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And a very, very good evening to everybody.
The program is Off The Hook.
Emanuel Goldstein here with you, joined tonight by Kyle.
Hello, hackers.
Rob T. Firefly.
Good evening.
Gila.
Hello.
And Alex.
Good evening, everyone.
You notice how I incorporate everybody as if we're in the studio.
I didn't say the Skype people.
Now you don't know who's on Skype and who isn't.
You can't tell.
It's seamless.
We are finally, after a year, we've achieved seamlessness here on Off The Hook.
Welcome, everybody.
We are in the midst of it all, mid-February, the middle of winter, snow everywhere.
And the pandemic rages on.
But, you know, I feel like we're getting somewhere.
I feel like we're rounding a curve and things are starting to improve.
We're going to go into some detail for people trying to get vaccines because we know a lot of people are trying to get those vaccines right now.
And soon a lot more people will be joining them as the qualifications open up.
I myself had quite a lot of experiences over the past few days because I wound up qualifying due to a comorbidity,
a word I still can't get used to, in the form of asthma, which I never was happy to have.
But in this particular case, it served me.
I was able to get an appointment.
It wasn't easy.
It wasn't easy.
And I know for some people it's damn near impossible.
We're going to try to help you out and help you think like a hacker and come up with ways to make the system work for you.
That's what it's all about.
Anyone out there have any experiences they wish to share?
Go ahead, Gila.
I am eligible.
I became eligible earlier this week.
But apparently in my quest to get an appointment, the information about this week's eligibility has not been as widely shared as one would hope.
And I have tried a couple of times to get appointments.
They're like, no, you're not eligible.
Go away.
Okay.
I think I know what happened.
And you know what?
Let's make it our goal to get Gila an appointment by the end of the show.
How about that?
Or, you know, whatever.
But who told you that?
Now, not the name of the person, but what kind of person?
Oh, no, not a person.
A person did not tell me.
A couple of websites for national drugstore chains told me to go away.
Exactly.
The drugstore chains are not using the same qualifications as the states.
For instance, New York State has the comorbidities, but drugstore chains only 65 plus.
Interesting.
Yeah.
It took me a full day to figure that out.
They don't exactly tell you.
So you will not be able to get an appointment through a drugstore if you're not over 65 years old.
However, you can get one through New York City or through New York State and presumably through other states as well.
You can find it through New York because that's where we are.
But we're more than happy on overtime at 8 o'clock.
If people want to call in with any questions for their particular state, we'll try to help out as far as giving advice on that as well.
Excellent.
Yes.
Rob, did you have something?
Were you just waving your hand?
I did not.
I was doing something else.
While I've got the mic, it's very interesting because I, too, have comorbidities, but I have not heard about my eligibility.
Gila did.
I'm not saying that people like her better than me, but I certainly do.
Oh, no.
I didn't hear about it.
I just went through and said, oh, I'm eligible now, and I went for it.
Okay.
So that's what happened.
It's of interest, and, of course, I'm ready and willing to go wherever they tell me to get this done, but I have not heard anything as of yet.
I have had messages from my medical providers and things that say things like we will let you know as soon as there's anything to tell you.
Please don't call us and tie up our lines because I imagine everyone's calling them and tying up their lines.
Okay.
Well, let's start with New York City for the people in the five boroughs.
Unfortunately, residency is a requirement in this particular case.
I don't really understand the point of that because, you know, if you're here, you should be able to get the vaccine.
It doesn't matter where you're from, and everyone should pretty much have the same level of access.
It shouldn't be easier to get a vaccine in one state over another, and it would be ridiculous to expect somebody to go back.
Let's say somebody from Florida was here, but they can't get it here.
They have to go back home.
It's ridiculous.
You should be able to get it wherever you are.
It's a great point because they don't have any less of an impact on public health to people who are here.
Exactly.
It's better for everybody.
Yeah.
I mean, what are we going to say for undocumented people?
You can't get a vaccine because you're not documented?
Does that make any sense?
So it's okay for people to get COVID because some people don't like immigrants.
Don't get me started.
I'll take up the whole hour just thinking about that.
Yes, Rob?
It's not only a matter of immigrants.
What about the people in the city, the thousands of people in the city experiencing homelessness, which puts them at so much more risk, especially at this time of year, but also for COVID?
Absolutely.
Alex, did you have something?
Go ahead.
Yeah, sure.
I've dealt with this in three different states, in New York and Pennsylvania, and assisting my mother in Florida.
My mother in Florida was able to get the vaccine, but she had to spend probably a grand total of, I would guess, six to seven hours on hold calling various places.
And my stepfather was going through the VA to get his shots, and I think he gave up on that endeavor because it was just a complete runaround the entire time.
Really?
One of the things I have noticed, though, is that, as you had mentioned, Emmanuel, the comorbidities are often changing.
They're not necessarily reflected in the scheduling systems that are being used by the various medical centers or the pharmacies.
Places like Rite Aid or Duane Reade may have different criteria, which raises the issue, then.
If you know that your state has changed the comorbidity requirements and you fit into one of those comorbidities, meaning you have asthma or you're a smoker, et cetera, whatever the criteria are,
is it okay, then, to schedule yourself a vaccine appointment by saying something erroneous, like you're over 65 and then taking an appointment at Rite Aid or a local pharmacy in order to get the vaccine?
I don't know.
Do you think they would refuse you?
I'm not sure.
There are a lot of open-ended questions.
Well, I think you'd have to present the ID that proved you were over 65, for one thing.
Well, but they should be delivering or doling out the vaccines to anybody who fits the eligibility criteria, not just people who are over 65.
Right, but if you're using that as the reason why you're getting the vaccine, they're going to want some backup as to – you can't just stroll in as an 18-year-old and say you're over 65.
That's not going to work.
Let's say you're an 18-year-old who has a suppressed immune system, which would make you eligible for the vaccine.
You can only find an appointment, let's say, at your local pharmacy.
So, you state at the time of making the appointment that you're over 65, you show up with documentation about your comorbidities.
I wonder if they would refuse you.
If you showed up at a time where they were not accepting people with those comorbidities, no, they would not accept you.
So, that's something I would not advise doing that.
It's part of the way it was designed.
I think that they are doing specific age groups for certain retail outlets that are administering this.
The other criteria is being implemented now, I think, as of this week, right?
I mean, that's what we're talking about.
And then the locations for that are distinct from what you're talking about at like a CVS or a retail place.
As far as I know, it's the same, and correct me if I'm wrong, it's the same throughout the country on the state level,
where the comorbidities are being accepted there, but not the drug stores.
That's my understanding.
I might be wrong.
Maybe some states aren't.
Yes, Alex?
No, that actually is incorrect, because in Pennsylvania, they are accepting comorbidities that are actually quite different than in New York.
Being a smoker or using tobacco products is considered a comorbidity that will make you eligible.
You know, I got into a fight with a friend of mine about this, because I was saying I don't think it's fair for smokers to cut the line.
And I took exception with that, saying that it's a medical condition.
Smoking is not a medical condition.
Smoking is a decision.
Lung cancer is a medical condition.
And anybody who has emphysema or any smoking-related disease, yeah, I see that as a medical reason.
But let's just stop someone from just saying, hey, you know what?
I'm going to start smoking today.
I'm a smoker.
I qualify.
Move aside, Grandpa.
I'm getting my shot.
It's super disingenuous.
They can't say that.
I don't think that's fair.
I know that's controversial, but I don't think that's fair.
Well, look, I think the comorbidities are listed there for a particular reason.
And having your lungs in some sort of suppressed state because of continued smoking, I think, makes sense as a comorbidity.
And I would guess that other states will probably follow suit after there is a greater population of the over 65s that are being inoculated for the vaccine as well.
I mean, I was concerned about it.
But I think this is a really great point, I think, to make here.
And it reminds me of reading privacy policies.
But when you're going through the vaccine scheduling process in that system, it is extraordinarily important to read what those comorbidities are.
Because it's just presented to you as this giant block of text with copious amounts of words that are at least three or four syllables each, maybe sometimes five.
And you really have to read that list.
If you look at that list and you examine it, you may have some of these underlying conditions.
Like, Emmanuel, you mentioned once they opened it up to asthma, then you became eligible.
And, look, I think that that's great.
And I think that the more that we are opening up the comorbidities for vaccine appointments, the better off we're going to be.
Because we need the greatest amount of people in the shortest amount of time to get vaccinated to prevent variants from emerging from the virus itself.
What you say is correct as long as we have supply.
If we run out of supply, then it doesn't matter how many people we open it up to, not enough people will be getting it.
That's true, too.
I mean, I think that there is some ethical obligation on the part of the schedulers to only provide appointments when there are supplies.
Because I've heard stories of people getting canceled on, you know, six or seven times.
And I think, you know, perseverance is also key here.
You know, if at first you don't succeed, try, try again.
Just keep going at it.
You know, another thing that I've found with regard to the vaccine scheduling systems is that so many of them are so disparately designed.
There's no consistent design through any of these, but except being a real pain in the butt to use on a mobile device.
And so if you've only got a phone, I was trying to schedule somebody an appointment for the last two days on my mobile phone in Pennsylvania.
