[00:00.000 --> 00:01.740]  Hi, I'm Danny Glover.
[00:01.860 --> 00:03.080]  This is Saul Williams.
[00:03.320 --> 00:04.860]  And this is Michael Fry from Spearhead.
[00:05.020 --> 00:09.720]  And this is WBAI, listening-supported, non-commercial radio in New York.
[00:10.020 --> 00:12.720]  This is Reverend Jesse Jackson of the Rainbow Push Coalition.
[00:13.000 --> 00:18.120]  Please call and support WBAI, non-commercial peace and justice radio in New York.
[00:34.340 --> 00:37.460]  Time for a special edition of Off the Hook.
[00:44.040 --> 00:45.960]  The telephone keeps ringing.
[00:46.380 --> 00:48.520]  So I ripped it off the wall.
[00:49.480 --> 00:51.500]  I cut myself while shaving.
[00:52.100 --> 00:54.020]  Now I can't make a call.
[00:54.640 --> 00:56.840]  We couldn't get much worse.
[00:59.620 --> 01:02.300]  Bum diddly-bum for the best, expect the worst.
[01:02.860 --> 01:04.780]  I hope that's understood.
[01:05.100 --> 01:05.760]  Bum diddly-bum!
[01:36.290 --> 01:37.650]  And a very good evening.
[01:37.650 --> 01:42.330]  You are listening to WBAI 99.5 FM New York.
[01:43.090 --> 01:44.750]  And this is indeed Off the Hook.
[01:44.910 --> 01:45.210]  Rob T.
[01:45.330 --> 01:46.310]  Firefly here with you.
[01:46.430 --> 01:47.850]  I am joined in the studio by Mike.
[01:48.170 --> 01:48.630]  Hi there, Rob.
[01:49.150 --> 01:49.510]  Hello.
[01:49.790 --> 01:53.350]  I am joined over Comrex by Bernie S.
[01:54.170 --> 01:56.030]  Is that a new detergent, Comrex?
[01:56.670 --> 01:57.350]  Yes, indeed.
[01:57.610 --> 01:59.770]  It gets the ugly stains off your phone connection.
[02:00.230 --> 02:03.090]  And it makes me sound good from Philadelphia.
[02:03.390 --> 02:04.030]  It does.
[02:04.290 --> 02:06.530]  You have to carry this around with you so you sound this good in person.
[02:08.430 --> 02:12.910]  And over the phone from Parts Unknown, we should have Emanuel and company.
[02:12.990 --> 02:13.430]  Guys, are you there?
[02:16.560 --> 02:17.800]  I just heard a...
[02:17.800 --> 02:18.380]  Hello.
[02:20.220 --> 02:23.700]  You know, usually when you ask that question, the answer is almost always yes.
[02:25.000 --> 02:25.320]  But...
[02:25.320 --> 02:29.900]  No, you have one part of the company, but I'm on the opposite side of Amsterdam.
[02:29.900 --> 02:30.980]  This is Bicycle Mark.
[02:31.080 --> 02:31.240]  Hello.
[02:31.460 --> 02:32.300]  Hello, Bicycle Mark.
[02:32.320 --> 02:32.920]  How are you?
[02:33.560 --> 02:39.060]  I'm okay, but I left the guys in the eastern part of Amsterdam, and I came over to the west where I live.
[02:39.340 --> 02:40.200]  Well, that was careless.
[02:41.280 --> 02:43.760]  I mean, Bicycle Mark, we're talking to you from New York.
[02:43.760 --> 02:48.400]  That is considerably farther away than east and west Amsterdam are from each other.
[02:48.940 --> 02:53.840]  Yes, but I didn't have my bicycle tonight, and I was dependent on public transport to get home.
[02:53.840 --> 02:59.500]  And like in some cities in this world, after midnight, it is very difficult to get around town.
[02:59.680 --> 03:02.920]  So I chose to come home, and then, well, here we are.
[03:03.520 --> 03:04.360]  Or I am.
[03:04.500 --> 03:04.960]  They're not.
[03:05.340 --> 03:05.700]  Wow.
[03:05.880 --> 03:09.340]  So should we just call you a regular Mark today, or...?
[03:09.340 --> 03:10.640]  Well, yes.
[03:11.460 --> 03:12.260]  Oh, no.
[03:12.400 --> 03:13.220]  Always Bicycle Mark.
[03:13.840 --> 03:14.320]  Okay.
[03:15.660 --> 03:20.700]  Well, without any other plans to get Emanuel and company on the line, I guess it's just us guys.
[03:22.060 --> 03:24.560]  I've started reading Glenn Greenwald's book.
[03:24.640 --> 03:25.580]  Have you read it, Rob?
[03:26.220 --> 03:32.420]  No, but I've read actually some excerpts that they've been serializing on the UK Guardian site.
[03:33.260 --> 03:35.940]  They've been printing articles excerpted from the book.
[03:36.880 --> 03:38.760]  I'm hearing all sorts of beeps from your end, Mark.
[03:40.460 --> 03:40.940]  Beep?
[03:41.180 --> 03:41.620]  Yes.
[03:42.380 --> 03:44.960]  That could be someone trying to call, but not me.
[03:46.020 --> 03:46.880]  It could be.
[03:48.160 --> 03:48.720]  All right.
[03:48.860 --> 03:50.880]  Well, how's the book?
[03:53.820 --> 04:02.900]  Apparently, the powers that be would rather have us listen to beeps than talk about this book, which shows you how powerful the powers that be might be.
[04:03.020 --> 04:08.760]  But it's fascinating, sort of the story behind the Snowden leaks.
[04:09.060 --> 04:14.200]  And, of course, much of it has been discussed in public before, but to have it all together in one place.
[04:15.000 --> 04:18.700]  And then, of course, Greenwald goes into the leaks themselves.
[04:18.860 --> 04:23.920]  And I actually haven't gotten to the part yet where there are new leaks, but I understand that is in there.
[04:25.020 --> 04:25.240]  Indeed.
[04:27.600 --> 04:30.040]  So there's been a lot of talk about this book.
[04:30.280 --> 04:38.700]  Before we get too far into the news, there is something that we should address because this is a fundraising episode, but it's not the kind you think.
[04:39.060 --> 04:40.800]  It's a new kind of fundraising episode.
[04:41.060 --> 04:43.480]  It's a different flavor of fundraising episode, I think.
[04:44.680 --> 04:46.600]  Different to things we've done here in the past.
[04:47.580 --> 04:57.300]  And first of all, we talked last week a bit about the outstanding premiums, which is an issue, and which we are working very hard on our end to rectify.
[04:58.980 --> 05:12.740]  Now, there were batches of premiums from last year's May Drive and October Drive, which I personally am happy to say that I delivered to the station's facilities in Brooklyn this past weekend.
[05:12.740 --> 05:21.480]  They were dropped in the mail on Monday, so you might conceivably have them already, or you will be getting them very soon if your name was on any of those packages.
[05:21.860 --> 05:36.580]  But there has been a discovery while WBAI has been moving things around, still sort of sorting through boxes and recovering from the Sandy Debaclee.
[05:36.920 --> 05:38.720]  They found some boxes with our name on them.
[05:39.080 --> 05:44.360]  They found some boxes with some premiums from past shows that we didn't even know were there.
[05:45.080 --> 05:46.800]  And they didn't, and nobody did.
[05:46.960 --> 05:49.600]  So these are a box of mystery premiums.
[05:49.680 --> 05:56.260]  We know what they are, but we did not have access while I was there to the information about who these are for.
[05:56.260 --> 05:58.820]  And these are from quite a while ago.
[05:59.020 --> 06:00.640]  These are from 2012.
[06:00.680 --> 06:02.040]  There were some from 2011.
[06:03.380 --> 06:18.880]  So what I need to ask you to do, dear listeners, is if you're waiting on a premium, if you pledged for something at some point in the past, like more than a year ago, and you have not gotten it, let us know.
[06:19.140 --> 06:19.760]  Send us an email.
[06:20.020 --> 06:20.760]  Get in touch.
[06:20.960 --> 06:24.880]  Let us know if your address has changed, if your name has changed, if any of that info has changed.
[06:25.200 --> 06:44.560]  But let us know what the premium was, what your name and address was that you pledged under, and we can take that information to the station and further follow up on all the madness and see if we can match some of these orphan premiums back up with their proper supporters.
[06:45.260 --> 06:46.720]  So, yes, let us know.
[06:47.120 --> 06:47.780]  Send us an email.
[06:47.920 --> 06:56.160]  I know it might seem like you email us and you don't hear anything back or whatever, but we do read those, we do save those, we do file those, we do take those to the station.
[06:56.560 --> 07:00.580]  So it's vital that you get in touch with us and help us sort this mess out.
[07:00.800 --> 07:07.820]  I know you were on the phone with me, Bernie, when we were going over this with the station staff, and it was quite an interesting situation, wasn't it?
[07:08.300 --> 07:10.680]  It was almost like an archaeological dig.
[07:14.200 --> 07:18.700]  But I wasn't digging it, and none of us were, to find some things gathering dust.
[07:18.880 --> 07:34.200]  But the good news is there's some volunteers at BII's new offices, and you were there, and I was there on the phone, and we're talking with other people to try to get all the information together to get these old premiums out.
[07:34.320 --> 07:40.580]  We'd assumed that a lot of these had gone out, we had an unpleasant surprise, but we're really working on this.
[07:40.680 --> 07:41.280]  A lot of hours.
[07:41.420 --> 07:48.840]  Just in the past week, I think there's been many person hours working on this issue alone.
[07:49.340 --> 07:50.620]  And there will be more.
[07:50.760 --> 08:00.460]  And if you're interested in helping, if you are in the Brooklyn area, and you would like to go and help, because they need some more eyes to look at this, they need some more help with this whole thing.
[08:00.640 --> 08:11.740]  So if you would like to help, email volunteer at WBAI.org, and our friend Mitch over there will get in touch with you and let you know how you can help.
[08:14.040 --> 08:15.780]  So, yeah, that's where we are on that.
[08:15.980 --> 08:17.720]  Now, going to today.
[08:17.720 --> 08:22.000]  I just have to ask, Bicycle Mark, are we calling you on, like, a real phone?
[08:22.640 --> 08:23.400]  Yes, you are.
[08:23.960 --> 08:27.840]  Is this beeping possibly related to Emmanuel trying to talk to you?
[08:28.620 --> 08:30.280]  I think trying to talk to you.
[08:30.460 --> 08:38.760]  I'm getting no signal that I'm receiving any other calls, and that makes sense at this hour of the night, but that could be him contacting you.
[08:38.940 --> 08:48.420]  So what I'll do, Bicycle Mark, is I will let you go briefly, see if this is the guys trying to call in, and hopefully loop you back in afterwards.
[08:48.560 --> 08:52.240]  So if I don't hear from you again, Bicycle Mark, have a good evening, but hopefully I will.
[08:52.960 --> 08:55.060]  Okay, I'll stand by and hang up.
[08:55.260 --> 08:55.600]  Okay.
[08:56.220 --> 09:02.800]  This is the show where we talk about telephones and sometimes a bit too much, but we're always amused.
[09:03.020 --> 09:03.740]  Hopefully you are too.
[09:04.580 --> 09:05.940]  We try our best.
[09:07.120 --> 09:16.100]  So, yes, while we're waiting for the guys to get us back, let's talk about what we've got going on now.
[09:16.240 --> 09:26.220]  If you call our pledge line, or if you go to our pledge site, the phone number for pledges is country code 1-212-209-2950.
[09:26.600 --> 09:31.760]  The website is give, the numeral 2, wbai.org.
[09:31.760 --> 09:43.160]  And if you go to either of those and tell them you're supporting off the hook or pick off the hook from your favorite show drop-down menu if you're using the website, we have got, well, we've got needs.
[09:43.380 --> 09:44.500]  We've got financial needs.
[09:44.620 --> 09:48.220]  We've got needs that we need to ask you to help us with.
[09:48.220 --> 10:01.300]  And what we can give you in return are WBAI's own premiums, which already have their own sort of stockpiles and their own connections and their own systems for getting to you.
[10:01.580 --> 10:06.980]  But ultimately, what we're doing is, once again, the show is the premium.
[10:07.800 --> 10:11.140]  So we're going to get on with our normal show very shortly.
[10:12.800 --> 10:16.840]  But we're not going to be pitching to you and begging you for the entire two hours.
[10:16.940 --> 10:17.860]  This is a two-hour show.
[10:18.340 --> 10:21.460]  The personal computer show is off today, so we're taking up their time.
[10:22.560 --> 10:45.420]  So, yeah, if you think it's important to support us, if you would like to see what premiums the station has available for you, go to give, the numeral 2, wbai.org and donate in the name of Off the Hook or call Country Code 1-212-209-2950 and see what they can do for you.
[10:45.460 --> 10:53.080]  Tell them you're supporting Off the Hook because this is a two-hour show with two-hour responsibilities and we cannot do this without you.
[10:53.200 --> 10:54.600]  We cannot continue to do this without you.
[10:54.800 --> 10:59.000]  So give us a call, give us some web hits and do what you can.
[11:01.060 --> 11:01.960]  And now the news.
[11:02.480 --> 11:03.880]  So, you were reading Greenwald's book.
[11:03.880 --> 11:04.680]  I was.
[11:05.520 --> 11:08.720]  I wish I had finished it so that we could talk about it more.
[11:14.240 --> 11:19.760]  But it's a fascinating read so far and I encourage anyone to pick up a copy.
[11:19.980 --> 11:22.620]  It's selling apparently like hotcakes, which is encouraging.
[11:22.760 --> 11:32.540]  A lot of people are interested in the NSA story, which we, of course, have been covering since day one, which has been, I learned, almost a year at this point.
[11:33.040 --> 11:33.780]  Almost a year.
[11:33.900 --> 11:34.600]  It's kind of hard to believe.
[11:36.040 --> 11:37.960]  And there's a lot of revelations.
[11:38.220 --> 11:39.080]  There's a PDF.
[11:39.320 --> 11:43.680]  You can go on Greenwald's website and get the PDF of the new documents.
[11:44.280 --> 11:50.640]  And that's worth looking through, of course, if you want the analysis that's in the book.
[11:50.640 --> 11:53.440]  I wouldn't necessarily encourage you to do this.
[11:53.540 --> 12:03.400]  It's not what I did, but I've heard rumors that some people have managed to download the book without paying for it from the internet, which I guess is a thing that is possible to do these days.
[12:03.400 --> 12:04.740]  Well, it's the internet.
[12:04.900 --> 12:05.720]  These things happen, I guess.
[12:05.880 --> 12:13.280]  But, of course, any media that you benefit from and enjoy, you should, perhaps after the fact, if that's how things happen, try and make it right.
[12:14.480 --> 12:15.140]  Hey, Mike.
[12:15.400 --> 12:16.040]  Hey, Bernie.
[12:16.800 --> 12:19.620]  I wanted to ask you if you've gotten to the part of the book yet.
[12:19.620 --> 12:38.100]  I haven't read it yet, but apparently there is a section that talks about how these state surveillance agencies really don't just target the bad guys, but target what we would all refer to as dissenters.
[12:38.880 --> 12:42.940]  Yeah, that has actually, that part has been excerpted on the Guardian's website.
[12:43.660 --> 12:49.180]  The title of that is From Martin Luther King to Anonymous, The State Targets Dissenters, Not Just, Quote, Unquote, Bad Guys.
[12:50.000 --> 12:51.300]  And that's worth reading.
[12:51.660 --> 12:52.560]  Even, you don't have to buy the book.
[12:52.660 --> 12:53.760]  You can read this on the Guardian site.
[12:55.020 --> 12:56.640]  And, yeah, interesting stuff.
[12:57.920 --> 13:00.160]  Mike, any word from the guys there?
[13:00.440 --> 13:04.660]  I'm trying to coordinate and talk at the same time, which is a bit difficult.
[13:06.300 --> 13:07.600]  Ah, but I have some information.
[13:07.840 --> 13:08.860]  I have some information.
[13:09.080 --> 13:09.680]  The beeping seems to have stopped.
[13:09.860 --> 13:11.060]  Which I'm going to try and apply.
[13:11.320 --> 13:28.760]  But to your point, Rob, I do think that it's worth noting that the entire book is really about the NSA and the surveillance state in general spying on everyone throughout the entire world.
[13:30.380 --> 13:33.160]  I don't know that there's one section on that.
[13:33.360 --> 13:34.560]  This is true.
[13:34.800 --> 13:42.200]  But this one section that's been excerpted, as have been some others on the Guardian site, can perhaps give you a taste of things.
[13:42.200 --> 13:50.480]  So, while Mike is trying to wrangle the phones here, let's see what else has been going on.
[13:50.860 --> 13:52.700]  Now, we mentioned Greenwald.
[13:52.880 --> 13:53.260]  It's funny.
[13:53.420 --> 13:58.140]  There was actually some rumblings this past week because he is on his book tour now.
[13:59.100 --> 14:01.140]  He was in New York very recently.
[14:01.320 --> 14:03.620]  Tonight he is in D.C., actually, as we speak.
[14:04.340 --> 14:05.620]  So, if you're in D.C.
[14:05.660 --> 14:13.660]  and you're listening to the show and you're at Glenn Greenwald's book event, stop being so rude and leave the book event so you can listen to us.
[14:14.440 --> 14:15.100]  Or not.
[14:15.200 --> 14:15.700]  It's up to you.
[14:16.160 --> 14:20.600]  But, yeah, there's been a lot of chatter about this.
[14:20.720 --> 14:34.280]  There's even been talk that some people under the banner of Anonymous have decided to actually protest Glenn Greenwald at these events for his association with somebody that has something to do with PayPal.
[14:34.780 --> 14:37.020]  There's been all sorts of stuff going on and it's really...
[14:37.020 --> 14:39.900]  It's sort of interesting to see every side of this.
[14:41.040 --> 14:41.480]  So...
[14:41.480 --> 14:44.920]  I would like to know if we've successfully reached Emmanuel or not.
[14:45.960 --> 14:47.940]  I don't see any lights on the phone here.
[14:48.520 --> 14:49.740]  I just lit one up.
[14:49.900 --> 14:50.540]  Did it go away?
[14:50.720 --> 14:51.540]  It went away.
[14:51.740 --> 14:52.380]  That's so sad.
[14:53.080 --> 14:54.300]  This is very sad.
[14:54.300 --> 14:54.920]  I'm a firefly.
[14:55.060 --> 14:55.700]  I like little lights.
[14:56.860 --> 15:01.080]  But, yeah, while we keep working on this, so...
[15:01.080 --> 15:01.920]  Rob?
[15:02.160 --> 15:02.740]  Yes, Bernie?
[15:03.300 --> 15:06.440]  Were you saying that Glenn Greenwald was some...
[15:06.440 --> 15:11.440]  his book tour or something was in some way financially connected with or sponsored by PayPal?
[15:12.320 --> 15:12.800]  No.
[15:12.940 --> 15:14.220]  I think it was down to...
[15:14.220 --> 15:24.080]  I don't have the whole story in front of me, but I think it was down to his associating with somebody that works or is at a higher position at PayPal which has not paid legal...
[15:24.080 --> 15:33.080]  which has run up legal fees for a group called the PayPal 14 which was a group that was caught under the banner of Anonymous again.
[15:33.740 --> 15:45.860]  I think it was DDoSing the PayPal site or in some other way interfering with the PayPal site and they were caught and they ran up a bunch of legal fees and now they, for some reason, take this back to Glenn Greenwald.
[15:46.280 --> 15:55.180]  If you understand why and you're listening, get in touch with us SOTH at 2600.com and get us that info.
