27.870 --> 38:29.150]  So you could have gotten into...
[38:29.150 --> 38:31.070]  I did not encounter a fair officer.
[38:31.370 --> 38:32.550]  But if you had...
[38:33.430 --> 38:34.590]  A $74 ticket.
[38:34.790 --> 38:36.530]  I had done this already, so I didn't, yeah.
[38:36.830 --> 38:40.410]  And the music you played is the Deutsche Welle International Shortwave Radio Interval Identification Music.
[38:40.510 --> 38:41.090]  No, it's not.
[38:41.210 --> 38:43.770]  As we said on the radio show, it was Radio Moscow.
[38:43.770 --> 38:47.330]  This is one of the people that wrote in with the answer after we said what the answer was.
[38:47.810 --> 38:50.010]  But thanks for writing to us.
[38:51.170 --> 38:56.370]  Guys, I was listening to your archive regarding Bernie's ticket woes and having to validate your tickets after you just bought them.
[38:56.510 --> 39:08.530]  In Melbourne, Australia, we not only have a system like that, but we have pay cops that will take great delight in beating the asterisks out of you if you have a ticket, but it's not validated every time you get on a train, tram, or bus.
[39:09.770 --> 39:19.330]  There are a large number of cases where the ticket cops like to travel around in large, clockwork orange-like groups and take great delight in punching, kicking, and sitting on the poor, unsuspecting travelers.
[39:19.910 --> 39:20.570]  Sitting on them?
[39:20.710 --> 39:21.150]  Sitting, yeah.
[39:21.150 --> 39:24.550]  Most of the time, the only crime they committed was not validating their ticket.
[39:25.110 --> 39:26.050]  I got off easy.
[39:26.210 --> 39:27.110]  Yeah, you got off easy, Bernie.
[39:27.190 --> 39:27.550]  You really did.
[39:27.690 --> 39:32.190]  It's normally the poor and unfortunate people such as university students who suffer the most.
[39:32.590 --> 39:36.350]  I believe our leaders are taking lessons from your leaders as in how to win friends and influence.
[39:37.050 --> 39:38.510]  Signed, Mal from Australia.
[39:38.990 --> 39:43.810]  Well, in this case, you know, I think we might be taking the lessons here because that system is new to us.
[39:44.430 --> 39:45.090]  But we'll see.
[39:45.230 --> 39:47.770]  We'll see if the harassment grows like it does over there.
[39:47.770 --> 39:55.910]  I think the implication was that the beating of people by police officers is a U.S.
[39:55.950 --> 39:56.090]  impact.
[39:56.130 --> 39:58.130]  I think being sat on would be more unpleasant.
[39:58.730 --> 40:01.150]  I don't think we invented cops beating people up.
[40:01.230 --> 40:02.750]  I think that's something that's been going on for centuries.
[40:03.230 --> 40:06.470]  Because in Britain, they sat on the guy on the train, and then they shot him in the head several times.
[40:06.930 --> 40:07.190]  Yeah.
[40:07.530 --> 40:09.010]  See, and we learn from that.
[40:09.190 --> 40:10.550]  We learn different methods.
[40:12.270 --> 40:13.570]  Okay, continuing here.
[40:13.570 --> 40:22.150]  Some people wrote in concerning my problem with the weird charge for voicemail that I got when I was on the Trans-Siberian Express talking to you guys.
[40:23.950 --> 40:27.410]  This person says, you mentioned getting voicemail calls on your bill during your travels.
[40:27.470 --> 40:31.430]  Could this be due to the screw-up where they swapped your voicemail account with that other guy?
[40:32.150 --> 40:32.570]  Yeah.
[40:32.930 --> 40:34.070]  I don't think it does.
[40:34.170 --> 40:43.170]  But when I got home, I found out that my greeting was actually somebody else's greeting, and they were able to access my voicemail, and it was awfully weird.
[40:43.510 --> 40:44.890]  I don't know if it was related to that.
[40:44.910 --> 40:47.770]  I don't think so, because that was a long, long time beforehand.
[40:47.770 --> 40:50.330]  That was at least a month and a half before I got home.
[40:50.470 --> 40:52.010]  So I don't think that's it.
[40:52.010 --> 40:55.690]  I think it's more likely this person named Adam wrote in.
[40:55.810 --> 40:59.730]  In regards to your November 9th show, you mentioned a charge for voicemail on your T-Mobile bill.
[41:00.130 --> 41:04.510]  Inbound calls to your phone, routed to voicemail, do charge on your bill.