And it was extraordinarily difficult because you had to navigate through this really crowded map of all of the pharmacies in your area,
pick one, and then determine whether or not that particular pharmacy had any vaccine appointments that were available.
And if that one didn't have any appointments that were available, then you had to click on the next one.
Then you had to click on the next one.
It didn't just show you all of the appointments that were available within your particular region.
You had to click on every single one, which on a mobile device, on a phone, was a real pain.
Yeah.
And it took a long time.
And another tip in scheduling a vaccine appointment for someone was that if you get an appointment, by the time you actually fill out all of the details,
all of the personally identifying information about your name, your age, your weight, et cetera, comorbidities, the appointment may be gone.
So you have to move really, really quickly.
You have to act like these are tickets for Billy Joel of Madison Square Garden at the end of the pandemic or something, or Hope tickets, right?
Well, it's interesting you say that because I'm looking at my ticket.
I got a ticket for an appointment.
It's not until April, too, by the way.
So you might have to wait a while.
And it's not anywhere near where I am.
Sometimes you have to travel.
But it says event information when it's listing my appointment.
So this is software that's used for some kind of events, obviously.
I don't know if this is Eventbrite or Ticketmaster or what.
It has to be.
It really does.
I mean, it's the logical thing to kind of adapt quickly to scheduling these kinds of things.
Yeah.
If we can identify what software they're actually using, well, then people who know how to use that software can have an advantage.
Identifying the software based on certain types of wording, I think, is important to share.
Alex?
Yeah.
It probably was Eventbrite that was used to make your appointment manual.
And that's something that I've seen.
And there's been some reporting on this, too, I think, by Vice, that Eventbrite has been used to schedule these appointments.
And, in fact, while I was investigating a bunch of vaccine scheduling-related registrations in the DNS,
because I'm monitoring all domains that have the string VACCIN in them,
and as we've discussed in the show, in going through some of the scheduling systems that we found,
in Florida in particular at retirement communities or communities for older persons,
they were relying entirely on Eventbrite to do the scheduling.
And it's well known that you can script certain bots to go and take up appointments on Eventbrite systems.
I find that extraordinarily dangerous.
The one saving grace is that because these systems are so desperate
and there's no one centralized database of vaccine appointments,
it would be difficult to script a bot to take up all of the vaccine appointments on every single system without a tremendous amount of effort.
That kind of effort can be put in by a malicious actor.
Somebody who's a notorious anti-vaxxer could do something like that,
and that would affect a distributed denial of vaccination.
Exactly. And what you say is very true as far as having different systems in different places.
That's a big advantage, because if it was just one system,
then that system would be open to attack and completely being crippled by a successful attack,
whereas having multiple smaller systems in specific places, they're each vulnerable in their own ways.
We will certainly see those bad actors taking down a system or two
or making so that people can't get appointments and nobody is showing up.
And by the way, you're monitoring the word vaccine.
You should also be monitoring VAX as well, because most of these sites have that in their URLs.
That's a good point, and I think I will add to that tonight.
All right. Now, we said we're going to do New York City.
So let's at least start with that and see where we get.
The website for New York City is vax4nyc, the number four.
That's vax4nyc.nyc.gov.
So if anybody wants to type along with me, we'll go through this together.
And we find ourselves at a page that's an appointment scheduler,
and they basically ask how can we help you today, schedule first dose, schedule second dose,
which seems odd because I think you schedule the second dose when you get the first dose,
and reschedule appointment, cancel appointment.
So let's schedule our first dose.
So we click on that, and then we get a list of eligibilities, including the comorbidities.
So basically, you just have to say that, yes, you qualify, and that you're not lying.
And I'm not lying here.
Actually, you're supposed to check off how you qualify or if you have a comorbidity
and then say that you're not lying, and then click next.
And then you go to the next page, and then you have to say you're not a robot.
Okay.
You have to say you're not a robot and also give your full name.
Now, we're just going to make a test name here, and it's not going to actually mean anything.
We're not going to make an appointment.
So we have a test name.
Today's date shows next to it.
I've said I'm not a robot, and now I'm clicking next.
Okay.
I didn't certify.
I have to certify something that I'm not a robot.
Okay.
Now I click on next.
Okay.
I'm not sure what's happening.
Okay.
It keeps unchecking these boxes.
No, I have not had an allergic reaction to vaccines in the past.
I'm going to click next again.
Hopefully it works this time.
Yes.
No appointments are currently available.
So here's the trick.
If you get to this page where it says schedule an appointment, start search on 2-17-21.
You'll see next to it is a zip code field, which is blank.
This is the trick.
If you fill in that zip code field with five digits, let's pick a New York City zip code.
Any favorites?
Alex?
Go ahead, Gail.
How about 1-0-0-0-1?
1-0-0-0-1.
That's a good one.
Okay.
Now you type in these numbers slowly.
1-0-0-0.
Then when you type the 1, you're going to notice that the page refreshes.
Again, it says no appointments are currently available.
But instead of having to go back, as the previous button below it implies you have to do,
all you have to do is hit backspace and type that 1 again.
The same thing will keep happening.
It will keep checking.
Now, I'm going to keep doing that.
I'm not going to keep doing it for the whole show.
I tried that earlier, and within five minutes an appointment showed up.
But you have to move fast when those appointments show up.
You'll see a time, and you'll see a button to go to the next page.
You have to click both of those buttons almost instantly in order to get that appointment
because there are many people doing the same thing.
But the fact is it works, and you will get an appointment this way if you just keep trying that.
So it's not that difficult.
I wonder if the information that you gave earlier, you know, I gave a test name,
if that's carried over or if you have to just enter your info from scratch afterwards.
So you might not need to enter valid info to get to this point.
Go ahead, Alex.
So if you were to put it, this is a really fascinating trick, hack of yours.
I just discovered it by accident.
I think it's great.
I think it's fantastic advice that can help a lot of people here.
And maybe one of these things that's, you know, a feature, not a bug.
Oh, I just got an appointment.
Capsule Pharmacy, a teacher's preparatory high school, and that's for February 20th at 1130 a.m.
I would have to click 1130 a.m. and then next.
I know it's not going to be there by the time I click next.
1130 a.m., next, and appointment no longer available.
So you have to move fast when this happens, but somebody moved faster than I did.
But you saw how quickly I was able to get an appointment,
and an appointment pretty soon too, February 20th.
That's much better than what I got through New York State.
I'm sorry, Alex, continue.
My question was can you change two of those digits if you were to change it to 10011?
Well, let me tell you another secret.
The zip code doesn't matter because you'll see appointments all throughout the five boroughs.
So it doesn't matter what zip code you put in as long as it's a New York City zip code.
And maybe that doesn't even matter.
I don't even know if it checks that.
You just have to hit backspace, type that last digit, backspace, type that last digit.
You'll get carpal tunnel syndrome for sure, but you will get an appointment as well.
Well, can you try it?
Can you try to put in 90210?
I'm not going to try that during our show.
You can try that afterwards.
Feel free.
Our listeners can do this as well.
We've given them all the info they need.
Now, that's New York City.
Again, you have to be a resident of New York City for that to work.
And also, as long as we're talking about New York City, a couple other nifty sites,
vaccinefinder.nyc.gov will give you a list of locations,
and you can see for yourself just how many places there are where you can get vaccines in New York City.
There are a lot of them, and some of them you can schedule directly through those particular places.
Not all of them.
I would say not most of them, but you can at least try.
vaccinefinder.nyc.gov slash locations if you want to go right to the map of all the places.
And if you don't have a computer, which many people don't, well, you can either call someone like us to help you.
And, yes, as hackers, we should all be trying to help people who are not able to do the things we do.
It's not hard.
You, of course, need to have their information.
You need their name.
You need their address.
If they have insurance, you need their insurance number.
Their insurance company.
Things like that so that you're not stuck when you actually are filling out the form for them.
But there's nothing wrong with that.
Nothing wrong with you filling that out if you have their permission
and getting them an appointment in a place they can get to.
Make sure it's a place they can get to.
And in some places, they're instituting plus-one policies where you could get a vaccine if you take someone over 65.
Interesting.
You know, what I was wondering was people with families,
I don't think you can schedule more than one at a time except for a case like that.
But if you have, you know, like four kids and you want to get them all vaccinated,
I don't think there's a way of doing that easily.
Not at this point.
Okay, so also the phone number.
1-877-VAX-4NYC.
Okay, I'll translate that into numbers.
1-877-829-4692.
You call that number, and I think you wind up speaking to a person who can help you through this whole procedure.
I'm not sure how easy it is to get through to somebody and how much help they can give you,
but that is an option.
1-877-829-4692.
That's for New York City.
Now, New York State.
I'll give you a phone number for New York State as well as long as we're giving out phone numbers.
1-833-NYS-4VAX.
Everyone got really cool phone numbers.
1-833-697-4829.
That's the New York State hotline.
And they can help you through the registration process there.
But to register through the state, and if you don't live in New York City, this is probably one of the better ways to do it,
go to COVID-19Vaccine.health.ny.gov.