[15:56.240 --> 16:04.440]  So, a lot of other things are going on around town, around the world and I think I see a thumbs up and I see a blinking light and I like that.
[16:04.520 --> 16:05.560]  I see a steady light, actually.
[16:06.300 --> 16:09.560]  So, does this mean we have some friends on the phone to talk to?
[16:10.720 --> 16:13.020]  Well, you have a manual on the phone to talk to, yeah.
[16:13.920 --> 16:14.580]  Rob, Rob.
[16:14.640 --> 16:15.180]  Okay, so...
[16:16.080 --> 16:18.380]  We have an acquaintance to talk to, I guess.
[16:19.140 --> 16:23.040]  I do have to say that was embarrassingly easy once we figured out what we had to do.
[16:24.220 --> 16:25.200]  This is what we do.
[16:25.380 --> 16:26.100]  My phone number, yeah.
[16:26.240 --> 16:26.980]  That's really...
[16:26.980 --> 16:29.380]  I'm glad you conquered that challenge.
[16:29.540 --> 16:30.280]  Okay, this is what we do.
[16:30.380 --> 16:37.060]  Well, while you let us know what you've been up to, Emmanuel, I'm going to see if I can get Bicycle Mark back on the line with us now.
[16:38.140 --> 16:41.540]  Okay, well, actually, right now I'm in Amsterdam.
[16:42.700 --> 16:53.440]  Kyle and I have been traveling throughout various parts of Europe, meeting up with some people, planning some things for the conference, various other sort of things going on.
[16:55.100 --> 17:11.180]  Not really a lot I can say right now, just that we have been doing a lot of catching up and, of course, keeping track of various things that are going on around the world and involving hackers, technology, and various things that we're involved in as well.
[17:11.700 --> 17:17.660]  I suppose I could ask what you guys have been up to because I haven't really been keeping in touch with the folks back home.
[17:19.640 --> 17:20.040]  Well...
[17:20.040 --> 17:20.820]  Just keep talking.
[17:22.000 --> 17:25.740]  Well, I mean, it's been a sort of slow week here in New York.
[17:26.160 --> 17:31.000]  I've been enjoying the springtime, but we've been planning, as you said, the conference.
[17:31.660 --> 17:34.020]  Things are really full steam ahead at this point.
[17:35.640 --> 17:36.040]  Yes.
[17:36.040 --> 17:53.340]  I was really surprised today to learn that the HopeX Speaker Selection Committee, which is reviewing hundreds of submissions, has sent or received...
[17:53.680 --> 18:03.100]  There's been over 2,000 messages posted on this mailing list to go over all the speaker proposals and the panel proposals.
[18:03.100 --> 18:08.820]  So thousands of email messages by this small team of people have been exchanged.
[18:09.140 --> 18:13.220]  And that's pretty overwhelming much work.
[18:13.380 --> 18:22.380]  But there's a lot of other groups that are working, other mailing lists and other groups of people that are working on their sub-projects to make the HopeX conference happen.
[18:22.820 --> 18:28.720]  And it's just amazing to see the logs of how many messages are going back and forth to make this conference happen.
[18:29.220 --> 18:38.100]  If you've noticed a slowdown on net traffic over the past few weeks it's probably because of us going back and forth between ourselves asking various questions.
[18:38.900 --> 18:39.940]  It's all our fault.
[18:40.260 --> 18:42.480]  Speaking of traffic, I believe we have Bicycle Mark back.
[18:43.560 --> 18:44.300]  Yes, yes.
[18:44.560 --> 18:46.500]  Greetings from this side of Amsterdam again.
[18:46.980 --> 18:47.360]  Welcome back.
[18:47.440 --> 18:56.720]  You know, it's funny, Bicycle Mark, you were just in the same room as me not too long ago, and now you sound like you're on a different planet and we're still both in the same city.
[18:57.800 --> 18:58.540]  Yeah, both.
[18:58.900 --> 18:59.020]  Yeah.
[19:00.480 --> 19:01.860]  That's the beauty of technology.
[19:03.300 --> 19:11.420]  Well, we're routing the calls of course through New York, so you both sound like sort of off to us and probably like twice that to each other.
[19:12.140 --> 19:18.020]  Let me point out, I'm calling from my or you're calling me now from my cell phone number in New York City.
[19:18.260 --> 19:25.040]  This cost me a pretty penny here, so I just want to let people know that AI people put their money where their mouths are.
[19:25.540 --> 19:28.680]  Yes, indeed, and we're hoping the listeners do as well.
[19:30.000 --> 19:33.060]  So, some other stuff going on around town here.
[19:33.220 --> 19:38.960]  Speaking of New York, we've got an interesting situation with our payphones.
[19:41.440 --> 19:42.960]  They're not payphones anymore.
[19:43.320 --> 19:46.200]  Nope, they're not payphones anymore, and the question is what should they be?
[19:46.760 --> 20:02.740]  Now, last year the mayor asked designers to reimagine the city's network of decrepit payphones as sort of internet kiosks, charging stations, you know, electronic advertising pukers, or whatever you call them.
[20:02.960 --> 20:06.220]  But that was mostly just sort of a concept thing.
[20:06.860 --> 20:13.460]  Now the current mayor, Mayor de Blasio, is aiming to make that real, aiming to make it a real thing.
[20:14.280 --> 20:19.660]  We've got a story here from Gizmodo which tells us all about how the city's department...
[20:21.460 --> 20:22.260]  That's interesting.
[20:23.120 --> 20:23.900]  That's not me.
[20:24.280 --> 20:24.860]  Oh, ignore that.
[20:24.860 --> 20:25.600]  That was at my end.
[20:25.700 --> 20:25.880]  Sorry.
[20:26.140 --> 20:26.660]  Another line.
[20:27.440 --> 20:28.700]  It didn't sound much like you.
[20:29.040 --> 20:29.580]  Thank you, Bernie.
[20:29.700 --> 20:30.220]  Thank you so much.
[20:30.300 --> 20:35.280]  So, the city's department of information technology and telecommunications put out a new request for proposals.
[20:35.280 --> 20:42.920]  This time, it's not for pie-in-the-sky designs, it's for real budgets and designs to create a city-wide Wi-Fi network and state-of-the-art information hub.
[20:43.500 --> 20:48.360]  There are about 11,000 payphones scattered across the city and this plan would retrofit up to 10,000 of them.
[20:48.640 --> 20:50.580]  Forget the other 1,000, no one cares about them.
[20:50.720 --> 20:57.560]  But it'll retrofit them with new hardware that would broadcast free Wi-Fi financed by ad revenue within 85 feet of the station.
[20:58.240 --> 21:01.820]  The mayor says in a statement for years, the question was what to do with payphones.
[21:02.400 --> 21:09.680]  We could have suggested a few things like maybe use them to make phone calls, but the question was what to do with payphones and now we have an answer.
[21:09.820 --> 21:22.420]  By using a historic part of New York's street fabric, we can significantly enhance public availability of increasingly vital broadband access, invite new and innovative digital services, and increase revenue to the city all at absolutely no cost to taxpayers.
[21:23.800 --> 21:25.760]  This seems a bit interesting.
[21:26.840 --> 21:31.080]  I would say I'm going to miss payphones when they're gone, but they're kind of already gone since they're all dead.
[21:31.240 --> 21:31.560]  I don't know.
[21:31.620 --> 21:32.160]  What do you guys think?
[21:32.860 --> 21:35.080]  When's the last time you've wanted to use a payphone?
[21:35.280 --> 21:42.080]  Forget the fact they don't work and you were unable to, but when were you like, you know what, if that payphone worked, I would put a quarter in it right now.
[21:43.760 --> 21:44.100]  Today.
[21:44.440 --> 21:46.100]  Well, they're good for emergencies.
[21:46.140 --> 21:59.400]  You know, when something happens and you need to report it and for whatever reason you don't have a phone or there's no signal or something or somebody is walking around who doesn't have a phone and needs help, they're good to have around.
[21:59.820 --> 22:12.280]  They could be good to have around, especially as the mayor's statement goes on to say, the phone served a critical role during power outages following Hurricane Sandy as public payphones receive electricity via the phone line and not external power sources.
[22:13.320 --> 22:19.440]  These new stations would provide the city with Wi-Fi and access to 911 even if another superstorm takes our electricity.
[22:21.140 --> 22:27.960]  So I guess they're saying they want to have these powered off the phone line as well, which is kind of interesting, but I don't know.
[22:28.260 --> 22:29.380]  No, I don't believe it.
[22:30.420 --> 22:38.480]  But if you've got any bright ideas and you're that kind of engineer or designer or what have you, this RFP invites anyone to submit a proposal for the project.
[22:38.660 --> 22:40.220]  They're due on June 30th, though.
[22:40.740 --> 22:45.480]  So find the RFP on nyc.gov and get your ideas in.
[22:48.360 --> 22:48.780]  Rob?
[22:48.780 --> 22:49.600]  Yes, Bernie.
[22:50.320 --> 22:55.460]  I kind of think the mayor doesn't really know what he's talking about when he's implying that the...
[22:56.000 --> 22:57.060]  Well, that's nothing new.
[22:57.520 --> 22:59.140]  But the...
[22:59.140 --> 23:00.880]  Well, maybe I'm thinking about the last mayor.
[23:01.020 --> 23:07.840]  But anyway, the phone line power is not sufficient to power a wireless router.
[23:09.020 --> 23:17.720]  So they're going to have to have some sort of battery backup system in these payphone kiosks to power a wireless router.
[23:18.180 --> 23:18.420]  Yeah.
[23:18.520 --> 23:29.360]  And they're going to have to power the entire internet infrastructure for these things as opposed to phone lines which did provide like a 48 volts from the central office over the phone line.
[23:29.480 --> 23:31.420]  But it's a completely different power thing.
[23:31.860 --> 23:32.160]  So...
[23:32.160 --> 23:32.360]  Right.
[23:34.680 --> 23:37.320]  These kiosks cannot be powered by the old phone lines.
[23:37.480 --> 23:37.760]  It just...
[23:37.760 --> 23:38.660]  That's not going to happen.
[23:38.900 --> 23:39.160]  Yeah.
[23:39.280 --> 23:53.380]  I mean, if you'll pardon me referencing a classic, I remember Steel This Book had a section on back in the 60s using the phone line's power to power like a lamp or something instead of paying the power company for your electricity.
[23:53.880 --> 23:57.140]  And that, of course, would not be a healthy thing to do for the phone network.
[23:57.300 --> 24:04.320]  But yeah, the power in a phone line is generally too negligible to do anything beyond to run the phone on with it.
[24:04.440 --> 24:15.480]  So, yeah, it's quite possible that the mayor or whoever writes his statements doesn't quite know the intricacies of sort of fortress phones and co-cots and all that exciting stuff.
[24:16.000 --> 24:21.540]  What is the incentive for the phone company to keep the phone line there in the first place to provide that electricity?
[24:21.840 --> 24:23.320]  They're not making any money off of this.
[24:23.420 --> 24:27.740]  They're making lots of money from the advertising revenue on the sides of the things.
[24:27.780 --> 24:29.360]  And I guess they want to keep that revenue.
[24:29.840 --> 24:30.100]  Yeah.
[24:30.100 --> 24:34.920]  I remember reading that's actually why so many payphone kiosks are still around in the city.
[24:35.180 --> 24:37.540]  Even, you know, the majority of them don't have phones in them anymore.
[24:37.740 --> 24:41.540]  But they still pull in money for whoever owns them because they've still got ads plastered all over them.
[24:41.640 --> 24:42.200]  So that's...
[24:42.200 --> 24:42.980]  And that's the point.
[24:43.080 --> 24:43.260]  Yeah.
[24:43.380 --> 24:45.800]  They own the kiosks and they can have the advertising there.
[24:45.880 --> 24:48.540]  They don't need a phone line to go there to have an advertisement.
[24:48.960 --> 24:49.960]  So what's the incentive?
[24:50.800 --> 25:01.600]  I mean, I suppose the city could mandate that you actually make these things do something useful if you want to keep the right to have your thing on the public sidewalk and sell advertising revenue.
[25:02.020 --> 25:06.000]  I don't know why they have taken so long to have that radical idea, but...
[25:07.420 --> 25:08.300]  They might as well.
[25:08.300 --> 25:17.420]  Listen, since we have Bicycle Mark on the phone and it's 1.30 in the morning here, maybe we should ask him a couple of questions as to what he's been up to over the past...
[25:17.420 --> 25:19.440]  Oh, last time you were on Off the Hook.
[25:21.540 --> 25:22.420]  Oh, okay.
[25:22.640 --> 25:22.940]  Well, yeah.
[25:23.500 --> 25:26.640]  The last time I was off the hook was probably last year.
[25:26.640 --> 25:29.560]  So I've been working in Dubai, actually.
[25:30.600 --> 25:43.400]  I've long been obsessed with that city and finally went there to do long interviews with taxi drivers, but also people who started their own projects there from all over the world.
[25:43.560 --> 25:47.040]  So I did that as a podcast series and I crowdfunded it.
[25:47.260 --> 25:49.660]  You know, the kids like to do that these days.
[25:50.380 --> 26:07.520]  And I did a series of something like, I don't know, 15 programs, audio programs, and also did text stories about people's lives in that city and in turn about what is happening to the city overall over the last 10 years according to regular people's stories.
[26:09.020 --> 26:11.200]  What are some of the things you've learned?
[26:13.160 --> 26:32.860]  Well, you know, first of all, on a very surface or basic level, people often say that a city like that being known for mostly just money and as a headquarters for corporations in that region is that the city actually has a very vibrant soul, but you do not see it if you're just passing through.
[26:33.800 --> 26:39.460]  More specifically, I learned about what it's like to not be noticed.
[26:39.920 --> 26:56.760]  You know, taxi drivers in this particular city, although I'm sure they're not alone in this world, but they are largely invisible even though they have tons of stories and amazing life wisdom to share and it could be interesting.
[26:56.760 --> 26:58.140]  People mostly ignore them.
[26:58.620 --> 27:05.860]  And I learned about conditions all over the world from Pakistan, India, Bangladesh, Nepal, Sri Lanka.
[27:06.160 --> 27:31.480]  I even met Saharans who didn't have a country and they talked about how not having a country shaped their childhoods and eventually led them to move from place to place until they arrived in Dubai where they were trying to make their lives but at the same time don't have the right to be citizens so they try and linger as long as they can using guest worker permits and so on.
[27:32.040 --> 27:35.300]  Mark, are you referring to the Western Sahara people from that area?
[27:35.720 --> 27:36.580]  That is correct.
[27:36.740 --> 27:36.860]  Yeah.
[27:37.020 --> 27:59.560]  Yeah, I met a few Polisarios specifically who had eventually left that region in search of a better life and actually those are the people who often say they wished they could make the rest of their lives in Dubai because everybody's so temporary there and they were trying to figure out a way they could extend the contract because these taxi drivers often have five-year contracts and you can of
[27:59.560 --> 28:22.860]  course get an extension so you can do another five years so rarely did I meet anybody who lived in the city for more than 10 years that was almost an exception if I met somebody who did 15 years I found a gentleman from Bombay who had been there for 35 years and he had amazing stories from when Dubai was nothing more than you know one road that you had to To constantly sweep because of the sand
[28:22.860 --> 28:23.800]  that would cover it up.
[28:24.360 --> 28:33.420]  And not too much else going on except for pearl diving, which was the big industry before there was anything else in that particular city, in that region.
[28:39.000 --> 28:39.440]  Wow.
[28:39.440 --> 28:47.040]  I remember seeing Michael Palin's piece, Around the World in 80 Days, where he also went to Dubai when he did the original thing.
[28:47.140 --> 28:50.860]  And then he did a follow-up, I guess it was 20 years or 25 years later.
[28:50.860 --> 28:58.400]  And he had some similar observations about the way that the city had grown in that relatively short period of time.
[28:59.240 --> 29:00.780]  Yeah, and it's incredible.
[29:01.060 --> 29:13.820]  We talk about how New York City is, of course, a metropolis with so many cultures represented and these traditions of immigration, which is all well and good and true.
[29:13.820 --> 29:25.140]  But Dubai has what is a younger but also a growing tradition, especially of representation from Asia, Southeast Asia, but all different countries.
[29:25.480 --> 29:28.120]  So it is also an amazing melting pot.
[29:28.800 --> 29:36.760]  And I was using... I was staying at different people's houses, basically, using one of these systems for finding apartments from other people.
[29:36.760 --> 29:41.020]  And I managed to stay with a lot of families that had come from India.
[29:41.980 --> 29:49.360]  And, you know, here's another group of people who have been working in Dubai for a few generations, but, of course, not always able to stay.
[29:49.520 --> 29:53.260]  But here I was with families that were making their lives in this city.
[29:53.360 --> 29:54.920]  They had kids that were going to school.
[29:55.850 --> 29:58.260]  And it's interesting to see their experience.
[29:58.400 --> 30:00.500]  For them, this was the city to live in.
[30:00.640 --> 30:02.920]  They're not going to go home until maybe they're old.
[30:02.920 --> 30:10.900]  And yet, you know, again, limitation on their rights, or limitation, at least, in their right to stay in the long run.
[30:10.980 --> 30:11.480]  But that's okay.
[30:11.660 --> 30:13.160]  You know, they figure it out as they go.
[30:13.360 --> 30:18.740]  So it's interesting to see this whole new generation of people populating this city.
[30:20.940 --> 30:25.760]  And there's art, and there's culture, and there's creativity.
[30:25.800 --> 30:27.540]  And you don't often hear about it.
[30:27.600 --> 30:31.240]  You know, what you usually just hear about is the architecture, which is indeed amazing.
[30:31.900 --> 30:34.480]  But I was more interested in the heart.
[30:34.660 --> 30:37.520]  And so that was what I was really busy collecting.
[30:39.360 --> 30:40.660]  Mark, can you tell us something?
[30:40.660 --> 30:48.240]  You've been doing a podcast for a number of years now, a very popular one, that takes you around the world and talking to all kinds of different people.
[30:49.020 --> 30:59.880]  Can you tell us something about that and how you put it together, what's inspired you, and is it something that maybe some creative person out there listening might one day be able to do themselves?
[31:01.240 --> 31:09.420]  Yeah, so I started my podcast 10 years ago, which in Internet years, as we all know, is like 100 years, right?
[31:09.520 --> 31:10.280]  Or what's the math?
[31:11.740 --> 31:14.900]  And when I started, you know, there weren't many podcasts.
[31:15.080 --> 31:16.420]  There were radio shows, of course.
[31:16.420 --> 31:25.420]  I mean, I've been listening to Off the Hook since I was a kid, and BAI in general is part of my daily diet growing up in New Jersey.
[31:26.380 --> 31:33.000]  But so when podcasting started, you know, there were a lot of independent voices all over the world, and we're all doing different things.
[31:33.200 --> 31:39.520]  And my interest very quickly became the idea of not only sharing my experience where I live.
[31:39.520 --> 31:44.980]  So, okay, I live in the Netherlands, and I moved here for different reasons, and talking about all that.
[31:45.340 --> 31:50.160]  But also being able to interview people in different parts of the world and get their experience.
[31:50.160 --> 31:55.440]  It always bothered me that, right, we have a conflict in, say, Iraq or Afghanistan.
[31:55.440 --> 32:03.100]  But we, the only stories we hear from these places are by the journalist who gets parachuted in, or however they get in.
[32:03.320 --> 32:04.800]  Probably not by parachutes these days.
[32:05.060 --> 32:19.820]  But I wanted to hear from regular people in those countries, and I had that dream that either I could listen to them directly by hearing their radio program or their podcast, or I could go or find a way to interview them when they pass through my city.
[32:20.040 --> 32:21.060]  So that's a great advantage.
