Turned on by Esther Dyson

00:01 Welcome to the show that needs no introduction because we have absolutely no agenda coming to you from the United Kingdom in the curry Manor I'm Adam curry, and I'm John C. DeVorek from actually sunny and warm, California Oh nice to hear nice to hear so we just hit record I probably should have started two minutes ago as usual because Patricia came upstairs the minute I hit record and then I stopped it like a fucking fool and Because there's a... I was reading the Financial Times and they were like, there's two stories on one page that I thought was just funny. And I wanted to read them to you. And I was looking for it and she... of course Patricia had already taken the paper and the cat was pooping on it.

00:42 But, and they said, yeah, don't worry about it. And so I said, I remember what I was going to talk about. But then, you know, wait a minute, you know, don't doesn't the cat normally poop on the, on, on, on the, on the times of London as opposed to the financial, the daily mail, no, no, no, the daily mail, daily mail. That's it. I love the finance, the financial times weekend is, is I look forward to that. It's a real time. And maybe I might, might just an old fashioned guy that I look forward to that. It's almost like school. It's one of the, it's really an outstanding paper. I like it. I agree. You want me to just tell you these two stories that were on the same page that I thought was interesting? Yeah, sure. Okay. So the first one is, and I don't know if you've been following this, but Gordon Brown has basically gone over to China, Gordon Brown being the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, and he's basically said, hey, all these sovereign wealth funds you guys have set up, why don't you start investing that over here and we'll open up all kinds of

01:37 trade Roots and everything can can be copacetic and oh by the way we have Northern Rock we wouldn't mind if you maybe bought some bonds that were you know turning that into so And then we'll let you sell products here and and essentially he's saying the UK in return for all this money and Chinese products that will be coming in the UK will reciprocate with It was interesting the way the Financial Times wrote it. With Britain's luxury goods, like Rolls Royce, financial services and the English language. So that's the Chinese money is flowing in now, saving the city, the financial city.

02:23 And on the same page, there's this new tax law they want to implement. And I don't know if you care anything about tax law, but this is a very... There's two things that are very interesting. One is that if you are like me, if you live here and at least partially work here, but you have income from overseas, you'll have to pay 30,000 pounds annually to be taxed only on what you bring into the UK or be taxed worldwide. And between taxes and there's always credit so you know if you pay taxes in one country then you get a credit and you don't have to pay the tax on the same money in the country where you may be living or where the money was made. But there's one specific citizenship that is a little different when it comes to capital gains and that's American citizenship.

03:20 You are taxable on your capital gains no matter where in the world it took place and you have to report it and you have to pay your taxes over it. But now the UK is going to do the same thing for capital gains of people who are living in the UK. So if, let's say, I sold some stock in the US or if I sold a company in the US and I made money on it, I would pay presumably 18 or 19% in the US and another 18 or 19% if I ever wanted to use any piece of that money in the UK. So, the message that I just read on this Financial Times was, Americans, fuck off. Chinese, come on in boys. That's really what it looked like.

04:06 That's what it was. It is, it's messed up and I'll probably have to leave. Well, you know, if I were you, you're an artist, you can go to Ireland. What's the benefit of Ireland? Well, they have some deal there if you're an artist or a writer or something to do with the arts. You can get Irish citizenship in some way, shape or form. I think it's still valid. It could be wrong. I mean, this could have ended, but I know it existed for a long time and the Irish are bitching about it. You can get Irish citizenship and no income tax. They just say, no, you don't have to pay any taxes. I kind of like that. So, you know, I'm an artist, right? Doing this is artistry.

04:45 You're an artist. Yeah, cool. You're recording artist. You're a Performance artist international performance artist surely your hair Adam Adam curry mystique And I think the hair dude just get you you'd be grandfathered in I'd love to go to Australia But in Australia you have to have I think you have to you know you have to be like a rocket scientist Otherwise, you know I didn't well You know what is too far man and for what? Oh? It's too far. Yeah, but I wouldn't mind moving away from everybody. Why don't you move to Perth? That's far. It is beautiful there. That's what I'm told, but nobody's ever gonna... I'm never gonna know. Oh, I've been to Perth. You have? Yeah, yeah. I did a documentary of... we went from

05:34 Arrived in Sydney, but really the documentary started in Melbourne and then went clear across the country including the the South Pacific line which is the Includes the longest piece of completely straight railroad anywhere in the world through the oh right Yeah, the the desert that's been nuked where they used to the nuclear testing And it's like a 24-hour train ride and that goes all the way to Perth and that train ride let me tell you John I Is not fucking worth it. I wouldn't think so. 24 hours on a train in the middle of nowhere may not be that great. It was kind of an old-fashioned Orient Express type of vibe, but nah, that was no good. No, I had some fun, man. I stayed in the Outback for like three or four days. It was a pretty crazy time. Very interesting. I like the country a lot. I would not mind living there, actually.