Okay, you do that, and you'll see a list of locations.
There aren't that many locations.
There's about a dozen locations statewide.
But you will get an appointment at one of these.
It won't be as quick as New York City.
In my case, I had to wait until April.
It might not be right next door to you, but you can at least try.
So you basically fill out information there.
And, again, this information does not have to be valid.
You can put whatever name you want, but you just have to qualify for the vaccine in one way or another,
either by being over 65 or having a comorbidity.
And then you will get to the point where you select a location, and you get the screen that says no appointments available.
And rather than give up at that point, you simply reload the page and reload that page, the one that says no appointments available.
You don't have to fill out that information again.
Just keep reloading that page.
And it might take a while.
It might take hours.
It might take half a day, but appointments do open up.
Now, let's say you don't like hitting the reload key all the time, and many people I find don't like to do that.
There are little extensions that you can attach to your browser.
I found a really good one for Chrome.
It's called Tab Auto Refresh.
So you install this, and you basically activate it when you get to that page.
And you set it to reload the page every two seconds.
And then you sit back and you just watch.
You just watch the page reloading over and over again, saying no appointments available, no appointments available.
I did that yesterday.
And guess what?
After about five minutes, an appointment showed up.
And do you know what happened next?
It reloaded the page again because I didn't stop it.
I couldn't stop it.
And I spent the next minute trying to figure out how do I stop this thing from reloading the page every two seconds.
And, of course, you have to click on the extension and then say stop doing this.
And, of course, by the time I figured that out, the appointment was long gone.
But it shows that it is possible.
You can do it.
And these little extensions make it a lot easier.
Keep in mind there are people doing this all over the place, so it's a lot of competition.
But there are some places where there are plenty of appointments.
For instance, SUNY Potsdam, if you feel like traveling to upstate New York, you can get an appointment there right now.
I think Plattsburgh, Syracuse, places like that, there are lots and lots of appointments.
So if you're up to making two trips and you'd have to make a second trip two weeks after your first does, it has to be in the same place.
That's an option as well.
So as you can see, there are ways to manipulate the system to get what you want.
And further to that point, you don't necessarily have to be vaccinated in the state in which you reside.
You can travel to other states and get the vaccine elsewhere.
And if your comorbidities qualify you to do that, you may want to think about it.
I heard reporting of people involved in the VA system being able to find appointments at other network VA, network hospitals and clinics where they were able to schedule and get their vaccines that way.
Well, I would check on that.
I know it began that way, but there's been a lot of ultranationality insofar as localities where people are saying,
why should we have people from New Jersey coming over and getting.
I don't understand why people would object to that, but I'm seeing where proof of residency is required.
Stupidest thing. Also, proof of employment.
If you if you work someplace in the state that you're trying to get a vaccine, that's enough.
If you can get an employee ID card or a paycheck or something like that, there are there are ways there are always ways.
I think you're right about that, Emmanuel, when it comes to city based vaccine distribution or anything that's that's very hyper local, like New York City.
You would have to prove residency within the five boroughs in order to become eligible to use one of those vaccination sites.
But elsewhere in the state, I do believe that they are providing full faith and credit for the rest of the country.
And that, you know, if you want to travel to South Dakota, North Dakota, I mean, you may be able to get a vaccine appointment tomorrow.
It's like you said, you know, it's quite possible.
And I think people should really think about doing this if you're if you live not too far away, as all New Yorkers do.
You know, you live we live very proximate to New Jersey, to Pennsylvania, to Connecticut.
There may be other places where you can do this and do well.
Let me let me just tell you right now, there was a story on Long Island newspapers of people who actually they didn't do anything wrong.
They used an app that told them where the nearest vaccination site was and turned out the nearest vaccination site from Long Island was just over the sound in Connecticut.
So they went to Connecticut, couldn't prove their residency in Connecticut, were turned away.
So check before you go to make sure that's not a requirement.
I believe it's a requirement throughout New York state.
I'm not sure. But do check first.
Again, there are ways around the system.
If you can prove that you reside someplace or work someplace, you should be.
And of course, as as a vaccine becomes more available, this won't be enforced nearly nearly as much.
Kyle. Yeah, definitely.
There are exceptions in situations, especially with essential workers and people that are involved in areas like health care that they're going to be proximate and exposed potentially to people who are infected.
Go ahead, Rob. For one thing, you mentioned that these systems have been adapted from things like Eventbrite or Ticketmaster or that sort of thing.
And it's entertaining to me that the tricks and ways around things that we're discussing now are very similar to the tricks and ways around things that people used to use to, like, get concert tickets that were in demand or like buy one of the the in-demand games consoles this past holiday season and stuff.
You know, it's it's all just Web pages and it works the same way.
There's there is another site that I've been finding very interesting today.
If you go to the Department of Health site for the city at NYC dot gov slash DOH, they have a data section on that side on that site where you could see the numbers basically for the cases of throughout the city, the cases and the deaths.
And they have now added a spot where you could find your data by zip code, which means you can check your immediate neighborhood if you live in the city and find out how your neighborhood is doing in comparison to the rest of the city in terms of numbers.
And so, like, you could see this many people out of out of every one out of every this many people was diagnosed in your area, one out of every so-and-so people in your neighborhood died of COVID-19.
OK, so how did your neighborhood do? I know you checked.
I did. I did check right now. I've got what we were talking about. One zero zero zero one, which is not my neighborhood, but it's it's in Chelsea.
And over there, they've had they've got a population of twenty seven thousand six hundred thirteen people, one thousand one hundred and two cases.
So that's one out of every twenty five people in the neighborhood has been diagnosed with COVID-19.
The deaths, 28 deaths in the area, one out of every nine hundred eighty six people.
And you can see that that's that's lower than Manhattan's general case rate.
That's lower than New York City's general case rate. The death numbers are also lower than Manhattan or New York City.
And you can see how your own neighborhood compares as well. You're saying this was all these numbers.
You decided that's for your neighborhood or for one zero zero zero one.
That's that's for one zero zero zero one. Chelsea, Nomad and West Chelsea.
I always thought more people than twenty seven thousand people lived in that zip code.
But I guess maybe it's a lot of business. Yeah.
And you can you can look up, you know, any any neighborhood in the city and it will pull up the numbers for you.
And if I if I look at my own neighborhood, I see it's it's doing worse than that.
So, you know, it's it's not good news, but it's also good to be aware of these things and just just how things are going.
One thing to keep in mind is that as more people get the vaccine,
these numbers will get better because the people getting the vaccine are ideally the people most at risk.
And the people who are at the back of the line are people who are more likely to to be able to get through it.
OK, so I think what we're going to see in the next couple of months are the numbers going down at a pretty good rate.
We just can't feel too optimistic about it as far as thinking it's over because we still have to be careful.
But we're going around that curve and we'll start to feel a lot better.
But we have to continue to be vigilant and make sure that people get the shot and and that this thing can peter out.
Yeah, I think something else you can. I'm sorry.
That's something else you can keep track of with this page, because there's also the daily test rate for the last seven days on here for your neighborhood.
You can see, you know, percent positive new cases and keep track of those numbers.
See how they compare. Go ahead, Kyle.
Well, just it occurs to me that a lot of the larger sites that have opened up will transfer use over once their neighborhoods have been vaccinated,
like the stadiums in different areas like the Bronx and and Queens and other parts of of the boroughs in New York will have taken care of the people immediately in the area of that that stadium.
And no doubt will branch out and offer and include people from other boroughs and other parts of the city and state to do larger or as large a scale vaccinations as possible, as quickly as possible.
And no doubt the supply is a barrier to that, but they certainly being in the neighborhood, they have to take care of their people there first.
And then I can totally see that.
And we all understand that they're eager to be able to use those larger facilities to get people from all over through.
Well, that's that's an important fact, too.
We were saying that New York City requires residency proof.
Not only that, but if you go to Citi Field, you have to prove you're a resident of Queens.
OK, if you go to Yankee Stadium, you have to be a resident of the Bronx.
And, you know, it gets even more so.
Yeah, for now. And that, as Kyle said, that will change as as the vaccine becomes more available and more people get vaccinated.
Go ahead, Alex.
As we're discussing this, it occurs to me that one question I think that we are completely avoiding asking is that is it a good idea from a systems, from a hacker's perspective, to have all of this authority to dole out vaccinations in this myriad of different ways?
Delegated to the states. Why isn't this a federal program?
We have the reach of the federal government in every corner of every state of the union.
And yet we have very little federal effort aside from the VA hospitals and some recent initiatives of the Biden administration to to open up federal vaccination sites in pharmacies.
Well, to answer your question, I point to the last four years as making that absolutely impossible.
But even even without that, I still think that the efficiency level on something so massive might not be as good as potentially it could get with states.
I know there are states that do a very bad job as well.
Some states don't even take this seriously.
So, yeah, you make a good point.
Right now, I'm happy if if if the federal authorities are supplying the vaccine to the states and perhaps maybe as with Obamacare, states aren't up to the task, they can step in.
I mean, it reminds me a lot of something that we just went through where there are a massive amount of differences between states and it's hypercritical to the nation.