[32:21.300 --> 32:24.820]  I mean, here you are, a shining example, Emanuel, you're in New York.
[32:24.820 --> 32:29.760]  I mean, you're in Amsterdam right now, and so we can do an interview while you're here, or maybe I'll be in New York.
[32:30.120 --> 32:46.920]  So my podcast has taken me through Russia, Afghanistan, numerous times, where I'm going to places as a teacher, teaching podcasting, teaching making your own media, and also doing my program, following the stories that catch my interest as I go.
[32:47.160 --> 32:52.580]  I've worked in Kosovo, in Bosnia, in Egypt the year after the revolution.
[32:52.580 --> 32:58.760]  We did this project together with public radio, a friend of mine from public radio, Christopher Lydon.
[32:59.100 --> 33:02.140]  And there we were, you know, crowdfunded, in fact.
[33:02.560 --> 33:05.400]  And we were being crowdfunded before there was Kickstarter.
[33:05.840 --> 33:10.580]  Regular people were sending me air miles so that I could travel to New Orleans after Katrina.
[33:11.200 --> 33:20.020]  So it's been a crazy decade of ups and downs, because sometimes, of course, you know, the money is the support, the funding.
[33:20.780 --> 33:23.260]  Here we are talking during a fund drive.
[33:23.600 --> 33:26.100]  So, you know, I know all about that.
[33:26.240 --> 33:31.400]  Many of us do, who have projects that we believe in and that we're trying hard to push, but that aren't about profit.
[33:31.400 --> 33:38.140]  So I also face that reality of having to find the funds to carry on or find the support.
[33:38.600 --> 33:40.900]  But a lot of ups as well.
[33:41.100 --> 33:44.080]  A lot of great trips to amazing places in the world.
[33:44.260 --> 33:51.040]  And where I get to interview people who normally aren't the spokespeople or the high-profile guests.
[33:51.220 --> 33:53.020]  I've had a high-profile guest or two.
[33:53.020 --> 33:55.820]  But, again, you know, I love Taxi Driver.
[33:56.020 --> 33:59.800]  I love the local poet who hasn't really hit it big yet.
[34:00.920 --> 34:03.500]  That's what I like to hear from, or who I like to hear from.
[34:03.860 --> 34:07.780]  And where can people get a hold of your podcast if they're interested?
[34:08.840 --> 34:11.040]  My podcast is called Citizen Reporter.
[34:11.280 --> 34:17.920]  And in most any podcast directory, you can find Citizen Reporter or citizenreporter.org is the website.
[34:17.920 --> 34:20.110]  And it's basically a weekly program.
[34:20.520 --> 34:24.420]  And it's the last few years, I have these different series that come up.
[34:24.590 --> 34:27.780]  So Dubai and the Dubai Taxi Project is my latest one.
[34:28.320 --> 34:36.210]  But if you go back, all these places, Mongolia, I don't know, so many great trips, I kind of lose track of them.
[34:36.380 --> 34:38.610]  So my website keeps better track of them than I do.
[34:39.210 --> 34:39.650]  Excellent.
[34:39.880 --> 34:42.240]  And, of course, they did mention this is a fun drive.
[34:42.860 --> 34:47.690]  Just very quickly, give you the pledge number again, 212-209-2950.
[34:48.520 --> 34:51.070]  Call them up and tell them you want to support off the hook.
[34:51.210 --> 34:59.500]  Or go to give, the numeral 2, WBAI.org, and type them that you want to support off the hook and give us your support.
[34:59.860 --> 35:01.020]  We can't do it without you.
[35:01.840 --> 35:12.830]  We had a lot of response to our show last week where we pretty much laid it all out for listeners to understand where we're coming from as far as the situation with premiums.
[35:14.440 --> 35:18.420]  Unfortunately, I have to say nothing really has been resolved on that front.
[35:18.420 --> 35:24.900]  I mean, there are people in the Brooklyn office who have been working hard to get premiums to people.
[35:25.230 --> 35:34.880]  The situation that we've had, though, stems from the NSA and the WikiLeaks material that we were providing to the radio station.
[35:35.130 --> 35:41.520]  It made $8,000 total, I think, over the past several months.
[35:41.630 --> 35:46.610]  And the only thing the radio station had to do was get the thumb drive so that we could transfer the information to it.
[35:46.610 --> 35:50.520]  But still, we have heard no progress with that.
[35:50.860 --> 35:52.790]  Our general manager is probably working on it.
[35:53.630 --> 35:56.400]  The executive director of Pacifica was working on it.
[35:56.440 --> 36:01.310]  Although what I heard recently was that she has been evicted from her office by the police.
[36:01.520 --> 36:04.460]  And that's a situation in flux now.
[36:04.860 --> 36:08.330]  So the usual Pacifica drama just continues.
[36:08.670 --> 36:11.570]  And it's kind of we're our own worst enemy on that regard.
[36:11.710 --> 36:15.110]  Yeah, we're keeping as close an eye on this as we can while maintaining our sanity.
[36:15.590 --> 36:18.020]  I touched upon the rest of this at the beginning of the hour.
[36:18.150 --> 36:24.570]  But, yeah, if you've pledged for the thumb drives for the NSA or WikiLeaks material, we're still working on getting those drives.
[36:25.460 --> 36:31.500]  If you've pledged for the other stuff from the May and October of last year drives, those were dropped in the mail this week.
[36:32.190 --> 36:32.940]  Anything else?
[36:33.070 --> 36:43.520]  If there is anything, no matter how, you know, anything years ago that you pledged for that you haven't gotten a hold of, let us know, OTH at 2600.com.
[36:43.830 --> 36:46.400]  We will be following up on everything we get.
[36:46.590 --> 36:48.070]  So, yeah, let us know.
[36:48.810 --> 36:53.940]  Rob, I think some people have been told that the thumb drives are no longer available.
[36:53.940 --> 36:55.130]  That was not the case.
[36:55.270 --> 37:00.670]  If you pledged for those and you were promised those, you will get those at some point.
[37:00.830 --> 37:04.000]  Being told that they don't exist is not right.
[37:04.750 --> 37:07.130]  So we're going to keep the pressure on as far as that goes.
[37:07.230 --> 37:19.000]  Now, if you're one of the people that believes that community radio should just be supported because it's community radio, then I urge you to call 212-209-2950 and just pledge for the sake of pledging.
[37:19.110 --> 37:20.880]  Because that's really what it should be all about.
[37:21.040 --> 37:31.880]  All this nonsense with premiums and supplying and sending and things like that, it just really gets to be a weight around our necks at some point.
[37:31.880 --> 37:36.360]  And I know there are people out there that just really care to hear the radio station and programs like this.
[37:36.520 --> 37:39.040]  And that's the real reason you should be calling in the first place.
[37:39.710 --> 37:48.270]  So for those people, please make that phone call, 212-209-2950, or go to the website, www.give2wbai.org.
[37:48.270 --> 37:50.590]  That's number two, give2wbai.org.
[37:50.750 --> 37:51.040]  Yeah.
[37:51.190 --> 38:07.550]  And I don't mind telling you guys, I have been told by people here, by people outside of here, that that whole the show is the premium thing, it should work in principle, but it sort of gets, I think, pushed aside as something that's not even worth trying,
[38:07.550 --> 38:09.090]  because in practice it won't work.
[38:09.270 --> 38:12.730]  We need to prove that wrong, because it's the only way we can survive right now.
[38:13.110 --> 38:14.170]  So, yeah, cool.
[38:14.330 --> 38:19.590]  We could go on for hours with just the absurdity of some of the things that we've had to deal with over the years.
[38:19.830 --> 38:34.190]  I've had conversations, he had conversations with people that were upset that we were writing the premium number on the envelope so that people would know what premium was in the envelope, and we were told that's illegal against postal regulations to write on an envelope.
[38:34.730 --> 38:42.130]  Believe me, there was the weirdest conversation I think I've ever had, but there were actually people that were objecting to us doing that so people would know what was in the envelope.
[38:42.130 --> 38:50.630]  And, of course, when they crossed that out later, they weren't able to figure out what was inside them, and those premiums were... who knows what happened to them.
[38:51.090 --> 39:05.190]  Other times, we've gotten into problems where we've donated huge amounts of material, say, 100 DVDs of a conference, a full conference full of DVDs, and that's many, many thousands of dollars for the radio station.
[39:05.190 --> 39:14.210]  But we were told that it's very expensive to mail this, and it's costing the station money to mail this, and you guys should cover that as well.
[39:14.880 --> 39:18.550]  It's just insane, some of the logic that we have to deal with.
[39:18.690 --> 39:31.330]  And that's why it's so frustrating for us when we come and ask for money on a situation like this to have to say that we can't give any more premiums to the station until we get some semblance of sanity in the process.
[39:31.330 --> 39:36.250]  But we do urge people to call and support the station so that we can continue to at least be on the air.
[39:36.750 --> 39:38.960]  Right, because it's really the only way we can do it.
[39:39.090 --> 39:50.310]  And, of course, you know, we don't like having to go to you and say, the system's messed up and you haven't gotten your thank you gifts, and we're trying to, you know, we don't have much else to tell you beyond that.
[39:50.540 --> 39:59.540]  But it is the situation, and we're doing everything we can to rectify this and to force things into making some kind of sense.
[39:59.540 --> 40:11.210]  But because we do think it's worth fixing, we could really spend the whole two-hour slot we've got today talking about nothing but the weirdness that we encounter when trying to accomplish this.
[40:11.570 --> 40:17.750]  But suffice it to say that, yeah, we're working on it, and we are absolutely grateful for your support.
[40:18.000 --> 40:33.610]  If you've supported us in the past, if you're picking up the phone now and calling 212-209-2950, if you're going over to give the numeral to WBAI.org and showing your support, that's really the most wonderful thing you can do for us.
[40:33.610 --> 40:34.790]  It's what keeps us here.
[40:35.000 --> 40:36.290]  It's what keeps the station here.
[40:36.570 --> 40:42.630]  And, yeah, it's a necessary part of this whole community-sponsored radio process.
[40:44.130 --> 40:45.900]  So what else is going on in the world?
[40:45.980 --> 40:48.190]  Emmanuel, so you guys are traveling.
[40:48.420 --> 40:50.050]  How's your trip treating you?
[40:51.040 --> 40:55.190]  Well, we're about to enter Germany in the days ahead.
[40:55.770 --> 41:00.630]  We're going to be driving around in a car, actually, in Germany for a few days.
[41:01.000 --> 41:04.190]  And then we're headed over to Spain and Portugal.
[41:04.880 --> 41:15.070]  And, again, if there are any VAI listeners, off-the-hook listeners, who want to contact us, simply write to our email address, OTH at 2600.com.
[41:15.070 --> 41:17.920]  Maybe we can swing by your town, your neighborhood.
[41:18.730 --> 41:24.090]  We're planning on hitting some of the major cities, but also some of the smaller places as well.
[41:25.650 --> 41:34.730]  Again, we're talking to people we know, meeting new people that we don't yet know, and also working on various projects from abroad as well.
[41:35.750 --> 41:38.500]  So it's always fun to meet listeners.
[41:38.500 --> 41:42.130]  And we always do meet listeners in just about any country we wound up in.
[41:42.330 --> 41:44.960]  Are you going to attend any of Mitch's workshops?
[41:44.960 --> 41:47.920]  I understand he's doing a workshop tour of Germany right now.
[41:49.090 --> 41:50.980]  We might run into Mitch, actually.
[41:51.190 --> 41:54.500]  We're thinking about working into our schedule somehow.
[41:54.650 --> 41:56.980]  Though, you know, we've seen many of Mitch's workshops.
[41:57.170 --> 41:58.290]  They're always fun.
[42:00.440 --> 42:03.040]  And it's definitely on the list of possibilities.
[42:03.500 --> 42:08.250]  And if anybody is in Germany listening, we can't encourage you to do that enough.
[42:08.570 --> 42:12.250]  And, of course, Mitch will be having workshops at our own Hope Conference in July.
[42:12.500 --> 42:13.590]  So I did that look for you.
[42:13.650 --> 42:14.940]  You won't be able to attend those.
[42:16.230 --> 42:16.900]  Well, I know.
[42:17.050 --> 42:17.610]  Maybe I will.
[42:17.730 --> 42:26.040]  Maybe I'll just walk away from everything else I'm doing at the conference and go and sit in on one of Mitch's panels downstairs.
[42:26.460 --> 42:27.420]  It's always worth doing.
[42:27.590 --> 42:38.380]  Like, I've been soldering for most of my life, and still I could go to Mitch's beginner soldering tutorial and still learn something because there's just so much to what he teaches and his methods are awesome.
[42:38.550 --> 42:40.790]  And he's just a great guy to learn anything at all from.
[42:41.050 --> 42:43.900]  So, yeah, lots of cool stuff going on for Hope.
[42:44.250 --> 42:47.070]  I wanted to peek at this listener email that we got.
[42:47.750 --> 42:51.570]  Steve writes, Can you mention on Off the Hook how the unscheduled speakers track will work?
[42:51.630 --> 42:53.400]  Is it restricted to badge-paid attendees?
[42:53.570 --> 42:54.570]  How does the queue work?
[42:54.670 --> 42:54.980]  Et cetera.
[42:56.040 --> 42:58.570]  While we're on the subject of Hope, I'd just like to address that.
[42:58.570 --> 43:00.860]  So, yes, we do have an unscheduled track.
[43:01.900 --> 43:07.050]  We are also going to have some opportunities for other sort of spur-of-the-moment things, workshops and whatnot.
[43:08.830 --> 43:10.690]  The details are not all in place yet.
[43:10.730 --> 43:13.330]  But, yes, it is limited to attendees of the conference.
[43:13.330 --> 43:16.920]  You have to be part of the conference in order to do this.
[43:16.980 --> 43:17.590]  You have to be attending.
[43:18.040 --> 43:22.540]  But once you're there, basically, whether your talk...
[43:22.540 --> 43:24.790]  And I believe we're still going through talk submissions.
[43:25.950 --> 43:40.090]  But if you've submitted a talk and it ends up not getting chosen or if you just came up with an idea for a talk now or if you come up with an idea for a talk at the conference, you can basically just go grab yourself a block of time and give that talk.
[43:40.440 --> 43:41.150]  And it's...
[43:41.950 --> 43:43.520]  The way it works, basically.
[43:44.180 --> 43:46.210]  I'll say a few words about the whole speaker thing.
[43:46.210 --> 43:51.140]  And I think maybe Bernie might be able to address our workshops and projects and other things like that.
[43:51.480 --> 43:56.580]  But what we basically have are three speaker tracks that run throughout the entire weekend.
[43:58.000 --> 44:06.250]  And we also have an unscheduled track, which basically means that we don't set that up in advance.
[44:06.330 --> 44:08.680]  That all happens at the conference.
[44:08.710 --> 44:22.020]  If you have an idea for a talk or if there's just something that suddenly came up that you weren't able to submit in time, we have a sign-up system that you can find out about at the info desk downstairs.
[44:22.500 --> 44:25.900]  And you simply say, I want to talk from this time to this time.
[44:26.270 --> 44:30.790]  And in the unscheduled room, that's where you give your talk.
[44:30.790 --> 44:32.330]  It's not judged.
[44:32.500 --> 44:34.120]  It's not graded.
[44:34.230 --> 44:36.460]  It's basically first come, first serve.
[44:36.770 --> 44:40.560]  Of course, we do have to share the podium with other people.
[44:40.560 --> 44:42.400]  So you can't dominate too much.
[44:42.830 --> 44:45.810]  But we see some very interesting talks in that room.
[44:46.060 --> 44:47.750]  Sometimes they're really, really interesting.
[44:48.680 --> 44:50.730]  They're not recorded usually.
[44:50.830 --> 44:55.100]  So you have to be in the room to actually see what happens there.
[44:55.290 --> 45:02.310]  But many times the talks in the unscheduled room wind up being in one of the scheduled tracks two years later at the next health conference.
[45:02.680 --> 45:06.230]  Yeah, I know of at least one occasion on which that occurred.
[45:06.230 --> 45:14.210]  And the person's talk basically filled up the unscheduled room, had standing room only, and was exceedingly popular and successful.
[45:14.620 --> 45:21.980]  And that presenter basically cut their teeth in the unscheduled track, submitted it as a main track talk the next time around.
[45:22.120 --> 45:23.920]  And again, it filled the main room.
[45:24.040 --> 45:25.290]  So yeah, it's a good place to start.
[45:26.490 --> 45:28.770]  And of course, you can record it if you want.
[45:28.790 --> 45:35.200]  If you bring someone with you who has a camera, you can record your presentation in the unscheduled track, post it, do whatever you want afterward.
[45:35.200 --> 45:41.210]  But yeah, it's always been one of my favorite aspects of the whole thing.
[45:41.920 --> 45:42.730]  So, I mean...
[45:42.730 --> 45:44.000]  And we've had...
[45:44.000 --> 45:44.770]  I'm sorry.
[45:45.100 --> 45:45.750]  Go ahead, Mike.
[45:45.920 --> 45:46.880]  I'll go then, Bernie.
[45:47.100 --> 45:50.290]  The modern term for this kind of thing is unconference.
[45:50.480 --> 45:53.680]  But I think, like, we've been doing this since before that term was invented.
[45:53.680 --> 45:55.660]  So I don't think we need to start using it now.
[45:56.400 --> 45:57.330]  Please, let's not.
[45:57.560 --> 45:59.140]  I never liked that word.
[46:00.750 --> 46:05.040]  But as far as speakers' submissions go, we've had so many of those this year.
[46:05.250 --> 46:06.520]  It's simply mind-boggling.
[46:06.660 --> 46:08.980]  We're still processing a bunch of them.
[46:09.210 --> 46:11.330]  The deadline was April 30th.
[46:11.860 --> 46:23.540]  But if you're smacking yourself in your head from missing that deadline, we do consider late submissions if they're really, really good, if they're interesting, if they fill a gap that we might have as far as content.
[46:24.230 --> 46:26.700]  You have nothing to lose by submitting it to us.
[46:26.700 --> 46:36.680]  Just, if you've already submitted it somewhere else, please don't submit it to us because we don't like to have stuff that's duplicates of other conferences or even of our own conference.
[46:36.790 --> 46:40.560]  If you've given the same talk before, people can just watch it on YouTube.
[46:40.750 --> 46:42.790]  They don't need to actually see it again.
[46:43.310 --> 46:48.520]  For unique, interesting talks, though, that are past deadline, send it in anyway.
[46:48.700 --> 46:50.790]  Maybe we'll be able to find room for it.
[46:51.000 --> 46:53.380]  At least give it a shot.
[46:53.700 --> 46:56.040]  The address is speakers at hope.net.
[46:56.040 --> 47:06.600]  And you can find all kinds of information about the whole speaker submission process by going to hope.net and clicking on the speakers section and learning all about that.
[47:07.160 --> 47:12.400]  Now, Bernie, I know there's all kinds of information on various projects and workshops and things like that.
[47:12.400 --> 47:15.330]  We've had more of that, I think, this year than ever before.
[47:16.600 --> 47:26.310]  Yes, and it's not too late to submit a workshop or a project to either workshops at hope.net or projects at hope.net.
[47:26.520 --> 47:32.860]  What these are, they're not really a talk, but they're more of a hands-on experience.
[47:33.290 --> 47:35.560]  A lot of them are related to a talk.
[47:35.880 --> 47:48.710]  Suppose you have a speaker that is giving a talk about some really interesting electronic project that they designed and built that's easy to build on your own.
[47:48.880 --> 47:56.960]  And then maybe after the talk, he'll do a workshop where a bunch of people sit down at a table that's already pre-equipped with soldering workstations.
[47:57.830 --> 48:02.360]  And you can build that device right there in a group experience.