06:28 So we got some fan mail, well, I don't know about that, but we got some fan mail, you know, we can still Skype the show. We got some fan mail, by the way, over the last week or two, and one came in from Sean Kendall who was complimenting us for our Stream of Consciousness style of podcast, which he thought was compelling listening, I suppose. And I realized that because I pulled out a notebook because over the weeks we keep trying to talk about stuff that we write down And then we never have to know of course not But so I found a notebook with my notes, and I realized that we got we're not stream of consciousness at all We're just completely disorganized It's interesting to think that you could pass it off as stream of consciousness when in fact you're just all screwed up now that said

07:12 I found a notebook with some of these notes in it and I realize now that the problem that I have and the reason I'm not as rich as you and some other people is because, and you can blame it on disorganization, you can blame it on all kinds of different things, laziness, sloth, and I think I work pretty hard but then I realize what it really is. The whole thing boils down to one thing, it's very simple, penmanship. You can't read your own handwriting. I can't read these notes. So I pulled some of these notes down that I think would be interesting to try to decipher. Well, let me just say, I can't read my own handwriting either. And you know what I've been using? I've been using Google Notebook. It has a mobile version.

07:53 So no matter what device I'm on whether it's the n800 or if it's my cell phone or in front of the computer You know the the mobile notebook is just like I pull it out boom click I type in whatever I want to type it It's it's gotten pretty quick. Well. I should do that sure because these these notes But there's still even so I even like because I used to take notes on the computer and that there's still a couple of issues I have one is that Have a tendency to write down phone numbers and that but and I all I say to myself put the guy's name down put the guy's name down because you're never gonna remember I'll remember by the way. I wrote the ape who it was I'll remember and you do remember for about 15 minutes And then you see this phone number later go whose number is this and you can't call the person saying hey, yeah You know, I'm just a big, you know, it's a dentist John C. Dvorak. Surely you've heard of me. Hi and

08:44 Now the other problem I have which is really probably more annoying and more dangerous at least for me as a writer is I write down kind of thoughts and sometimes observations and Sometimes quotes or phrases I want to use because I think this is pretty funny unfortunately, I also write down notes of somebody else saying something and then you attribute those to your own brilliance and No, I always look at it if I'm not absolutely sure that I dreamed it up, which is hard to do because I dream up a lot of stuff, so I throw a lot of stuff away out of fear. But I've got one right here. Now this is a piece of notepad paper and it says, NYC 11am recorder, cancel TV. That's the top of the note, so I don't know what that means. Well that was part of your New York City trip, right?

09:31 This is from months ago. Maybe all right, and I don't cancel them anyway last time I cancelled TV was when I had direct TV and people out there if you have direct TV or the dish Network and you can go on vacation You can cut the service off for like a month or 90 days, and you won't get you want to pay And they'll put it right back on you can actually give them the date you want it off and the date you want it on and they do it automatically it's great. Oh, they should have a way to do that on the website. That's even better It would be good. Now, so here's the quote, so I had this in a different pen. It says, when it comes to politics, the internet is like cocaine. Now I don't know whether I said that, if it's my comment or somebody else said it and I thought it was clever. When it comes to politics, the internet is like cocaine. Yeah. So I don't know, is that mine? I'm not sure. Did somebody say it? I can't tell. I know I didn't say it. Let's see what else we got.

10:29 It's a good phrase. Who's Skyping you, man? I can hear it in the background. Here, let me just tell him to stop. Yeah, say excuse me. Stop doing podcast now. Sorry. Alright. Let's see, another thing. Let's see what else we got. Here's some other notes. Trojans, worms, and spyware. Future of malicious code. Michael Upslow. Did some guy write that is it a book I should read I'm not sure future and then it says Elsevier which indicates a publisher Yeah, it's a Dutch publisher or formerly done publisher. Well. They're all over the place now. This is a PC fighting spyware Megazine PC fighting spyware magazine ed editor heights no, it's insane. No, maybe editor Neil Ruben king and

11:29 TOC, Table of Contents, I don't know what that's all about. O'Reilly, PC Structure, Species, Species, Taxonomy. This is so useless, it's unbelievable. You know what? I'm pretty sure you did write the cocaine quote because all of this stuff is totally done when you're high. There's no doubt about it. I'm not high. That's the joke of it. I mean if I was in college and I was doing this, I would think, well yeah, this is typical, you know, your college, you know, You know, imbibing and the next thing you know you're writing down stupid things. I'm not high, I don't use drugs at all. I usually don't take notes if I'm drinking, it's just ridiculous, of course I could account for the bad handwriting. Anti-climactic leopard. Cat of the... Oh, go ahead, cat of the what? Cat of the bag.