[41:04.510 --> 41:12.370]  This happens because the call is routed overseas first to where you are, and then routed back to the United States to your voicemail, and it's still a roaming call.
[41:12.510 --> 41:17.250]  I've discussed this many times with my customers as I work for the former AT&T Wireless, now Singular.
[41:18.050 --> 41:21.530]  Well, Adam, you know, I got to say, that really floors me.
[41:21.670 --> 41:32.370]  I can get charged for a call coming to my phone that I don't pick up when I'm in a foreign country, and someone can just keep calling me over and over again, and I have to pay every time they do that, even though I don't pick up the call and I don't talk to anybody?
[41:32.950 --> 41:34.350]  Does that make sense to anybody here?
[41:35.210 --> 41:35.530]  No?
[41:35.830 --> 41:37.430]  They can't see you shaking your heads, you know?
[41:37.690 --> 41:38.010]  No.
[41:38.270 --> 41:38.510]  Okay.
[41:38.790 --> 41:42.710]  It makes great sense to me because we know that they cheat and rob you.
[41:42.850 --> 41:45.090]  Well, I assume they were cheating in some way.
[41:45.310 --> 41:48.150]  But if that's policy, I'd like to know for more people if that's policy.
[41:48.190 --> 41:53.770]  If you're overseas, and you get a phone call, and you don't take it, and it goes to voicemail, why would you have to pay for that?
[41:53.770 --> 41:54.730]  You're not doing anything.
[41:54.810 --> 41:55.530]  It's just ringing.
[41:55.710 --> 41:56.990]  I think it may have to do with the routing.
[41:57.270 --> 42:06.370]  If the GSM network doesn't know that your phone is overseas, right, then it has no reason to route it overseas, but if your phone is on and you ignore the call, it's already routed.
[42:06.430 --> 42:08.790]  But you haven't picked up the call, so you shouldn't be charged.
[42:08.950 --> 42:09.310]  Exactly.
[42:09.470 --> 42:13.330]  You think you're saving money by not picking up the call, but you're getting...
[42:13.810 --> 42:14.810]  I don't agree with this.
[42:14.830 --> 42:15.230]  ...built anyways.
[42:15.230 --> 42:16.730]  Well, I don't think anybody agrees with that.
[42:16.850 --> 42:18.070]  I just don't think people know about it.
[42:18.150 --> 42:26.730]  But it also opens up tremendous harassment potential for, you know, if you know somebody who's overseas, you just keep calling their phone over and over again, and you can even block your number, and now you have to pay for that?
[42:28.150 --> 42:28.770]  Exactly, Bernie.
[42:28.850 --> 42:29.090]  Like that?
[42:29.090 --> 42:29.390]  Exactly.
[42:29.450 --> 42:30.770]  No, he makes a very good point.
[42:30.930 --> 42:32.950]  It totally makes no sense at all.
[42:33.590 --> 42:35.070]  And I would make that noise, too.
[42:35.250 --> 42:36.390]  Okay, who wants to call Bernie back?
[42:37.770 --> 42:39.690]  I think Mike's going to try it this time.
[42:39.970 --> 42:41.530]  I got some more mail to read here.
[42:43.590 --> 42:44.330]  Let's see.
[42:46.010 --> 42:49.570]  I live in Sweden, and I listen to the podcast.
[42:50.350 --> 42:56.130]  Anyway, a friend of mine was talking to somebody on the phone when suddenly some conversation between two strangers appeared on the line.
[42:56.550 --> 42:59.590]  Apparently, they could not hear my friends, but my friends could hear them.
[42:59.910 --> 43:03.710]  They later asked somebody about it, and they said, yeah, it happens.
[43:04.130 --> 43:05.050]  What's up with that?
[43:05.110 --> 43:06.370]  It sounds shockingly insecure.
[43:06.690 --> 43:08.390]  I'm never using a Swedish phone again.
[43:09.330 --> 43:09.790]  Thanks.
[43:09.790 --> 43:11.630]  Thanks, if you can explain how something like that can happen.
[43:11.810 --> 43:12.590]  Signed, Sippin.
[43:13.210 --> 43:17.090]  And also, if this can happen randomly, could it also be induced, and then how?
[43:17.350 --> 43:18.470]  What a neat trick.
[43:18.970 --> 43:25.890]  Well, you know, that kind of thing was very common back in the old days when, you know, crosstalk occurred on landlines all the time.
