[00:00.000 --> 00:06.440]  Del Rio hopes that advocates and civil rights groups will be able to bring enough pressure to stop thumbprinting.
[00:06.940 --> 00:10.160]  For FSRN, this is Zoe Sullivan in New York.
[00:12.040 --> 00:19.800]  You've been listening to Free Speech Radio News, which is supported by Pacifica Radio, community radio affiliate stations, and listener supporters.
[00:20.100 --> 00:21.480]  You can send us your feedback.
[00:21.480 --> 00:25.460]  Just drop us an email to comments at fsrn.org.
[00:25.720 --> 00:28.620]  That's comments at fsrn.org.
[00:29.500 --> 00:32.160]  From KPFK in L.A., I'm Aura Bogado.
[00:34.420 --> 00:37.060]  And you're listening to radio station WBAI New York.
[00:37.200 --> 00:38.400]  The time is 7 o'clock.
[00:38.560 --> 00:39.860]  Time for Off the Hook.
[00:45.080 --> 00:49.620]  The telephone keeps ringing, so I ripped it off the wall.
[00:50.540 --> 00:55.140]  I cut myself while shaving, now I can't make a cough.
[00:55.720 --> 01:00.480]  We couldn't get much worse, but if they could, they would.
[01:00.480 --> 01:09.200]  And the
[01:30.330 --> 01:31.310]  program is Off the Hook.
[01:31.550 --> 01:35.930]  Emmanuel Goldstein here with you on this Wednesday evening, joined by Mike.
[01:36.470 --> 01:36.970]  Hi.
[01:38.030 --> 01:39.590]  Not Kevin on the other side of the room.
[01:39.890 --> 01:40.250]  Hello.
[01:40.830 --> 01:41.470]  Rob T.
[01:41.550 --> 01:41.890]  Firefly.
[01:42.130 --> 01:42.610]  Good evening.
[01:42.870 --> 01:43.250]  Voltaire.
[01:43.630 --> 01:43.850]  Hey.
[01:44.190 --> 01:45.750]  And Mitch Altman joining us.
[01:45.910 --> 01:46.250]  Hello.
[01:46.590 --> 01:47.750]  Down in Philadelphia, Bernie S.
[01:48.210 --> 01:49.230]  Greetings from Philadelphia.
[01:49.550 --> 01:50.170]  But you know what?
[01:50.170 --> 01:54.030]  We're going to jump right into something that is a special feature for tonight.
[01:54.050 --> 01:56.110]  Because tonight, yes, tonight is a fundraising edition.
[01:56.150 --> 02:00.950]  And we want to share something with you that you can also be a part of.
[02:00.950 --> 02:08.250]  It's a memory, if you will, a memory from a conference that concluded a few weeks ago, maybe seven weeks ago or so.
[02:09.490 --> 02:09.930]  Go ahead.
[02:10.050 --> 02:12.050]  Is the thing we're going to share the phone number to pledge?
[02:12.430 --> 02:13.750]  Well, you can give that phone number up.
[02:13.850 --> 02:16.610]  It's 1-212-209-2950.
[02:16.930 --> 02:17.190]  That's right.
[02:17.230 --> 02:18.850]  Although 1 technically is not part of the number.
[02:19.010 --> 02:20.310]  It's part of the country code.
[02:20.650 --> 02:21.470]  Yes, that's true.
[02:21.610 --> 02:21.950]  That's true.
[02:22.030 --> 02:23.110]  But the area code is 212.
[02:23.710 --> 02:25.790]  But, yeah, you probably have to dial 1 no matter where you are.
[02:25.870 --> 02:27.750]  212-209-2950.
[02:27.750 --> 02:33.850]  But what I'd like people to do before actually calling in, because we're still getting things set up down in the tally room, take a listen to this.
[02:33.970 --> 02:43.590]  This is an excerpt from our keynote speaker, Stephen Levy, author of Hackers, not the film, the book, which came out in 1984, talking about the early days of hacking.
[02:43.850 --> 02:54.670]  Talking about some of the people who are really, really famous these days that he met in doing the research for the book and how it all sort of developed and what the hacker spirit is really all about.
[02:54.670 --> 02:59.910]  And then after that, we'll have a little bit more time to discuss particulars and other things like that.
[02:59.990 --> 03:00.530]  But just give a listen.
[03:00.530 --> 03:05.390]  This is from The Last Hope of July in 2008 here in New York City.
[03:09.160 --> 03:10.580]  And for some reason, it's not coming up.
[03:10.660 --> 03:11.360]  Okay, I see what happened.
[03:11.440 --> 03:12.880]  Somebody pressed that button over there.
[03:13.000 --> 03:13.420]  Very nice.
[03:13.520 --> 03:14.960]  Very slick, guys.
[03:15.060 --> 03:17.080]  Somebody set me up here to hit the wrong button.
[03:17.700 --> 03:18.580]  Let's try that again.
[03:18.580 --> 03:26.980]  Because all roads seem to lead to what happened in the late 50s and early 60s, and in one place specifically, which was MIT.
[03:27.400 --> 03:34.000]  And as I talked to other people, I realized, you know, it actually feels like hacker culture began there at MIT.
[03:34.000 --> 03:39.340]  So I really have to add a third section to my book, and that will be the lead section, the opening section.
[03:39.340 --> 03:46.420]  And when I did that, it was called True Hackers, in which I wrote about MIT in the late 50s and early 60s.
[03:46.540 --> 03:53.020]  And to me, it turned out my favorite part of the book, and the part which really resonates to this day.
[03:53.480 --> 03:57.840]  And, you know, it was just thrilling to be able to talk to these people.
[03:57.940 --> 04:01.340]  No journalist had ever gone near them before, and to tell their story there.
[04:03.280 --> 04:09.360]  So, even before I did that, you know, of course, I met a lot of interesting people during the course of interviewing there.
[04:09.480 --> 04:11.480]  Steve Wozniak, of course, was great.
[04:11.500 --> 04:17.340]  He was super generous with his time, and, you know, really shared with me what goes on inside a hacker's head.
[04:17.520 --> 04:20.380]  I didn't talk to Steve Jobs during the course of doing hackers.
[04:21.320 --> 04:35.580]  Right after I finished the book, the Macintosh was about to come out, and I did get an assignment for Rolling Stone to write about the Mac, which hadn't come out yet, and I got Apple to let me in a couple months before they released it.
[04:35.720 --> 04:37.080]  And that's when I first met Steve.
[04:37.760 --> 04:43.260]  It was kind of interesting because, you know, it was the end of a day that just, again, blew my mind.
[04:43.260 --> 04:46.640]  It was sort of akin to the first day I was researching hackers.
[04:47.060 --> 04:50.040]  And I met all these amazing people, and, of course, saw this amazing computer.
[04:50.240 --> 04:56.740]  The people I met that day, people like Andy Hertzfeld and Bill Atkinson and Susan Kerr, the Macintosh artists, are my friends to this day.
[04:56.740 --> 04:59.580]  And, of course, the computer I met that day is my computer to this day.
[04:59.620 --> 05:01.180]  So it was a big deal for me.
[05:01.240 --> 05:04.700]  At the end of the day, I was supposed to meet Steve Jobs, and we were going to go out to dinner there.
[05:05.380 --> 05:08.600]  And, you know, I heard a lot about him, and I thought, what is this guy really like?
[05:09.000 --> 05:17.080]  So, you know, we meet out in the lobby of this Bandley 3, the building where they did the Macintosh, and immediately he launches into this tirade.
[05:17.220 --> 05:18.800]  You know, so I was doing this story for Rolling Stone.
[05:18.860 --> 05:22.520]  He said, you know, I was just on an airplane, and I was reading a copy of Rolling Stone.
[05:22.520 --> 05:25.760]  And there was this cover story about MTV, and it was awful.
[05:25.920 --> 05:33.760]  And he started proceeding, just trashing the story left and right, and using horrible analogies to body functions, gross body functions, to talk about this story.
[05:33.880 --> 05:38.600]  And he kept talking and talking, and I wondered, when is he going to take a breath so I could tell him that I wrote that story?
[05:41.570 --> 05:47.030]  And I finally did, and he just kind of changed the subject, and wound up getting a great interview.
[05:47.450 --> 05:51.110]  You know, and Steve is not really a hacker.
[05:51.310 --> 05:52.810]  He's more of an artist mentality.
[05:52.810 --> 06:00.270]  You know, you would never have a hacker whose obsession is to have fewer and fewer and fewer buttons on a device, which is sort of Steve's goal.
[06:00.510 --> 06:05.030]  You know, the iPhone, he's got it down to one button, and eventually it's just going to be no buttons.
[06:05.210 --> 06:09.530]  Like, you know, there's just going to be a sort of head meld with the device, whatever it is.
[06:09.870 --> 06:14.970]  But it is pretty cool, I guess, to be a hacker, to try to implement those ideas, to put one button on there.
[06:15.190 --> 06:17.430]  So, you know, he certainly deserves to be in this discussion.
[06:17.710 --> 06:20.650]  I also met Bill Gates when I was researching hackers.
[06:22.150 --> 06:23.770]  And I set up an interview with him.
[06:23.930 --> 06:24.690]  It was around 1983.
[06:25.190 --> 06:27.030]  He looked like he was about 12 years old at the time.
[06:27.530 --> 06:32.870]  And I had my first of what would turn out to be, like, many interviews with Bill Gates.
[06:33.030 --> 06:35.630]  And I think Bill Gates really is a hacker.
[06:35.750 --> 06:37.590]  He really has a total hacker's mentality.
[06:37.590 --> 06:45.070]  And for many years, after he founded Microsoft, he would look at a project and just go, you know, really be critical of it.
[06:45.150 --> 06:46.710]  He'd say, I could code that up in a weekend.
[06:46.810 --> 06:47.850]  What do you want to give me that?
[06:48.090 --> 06:50.770]  And, you know, the thing was, he really could code that up in a weekend.
[06:50.770 --> 06:51.690]  He was really good at it.
[06:51.850 --> 06:54.270]  He hasn't done any coding in quite a long time.
[06:54.870 --> 07:03.410]  But still, to this day, when he talks about business, you know, he'll talk about it and he'll talk about Microsoft and other things.
[07:03.410 --> 07:14.090]  When you talk about some technical issue, he'll just light up and go wild and maybe tell you that if you venture an opinion, that's the stupidest thing I ever heard, which is a big expression of his.
[07:14.230 --> 07:22.350]  And once we were actually having a conversation about antitrust during a very tender time in Microsoft's history, and he threw a pencil at me.
[07:24.610 --> 07:25.630]  He was so livid.
[07:28.230 --> 07:29.470]  But now it's funny.
[07:29.750 --> 07:30.210]  He can't...
[07:30.210 --> 07:33.290]  In later years, he couldn't say, that's the stupidest thing I ever heard.
[07:33.890 --> 07:39.450]  He threw an expletive somewhere in that sentence, usually, because people would just start laughing when he said it.
[07:39.530 --> 07:41.650]  It was such a self-parody.
[07:42.550 --> 07:59.430]  So anyway, I got to MIT, and I found something really interesting, which was these early hackers, the true pioneers of hacking, had the same way of looking at things that those hardware hackers and other ones did.
[07:59.950 --> 08:02.730]  And it was really remarkable what I found there.
[08:02.770 --> 08:06.810]  I think I found sort of like the Rift Valley of computer culture there.
[08:06.970 --> 08:20.430]  And I can say, I've been downstairs and looked around, that the culture which we have in this room, downstairs, the booths, the other sessions that you have here, just would not have existed had it not been for MIT.
[08:20.810 --> 08:22.910]  That's where things really got started there.
[08:23.070 --> 08:27.250]  And specifically, it started, strangely enough, in this building called Building 20.
[08:27.510 --> 08:30.390]  A structure was put up during World War II.
[08:30.630 --> 08:31.970]  It was meant to be a temporary structure.