12:19 Hmm so clearly something about Apple's Leopard, anticlimactic and then you were kind of thinking of some angle on it. Maybe it was just cat out of the bag, I'm not sure. But then the next line is Neanderthals redheads. Apparently Neanderthals were redheads. Interesting. You know that in the UK, the gingers, as they call them here, are actually discriminated against and people are always making jokes about people who are ginger. And they treat them almost like, you know, well, you know, everything's great about you, but man, you're ginger. And I was thinking maybe that does date back to Neanderthal days. Well, I think in England it's because there's so many redheaded Irish and Scottish women that just the hatred of the Irish and the Scots seems to be more likely in that case.

13:12 I mean the British are extremely bigoted towards all kinds of people. The French, of course, at the top of the list. Ah, wait, wait, wait, wait. Stop right there. Listen to this. Hey Adam, this is Arnaud, the lazy Frenchman. No, actually, I'm not the other French caller. I'm the Silicon Valley Frogs podcaster, although I haven't casted in a while. Anyway, I was listening to you know what i'm calling about months you know what i'm talking about i was listening to you and jacquie debar and uh... no agenda and um... i know you don't mean any harm when you call the french uh... lazy um... although i think in that department uh... there are a few others who might have it beaten there

14:06 Just to get back on the French economy, it's true that the French economy, you know, it has its ups and downs. Right now, if you compare it with the US economy, I guess it's pretty much a tie. Ah, he's boring me now. That's our new... Yeah, that was... you gotta tighten those up. There's a good program out there for everybody called Audacity. What I'm lacking is something called time. Ah, well I don't blame you there. I'm so sorry. Okay, let's go back to some of these notes, see if we can come up with anything. Domino's Pizza, XX Pimp, we're not going to use it tomorrow. Oh, I know what that was from. That's when you were trying to get hookers to audition for Textra.

14:56 Don't think so. Okay. Do you deny that you tried to get hookers to audition for texture? Are you denying this? We're looking for strippers, I'm sorry not hookers. There's a big difference. There's a big difference big difference And you know the strippers are the ones with the heart of gold the hookers are not necessarily All right Philly wife you're reliably informed I'm just guessing Philly Wi-Fi, talk to a blonde something. Yahoo 415 DLUS 140 watching weekly, 140 weekly. Okay, so that's about something some show Yahoo is doing.

15:41 Maybe oh yeah, it could be clay claims the profits the handful The hand something or the handoff newspapers in the digital age. I don't I think it was a book title I do write down book titles to come always saying there's a book I should do and then once I write the book title down then I don't have to do the book What do you mean you don't have to do the book? Well, because I've already come up with the title, so I figured the work is all done. Can you make any money off of books, John? Is there any money in that? Yeah, I actually make money off of books. I need to finish some books nowadays. It's my problem. But is it worth the effort? It's a good exercise. Most books are not worth the effort, I would say, and I try not to do those types of books.

16:29 Divix Juggernaut Shutdown Button Breakthrough Triggering Mechanism of Thought. That's a pretty good one. I think that's one of my little quotes I wanted to say about something. Self-communication, self in quotes, now I wrote this down, I don't know what this means. In quotes, self, Then that's the end of the quote. Just the word self. Self-communication of blogs. What does that mean? That means you're talking to yourself when you're blogging, I guess. Or maybe that the actual technical infrastructure talks to other blogs, something like that. And I got blog as evidence against you.

17:09 Sure, which I think that's pretty obvious now. Here's one of these quotes again by this time. I'm absolutely sure I didn't say it I think some Admiral did and I wrote it down for some reason I don't know why I bother writing it down. What am I gonna do with it? I will not allow a network computerized system on this ship while I'm in command. Okay Wow, that was probably the story about the 787, I think the Dreamliner, and that there was a question whether passengers using the Wi-Fi network would be able to hack into the plane's computer system.