[48:02.680 --> 48:05.540]  We did a lot of workshops like that at the Hope No.
[48:05.620 --> 48:06.860]  9 conference two years ago.
[48:07.200 --> 48:08.560]  And it was a great success.
[48:08.730 --> 48:10.140]  We'll be doing more of those again this year.
[48:10.380 --> 48:16.770]  There's other instructional workshops that don't involve hands-on electronics, but may involve just learning something.
[48:17.480 --> 48:20.500]  I believe last year and again...
[48:20.500 --> 48:30.860]  or two years ago, and then again this year, we'll be having some workshops on how to submit FOIAs, Freedom of Information Act requests, which is a real...
[48:31.620 --> 48:34.540]  it's not something you can easily learn from a book.
[48:34.640 --> 48:35.360]  I mean, it's something...
[48:35.360 --> 48:39.480]  it's good to have a hands-on person to explain to you how...
[48:39.480 --> 48:45.460]  someone who has a lot of experience, Michael Resvitsky, will be presenting a FOIA workshop.
[48:45.460 --> 48:51.580]  Actually, FOIA and Advanced FOIA, two workshops this year, about how to submit Freedom of Information Act requests.
[48:51.580 --> 49:01.290]  We're learning more and more that ferreting out information about what our government does is leading to all kinds of interesting revelations.
[49:01.980 --> 49:14.230]  And, you know, a lot of times these agencies are very close to the vest about these documents, and there are certain techniques you can use, which you can learn at these workshops, on how to get the documents the government doesn't want to give you.
[49:14.640 --> 49:16.270]  So, those are some of the examples.
[49:16.580 --> 49:18.000]  Some of them will be on the sixth floor.
[49:18.140 --> 49:23.730]  Some of them will be on the main pavilion floor, you know, the mezzanine level.
[49:24.020 --> 49:27.640]  To answer the listener's question, these will not be open to the general public.
[49:27.790 --> 49:32.080]  They are only open to the third track, and all the workshops are only open to HOPE attendees.
[49:32.660 --> 49:37.000]  Otherwise, there'd be, you know, 10,000 people flowing in from the street.
[49:37.380 --> 49:38.620]  We wouldn't have room for them.
[49:38.860 --> 49:41.080]  So, we've got to pay for the space.
[49:41.080 --> 49:44.210]  So, it's very expensive in the middle of Manhattan, as you can imagine.
[49:45.710 --> 49:50.810]  Yeah, I mean, on that point, I really like that we like this radio station, actually.
[49:50.980 --> 49:53.310]  The conference is paid for entirely by the attendees.
[49:53.620 --> 50:00.000]  We've had proposals to have, like, car companies sponsor the conference, and that might lower the cost, and that would be really cool.
[50:00.140 --> 50:08.920]  But to give up that measure, of editorial control that they would demand in exchange, I think, is something that we really don't want to do.
[50:09.020 --> 50:12.210]  And it's definitely something we don't want to do here on this radio station.
[50:12.680 --> 50:24.600]  Yeah, we do not survive by telling you what brand of fizzy drink to pour down your throat or what brands of automobile you should be driving if you even think you should be driving one.
[50:24.790 --> 50:30.200]  This is the only way we survive is by asking for your support directly and benefiting from that.
[50:30.200 --> 50:41.460]  So if you can call 212-209-2950 or go to give, the numeral 2, WBAI.org, you'll be participating in really the only way that's kept the station alive for generations now.
[50:42.430 --> 50:45.000]  And we can't continue to do this without you.
[50:46.010 --> 50:48.830]  It's, you know, it's kind of too crazy to work, but it does.
[50:48.830 --> 50:50.080]  And we need it to keep working.
[50:50.100 --> 50:51.920]  And the only way we can do that is with your help.
[50:53.490 --> 50:54.210]  So, uh...
[50:54.580 --> 50:56.420]  Can I ask, is Bicycle Mark still there?
[50:57.080 --> 50:58.440]  I'm still here, yes, yes.
[50:58.920 --> 51:01.680]  You know, I apologize on behalf of all of us.
[51:02.080 --> 51:07.640]  We keep forgetting that you're there in Amsterdam, the same city I'm in right now.
[51:07.750 --> 51:09.330]  And it's also almost 2 o'clock in the morning.
[51:09.480 --> 51:12.250]  So we shouldn't keep you up much later.
[51:12.250 --> 51:16.400]  No, but I think it's important that we, you know, we get through these things and remind people.
[51:16.480 --> 51:17.980]  I would remind people all over the world.
[51:18.180 --> 51:31.270]  You know, I notice as I travel and speak to people who like getting their information from independent sources, from non-commercial sources, no matter what country they live in nowadays, people listen to programs from WBAI.
[51:31.730 --> 51:37.730]  I don't live in New York, haven't for 12 years now, but I still listen to programming in WBAI.
[51:37.880 --> 51:40.210]  It's part of my media diet, an important part.
[51:40.750 --> 51:51.420]  So, in that sense, I would also appeal to people who are not in the New York area and listening to this through other means, especially streaming or even hearing it after the fact.
[51:51.860 --> 51:53.020]  You're part of this, too.
[51:53.230 --> 51:54.830]  You know, I hope people realize that.
[51:54.860 --> 51:58.180]  I think they do because they enjoy it so much and it's such an important part of their lives.
[51:58.750 --> 52:03.230]  So, that's, yeah, that's just one thing I can add to this at this late hour.
[52:05.100 --> 52:06.330]  Well, we appreciate that.
[52:07.230 --> 52:11.160]  And there are listeners all around the world I know who tune in and also get it.
[52:11.620 --> 52:21.380]  And that's what gets us going, knowing that there are people out there that are paying attention, that are contributing, that are a part of this whole world that we're a part of.
[52:21.830 --> 52:22.230]  Indeed.
[52:22.880 --> 52:24.560]  So, you guys are in Europe right now.
[52:25.330 --> 52:28.420]  There's actually a bit of news going on around about Europe.
[52:28.750 --> 52:33.750]  Apparently, the top court of Europe has decreed that people have the right to be forgotten on the Internet.
[52:34.040 --> 52:34.880]  Do you guys hear about this?
[52:36.270 --> 52:37.080]  I forgot.
[52:38.770 --> 52:43.940]  Well, apparently, people can ask Google to delete sensitive information from its Internet search results.
[52:44.770 --> 52:51.140]  This was ruled by the Luxembourg-based European Union Court of Justice, or the ECJ.
[52:51.680 --> 52:53.770]  And this decision was reached...
[52:53.770 --> 52:54.100]  Yes, Mike?
[52:54.310 --> 52:55.330]  So, we're going to get letters.
[52:55.330 --> 52:57.560]  This is not part of the EU.
[52:57.750 --> 52:59.580]  So, it's the European Court of Justice.
[52:59.860 --> 53:01.940]  It's the European Union Court of Justice.
[53:02.080 --> 53:02.980]  Is it a different one?
[53:03.270 --> 53:04.330]  That's what it says here.
[53:05.960 --> 53:09.180]  It's the judicial branch of the European Union.
[53:09.600 --> 53:10.960]  Okay, so it is an EU thing.
[53:11.790 --> 53:12.920]  Yes, it's related.
[53:13.230 --> 53:13.330]  Yes.
[53:13.330 --> 53:15.230]  It's a bit like the Supreme Court of Europe.
[53:15.480 --> 53:17.100]  Sorry to the fans of the Supreme Court.
[53:17.250 --> 53:19.330]  Maybe we shouldn't be comparing the two, but they're comparable.
[53:20.080 --> 53:20.290]  Okay.
[53:20.620 --> 53:25.860]  Well, this decision came after a Spanish man complained to the Data Protection Agency in Spain.
[53:26.560 --> 53:29.120]  So, maybe you can get in touch with this guy while you're over there later.
[53:29.500 --> 53:39.900]  He complained that an auction notice of his repossessed home on the search result He should come to the U.S.
[53:39.960 --> 53:41.920]  if he wants to know what a violation of privacy is like.
[53:42.270 --> 53:43.380]  He really does.
[53:43.980 --> 53:47.730]  Google is not, as you can imagine, thrilled about this.
[53:47.900 --> 54:02.160]  But the judge has said, if following a search made on the basis of a person's name, the list of results displays a link to a web page which contains information on that person in question, the data subject may approach the operator directly and where the operator does not grant his request,
[54:02.160 --> 54:09.020]  bring the matter before the competent authorities in order to obtain under certain conditions the removal of that link from the list of results.
[54:09.620 --> 54:24.420]  So, basically, Google has maintained a page for a long time called Chilling Effects and what it is is basically a non-clickable list of URLs that they've been forced to remove from their search results.
[54:24.770 --> 54:26.980]  So, it looks like maybe we'll be...
[54:26.980 --> 54:35.960]  This has been used for things like copyright violations, RIA, MPAA complaints about links to unauthorized copies of their work.
[54:36.080 --> 54:47.160]  But it looks like this might now become an individual thing where you can have your own chilling effect on Google's search results if you're a European and you don't like what Googling you does.
[54:47.380 --> 54:55.580]  This is a really interesting case, I think, because I certainly feel for the guy who doesn't want people to know his house was repossessed.
[54:55.860 --> 55:11.250]  But the solution here, the proposed solution is to put even more power into the hands of Google, which is a frightening thought in my view, to choose what goes into your search results, to choose if these removal requests are legitimate or not.
[55:11.380 --> 55:17.980]  And that is, in my view, possibly even more frightening than them just doing everything all the time.
[55:19.660 --> 55:20.420]  I don't know.
[55:20.460 --> 55:21.180]  What do you think about this, Bernie?
[55:22.750 --> 55:31.540]  I am really jealous of Europeans who can have a little more privacy than we have here.
[55:31.540 --> 55:43.040]  Actually, a lot more privacy because they have a system of law and justice that actually seems to listen a little bit more to the public and the public interest.
[55:44.100 --> 55:50.770]  So I want to know, Americans really can't enjoy the fruits of this decision, can they?
[55:50.920 --> 55:52.250]  Or what if they move to Europe?
[55:52.640 --> 55:57.480]  Could they then request all the information Google has collected on them while they were in the States?
[55:58.000 --> 55:59.230]  How would that work?
[56:00.180 --> 56:00.860]  Yeah, I don't know.
[56:00.960 --> 56:08.360]  If you have to be European or if maybe you guys who are over there right now can just stop by the local government office and put in your complaints while you're over there.
[56:10.140 --> 56:11.180]  Put one in for me.
[56:12.420 --> 56:14.700]  Once you're a resident, some doors do open.
[56:14.980 --> 56:17.790]  But yeah, I'm not quite sure how far this goes.
[56:17.940 --> 56:19.230]  But this could be the beginning.
[56:19.420 --> 56:22.770]  I know that in the United States there's been a lot of discussion of corporate personhood.
[56:23.040 --> 56:27.290]  This could be the early signs of person-personhood here in Europe.
[56:29.210 --> 56:29.980]  What a project.
[56:30.270 --> 56:31.560]  That joke wouldn't go far.
[56:33.000 --> 56:36.250]  This is definitely a fascinating story and we'll be keeping a close eye on it.
[56:36.360 --> 56:43.380]  And of course, if you hear anything about where this goes that you think is of interest, send it on to us OTH at 2600.com.
[56:44.980 --> 56:48.860]  If you are able to get something removed from Google, tell us about it.
[56:49.330 --> 56:52.250]  Yeah, we would love to hear about what you don't want Google to know about you.
[56:53.230 --> 56:57.880]  We'll read it on the air, but our audio programs are not yet...
[56:57.880 --> 57:00.810]  We don't yet produce transcripts, so it might be a little bit hard to find it.
[57:02.120 --> 57:03.680]  It might, but we're not making any promises.
[57:07.200 --> 57:11.960]  Are people talking about this everywhere you go, Emmanuel, in Europe?
[57:13.080 --> 57:13.820]  Not yet.
[57:13.940 --> 57:14.280]  Not yet.
[57:14.400 --> 57:17.540]  I haven't really conversed with very many people in the streets.
[57:17.880 --> 57:22.380]  Hopefully, I'll do that soon and I can find out what the mood of the people is.
[57:23.960 --> 57:31.700]  But as we move into our second hour, just a few minutes, I wanted to touch with something that listeners sent to us.
[57:32.520 --> 57:36.660]  And I think, Bicycle Mark, do you really want to stay up much longer?
[57:37.240 --> 57:39.420]  No, I am going to head to bed.
[57:40.220 --> 57:41.720]  Yeah, I know it's...
[57:41.720 --> 57:52.000]  We're going to follow pretty soon after that as we move into the second hour because I know we have at least one special guest coming up and who knows, we might even take some phone calls from listeners.
[57:52.760 --> 57:57.280]  I'm wondering why we're on for two hours tonight and possibly asking all kinds of other interesting questions.
[57:58.500 --> 58:03.660]  But Bicycle Mark, I want to thank you so much just for being a part of all of this and for doing what you do.
[58:04.860 --> 58:06.020]  Always a pleasure, guys.
[58:06.380 --> 58:09.480]  People out there, support the station and I'll talk to you all very soon.
[58:10.660 --> 58:11.940]  Okay, we'll see you next time.
[58:12.280 --> 58:13.220]  Thanks, Bicycle Mark.
[58:13.380 --> 58:18.400]  And again, for people who want more of his work, the website is citizenreporter.org.
[58:19.320 --> 58:19.720]  Bye.
[58:19.940 --> 58:20.300]  Yes.
[58:21.360 --> 58:21.860]  Bye, Mark.
[58:21.860 --> 58:22.620]  Oh, worth a listen.
[58:23.800 --> 58:26.100]  And you are listening to WBAI New York.
[58:26.100 --> 58:28.360]  It's coming up on 8 o'clock.
[58:28.840 --> 58:34.180]  And if you expect to hear the personal computer show, you're going to be disappointed tonight because we're not leaving.
[58:34.180 --> 58:37.800]  We're staying on this particular frequency for another hour.
[58:38.580 --> 58:40.420]  or at least most of us are staying.
[58:41.320 --> 58:51.680]  We have a report from a listener, an email from a listener, and you can be a listener too, that writes to us by emailing OTH at 2600.com.
[58:52.320 --> 59:01.400]  This person wrote in with what I thought was a particularly interesting letter based on a conversation we had a few weeks ago about emergency broadcasts that take place.
[59:01.760 --> 59:10.320]  There was a couple of companies got in trouble for broadcasting a movie trailer that had a fake emergency alert tone and the FCC didn't take kindly to that.
[59:10.740 --> 59:23.020]  This person writes in, I just finished listening to your latest broadcast where you talked to me about the emergency alert system and as someone with an intimate knowledge of the system and its history, I thought I could impart some info.
[59:23.820 --> 59:30.060]  Unfortunately, I'm on the West Coast where a trip to New York City for hope has never been an option for me, but maybe someday I'll be able to come out and give a talk on the subject.
[59:30.240 --> 59:33.100]  We'd certainly like to hear more on this because it's fascinating to us.
[59:33.500 --> 59:42.020]  In the beginning, 1951, that's when the beginning was, there was Conorad, Conorad, C-O-N-E-L-R-A-D.
[59:42.300 --> 59:45.860]  There was an alert system that utilized key stations.
[59:46.320 --> 01:00:03.080]  They would receive a message from the federal government then to send the alert, they would turn off their AM carrier for five seconds, then they'd turn on for five seconds, off for five seconds, back on, broadcasting a 960 hertz tone for 15 seconds, followed by the emergency message.
[01:00:04.020 --> 01:00:11.160]  stations down the line would have systems in place to detect the carrier, off, on, off, on, and then notify the station that there was no alert.
[01:00:11.920 --> 01:00:16.000]  Bernie, maybe you remember what the frequencies were of Conorad stations, do you?
[01:00:17.360 --> 01:00:19.900]  Well, I'm reading his email, so I would be cheating.
[01:00:20.800 --> 01:00:22.380]  You mean the radio frequencies?
[01:00:23.440 --> 01:00:24.940]  Yeah, the actual radio frequencies.
[01:00:25.100 --> 01:00:25.860]  There are two frequencies.
[01:00:26.160 --> 01:00:28.180]  In fact, if you look on old radio dials...
[01:00:28.180 --> 01:00:28.300]  There were.
[01:00:28.380 --> 01:00:45.760]  Yeah, I was going to say, if you go to a flea market and you'll find an old AM radio from the 50s, or maybe between the late 40s, let's see, probably early, sometime in the 50s until the early 60s, there's a little, on the radio dial, and radios had like a dial or sort of a band span thing,
[01:00:45.980 --> 01:00:51.620]  there was a little symbol indicating that's where you tune when there was a huge emergency, but I don't recall the frequencies, do you?
[01:00:53.000 --> 01:01:00.000]  Well, in the time that you said all that, I clicked on the Wikipedia link and I'm currently trying to figure out what the frequencies are right now.
[01:01:00.120 --> 01:01:12.940]  Okay, well, I'm going to have to ask you to hold that thought and that Wikipedia link because it's at the top of the hour, you're listening to WBAI 99.5 FM New York, and you are not listening to the Personal Computer Show.
[01:01:13.020 --> 01:01:16.260]  They're off today, you are listening to Off the Hook, extending into a second hour.
[01:01:17.100 --> 01:01:28.240]  But we are going to take a very short break, and we will be right back after this piece of very interesting music that I think you'll enjoy with more information about the emergency alert system.
[01:01:29.800 --> 01:01:34.820]  Click on Help, call someone else, or figure out how to freaking Google it yourself.
[01:01:35.020 --> 01:01:39.820]  Click on Help, call someone else, or figure out how to freaking Google it yourself.
[01:01:40.040 --> 01:01:44.800]  Click on Help, call someone else, or figure out how to freaking Google it yourself.
[01:01:45.080 --> 01:01:49.740]  Click on Help, call someone else, or figure out how to freaking Google it yourself.
[01:01:49.960 --> 01:01:52.260]  I'm not your damn personal IT guy.
[01:01:52.300 --> 01:01:56.120]  I get no piece, but at least now I see why you ask me about computers.
[01:01:56.120 --> 01:01:59.820]  Apparently I'm the only person who knows how to turn the damn things on.
[01:01:59.840 --> 01:02:01.520]  Oh look, you can't configure your route.
[01:02:01.640 --> 01:02:02.220]  Look again.
[01:02:02.420 --> 01:02:04.700]  Well, maybe you should write the settings down, my friend.
[01:02:04.820 --> 01:02:07.220]  But that might require a little effort from you.
[01:02:07.380 --> 01:02:09.760]  And Mr. Big Shot has more important things to do.
[01:02:09.860 --> 01:02:12.220]  It's fine if I have to explain it one time.
[01:02:12.280 --> 01:02:14.800]  Now we're at number 29 and I'm losing my mind.
[01:02:14.960 --> 01:02:16.280]  So I'll just drop everything.
[01:02:16.480 --> 01:02:17.360]  Deadlines be damned.
[01:02:17.460 --> 01:02:19.760]  And explain again, although I know you'll never understand.
[01:02:20.160 --> 01:02:21.460]  Close all of those windows.
[01:02:21.500 --> 01:02:22.180]  Let's begin.
[01:02:22.360 --> 01:02:22.880]  Click on this.
[01:02:23.040 --> 01:02:23.440]  Click on that.
[01:02:23.500 --> 01:02:24.780]  Now put your password in.
[01:02:24.780 --> 01:02:25.040]  See?
[01:02:25.260 --> 01:02:27.120]  You don't need to be a total whiz.
[01:02:27.480 --> 01:02:29.940]  No I don't know what your password is.
[01:02:30.100 --> 01:02:30.980]  Click on help.