[08:32.190 --> 08:34.110]  It wasn't knocked down until 1998.
[08:34.510 --> 08:40.950]  And it was replaced by this really complicated Frank Gehry, you know, giant building, which is falling apart now, incidentally.
[08:42.130 --> 08:44.470]  And I don't know if it's going to last as long as Building 20.
[08:44.670 --> 08:55.730]  But if you ventured back in the late 50s into Building 20, and you'd go to all sorts of things that were little nuclear reactors and other kinds of strange things there, you would stumble upon a room with a model railroad layout.
[08:55.850 --> 08:56.950]  And you'd think, this is odd.
[08:56.990 --> 09:00.070]  This was the Tech Model Railroad Club of MIT.
[09:00.170 --> 09:01.210]  They called it Tumerc.
[09:01.830 --> 09:13.610]  And on top of the big, you know, elaborate train layout with little painted hills and little conductor figures with little painted mustaches on them, and, you know, little trains going on there that were beautifully painted.
[09:14.070 --> 09:15.810]  That would be on top of the layout.
[09:15.990 --> 09:24.310]  And underneath the layout, there would be this really complicated tangle of switches and, you know, diodes and all kinds of strange stuff.
[09:24.490 --> 09:26.250]  And that was called, like, the system.
[09:26.470 --> 09:33.010]  And the people who worked underneath it all the time were the S&P group of the Model Railroad Club, Signals and Processing.
[09:33.110 --> 09:35.590]  And they were, really, like, the first hackers.
[09:35.590 --> 09:39.930]  You know, they ran that thing like an intricate computer system.
[09:40.030 --> 09:48.310]  And they actually referred to it as hacking in that system, which is, like, the first thing I found that people using that term for that kind of thing.
[09:48.530 --> 09:52.090]  Now, at MIT, they had this term called hack, which is like a prank.
[09:52.250 --> 09:58.450]  When you would cover the big dome there on Massachusetts Avenue with aluminum foil, they'd say, oh, that's a great hack.
[09:58.730 --> 10:11.490]  And I think it was partly that and partly the way a golfer uses the term hacker, just hacking away at something, you know, in terms of maybe a non-methodical, but, you know, persistent and sometimes, you know, clever way of doing things.
[10:11.590 --> 10:12.470]  And they used that.
[10:12.650 --> 10:17.390]  And I actually came across some of the newsletters of the Tech Model Railroad Club.
[10:17.870 --> 10:19.510]  And they would sing songs of hacking.
[10:19.750 --> 10:38.970]  And, you know, let me actually read one, a poem that this guy, Peter Sampson, who was a key figure in the Railroad Club in early computing, wrote, sort of in the spirit of Walt Whitman, switch-thrower for the world, fuse tester, maker of routes, player with the railroads and the system's advanced chopper,
[10:39.290 --> 10:43.650]  grungy, herring, sprawling machine of the point function linolight.
[10:44.010 --> 11:00.590]  They tell me you are wicked, and I believe them, for I have seen your painted light bulbs under the loose site luring the system coolies, under the tower, dust all over the place, hacking with bifurcated springs, hacking, even as an ignorant freshman axe who has never lost occupancy and has dropped out,
[11:00.930 --> 11:15.850]  hacking the end boards, for under its locks are the switches, and under its control, they advance around the layout, hacking, hacking the grungy, herring, sprawling hacks of youth, uncabled, flying diodes, proud to be switch-thrower, fuse maker, maker of routes,
[11:16.130 --> 11:19.230]  player with railroads, and advanced chopper to the system.
[11:20.910 --> 11:32.310]  Well, in the spring of 1959, these people who worked on this virtual computer, underneath the layout board of the model railroad club, actually got to use a real computer.
[11:33.170 --> 11:46.910]  MIT moved on this interactive computer that was sort of given by the defense department, called the TX0 to, you know, the model railroad, to a building next to the model railroad club, no one had written system software for it, and they got to use it.
[11:47.210 --> 11:55.250]  Previously, the only access to computers they had, someone had taken a course, the first computer course at MIT, it was operated by John McCarthy.
[11:56.110 --> 12:04.010]  And it was very frustrating, because back then they had to give paper cards to, you know, the priests around the computer, you had to wait for days to get your output.
[12:04.190 --> 12:05.210]  But this was interactive.
[12:05.390 --> 12:06.430]  And they went crazy.
[12:06.570 --> 12:08.530]  They built all the system software.
[12:08.890 --> 12:11.590]  And they also did things that you weren't supposed to do on a computer.
[12:11.950 --> 12:13.630]  Things that no one had thought of doing.
[12:13.890 --> 12:20.090]  Like one of them wrote a program called Expensive Typewriter, which turned out to be the first word processing program that you could process things.
[12:20.250 --> 12:23.030]  Another one did a spreadsheet-like math program.
[12:23.250 --> 12:28.690]  He handed in his homework using it, and the teacher gave him a zero, saying, this is stuff, you can't do this on a computer.
[12:29.230 --> 12:30.210]  I'm rejecting that.
[12:31.690 --> 12:40.590]  So, what's more, the things they did on the TX0, they shared, they believed that every line of code should be visible to everyone else.
[12:40.770 --> 12:46.030]  They had no concept of intellectual property, or proprietary information.
[12:46.250 --> 13:02.710]  Since they were so desperate to find out how to do things, they were so desperate to find out how to do things, that they felt that it would be cruel and unusual punishment to deny someone the access to do this.
[13:02.810 --> 13:04.570]  So, they wrote the programs on paper tapes.
[13:04.670 --> 13:06.670]  They put the paper tapes in a drawer by the computer.
[13:06.950 --> 13:12.210]  Anyone could pick up that paper tape, look at the code, improve it, then put the thing back there.
[13:12.310 --> 13:14.670]  There wasn't an idea of who owned a program.
[13:14.870 --> 13:16.750]  It was a ridiculous concept to begin with.
[13:17.230 --> 13:17.770]  All right.
[13:17.830 --> 13:28.390]  And we're listening to Stephen Levy, keynote speaker at the Last Hope Conference taking place here in New York City in July, and brought back quite a few memories of the most recent conference we just had.
[13:29.390 --> 13:30.330]  Good speaker, eh?
[13:30.870 --> 13:31.110]  Yeah.
[13:31.350 --> 13:31.670]  Yeah.
[13:31.930 --> 13:34.310]  Some interesting points brought up.
[13:34.610 --> 13:44.090]  We're offering this, in addition to a whole bunch of other talks, as part of our brand new premium that we just are making available today.
[13:44.550 --> 13:48.590]  For people who pledge $75, you will get 10 of these talks.
[13:49.150 --> 13:50.110]  What are the 10?
[13:50.510 --> 13:51.590]  Well, let me get to it.
[13:51.750 --> 13:52.730]  I barely took a breath.
[13:52.970 --> 13:53.930]  You don't get to breathe.
[13:54.070 --> 13:55.910]  Stephen Levy is the first one.
[13:56.010 --> 13:56.890]  He's our keynote speaker.
[13:56.950 --> 14:03.850]  But we also have some of our featured speakers, namely Adam Savage, Kevin Mitnick, Steve Rambam, Jello Biafra.
[14:04.530 --> 14:07.950]  We have the social engineering talk, which is a lot of fun.
[14:08.050 --> 14:09.550]  We'll have an excerpt from that a little bit later on.
[14:09.990 --> 14:11.870]  We have Grand Theft Laszlo.
[14:11.930 --> 14:12.970]  We'll talk about that in a little bit.
[14:13.470 --> 14:17.670]  But Hacking Cool Things with Microcontrollers, with Mitch Altman, who's right here in our studios.
[14:17.970 --> 14:19.490]  What do you think of that talk of yours?
[14:19.810 --> 14:21.870]  It was fantastic.
[14:22.330 --> 14:23.110]  Good audience response?
[14:23.650 --> 14:25.370]  Yeah, it was actually a standing room only.
[14:25.590 --> 14:25.830]  Okay.
[14:26.490 --> 14:32.330]  And Hacking Democracy, all about the ES&S voting systems, electronic voting.
[14:32.510 --> 14:34.210]  Very interesting panel discussion there.
[14:34.650 --> 14:38.490]  And finally, the intersection of culture jamming, hacking, and hacktivism.
[14:38.610 --> 14:44.650]  That's with Mark from Negative Land and a bunch of other culture jammers and hacktivists and people like that.
[14:45.070 --> 14:48.530]  That was the Sunday afternoon panel, which I think was very well received.
[14:48.650 --> 14:54.610]  So that's 10 talks, which actually comes to a little more than 10 DVDs because a couple of them ran two DVDs.
[14:55.530 --> 14:56.890]  I think one even ran three.
[14:57.430 --> 14:59.470]  212-209-2950.
[14:59.470 --> 15:03.090]  For a pledge of $75, you'll get those 10 talks.
[15:03.090 --> 15:07.330]  For a pledge of $125, you'll get 20.
[15:07.870 --> 15:09.870]  Yeah, you'll get another 10 on top of that.
[15:10.090 --> 15:19.070]  Another 10 decent ones, including lockpicking seminars and various other... the talk on Wikipedia, the bag cam.
[15:19.290 --> 15:20.930]  Bernie, a bag cam is one of your favorites, right?
[15:21.470 --> 15:32.630]  Yeah, it's just amazing behind-the-scenes candy camera video, what happens to your luggage after it gets past the transportation... TSA, the Transportation Security Administration.
[15:32.630 --> 15:33.130]  Yeah.
[15:33.390 --> 15:47.990]  So this guy actually stuck a camera inside his bag and filmed the entire process of what happens to your bag once it goes behind the desk, right onto the plane, onto the conveyor belt, and into the next airport.
[15:48.450 --> 15:53.210]  So that's one of the talks you'll get if you get the 20 package for a pledge of $125.
[15:53.470 --> 15:57.650]  You'll also get the anonymous panel, which, not Kevin, I know you were involved in.
[15:57.770 --> 15:59.330]  I was quite involved in that panel.
[15:59.430 --> 16:00.730]  Yeah, that went over pretty well, too.
[16:00.730 --> 16:02.590]  I was very surprised by how well it went over.
[16:02.650 --> 16:06.210]  These are the people that don't name themselves, that have... I mean, how would you describe them?
[16:07.750 --> 16:14.390]  They're a nameless, organizationless collective of people who are out to fight the Church of Scientology.
[16:14.450 --> 16:15.390]  Well, more than that, though.
[16:15.470 --> 16:17.550]  I mean, they're more powerful than any government, these people.
[16:17.690 --> 16:18.690]  Oh, they have their own country.
[16:18.770 --> 16:19.010]  They do.
[16:19.090 --> 16:19.350]  They do.
[16:19.430 --> 16:23.970]  And they have millions of people following them on various boards and things like that.
[16:24.050 --> 16:27.210]  Anyway, somehow, we got them to show up at the conference and give a talk.
[16:27.310 --> 16:30.010]  Whether they have paper bags over their heads, or how do they not get identified?
[16:30.710 --> 16:35.890]  I believe only one of them was actually wearing the mask that's been defined as anonymous.
[16:36.130 --> 16:36.350]  Uh-huh.
[16:36.570 --> 16:36.770]  Okay.
[16:36.770 --> 16:38.110]  Everyone else was...
[16:38.110 --> 16:39.590]  So, we have that.
[16:39.770 --> 16:43.350]  We have a bunch of other things for the 20.
[16:43.350 --> 16:46.490]  Now, if you're the kind of person who wants everything, though...
[16:46.490 --> 16:48.110]  Wait, can we just... before we get...
[16:48.290 --> 16:50.390]  So, you can get 20 DVDs for $125?
[16:51.210 --> 16:52.110]  That's what I just said.
[16:52.550 --> 16:53.030]  And then you...
[16:53.030 --> 16:54.450]  I want to write it down for you, because I can do that.
[16:54.450 --> 16:54.730]  Please.
[16:55.030 --> 16:57.750]  And if you pledge $75, you'll get 10 DVDs.