[43:25.910 --> 43:27.350]  You'd pick up your phone, you'd hear somebody else.
[43:27.630 --> 43:29.330]  Sometimes they could hear you, sometimes they couldn't.
[43:30.010 --> 43:32.970]  I've heard crosstalk maybe five, ten years ago.
[43:33.130 --> 43:33.370]  Really?
[43:33.530 --> 43:33.690]  Yeah.
[43:33.690 --> 43:34.690]  Yeah, but not recently.
[43:34.870 --> 43:36.110]  No, not any time ago.
[43:36.130 --> 43:37.410]  It's apparently happened fairly recently.
[43:37.410 --> 43:40.890]  So maybe the Swedish phone system still has some of that.
[43:40.990 --> 43:42.550]  I don't know what caused it in the first place.
[43:43.070 --> 43:44.370]  Bernie, do you know what caused it in the first place?
[43:44.450 --> 43:45.290]  Not podcasting.
[43:46.290 --> 43:46.570]  Crosstalk.
[43:46.770 --> 43:47.510]  Sorry, my terms again.
[43:47.510 --> 43:48.950]  It's a real problem, this podcasting.
[43:48.970 --> 43:49.110]  Yeah.
[43:49.410 --> 43:50.950]  No, crosstalk on telephones.
[43:51.010 --> 43:54.870]  You know, when you pick up and you hear somebody else's conversation, and sometimes they can hear you, and sometimes they can't.
[43:54.970 --> 43:56.390]  That hasn't happened here recently, has it?
[43:56.390 --> 44:01.870]  In the old days, when it was all analog, and I don't know if this is an analog system he's talking about, I kind of doubt it.
[44:01.910 --> 44:02.250]  Sweden?
[44:02.410 --> 44:02.910]  I doubt it, yeah.
[44:03.270 --> 44:15.030]  In the old days, it was not uncommon for just normal, like, FM radio, and sometimes the signals would bleed over in the early days of cell phones in the mid to late 80s.
[44:16.750 --> 44:18.350]  But it could be anything, really.
[44:18.530 --> 44:20.330]  It just could be a problem with their switching system.
[44:20.970 --> 44:21.910]  It could be a lot of things.
[44:22.050 --> 44:24.370]  It could be completely in the landline system.
[44:24.370 --> 44:26.050]  And were these mobile phones?
[44:26.650 --> 44:29.150]  He didn't say they were mobile phones, so I assumed they were land phones.
[44:29.870 --> 44:39.070]  I remember, back in the 70s, my phone rang, and I answered it, and there was a whole bunch of people, a whole bunch of conversations going on at once.
[44:39.870 --> 44:43.210]  And it was like a huge party line thing, and I didn't have a party line.
[44:43.450 --> 44:46.770]  And someone said, can I bring over that basket of tomatoes now?
[44:47.010 --> 44:49.530]  And I said, yeah, sure, bring them over.
[44:50.050 --> 44:52.430]  Apparently they were talking to somebody else, but he heard me.
[44:53.070 --> 44:55.230]  He said, okay, I'll bring them over.
[44:55.470 --> 44:57.190]  And then I always wondered who got the tomatoes.
[44:57.410 --> 44:59.850]  But it was just the strangest thing.
[44:59.970 --> 45:02.350]  There were like dozens of conversations going on at once.
[45:02.630 --> 45:03.570]  It happened to be once.
[45:03.790 --> 45:10.930]  Well, you know, lots of times what happens, or what happened when we had access to a multi-line phone, is we'd hook people up at random and just simply connect them all together.
[45:10.930 --> 45:18.190]  And it really was like a party, because all these people would communicate and sometimes threaten each other because they all assumed they were called by somebody else.
[45:18.750 --> 45:25.150]  So you always have to not discount the possibility of human interaction here, that a human might be responsible for the whole thing.
[45:25.270 --> 45:27.650]  But then again, you know, technically it's possible.
[45:28.150 --> 45:28.930]  It still can happen.
[45:29.390 --> 45:30.190]  Okay, a couple more letters.
[45:30.330 --> 45:31.230]  And let's take some phone calls.
[45:31.330 --> 45:32.950]  212-209-2900.
[45:33.110 --> 45:39.510]  And this is a tremendous opportunity for you New York listeners, because if the internet still is down, you've got to jump.
[45:40.030 --> 45:43.110]  Yeah, nobody else can call in, because they don't know we're asking for phone calls.
[45:43.110 --> 45:43.790]  You might cause panic.
[45:43.910 --> 45:45.030]  You should say the stream is down.