17:47 Oh yeah, you know there's a really- yeah maybe. Hey this is a good game. I'm into this. This is pretty cool. Yeah no that's a good one. Okay this one you'll never get anything out of. And I can't- I don't get it myself. What am I doing? Primers. We ask ourselves that all the time. Just a list of words. Primers, Sarah with an H, Dallas, last show, Team SK, three arrows coming from those words and two of them going nowhere, one going to a blank line and one pointing to 1976. Then two, it says two, a word I can't read, it says C-L-U-S-N, four, Korean. Then a boxed word, like I'm in Hollywood, says gamer with an arrow pointing to M-F-A-B and then under that is the letters M-A-F-V-P circled and then at the very bottom of the same page is team sport cost network. How often do you and your wife have sex?

18:48 Apparently not enough. It just seems to me I might just write... maybe we're having sex while I'm writing these notes. I mean it doesn't make any sense at all. That's pretty sad because I bet you there's some good shit in there. You know there's lots of guys with the promise. I've produced too much material well, so that's really what they I mean clearly we have a lot of Horsepower and processing on these laptops I mean that that's really somehow we should be able to create an interface that you can use the way you're using that That notepad and then it can actually help you retrieve the information Or that you can link this I don't know it just feels like there's got to be a different type of type of this way

19:30 I have, you know, the reason I write so many columns and I try to do so much work is because I gotta get these things out of my system. Otherwise they clog you up. And I actually, you know, believe that. Now, so I'm writing down stuff all the time and I used to at one time, I tried using one of those recorders, you know, note to self, you know, da da da da da. And it's like, you know, that's annoying. I mean, everybody thinks you're an asshole for doing that. So I don't do it. Yeah, I have a million to-do lists everywhere too that never get done. Right now I just want to I don't want to do this for the whole show, but I'm gonna do one more One more list and that I'm did this is not much on this one page, but it's the same thing It says security and then there's the word Roger It looks like Roger and then the word then and that's underlined and then next there's another underlined two words Microsoft and then there's a like just a scribble and

20:22 But I think it says pager. Maybe this is all pager. Security pager, Microsoft pager, Cisco pager. All those are underlined. And then the word Oracle not underlined. And then the words download new camera and that's boxed. Download new camera. Yeah, it's got a nice sound to it. I don't think it's possible Anyway, that's yeah, but this is the this is what you know is being taken for stream of consciousness. It's just nuts Anyway dry was so I run into these notebooks if they're not fresh and they're these old ones It's just like why did I even bother writing anything down? You know when I'm going through the supermarket and you know, they have that stationary section

21:06 I have a hard time passing by without picking up a notebook. You know what I mean? Like a nice fresh thing, you know, crackly white notebook that I can, you know, write stuff in and I fill it up and you know, I've got them somewhere. I don't know if I do anything with them. Well, I mean, they may be auctionable, you know, if you become more famous. But generally speaking, I rip the pages out of these things and throw them out, and I just shake my head thinking I probably lost a lot of good material. I mean, there's material here that's just disappearing left and right. And what I don't get, and I think maybe I should seek counseling, but what I don't get is why

21:45 Why I can't talk myself into doing the extra, taking the extra step and writing the person's name down next to the phone number that I write down. Or writing a little more detail. Or trying to be neat so you can read your own writing. Well that's a block. That's a block in itself. That's a mental block and we can get you counseling for that. I know exactly who can help you. Good, so I would be useful because it's like it's be it's getting on my nerves. Well. You know this has been going on forever You're doing it yourself. I mean, that's the easy thing you can change that you just do it, but you clearly know It's a it's a self-importance thing you think you're too important I'm too important for my own information exactly exactly

22:36 So that's kind of my complaint, but that's the that's a real stream of consciousness has nothing to do with this program well True well or or does did you hear about our crash here at Heathrow? Yeah, that's been in the news here quite extensively. I guess some wire broke or a cable didn't work or something didn't communicate and the guy couldn't gun it when he had to. Isn't that a fly-by-wire newer 747? What was it? It's a 777. I talked a little bit about the preliminary, you know, it was so infuriating, John, to sit here and, you know, finally, I hate to say it, but finally something on the news I really know something about.