[16:58.070 --> 16:58.070]  Same.
[16:58.210 --> 17:00.690]  75 for 10 DVDs, 125 for 20.
[17:00.690 --> 17:01.730]  I know it doesn't add up.
[17:02.050 --> 17:08.470]  I know it doesn't... it should be... it should be more than that, but it's not, because we just don't know how to say no.
[17:09.410 --> 17:10.690]  Yes, I'm getting to that, too.
[17:11.490 --> 17:11.710]  Okay.
[17:11.790 --> 17:16.950]  Everybody who pledges $30 or above, 30 or above, gets an off-the-hook t-shirt.
[17:18.190 --> 17:19.230]  That's the truth.
[17:19.510 --> 17:21.910]  And we should point out that not Kevin is wearing it.
[17:21.970 --> 17:22.770]  He's wearing one, yes.
[17:22.830 --> 17:23.730]  He got one a while ago.
[17:23.850 --> 17:25.710]  I think I'm supposed to say he looks fetching in it.
[17:26.210 --> 17:27.430]  Yeah, you could say that if you want.
[17:28.090 --> 17:28.770]  So, okay.
[17:28.970 --> 17:39.050]  So, but those of you who want everything, you want the entire thing, the entire conference, we have a very special deal tonight, and this deal really is not going to last very long, because it should cost a whole lot more than that.
[17:39.190 --> 17:45.510]  But for $250, you'll get all the talks, and that's over 100 DVDs, you know?
[17:45.570 --> 17:45.850]  100?
[17:46.470 --> 17:47.730]  How long would that take to watch?
[17:47.790 --> 17:57.670]  We had somebody in here before from the tally room who kept trying to figure out if we were serious about this, because she was saying... no, you're saying 100 DVDs for $250.
[17:58.130 --> 18:02.190]  You mean there's only 100 that you have, not that you're giving away 100 DVDs.
[18:02.390 --> 18:11.470]  And we just, we were trying to instill that, yes, we are insane, and we do offer these amazing deals sometimes, and this is one of those times that we're doing that.
[18:11.610 --> 18:18.130]  But I'll tell you, we're not going to do it for very long, because we're still printing the DVDs from the last fundraiser in the spring.
[18:19.430 --> 18:23.390]  That was so popular, but we had to keep printing them all summer long.
[18:23.870 --> 18:25.670]  But we did get through them all.
[18:25.730 --> 18:29.410]  I think we just finished yesterday with the final number.
[18:29.510 --> 18:31.670]  We thought we were finished a couple of weeks ago, but now we're really finished.
[18:31.810 --> 18:36.710]  And those will all be sent out this weekend, if not sooner, if you haven't already gotten them.
[18:36.990 --> 18:39.210]  So 212-209-2950.
[18:39.590 --> 18:39.890]  Yeah.
[18:40.070 --> 18:44.970]  So you'll get, for a pledge of $250, you'll get 100 DVDs of talks from the last Hope Conference.
[18:44.970 --> 18:49.210]  If you missed it, this is certainly the best thing you can do to find out what actually happened.
[18:49.610 --> 18:51.530]  And you'll also get the Off the Hook t-shirt.
[18:51.670 --> 18:57.270]  But for a pledge of $75, you'll get those top 10, the 10 greatest hits, I guess, of the conference.
[18:57.290 --> 19:00.030]  For 125, you'll get the top 20.
[19:00.170 --> 19:01.990]  212-209-2950.
[19:02.190 --> 19:05.690]  We have one call on the line, but, you know, we should have like 10 calls.
[19:05.770 --> 19:06.530]  Hey, RedHack's here.
[19:06.770 --> 19:07.110]  Hi.
[19:07.370 --> 19:12.510]  Don't forget also that, I mean, you're getting these DVDs, but you're also supporting WBAI, which is really, really important.
[19:12.870 --> 19:19.370]  You know, it's great that we have in New York this radio station, as we always say, in the middle of the FM dial.
[19:19.510 --> 19:19.770]  That's right.
[19:20.350 --> 19:22.850]  That's public, you know, public radio.
[19:23.070 --> 19:24.670]  So really, it's important.
[19:24.990 --> 19:26.170]  Reaches four different states.
[19:26.170 --> 19:28.650]  And of course, through the internet, it reaches the entire world.
[19:28.870 --> 19:29.010]  Right.
[19:29.110 --> 19:31.370]  And just even on that level, to support it.
[19:31.770 --> 19:36.930]  And, you know, if you can't afford 75 or 125, anything really helps.
[19:37.130 --> 19:39.150]  So it's just important to note that.
[19:39.270 --> 19:39.490]  Absolutely.
[19:40.010 --> 19:40.210]  Okay.
[19:40.270 --> 19:41.610]  We have four calls on the line now.
[19:41.670 --> 19:44.710]  And I think now is the time where we're going to send people down there to help out with Tally.
[19:44.870 --> 19:46.590]  So, Voltaire, you're going to go down to Tally, right?
[19:46.910 --> 19:47.110]  All right.
[19:47.210 --> 19:47.470]  All right.
[19:47.470 --> 19:56.130]  You're making the supreme sacrifice to walk down the hall and start taking phone calls and make sure that the orders go smoothly, that the right prices are given for everything.
[19:56.610 --> 19:58.190]  I remember the off-the-hook shirts.
[19:58.430 --> 20:00.650]  Unfortunately, we only have those available in extra-large.
[20:01.010 --> 20:02.350]  Voltaire, that's very important to tell you.
[20:02.610 --> 20:05.290]  That's only available... the off-the-hook shirts are only available in extra-large.
[20:05.370 --> 20:07.350]  Those are the only shirts we're giving away this week.
[20:07.470 --> 20:07.830]  Nice question.
[20:08.070 --> 20:08.390]  All right.
[20:09.050 --> 20:09.210]  All right.
[20:09.290 --> 20:11.170]  212-209-2950.
[20:11.390 --> 20:17.090]  So again, pledge of $75 gets you 10 of the DVDs from the Hope Conference.
[20:17.170 --> 20:18.830]  And we don't mean 10 of the same talk.
[20:18.950 --> 20:20.170]  We mean 10 different talks.
[20:20.850 --> 20:24.910]  For a pledge of $125, you'll get 20, 20 separate talks.
[20:25.150 --> 20:28.510]  And for a pledge of $250, you'll get a hundred or more.
[20:28.650 --> 20:29.570]  My God, so many.
[20:29.670 --> 20:30.470]  We had so many talks.
[20:30.870 --> 20:32.590]  Now, I'm just trying to figure out how to even watch...
[20:32.590 --> 20:35.470]  Now, I'm getting worried because we have like six, seven calls on the line now.
[20:35.590 --> 20:39.490]  I'm wondering what... our poor DVD reproducing robot is going to have a nervous breakdown.
[20:39.690 --> 20:41.110]  How would you even watch a hundred talks?
[20:41.730 --> 20:44.850]  Well, I mean, obviously, you'd have to take a lot of time to do this.
[20:44.970 --> 20:46.450]  But this will get you through the winter for sure.
[20:46.450 --> 20:54.850]  I can tell you that I was in charge of just ripping the audio from the DVDs, which was happening at at least 10 times the speed of the actual DVDs.
[20:54.910 --> 20:57.390]  And that took me about two weeks.
[20:57.590 --> 20:57.970]  Took you too long.
[20:58.030 --> 20:58.290]  Yeah.
[20:58.390 --> 21:00.490]  We kept calling you saying, what's the problem here?
[21:00.510 --> 21:01.070]  What's the holdup?
[21:01.630 --> 21:01.990]  Yeah.
[21:02.130 --> 21:03.790]  So there's a lot of content there.
[21:03.930 --> 21:08.990]  Now, speaking of content, we want to get into some more content right now so people know what it is that we're talking about here.
[21:09.390 --> 21:11.430]  Now, Adam Savage showed up at our conference.
[21:11.670 --> 21:15.890]  So for those of you who don't know, he's the co-host of Mythbusters and terrific guy, most amazing.
[21:16.050 --> 21:24.630]  This guy is the true essence of what hacking is all about, I think, because he just has this insatiable spirit of wanting to learn things, wanting to find out, wanting to experiment.
[21:25.150 --> 21:29.710]  And he just was so into being at the conference and talking to these people.
[21:29.830 --> 21:31.710]  And it was just so inspiring to see that.
[21:32.330 --> 21:34.510]  Now, Adam's been in the news, actually, recently.
[21:34.710 --> 21:35.790]  You might have read this.
[21:35.830 --> 21:37.130]  It's so crazy how this happened.
[21:37.330 --> 21:43.190]  He was in the news because somebody actually played one of his talks from the conference.
[21:43.730 --> 21:49.410]  And he had said something about a particular episode not being allowed by the Discovery Channel.
[21:49.990 --> 21:54.070]  And the funny thing is, we had had this up on the website for many weeks.
[21:54.170 --> 21:55.010]  It was at the conference.
[21:55.390 --> 22:03.830]  But all the mainstream media, online mainstream media, reported it as if it had just happened, even though it was a comment he made six weeks earlier.
[22:04.070 --> 22:06.850]  And I think maybe only one of them even referred to the conference.
[22:06.970 --> 22:10.750]  They all just said something like, at a hacker conference, not getting any details.
[22:10.830 --> 22:12.070]  Never give us credit for anything.
[22:12.450 --> 22:13.550]  But that's just the way they are.
[22:14.010 --> 22:17.970]  So as it turns out, he actually had to recant some of what he said.
[22:18.610 --> 22:23.210]  While it was in fact true that particular episode wasn't allowed on, it wasn't because of Discovery Channel.
[22:23.590 --> 22:26.250]  It was because of other forces at work.
[22:26.330 --> 22:28.930]  But it was just amazing to see how it became news.
[22:29.170 --> 22:33.950]  Because somebody watched it on the internet and fed it to the right blog or something like that.
[22:34.090 --> 22:39.150]  It doesn't matter that 3,000 people were there and saw it and were talking about it.
[22:39.190 --> 22:41.090]  It has to be reported by the right person.
[22:41.470 --> 22:42.470]  Yeah, it was kind of funny.
[22:42.710 --> 22:48.550]  I got a couple of emails when that story blew up with people saying things like, hey, you know that guy that was at your conference?
[22:48.550 --> 22:49.490]  He just did this thing.
[22:49.530 --> 22:50.730]  Yeah, he just did this.
[22:50.870 --> 22:52.970]  And, you know, it's incredible.
[22:53.310 --> 22:56.170]  We have our issues with the media.
[22:56.310 --> 23:01.090]  And if Aldert were here, our friend from Holland who handles the press, did a great job this year?
[23:01.290 --> 23:09.310]  He kind of corrals them into the various parts of the conference that we want them to be at and not bother people that don't want to be bothered.
[23:09.870 --> 23:18.450]  But basically, the way you're supposed to do it at a conference this size, you're supposed to have a big PR firm and supposed to be like a product that you're selling.
[23:18.610 --> 23:20.310]  And that's how you get the attention.
[23:20.470 --> 23:26.270]  The fact that we let the media know about various things and we do publicity through websites and radio shows.
[23:26.450 --> 23:29.750]  And the fact that over 3,000 people showed up and were a part of this.
[23:30.070 --> 23:31.330]  No, that's not how you do it.
[23:31.390 --> 23:32.550]  You have to be slick.
[23:32.710 --> 23:41.350]  You have to be nice and polished and send out brochures and get the media to have the right angle and be afraid of the hackers and things like that.
[23:41.350 --> 23:41.870]  You know what the media really loves?
[23:42.070 --> 23:42.290]  What's that?
[23:42.570 --> 23:46.890]  A good way to get the media to cover you, Emmanuel, is to purchase an advertisement.
[23:47.170 --> 23:47.990]  Yeah, they love that.
[23:48.110 --> 23:50.450]  They really love that if you pay them to cover you.