[45:48.270 --> 45:52.970]  Because right now, the only internet that matters is the stream going out to our listeners, which isn't doing that.
[45:53.650 --> 45:55.710]  I've been listening to your radio show for a few years now.
[45:56.150 --> 45:59.030]  The reason I started listening is for your discussion about technology and hacking.
[45:59.070 --> 46:01.110]  The last few months really seem like all politics.
[46:01.270 --> 46:02.670]  You know, I am so sick of these people.
[46:02.810 --> 46:03.710]  Well, let me finish the letter first.
[46:04.090 --> 46:08.310]  I still listen just to see if you guys are talking about tech slash hacking, but I am always disappointed.
[46:08.550 --> 46:10.750]  Am I right in thinking the show has changed over the years?
[46:10.850 --> 46:12.870]  Will you guys talk more about tech and less politics?
[46:13.290 --> 46:14.230]  Signed, Eric in Milwaukee.
[46:14.390 --> 46:14.950]  Well, Eric, listen.
[46:15.510 --> 46:17.210]  You know, I don't know what you consider to be politics.
[46:17.210 --> 46:17.970]  All right.
[46:18.230 --> 46:20.190]  You talked about last week's show.
[46:20.330 --> 46:21.270]  I listened to last week's show.
[46:22.270 --> 46:24.570]  What did we talk about politics last week?
[46:24.650 --> 46:25.790]  What did we talk about politics this week?
[46:25.810 --> 46:27.510]  Is talking about the Patriot Act?
[46:27.570 --> 46:28.610]  Is that considered politics?
[46:29.110 --> 46:29.830]  I got news for you.
[46:29.890 --> 46:30.630]  That's not politics.
[46:30.650 --> 46:32.090]  That's something that affects everybody.
[46:32.210 --> 46:44.090]  And there's all kinds of technical issues involved in that, such as how computers are going to be monitored, how libraries are going to be accessed by federal agents and things like that.
[46:44.090 --> 46:48.770]  But, you know, I think we've always had, quote, unquote, politics as part of our show.
[46:48.850 --> 46:50.190]  We shouldn't shy away from it.
[46:50.270 --> 46:52.950]  But it's by no means the main issue.
[46:53.030 --> 46:56.930]  Well, I think in a lot of the things we discuss, politics and technology are intertwined.
[46:57.010 --> 46:59.130]  For example, the DNS discussion we had before.
[46:59.130 --> 47:03.790]  I mean, it's an Internet issue, but it also is political.
[47:03.950 --> 47:06.090]  A lot of politics gets related.
[47:06.210 --> 47:06.870]  They all get mixed together.
[47:06.950 --> 47:07.690]  Everything gets mixed together.
[47:07.770 --> 47:09.390]  Yeah, you can't extract this.
[47:09.570 --> 47:11.590]  It's like people at Thanksgiving, right?
[47:11.830 --> 47:16.750]  When you hang out with your relatives, they say, oh, let's not talk about Bush because it's just going to get people upset.
[47:17.030 --> 47:18.430]  You know, of course you talk about...
[47:18.430 --> 47:19.210]  You debate these things.
[47:19.290 --> 47:20.030]  You talk about these things.
[47:20.110 --> 47:22.250]  You don't shy away from the issues of the day.
[47:22.690 --> 47:23.490]  Talk about the war.
[47:23.670 --> 47:25.490]  Talk about, you know, the state of the economy.
[47:25.650 --> 47:26.690]  Talk about things that upset you.
[47:27.110 --> 47:28.370]  That's the only way things change.
[47:28.370 --> 47:35.310]  If you shy away from them and avoid any kind of conflict, any kind of discussion, that's the best way for it to just keep going the way it's going.
[47:35.850 --> 47:37.930]  And I think we talk about technology plenty.
[47:38.050 --> 47:41.850]  I think technology is a major player in the politics of the day.
[47:43.270 --> 47:44.530]  Bernie, any thoughts on that?
[47:45.730 --> 47:46.930]  They're inextricably linked.
[47:47.390 --> 47:51.130]  I think technology is, in many cases, where the rubber really hits the road.
[47:52.130 --> 48:06.590]  And, you know, governments just can't resist getting their hands on this stuff and using it to, you know, spy on people or whatever they want to do, control people, tattoo people, you know, electronically, that sort of stuff.
[48:06.590 --> 48:10.890]  So you really can't talk about that technology without talking about its implications.