[01:02:31.320 --> 01:02:34.820]  Call someone else Or figure out how to freaking Google it yourself.
[01:02:35.020 --> 01:02:46.020]  Click on help.
[01:02:46.200 --> 01:02:49.760]  Call someone else Or figure out how to freaking Google it yourself.
[01:02:50.040 --> 01:02:52.240]  Why are your problems automatically mine?
[01:02:52.240 --> 01:02:54.800]  I know it's fine, I'm nothing better to do with my time.
[01:02:54.980 --> 01:02:57.140]  But it's not like I ask you every day for help.
[01:02:57.280 --> 01:02:59.540]  When I make a dookie and I can't wipe myself.
[01:02:59.760 --> 01:03:02.260]  So what were you trying to do when the error appeared?
[01:03:02.480 --> 01:03:04.800]  Then I cursed cause it's even worse than I feared.
[01:03:05.000 --> 01:03:10.060]  I see your PC is an ancient jalopy and you're trying to copy a DVD onto a floppy.
[01:03:10.160 --> 01:03:12.340]  First of all, where'd you even get a floppy disk?
[01:03:12.540 --> 01:03:14.820]  Cause really, I didn't think those things still exist.
[01:03:15.160 --> 01:03:18.400]  Secondly, I don't want to be a spoil sport, but that's an ethernet cable.
[01:03:18.580 --> 01:03:19.760]  That's a USB port.
[01:03:19.880 --> 01:03:24.820]  If you buy something new and don't know how to hook it up, it doesn't make you less of a man to look it up.
[01:03:25.000 --> 01:03:27.180]  You claim you're not an idiot, well prove me wrong.
[01:03:27.360 --> 01:03:29.980]  And stop giving me more material for this song!
[01:03:30.260 --> 01:03:34.740]  Click on Help, Call someone else, or figure out how to freakin' Google it yourself.
[01:03:34.740 --> 01:03:37.420]  Click on Help, call someone else.
[01:03:37.520 --> 01:03:39.780]  Or figure out how to freaking Google it yourself.
[01:03:52.700 --> 01:03:53.140]  Hello?
[01:03:53.920 --> 01:03:55.820]  Hey Tom, can I see you for a sec?
[01:03:56.020 --> 01:03:59.500]  I'm trying to get my iPhone to sync with my home computer over the VPN.
[01:04:01.420 --> 01:04:06.880]  I'm sorry I'm unable to take your call at the moment, but if you leave your name and number, I'll get right back to you.
[01:04:08.540 --> 01:04:08.940]  Beep.
[01:04:09.800 --> 01:04:14.840]  It happens every day and I can't get away, cause they follow me around like a dog who wants to play.
[01:04:15.040 --> 01:04:17.260]  I know when my phone rings, my day will be wrecked.
[01:04:17.420 --> 01:04:19.840]  When my boss says, Tom, can I see you for a sec?
[01:04:20.060 --> 01:04:22.260]  A second rapidly becomes an hour and a half.
[01:04:22.260 --> 01:04:26.080]  I would laugh, but I'm not part of the IT staff, so I don't know what I'm doing.
[01:04:26.080 --> 01:04:29.840]  I just click around and curse and pray to various gods that I don't make the problem worse.
[01:04:30.060 --> 01:04:32.340]  Funny how I said before this date was gonna drag.
[01:04:32.460 --> 01:04:34.660]  Now I'm working quick cause his cologne is making me gag.
[01:04:34.920 --> 01:04:37.340]  He says I have to fix it and I can't wait till later.
[01:04:37.380 --> 01:04:39.740]  And somehow it's my fault, he never backed up his data.
[01:04:39.980 --> 01:04:42.360]  There's still a couple quirks and it's making me berserker.
[01:04:42.460 --> 01:04:44.740]  Dammit Jim, I'm a Mac, not a miracle worker.
[01:04:44.740 --> 01:04:49.920]  And when I finally fixed every problem he ever had, my uncle calls asking about his son's leap pad.
[01:04:50.160 --> 01:04:54.820]  Click on help, call someone else, or figure out how to freaking Google it yourself.
[01:04:54.820 --> 01:05:09.860]  Click on help, call someone else, or figure out how to freaking Google it yourself.
[01:05:12.720 --> 01:05:16.540]  And that was I'm Not Your Personal IT Guy by Devo Spice.
[01:05:16.700 --> 01:05:19.840]  You can hear more of his work at DevoSpice.com.
[01:05:20.000 --> 01:05:22.620]  That's D-E-V-O-Spice.com.
[01:05:24.400 --> 01:05:25.120]  Great song.
[01:05:26.980 --> 01:05:28.060]  There we are.
[01:05:28.360 --> 01:05:29.920]  So, Emmanuel, you're back.
[01:05:31.240 --> 01:05:34.520]  I'm back, but not for very long because my phone is about to die.
[01:05:35.500 --> 01:05:37.600]  Bernie, do you have the article I was reading in front of you?
[01:05:38.740 --> 01:05:43.800]  Well, no, I wouldn't know what article you're reading, but I don't have it.
[01:05:44.060 --> 01:05:45.560]  I'm sorry, I hear a letter from a listener.
[01:05:45.920 --> 01:05:46.780]  Oh, the email.
[01:05:46.900 --> 01:05:47.720]  Yes, I do have that.
[01:05:47.900 --> 01:05:57.000]  Yes, because there's some interesting stuff ahead in that, including some information on a telephone network, which I'm very interested in.
[01:05:57.460 --> 01:05:59.780]  But my phone, I'm surprised I actually died already.
[01:05:59.880 --> 01:06:01.180]  I'm down to the last possible bar.
[01:06:01.300 --> 01:06:02.480]  Plus, it's cost me a fortune.
[01:06:03.300 --> 01:06:07.260]  So, I'm going to let you guys go and have fun.
[01:06:07.720 --> 01:06:10.840]  But I know you have a special guest coming up as well, and maybe some phone calls.
[01:06:11.540 --> 01:06:12.120]  We do.
[01:06:12.480 --> 01:06:15.420]  Well, thank you very much for joining us from Germany and going to the trouble.
[01:06:15.600 --> 01:06:20.880]  And we hope you have some suitably exciting adventures to tell us about next week.
[01:06:25.160 --> 01:06:27.720]  Did the phone die before he could say?
[01:06:28.680 --> 01:06:31.800]  Either the phone died or he just got disgusted and hung up on us.
[01:06:31.800 --> 01:06:37.860]  That's a common response to us, but we will...
[01:06:37.860 --> 01:06:44.640]  I don't know if we're on next week, but we will find that out, and Emmanuel will be with us the next time we're on, whatever week that is.
[01:06:44.720 --> 01:06:48.880]  Yes, we're on either next week or the week after, and we're preempted for the other.
[01:06:48.880 --> 01:06:54.400]  But we'll figure it out, and we'll post about it and all that good sort of stuff.
[01:06:56.240 --> 01:06:56.820]  Hey, Rob.
[01:06:57.080 --> 01:06:57.480]  Yes, Bernie.
[01:06:58.080 --> 01:07:03.140]  Do we have room for some more stories before... new stories before we bring on our guest tonight?
[01:07:03.340 --> 01:07:03.800]  Yes, indeed.
[01:07:03.900 --> 01:07:06.460]  We have about another 20 minutes until we bring our guest on.
[01:07:06.700 --> 01:07:08.700]  So, there's a lot of other stuff going on.
[01:07:08.760 --> 01:07:09.420]  What did you have in mind, Bernie?
[01:07:10.460 --> 01:07:20.920]  I saw a pretty interesting article in Wireless Week about police employing a new mobile app to catch riot instigators.
[01:07:22.700 --> 01:07:27.160]  And basically, this is... let's see which police department this was.
[01:07:27.640 --> 01:07:28.980]  Was it in Boston?
[01:07:30.580 --> 01:07:33.500]  Well, I'll find it here.
[01:07:34.100 --> 01:07:35.200]  Los Angeles.
[01:07:35.560 --> 01:07:38.200]  It's the police department with no regards for civil liberties.
[01:07:38.200 --> 01:07:39.300]  That narrows it down a bit.
[01:07:39.420 --> 01:07:42.400]  Well, which... I mean, that doesn't narrow it down very much, does it, Mike?
[01:07:42.860 --> 01:07:44.260]  Not all that much, no.
[01:07:44.880 --> 01:07:45.420]  But...
[01:07:45.420 --> 01:07:57.720]  In Los Angeles, they're talking about a party in Southern California where, you know, there was a lot of overzealous reveling.
[01:07:57.880 --> 01:08:08.620]  So, what the police did is the Los Angeles County Sheriff's Department, they came up with this idea to release a...
[01:08:08.620 --> 01:08:18.060]  to produce, I'm sure they paid some company development called LEEDIR, L-E-E-D-I-R, the Large Emergency Event Digital Information Repository.
[01:08:18.060 --> 01:08:25.440]  And it's a crowdsourcing app where individuals can have the sheriff's department app on their smartphone.
[01:08:25.960 --> 01:08:44.380]  And whenever they see somebody doing something wrong, they can just point the camera from their smartphone at the wrongdoer, which will then record the callers, you know, the person's phone information who's sending the picture and send the picture and the geographic coordinates of where the thing went on.
[01:08:44.380 --> 01:08:50.180]  And then you can send a text along with that to indicate what's going on and so forth.
[01:08:50.460 --> 01:08:52.360]  So, it's kind of like a mobile snitch app.
[01:08:52.760 --> 01:09:07.240]  So, I'm wondering how common this is going to be in the future where maybe we'd be required to have a mobile snitch app on all our phones to turn anybody in that we see it.
[01:09:07.240 --> 01:09:13.140]  Or maybe the phone's cameras will just be activated all the time and whether we like it or not, the phones will be snitching on us.
[01:09:13.220 --> 01:09:13.800]  Oh, wait a second.
[01:09:13.860 --> 01:09:14.940]  They're doing that already, aren't they?
[01:09:15.120 --> 01:09:15.860]  Quite, quite so.
[01:09:16.200 --> 01:09:27.460]  You know, I've got an app on my phone called Stop and Frisk Watch, which actually works in the other direction and records authority figures who are in the process of arresting you or doing something else that you want to document.
[01:09:27.460 --> 01:09:34.180]  But, yeah, I guess the bad guys can get hold of smartphone technology, too.
[01:09:35.280 --> 01:09:39.680]  But, all in all, it's not getting any less weird out there.
[01:09:40.360 --> 01:09:49.680]  Speaking of which, we've been handed a piece of paper by someone here at the station, which I get to now read to you and say this just in because I've always wanted to be that guy.
[01:09:49.680 --> 01:09:57.680]  Anyway, the Conorad frequencies that you guys were talking about earlier, I've been told that they are 640 and 1240 kilohertz.
[01:09:58.720 --> 01:09:59.540]  That sounds right.
[01:09:59.740 --> 01:10:01.840]  Yeah, it sounds right to me.
[01:10:02.040 --> 01:10:04.580]  And, yeah, interesting stuff.
[01:10:05.540 --> 01:10:18.500]  Now, I'm really curious how the stations did that back then because the stations really weren't equipped to transmit on, you know, their transmitter was designed for one frequency and their antenna was resonant for a certain frequency.
[01:10:18.500 --> 01:10:22.300]  So, I don't know where they had to have antenna tuners to change.
[01:10:22.400 --> 01:10:24.700]  When an emergency came, they'd have to switch to that frequency.
[01:10:25.380 --> 01:10:30.520]  There weren't a whole bunch of stations just lying around waiting to broadcast on that frequency when something happened.
[01:10:31.180 --> 01:10:33.840]  And AM stations didn't necessarily cover...
[01:10:33.840 --> 01:10:41.980]  It may be that there were a few stations that were very... could just have really high power levels and you could hear them from, you know, several cities away when there was an emergency.
[01:10:41.980 --> 01:10:48.500]  But now we have the emergency alert system, which doesn't even use... doesn't rely on radio necessarily.
[01:10:48.500 --> 01:10:56.120]  It works over cable TV and satellite TV and smartphones and dumb phones.
[01:10:56.500 --> 01:10:59.500]  And we all know about the emergencies.
[01:10:59.500 --> 01:11:05.340]  And the president can, on his authority, make us all aware of anything through any of those mediums.
[01:11:06.320 --> 01:11:08.480]  It's an interesting thing to think about.
[01:11:08.800 --> 01:11:10.740]  And, yeah.
[01:11:10.980 --> 01:11:17.940]  So, with all this going on, there's a lot of other stuff that we need to keep just as close an eye on.
[01:11:18.200 --> 01:11:22.260]  The FCC is in the news this past week.
[01:11:22.460 --> 01:11:23.180]  Oh, good.
[01:11:23.500 --> 01:11:23.740]  Yeah.
[01:11:24.080 --> 01:11:24.900]  Our old pals.
[01:11:26.020 --> 01:11:26.940]  They're actually...
[01:11:26.940 --> 01:11:32.300]  There's a crowd out in front of the FCC, as we speak, that have been camping there for the past week.
[01:11:32.300 --> 01:11:44.560]  They've been occupying the FCC, which is a thing called, appropriately enough, Occupy the FCC, which has a website at occupythefcc.com.
[01:11:44.560 --> 01:11:55.480]  This is being done by the group Fight for the Future, which is an Internet rights protection group, which fought things like SOPA and CISPA and continues to do so.
[01:11:55.680 --> 01:12:02.100]  And tonight is their final planned night of camping and protesting out in front of the FCC headquarters in Washington, D.C., 24-7.
[01:12:02.300 --> 01:12:11.120]  Because tomorrow is when the FCC makes their announcement of what they're going to do with the proposed new rules that deeply affect net neutrality.
[01:12:13.660 --> 01:12:15.300]  So, if you're in the D.C.
[01:12:15.380 --> 01:12:21.560]  area and you want to go hang out with them, you can meet them tonight at the FCC headquarters.
[01:12:21.560 --> 01:12:28.920]  Or if you'd like to do that, the information is at occupythefcc.com.
[01:12:28.920 --> 01:12:40.000]  I've spoken over the past week with some people who have been talking to congressmen and congresswomen, maybe, and FCC officials.
[01:12:40.340 --> 01:12:49.960]  And if you remember when we reported a couple weeks ago that the net neutrality was being essentially killed, I was pretty pessimistic that this could be stopped.
[01:12:49.960 --> 01:12:53.140]  But there is some cause for optimism.
[01:12:53.580 --> 01:12:56.740]  Maybe it won't get as bad as we feared right away.
[01:12:56.900 --> 01:13:08.860]  So, I would encourage people who are also optimistic to go on the FCC and they have this awful website, but you can try and navigate it to find the official place to leave a comment on this proposal.
[01:13:08.860 --> 01:13:23.840]  And apparently they've been getting comments in such numbers that there are rumors they will delay the announcement of the final rules or even change the final rules to be a bit more friendly to normal people and not just to, you know, Comcast and Verizon.
[01:13:23.840 --> 01:13:28.660]  Yeah, there's an interesting post on the official FCC blog on FCC.gov.
[01:13:29.040 --> 01:13:30.340]  And I have it in front of me now.
[01:13:30.400 --> 01:13:35.400]  This is written by the FCC commissioner last week, someone by the name of Mignon Clyburn.
[01:13:36.340 --> 01:13:38.620]  Mignon like the filet, Clyburn like the Clyburn.
[01:13:39.360 --> 01:13:42.540]  And this post says, over 100,000 Americans have spoken.
[01:13:42.800 --> 01:13:51.520]  And during the past few weeks, tens of thousands of consumers, companies, entrepreneurs, investors, schools, educators, healthcare providers, and others have reached out to ask me to keep the internet free and open.
[01:13:52.260 --> 01:13:55.400]  While the calls, emails, and letters are new, my commitment to internet freedom is not.
[01:13:55.520 --> 01:13:58.720]  In fact, my public efforts to preserve a free and open internet began many years ago.
[01:13:58.820 --> 01:14:03.320]  And this person goes on and on to basically give some career highlights.
[01:14:04.760 --> 01:14:12.920]  And then in January, the DC circuit disagreed with the FCC's legal approach concerning the no-blocking and non-discrimination rules and remanded the issue to this agency.
[01:14:13.260 --> 01:14:21.200]  Unlike many, I actually see this remand as a unique opportunity for us to take a fresh look and evaluate our policy in light of the many developments that have occurred over the last four years.
[01:14:21.200 --> 01:14:26.660]  There is no doubt that preserving and maintaining a free and open internet is fundamental to the core values of our democratic society.
[01:14:26.760 --> 01:14:29.460]  And I have an unwavering commitment to its independence.
[01:14:29.800 --> 01:14:36.660]  My mind remains open as I continue to evaluate how best to promote these fundamental core values over 100,000 Americans and counting.
[01:14:36.840 --> 01:14:41.640]  I am listening to your voices as I approach this critical vote to preserve an ever free and open internet.
[01:14:42.620 --> 01:14:48.520]  And to that from the commissioner of the FCC, it sounds like hopeful words, but it sounds like it sounds like politics.
[01:14:48.740 --> 01:14:50.900]  So I'm not sure how cheered up to be by this.
[01:14:50.960 --> 01:14:54.320]  Just to be clear, Rob, there are five people that have the title commissioner.
[01:14:54.520 --> 01:14:55.660]  So it is not the commissioner.
[01:14:55.800 --> 01:14:57.800]  The commissioner is one of the commissioners.
[01:14:58.120 --> 01:15:02.720]  And this is the viewpoint that has thus far been in a minority amongst those five.
[01:15:02.920 --> 01:15:04.920]  But maybe something will change.
[01:15:04.920 --> 01:15:07.260]  This is the FCC commissioner who is called Mignon.
[01:15:08.200 --> 01:15:08.940]  I don't know.
[01:15:08.980 --> 01:15:09.460]  Hey, Rob.
[01:15:09.460 --> 01:15:10.060]  What do you think about this, Bernie?
[01:15:11.540 --> 01:15:32.480]  I'm really still confused by this net neutrality or this new initiative by the chairperson of the FCC, Tom Wheeler, who used to work for a cable industry lobby and before that for the cellular telephone industry.
[01:15:32.480 --> 01:15:34.420]  The whole revolving door thing, you know.
[01:15:35.240 --> 01:15:37.680]  I'm a little confused about how he expects...
[01:15:37.680 --> 01:15:56.300]  He says he wants to roll out a system where the ISPs, whether it's Time Warner, Comcast, Verizon, whatever, or other internet service providers, where they can provide a so-called fast lane for content providers that pay extra money to the ISP.
[01:15:57.420 --> 01:16:14.060]  He wants to make that okay, but he says that this will not degrade or affect the service, the bandwidth available to content providers that do not pay like a protection racket fee to these ISPs.
[01:16:14.060 --> 01:16:17.680]  But there's a finite amount of bandwidth that all these ISPs have.
[01:16:17.840 --> 01:16:26.620]  So how can you provide fast more bandwidth to some content providers without it affecting the remaining bandwidth to others?
[01:16:26.660 --> 01:16:28.540]  This just seems illogical to me.
[01:16:28.940 --> 01:16:31.720]  I think the answer to your question is that it's impossible.
[01:16:31.720 --> 01:16:36.080]  And, I mean, the way that you create a so-called fast lane...
[01:16:36.080 --> 01:16:41.240]  So, first of all, as a consumer, you're paying already for, like, some amount of bandwidth, and you're getting much less than that.
[01:16:41.640 --> 01:16:50.300]  And I guess part of the fast lane proposal is maybe certain content providers would be privileged to actually fill up your bandwidth.
[01:16:50.460 --> 01:16:55.560]  But it is not, according to some people, an accident that you're not getting the speeds.
[01:16:55.560 --> 01:17:01.180]  There was a fascinating blog post published within the last week by this company called Level 3.