23:19 I really know about flying, I know about Heathrow, I know all of these different things. I have not flown a 777, but there's a lot of stuff that I do know. The first 48 hours was so frustrating. To see them just rolling out, you know, Bozo after Bozo... ...uh, you know, eyewitnesses who of course, you know, have very limited useful information. You know, just constant live shots. I'm like, please get some fucking experts on. And, uh... Now they have, and now I have to say the coverage is excellent. And part of that is because the AAIB, the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau, well, they promised a preliminary report in 25 days, which is quite fast, certainly if you compare it to the NTSB. But they also released a, kind of like a pre-report, which was really quite good and quite helpful.

24:13 Because the first question is really only two things Pilots are real simple. There's only two things that can get can cause this to happen pilot error or maintenance. I mean, those are the two things, right? Because this is, you know, or some catastrophic wrong part, but even that is attributable to maintenance because maintenance should have caught it. That's essentially the way it works. So you can't say whether. No, then the pilot, it's pilot error. He should not have been flying. You know, that's and that's how the reports are written too. So, What the news is doing is everyone's lauding the crew and how fantastic and I'll get to that in a second.

24:53 But what they're you know what they're not really reporting on is you know excuse me This is a triple seven it only has two engines if you've ever flown on one of these John these engines are massive They're like five times the size of of what I've been in numerous times right it is indeed as far as I know the only aircraft of this size that is fly-by-wire meaning You're not actually when you pull back on the control On the yoke you're not actually mechanically connected with the ailerons I think the big I think the big Airbus 340 is also that you're right. It's also fly-by-wire correct that has the joystick on the side right so everything is issuing a command to Basically servos and so to the throttle and that's connected to something called the Fadek which is the fully authorized digital engine controller and

25:45 So essentially, when you're moving the throttle controls, the FADEC is probably compensating and doing all kinds of work and making most efficient use of the command on the engines. So on final approach, they're two miles out at 600 feet. They're on autopilot, so it's an autopilot landing, which is quite normal and probably around 300 feet, they'd still disengage and land it by hand, even though on this plane, I believe it can completely land itself without, you know, completely on autopilot. So it also has auto throttle engaged, obviously. And the co-pilot is actually doing the landing, which is quite normal. You know, these guys, they switch off, they're coming in from Beijing. So it was just this guy's turn to land.

26:33 the There's nothing there's not a lot of wind and the plane you know when you're coming down essentially You're using pitch so your nose up or down is for your speed It's kind of reverse when you think about it, and you're using the throttle for height because you're configured completely different You know if you ever seen a big plane come in you see the nose is actually up. It's not down right yeah except for a b-52, but anyway go ahead And so... So the plane starts to dip a little bit below the glide path. And then the auto throttle tries to rev the engines up a little bit. Engines are actually almost at idle when you're landing. A lot of people don't know, depending on the conditions. But they can almost be off in some circumstances. And so the throttle levers will also automatically move forward, but the engines don't respond.

27:33 And so, from what I've read in the report, then they tried manually to ram the throttle levers forward. Still no response from the engines. At this point, they're below the glide path. And indeed, where he landed is very consistent. Where they first impact is very consistent with losing power on final approach. And I think the only thing, just looking at it, is... He might have done a better job with actually, you know, having the wheels break off might not have necessarily have to have happened. But again, pilots are real simple, so there's only two types of landing. You know, you've got a good landing if everyone walks away, and if the aircraft is reusable, that's a great landing. So, and right now I would not step into a 777 at all. They have not issued any kind of warning, but I'm telling you, something's fucked up with that airplane.

28:30 Well, I wouldn't get into one until they fix that whatever the problem is I but you know they usually ground them in the US when something weird like that happens Which is the story and no one's reporting on that all they're talking about is the crew you know it's like excuse me don't let people fly You know not on these planes right now. You should ground the fleet. I think well. This is interesting. I just got a memo so Disappearance you know we have our Natalie seems to just like to get her Her announcement, my stepson just sent me this from Valleyweg. Quote, also John Dvorak told me not to say my age on Textra because I was getting too close to 30. I don't have a complex about turning 30 and I'm not about to let that cranky geek give me one. I'll be 30 in eight months, John so there. I told you she didn't like you. You didn't believe me, did you? I didn't care whether she was turning 30. I actually didn't think she was that old. Why does she do that? That's so lame.