[23:50.730 --> 23:51.970]  That's essentially what you're doing.
[23:52.030 --> 23:54.630]  If you hire a PR firm, you're paying to be covered.
[23:54.890 --> 23:55.670]  And you know what?
[23:55.670 --> 23:56.930]  We just don't do things like that.
[23:57.090 --> 24:00.030]  We maybe make news by having a conference.
[24:00.030 --> 24:02.670]  And if people think it's news, they'll report it.
[24:02.750 --> 24:03.910]  The real journalists will report it.
[24:04.030 --> 24:05.990]  Or people will show up and it'll be great.
[24:06.050 --> 24:09.550]  And that's the difference, I think, between this conference and a lot of the other ones.
[24:09.670 --> 24:11.510]  And between this radio station and a lot of the other ones.
[24:11.510 --> 24:11.850]  That's right.
[24:11.910 --> 24:12.550]  There's a good parallel there.
[24:12.570 --> 24:19.810]  It's probably no surprise to you that if you've ever been reading an article about where a company is mentioned that on the page opposite, there happens to be an ad for that company.
[24:19.810 --> 24:21.430]  I've seen that more times than I can remember.
[24:21.710 --> 24:23.590]  Or at least somewhere in the publication, definitely.
[24:23.850 --> 24:24.650]  That's how it works.
[24:24.690 --> 24:25.530]  That's the media for you.
[24:25.710 --> 24:30.650]  So yeah, a little lesson in how it works in this country through what happened with Adam Savage.
[24:30.770 --> 24:32.890]  But it was just great to have him there.
[24:33.010 --> 24:39.930]  What we're going to play now is his Maltese Falcons story that he told at the conference.
[24:40.450 --> 24:41.750]  We were so packed.
[24:41.890 --> 24:43.330]  We were packed in the room upstairs.
[24:43.570 --> 24:45.110]  We were packed downstairs at Simulcast.
[24:45.650 --> 24:50.270]  And of course, a ton of people have downloaded the audio that we have up on our website since.
[24:50.490 --> 24:51.570]  Now, Rob, you were there.
[24:51.710 --> 24:52.270]  You were at the...
[24:52.270 --> 24:52.710]  I was indeed.
[24:52.890 --> 24:54.390]  What was the mood like in that room?
[24:54.530 --> 24:57.270]  The mood was very... it was wrapped, I want to say.
[24:57.430 --> 25:03.070]  Like, it was... everyone was just very... so into what he was saying because he was saying such a basic... sorry.
[25:03.190 --> 25:04.190]  He was saying such a...
[25:04.190 --> 25:05.170]  He started already.
[25:05.370 --> 25:06.270]  I don't know why he did that.
[25:06.450 --> 25:07.190]  Stop talking over me, Adam.
[25:08.170 --> 25:09.390]  Oh, we got him to start again.
[25:09.570 --> 25:13.730]  The things he was saying were just such a basic part of, I think, a large part of why everyone was there.
[25:13.790 --> 25:16.970]  And he really spoke directly to us about things that are precious to us.
[25:16.970 --> 25:17.210]  Yeah.
[25:17.390 --> 25:21.830]  It's incredible when somebody gets to that stage where they're basically an icon.
[25:21.850 --> 25:22.970]  They're very famous.
[25:23.350 --> 25:24.990]  They're a household word.
[25:25.090 --> 25:25.530]  They really are.
[25:25.910 --> 25:30.210]  Yet, they still retain the spirit and the adventure.
[25:30.570 --> 25:36.750]  And they don't let it get to them and turn them into somebody that, you know, that we wouldn't appreciate so much.
[25:36.970 --> 25:37.110]  Indeed.
[25:37.450 --> 25:42.270]  I was just... you know, and there are so many people like that who come to the conferences or participate or give talks.
[25:42.470 --> 25:43.250]  And I know.
[25:43.370 --> 25:46.250]  I know in future conferences, we'll get so many more.
[25:46.730 --> 25:49.510]  And people like that are listening now and one day will participate.
[25:49.750 --> 25:58.070]  So let's listen to Adam Savage as he began his talk at the Last Hope Conference in July of this year at the Hotel Pennsylvania in New York City.
[25:58.630 --> 26:03.070]  And again, give out the phone number 212-209-2950 for a pledge of $75.
[26:03.090 --> 26:05.110]  You'll get this talk plus nine others.
[26:05.630 --> 26:09.830]  For a pledge of $125, you'll get this talk plus 19 others.
[26:10.190 --> 26:14.470]  For a pledge of $250, you'll get this talk plus at least 99 others.
[26:14.670 --> 26:15.230]  We're not kidding.
[26:15.370 --> 26:16.010]  We're not making this up.
[26:16.130 --> 26:20.070]  But you have to call during this hour, 212-209-2950.
[26:20.070 --> 26:23.550]  And every pledge $30 and above gets you an off-the-hook t-shirt.
[26:24.270 --> 26:26.170]  Any other things we want to remind people?
[26:26.370 --> 26:27.410]  I think that's pretty much it.
[26:27.450 --> 26:29.250]  Maybe the phone number one more time from your voice, Mike.
[26:29.490 --> 26:29.630]  Yeah.
[26:29.690 --> 26:40.530]  And in case they have a block on dialing numbers that you say, and for some reason they don't for my voice, the number, country code 1, area code 212, and the number is 209-2950.
[26:40.530 --> 26:41.310]  That's right.
[26:42.010 --> 26:42.210]  All right.
[26:42.430 --> 26:44.230]  Without further ado, here's Adam Savage.
[26:45.030 --> 26:46.290]  Ah, God, it's good to be here.
[26:49.650 --> 26:56.870]  This is the group of people that actually understand what we're talking about when we don't even know what we're talking about, which is most of the time.
[26:58.010 --> 27:00.430]  I've been paying attention to this conference for a while.
[27:00.570 --> 27:02.150]  I'm really honored that you guys have me here.
[27:02.530 --> 27:03.730]  It really is my honor.
[27:03.810 --> 27:09.750]  I feel like I'm one of the least qualified people in this room, but being unqualified is my job, so I'm just going to run with it.
[27:11.210 --> 27:24.050]  What I have is about a 15-minute, maybe 10 minutes, if I could talk really fast, piece on obsession, discussing my personal obsessions, because I suspect that there's some minor obsessive compulsive tendencies in the audience.
[27:26.030 --> 27:31.050]  And then I'm going to take questions from you guys and just have a conversation for another 40 minutes.
[27:31.310 --> 27:31.470]  All right?
[27:31.570 --> 27:31.870]  Sound good?
[27:34.030 --> 27:34.470]  Okay.
[27:35.530 --> 27:38.150]  We'll see how fast I can run through this thing.
[27:42.160 --> 27:47.960]  About four years ago, the New Yorker did a piece on a cache of dodo skeletons found on the island of Mauritius.
[27:48.060 --> 28:00.040]  Now, Mauritius is a small island off the west coast of Madagascar in the Indian Ocean, where the dodo bird was found, discovered, and eventually extinguished by human inhabitation or rats or whatever your prevailing theory is.
[28:00.220 --> 28:09.360]  Now, this article was about how archaeologists were very excited to find this cache of skeletons because it meant that they might actually be able to assemble a full dodo skeleton for the first time.
[28:09.520 --> 28:19.280]  While museums all over the world have different dodo skeletons, none of them has a complete and whole skeleton from a single dodo, because the dodo went extinct in such a recent time, 1700.
[28:19.800 --> 28:25.420]  Nobody was actually paying attention to extinction as the tragedy that we understand it is now, and nobody saved the bones.
[28:25.820 --> 28:27.920]  Nobody saved all the bones from a single dodo.
[28:28.020 --> 28:30.920]  Everyone's had to assemble theirs from many, many different pieces.
[28:31.900 --> 28:33.200]  Now, this appeals to me.
[28:34.780 --> 28:46.080]  I have a particular obsession with things of a peculiar type of rarity, things that there's only one of in the world, or maybe there's no one even knows where the one in the world is.
[28:46.540 --> 28:47.720]  Lost manuscripts.
[28:48.060 --> 28:49.940]  The Necronomicon from Evil Dead.
[28:50.700 --> 28:51.200]  Yeah.
[28:54.220 --> 28:57.540]  Tibetan clay-sealed tablet manuscripts found in caves.
[28:59.020 --> 29:01.100]  Aristotle's Commedia from The Name of the Rose.
[29:01.560 --> 29:12.640]  Things like this really, really get me going and make me... for some reason it feeds right into my love of making objects, because the objects that I make are, of course, one of a kind, because I'm the one that made them.
[29:12.860 --> 29:16.680]  There's, like, this direct parity between objects of this kind of rarity.
[29:16.820 --> 29:21.760]  And I... the thing that really got my attention, though, about this article about the dodo birds, was this photograph.
[29:22.900 --> 29:25.740]  I couldn't... this photograph was so compelling to me.
[29:25.920 --> 29:27.080]  It was so beautiful.
[29:27.280 --> 29:30.700]  This... there was so much personality in this skeleton.
[29:30.820 --> 29:32.720]  I could see that this isn't fossilized.
[29:32.780 --> 29:33.560]  It's real bone.
[29:33.660 --> 29:39.180]  I could see the wire that the conservator used to assemble the skull there around the beak.
[29:39.440 --> 29:42.280]  There was so much story in this piece.
[29:43.300 --> 29:45.100]  And it got to me that I wanted one.
[29:47.880 --> 29:49.840]  Now, I have a little more money now than I used to.
[29:50.500 --> 29:52.340]  And I began looking around on the web.
[29:52.480 --> 29:56.460]  This is actually the dodo skeleton on the island of Mauritius in their tourism museum.
[29:56.560 --> 29:57.280]  It's my favorite.
[29:57.920 --> 30:02.180]  And I began downloading pictures of dodo skeletons from all over the web.
[30:02.360 --> 30:03.520]  Museums all over the world.
[30:03.680 --> 30:06.120]  And I wanted to see if anyone sold a replica of one.
[30:06.580 --> 30:07.840]  I figured it was a long shot.
[30:07.880 --> 30:10.120]  I did find this couple that makes them four museums.
[30:10.440 --> 30:12.580]  They charge about $20,000 a piece.
[30:12.680 --> 30:14.100]  And I don't have that much money.
[30:15.320 --> 30:20.220]  But I did manage to gather several hundred pictures into my creative projects folder.
[30:20.220 --> 30:22.920]  I think a lot of you have folders like this.
[30:23.160 --> 30:24.560]  It's called Creative Projects.
[30:24.660 --> 30:26.720]  It really is just full-out obsession.
[30:26.940 --> 30:31.600]  Probably 40 gigabytes, 25,000 photos of everything I'm interested in.
[30:32.540 --> 30:33.100]  Rings.
[30:33.380 --> 30:34.080]  Decoder rings.
[30:34.220 --> 30:34.840]  Right here.
[30:34.900 --> 30:36.060]  That's a pistol ring.
[30:36.400 --> 30:38.120]  You guys have probably seen this online.
[30:38.240 --> 30:39.860]  Just like, you know, checking the same sites.
[30:40.000 --> 30:40.940]  Airplane cockpits.
[30:41.040 --> 30:41.980]  People's workbenches.
[30:42.240 --> 30:43.260]  Ah, the ZF-1.
[30:44.660 --> 30:45.720]  Stormtrooper costumes.
[30:47.760 --> 30:49.460]  And I'm gonna give up my geek cred.
[30:49.720 --> 30:51.940]  I hand drew this map of Middle-earth for myself.
[30:58.250 --> 31:04.570]  So one day I'm at the art store, and I'm maybe about a month after I saw the Dodo article.
[31:04.870 --> 31:05.550]  It might have been a year.
[31:05.710 --> 31:09.630]  But I'm at the art store, and I'm buying some Super Sculpey and some stuff for my kids.
[31:09.630 --> 31:11.110]  We're gonna have a craft day at home.