[48:11.230 --> 48:18.190]  And the implications are what the politics are imposing on it.
[48:18.190 --> 48:21.210]  So it's a, it's a, you can't get away from it.
[48:21.530 --> 48:26.730]  And a lot of times, you know, politicians don't understand the specifics of the technology.
[48:26.930 --> 48:29.990]  And so they write laws that seem silly to us.
[48:30.090 --> 48:34.790]  And, you know, it's good to inform people that these kinds of things are silly.
[48:34.970 --> 48:36.170]  And something should be done about them.
[48:36.350 --> 48:38.090]  Maybe the politicians should be, should be taught.
[48:38.250 --> 48:40.370]  Because what they do affects all of us.
[48:40.570 --> 48:40.930]  Absolutely.
[48:41.270 --> 48:41.470]  Absolutely.
[48:41.670 --> 48:41.830]  Okay.
[48:42.030 --> 48:44.290]  And this one last letter, and we're going to take some phone calls.
[48:44.390 --> 48:45.490]  212-209-2900.
[48:45.950 --> 48:49.950]  I live in Philadelphia and did not have access to any of the radio stations that broadcast your show.
[48:50.010 --> 48:53.870]  So I have it automatically downloaded to my iPod via iTunes so I can listen to it at my leisure.
[48:54.430 --> 48:57.730]  I even listen to almost all of the world tour of Emanuel's.
[48:58.190 --> 49:01.230]  Why is it that you speak of podcasting with such disdain?
[49:01.470 --> 49:05.150]  And why do you actively post your shows if you have such a distaste for the entire concept?
[49:05.550 --> 49:06.390]  Signed, Cadres.
[49:06.610 --> 49:10.630]  And Mike, since you're the one that expresses the most disdain for podcasting, I think you should answer that question.
[49:11.810 --> 49:14.030]  First of all, it's a very, very silly word.
[49:14.030 --> 49:17.010]  My primary objection is to the word, not the actual...
[49:17.010 --> 49:17.370]  Disdain?
[49:18.690 --> 49:19.570]  Oh, podcasting.
[49:19.690 --> 49:19.890]  Okay.
[49:20.210 --> 49:20.270]  Yeah.
[49:20.650 --> 49:21.090]  Disdain?
[49:21.250 --> 49:21.870]  Disdain's good.
[49:21.950 --> 49:22.610]  It's a good word.
[49:22.670 --> 49:23.270]  It's a great word.
[49:23.330 --> 49:24.190]  Yeah, but podcasting.
[49:24.250 --> 49:35.030]  And the other problem with the word podcasting is that it implies that you must have an Apple iPod and I don't like to promote any commercial products on this station.
[49:35.230 --> 49:38.610]  Well, is there maybe an alternate phrase you'd like to venture forth with?
[49:38.610 --> 49:40.310]  You could download the show.
[49:40.450 --> 49:44.110]  You could download it automatically with an RSS feed if you want.
[49:44.290 --> 49:45.830]  Yeah, that's a lot quicker to say that, isn't it?
[49:45.950 --> 49:46.730]  You could download it.
[49:46.870 --> 49:49.110]  Download it with an RSS feed instead of saying podcasting.
[49:49.110 --> 49:50.030]  You could download the show on our website.
[49:50.230 --> 49:52.110]  It could be downcasting.
[49:52.610 --> 49:53.010]  Downcasting?
[49:54.110 --> 49:54.690]  That's really bad.
[49:54.690 --> 49:55.250]  That's really bad.
[49:55.490 --> 49:55.690]  I'm sorry.
[49:55.870 --> 49:56.050]  Yeah.
[49:56.370 --> 49:57.210]  Didn't think that one through.
[49:57.690 --> 50:05.490]  Well, basically, I think what Mike's getting at is that our disdain isn't for the technology itself but just for the silly word or at least his disdain.
[50:05.490 --> 50:07.190]  But what does the word iPod mean, anyway?
[50:07.770 --> 50:11.070]  I think it means something that you, like, connect your eyes and your feet.
[50:11.270 --> 50:12.410]  But what's the pod part?
[50:13.570 --> 50:13.890]  Feet?
[50:14.530 --> 50:14.850]  Peapods?
[50:14.970 --> 50:15.370]  I don't know.
[50:15.490 --> 50:15.730]  All right.
[50:15.810 --> 50:18.550]  Well, you know, let's change the language a little bit.
[50:18.610 --> 50:19.250]  We'll think of something.
[50:19.350 --> 50:22.210]  And, of course, our listeners can write in to us as well.