[01:17:01.540 --> 01:17:08.560]  Level 3 is one of the largest sort of backbone internet providers in the world, if not the largest.
[01:17:08.820 --> 01:17:29.460]  And so what that means is, you know, if you have a server in Texas and I want to look at your content here in New York, maybe Level 3 or their competitors will be the one to sort of get that data across the country from your server network to your consumer broadband provider network.
[01:17:29.700 --> 01:17:35.860]  And they publish some graphs of usage of their sort of interconnects.
[01:17:35.960 --> 01:17:42.500]  So the way they work is they connect to your server operator's network, they connect to your cable provider's network, they connect to a whole bunch of networks.
[01:17:42.500 --> 01:17:43.280]  That's what they do.
[01:17:43.940 --> 01:17:48.120]  And there's a, each of those links has a fixed capacity.
[01:17:49.000 --> 01:18:05.140]  And normally what most people do is when those links are full, the two sides, both Level 3 and the other, the part, the entity they appear with, will, you know, sort of share the cost to upgrade the link so that they can, their mutual customers can exchange as much traffic as they want.
[01:18:05.140 --> 01:18:17.000]  But they produce some graphs that show some very full links that are not being upgraded because the entities they appear with are refusing to pay the cost of the upgrades.
[01:18:17.200 --> 01:18:20.040]  So that's degrading the performance for their customers.
[01:18:20.180 --> 01:18:25.460]  And Level 3 is very careful not to say directly who the people who are doing this are.
[01:18:25.460 --> 01:18:28.320]  They just say there's like five of them in the United States and one in Europe.
[01:18:28.580 --> 01:18:36.640]  But they, they also say that these are some of the, you know, companies that are most hated basically in the United States.
[01:18:36.800 --> 01:18:39.760]  And they give, you know, some, some further description.
[01:18:39.760 --> 01:18:54.640]  So the company is clearly Comcast and Verizon and those sorts of entities, the large mass market broadband providers that are precisely the ones who are pushing for an end to net neutrality.
[01:18:54.840 --> 01:18:59.460]  They are already not upgrading their networks to give you the service that you pay for.
[01:18:59.600 --> 01:19:05.500]  And so, of course, they're going to just continue to do that even more if they have the right to this so-called fast lane thing.
[01:19:07.680 --> 01:19:12.000]  Yeah, it sounds about right for, for the telecom industry.
[01:19:12.560 --> 01:19:23.100]  Meanwhile, the, the, the FCC is considering treating cable companies like utilities in that they'll give them the sort of common carrier status.
[01:19:23.100 --> 01:19:30.280]  I have a story here from The Guardian in a live chat on Twitter, because that's, that's, that's a thing that the FCC does, apparently.
[01:19:30.280 --> 01:19:46.100]  Um, the, uh, the FCC Senior Counsel, Gigi Sohn, uh, the FCC Senior Counsel for External Affairs, said that the regulators open internet proposals to be published on Thursday, meaning tomorrow, will seek comment on whether broadband internet access should be treated in the same way as electricity,
[01:19:46.280 --> 01:19:49.920]  telephone calls, or water, where consumers have equal access to the same service.
[01:19:49.920 --> 01:20:02.040]  Uh, the FCC has faced a mounting backlash from consumer groups and tech firms after Chairman Tom Wheeler, him again, uh, appeared to signal he was preparing to formalize the creation of a quote-unquote fast lane internet for those able to pay for it.
[01:20:02.180 --> 01:20:08.240]  Wheeler is designed, has denied that that's his intention, but critics charge that he has signaled the end to net neutrality.
[01:20:08.240 --> 01:20:12.460]  And, of course, that's what, uh, we've been talking about for the past, uh, couple of weeks now.
[01:20:12.740 --> 01:20:18.860]  Um, common carrier regulations, uh, as you may know, cover telephone communications and require companies to offer the same service to everyone.
[01:20:19.160 --> 01:20:30.940]  Um, but in 2002, the FCC reclassified broadband as an information service, not a telecommunication service, which, uh, paved the way for a decade of legal battles and, uh, basically led us to the mess that we're, that we're in now.
[01:20:30.940 --> 01:20:32.000]  Um, that's right.
[01:20:32.060 --> 01:20:41.020]  Hey, Rob, I guess it's just a coincidence maybe, but back in 2002, um, uh, it was President George W.
[01:20:41.080 --> 01:20:46.860]  Bush and the, the chairman of the FCC was none other than Michael Powell.
[01:20:47.380 --> 01:20:54.380]  That name Powell may ring a bell because he was the son of, uh, uh, uh, General Colin Powell.
[01:20:54.560 --> 01:20:55.200]  Colin Powell, yeah.
[01:20:55.440 --> 01:21:01.940]  Who was appointed by President Bush as, uh, on, to be on the joint, I think the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff.
[01:21:02.140 --> 01:21:04.120]  Or one, he was up there in the military.
[01:21:04.460 --> 01:21:05.380]  Top, you know, big brass.
[01:21:05.620 --> 01:21:16.620]  But anyway, uh, Michael Powell was, uh, notorious for, uh, having just really, uh, uh, uh, eviscerated a lot of public interest, uh, protections.
[01:21:16.620 --> 01:21:26.820]  That the FCC had put down for decades, um, when it came to communications, um, both broadcast and telecommunication, other, you know, communications.
[01:21:27.480 --> 01:21:32.220]  So, um, that's why we are in this mess we are today, why we don't have net neutrality.
[01:21:32.440 --> 01:21:38.380]  Because 12 years ago, um, they were all, ISPs were regulated as common carriers.
[01:21:38.580 --> 01:21:39.860]  Now there's no regulation of them.
[01:21:39.920 --> 01:21:40.900]  They can do whatever the hell they want.
[01:21:41.120 --> 01:21:43.220]  And, uh, that's why we're in this mess today.
[01:21:43.920 --> 01:21:50.920]  Yeah, it turns out when given the freedom to do everything they can to scrape money out of people, they'll do everything they can to scrape money out of people.
[01:21:51.020 --> 01:21:51.560]  That's why they exist.
[01:21:52.040 --> 01:21:52.760]  That's the market.
[01:21:52.880 --> 01:21:53.760]  The magic of the marketplace.
[01:21:55.040 --> 01:21:58.940]  I mean, but, so, I'm not a huge believer in, in markets, uh, maybe.
[01:21:59.160 --> 01:22:06.580]  But there are countries, uh, the United Kingdom and France are among them, where they actually have a market in, uh, broadband.
[01:22:06.580 --> 01:22:13.400]  And, uh, so, the, the, the entity that owns the last mile is not the entity that actually provides you internet service.
[01:22:13.660 --> 01:22:14.820]  And so, there is a market.
[01:22:15.100 --> 01:22:17.740]  And there's, um, more than one player in the market.
[01:22:18.000 --> 01:22:22.480]  And this creates, uh, competition and lowers prices and increases quality.
[01:22:22.900 --> 01:22:24.680]  We don't have that in the United States.
[01:22:24.860 --> 01:22:27.800]  We have, uh, uh, monopolies.
[01:22:27.980 --> 01:22:29.760]  And that is not a market.
[01:22:29.760 --> 01:22:35.900]  So, uh, as a consumer, I cannot go to a different cable company and say, you know, I hear you offer better internet.
[01:22:36.160 --> 01:22:39.780]  So, of course, you know, if you, this is like Econ 1.
[01:22:40.380 --> 01:22:43.640]  If you believe Econ 1, it predicts exactly what we're getting.
[01:22:43.980 --> 01:22:45.520]  And, uh, we're getting it.
[01:22:47.160 --> 01:22:48.440]  Yeah, interesting stuff.
[01:22:48.820 --> 01:22:58.260]  Uh, let's see, uh, the, the chairman, uh, Wheeler, has always been clear that, uh, this option that they have, which is, uh, known as Title II, is a viable option.
[01:22:58.260 --> 01:23:03.840]  But, uh, reclassifying broadband under Title II will inevitably lead to further legal battles with cable firms.
[01:23:04.040 --> 01:23:08.780]  Now, what this means, uh, let me find it in the, in the post here.
[01:23:11.220 --> 01:23:13.000]  And I just lost my place.
[01:23:13.280 --> 01:23:17.700]  I mean, what Title II common carrier status means is it's like a telephone network.
[01:23:17.880 --> 01:23:25.660]  If you place a call on the telephone network, your company is required to interconnect with the recipient's telephone company.
[01:23:25.660 --> 01:23:33.980]  And just, you know, send your call on through without, you know, listening in to seeing, to see if you're saying something you shouldn't be saying.
[01:23:34.140 --> 01:23:37.280]  That they'll, you know, degrade the quality if you're criticizing the company.
[01:23:37.400 --> 01:23:39.260]  That's not allowed for a telephone company.
[01:23:39.520 --> 01:23:42.280]  And my view is it shouldn't be allowed for an internet company.
[01:23:42.420 --> 01:23:44.860]  But apparently that's very controversial at the FCC.
[01:23:45.300 --> 01:23:45.440]  Right.
[01:23:45.540 --> 01:23:47.060]  Imagine if you're a phone provider.
[01:23:47.060 --> 01:23:57.600]  Imagine if you could only call people on that same provider because all the companies were not instructed by on high to play nice with each other, basically, and give everyone the same service, no matter what.
[01:23:58.860 --> 01:24:05.200]  Imagine if your, you know, internet connection could only connect you to people who hosted their content on the same company.
[01:24:05.200 --> 01:24:10.240]  And that's the sort of mess that we would be, that we would be in, I think, eventually.
[01:24:11.000 --> 01:24:15.800]  Or there would be premiums on, you know, stuff depending on where it comes from.
[01:24:15.920 --> 01:24:16.840]  And that's the wrong way to do it.
[01:24:16.940 --> 01:24:22.920]  Because people who have their content on the internet, as we've explained before, have already paid the money to get that content on there.
[01:24:23.580 --> 01:24:28.880]  And what they're trying to do now is double dip and charge you for receiving that same content that someone's already paid to push to you.
[01:24:29.840 --> 01:24:32.280]  So, yeah, net neutrality is important stuff.
[01:24:32.460 --> 01:24:38.420]  And I think it's about time I'm going to try to get our next guest on the phone.
[01:24:38.780 --> 01:24:44.540]  Mike and Bernie, if you want to talk a bit more about this story or whatever, or what else is going on.
[01:24:45.160 --> 01:24:47.500]  I like a couple of quotes I'm reading in this article.
[01:24:49.540 --> 01:24:51.720]  An outfit called Broadband for America.
[01:24:51.720 --> 01:25:01.680]  They're a lobby group for cable companies, like the, similar to where our current FCC commissioner, Tom Wheeler, used to work for an organization like that.
[01:25:02.480 --> 01:25:10.580]  It says, a tweet tweeted that Title II will impede investment, ostensibly, in ISPs.
[01:25:10.840 --> 01:25:11.800]  Well, sure.
[01:25:12.140 --> 01:25:17.720]  Right now, ISPs have almost unlimited profits, billions and billions of dollars.
[01:25:19.080 --> 01:25:28.560]  And if they could only make a few billion instead of, like, many, many, many more billion, there might be a little bit less investment, because that's just how economics works.
[01:25:28.740 --> 01:25:31.240]  But I'm sure they'd be able to turn a fair profit.
[01:25:33.060 --> 01:25:35.340]  We seem to have lost you, Bernie.
[01:25:35.420 --> 01:25:36.020]  Are you still there?
[01:25:37.660 --> 01:25:42.600]  See, Bernie is talking to us over the internet, which does not offer service guarantees.
[01:25:42.600 --> 01:25:48.000]  And I don't think it was intentional, in this case, that his call seems to have disappeared.
[01:25:48.000 --> 01:25:54.680]  But this is, it could be intentional in the future, if we lose net neutrality, if the broadband providers have their way.
[01:25:54.840 --> 01:25:55.480]  Bernie, is that you?
[01:25:55.540 --> 01:25:55.860]  You're back.
[01:25:56.540 --> 01:25:57.320]  Oh, I'm sorry.
[01:25:57.340 --> 01:25:58.400]  I lost my connection.
[01:25:59.100 --> 01:25:59.500]  Okay.
[01:25:59.580 --> 01:26:00.220]  Well, you were saying.
[01:26:01.220 --> 01:26:06.460]  Oh, I was, did I, anyone hear the Bernie Sanders quote I read, or was that cut off before that?
[01:26:06.720 --> 01:26:09.500]  We did not hear from Bernie Sanders, which is always a shame.
[01:26:10.140 --> 01:26:13.320]  Yeah, Senator Bernie Sanders from Vermont, I believe.
[01:26:13.540 --> 01:26:19.980]  He tweeted, we must not let corporations turn profits by putting a price tag on the free flow of ideas.
[01:26:21.060 --> 01:26:24.620]  That's a kind of a flowery way of saying it, but, but I like that.
[01:26:24.980 --> 01:26:30.620]  Did, did the folks hear the, what the cable company lobby group was saying that Title II will impede investment?
[01:26:30.740 --> 01:26:31.760]  Yeah, we did hear that.
[01:26:31.960 --> 01:26:32.280]  Okay.
[01:26:32.460 --> 01:26:33.080]  Well done, Bernie.
[01:26:33.080 --> 01:26:36.080]  You got the cable company's point of view through, but not Bernie Sanders.
[01:26:36.220 --> 01:26:37.620]  Well, yeah, but I was explaining what they mean.
[01:26:37.620 --> 01:26:42.680]  There's going to be, of course, there'll be a little bit less investment if the profits are not insanely huge.
[01:26:42.980 --> 01:26:47.840]  If they can't, you know, if they can only make $5 billion instead of $10 billion this year.
[01:26:48.840 --> 01:26:50.680]  Yeah, there's going to be less investment.
[01:26:50.820 --> 01:26:51.520]  But so what?
[01:26:51.740 --> 01:26:52.500]  That's okay.
[01:26:52.940 --> 01:26:55.600]  It's not clear to me, actually, Bernie, that that is true.
[01:26:55.600 --> 01:26:57.900]  Because right now they, they just make profits.
[01:26:58.120 --> 01:27:07.300]  And if you make profits without making investments, that's always better than spending some of your profits on upgrading your networks, as you might be forced to do, if you have a competitor.
[01:27:07.500 --> 01:27:08.700]  Oh, I was referring to shareholder investments.
[01:27:08.720 --> 01:27:22.180]  I was referring to people who buy stock in these companies, which is, you know, these companies are required to serve their, because they're corporations, they are required by law to serve their shareholders first and make money.
[01:27:22.300 --> 01:27:23.700]  They're legally required to do that.
[01:27:23.800 --> 01:27:24.520]  That is our system.
[01:27:24.900 --> 01:27:30.780]  They're required to serve their shareholders' interests more than their customers' interests.
[01:27:30.780 --> 01:27:34.580]  That's just... that's our system of economics.
[01:27:35.760 --> 01:27:38.160]  And some of the companies are quite good at that.
[01:27:38.860 --> 01:27:39.120]  Yeah.
[01:27:40.440 --> 01:27:43.180]  So, Rob, how are we making out getting this guest on the line?
[01:27:43.520 --> 01:27:45.420]  Rob is very busy dialing.
[01:27:45.540 --> 01:27:47.840]  I don't know if he can talk and dial at the same time.
[01:27:48.100 --> 01:27:48.960]  Okay, sorry.
[01:27:49.320 --> 01:27:50.300]  It's a possibility.
[01:27:50.700 --> 01:27:54.240]  I'm still working to get our guest, but it shouldn't be a moment.
[01:27:55.760 --> 01:27:57.340]  We're in suspense here.
[01:27:57.720 --> 01:27:58.680]  I'm in suspense.
[01:28:00.780 --> 01:28:03.380]  This is a very, you know, this is a very crucial thing.
[01:28:03.540 --> 01:28:07.360]  It really, I think, affects the future of the Internet in this country.
[01:28:07.620 --> 01:28:15.300]  And unfortunately, so much of the Internet throughout the world is currently run through the United States that it really affects the future of the Internet in the world.
[01:28:15.980 --> 01:28:19.520]  Other countries will, of course, try and copy the U.S.
[01:28:19.620 --> 01:28:19.840]  model.
[01:28:20.060 --> 01:28:20.500]  If the U.S.
[01:28:20.600 --> 01:28:33.260]  comes up with something particularly bad, I'm sure other countries will be, you know, other cable companies throughout the world will be jealous of the profits that American companies are able to make.
[01:28:33.400 --> 01:28:38.120]  So I hope that people will write to the FCC and write to their congresspeople.
[01:28:38.360 --> 01:28:40.940]  And maybe we can make a difference.
[01:28:41.200 --> 01:28:42.020]  It's possible.
[01:28:42.460 --> 01:28:46.460]  And our next guest may be the sort of person to talk to about this sort of thing.
[01:28:47.020 --> 01:28:50.800]  We have on the line Sandra Ordonez from the Open Internet Tools Project.
[01:28:50.960 --> 01:28:51.560]  Sandra, how are you?
[01:28:52.560 --> 01:28:52.860]  Good.
[01:28:52.900 --> 01:28:53.580]  How are you guys?
[01:28:54.020 --> 01:28:54.580]  Very, very good.
[01:28:54.700 --> 01:28:55.540]  Thank you for joining us.
[01:28:56.540 --> 01:28:58.660]  So Sandy's with OpenITP.
[01:28:58.880 --> 01:29:02.600]  Can you tell our listeners a little bit about what your organization does?
[01:29:03.560 --> 01:29:04.040]  Sure.
[01:29:04.760 --> 01:29:14.560]  So we support the community behind anti-surveillance and anti-censorship tools, which are also known as circumvention tools.
[01:29:14.560 --> 01:29:17.460]  And those are things like Tor and CryptoCat.
[01:29:17.640 --> 01:29:19.580]  Those seem to be the most well-known.
[01:29:21.720 --> 01:29:22.500]  Yes, indeed.
[01:29:22.660 --> 01:29:25.980]  And so how do you go about spreading this sort of thing?
[01:29:27.420 --> 01:29:28.020]  Sure.
[01:29:28.260 --> 01:29:32.660]  So our organization supports the community in many ways.
[01:29:33.620 --> 01:29:35.200]  We offer grants.
[01:29:37.180 --> 01:29:39.600]  We organize hackathons.
[01:29:39.600 --> 01:29:44.300]  And we also organize events like TechnoActivism Third Mondays.
[01:29:44.480 --> 01:29:53.680]  Even though it is a community-run event, we've been really an intrinsic piece of helping organize that initiative.
[01:29:54.020 --> 01:29:59.900]  And basically what it is, is it's monthly meetups that happen in 21 cities throughout the world.
[01:29:59.900 --> 01:30:04.720]  And they bring together people that are interested in surveillance and censorship.
[01:30:04.900 --> 01:30:22.020]  But most importantly, they allow the developers of these tools to actually meet people that are either using these tools or are interested in helping develop these tools and kind of give input, not from the technological part, but more from the front end,
[01:30:22.260 --> 01:30:28.740]  like why they had difficulty downloading it or why they can't seem to use it.
[01:30:28.840 --> 01:30:32.860]  And that cross-pollination of individuals is really, really important.
[01:30:33.380 --> 01:30:40.980]  So TechnoActivism Third Mondays really focuses on bringing everyone to the table because these are issues that really affect everyone.
[01:30:40.980 --> 01:30:48.860]  And until we're having, you know, a diverse conversation with everyone, things are really not going to change.
[01:30:48.860 --> 01:30:52.800]  Because the geeks know how to protect, you know, their privacy.
[01:30:54.640 --> 01:30:57.400]  People that are not as technically savvy really don't.