[31:11.230 --> 31:12.570]  We're gonna sit around the kitchen table and build.
[31:13.450 --> 31:19.410]  And I got all these photos that, for some reason, are ringing through my head while I'm in the art store.
[31:19.410 --> 31:25.290]  And I'm thinking, you know, I've looked at the Dodo Skeleton enough, the Dodo Skull enough, that I really understand its topology, I think.
[31:25.350 --> 31:26.370]  I've got it in my head.
[31:26.470 --> 31:29.870]  And maybe I could make a Dodo Skull.
[31:30.670 --> 31:33.370]  The thing you should understand about me, though, is that I'm not a sculptor.
[31:33.450 --> 31:36.790]  I have never been a traditional soft sculptor.
[31:37.270 --> 31:39.970]  In special effects, I was what you call hard-edged model maker.
[31:39.970 --> 31:41.850]  I could make towers like this all day long.
[31:42.370 --> 31:43.430]  Things from The Mummy.
[31:44.490 --> 31:45.910]  Destroyed New York from AAI.
[31:46.070 --> 31:47.490]  Parts from Terminator 3.
[31:48.150 --> 31:48.690]  Bicentennial Men.
[31:48.830 --> 31:50.890]  This kind of stuff, absolutely my bailiwick.
[31:50.990 --> 31:52.830]  I love hard-edged model making.
[31:52.950 --> 31:55.770]  When it comes to the soft stuff, dragons' faces, I leave that to the other guys.
[31:55.890 --> 31:58.150]  Some of my friends are the most brilliant sculptors I've ever met.
[31:58.350 --> 32:00.050]  It's their task.
[32:00.190 --> 32:05.510]  However, I understood the topology of this thing enough where I thought I could tackle it.
[32:05.510 --> 32:10.210]  And I found this photo, which is a hand with the skull, which gives me a size reference.
[32:10.870 --> 32:12.470]  So I probably printed it out.
[32:12.850 --> 32:16.970]  I kept on expanding the size until the hand matched my wife's hand, actually.
[32:17.550 --> 32:18.950]  It looks like a lady's hand.
[32:19.150 --> 32:21.090]  And then I had a size reference for the skull.
[32:21.210 --> 32:26.150]  And I began to gather all the rest of the photos I had, print them up to an accurate scale.
[32:26.250 --> 32:31.550]  And after about an hour or two, I had a reasonable facsimile of a Dodo skull.
[32:31.730 --> 32:33.110]  I wish I could show it to you.
[32:33.110 --> 32:41.390]  The problem is, is even though it occurred to me at the moment to take pictures of the process of my first, quote, sculpture, for some reason I was lazy and I did not take pictures.
[32:42.390 --> 32:45.430]  However, after about an hour, I had this Dodo skull.
[32:45.710 --> 32:52.450]  And the armature wire I had going around to the back of it to hold the skull up actually turned out to be perfectly placed for a vertebrae.
[32:52.490 --> 32:55.590]  Because skeletons is another thing that I've been obsessed with over the years.
[32:55.770 --> 33:01.330]  I have several dozen in my collection and I've, you know, if I'm in the woods and I find some vertebrae, I'm taking them home.
[33:02.750 --> 33:07.770]  I understood vertebrae enough to actually understand, to know their mechanical, how they work mechanically.
[33:07.910 --> 33:09.390]  The different parts ride upon each other.
[33:09.510 --> 33:12.670]  And I began to fake myself a Dodo spine.
[33:12.930 --> 33:15.130]  I wasn't thinking about making a full Dodo at this point.
[33:15.210 --> 33:18.730]  It was kind of like, the only way you can clean a really messy room.
[33:18.890 --> 33:20.210]  I don't know if you guys have ever seen one.
[33:22.270 --> 33:24.310]  Is to just pick up one thing at a time.
[33:24.450 --> 33:25.710]  You don't have to think about the whole thing.
[33:25.810 --> 33:28.330]  Just one thing at a time, one thing at a time, and eventually the room is clean.
[33:28.550 --> 33:30.690]  I was just going vertebrae by vertebrae by vertebrae.
[33:30.750 --> 33:34.410]  Just thinking about the next one and keeping on going, adding some more wire, et cetera, et cetera.
[33:34.510 --> 33:39.790]  Until, by the end of that day, I had a Dodo skull and a spine and the better part of a pelvis.
[33:40.710 --> 33:41.590]  So I kept going.
[33:41.590 --> 33:44.490]  I downloaded more pictures of Dodo skeletons.
[33:44.890 --> 33:47.010]  More pictures of Dodo pieces, parts.
[33:47.750 --> 33:48.590]  Check this guy out.
[33:48.750 --> 33:53.870]  I found a guy, drawings, original drawings from naturalists who visited Mauritius when the Dodos were alive.
[33:54.050 --> 33:55.970]  A whole Dodo foot skeleton.
[33:56.250 --> 33:58.830]  This guy even put it on a scanner with a ruler on it.
[33:59.230 --> 34:00.290]  Thank God for him.
[34:00.510 --> 34:01.290]  This guy, too.
[34:02.350 --> 34:07.050]  And so, finally, after about six weeks, I made myself a Dodo skeleton.
[34:12.900 --> 34:20.720]  You'll notice, I even went so far as to actually make a museum label and I had tap plastics make me a museum vitrine for it.
[34:20.780 --> 34:23.300]  I don't have the room in my house for it, yet there it is.
[34:24.660 --> 34:27.480]  And it was deeply satisfying.
[34:28.340 --> 34:43.060]  And it also represented kind of a sea change for me because, you know, now that I had my Dodo, all of a sudden, in my obsessions folder, in my creative projects folder, there might be something else I could make for myself that I had never considered to make for myself because,
[34:43.080 --> 34:46.780]  at that point, when I was first obsessed with it, I wasn't a sculptor.
[34:47.300 --> 34:49.440]  And so I went back into the creative projects folder.
[34:49.500 --> 34:50.380]  What else could I make?
[34:50.960 --> 34:52.360]  And I settled upon...
[34:53.520 --> 34:54.520]  The Maltese Falcon.
[34:56.040 --> 34:58.220]  And if you've never read The Maltese Falcon, you have to read it.
[34:58.280 --> 35:01.160]  And if you've never seen the movie The Maltese Falcon, you have to see it.
[35:01.720 --> 35:12.640]  I know there's Elvis people and Beatles people, and there are definitely Hammett people and Chandler people, and I am a Raymond Chandler person through and through, but I've got to give it up for The Maltese Falcon because it's a fantastic book and an amazing movie.
[35:12.800 --> 35:22.320]  And it is specifically about the obsession with an object, the object of desire, the Maltese Falcon that Bogart comes across in the film, that Gutmann is looking for.
[35:22.520 --> 35:33.700]  Now, it's supposedly a 14th century gift from the Knights of Malta to the Habsburg kings whose thanks for giving them the island of Malta during the fight with the Islamic Empire.
[35:33.980 --> 35:39.940]  In fact, it's actually based on quite a similar thing, this hideous thing from the 16th century, which is called the Niphauser Falcon.
[35:40.220 --> 35:44.860]  And it's actually a ceremonial pouring vessel made kind of as an offering, but not by the Knights of Malta.
[35:45.160 --> 35:49.460]  Although, Hammett built a lot of real history into his history of the Maltese Falcon.
[35:50.880 --> 35:55.040]  I even went so far a few years ago to buy this replica off of eBay.
[35:55.180 --> 35:58.180]  And I know it's kind of dark, but all you need to know is that it's a piece of crap.
[35:59.600 --> 36:04.300]  And that as soon as I received it in the mail, they had taken photos of it that made it look like it might be kind of accurate.
[36:04.440 --> 36:06.360]  When I got it, it just... I mean, it looks like...
[36:06.360 --> 36:08.740]  To me, it looks like Peter Falk in a falcon suit.
[36:11.280 --> 36:12.900]  I don't know where that analogy came from.
[36:14.740 --> 36:17.920]  And the problem is... I saw it, I knew that it was a piece of crap.
[36:18.060 --> 36:18.960]  It sat on my shelf.
[36:18.980 --> 36:21.280]  I thought, you know, I wanted the real thing.
[36:21.500 --> 36:24.080]  And at that point, I didn't consider making myself one.
[36:24.100 --> 36:27.400]  I thought maybe I could ask a friend to sculpt it for me and something like that.
[36:27.400 --> 36:32.020]  I mean, there's certainly plenty of hideous replicas on the web that people have made.
[36:32.220 --> 36:34.280]  But I wanted the real, real thing.
[36:35.040 --> 36:36.180]  I wanted this.
[36:37.000 --> 36:40.720]  And this is a picture that I came across in a very small thumbnail.
[36:41.340 --> 36:47.120]  It turns out that the original Maltese Falcon, which was made in lead, was given as a...
[36:47.120 --> 36:47.880]  Where do I begin?
[36:48.080 --> 36:51.220]  You'll remember William Conrad from the Canon series in the 70s.
[36:51.280 --> 36:53.840]  William Conrad actually has a much longer history with Hollywood.
[36:54.000 --> 36:58.380]  He was kind of a fixer, kind of a cleaner director, a writer, an actor.
[36:58.800 --> 37:02.080]  He did a lot of work helping the studios finish projects that were unruly.
[37:02.080 --> 37:06.680]  And as a thank you to all his service, Jack Warner gave him the Maltese Falcon.
[37:06.900 --> 37:11.240]  And it sat on his office shelf for about 30 years until he died.
[37:11.300 --> 37:12.760]  And then his wife sold it at Christie's.
[37:12.880 --> 37:23.840]  I managed to track down an antiquarian bookseller who was able to find me the original Christie's auction catalog and get me this picture, which gives a tremendous amount of beautiful detail of the falcon.
[37:23.960 --> 37:24.740]  And this texture.
[37:24.920 --> 37:27.940]  I mean, I'm still mystified by this texture.
[37:28.040 --> 37:35.360]  This bird is cast in lead, then it was painted with black enamel for the movie, and after 40 years of people handling it, for some reason, it's gold.
[37:35.760 --> 37:37.620]  I don't get it, but I love it.
[37:37.700 --> 37:52.020]  And the patina, the other thing, one of the other areas that I'm really fascinated by within the subset of objects is the patina that tells the story of the narrative of the object.
[37:52.260 --> 38:00.640]  In fact, every model maker will tell you when you're working on a spaceship on Star Wars and you're gluing two things and then you're taking a space and you're gluing another one.
[38:00.720 --> 38:02.900]  Because in Star Wars, it's actually two things, space, one thing.
[38:03.020 --> 38:04.660]  In Star Trek, it's three things in a row.
[38:05.740 --> 38:12.060]  And you're gluing these details on piece by piece, and you always have in your head the narrative of what these things are.
[38:12.060 --> 38:13.020]  I understand wood.
[38:13.020 --> 38:14.080]  This is a cooling vent.
[38:14.200 --> 38:15.180]  This is an offshoot thing.
[38:15.320 --> 38:16.880]  This is something else, a thermostat.
[38:17.240 --> 38:19.740]  And that narrative informs the piece.
[38:19.860 --> 38:21.840]  It tells me that the piece is looking right.
[38:21.940 --> 38:24.520]  It doesn't quite look because it doesn't look like, you know, this works here.
[38:24.680 --> 38:29.380]  And the patina of the falcon here is completely self-similar to me to that.
[38:30.080 --> 38:31.720]  It is a narrative of function.
[38:31.880 --> 38:33.440]  It tells the story of the object.
[38:36.790 --> 38:40.510]  Other birds I found online that were in my obsession folder.
[38:40.510 --> 38:48.870]  This one is actually a resident Maltese falcon, apparently built when Humphrey Bogart got pissed off because the lead one was so friggin' heavy that he dropped it.
[38:49.230 --> 38:57.010]  This is a resident one found in a New Jersey flea market back about 10 or 11 years ago by a Los Angeles filmmaker who recognized it for what it was.