[50:22.350 --> 50:22.590]  Jim?
[50:22.730 --> 50:26.610]  I have just one thing that I only want to mention because there's a time constraint on it.
[50:29.170 --> 50:31.570]  Forbes.codefix.net slash capsule.
[50:31.850 --> 50:33.750]  I'll let people go to that to see what it is.
[50:33.770 --> 50:35.250]  I'll try to discuss more of it next time.
[50:35.250 --> 50:36.090]  Let's go to phone calls.
[50:36.290 --> 50:36.750]  All right.
[50:37.730 --> 50:39.050]  212-209-2900.
[50:39.270 --> 50:39.890]  And good evening.
[50:40.030 --> 50:40.370]  You're on the air.
[50:40.610 --> 50:41.530]  Let's go to phone calls.
[50:41.870 --> 50:42.210]  All right.
[50:42.450 --> 50:42.670]  Hello?
[50:42.930 --> 50:43.110]  Yes.
[50:43.230 --> 50:43.410]  Go ahead.
[50:43.470 --> 50:44.170]  Turn down your radio, please.
[50:44.470 --> 50:45.210]  Yes, I just did.
[50:45.430 --> 50:45.690]  Okay.
[50:45.830 --> 50:46.270]  Hey, guys.
[50:46.470 --> 50:47.530]  I'm listening to the show all the time.
[50:47.670 --> 50:47.990]  I'm a member.
[50:48.170 --> 50:49.250]  And you're in a car, aren't you?
[50:49.530 --> 50:50.690]  Yes, I'm driving home.
[50:50.830 --> 50:51.010]  Okay.
[50:51.010 --> 50:51.430]  Be careful.
[50:51.810 --> 50:52.330]  I am.
[50:52.490 --> 50:53.470]  I have my hands for you.
[50:53.590 --> 50:53.890]  Okay.
[50:53.930 --> 50:54.750]  What's on your mind?
[50:54.850 --> 50:57.310]  I just wanted to get your feedback on this thing.
[50:57.430 --> 51:06.370]  I've been hearing a commercial in BAI all day regarding MCI, 600 fee on the prisoner inmates when they call.
[51:06.530 --> 51:10.110]  There's a 600% charge for collect calls.
[51:10.330 --> 51:15.170]  And there's some kind of action being planned or being talked about.
[51:15.930 --> 51:17.310]  And how do you get away with that?
[51:17.570 --> 51:20.730]  Well, this is something that the phone companies have been doing for a long, long time.
[51:20.810 --> 51:25.270]  I think, Bernie, you can probably speak to this a little more as to what the phone companies actually get away with.
[51:25.410 --> 51:27.370]  And so we're going to let you go because of all the noise in your car.
[51:27.630 --> 51:27.790]  All right.
[51:27.890 --> 51:28.350]  Drive carefully.
[51:29.670 --> 51:48.950]  Having been subjected to having to use these highly overpriced collect phones from prisons, these actions against the companies, MTI and others, is really, I think, are really misguided because the problem is the corrupt prison institutions or the State Bureau of Prisons or the Federal Bureau of Prisons,
[51:48.950 --> 52:01.630]  in many cases, where they have set up a bidding system where they will award the phone contract for the prison to the carrier who kicks back the most money to the institution.
[52:02.370 --> 52:04.350]  And it should be blatantly illegal.
[52:04.590 --> 52:05.450]  It's kickbacks.
[52:05.650 --> 52:18.530]  And the kickbacks are funded by exorbitantly overcharged rates that the prisoners who have to call collect to their friends and family members have to pay.
[52:18.650 --> 52:20.710]  And ironically, it's not the prisoners who have to pay this.
[52:20.810 --> 52:25.470]  It's the innocent friends and family of people who are incarcerated.
[52:25.850 --> 52:27.690]  Not that there aren't innocent people in prison as well.
[52:27.810 --> 52:30.810]  But the bottom line is it should be an illegal kickback scheme.
[52:31.770 --> 52:36.890]  And these protests should be targeted at the institutions, not at the companies.
[52:36.890 --> 52:40.210]  Companies are always going to try to get the business, no matter what.
[52:40.390 --> 52:42.310]  So they should bark up the right tree.
[52:42.610 --> 52:47.710]  I think you're giving MCI a bit of a lot of credit here.
[52:47.850 --> 52:51.390]  They certainly are profiting from this scheme as much as anyone.
[52:52.090 --> 52:53.310]  But they don't set the policy.