[01:30:57.540 --> 01:31:05.480]  So it's really important to cultivate that conversation, you know, across many fields and, you know, many ages and, you know, many interests.
[01:31:05.520 --> 01:31:09.000]  So that's what we try and do with TechnoActivism Third Mondays.
[01:31:09.440 --> 01:31:09.840]  Right.
[01:31:09.920 --> 01:31:19.720]  And that's always been something that's been very necessary, I think, in the field of, like, circumvention software or technology, where the sort of people who make that sort of thing can easily use it.
[01:31:19.840 --> 01:31:27.260]  But it's still not something that just anybody could start up and run easily without being an expert.
[01:31:27.600 --> 01:31:46.480]  So what you do is try and work with the people who make the software and the people who use the software and try and form that connection between the product and the user where it's actually something that people could run And also what we've seen in the last year,
[01:31:46.720 --> 01:31:52.840]  obviously, well, I'd probably say a year and a half, obviously, because of, you know, what's come out in the news.
[01:31:53.080 --> 01:31:57.100]  You know, there's a lot of people that didn't think about these issues beforehand.
[01:31:57.440 --> 01:31:59.740]  And now they are thinking about these issues.
[01:32:00.060 --> 01:32:11.160]  So it also provides a forum for people that are kind of experts in security and privacy, that they have a platform so that they can talk to the general public and help them.
[01:32:11.180 --> 01:32:18.960]  understand how they're being affected, you know, what they need to look out for, how they can protect themselves.
[01:32:19.680 --> 01:32:28.160]  This coming Monday in New York, for example, we're going to have an event called Data Valence and Everyday Consciousness in the Smart City.
[01:32:28.820 --> 01:32:32.720]  And the person who is presenting, his name is Gregory Donovan.
[01:32:33.160 --> 01:32:35.080]  He's the founder of Open Cooney.
[01:32:35.360 --> 01:32:44.640]  And through the presentation, what he's going to talk about is how people that live in cities are are being surveilled on a constant basis and they're not even aware, right?
[01:32:44.980 --> 01:32:52.080]  Because by nature, when you're in a city, you're actually surrounded by a lot of surveillance technologies, you know?
[01:32:52.780 --> 01:32:54.660]  And things like your phone, right?
[01:32:54.800 --> 01:33:00.580]  Like your phone actually allow many people to know where you are all the time.
[01:33:01.000 --> 01:33:05.220]  Sometimes people, you don't really want them to know, you know, where you are.
[01:33:05.220 --> 01:33:05.560]  Right.
[01:33:05.860 --> 01:33:22.900]  So he's going to be talking about that and, you know, talking about it from a point of view so that like a normal person, like I say normal, a non-technical person can come and really have a basic understanding of how they, their privacy is affected within a city environment.
[01:33:22.900 --> 01:33:23.820]  Right.
[01:33:24.020 --> 01:33:30.620]  And that's, that's certainly something that, that's a mission that we could take to heart here on this station and on this program.
[01:33:30.860 --> 01:33:39.420]  Of course, we still need you to support us 212-209-2950 or give the numeral to WBAI.org to keep us on the air.
[01:33:39.420 --> 01:33:45.260]  But, um, so, so, uh, what, uh, what sort of things like you say techno activism third Mondays?
[01:33:45.320 --> 01:33:48.580]  Now they're called that, uh, because they're on the third Monday of every, of every month, correct?
[01:33:49.480 --> 01:33:50.460]  Yes, that's correct.
[01:33:50.740 --> 01:33:54.120]  And again, they happen in 21 cities throughout the world.
[01:33:54.320 --> 01:34:02.740]  And if there is not a instance or like a meetup in your part of the world, you definitely can reach out to us and we can help you start one.
[01:34:02.740 --> 01:34:06.220]  Um, we, we have a very collaborative, um, style.
[01:34:06.640 --> 01:34:10.920]  So, um, you know, we really, we really support communities.
[01:34:11.000 --> 01:34:25.900]  So if you're interested in starting one in your city, like, um, not only will we help you, but we also allow you to, um, kind of get really involved with the process of, um, kind of fleshing out TA-3M.
[01:34:26.020 --> 01:34:28.940]  We call it TA-3M for short, um, from the very beginning.
[01:34:28.940 --> 01:34:34.440]  Um, so it's a really, you know, I come from open source, so I can say this.
[01:34:34.680 --> 01:34:36.620]  Some tech environments can be very harsh.
[01:34:37.180 --> 01:34:41.900]  Um, we really try and create an environment where it's fun for organizers.
[01:34:42.380 --> 01:34:44.440]  It's fun for the people that are volunteering.
[01:34:44.860 --> 01:34:46.420]  And we really look at diversity.
[01:34:47.020 --> 01:34:48.000]  Um, I am a Latina.
[01:34:48.220 --> 01:34:49.100]  I grew up in New York City.
[01:34:49.300 --> 01:34:57.760]  And so I'm really conscientious of that because we want to make sure that everyone feels, you know, welcomed and, um, you know, safe to talk and be themselves.
[01:34:58.500 --> 01:35:01.440]  So, um, that's also, like, a big thing for us.
[01:35:01.560 --> 01:35:03.780]  Um, and it's, you know, it's been working out really well.
[01:35:04.260 --> 01:35:04.620]  Absolutely.
[01:35:04.760 --> 01:35:15.460]  We, we try and, uh, foster the same sort of, uh, environment at Hope where everyone, no matter what their, uh, level of expertise, can get together and, uh, and learn things and share, share what they know and, uh, and commiserate.
[01:35:15.460 --> 01:35:15.460]  Great.
[01:35:15.600 --> 01:35:24.220]  So what's, uh, I hear, I hear a lot about, uh, the work you guys do on, on all levels from, like, small, uh, local things to sort of internationally, uh, reaching things.
[01:35:24.760 --> 01:35:32.160]  Um, what's, what's, uh, um, can you give us some more examples of the sort of, uh, the sort of, um, things that, uh, that your organization does?
[01:35:33.580 --> 01:35:34.820]  Yeah, sure.
[01:35:35.120 --> 01:35:41.180]  So, um, uh, recently there was an event in San Francisco called RightsCon.
[01:35:41.180 --> 01:35:47.220]  Uh, and, uh, we hosted what we call the UX Hackathon or a UX Sprint, I should say.
[01:35:47.480 --> 01:36:03.840]  And so what it was, it was a space where, um, you know, projects, these tools, could go and meet with UX experts as well as, um, you know, people that use these tools and kind of get an idea of what was working and not working.
[01:36:03.860 --> 01:36:09.260]  And through the UX Sprint, um, you know, a lot of tools were able to kind of, they kind of had an aha moment.
[01:36:09.260 --> 01:36:10.800]  They're like, oh, I get it.
[01:36:10.900 --> 01:36:12.940]  This makes sense because I'm technical.
[01:36:13.240 --> 01:36:16.080]  And of course, like, this process makes sense for me.
[01:36:16.200 --> 01:36:20.660]  But this sense doesn't make sense for you because you don't know, like, what SQL is or whatever.
[01:36:20.900 --> 01:36:23.160]  Like, so it was a really, really successful event.
[01:36:23.540 --> 01:36:26.480]  Um, there's a lady, um, that works in my office.
[01:36:26.700 --> 01:36:27.980]  Her name is Gus Andrews.
[01:36:28.080 --> 01:36:30.400]  She's actually really, also really involved with Hope.
[01:36:30.600 --> 01:36:33.660]  She actually used to be part of this show at one point.
[01:36:33.740 --> 01:36:34.380]  Yes, of course.
[01:36:34.380 --> 01:36:43.060]  Um, and she's going to, she's going to have like a UX, um, like a UX, um, why can't I think of the word?
[01:36:43.400 --> 01:36:46.180]  Uh, like a UX kind of table at Hope.
[01:36:46.380 --> 01:36:53.120]  So people, if they want to help and they want to contribute, you know, if you don't really want to volunteer and spend a lot of hours, you are going to be at Hope.
[01:36:53.120 --> 01:37:00.860]  So the least you could do is just spend five minutes kind of playing with the tools and giving us feedback on what's working and what's not working.
[01:37:01.020 --> 01:37:06.000]  So I really encourage people that are going to be at Hope to stop by, um, the noisy square.
[01:37:06.180 --> 01:37:08.800]  It's going to be housed at the noisy square table.
[01:37:09.020 --> 01:37:10.860]  Um, and again, her name is Gus Andrews.
[01:37:10.900 --> 01:37:11.880]  Yes, she's part of the show.
[01:37:12.000 --> 01:37:16.000]  So I really encourage you guys, um, to reach out and give your input.
[01:37:16.000 --> 01:37:20.140]  I should point out for those who don't recognize the acronym UX, uh, is user experience.
[01:37:20.140 --> 01:37:26.420]  It's what happens when somebody sits down in front of a software or something else and has to make use of it.
[01:37:26.600 --> 01:37:33.700]  So working on the UX end of things is something that's often neglected when in a world of just, uh, hardcore programmers and coders and geeks.
[01:37:34.060 --> 01:37:40.940]  Whereas it's, it's the most important thing for anyone else who's going to sit down in front of the thing and try and, uh, and get the benefit of it.
[01:37:41.200 --> 01:37:42.840]  So it's, it's definitely important.
[01:37:42.920 --> 01:37:45.140]  It's definitely, um, so you guys are, you guys are coming to Hope.
[01:37:45.720 --> 01:37:49.220]  And, uh, you know, we, we definitely look forward to seeing you there.
[01:37:49.700 --> 01:37:51.800]  Um, have you, have you been to Hope in the past or?
[01:37:52.900 --> 01:37:54.420]  No, it will be my first time.
[01:37:54.600 --> 01:37:55.440]  So I'm quite excited.
[01:37:55.960 --> 01:37:56.320]  Excellent.
[01:37:56.460 --> 01:37:57.640]  Well, welcome ahead of time.
[01:37:58.380 --> 01:37:59.560]  Um, Bernie, what do you think?
[01:38:00.460 --> 01:38:01.200]  I think this is great.
[01:38:01.300 --> 01:38:14.640]  This is a, this is a good example of the kind of material, uh, and, and things you can learn coming to, uh, hope, which stands for hackers on planet earth, which is this July 18th through 20th at the hotel, Pennsylvania.
[01:38:14.960 --> 01:38:20.820]  And for more information about this conference, you can go to hope.net and read a whole lot about it.
[01:38:20.940 --> 01:38:22.260]  You can still register for tickets.
[01:38:22.380 --> 01:38:28.060]  It's as a manual noted earlier, it's still not too late to submit, uh, uh, uh, a talk.
[01:38:28.060 --> 01:38:33.140]  Uh, if you just go to the website and click on speakers, you can learn more about how to submit a talk.
[01:38:33.320 --> 01:38:49.240]  It's a little bit late in the game, but we're still considering submissions or workshop or a project, anything you want to submit, uh, we will try to find room to host it because this is an amazing educational conference with like a hundred speakers, dozens of workshops,
[01:38:49.480 --> 01:38:55.080]  projects and music and art and just amazingness for three days.
[01:38:56.220 --> 01:38:56.660]  Excellent.
[01:38:56.920 --> 01:39:02.820]  So, um, Sandra, where can, uh, where can people go to get more info about, uh, OpenITP and, uh, your events and so on?
[01:39:03.760 --> 01:39:10.060]  Well, for, uh, Techno Activism Third Mondays, uh, they should visit TA3M.net.
[01:39:10.720 --> 01:39:15.740]  And if they're interested in OpenITP work, OpenITP.org.
[01:39:16.100 --> 01:39:21.420]  Um, so those are two, the two websites, TA3M.net and OpenITP.org.
[01:39:22.260 --> 01:39:22.700]  Excellent.
[01:39:22.860 --> 01:39:23.020]  Excellent.
[01:39:23.440 --> 01:39:25.980]  Um, well, I wanna, I wanna, thank you very much for joining us.
[01:39:26.140 --> 01:39:31.440]  We're, uh, probably gonna move on and, uh, read some, uh, more listener mail and, uh, possibly take phone calls if we have time.
[01:39:31.640 --> 01:39:35.960]  Uh, you're welcome to stick around for that if you'd like, uh, Sandra, or, or, uh, we can say goodbye to you now.
[01:39:36.540 --> 01:39:40.760]  Um, but, uh, but yeah, thank you, thank you very much for joining us.
[01:39:41.620 --> 01:39:42.140]  Thank you.
[01:39:42.280 --> 01:39:43.300]  It was a, it was a lot of fun.
[01:39:43.420 --> 01:39:45.340]  I'm really looking forward to seeing you guys at Hope.
[01:39:45.520 --> 01:39:46.500]  And really good job.
[01:39:46.760 --> 01:39:52.840]  I really hope you guys get a lot of, uh, donations tonight because you guys do a phenomenal job and I'm really happy you guys are on the air.
[01:39:53.720 --> 01:39:59.320]  Thank you very much, uh, Sandra Ordonez from OpenITP, the Open Internet Tools Project.
[01:40:00.300 --> 01:40:00.740]  Um...
[01:40:00.740 --> 01:40:14.740]  Of course, if you'd like to make Sandra happy as well as, um, making us happy and making yourself happy by keeping this program and this station on the air, the number 212-209-2950 or the website give2wbai.org.
[01:40:14.860 --> 01:40:17.600]  And of course, that is the digit to rather than the word.
[01:40:18.080 --> 01:40:18.280]  Okay.
[01:40:18.520 --> 01:40:18.800]  Excellent.
[01:40:19.240 --> 01:40:19.380]  Uh, okay.
[01:40:19.440 --> 01:40:22.040]  Another, uh, couple of listener emails, uh, that we've gotten.
[01:40:22.280 --> 01:40:26.460]  Uh, Max writes, is it known what, uh, Jim Vicente's new address is?
[01:40:27.080 --> 01:40:35.860]  Um, we, we spoke a couple of weeks ago about, uh, our colleague, Jim, who, uh, who was on the show, uh, um, in the past and suffered from a stroke.
[01:40:35.860 --> 01:40:39.760]  He also suffered a heart attack in January, and, uh, he was in the hospital for that.
[01:40:39.860 --> 01:40:49.400]  But as soon as we gave out the address for his hospital room for people to send him well wishes, he, um, he immediately left the hospital, um, because he's a slippery character, is our Jim.
[01:40:49.600 --> 01:40:54.720]  But, yes, um, Jim is now at an assisted living facility, and we have permission to give out the address.
[01:40:55.220 --> 01:40:58.480]  Um, it is Madison York Assisted Living.
[01:40:59.040 --> 01:41:03.420]  Attention, Jim Vicente, V-I-C-H-E-N-C-H, room 810.
[01:41:03.980 --> 01:41:11.800]  That's room 810, um, 6180 Woodhaven Boulevard, Flushing, New York, 11374.
[01:41:12.600 --> 01:41:13.020]  And, uh...
[01:41:13.020 --> 01:41:13.280]  And, uh...
[01:41:13.280 --> 01:41:14.560]  Jim is probably listening right now.
[01:41:14.740 --> 01:41:15.920]  He, he probably is.
[01:41:16.120 --> 01:41:16.620]  Uh, hello, Jim.
[01:41:16.840 --> 01:41:17.660]  Always good to, uh...
[01:41:17.660 --> 01:41:18.000]  Hey, Jim.
[01:41:18.840 --> 01:41:19.920]  Always good to talk to him.
[01:41:20.080 --> 01:41:26.740]  And, uh, he was actually at the 2600 meeting a couple of weeks ago, and, uh, looking very fit for someone who suffered a stroke and then a heart attack.
[01:41:26.740 --> 01:41:30.180]  And, uh, yeah, he's, he, he is tough.
[01:41:30.420 --> 01:41:35.340]  And, uh, you know, any well wishes or, or things like that you want to send him, that is the address.
[01:41:35.420 --> 01:41:38.100]  Uh, if you missed it, uh, you can get the mp3 later.
[01:41:38.100 --> 01:41:40.480]  Or you can write down right now really quickly.
[01:41:41.040 --> 01:41:42.200]  Madison, New York, Assisted Living.
[01:41:42.400 --> 01:41:43.280]  Attention, Jim Vachench.
[01:41:43.600 --> 01:41:50.040]  Room 810, 6180 Woodhaven Boulevard, Flushing, New York, 11374.
[01:41:50.940 --> 01:41:54.500]  Um, another email we got, uh, Trent writes, Hey, Bernie S.
[01:41:55.020 --> 01:41:58.480]  Uh, what was the name of that remote application you mentioned you had installed on your Blackberry?
[01:41:58.480 --> 01:42:00.200]  It sounded like Lucid Live Lite.
[01:42:01.880 --> 01:42:06.200]  Yeah, it's, it's, it's Lucy, L-U-C-I, Live Lite.
[01:42:06.840 --> 01:42:14.120]  There's a Lucy Live, which is like a $300 app, but the Lucy Live Lite is the surprisingly light version, which is 30 bucks.
[01:42:14.400 --> 01:42:16.200]  And it's a pretty good client.
[01:42:16.360 --> 01:42:25.480]  It runs on not only the Blackberry 10 operating system, but, uh, uh, iOS, you know, for iPhones and iPods and, uh, and iPads.
[01:42:25.940 --> 01:42:31.120]  And it runs on Windows and Linux and, uh, Mac OS.
[01:42:31.480 --> 01:42:45.700]  It runs on virtually any platform you're likely to run across and enables you to connect with a device called the Comrex BrickLink, which is sitting probably right in front of you at the studio and, uh, provides a, a pretty decent quality audio connection between,
[01:42:45.700 --> 01:42:49.160]  uh, any mobile device or computer and our studio.
[01:42:49.180 --> 01:42:52.060]  So we're glad to have it and, uh, we hope to use it more in the future.
[01:42:52.720 --> 01:42:53.960]  Oh, that's, that's what that is.
[01:42:54.040 --> 01:42:55.040]  I've had my feet up on it.
[01:42:55.040 --> 01:42:55.800]  I thought it was a stool.
[01:42:56.140 --> 01:42:57.820]  Um, I'll, I'll brush that off later.
[01:42:58.380 --> 01:43:05.020]  Uh, so I'm, I'm thinking, uh, maybe we have a little bit of time left in our, in our double length, uh, episode.
[01:43:05.740 --> 01:43:08.560]  Maybe it might be an idea to, uh, take a couple of phone calls.
[01:43:08.940 --> 01:43:14.040]  Um, not just to our pledge line at 212-209-2950.
[01:43:14.520 --> 01:43:23.460]  Although those are the important phone calls that, uh, that keep us alive and on the air, but, uh, maybe some listener phone calls to our regular call in line, uh, 212-209-2900.
[01:43:24.720 --> 01:43:26.700]  And, you know, tell us what's on your mind.
[01:43:26.700 --> 01:43:30.520]  Uh, tell us what, uh, ask us questions and that sort of thing.
[01:43:30.720 --> 01:43:32.700]  I'm not seeing any phone lines light up yet.
[01:43:32.840 --> 01:43:46.540]  While we wait, uh, for those calls to come in, one story that did cross, uh, my attention this week, uh, Chelsea Manning, uh, who of course leaked all those documents to WikiLeaks, uh, and was formerly known as Bradley Manning, there was this bizarre story in the AP that was,
[01:43:46.540 --> 01:44:00.060]  uh, leaked that she is going to be, uh, transferred to a federal prison rather than a federal military prison where she would be able to get, uh, uh, hormone treatment for, for, uh, gender change or sex change.
[01:44:00.060 --> 01:44:13.760]  Um, and then, uh, uh, her lawyer, David Coombs posted this morning that the first he learned of this was from the AP story and that this is not actually what he and Chelsea were asking for.
[01:44:13.900 --> 01:44:17.240]  They were asking for, uh, treatment within the military system.