And I'm talking about voting.
I mean, voting systems is this is a very similar dilemma is a very similar problem that we have, that the states have the delegated authority to deal with.
But that's under the Constitution of the United States.
The reason why the states are dealing with this from a logistics point of view is that it just has not been thought about from the federal government standpoint for those four years.
I mean, we heard the Biden administration say time and time again that there was really no plan for the vaccine rollout, that it was completely delegated to the states.
Right. But that's not the fault of of of the federal government as it stands.
It's the fault of the occupants of the federal government who didn't do their job.
But theoretically, that should work.
And by bringing up the election, I think I think you kind of are proving the point, because imagine if the election was run by the federal authorities, how that would have turned out.
The fact that it's run by states and counties and people who are really dedicated to democracy and fairness and that they are the ones in charge of their localities.
That's what saved us. That's what saved us.
And I think, you know, making it as local as possible, I think is the best move.
I agree. I to a certain extent.
I mean, obviously, there are a lot of problems that come along with giving states this delegated authority, you know, without any kind of guidelines, without any kind of consistent framework.
You know what I think a better approach would have been had there been a reasonable person at the helm of the federal government for the last four years or even the last year, which would have been to establish some overarching criteria, some framework by which the states have to roll out these vaccines and tie that through a spending bill to federal funding.
And if they're not adhering to these particular types of requirements, then they would lose certain types of federal funding.
I mean, there were there were definitely ways to do this through Congress politically by giving some kind of overarching framework so that we wouldn't be dealing with this hodgepodge of different criteria, comorbidity system, scheduling problems, vaccine appointments, refreshing pages, zip code changes.
All of this nonsense could have been, I think, alleviated easily.
Well, I think you're you're countering yourself when you say easily.
And then in the same sentence, you say through Congress, I don't think it's possible as long as you're going through Congress.
Yes. You know, from a technical point of view, it would be great.
But I see so much arguing and bickering on one side or another over the simplest things, let alone something moderately complex like this.
I hear the point, but I have to think that that is transforming as we speak.
It's not a static thing.
So you may be absolutely right in the critique there, but I think it's it's an ongoing transformation as the leadership is clearly is changing and is so distinct in their perspective on how this should go.
But in the immediate, I think the federal government has to get hold of supply chains and the manufacturing aspects and the overall distribution network securing that that's already been their emphasis and expertise in the development part of this.
So they're going to redouble those efforts to bolster what the states are relying on in the supply.
Now, there are genuine issues that the the overarching that I said are probably underway in terms of transformation and and maybe adjusting because the perspective is so different in this transformation.
But there definitely are needs for like testing supplies and all these back back end kind of like much less visible parts of the process, but will support the process in the next six months or a year and in the future.
So that that I think is all the sort of long game of this.
It's going to really change, but and is changing as we were discussing it.
But it doesn't feel it like in the immediate.
Thank you for listening to off the hook.
Thank you.
That kicks in, actually, when we're being told to move, move on with the show and also to remind people that at eight o'clock, you can join us on YouTube channel.
Twenty six hundred one word.
That's our channel for off the hook overtime where you can call us.
You can call us the phone number.
We're going to give out the phone number is 802321.
That's 8023214225.
And we'll take calls starting at around eight o'clock.
So don't call now.
Don't call now because it won't go anywhere.
It won't even ring.
It won't do a darn thing.
If you call afterwards and you get voicemail, it means that somebody else is on the phone.
It's kind of a similar system, I guess, except that we can't figure out how to give you a busy signal.
Continuing, though, with just a little bit more information on the vaccine, we gave you a lot of information for New York City and New York State.
We can't cover all the states.
However, if you have questions about a particular system, write to us.
O.T.H. at twenty six hundred dot com.
We'll do our best to investigate, maybe give you some tips as to ways around it.
You can you can certainly experiment with systems even if you're not in the state.
And you might find some tricks like the kinds we found as far as being able to to quickly reload pages and find out there's an appointment in your area.
New Jersey.
I don't have a lot of information on New Jersey.
I've never actually tried their site.
I do know it's covid vaccine.
One word covid vaccine dot NJ dot gov.
And they have a phone number as well.
But this phone number says it's for vaccine appointment support.
Not sure what that means.
I think that that's if you're just having trouble using the online system.
I don't think they'll actually give you an appointment, but maybe they will.
Eight, five, five, five, six, eight, zero, five, four, five.
That number for New Jersey.
Eight, five, five, five, six, eight, zero, five, four, five.
Alex.
One thing I'd like to mention for listeners as well is that as part of my effort to monitor the DNS for vaccine related domains, we have come across quite a few that have offered scheduling services for the vaccine itself.
Meaning that you may have you may have the option to pay one hundred dollars or more and have the vaccine delivered to your house.
You know, these are I would say the majority of them are scams.
So I would be very cautious about any emails that you receive about home vaccination service.
For God's sake, you don't even know it's the vaccine.
I mean, don't accept that.
No.
You know, have somebody take you if you if you can't get out yourself.
But no, do not.
You should not be paying a penny for this.
It's it doesn't cost anything to anyone.
So anyone who is trying to charge you, you know, if somebody helps you with the Web site, they should not be charging you either.
So this is not a money making endeavor.
This is this is saving our asses endeavor.
That's that's right.
And so be very, very careful about phishing emails, offering you these types of services or any kind of Web site or domain that's offering these types of services.
Be extraordinarily critical of anybody that's asking you to whip out your credit card or pay any kind of cash.
Right.
For the vaccine, because it is very likely a scam.
There are many opportunistic actors that are taking advantage of the short supply of this particular commodity to make profit for themselves.
Yeah.
And above all, don't despair, because while it seems dire right now, as far as being able to get an appointment, it is going to get easier as more people get their appointments, as more people are vaccinated, as there is more supply, it will get easier.
So if you don't get one today, it's not the end of the world.
Maybe you'll get one tomorrow.
Maybe you'll get one next week.
You will get one.
Just be patient and know that the system will work in the end.
Go ahead.
I just want to point out one more thing for our New York City listeners, because I was thinking about transportation issues, because a lot of times you get an appointment that's completely not where you are.
Right.
If you are in New York City and you are over 65 and you don't have a car, the city will get you to and from your vaccination appointment.
Really?
Yeah.
Yeah.
They're hooking up accessorize, their cab services they're working with.
But the city is also coordinating transportation for people over 65 to get their vaccines.
Does this cost something?
I don't believe so.
Wow.
OK.
Can we praise de Blasio?
I know everybody hates de Blasio, but come on.
This is good.
A couple of good things that he's doing.
Here's an interesting website that lists the availability in New York City.
It's nycvaccinelist.com.
One word, nycvaccinelist.com.
What that does is it shows where there are appointments available.
Now, just because it says something is available doesn't mean it is available.
But you click on that and you'll either get to a point where you can actually fill out a form and make an appointment or it'll redirect you to the NYC site.
But it's another site to look at to get more information.
nycvaccinelist.com.
And also what we mentioned last week, TurboVax.info, T-U-R-B-O-V-A-X.info.
That's a site that will send you alerts when appointments open up.
Again, you have to move very fast.
You can also follow them on Twitter.
TurboVax is the username on Twitter.
And you can get updates.
You can have your phone beep every time an appointment opens up and have a lot of fun with that.
Yes, Alex?
Alex?
Sorry.
I was actually investigating one of these fraudulent sites.
And I think maybe we should save this for off-the-hook overtime so we don't confuse our listeners by giving out the name of one of these fraudulent sites.
And there's an 800 number that's associated with one of these particular sites, and maybe we can call that on off-the-hook overtime.
Okay, giving us some homework here.
Maybe we can try that and see what happens.
We do have a phone line that we use for off-the-hook overtime.
That does sound like a bit of fun.
We are going to go into some more detail on various other things.
But, again, the info that we have here for New York City, go to ‑‑ hang on.
I lost my list.
Vaccinefinder.nyc.gov.
You can schedule directly on that.
New York State, covid19vaccine.health.ny.gov.
New Jersey, covidvaccine.nj.gov.
There are all kinds of other sites as well for all the other states.
And, of course, this doesn't even take into account the international experiences people are going through.
Write to us, please.
Let us know how you're doing with this.
If you're helping anybody, if you qualify yourself, we'd like to know just exactly how you're faring.
I'd like to talk about one story very, very quickly before we run out of time.
And, again, off-the-hook overtime starts at 8 o'clock on the YouTube channel, channel 2600.
Starts at 8 o'clock.
And our phone number there is 802-321-4225.
But winter has hit Texas.
And you might think it's the first time it's ever hit Texas.
There are people there without power for days, freezing temperatures, snow on the ground.
Yeah, climate change is a bitch, isn't it?
Especially if you're not prepared for it, and the infrastructure in Texas was not.
But here's the thing that really kind of gets me, is that the powers that be,
specifically the governor and all his cohorts, are taking this as an opportunity to blame the Green New Deal,
saying that windmills or wind turbines are what froze, when that's not the case at all.
In fact, the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, known as ERCOT, they supply 90% of the state with its power.