29:31 I don't know. She has a, I don't know. She's going to get, of course now unfortunately, she should know better as a writer because writers are, you know, when you slam someone who's a writer... Yeah, you know you're going to get it back. It could be years later. You're going to get it back, usually in spades and you have to be able to put up with the return fire. Yeah, because I've done it numerous times and I've gotten blasted I you know sometimes you wait like a year or two and then something all of a sudden you get this you get hit by something you know exactly Because you've been waiting why it's why you're getting this this this slam. Yeah, you guys like elephants

30:08 So so I guess I'll have to now geez so now I guess I have to do something Where did she? I'm looking at Valleywag. I don't see that here. Let me just send you this link It's just apparently just came out. That's funny But how did Valleywag know about Becky? No, I didn't tell him so how did they know that how did they know that at all? Oh? There's probably about five people who knew I don't know I have no idea I didn't even know they do I mean you just I just found out but no there was right now. You know they had a posting maybe It was a weird time. It was like around maybe was a couple weeks ago So I was still fresh in the new year a lot of other shit going on and they posted you know Becky Worley to be The new host of textra I have no idea okay. I'm sure I could track it. Well. Don't well. Don't tell anyone I

31:04 Whatever you But You know there's a couple crew guys there. They could have overheard I mean you know I don't know who knows they would you know they were shooting her so I mean somebody could have and they were shooting it in South Park no less right where there's all the dot-com people anybody oh, this is a good one John Wow The uh... They gave her a big write-up. We'll put a link on the curry.com site to this particular post. I don't think so. You can go put that on Dvorak.org slash blog. Yeah, okay, I'll put it on Dvorak.org slash blog. I'm not giving this one a love. Bubba can put it on Cage Match. This is actually quite funny. I mean, I don't know what she's thinking. She's talking about her appearance. I mean, there's a whole thing about her appearance that's kind of carried away.

31:55 Um, editor's note, Natalie and I are at Moose's for her going away party. Join us. When was this? Is this an old poster? It says Friday, January 18th. Must have been this Friday, which we missed. Anyway, uh, she goes on and on. What's the title of the post? So long and thanks for all the fashion advice. Oh yeah, I got it. And then she's like, just a straight, it's like she posted this. Blah blah blah blah. Men don't take me seriously because I'm pretty. That's so much bullshit. I can't imagine a more boring sentiment. I will say this since transitioning from print to video, she hasn't transitioned really, I do receive just as many viewer emails about my hair, makeup and clothes as I do about tech news. Quote, the lipstick you wore in episode 104 was not your color. Okay, so what? John Dvorak said not to blah, blah, blah. I don't take comments about my appearance too seriously, but I do find them amusing. I've thought about it, but my tech community has such strong opinions about what I should look like. I don't think so.

32:56 I accept all this but I'm going to wear red lipstick from time to time. It doesn't go anywhere. I'm heading to New York. It's like a Twitter thing. I mean, what is this? You should just have a Twitter account. I'm heading to New York on Monday. I'm sure she does Twitter. I'm sure she has a Twitter. I look at her. I'm subscribed to her weblog. She also has a Flickr stream which is very entertaining. Think she forgets all that vehicle people can subscribe to it. Yeah pretty interesting Let me see if I find and follow Do you have a Twitter John no I can't I don't have you talking you know you said yourself I haven't got time to do this stuff. I don't either, but I don't really I have a I have a Twitter account and once in a while Yeah, but that way I mean what so you can subscribe to other people's feeds not for your you're not twittering well, I use it kind of sometimes it's just I

33:55 It's a way to get something out. I will use it maybe once every two or three weeks. Sure. And I got a couple thousand followers. I have followers. Come to me. So put on your eyeshades and put on your earplugs. You know where to put the cork. My name is Tommy and I'm so glad that you're here. I'm sorry. Yeah, you should be. So there's a now my I have to my stepson sending me more weird stuff a Valley way apparently there is Something about sex columnist. Oh, this is the sex columnist who touched these jobs. Oh, this is a violet blue story Yeah, you know I guess I guess I guess a million guys Taped it don't you know shot it after little recorders. Don't even insult. Don't even insult me with this story This is a stupid

34:55 Yeah, I think so too. That's stupid. I've requested... Oh, you can't just follow Natalie, you have to request it. I've requested it. Oh, you mean for her Twitter? Yeah. I didn't know that. Oh, you could just... Why don't you just request it? I did! I did, of course I requested it. I'm not nuts. She probably doesn't do that much posting. I don't get the impression that she's that much of an active... Twitter or blogger kind of thing. I mean, there are people you run into and you find out that they have a Twitter thing. They're Twittering everything. Again, I went here, I did this, I did that, I went to the store, I got in the car, I drove around the block, I got pulled over by a cop, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, and it just goes on and on and on. It's like, gee, I mean, how much, I think it's a lot of nervous energy going into these things. Well, I do like, there is something reverse about it that I like.