[01:44:17.600 --> 01:44:24.640]  So it's, uh, a bit of a strange story and one that we will continue to follow still up in the air at the moment as to what will happen.
[01:44:24.640 --> 01:44:25.400]  Okay.
[01:44:25.440 --> 01:44:27.240]  Uh, we've got a couple of phone calls coming in.
[01:44:27.360 --> 01:44:29.680]  Let's, uh, let's see how good a decision this is.
[01:44:29.920 --> 01:44:30.940]  Uh, try this one.
[01:44:31.260 --> 01:44:32.040]  Good evening.
[01:44:32.140 --> 01:44:32.680]  You're on off the hook.
[01:44:32.900 --> 01:44:33.660]  Oh, hi.
[01:44:33.900 --> 01:44:34.140]  Yeah.
[01:44:34.440 --> 01:44:36.020]  Um, I just want to say one thing.
[01:44:36.140 --> 01:44:40.080]  I know last week you were complaining about not being able to get through to that premium line.
[01:44:40.300 --> 01:44:40.660]  Yes, indeed.
[01:44:40.960 --> 01:44:46.260]  And I think you said, somebody there said they called and you know, 20 rings, they finally got through.
[01:44:46.500 --> 01:44:48.300]  Actually, there is a better number to call.
[01:44:48.440 --> 01:44:50.260]  I don't know why they don't give this one out.
[01:44:50.380 --> 01:44:54.600]  I know there's the, the promo that Reggie Johnson does and he gives out that number.
[01:44:55.020 --> 01:44:57.980]  And I, I tried it 20 times and gave up.
[01:44:58.100 --> 01:45:02.160]  So I didn't think anybody answered at all, but there is a better number where they add.
[01:45:02.180 --> 01:45:02.620]  What is it?
[01:45:03.160 --> 01:45:04.200]  After four or five rings.
[01:45:04.380 --> 01:45:19.100]  It's three, four, seven, five, two, nine, six, six, six, four, four, seven, five, two, nine, six, six, six, four, and they have a machine there and they pick up after four or five rings and you give them your information.
[01:45:19.280 --> 01:45:19.960]  They call you back.
[01:45:20.400 --> 01:45:21.520]  So I don't know why.
[01:45:21.640 --> 01:45:23.500]  I tell PI is a little understaffed now.
[01:45:23.680 --> 01:45:28.060]  We like phone numbers here on Off the Hook, so thank you very much for giving us that information.
[01:45:28.320 --> 01:45:28.900]  Okay, good luck.
[01:45:29.020 --> 01:45:31.900]  And we encourage people who need it to make use of it.
[01:45:32.500 --> 01:45:33.720]  Let's see who else is out there.
[01:45:34.720 --> 01:45:35.460]  Good evening.
[01:45:35.780 --> 01:45:36.460]  You're on Off the Hook.
[01:45:37.640 --> 01:45:38.240]  Hey there.
[01:45:38.820 --> 01:45:45.540]  I wanted to ask you guys if you saw the NSA special on WGBH Frontline last night.
[01:45:46.400 --> 01:45:47.040]  I did.
[01:45:47.480 --> 01:45:48.340]  Bernie, how was it?
[01:45:48.880 --> 01:45:50.400]  Yeah, it was at PBS Frontline.
[01:45:50.580 --> 01:45:51.460]  It wasn't just on WGBH.
[01:45:51.720 --> 01:45:55.100]  It was on most of the PBS affiliates, PBS Frontline.
[01:45:55.220 --> 01:45:59.260]  It's a pretty good investigative journalism TV show that's been around for like 20 years.
[01:45:59.400 --> 01:46:04.060]  But it was, I think it was called Nation of Secrets or something along those lines.
[01:46:04.200 --> 01:46:12.480]  It was a two-hour special about the whole history of this recent NSA skullduggery over the past 10 years or so.
[01:46:12.660 --> 01:46:13.800]  And it was fascinating.
[01:46:14.020 --> 01:46:17.740]  I don't think I learned much from a technical standpoint about the programs that were happening.
[01:46:17.740 --> 01:46:39.140]  But it was interesting to hear about all the political stuff that was going on as far as how the Bush administration really strong and ardent pressure the New York Times to prevent them from reporting about the mass unwarrantless wiretapping of American citizens until after the 2004 election.
[01:46:40.820 --> 01:46:41.980]  Which they dutifully complied to, right?
[01:46:42.840 --> 01:46:43.300]  I'm sorry?
[01:46:43.620 --> 01:46:45.880]  Which they dutifully complied with.
[01:46:45.880 --> 01:46:57.220]  Yes, the Times did, which is actually an interesting reason that that is the reason that Ed Snowden, who had a very dim view of the Times for having buckled down to the White House, keeping this a secret.
[01:46:57.780 --> 01:47:01.980]  He didn't release all these leaked documents, Ed Snowden, to the Times.
[01:47:02.120 --> 01:47:03.960]  He went to other news journalism outlets.
[01:47:04.100 --> 01:47:17.620]  So I hope that is a lesson to the Times and any other news organization that would believe the lies from the White House or any other government agent saying, oh, it'll destroy the world, blood will be on your hands if you report this story, which is exactly what they were told.
[01:47:17.620 --> 01:47:22.640]  Well, those critical people, David Addington is the critical guy.
[01:47:22.820 --> 01:47:27.540]  He's still out there, and he's really kind of a war criminal and should be charged as such.
[01:47:28.320 --> 01:47:39.500]  Beyond that, I just wanted to say that the precedent of the Times not reporting a story involving NSA is also related to the Ron Pelton story, P-E-L-T-O-N.
[01:47:39.500 --> 01:47:48.540]  And Ron Pelton was an NSA employee who went to the Soviets in 1984 and discussed a program called Ivy Bells.
[01:47:48.900 --> 01:48:00.180]  And Ivy Bells was the underwater cable tapping device that the NSA had produced to tap Soviet cables that carried military traffic.
[01:48:00.780 --> 01:48:21.960]  And for a long time, the New York Times sat on that story, and in fact, Casey, who was then the head of the CIA, came and threatened the New York Times with closure and told them that if they published this story, it would do grave damage to the national security of the United States and all that.
[01:48:22.080 --> 01:48:23.800]  And in fact, the New York Times did.
[01:48:24.020 --> 01:48:27.400]  After a while, after a slight embargo, they did go ahead and publish that.
[01:48:27.400 --> 01:48:31.760]  And that cable tapping device is on display in Moscow.
[01:48:32.460 --> 01:48:32.980]  Fascinating.
[01:48:32.980 --> 01:48:34.240]  You can go and have a look at the thing.
[01:48:34.440 --> 01:48:35.940]  And in fact, the James E.
[01:48:36.140 --> 01:48:47.260]  Carter submarine, which is one of the latest to join the fleet, I think, in 2010 or 11, has a special pod that was built in.
[01:48:47.860 --> 01:48:50.380]  It's sort of like a stretch aircraft.
[01:48:50.380 --> 01:49:04.160]  What they did was they built most of the submarine in Groton, Connecticut, and then they brought in this special NSA additional pod, which was installed between the hull sections to expand the overall length of the submarine.
[01:49:04.340 --> 01:49:19.500]  And that pod has a very special application for getting into fiber optics on the bottom of the ocean and having man-workable access to the cables to tap these things.
[01:49:19.560 --> 01:49:31.680]  So I urge people to pay a lot of attention to this, because this undersea cable tapping is a present and future thing to stay abreast of.
[01:49:31.800 --> 01:49:33.400]  It's definitely worth keeping an eye on.
[01:49:33.800 --> 01:49:36.420]  Watch the next one, which comes up next Tuesday.
[01:49:36.420 --> 01:49:39.540]  It's the second part of this series.
[01:49:40.600 --> 01:49:42.400]  Right, Tuesday at 9 o'clock, I believe.
[01:49:43.000 --> 01:49:43.620]  That's correct.
[01:49:43.800 --> 01:49:47.640]  Right, and PBS, I believe, puts their programs up on the web for viewing as well, on their website.
[01:49:47.980 --> 01:49:49.000]  I think they do.
[01:49:49.160 --> 01:49:52.300]  So you can actually go back and see what they were talking about.
[01:49:52.400 --> 01:49:53.780]  I think it was a very good presentation.
[01:49:53.800 --> 01:49:58.220]  I'm amazed that they got Michael Hayden to talk and see what he did.
[01:49:58.760 --> 01:50:02.860]  And also, you know, Tom Drake and Bill Binney, these guys are famous.
[01:50:03.560 --> 01:50:06.820]  Yeah, Bill Binney was one of our keynote speakers at the most recent HOPE conference.
[01:50:07.040 --> 01:50:07.260]  Indeed.
[01:50:07.260 --> 01:50:08.120]  That's fantastic.
[01:50:08.380 --> 01:50:23.280]  And I hope you talked about, you know, the Stellar Wind and Thin Thread, which they talked about, and some of these programs, which, you know, have a direct and very clear connection to what Ed Snowden was releasing.
[01:50:23.620 --> 01:50:25.360]  So it's all very good.
[01:50:25.600 --> 01:50:30.680]  And it really does, you know, if you talk about the open Internet, this is what has to be endorsed.
[01:50:30.680 --> 01:50:33.000]  And strong encryption has to be endorsed.
[01:50:33.960 --> 01:50:40.200]  And we have to watch the NSA because they lie through their teeth, and then they lie through their teeth again.
[01:50:40.380 --> 01:50:40.820]  You're kidding.
[01:50:41.140 --> 01:50:44.280]  And it goes back to 75 in the Church Committee hearings.
[01:50:44.420 --> 01:51:01.900]  And that's really the original, you know, line that they did in the breaking of the Constitution that they did back then, which formed in 1978, the FISA and the FISC, they were directly formed because of those, you know, overturns of information.
[01:51:02.100 --> 01:51:02.380]  Right.
[01:51:02.520 --> 01:51:06.680]  Which they have since co-opted completely at this point, it seems.
[01:51:06.680 --> 01:51:07.820]  That's correct.
[01:51:07.980 --> 01:51:20.760]  They were actually discussing, and Mr. Greenwald, in his new book, discusses the fact that the FISC actually gave blanket authority, apparently on a judge's discretion, to eavesdrop on countries.
[01:51:21.140 --> 01:51:41.500]  And they were doing that at the UN to serve Susan Rice's appetite for advanced information on a particular chartered vote that was coming up in the UN and four of the countries that were not covered by NSA surveillance were actually brought in through the FISC.
[01:51:41.640 --> 01:51:45.660]  And that is a total abrogation of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act.
[01:51:45.920 --> 01:51:55.160]  Well, then one of the judges signed a general warrant to authorize the warrantless wire, a general warrant to authorize mass wiretapping of Americans.
[01:51:55.160 --> 01:51:59.760]  So it's like the court serves no purpose other than just to rubber stamp.
[01:51:59.920 --> 01:52:03.040]  They've almost never said no to any request.
[01:52:03.280 --> 01:52:03.520]  Right.
[01:52:03.780 --> 01:52:06.160]  Okay, well, caller, thank you very much for your call.
[01:52:06.180 --> 01:52:08.080]  We're going to move on, but thank you for calling.
[01:52:09.620 --> 01:52:11.160]  Okay, let's see who else is out there.
[01:52:12.060 --> 01:52:12.640]  Good evening.
[01:52:13.420 --> 01:52:14.440]  You're not on off the hook.
[01:52:14.540 --> 01:52:14.900]  Good evening.
[01:52:15.020 --> 01:52:15.640]  You're on off the hook.
[01:52:16.260 --> 01:52:16.920]  Hi there.
[01:52:17.680 --> 01:52:27.280]  I'm an old-time broadcaster, and before I was screaming at my radio, 640 and 1240, regarding the old Conorad system.
[01:52:27.660 --> 01:52:44.100]  And I wanted to explain to you, I know this is trivial compared to the last caller, which was excellent, by the way, but the old Conorad system used to work by having area AM broadcasters actually swap out coils in their transmitters.
[01:52:44.220 --> 01:52:44.680]  Thank you.
[01:52:44.680 --> 01:52:47.700]  So they would load into one of those frequencies.
[01:52:47.700 --> 01:52:48.800]  Thank you.
[01:52:48.940 --> 01:52:49.820]  I wondered how they did that.
[01:52:49.920 --> 01:52:50.800]  That answers my question.
[01:52:51.140 --> 01:53:05.880]  The fear was, at the time, that domestic AM radio stations would be used in the same way they used to guide airplanes, which would be to actually track to the radio station in order to deliver their bombs.
[01:53:05.880 --> 01:53:27.120]  So what they had was that five-second thing that you mentioned used to not only be the code that would trigger the system, but the stations that were assigned would actually switch transmitters on and off so that they would provide a continuous signal to the listener,
[01:53:27.120 --> 01:53:41.800]  but in fact they would be coming from different directions every five seconds so that any incoming missile or plane dropping would be confused as to where the target was.
[01:53:42.000 --> 01:53:42.340]  Wow.
[01:53:42.400 --> 01:53:44.500]  So it was like a really slow frequency hopping scheme.
[01:53:44.680 --> 01:53:46.080]  That's exactly what it was.
[01:53:46.200 --> 01:53:46.420]  Wow.
[01:53:46.560 --> 01:53:48.200]  Manually by swapping out coils.
[01:53:48.500 --> 01:53:49.520]  That's really interesting.
[01:53:49.520 --> 01:54:08.580]  Yeah, and they had all the stations that were participating had to maintain the set of tuned coils that would work on either 640 or 1240 and then be able to trigger in a sequence on and off so that the planes, the enemy planes, wouldn't know where to bomb.
[01:54:09.240 --> 01:54:10.040]  Very interesting.
[01:54:10.640 --> 01:54:12.420]  Thank you very much for the information, caller.
[01:54:12.620 --> 01:54:15.740]  Okay, you guys have the best show that there is.
[01:54:16.020 --> 01:54:17.160]  Thank you very much.
[01:54:17.720 --> 01:54:17.960]  Okay, bye-bye.
[01:54:18.020 --> 01:54:18.760]  We're pleased to hear it.
[01:54:19.280 --> 01:54:20.340]  On that note...
[01:54:20.340 --> 01:54:23.860]  Yeah, if you agree with that, caller, help keep us alive, keep us on the air.
[01:54:24.040 --> 01:54:25.740]  Even if you think we're merely good.
[01:54:26.040 --> 01:54:32.220]  Even if you think we're mediocre, call 1-212-209-2950 and support Off the Hook.
[01:54:32.380 --> 01:54:36.680]  Or go to give, the numeral 2, wbai.org, and support Off the Hook.
[01:54:37.100 --> 01:54:40.760]  Because that is all that can keep us alive over here.
[01:54:41.620 --> 01:54:42.960]  We have a little bit of time left.
[01:54:43.060 --> 01:54:45.420]  We're going to try and sneak in a couple more phone calls if we can.
[01:54:46.240 --> 01:54:46.960]  Very good evening.
[01:54:47.080 --> 01:54:47.680]  You're on Off the Hook.
[01:54:48.220 --> 01:54:49.100]  Yes, hello.
[01:54:49.560 --> 01:54:49.960]  Hello.
[01:54:50.800 --> 01:54:51.920]  I'd like to say...
[01:54:51.920 --> 01:54:52.040]  Tom.
[01:54:52.540 --> 01:54:52.960]  Hello?
[01:54:53.540 --> 01:54:53.960]  I'd like to say...
[01:54:53.960 --> 01:54:54.980]  Is it Tom from the Bronx?
[01:54:55.220 --> 01:54:55.960]  Yes, it is.
[01:54:56.160 --> 01:54:56.560]  Hello.
[01:54:56.840 --> 01:55:13.740]  I'd like to say that some time ago, I wrote the FCC, and I had said that there are a lot of blind people that have lost the ability to have TV on their TV radios that do not work anymore.
[01:55:14.320 --> 01:55:31.900]  And I said, why not take, to make it inexpensive, why not take a radio station that may be faltering a bit, and to try to have X amount of TV shows per day put on the station.
[01:55:32.400 --> 01:55:34.760]  In other words, and it would draw advertising.
[01:55:36.060 --> 01:55:36.900]  In other words...
[01:55:36.900 --> 01:55:39.380]  You mean on the old analog TV frequencies?
[01:55:39.540 --> 01:55:40.020]  Is that what you mean?
[01:55:41.540 --> 01:55:44.020]  Well, right on the radio, right over the radio.
[01:55:44.700 --> 01:55:46.820]  Oh, you mean put TV programming over the radio?
[01:55:46.880 --> 01:55:46.960]  Yeah.
[01:55:47.060 --> 01:55:51.620]  You used to be able to listen to Channel 6 on like 88.1 MHz or something.
[01:55:52.700 --> 01:55:55.020]  But yeah, actually, that would be a good idea.
[01:55:55.180 --> 01:55:59.560]  In other words, there's people that are blind, and they've been cut off from it.
[01:55:59.640 --> 01:55:59.980]  Yeah.
[01:56:00.080 --> 01:56:01.580]  If they don't have enough money to get...
[01:56:01.580 --> 01:56:02.260]  You can't buy a radio...
[01:56:02.260 --> 01:56:07.320]  You used to be able to buy radios that would tune to the audio carrier of TV stations, but you can't anymore.
[01:56:07.480 --> 01:56:11.360]  Since digital TV came out, I have not seen a single radio that let you tune TV audio.
[01:56:11.380 --> 01:56:12.280]  It's really a shame.
[01:56:12.680 --> 01:56:17.960]  Anyway, I wrote to them, and they wrote me back, and they said they gave it a number.
[01:56:19.220 --> 01:56:32.020]  And they launched the missile up, and they've got it going around the world, but nothing has ever been done with it.
[01:56:32.020 --> 01:56:32.200]  Okay.
[01:56:32.900 --> 01:56:34.080]  Keep calling the FCC.
[01:56:34.420 --> 01:56:34.880]  Absolutely.
[01:56:35.160 --> 01:56:37.600]  And on that note, I'm going to say goodnight.
[01:56:37.740 --> 01:56:39.680]  Thank you very much, caller Tom from the Bronx.
[01:56:39.780 --> 01:56:40.680]  Always nice hearing from him.
[01:56:40.940 --> 01:56:47.460]  I'd like to thank our guests, Sandra Adonos from OpenITP.org, Bicycle Mark.
[01:56:47.460 --> 01:56:52.000]  Over there in Europe land, Emmanuel was technically a guest today.
[01:56:52.780 --> 01:56:54.160]  Thank you guys here in the studio.
[01:56:54.780 --> 01:56:57.320]  Send us email, othat2600.com.
[01:56:57.920 --> 01:56:58.860]  Support our show.
[01:56:59.120 --> 01:57:08.200]  Even if we're not live broadcasting, you can still support us by calling 212-209-2950, or give the numeral to WBAI.org, and supporting Off The Hook.
[01:57:09.540 --> 01:57:10.320]  This is Rob T.
[01:57:10.400 --> 01:57:11.680]  Firefly for Off The Hook saying goodnight.
[01:57:11.920 --> 01:57:12.080]  Goodnight.
[01:57:42.600 --> 01:57:44.620]  Stand up.
[01:57:45.040 --> 01:57:47.140]  Where do you want to go?
[01:57:49.940 --> 01:57:55.020]  It's time to chart directions we don't know.
[01:57:58.260 --> 01:58:02.420]  Can I find a brand new place to hide?
[01:58:05.320 --> 01:58:12.000]  A precious silence, fading sun, It's both of us inside.
[01:58:13.600 --> 01:58:18.520]  All of us doesn't mean a thing.
[01:58:20.060 --> 01:58:24.800]  It's the land and the blind, the white man is king.