They said wind power was responsible for just a fraction of the loss,
but of the 45,000 megawatts of power offline during the peak, 30,000 megawatts stem from natural gas,
while only 16,000 were from wind turbines.
Of the power shortfall that hit Texas, they say over 80% was due to problems at coal and gas-fired plants.
Experts say traditional energy sources, including coal and natural gas,
performed below expectations, while wind power actually performed above expectations.
It is incredible to me how we have seen this Orwellian style of disseminating information
get to the point where something happens, and the exact opposite is what is reported.
If you watch mainstream media, you will see they're talking about the wind turbines failing,
just because Republicans and the governor are saying this, taking this opportunity to attack clean energy,
when in fact it was their dirty energy that failed, and it's provable.
The facts point this out quite distinctly.
We have to be careful of this kind of thing on so many levels.
I didn't expect to see it here, a snowstorm in Texas, but the ugliness shows its face everywhere.
I guess our mantra to listeners, always doubt what you hear, always question, and look for the facts.
Look for actual facts.
I don't think they can critique it, because it's a major export.
It's a product there, and of course their system powers it,
but a lot of other systems around the country power it.
You're looking at an opportunity to spread something that's false.
When something's so bad, they're doubling down on telling you why that isn't the reason.
It's an opportunity to say, hey, we need to do a lot better.
We need to think about our own energy and think about improving constantly.
It's the bad weather when you figure out you need a snow shovel and all these things.
You need to do it in the off-season.
Here, it isn't even the off-season, it's the immediate,
and it's now coming home to a place that just wants to turn a blind eye
instead of taking it as an opportunity to build a much more comprehensive system.
It's really sad and disappointing in that sense.
But all too predictable, and it's sad, it certainly is.
Our thoughts are with our listeners in Texas who might be in dark houses and cold houses.
Just hang in there, you'll get through this.
Don't listen to the people who lie to you.
It's sad that they would take this opportunity to do that.
Moving forward with progressive thinking and new technology, that's the future.
Speaking of which, tomorrow we get to be scared when we have the latest rover landing on Mars,
hopefully landing on Mars.
Seven hours of...
Seven minutes.
Seven minutes.
Yeah, not seven hours.
It's going to feel like that.
Seven minutes of terror where we don't know what's going on.
That's tomorrow afternoon.
I urge everybody to follow this.
It's going to be amazing, and hopefully we'll wind up with another rover on Mars
with a microphone so we can hear if there are actual Martians talking in the background.
As soon as we get that sound, we will air it here.
Yeah, and a helicopter.
We're going to have a helicopter on Mars.
I think that's cool.
Hey, we're out of here.
Back next week, OTH at 2600.com.
Off the Hook Overtime coming up 8 o'clock on YouTube channel 2600.
We'll see you next week.
Good night.
Bye.
Bye.
Bye.
And here we are for off the hook overtime
We're getting the hang of this YouTube thing. It's taking taking a while, but I'd like to know are people able to find us
You know, are you able to search for us? Is it a hassle to connect that kind of thing?
We're not YouTube experts. So any any hints you can give us can you summon it on your personal assistant?
Yeah. Yeah, cuz you summon the stream on us on that's a skill. Maybe you have a particular YouTube
Affiliated assistant that allows you to do that. Tell us we want to know can't know everything and that certainly is
Has true of this OTH at 2600 comm is our email address our phone number 802 321 4 2 2 5 8 0 2 3 2 1
hack
Especially if you've never called us before we'd love to hear from you. Please. Let us know
Gila go ahead. I have a question about tonight's picture. Oh
Yeah, you notice that the picture is different this week isn't it pictures of it what word is is missing
Do you really think that you can just ask that question and get an answer?
Nice try. Yeah, not very nice try
The whole reason that's up there so somebody can tell us what it says
Because I don't think anybody remembers what it said or ever knew what it said
But there's somebody someplace where that sign is local and now that were the font they'll recognize it and they'll be able to tell us
What it is that will be removed if you have no idea what we're talking about
Well, I don't think you could be listening to us. Well, you'd have to look at the YouTube channel
Yeah, I think they're looking at the YouTube channel if they're calling us with the answer because they've already heard the
Mystery that we're going to allow you to call in. What's that number again?
802 321 4 2 2 5
What does that mean the last part 4 2 2 5 means hack and please verify the phone is plugged in and that we can hear
The ringer because sometimes we forget to do that and people are calling and getting angry and we can't hear them Alex
What are you doing?
You're playing with your phone
Yeah, I have taken a screenshot of the picture and I'm just zooming in on it
I mean, it looks obviously there's an S at the end there. So it's plural or it's a word that ends in s
It looks like a B at the at the outset of that that marred over word
So I'm gonna I'm gonna guess bills will be removed. Well, I could use that for sure. I'd like my bills to be removed
Yeah, I got a lot a lot of bills by the the gate, you know that it's on
You know that that looks like something that would be and there's some sort of stone edifice behind it
Probably something in the UK or Ireland again would be my guess. I
Guess it's it's it's the equivalent of post. No bills in this country. Yeah, I think that's right, you know
I have our first call
I was gonna read some stories because we didn't get a chance to read any stories
We talked about the vaccine the whole hour, but I thought it was interesting
I thought it was interesting and hopefully helpful to people and I'd love to know if anyone else has other other words for us
We have a caller. Good evening. You're on off the hook over time
Sort of like a B at the beginning, but I'm still thinking maybe it might be cars
Cars will be removed that that's a that's a big job though
They remove a car and that looks like such a tiny little sign telling you that your car
Bikes will be removed
That is by the subway station
On 23rd and maybe it's 8th or 7th something like that. And there's a
Place where it would be convenient to lock up one's bike before going into the subway
But there's a sign. Yeah, I think I know this the station you're talking about. I think I saw that sign Wow
That's a solid hypothesis with evidence. Well, here's some more evidence to to support that
Somebody didn't want this to be removed. They that whatever it is that they're threatening to remove and
The bike lobby is pretty powerful. So I would imagine somebody I mean who cares about bills, but people do care about bikes and
They they wiped out that word. That's that's my theory. I
Hopefully yes
We're perhaps willing to help people get appointments and I'm someone who needs that help with several
Comorbidities and with hand tremors, it makes it difficult to type fast enough. Mm-hmm
Now, do you have a computer? I?
Have a computer. Okay. Well then I think in your case the extension on the browser that
Simply reloads the page over and over again so that you don't have to type anything
I I'm computer semi limit. All right, and I could not get it to to work. Do you have Chrome? I
Do have Chrome. I did try while this show was on. Okay, how far did you get?
I
Think I installed it, but it not it didn't work to
To do that on the page, and I also don't know how to turn it off. Okay. Well, it's it's it's pretty simple
Go to a test page any page will do and there should be a little icon
Somewhere where your extensions are if you click on that you should see the tab auto refresh icon show up
Click on that and you'll see a timer that will say how many?
Seconds do you want to pass and you simply?
Put a two at the end of it. So it says two seconds or zero two seconds and
It should go at that point
Okay, and
Did you you maybe have to restart the web browser once you
Didn't have to restart my it's a long shot. I'm just curious
Is it possible it was working and you couldn't tell it was working because the same page kept showing up over and over again
That's another possibility I've tried
Re-clicking and re-clicking and re-clicking things and you can tell uh-huh that it's it's
Reshowing
Well, I mean that is the process to get an extension to work you install it you click on it
You run it you set the values and then you go to the page
That should work and if for some reason it's not I suggest trying it again. Try reinstalling it, you know, or maybe you
Refresh interval seconds, and I've just said it too and it's got two things here that you can click on
bypass cash and
reset tab
Okay, I don't have it in front of me. I don't recall seeing that
You guys out there in Skype land any any advice here?
Well, I would say if it doesn't work one way then try it the other way
You want to bypass the cash I think I didn't ask me that yeah bypass the cash
It seems like something you'd want to do in this case because the cash is something that has been
like updated and
Kept locally or some way not changing you want it to change
Okay
What's available which is nothing it's gone back to get started which is just what I don't want
Yeah, that that happens. If I believe you enter any
Any data in on that page?
you have to click you have to you have to just refresh that page if you if you go back in any way or
Click on anything else
Now you're on the New York State page, correct or the New York City page
Okay, because if you're in New York City, you should be using a different system
I'm specifically trying to get the Javits Center
Okay
Are you using the New York State site to do that?
Yes, that's kovat 19 vaccine dot health dot n y dot gov
No, am I eligible kovat 19 vaccine?
health and why
gov
Okay, I
Don't think we're talking about the same site for the way it worked for me
I went to cover 19 vaccine dot health dot n y dot gov. Okay, go to go to that page. We'll wait
This is great, it's like tech support over the radio. Yeah kovat 19 vaccine one word
That's the numerals 19 right dot health who spells it out Kyle I've never seen anybody to that
dot health dot n y dot gov
You read a $19 check
Okay, what do you see
Sign me up here. Go to the port where it says am I eligible?