35:46 So it's kind of like a chat room except instead of muting people you can turn people on. It's a little reverse. No, you're right. It's an exact chat room style of chit-chat. Yeah, but the control is different. The way you access the information Well, first of all, that's fundamentally different because you know you can get it through SMS and through you know IM and a whole bunch of different ways so in that way it's kind of ubiquitous like email. I kind of like that. But yeah, I'll follow people. It's not as interactive as a chat room. Well, but you can do, if you use the at sign then you can send a message to someone and it shows up specifically on that person's doorstep.

36:38 Oh, yeah, there are some tricks in there. You should look into it John because I think you might be surprised that there is something there that is I think a basis of Something it's not what it is now, but there's a concept that I'm liking I have to admit I do like it Don't just brush it all it's not just a chat room. It's not I mean I okay, okay? I don't you know I know that the guy who did it ev head and the You know, the people who are backing it, there seem to be a lot of guys who have a lot, they are forward thinkers. And I mean even Dave Weiner, your pal, Dave loves it. He loves it. He loves it. And he seems to, you know, he's a cutting edge guy. For sure. And he's been posting about it a lot recently.

37:27 And I don't just brush that off, you know. It is freaky right now. I mean, I'm sure it's 20,000 people who are just freaky like that. You know, Jason Calacanist is one of those guys, you know, like having dim sum, you know, thinking about buying a Tesla. Mahalo rules. Flying back to LA now. You know, that's literally... Well, I'm also reminded of there's something I've never really warmed up to and I see a lot of people that do this. You know, they have their, and you know, you're talking about my note taking and a sense of self-importance. But I'm not one of those guys who puts down my schedule on the blogs. Of course, I don't do that much, generally speaking. But I know a lot of people that say, here's what I'm doing for the next six months. I'm speaking here and I'm at a big conference over here. And I'm going here and I'm going there and I'm going to this important event and that important event. Well, you know who else does that very effectively on their weblogs? Escorts. They always have what town they're visiting and the dates and where they're going to be. And I think it's a really good thing.

38:32 Why? Yeah, so you can coordinate what are you talking about why? You know it's just a different line of business. What's the difference between an escort and Jason Calacanis? Well, I don't think that's a good example. Okay. I was stretching a bit. But the there might not be a difference between those two the not that I'm anyway, so Be brave and have an opinion John be brave. I don't see why I Why anybody or just when I see one of these things? I know people that do this and I see them here's my schedule and here's what I'm doing. It's always a bunch of

39:14 Crap anyway, and who's reading these blogs? I mean they have a few people that aren't you know if you're gonna be in Basel Switzerland You know how many people would read my blog that are that would be in Basel, Switzerland Switzerland for anything well? What's the name of the Brit from Basel he listens to my show he actually lives there again from a buzzer buzzer Yeah, the Britain Basel The Brit in Basel. Yeah, you want to coming up to you? Well, but you know what so you can you give me three names of people who do that give me three names I

39:56 I'll give you, I mean, right off the top of my head, Esther Dyson does it. Larry, our friend Larry at the Creative Commons, I don't know why I can't think of his last name. Lessig, Larry Lessig. Lessig, Lessig, Larry Lessig. Esther Dyson does it. And I think John Perry Barlow does it. Okay, so let me just say, Esther Dyson, I subscribe to her, she has a couple feeds and she also has a Flickr feed. And I gotta tell you, I enjoy it. I think it's... It helps me keep up with what Esther Dyson is doing and invariably our paths will cross one day. It'll be for a reason but I'm sure this will have something to do with it. And I do find what she does is quite interesting. You know, she has... One day she's... Well, she had a whole stream of pictures. She was...

40:46 Investing in some very light jet companies of course that interested me. She has an obsession for swimming pools So every hotel she stays at she takes a picture of the swimming pool I just got to say I like that coming from her. I think it actually adds to her business relevance Just give her a call She once came on to me at what's it the PC forum? I think it was I just started my company, so this was 95 I think 95 96 maybe I was still at MTV somewhere really smack in the middle of the 90s and she invited me to come out to PC forum that's in

41:30 Where the hell is it John? Arizona. It's all over there, but she moves to Arizona. Yeah, it was in Arizona. And I came in a little bit later on in the evening, say maybe around nine o'clock and they always have like a big welcoming party. This was kind of in like the ramp up to the dot-com. Everyone was joyous. There were VCs everywhere and I had never really witnessed anything like this. She was a little uh inebriated and she was really coming on to me. It was kind of weird Yeah, maybe she's hoping it. You know she's gonna fall over she had someone to grab well The reason why is I was like I was kind of getting turned on by her that was the kind of the weird Part about it. No, maybe she sensed it