[52:53.390 --> 52:54.770]  The policy is set by the prison system.
[52:54.950 --> 52:56.290]  And I think Bernie's right here.
[52:56.290 --> 53:05.750]  I think if you target the Bureau of Prisons or your state prison authority, whoever they may be, because, you know, not every time, not every time when prisoners make phone calls is it jacked up that tremendous amount, is it?
[53:05.930 --> 53:07.950]  I'm not sure exactly the rules.
[53:08.170 --> 53:19.070]  But the, you know, if we could get these companies to realize that it's very bad publicity to enter into these contracts, then they will cease entering into these contracts.
[53:19.070 --> 53:25.710]  Whereas the Bureau of Prisons really already has a pretty terrible reputation and is a much sort of harder target.
[53:25.950 --> 53:30.410]  Well, there's one other thing, too, that annoys me about the targeted campaign right now.
[53:30.590 --> 53:33.970]  One of the things they say to do, if you get a call from a prisoner, don't accept it.
[53:34.070 --> 53:40.170]  It's like, well, that's not a very nice thing to do for, you know, if someone's trying to call you using this flawed system, it's not their fault.
[53:40.310 --> 53:46.510]  Don't not take the call because, you know, you're making a statement against MCI or against the government, but fight the system in other ways.
[53:46.510 --> 53:47.990]  But remember who the victims are here.
[53:48.610 --> 53:53.570]  I understand that from that caller that there's obviously commercials on BAI today.
[53:54.150 --> 53:55.090]  It's not commercial either.
[53:55.090 --> 53:55.990]  It's a public service announcement.
[53:56.110 --> 53:57.130]  We don't have commercials.
[53:57.410 --> 53:57.950]  You're right.
[53:58.030 --> 53:58.850]  I misspoke.
[53:59.170 --> 54:15.970]  But also, today's Daily News, today's the 16th of November, a guy named Errol Lewis, L-O-U-I-S, his column in today's Daily News tells about, I believe, a protest tomorrow and who you can call to protest these exorbitant charges by MCI and, as Bernie says,
[54:16.050 --> 54:16.970]  the kickback to the state.
[54:16.970 --> 54:18.310]  Okay, let's take another phone call.
[54:18.470 --> 54:19.910]  Let's go over here.
[54:20.390 --> 54:21.390]  And good evening, you're on.
[54:22.670 --> 54:23.290]  Go ahead.
[54:23.930 --> 54:25.090]  Yeah, how you doing, fellas?
[54:25.370 --> 54:25.950]  What's on your mind?
[54:26.430 --> 54:29.130]  Just a real quick question regarding audio.
[54:29.890 --> 54:30.330]  Okay.
[54:30.330 --> 54:32.690]  I hate even using the word iPod.
[54:32.850 --> 54:49.570]  I'm a musician, and my band and I and a couple other people, we have nixed using iTunes to license some of our work because the sound quality is just really, really bad.
[54:49.570 --> 54:51.670]  You can't change the sound quality?
[54:52.190 --> 54:52.670]  No.
[54:52.890 --> 54:56.430]  No, you can't get it as warm of the sound.
[54:57.390 --> 55:00.130]  I mean, I've heard that said of digital media in general.
[55:00.310 --> 55:01.190]  It's just awful.
[55:02.370 --> 55:05.250]  I mean, the sound quality is just horrible.
[55:05.250 --> 55:06.350]  Uh-huh.
[55:06.890 --> 55:16.150]  Because we're on our 25th to 30th year anniversary, and we have, like, some great live stuff we're putting out, which...
[55:16.150 --> 55:16.930]  Who's your band?
[55:17.570 --> 55:18.210]  Violators.
[55:18.470 --> 55:18.690]  Okay.
[55:20.430 --> 55:25.710]  And with some fellas from the Smithereens, as well as some of the old heartbreakers.
[55:25.790 --> 55:28.610]  You probably have a lot of material out on vinyl, right?
[55:28.930 --> 55:29.330]  Yes.
[55:29.530 --> 55:33.930]  And I imagine you have the same feeling about vinyl and digital media, such as CDs.
[55:35.450 --> 55:43.310]  Yeah, but the CDs were always... you were able to compress it and get a really nice, nice, warm, meaty sound out of it, as I like to put it.
[55:44.710 --> 55:53.730]  And we talked with the people from Apple, and we just can't get a quality of audio that is good.
[55:54.030 --> 55:56.390]  Is there anything that you'd like to suggest that might be better?