Okay, hang on I'm typing it myself
Guys feel free to fill the dead air
While this is going on
I'd like to urge our listeners that those of you out there who are computer literate are fully able to do this on
behalf of your friends or family who may be in a situation in which they can't easily do this for themselves and
That that too is part of the hacker spirit, you know
Get out there with your skills and do what you can to make make those around you
This is what it's your time of it. This is what it takes. I
Just found out
That color if you're trying to get your first vaccine appointment, there are currently no first dose appointments available at the Javits Center
Well
No, you're right people are canceling who told you that who told you that
Vaccine finder dot NYC gov. Okay, there is a big red line that says no first dose appointments available at the Javits Center
That might be true
Okay, that might be true. But again, if somebody cancels the important thing right now is to get the listener
You know familiar with the process now if you scroll down on that page
You'll see a picture of a bunch of people in a big room. It says kovat 19 vaccine safe effective free
Do you see that?
It's towards towards the top it's right underneath the red. Yeah. Okay. Yeah check eligibility click that
Well, you have to click get started after at the bottom of the next page
I went forward and I went back again. Okay, you have to not do that
Just keep going forward not back. Now. You should get to a page with a list of locations
Okay, you have the list of locations
Okay, wait, you're ahead of me yes, okay again this information does not have to be valid
It's not carried over. So put you know, say you were born in 1899. It doesn't matter
Well, don't say that that might not work, but just put in a birth date that makes you old enough over 65
Click whatever sex you want to click say you work in the state of New York
You live in the state of New York and give a New York zip code
That should take you a couple of seconds
Okay providers
Okay
Okay
Well, maybe look for a backup
Hang on you you clicked I consent and you went to submit
Okay, and then you you clicked on locate providers
All right
Did you click did you click on Javits Center, right? Did you click on schedule your vaccine appointment?
That's what you have to
Know now you have to click on schedule your vaccine appointment. That is that is the whole key here
All right, if you click on that you'll go to another page and that page will say no appointments available
You have to get to that page. That's the page you want to reload
That very link that you told me to click on I saw it and as I reached for it
It went to a different page again, and now I have to add everything again. Well, it's not that much
It takes a couple of seconds to just enter you live in the state of New York and but next time next time you'll see
a list
click on schedule
Yeah
Right now I just want to get it to the point where she gets to the right page and no but if it's on it could
Be disrupting what she's trying to do
Do you maybe you want to tell her to turn it off?
I don't know if it is on it. I thought it wasn't on is your is your page refreshing every two seconds
Boy turn that off turn it off until you get to this page
Yeah, I click on the extension and you'll see an option to stop
and
Definitely definitely do that
I
Don't know what that
Okay, so it is off so it might not be on yeah if it was zero you wouldn't be able to do anything
Okay, so it's you have to get to the to the right page. So you're at the page now where you're entering the info
Okay, you're at that page stop stop you're at that page, right
Do you see Javits Center as the first entry?
How much longer I can do this for look
Once you once you click from the last page, you'll be on a page that says locate providers
All right. It'll ask for a zip code at that point distance from
The first if you have type 1 0 0 0 1 the first one will be Javits Center on
That under that section how to schedule appointment click on schedule your vaccine appointment. Once you do that
Did you enter a zip code
Did you enter a zip code
There's no place to enter it yet if you're on the locate providers page
Which you are correct
There's no place to put a zip code
Right now it says thank you for providing your information
Based on what you've told us you're eligible to receive a black vaccine
Blah-blah-blah and has two buttons to go back or locate. Okay, click on locate providers
Okay, and you should see you should see
Okay
Okay, you know what maybe you have the extension set so that that page
reloads over and over again if you
Click your extension again and see if there is a way of turning it off from this point
No, don't go back to the page stay on that stay on that page and click on
Okay, you know maybe uninstall the extension that way it won't interfere at all
I'll leave someone else to explain that I'm taking a drink
You
Want to go to the right side on your browser and
There's probably some lines like some through the three-line thingy or someplace where you get a menu and
I think there is a
Item listed when you click on that
that will tell you about extensions and
And then it'll open a tab and lists
Whatever extensions are there and you might be able to just turn a switch like to disable it momentarily without installing it
With without uninstalling it right now. I would suggest uninstalling it just so that we can get to the point where you can
Yes remove it you can always get it again
But you see where you get you have a little bit of control there
In your browser to turn it on and off so now you know how to get rid of it if it ever malfunctions
yeah, that was a
Mistake
And probably the culprit
This is fun working in customer service, you know when you when you work in customer service
You have to resolve the problem. You can't hang up. You don't have a telephone. You're just connected into the system and
When the other person hangs up, that's when you're free to go to the next one. That's how it works
Okay providers with my zip code. Okay an update and
No, it's avid center. No appointments. Okay. Okay now look above that
You'll see schedule your vaccine appointment two lines above that. Do you see that? Yes. Okay, click schedule your vaccine appointment
You should get a page that says in big letters. No appointments available. Do you see that?
That is the page you need to be reloading. So when you reinstall that that that extension
Make sure this page is reloaded every two seconds or however many second in your case may be a little bit longer
and and and if an appointment opens up, you'll see it then you stop that extension and
proceed
That's gonna be tricky then in your case maybe just keep hitting reload a bunch of times
It's one icon. You just have to keep pressing it
I
Wouldn't be able to type f5 works, right you could
Pressing an icon and hitting f5
He's still pressing with your finger. Yeah, I don't know the the the button feel might be different
The important thing is we got you to this page and I feel like that's an accomplishment. So you're in the right place. Yeah
You know
New York City the New York City site that we talked about earlier. I think that is easier
I think you'll get an appointment quicker that way
So I would suggest checking the New York City site
But listen, we got to move on we have other people waiting for to make calls
I hope it works out. It will eventually so just be patient and and
Check check in next week. We like to see you next week
20 appointments at one time slot. How am I going to be able to get one?
cancellation
Before somebody else gets it. Well, keep in mind more will become available and this won't be an issue
Probably in another week or two. We'll laugh at this and it won't even be a problem to get appointments. I that's my hope anyway
And best of luck, but we're gonna we're gonna move on. Thanks for your call
Wow, okay. Do we have an open line?
Okay, I guess that's what happens when you have the phone line up with nobody on it, all right, that's I learned something
Well, thanks for your help guys. Everybody's just staring in the rolling on the floor thinking that this is funny
That's not look everybody's going through this
All right, and you have to be patient and you have to try and help people this is these are the challenges
We're hackers. We can figure it out. We can we can explain it to people
Alex
No, I don't think I wasn't laughing. I don't think anybody was laughing at this, you know rolling on the floor laughing or anything
But it you know, I think patience is a virtue with all of this. We have to remember that
and it underscores what Rob was talking about towards the end of
the actual off-the-hook show, which is that this can be really a very difficult process right and and imagine if
You're a person who
Is from another generation you had several generations back and you don't even have a computer
Mm-hmm
Just got a telephone or you have some kind of mobile device or a tablet
These things are incredibly difficult to navigate and I think we need teams of people that are offering their services to try to help
Others that cannot do this themselves
Because it is a really really tricky process and the fact that and this really goes back to my point
As well that I think if there was some kind of framework in place that made this in some sense
consistent across counties across states
Whatever some kind of consistency in the process then people would be less confused
I mean, I think the last 17 minutes of that of
Off-the-hook overtime demonstrated that this is a tough difficult process was 17 minutes
It flew by Wow, it felt it felt like it felt like five minutes
Maybe 12, but no more than that
To help people on you know, and this will be a record. You see forever in Memorial
Oh, that's what you're saying. I agree with some of it and I disagree with some of it
I
Think if it was all the same system people would still be getting confused with they'd all be getting confused in the same way
And if there was a vulnerability that vulnerability would affect everybody not just some I kind of like having
Lots of different systems because there are advantages to some disadvantages to others and we can learn and develop better systems based on that
Let's take this phone call. Good evening. You're on off the hook overtime
How you doing, oh, you're you're the guy with the highway problem, right?
Right, right, right. How's that working out?