[38:57.150 --> 39:04.470]  It took him five years to authenticate it, which I thought was kind of funny because looking at it, I understood it was authentic the second I saw it because of a bunch of details.
[39:05.010 --> 39:08.250]  And this actually sold at Profiles in History in around 1999.
[39:08.250 --> 39:11.270]  Profiles in History is another movie memorabilia auction site.
[39:12.090 --> 39:20.890]  And the best thing that Profiles in History did, if you see there, is that they not only took a photo from the front, but there were photos of both sides and the back.
[39:21.050 --> 39:28.990]  And so now I had all the topological details I needed to really put the whole entirety of the Maltese falcon in my head and start to make it.
[39:29.110 --> 39:31.490]  So I promptly printed all of these photos up.
[39:31.570 --> 39:33.510]  I know these are lower res, but they gave me what I needed.
[39:33.510 --> 39:41.050]  I printed them up full size because luckily the Christie's auction catalog happened to print the exact size and dimensions of the falcon.
[39:41.290 --> 39:47.050]  And I began to use these with calipers and sculpting with Super Sculpey my Maltese falcon.
[39:47.150 --> 39:54.470]  Now, I only have one picture that I took to show to a friend of mine that I took with my eyesight camera on the laptop here.
[39:54.470 --> 39:55.390]  This is me.
[39:55.490 --> 39:56.490]  My wife's watching television.
[39:57.770 --> 39:59.970]  And I'm working on the falcon slowly but surely.
[40:00.130 --> 40:04.750]  Now, the other thing is, because this is only my second sculpture, I don't know how to make it shiny.
[40:04.750 --> 40:06.210]  I don't really know how to make it smooth.
[40:06.350 --> 40:12.030]  I definitely... it turns out that I'm pretty good at replicating a topology, but I don't know how to get all these correct textures.
[40:12.750 --> 40:15.050]  But I do know how to cheat the correct textures.
[40:15.670 --> 40:21.710]  So I threw it into a vat of rubber, let the rubber harden, pulled out the casting, made a resin casting of that.
[40:21.710 --> 40:26.850]  And now, when you want to smooth down a resin casting, you can use Bondo, you can use autofillers, you can use putties and everything.
[40:26.930 --> 40:32.290]  My preferred thing is actually about 70 coats of this, auto-primer.
[40:33.350 --> 40:34.650]  You just keep on spraying it.
[40:34.810 --> 40:37.230]  It drips like hell, but there's nothing that's easier to sand.
[40:37.390 --> 40:43.030]  And when you're done, you hit it with a bunch of quadruple zero steel wool, and you polish it, and I would say, oh...
[40:43.030 --> 40:47.730]  Yeah, so as I'm polishing this casting, you know, I'm trying to work on the light kicks.
[40:47.870 --> 40:53.370]  And luckily, in the movie, there's a scene when they reveal the falcon, they actually spin it on camera really close.
[40:53.470 --> 40:59.430]  So I did screenshots of every frame that the falcon is visible to really replicate...
[40:59.430 --> 41:01.490]  I'm really replicating the light kicks.
[41:01.610 --> 41:10.530]  I'm replicating the lighting in the room and taking a look at my piece as I'm sanding it, as I'm, you know, getting the different planes down, until I had this.
[41:10.530 --> 41:13.450]  And there's my Maltese falcon.
[41:20.840 --> 41:22.860]  Oh, we're not done by a long shot.
[41:24.200 --> 41:25.420]  I'm obsessive, remember?
[41:26.120 --> 41:38.240]  So here I have this thing, which I now realize, from the extensive amount of research that I've done, my Google foo and my arrogance tells me, this is the most accurate replica of the Maltese falcon that anybody has ever made up until now.
[41:38.240 --> 41:40.660]  And I'm pretty satisfied with it.
[41:40.760 --> 41:41.520]  It's got the shine.
[41:41.640 --> 41:42.700]  It's got all the light kicks.
[41:43.900 --> 41:50.140]  It has a lot of moxie, but it's not quite there because it's too light.
[41:50.800 --> 41:53.180]  The real Maltese falcon weighs 41 pounds.
[41:53.560 --> 41:54.400]  It's lead.
[41:54.740 --> 41:56.440]  I wanted one made out of lead.
[41:56.720 --> 41:59.780]  So I figured, let's start with bronze.
[42:00.420 --> 42:02.240]  I know I want it to be lead.
[42:02.340 --> 42:03.540]  It will eventually be lead.
[42:03.620 --> 42:06.340]  The whole story will end with me having a lead falcon with that patina.
[42:06.460 --> 42:09.140]  But in the meantime, I wanted to work with something that wasn't poisonous.
[42:10.880 --> 42:13.300]  So I had a wax master cast.
[42:13.440 --> 42:14.880]  We had gates put on it.
[42:15.340 --> 42:16.240]  It turned out...
[42:16.240 --> 42:19.120]  Anybody here familiar with the Replica Props Forum?
[42:20.300 --> 42:21.340]  Oh, come on.
[42:21.620 --> 42:30.840]  The Replica Props Forum is a group of really good geeks, of people like me collecting, trading information on and making their own props from movies that they want.
[42:30.920 --> 42:33.260]  Maps from Middle Earth, Stormtrooper costumes, everything.
[42:33.760 --> 42:34.920]  It's a level of...
[42:34.920 --> 42:39.420]  You wouldn't believe how much detail these guys can go into on Luke's lightsaber from Star Wars.
[42:39.960 --> 42:41.460]  And one of my friends...
[42:41.460 --> 42:43.740]  I have a bunch of friends on the RPF that I've met over the years.
[42:43.880 --> 42:46.460]  Actually, many that I haven't met, but only via online.
[42:46.460 --> 42:47.820]  We've traded stuff back and forth.
[42:47.900 --> 42:50.520]  And one of them managed a foundry in Northern California.
[42:50.540 --> 42:59.400]  And he did all this work for me, taking my wax master, actually spraying it with the plaster and prepping it, setting it up in his forge and actually pouring it in bronze.
[42:59.620 --> 43:02.360]  Here's the bronze master just coming out of the mold.
[43:02.360 --> 43:03.620]  Here it is sitting on a scale.
[43:03.740 --> 43:07.940]  You can see it weighs 27 and a half pounds, which is close enough.
[43:08.060 --> 43:11.020]  It's actually unbelievably heavy when you go to pick it up.
[43:12.200 --> 43:13.940]  This is it after being sandblasted.
[43:14.100 --> 43:26.540]  And then I took it, I polished it down, I hit it with steel wool, hit it with a bunch of polishing wheels, threw it in a bath of acid overnight to really darken down the patina, which I know isn't quite the patina, not quite the texture of the real Maltese Falcon.
[43:26.540 --> 43:30.760]  But again, during this interim period, I'm still wanting objects that thrill me.
[43:30.840 --> 43:37.460]  And so I'm still working with materials and processes that I feel are authentic to the material of the Falcon that I've got in front of me.
[43:37.620 --> 43:40.760]  And I don't know why these slides are in there.
[43:41.600 --> 43:43.000]  Oh, I see, it's doubled up.
[43:43.220 --> 43:43.840]  Sorry about that.
[43:44.700 --> 43:45.680]  And so there it is.
[43:45.780 --> 43:47.960]  There's my bronze Maltese Falcon.
[43:49.240 --> 43:50.520]  And this thing, yeah.
[43:50.760 --> 43:52.900]  Now, this one I'm really psyched about.
[43:54.800 --> 43:58.400]  It is, it's hilarious when you go to pick it up.
[43:58.600 --> 44:01.420]  The range of people's expressions when they go to pick it up.
[44:01.480 --> 44:03.740]  They grab it, it's really cold, and they can tell that it's heavy.
[44:03.740 --> 44:06.460]  And then they start to move it, and they get this expression like, wow, that's heavy.
[44:06.600 --> 44:08.160]  And then they try to tip it to lift it.
[44:08.240 --> 44:11.300]  And that's when they realize that it's actually much heavier than they were prepared for.
[44:12.500 --> 44:16.120]  And that a good 20% of people who go near it can't even pick it up.
[44:16.180 --> 44:19.680]  It's like, it's just, it's heavier than anything they handle in the normal course of their daily lives.
[44:20.880 --> 44:22.740]  But again, with this one...
[44:23.660 --> 44:24.720]  Oh, and here's the progression.
[44:24.900 --> 44:27.880]  Here's the, on the left is the piece of crap I bought on eBay.
[44:28.020 --> 44:29.840]  There's my super Sculpey Falcon.
[44:29.960 --> 44:31.200]  There's my first interim casting.
[44:31.200 --> 44:33.720]  There's my polished one, and there's my bronze one.
[44:33.820 --> 44:50.440]  I don't know if you can see what the problem there is, but there is a big problem, which is, if you've ever casted and molded anything, especially big volumetric objects like a, like a falcon like this, you lose a certain amount of size, between 1 and 5% in each generation of casting.
[44:50.620 --> 44:57.820]  And so, when I held up my resin bird, my original super Sculpey bird against the bronze bird, the bronze bird was 3 quarters of an inch too short at the beak.
[44:58.140 --> 45:00.100]  Which of course means, I hate it.
[45:03.730 --> 45:07.130]  It's nothing but an interim artist proof at this point.
[45:08.030 --> 45:10.390]  So, I figure now I have two options.
[45:10.950 --> 45:20.950]  I can either take the original casting of my polished black bird, have it laser scanned, have it a rapid prototype, and some type of deposition or 3D lithography process, and then recast in bronze.
[45:21.090 --> 45:28.850]  Oh, by the way, have it cast up 10% too large, so that at each casting procedure, progressing from there, I'd end up with a bronze one of the correct size.
[45:29.490 --> 45:31.370]  And then I'd cast it finally in lead.
[45:31.730 --> 45:39.630]  Or, I'd contact either Dr. Gary Millan, the dentist who bought one of the two lead Falcons, or Ron Winston, the man who bought William Conrad's Falcon.
[45:39.690 --> 45:42.270]  Ron Winston's actually the son of Harry Winston, the famous jeweler.
[45:42.710 --> 45:45.650]  And Ron bought William Conrad's Falcon at Christie's.
[45:45.650 --> 45:47.530]  And I met Ron last year.
[45:48.010 --> 45:52.390]  I spoke at the EG conference in Los Angeles, and Ron said, you know, next time you're in New York, give me a call.
[45:52.510 --> 45:53.290]  I'm here in New York.
[45:53.390 --> 45:55.210]  Ron didn't return my call this trip.
[45:55.890 --> 46:03.450]  But what I'm hoping that I can convince him or Gary Millan to do is let me visit the bird.
[46:03.890 --> 46:09.570]  I'll sign a piece of paper saying I'm only ever going to make one, but I have a portable hand-held laser scanner.
[46:09.710 --> 46:10.610]  It fits in his suitcase.
[46:14.180 --> 46:16.140]  I think you guys see where I'm going with this.
[46:16.880 --> 46:18.080]  Have it wrapped in prototype.
[46:18.460 --> 46:19.500]  Have it cast in bronze.
[46:19.620 --> 46:23.280]  Make it slightly too large so that each successive process I end up with the right hand, with the right one.
[46:23.440 --> 46:25.780]  And then I end up, I'll happily give them one too.
[46:26.460 --> 46:33.300]  I end up with my Maltese Falcon decked out in lead, and then I can figure out exactly how to do that gold process, that patina.
[46:34.120 --> 46:35.360]  That'll take me another six months.
[46:35.460 --> 46:37.100]  Check back with me in a year and I'll tell you how I'm doing.
[46:44.090 --> 46:44.590]  All right.
[46:44.590 --> 46:49.170]  And we were listening to Adam Savage speaking at the Last Hope conference.
[46:49.530 --> 46:54.610]  And boy, I'll tell you, you know, that was 20 minutes long, but it was riveting the whole way through, and it was impossible to cut any of that.
[46:54.930 --> 46:58.770]  Who would have thought a story about the Maltese Falcon would have been so interesting?