[55:56.870 --> 55:58.170]  I just want to ask you guys.
[55:58.310 --> 56:03.390]  I mean, you guys peruse more of the trade publications than I, or my bandmates, would.
[56:03.570 --> 56:04.770]  I think Redhack might have something.
[56:04.970 --> 56:06.830]  Well, I mean, there are lossless codecs out there.
[56:06.930 --> 56:09.610]  I think FLAC, F-L-A...
[56:09.610 --> 56:10.250]  F-L-A-C.
[56:10.430 --> 56:10.930]  F-L-A-C.
[56:10.930 --> 56:26.550]  The problem with them, and the reason why a company like Apple wouldn't want to use them, is that even though they do compress the audio down a bit, it's... you're still talking, you know, hundreds of megs versus, like, four with an MP3 or an A-C.
[56:26.550 --> 56:31.430]  You'll find that the typical file is maybe 50 or 60 megs, as opposed to something that could be much smaller with MP3.
[56:31.610 --> 56:37.230]  And especially with Apple, there's no digital rights management with, like, a codec like FLAC.
[56:37.230 --> 56:42.410]  And they're trying to strive away from any, you know, anything like that, where they can't control the content.
[56:43.010 --> 56:43.270]  But, uh...
[56:43.270 --> 56:54.330]  I wanted to toss it out to you guys, because, you know, we're banging our heads against the wall, because we do want to make some of our younger fans the music accessible to their MP3s and whatnot.
[56:54.850 --> 56:57.770]  You have also to consider the playback system.
[56:58.250 --> 57:07.050]  And on sort of normal, uh, cheap speakers, uh, a high bit rate MP3 is going to sound the same as the CD.
[57:07.770 --> 57:07.930]  Yeah.
[57:08.390 --> 57:09.490]  Anyway, we're going to have to leave it there.
[57:09.670 --> 57:10.170]  Thanks, uh...
[57:10.170 --> 57:10.650]  Thanks for the call.
[57:10.750 --> 57:12.590]  Thanks, everybody, for, uh... for calling in and for listening.
[57:12.830 --> 57:14.150]  Let's give out the address, uh...
[57:14.150 --> 57:15.450]  If you want to, uh, write to us.
[57:15.610 --> 57:19.670]  Email address, of course, O-T-H, for off-the-hook, at 2600.com.
[57:19.790 --> 57:21.310]  That's 2600.com.
[57:21.710 --> 57:27.510]  Or you can write to us by regular snail mail, off-the-hook, care of W-B-A-I.
[57:28.790 --> 57:29.910]  120 Wall Street.
[57:30.250 --> 57:30.950]  10th floor.
[57:32.010 --> 57:32.410]  Thank you, Walter.
[57:32.610 --> 57:33.170]  Uh, New York.
[57:33.590 --> 57:34.210]  New York.
[57:34.530 --> 57:37.030]  1-0-0-0-5.
[57:37.790 --> 57:38.650]  Are you sure about that?
[57:39.090 --> 57:40.110]  1-0-0-0-5?
[57:40.570 --> 57:40.970]  Yeah.
[57:41.190 --> 57:41.350]  Okay.
[57:42.190 --> 57:42.750]  Just wanted...
[57:42.750 --> 57:44.070]  You didn't have a confidence in your voice.
[57:44.190 --> 57:45.070]  1-0-0-0-0-5.
[57:45.070 --> 57:45.390]  Okay, fine.
[57:45.570 --> 57:46.410]  No, I believe you.
[57:46.470 --> 57:46.950]  I believe you.
[57:47.370 --> 57:50.870]  Um, anyway, we'll be back again next week with another, uh, action-packed edition.
[57:51.310 --> 57:54.090]  And, uh, I'm sure all kinds of fun things will have happened between now and then.
[57:54.750 --> 57:57.490]  Uh, until then, uh, have yourselves a good night.
[57:57.490 --> 57:58.270]  A good week.
[57:58.670 --> 58:00.230]  Stay tuned to the Personal Computer Show.
[58:00.390 --> 58:00.550]  Good night.
[58:00.550 --> 58:02.310]  Uh,
[01:00:31.840 --> 01:00:35.600]  you're listening to WBAI New York 99.5 FM.
[01:00:35.600 --> 01:00:35.620]  A welcome as a provider.
[01:00:35.620 --> 01:00:36.040]  PNK 50.7oons Something A tamperнем.
[01:00:36.140 --> 01:00:36.320]  2-0-0-5.