Well, we're working on it so
You know, Alex was it was a big help got me in contact with some folks at the FF and they're giving me some suggestions
So we've got a lot of communications going there
But I called you this evening to talk about something that Alex had mentioned which was Pennsylvania and their registration
system for vaccines for kovat 19, right
My dad lives there. He's over 80 and
He lives in a county which I've run into the same problem that Alex described when I go there
It's upon me to click on every drugstore and every supermarket that's on that map to try to figure out
You know who has a vaccine but I will say that some counties in Pennsylvania do have health departments and those you know
I don't know where Alex's parents are at or how far they can travel or are willing to travel but if you can
Locate one of those counties that has a health department
You can do a central registration with the Health Department instead of every individual little
You know business and drugstore and that may be an easier way for him to find
You know so that they can get a vaccine
Yeah, I think that's a great recommendation and and further to that point I think having
Local
Accounts with medical providers can also help. This is something we didn't mention during during the show
But I think it's worth mentioning now, you know, for instance
Yeah, I I have an a you know an account with NYU Langone and I'm constantly getting updates from them about availability
Vaccine appointments, etc. And that's a more centralized way to deal with this and and but the decentralized nature of having to click on every
single drugstore on this map
especially if you're on a mobile device is absolutely mad and
Then if you find one that actually has an appointment available you click on the appointment and then you have to enter in
Duplicative information to actually reserve that appointment all the information that you just
Entered into the website you then have to re-enter again and by the time you finish that process
The actual appointment is usually gone. So it's you know, it's a game of whack-a-mole. I think to an extent right now
I think we have to get a little bit lucky to to get a vaccine appointment or be willing to travel
and hopefully
You know your father gets one one soon, you know, you know how to get in touch with me if I can help in any way
Just send me a ping Alex. I do think that
In some cases maybe most cases the information you enter at the beginning doesn't really get passed along
So you can enter just whatever information you want to make sure that you qualify and then when you actually get the appointment
you enter the real information that doesn't help you as far as trying to type fast because
You actually have to have to make it to the submit button before somebody else does
Unless unless the system and maybe somebody can help prove this if you click on a time and you get to the point where you're
Entering data, maybe that sort of reserves it for you
And and you have a certain amount of time or you know, I don't know if it's a free-for-all at that point
Based on when we try to sell tickets for hope and the complaints that we get from people who don't make it in time
It seems like being told that okay you're in and and then by the time you're finished. No, you're not
We might be looking at a system like that again knowing the software would be very helpful because then we'd know the weaknesses
Yeah, and one of the other things I noticed is that especially in the county where my dad lives a
lot of those agencies that are
Listed on the map. They allow you to sign up on a waiting list, but they don't share waiting lists among them
So you could invest, you know
Two three days going through and registering and putting PII into how many different people's hands just to try to get?
One vaccine it is it's a really deplorable system that Pennsylvania has at this moment
Well again, let's hope it gets better with more doses coming with more people vaccinated
with the overall health improving
And it's got to get better can't get worse really can't but we have to keep trying we have to keep
Persevering Alex. Go ahead. I think it is going to get better. And you know
I've seen a lot of indications of this just in terms of the palliative care for the the virus itself
And and I think we're going to see a larger influx of additional vaccines over the next several months as well
And and possibly from sources that weren't very highly publicized in the past
Maybe some companies that we haven't heard of or drugs that we haven't necessarily been tracking or following
And I think with all of this coming to the market, let's say hopefully in the spring
We will reach a critical mass of vaccine supplies
To the effect that we won't have to deal with these crazy systems and trying to type fast or schedule
Appointments or refresh zip codes things like that will hopefully be a thing of the past within the next couple of months
So I think if we're patient there will be some some influx. I also think too that there is some merit to
thinking about
Delaying from a policy standpoint the second dosage of vaccines. I've been reading some
Scientific literature about these booster shots. They're essentially booster shots
If you look at the Moderna vaccine in particular you have about an 80% efficacy rate after the first vaccination shot
That's what I've been reading over the last couple of days
Which is pretty high and if you're not holding back that additional vaccine you can get more people to the 80% level
more quickly than you otherwise would have if you were holding back that second vaccine dose and
There's some wisdom to holding back those vaccines because there's literature coming out from the UK that indicates
That the longer the time period between the initial shot and the booster shot, which is what the second shot is
The greater the efficacy of the vaccine so right now with the Moderna shot
We're waiting 28 days for the booster shot
But if we waited 56 days, we may have a higher than 94 percent
Efficacy rate. We just don't know yet, but I like the idea of getting more people at the level of 80%
Vaccinated or 80% efficacy for the vaccine a larger portion of the population
Than a smaller percentage at ninety four point one percent
Again, all that information is subject to interpretation
And there are different kinds of vaccine out there
So it could vary follow the advice of medical professionals. And again as we get more doses
this will become less of an issue and the important thing is
Make sure you get that second dose at some point and and follow the advice that you're given
And make sure it's the same as the first one
Yeah, I you know, I was wondering about that
What happens we get one of one one of the other first?
I think there's a system in place that'll prevent you from doing that
Hopefully I was also thinking what happens to somebody who decides I'm gonna get this this vaccine in Pennsylvania and this one in New
York just to be extra safe
You know, I think you deserve whatever happens to you at that point, but I don't think that's a good idea at all
Go ahead Rob
Yeah
This is all this is all just really fascinating how we're all figuring out as we go along and how we're all dealing with it
But yeah, I want to reiterate what what you guys just said, which is listen to the medical professionals who actually know what they're talking about
You know, don't don't decide not to vaccinate because if something someone forwarded you on social media that you know comes from somewhere
That's not that's not reputable. I I was I think I may have mentioned this a week or two ago on this program
But I was thinking, you know, okay, I'm eligible for the vaccine
but should I hold back should I hold off on getting my dose if they say I'm
Eligible because what I'd be taking that dose away from someone else and had a little crisis of conscience about it
I'm after talking it over with people who know what they're talking about
Regarding these things. I I really feel like no if you if you have the chance to get your vaccine
No matter what your situation get your vaccine because it's not just for you
It's for all the people around you and it's for herd immunity and it's a matter of personal responsibility to get it
Just like wearing your mask. It's a matter of personal responsibility and it's for not just yourself, but those around you
Yeah, and again, you may raise a good point if if you are
Eligible if you're not eligible don't cut the line if you are get the vaccine
It's really simple
Thanks for your call and good luck out there. All right. Thank you. All right. Take care
You know, I just want to ask people here
When do you think we'll be able to just walk down the street like normal?
When do you think that day will come? I know it's not gonna be one day
But when do you think we'll be able to just you know, go out go to the studio go out after the show
Hang out in the city. Talk to people not have to wear masks
Alex when do you think that'll happen? I
Think it will
Optimistically be in the fall of 2021. Okay, I
See us still slogging through the vaccination process over the over the summer
I think we can also expect because the vaccination process as we detailed so
Abundantly today. It is a bit of a botched job across different states
Is taking because it's taking so long we can expect additional variants of the virus to come out
There may be a New York variant, you know, we have got the UK in the South African variant and during our show
I think dr. Foultry was on CNN stating that it does seem like the current vaccines are effective against these new variants
Which is absolutely great news when it comes to establishing herd immunity
But the sooner we do that the better because the later we do that the more likely we are going to have variants and those
variants are going to be what keeps us in masks and what keeps us socially distancing and
What keeps us away from each other and keeps us out of the goddamn studio. I really want to get back to the studio
I really want to go out to dinner with you guys and and you know, clink glasses. So my prediction is fall
2021
Maybe 2022 but I I also think that we're gonna be somewhat gunshot about being around people
Psychologically to go from being in a mask for 18 months or so
To just taking it off and going into a restaurant of socializing is going to be somewhat jarring
So I think we're gonna still see a lot of people out there who are going to be extra cautious
The other thing to consider is that these vaccines have an efficacy rate of 94 or 95 percent
Which means there's a 5% chance that you could still get COVID-19 and I think that's going to keep people
Rather cautious until we have
established
very
Efficacious palliative care for the virus itself. Well, the important thing I thought the same thing Alex the important thing to remember with that 5%
That it doesn't work upon look at the the percentage of people who suffer
Complications as a result of COVID and then factor that into okay, there's only 5% of
Everybody will
Will get the virus and of that the same percentage will have complications the number gets even smaller
So yeah, that's a problem, but it's not going to be an overwhelming problem. I don't believe
yeah, and apparently the
vaccines
Themselves will lessen the effect of having the virus. So even if you get it, you know, supposedly and again
Listen to the advice of medical professionals. Not me
The the symptoms are supposed to be less severe
Yeah
And the other thing is if 95, you know percent of of people it's effective on
Who are you going to get the virus from it has to be from another one of those?
5% that it's not effective on so it gets harder to get the virus
So I do think we'll be in better shape Gila you had something
Well, I was I was curious because I'm thinking about variants and I'm thinking about the flu shot and how the flu shot has to
Adjusted every year and I'm wondering if as more people are saying
This is going to become endemic and we're just gonna have to learn to live with it
Is there gonna be a kovat vaccination a kovat 19?
vaccination season every year
You know at my office
We have a flu shot clinic and you can go into one meeting room and everybody gets a flu shot the same day
And I'm wondering if it's gonna be that kind of a situation. Well, it's you know, there is a flu season
It's every season is kovat season
I think really it depends on what the virus does after the next move will be the viruses after people get vaccinated
and
How it how it reacts how it morphs into other things will determine do we need more protection against this or is this enough?
Have we stopped it? So it's a good question and
Something that we we will learn but Gila I need to know when you think things will become normal
Oh
goodness
I agree with Alex. I think we'll start creeping more toward normalcy in the fall
But when you said we'll be out and about without masks, I don't see that happening for a really long time
I think about when you would see tourists who are coming in specifically from Asia
Who were wearing masks on the street in New York City?
I think it might become a thing that just is a thing now
We'll be less cautious about taking them off in less public situations
But I could see people wearing masks outside for a really long time to come. So when when do you see that stopping?