[46:59.450 --> 47:02.450]  The room was filled up with people, with attendees at the conference.
[47:02.690 --> 47:10.950]  And it's part of the package we're offering tonight as part of the WBAI fundraiser for the Autumn Fun Drive, 212-209-2950.
[47:10.950 --> 47:12.090]  So a pledge is $75.
[47:12.610 --> 47:15.690]  You'll get that talk plus nine others on DVD.
[47:16.310 --> 47:18.310]  Now, what that means, Rob, you were there.
[47:18.470 --> 47:19.250]  You were in the room.
[47:19.370 --> 47:19.710]  I was.
[47:20.010 --> 47:23.790]  Now, we heard the audio, but obviously there's a lot of video to go with that as well.
[47:24.050 --> 47:24.410]  Yeah.
[47:24.750 --> 47:28.750]  He brought a slideshow, basically, that went along with every step of his talk.
[47:29.110 --> 47:33.910]  And you saw not only all the falcons he was talking about, but, you know, other things that he went into later.
[47:34.350 --> 47:38.110]  And it was all just this intense, interweaved presentation.
[47:38.550 --> 47:40.390]  And he just kept going from one thing to the next.
[47:40.430 --> 47:42.370]  And you really have to experience it.
[47:42.390 --> 47:43.310]  You have to see it to believe it.
[47:43.310 --> 47:45.250]  So, obviously, if you get the DVDs, you'll be able to see it.
[47:45.350 --> 47:45.530]  Indeed.
[47:45.830 --> 47:46.530]  As well as listen to it.
[47:46.890 --> 47:47.010]  All right.
[47:47.090 --> 47:48.370]  212-209-2950.
[47:48.510 --> 47:51.370]  A pledge of $75 gets you, as I said, that and nine other talks.
[47:51.430 --> 47:55.610]  A pledge of $125 gets you that and 19 other talks.
[47:55.870 --> 48:01.610]  And those are our favorites of the 100 or so talks that were given at the conference.
[48:01.610 --> 48:10.750]  Now, if you want all the talks, all the talks that were videoed, we're giving those away for a cut rate of $250 for people who pledge.
[48:10.890 --> 48:12.470]  212-209-2950.
[48:12.690 --> 48:15.370]  Now, keep in mind, these are not yet available to anybody.
[48:15.530 --> 48:18.350]  And when they are available, they are going to be more expensive than this.
[48:18.450 --> 48:19.790]  So, this is your chance.
[48:19.910 --> 48:26.850]  Not only do you get to keep BAI on the air, which is really worth more than any amount of money.
[48:26.850 --> 48:27.190]  Of course.
[48:27.330 --> 48:28.190]  But you get a good deal.
[48:28.470 --> 48:28.870]  Absolutely.
[48:28.870 --> 48:29.330]  Absolutely.
[48:29.630 --> 48:35.630]  I mean, we donate the premiums, the things that we come up with, because we believe in the station as well.
[48:35.830 --> 48:39.630]  And, yeah, we're going to be tearing our hair out and making these things for the station.
[48:39.630 --> 48:42.390]  But it's worth it if it brings in the pledges.
[48:42.530 --> 48:44.770]  And right now, it seems to be bringing in a good amount of pledges.
[48:44.910 --> 48:46.090]  We want to hit $2,000.
[48:46.090 --> 48:47.490]  We're at $1,280 right now.
[48:47.490 --> 48:55.110]  We think with a few more calls, especially people taking advantage of the full set, we'll be able to hit that mark this week.
[48:55.170 --> 48:58.750]  Remember, we're on for the next four weeks with different things every week.
[48:59.930 --> 49:02.970]  And that's as a result of the strong showing we've had in the past.
[49:02.970 --> 49:04.950]  It's 212-209-2950.
[49:05.090 --> 49:07.490]  Remember, you'll get Adam Savage talk.
[49:07.690 --> 49:14.610]  You'll get Stephen Levy, Kevin Mitnick, Steve Rambam, Jello Biafra, the social engineering talk, which we'll have an excerpt from in just a couple of minutes.
[49:15.150 --> 49:16.250]  Grand Theft Laszlo.
[49:16.330 --> 49:17.090]  We mentioned that earlier.
[49:17.250 --> 49:26.790]  That's where our friend Laszlo is talking about his work designing Grand Theft Auto, what's involved behind the scenes and the world of commercial radio and things like that.
[49:26.950 --> 49:27.390]  Great talk.
[49:27.630 --> 49:30.050]  And that's all part of the $75 package.
[49:30.210 --> 49:32.250]  212-209-2950.
[49:32.470 --> 49:33.970]  We have just one call on the line.
[49:33.970 --> 49:39.130]  So we'd like to get a bunch more before we go into the next set, as it were.
[49:39.350 --> 49:40.550]  We have some people to thank.
[49:40.750 --> 49:41.490]  Who are these people?
[49:41.610 --> 49:42.850]  We have a few people to thank.
[49:43.290 --> 49:47.030]  Gwen from Richmond Hill, New York, we want to thank for the pledge.
[49:47.450 --> 49:49.270]  And Kevin from Eugene, Oregon.
[49:49.270 --> 49:51.670]  And Michael from wonderful Chicago.
[49:52.710 --> 50:03.250]  And we also want to thank all these anonymous people who pledged, who don't like their names to be read over the air, but their pledge is wonderfully appreciated anyhow.
[50:03.790 --> 50:09.310]  And we also want to thank these businesses who have been generous to donate food for the people down here.
[50:09.790 --> 50:15.650]  Tea and Sympathy on Greenwich Avenue here in New York City, between 13th and 14th Street.
[50:16.590 --> 50:20.390]  And Alpha Noose on Maiden Lane, between Broadway and Nassau.
[50:20.490 --> 50:22.430]  Thanks for donating food to us.
[50:22.490 --> 50:23.370]  It's always nice.
[50:23.430 --> 50:24.030]  Keeps us going.
[50:25.210 --> 50:26.930]  212-209-2950.
[50:27.150 --> 50:30.790]  Pledge now to get your DVDs of the Last Hope Conference.
[50:30.910 --> 50:33.430]  Remember, a pledge of $75, you'll get 10.
[50:33.610 --> 50:35.490]  Pledge of $125, you'll get 20.
[50:35.590 --> 50:39.770]  For a pledge of $250, you'll get all of them, which is 100 plus.
[50:39.770 --> 50:40.730]  It's totally amazing.
[50:40.950 --> 50:41.270]  It is.
[50:41.370 --> 50:42.470]  Really, it's crazy, isn't it?
[50:42.650 --> 50:47.650]  And the top 10 and top 20 talks are awesome, but there's a lot of awesome talks in the rest, too.
[50:47.810 --> 50:48.070]  Absolutely.
[50:48.230 --> 50:49.250]  And we're not judging them.
[50:49.330 --> 50:50.410]  We're not saying these are better than others.
[50:50.530 --> 50:59.910]  These are the ones that were attended by a ton of people and have a bunch of the big names, you know, and basically, I guess, are the most popular ones.
[51:00.030 --> 51:01.650]  212-209-2950.
[51:01.950 --> 51:02.930]  We just have one call on the line.
[51:03.030 --> 51:04.450]  We've got to break that 2,000 mark.
[51:04.630 --> 51:05.770]  Yeah, please support WBAI.
[51:05.770 --> 51:08.570]  Where else can you get information like this?
[51:08.830 --> 51:15.770]  And you go across the mainstream dial, and that's pretty much what it is, and you get the mainstream point of view.
[51:15.890 --> 51:22.870]  And then right in the middle is WBAI, where you get all sorts of interesting views that you can't get anywhere else.
[51:23.070 --> 51:24.370]  It's worth supporting.
[51:24.750 --> 51:25.050]  Absolutely.
[51:25.270 --> 51:27.650]  You don't even really get points of view on the radio anymore.
[51:27.650 --> 51:31.190]  It's mostly just pop music and hip-hop.
[51:31.190 --> 51:32.870]  Yeah, it's brain-dead material.
[51:33.090 --> 51:33.710]  Brain-dead material.
[51:33.890 --> 51:35.830]  But this is stuff that makes you think.
[51:36.030 --> 51:42.650]  Stuff that will have you riveted to your TV set or your radio, whatever it is that you listen to us on or play your DVDs on.
[51:42.890 --> 51:44.350]  212-209-2950.
[51:44.550 --> 51:46.250]  I want to get one more excerpt in.
[51:46.290 --> 51:48.190]  We have only a few minutes to do this.
[51:48.550 --> 51:50.570]  So please keep the calls coming in while we're playing this.
[51:50.630 --> 51:54.670]  This is something from social engineering, where I was trying to reach...
[51:54.670 --> 51:55.530]  What was it?
[51:55.570 --> 51:56.350]  The limousine company?
[51:56.350 --> 51:59.930]  Yeah, this was a bit of fun we had on Saturday night.
[51:59.930 --> 52:02.230]  An example of the mischief that hackers can get up to.
[52:02.310 --> 52:04.110]  Remember, 212-209-2950.
[52:04.250 --> 52:04.890]  Three pledge levels.
[52:05.030 --> 52:06.690]  75-125-250.
[52:07.050 --> 52:08.890]  212-209-2950.
[52:09.110 --> 52:15.170]  With somebody who's a little more trusting, if you gain their trust, then they'll keep giving you information.
[52:15.330 --> 52:19.490]  They'll give you all sorts of frequent flyer numbers.
[52:19.490 --> 52:23.890]  They'll give you an address perhaps, an email address, a phone number.
[52:24.050 --> 52:24.770]  It's all possible.
[52:24.770 --> 52:28.330]  Okay, so now we have some flight arrival times.
[52:29.070 --> 52:30.390]  I'm going to call the limo company now.
[52:30.450 --> 52:36.110]  Now, these people, they may not tolerate any of this because they're always in a hurry, and they're always kind of short on the phone.
[52:36.130 --> 52:39.450]  So it's going to be tricky to get anything out of them.
[52:39.810 --> 52:40.870]  But let's give it a shot.
[52:41.030 --> 52:44.130]  You know, one thing with social engineering, you can't be afraid to take a chance.
[52:44.610 --> 52:46.950]  And always have a way to back out if you have to.
[52:48.170 --> 52:48.990]  Okay, let's go.
[52:57.240 --> 52:59.480]  Thank you for calling dial seven car and limousine.
[52:59.720 --> 53:02.600]  Your call may be recorded or monitored for quality assurance purposes.
[53:02.900 --> 53:03.000]  Yeah.
[53:03.060 --> 53:06.580]  If you have just arrived at the airport and are ready to be picked up, please press one.
[53:07.420 --> 53:08.100]  Please hold.
[53:15.100 --> 53:16.380]  Thank you for calling dial seven.
[53:16.500 --> 53:17.080]  This is Priscilla speaking.
[53:17.210 --> 53:17.730]  Can I help you?
[53:17.730 --> 53:18.230]  Yeah, hi.
[53:18.300 --> 53:19.160]  I've got a real problem here.
[53:19.280 --> 53:27.520]  My wife booked me to get picked up tomorrow, and she neglected to tell me what time I'm supposed to be picked up.
[53:28.200 --> 53:29.460]  My last name is Johnson.
[53:29.800 --> 53:30.940]  And you have a reservation already?
[53:31.230 --> 53:32.920]  I don't have the reservation number.
[53:32.940 --> 53:33.600]  That's the problem.
[53:33.780 --> 53:36.140]  Okay, let me get the first three letters of your last name.
[53:36.160 --> 53:37.400]  Okay, J-O-H.
[53:37.580 --> 53:38.300]  J-O-H.
[53:38.300 --> 53:41.180]  I'm coming into JFK from Los Angeles.
[53:41.500 --> 53:43.280]  And what's your full name, sir?
[53:43.730 --> 53:45.780]  Full name is Johnson, J-O-H.
[53:45.980 --> 53:46.640]  First name?