I don't know that I do
Honestly, and you think for the rest of our lives we walking around for the rest of our lives
But I could see it especially
You know if air quality doesn't get better. I could see it for both reasons. I agree with you
I agree with Gia Gil on this. Go ahead
I've been I've been thinking about a lot about that a lot as well
Like okay say, you know, we fast forward to when kovat is no longer the threat it is now
everyone's got their vaccines and we have herd immunity and everything else and
We are still going to have to do a lot of adjusting we have spent the past year now
socially socially distancing isolating quarantining all that good stuff and
We have to take into account the mental health concerns and the ink like
with
When are we going to be comfortable in a crowd again?
I know when this when this started hitting and I had to still ride a crowded public transport to work and
Be shoulder-to-shoulder with people and realize wait, maybe this isn't such a good thing
Those those days are gone now, but like when are we going to actually feel?
Comfortable again like in general and that's that that seems to me like it's going to be an even longer time than it takes for
All of us to get our vaccines. I think there there are going to be jitters
They're going to be there's going to be anxiety around this whole thing
And yeah, I think you'll probably still see people who choose to adopt mask wearing as as a precaution
Permanently, I think there'll be a whole field opened up for a post kovat stress syndrome
Seriously because people are going through something traumatic. That's why it's so important for us to remain in touch
to listen to people to be sympathetic
Because this isn't something that only a certain group of people going through we're all going through this whether we choose to acknowledge it or not
We're all going through this and we need to be there for each other. And I think that will make things so much easier. Yes, Alex
well something I
Recently which I thought was
Weirdly prescient and really I think hammer some kilos point is that I recently rewatched the Japanese
animation film Akira, which is set in this post
apocalyptic
Cyberpunk future and it was from the late 80s
I think Akira was from the late 80s like 1988 or 1989, but it was set in
2019 the futuristic post-apocalyptic cyberpunk world of
2019 and
You can see it's right at the beginning of the show. So many of the people that are walking around
Japan at that time. They're all wearing face masks
This is what they predicted in the late 80s is that the world would become so polluted or there'd be
Health issues and all of these motorcycle gang enthusiasts
What if they're all wearing these face masks that are eerily similar to what we all have to wear today?
So, you know something to be learned from from Japanese animation of the late 80s
Yeah, we're not done yet either. I mean, this is
something that has become a necessity, but I mean the kinds and quantity and
functionalities of masks for from now and till the future until
They're even more necessary like for space travel and so forth. There's
No limit to what people can design and come up with and I know
we've we looked into this for
various ideas and
inspiration over the years
and
have been fascinated by some of the leaps and bounds with augmented reality and and
The cool things that people are building around those types of technology and now we're actually
Demanding that
Life go on in a virtual way. So in weird ways we were
We are very well suited as a community. I think to build cool things that deal with a lot of
What's coming at us very quickly and maybe?
make things that are not bulky or not come, you know more comfortable or more functional or safer or or
Cheaper easier for people to access or have more
Sensors who knows so, I mean, it's it's really
Going to take on a different direction
Just look at what was done to ramp up PPE when we just didn't have any and and there's still problems with with lab
supplies and
scientific materials now
to say nothing of the testing and and stuff and even the
The fact that Gila brought up that it could be endemic. It's really sad
Had we been able to contain this had we some kind of warning had we not let cruise ship people just like go wherever
like
we maybe wouldn't have to face that but now that we do it it seems like
this is going to be an area of innovation face coverings and
Sanitization Rob Kyle quickly. When do you think things will go back to normal? Rob you first?
I feel like I feel like maybe a year from now. I feel like it'll be it might be another year another year. Okay, Kyle
I
feel like those
months the
vaccine
program well underway and behind us maybe some new programs that address things like Alex's phrase like the
National programming as far as how to integrate scheduling or make things easier for the future
Stockpiling manufacturing all those little things we realized in the face of this will be
just barely started to be
Something we can focus on instead of the immediate concerns everybody's health and rolling out vaccines
so I feel like it'll look a little bit normal after that vaccine program is something that we're learning from and and
Using the things learned for the future when it's in the rearview mirror
I think that will it'll appear that way, but it won't really be that way in all ways
And we will not look at it in much the same way
There's perhaps a certain sort of trauma that is gonna be associated with this for a lot of different reasons for a lot of different
people
for many people it's a culmination of a lot of different issues and
That's why it's important to keep the discussion going keep reflecting on
What what's going on in your community and in your family and with you?
But to be hopeful and to to try to be inspired to try to stay motivated, so I think
You know five years
Maybe but but a year five years before things are back to normal a year is really soon. Maybe two years
I don't know Wow think about it. We're we were thinking that
2021 would we would have all of this sort of in in the past or from the beginning
I was hearing 12 to 18 months and
They came up with a vaccine pretty damn quickly, so I don't know you know it seems like
It's not that that off from what the the possibilities were first explained to us from scientists
That is it's definitely not what they were talking about. It's definitely not the worst-case scenario as far as time
Well, it's also not the worst-case scenario as far as virus because imagine a virus that
Really was was fatal to most people and they have existed
You know the black death and all that these things can and will happen this is a barometer of how
We will perform in situations like that
We'll panic we'll hoard we'll deny
We'll make all these mistakes
So this is a big warning
I think to everybody for when it when the real death virus comes might not be in our lifetimes. Hopefully it's not
But at some point there will be something something really bad, but Kyle was there was there you said five years
That's that's your your prediction. I don't know I mean there's so many different ways to look at it. It's a
spherical
Conversation well let me say angles my I've sort of a two-pronged answer
I think we'll start seeing a lot more openness a lot people
Going outside maybe still wearing masks, but feeling a lot more comfortable
Towards the end of the summer. I'm gonna be very optimistic and say that but as far as going back to the way
we were I don't see that happening until we take some cautious steps into next winter and
You know when people expect to get sick and and see that not many people are getting sick from this
I think that's when a lot more people will become comfortable
There's there certainly will be a lot of people who won't be comfortable for a long time
But I don't think everybody's gonna react in the same way. I think you know most of us will be comfortable by
By the winter or in the winter next year or later this year and
Other people will feel the effects for a long time to come and still others will will feel better sooner
Go ahead Gila
Well, I guess my question also is what are we calling normal?
You know there are things that we had become to which we had become accustomed that are not good
But they are the way that the world was operating and there are also things that maybe
You know the way that the world has been operating work better for people in a way
I'm thinking about people working from home more. I'm thinking about you know, you don't have to put on
stockings and heels five days a week as
an example
Speak for yourself
What
What is normal and how do we redefine normal going forward? But the other thing I was thinking about
Especially in light of what we're talking about in
Texas is the way that we look at so many things right now is this cult of rugged American individualism and
Because that piece of it has been so
Part and parcel of the way that we've dealt with a pandemic
But also I don't know if you saw the statement that the former apparently mayor of Colorado Springs, Texas made on social media
Colorado City, Texas, I did hear about this. Why don't you repeat it where he basically said?
We're not in the business of giving handouts to people and if you don't have power you have to deal with it and I'm not
Gonna help anybody if you're not gonna help yourself
Basically, it was bootstrap your way to fixing the power grid
Well, I think he also says something like the strong will survive in the week will perish
And the week the week weren't that week and they didn't take kindly to that remark
Exactly all of it, but if it becomes you get yours and everything else
I mean, maybe that's a part of normal that we need to
Rethink going forward. Absolutely. That's Alex. Go ahead
To Gila's question. I think that we can consider
society back to normal
when investment bankers have no fear about snorting coke off of the toilet seat in a
in an annoying club
With music that's way too loud when we're back when we're back to investment bankers snorting coke off toilet seats
Then I think we're back to and who's gonna tell us when that's happening
You have to I guess get some friends in finance if you don't have any so I'll never know
I just want to point out that's a disgusting thing to do and we hear it off the hook are not endorsing investment banking at all
Thank you. Thank you for saying that
All right. Anything else guys? We don't have somebody on hold this time. I'm gonna make sure no
I mean you could give the number out
Now I have that strange noise, I mean, no we have to get out of here
We have things to do but want to thank people for for calling in Alex. Looks like you have something to say
Yeah, I feel like we falsely advertised that we were gonna be making some phone calls of our own
So perhaps we can can table looking at some of the fraudulent
COVID-19 vaccine
Scheduling websites and put that on the agenda for OTH overtime next week. Yes. I'll put you in charge of that. How about that?
Sounds great
Anything else guys Rob Gila
Just continuing to send, you know our thoughts to people friends family listeners everyone in Texas going through
Something that's really not easy right now. I heard from a friend over social media that
Apparently flushing your toilet with melted snow works if you need to
so
You know, we're thinking of you that that is that is something we are well the importance of infrastructure
I mean, you know not to beat a dead horse, but
In Canada these things don't happen in Norway Sweden, you know
Don't listen to people have an agenda and tell you that windmills don't work in the cold. They do they they
They work very well
You'll get through this. We'll all get through the very crises what we're going through right now
and
We will we will hang out we will do fun things and I think it'll be in the in the fairly near future again
Vaccine info if you have info you want to share with a particular system in your state or country or whatnot. Let us know
Give us information. We'll look into it. See if we have any insight
Oth at 2600 calm
we will be back next week with off the hook at 7 off the hook over time at 8 and
Until then stay hacking and whatever else Alex
Just good night. Everybody. Stay safe
Until next time goodbye