[53:46.640 --> 53:48.480]  First name is Robert or Bob.
[53:48.640 --> 53:50.780]  But the thing is, she might have booked it under her name, which is Hope.
[53:51.180 --> 53:52.520]  Okay, hold on one second.
[53:52.640 --> 53:55.420]  If you see any Johnsons there, it's very likely it might be that.
[53:58.560 --> 53:59.480]  Let me see.
[54:00.380 --> 54:02.320]  No, I don't see it under your name.
[54:02.500 --> 54:03.900]  Probably she has it under her name.
[54:03.920 --> 54:04.860]  What's her last name?
[54:05.460 --> 54:07.360]  Well, actually, her maiden name is Brown.
[54:07.520 --> 54:08.900]  Do you think maybe she booked under that name?
[54:09.000 --> 54:09.360]  Probably.
[54:09.540 --> 54:09.960]  Let's check.
[54:10.040 --> 54:10.360]  All right.
[54:14.210 --> 54:15.230]  And what's her name?
[54:15.490 --> 54:16.830]  Her first name is Hope.
[54:17.230 --> 54:17.590]  Hope?
[54:17.590 --> 54:18.870]  Hope, H-O-P-E.
[54:19.030 --> 54:19.330]  Okay.
[54:19.610 --> 54:22.130]  But, I mean, she's been known to go by different names, too.
[54:22.290 --> 54:25.690]  I mean, if you see a Brown there, that's probably possible that it's her.
[54:26.130 --> 54:26.510]  Hold on one second.
[54:37.940 --> 54:39.740]  No, I do not see a Hope Brown.
[54:39.880 --> 54:41.760]  I see a lot of Browns, but it's not Hope.
[54:41.760 --> 54:43.660]  Do you see any Browns with female names?
[54:45.360 --> 54:45.680]  Um...
[54:46.180 --> 54:47.060]  Let me see, let me see.
[54:48.240 --> 54:48.880]  Kara Brown.
[54:49.260 --> 54:49.900]  My God.
[54:50.620 --> 54:51.260]  Sarah Brown.
[54:51.720 --> 54:52.820]  Wait, I'm sorry, did you say Sarah?
[54:53.100 --> 54:53.760]  Yeah, Sarah.
[54:54.060 --> 54:55.660]  No, Sarah's her middle name.
[54:55.740 --> 54:56.500]  She uses that...
[54:56.500 --> 54:57.800]  She was an actress at one point.
[54:57.880 --> 54:59.700]  She did use that occasionally for stage.
[54:59.900 --> 55:01.660]  So, I don't know why she was looking for that name.
[55:01.660 --> 55:02.500]  And what airport is coming in?
[55:02.600 --> 55:03.300]  It's a JFK.
[55:04.100 --> 55:04.420]  JFK?
[55:04.560 --> 55:04.680]  Yeah.
[55:04.680 --> 55:08.920]  Because I see a pickup in Manhattan going to JFK.
[55:09.120 --> 55:10.400]  I don't think that one's it.
[55:11.160 --> 55:13.920]  Well, if you knew Hope, that's entirely possible.
[55:13.940 --> 55:14.600]  She got it wrong.
[55:14.780 --> 55:15.400]  She got it backwards.
[55:16.260 --> 55:18.020]  And what's her cell phone number?
[55:18.600 --> 55:19.820]  The 917 number?
[55:20.740 --> 55:22.480]  No, I don't see a 917.
[55:22.880 --> 55:24.060]  I see a different number.
[55:24.480 --> 55:26.120]  Hold on, let me try another way.
[55:26.320 --> 55:26.720]  Okay, yeah.
[55:26.740 --> 55:28.260]  Do you know any other name?
[55:29.080 --> 55:31.360]  Well, maybe it's a different Sarah Brown, I guess.
[55:31.520 --> 55:32.000]  It's possible.
[55:32.140 --> 55:33.260]  Yeah, it's a different Sarah Brown.
[55:33.500 --> 55:33.840]  Okay.
[55:33.840 --> 55:35.060]  Let me just try to see.
[55:35.980 --> 55:37.060]  That's an odd coincidence.
[55:37.660 --> 55:38.600]  Hold on one second.
[55:49.610 --> 55:50.390]  Let's see.
[55:56.020 --> 55:59.000]  And she made a reservation to pick you up at JFK?
[55:59.520 --> 56:00.700]  Yeah, that's what she told me.
[56:00.840 --> 56:01.260]  She said that...
[56:01.260 --> 56:01.940]  Okay, let me see.
[56:02.080 --> 56:03.520]  I'm on the...
[56:03.520 --> 56:10.600]  Well, it's either going to be on the 420 or the 610, which is flight 34 or flight 2 on American Airlines.
[56:10.800 --> 56:11.460]  Does that help?
[56:11.620 --> 56:13.260]  It's not coming out on that name.
[56:13.780 --> 56:14.220]  Maybe...
[56:15.280 --> 56:16.240]  Wow, wow, wow.
[56:16.840 --> 56:19.400]  Well, how many people are you picking up on the 420?
[56:19.520 --> 56:20.120]  Maybe that'll help.
[56:20.380 --> 56:21.360]  The 420?
[56:21.540 --> 56:21.720]  Yeah.
[56:21.940 --> 56:22.980]  I don't really...
[56:22.980 --> 56:23.600]  Hold on one second.
[56:23.740 --> 56:24.320]  Let me see something.
[56:24.800 --> 56:33.640]  Because the only thing I can tell you is I can either have the confirmation number, the pick-up date, or the pick-up time.
[56:35.480 --> 56:36.220]  Let me see.
[56:36.280 --> 56:38.640]  The passenger's name, the car, and the dispatch zone.
[56:38.740 --> 56:41.460]  That's all I can really get information out of.
[56:41.460 --> 56:44.280]  I can't really put in a number or anything.
[56:45.340 --> 56:45.960]  I see.
[56:46.720 --> 56:46.740]  I see.
[56:46.900 --> 56:47.300]  Okay.
[56:47.600 --> 56:51.580]  So, basically, you're telling me that there are a number...
[56:51.580 --> 56:53.700]  Did you say there were Johnson's on the 420?
[56:53.880 --> 56:54.280]  Johnson's?
[56:54.360 --> 56:55.500]  Let me find out again.
[56:55.720 --> 56:55.840]  Hold on.
[56:58.100 --> 57:03.220]  She basically told me she couldn't do it, and now I told her she could, and she's kind of going back and doing it anyway.
[57:07.070 --> 57:11.930]  Yeah, I got a lot of Johnson's, but I don't see no pick-up in JFK.
[57:12.450 --> 57:13.850]  Oh, for the 610 either?
[57:14.610 --> 57:15.170]  Mm-mm.
[57:16.170 --> 57:17.450]  Nope, I don't see.
[57:17.730 --> 57:18.050]  Okay.
[57:18.610 --> 57:19.430]  Oh, you know what?
[57:19.490 --> 57:20.790]  She's pulling up now in the...
[57:20.790 --> 57:22.230]  Okay, you know, I'm gonna settle this.
[57:22.350 --> 57:23.210]  Okay, no problem.
[57:23.430 --> 57:24.630]  Thanks so much for all your help.
[57:24.730 --> 57:25.610]  Don't worry about it.
[57:25.650 --> 57:26.190]  You'll be fine.
[57:26.190 --> 57:26.690]  Thank you.
[57:26.790 --> 57:27.370]  Bye-bye.
[57:27.770 --> 57:28.310]  All right.
[57:36.080 --> 57:43.360]  We didn't really accomplish anything, but we got her to totally believe our story and become sympathetic and all that, and that's 90% of it right there.
[57:43.440 --> 57:44.840]  You get people on your side.
[57:44.920 --> 57:57.060]  You tell a ridiculous story about how your wife messed something up, and, you know, they'll be on your side giving advice, even, and sympathy and all that, and you'll just have a good feeling that, wow, they really care, even though you don't really exist in that form.
[57:58.980 --> 58:00.500]  Oh, that was fun.
[58:02.120 --> 58:03.380]  I've got this evil streak.
[58:03.520 --> 58:05.160]  I really enjoyed that a little too much.
[58:05.340 --> 58:06.600]  But that was social engineering.
[58:06.760 --> 58:07.080]  That's...
[58:07.080 --> 58:16.020]  We do that every year at the conference, and that's one of the DVDs that we're offering for the pledge of $75, a full hour of those kind of antics and stories and things like that.
[58:16.640 --> 58:21.940]  And for a pledge of $125, you'll get 20 DVDs with all sorts of other stuff in addition.
[58:22.060 --> 58:24.180]  If you just want everything, $250 gets you everything.
[58:24.420 --> 58:28.300]  We're pretty much out of time, and we're about to hit our $2,000, which is great.
[58:28.480 --> 58:30.560]  212-209-2950.
[58:30.560 --> 58:39.060]  Remember, 10 DVDs for $75, $20 for $125, $100 or more for $250, all from the HOPE conference.
[58:39.200 --> 58:40.960]  212-209-2950.
[58:41.180 --> 58:42.900]  You can only get that during this show.
[58:43.020 --> 58:44.400]  You can't get it other times during the week.
[58:44.700 --> 58:45.760]  We'll be back next week.
[58:45.760 --> 58:47.140]  No guarantee we'll have this premium.
[58:47.340 --> 58:50.680]  So call now, 212-209-2950.
[58:50.860 --> 58:58.500]  Do we just have a moment to remind people that not only do they get these DVDs, they keep WBII and Off the Hook on the air, which is really almost more important.
[58:59.040 --> 59:00.000]  You could say that.
[59:00.100 --> 59:00.620]  That's one thing.
[59:00.640 --> 59:02.320]  But we don't have time to remind people of that, unfortunately.
[59:02.660 --> 59:08.800]  So what we'll have to do is tell people to call 212-209-2950, and we'll see you next week.
[59:09.280 --> 59:14.680]  Please keep those calls coming in, 212-209-2950.
[59:14.680 --> 59:15.900]  Good night.
[59:17.180 --> 59:21.900]  Operator, could you help me place this call?
[59:23.160 --> 59:27.520]  See the number on the matchbook is old and fatal.
[59:30.410 --> 59:36.830]  She's living in LA, with my best old ex-friend Bray.
[59:38.490 --> 59:42.570]  Gosh, she said she knew well and sometimes hated.
[59:46.160 --> 59:50.020]  Isn't that the way they say it goes?
[59:50.500 --> 59:56.560]  Well, let's poke it all out and give me the number if you can't find it.
[59:56.680 --> 01:00:01.200]  So I can call just to tell them I'm finding to show.
[01:00:02.220 --> 01:00:06.340]  I overcome the blow, I've learned to take it well.
[01:00:06.560 --> 01:00:12.500]  I only wish my words could just convince myself that it just wasn't real.
[01:00:12.920 --> 01:00:15.660]  But that's not the way it feels.
[01:00:24.320 --> 01:00:28.860]  Operator, could you help me place this call?
[01:00:30.200 --> 01:00:34.860]  I can't read the number that you just gave me.
[01:00:37.470 --> 01:00:43.650]  There's something in my eyes, you know it happens every time.
[01:00:44.830 --> 01:00:49.730]  I think about the love that I thought would save me.
[01:00:52.350 --> 01:00:56.610]  But isn't that the way they say it goes?
[01:00:57.210 --> 01:01:03.250]  Well, let's poke it all out and give me the number if you can't find it.
[01:01:03.250 --> 01:01:07.930]  So I can call just to tell them I'm finding to show.
[01:01:09.030 --> 01:01:12.970]  I overcome the blow, I've learned to take it well.
[01:01:13.230 --> 01:01:19.130]  I only wish my words could just convince myself that it just wasn't real.
[01:01:19.930 --> 01:01:22.230]  But that's not the way it feels.
[01:01:23.370 --> 01:01:24.150]  All right.
[01:01:24.370 --> 01:01:25.150]  No, no, no.