42:15 No, I don't know. I've known Esther for years and you know she's fine person I get by one time I accidentally will you do my eulogy John, please I can't that would be fantastic I've known Adam for years, and he's a fine person cakes over the right coffee on the left So I ran into her sit whatever so I don't know how many kids she or you actually I met her dad who was really a charming guy and The famous physicist. Oh, that's right. Yeah. He's super famous Freeman Freeman. Yeah, nice guy funny sense of humorous character a very small man and Then at one time I met I don't know how many others she's got brothers and sisters. I never kept up You know, I'm like one of those did you know my wife's always saying did you ask her ask her about the baby? Did you see you know, I don't you know, I don't pry I

43:04 I don't have you know basically self-centered and that's about the end of it We all know that so I met so I met her one of her sisters or her sister Who's a nurse and she's actually just so different than for the rest of everybody else? There was a bunch of intellectuals in the family. She's just like perky blonde. It was like really that's Yeah, it's totally off the wall is she hot if I remember right she's were quite attractive She may be the best-looking person in the family. Oh, what's her name? I don't remember I I mean, I can't even remember. Maybe Google can remember John. Let's see Esther actually Wikipedia probably has it in there Maybe or just I might have I'm not gonna go to we have to dice and sister. Yeah, she's a Mr.. Dyson sister it probably in there. You don't like the Wikipedia Whenever there's stuff there that I know something about it's usually not right, but I do I do I find that with the third thing I'll go to I you know I find that kind of an accuracy with the history channel and

44:06 You know I have a degree in history, and I'm still an amateur historian, and I read a lot of you know stuff Yeah, and the history channel is often what that where did they get this yeah? Well, this is what I'm saying. It's like whenever there's something on television about Amsterdam, you know, it's like... Okay, that wasn't really a representation of what Amsterdam is like. You know, and then... It's like whenever there's something you know something about, it turns out that the magic box is wrong. So it must be wrong about the other stuff too. You got to. Sister. Let me see... No, sister... I can't find it.

44:46 Yeah, well she's you know not well publicized. I suppose. Maybe I should try Esther Dyson's hold on Esther Esther Dyson's hot sister, maybe that'll Let me see if I get any better results from me getting a note from Esther tomorrow She doesn't listen to this show and i'm sure she doesn't uh... fact uh... i don't think anybody who's important actually listens to this show mostly people who are bored Yeah, I think you're right, but there's more of them. That's the good news Yeah, I know there's a lot of them, and there is occasional winners out there I mean all the notes we get from people seem to be important yeah Vice presidents of finance and all kinds of other characters Who was that the vice president of finance? I got a vice president of finance from some guy really I miss that I got some other voice comments But now I'm afraid to play them because they're probably too long oh

45:44 I don't know if we should play him. Well, if you get one that's a real winner, make a note and then play it. I have this note with like squiggle squiggle line arrow. I can't figure out which one is good anymore. But there is this... You know, I find that the... I like the Washington Post. I've become really choosy because of the, you know, all the stuff that we're talking about. I don't just read something from the BBC. If I have a choice, like on Google News, if I see that there's a story that the Washington Post is covering it, I'll select them first. They feel a lot more real to me. What would you say about them, John?

46:24 i'd like to watch the post yeah and i think they do a really good job the credible they don't have you know that they're not does so uh... i mean i think the people in new york times or uh... under a lot of pressure from all of you know scammers that have worked there and uh... And the kind of orientation now toward more soft stories and features and boring things. And the Washington Post seems to still be kind of hardline, and I think they do a lot of good material there. You know what's happening with me is now that, and I know it's just coming with age and just more years under my belt, but I'm kind of a kid in between generations. In between today's generation and your generation, if I can just put it kind of that way.

47:03 And so, you know, I grew up with newspapers, but then it quickly changed to something else and I kind of, you know, rode along on the transition. But I'm really valuing now understanding how full of shit most of the news is, and I'm really going out of my way, and this is only something in the past couple years, I'm really going out of my way. It's like, I'm not gonna pick up any paper, it's gonna be the Financial Times, or I'm gonna look at the Washington Post, and it's really become important to me, and I hope other people turn on to this, because for me, of course, it's too late, and I can't change the world anymore. Yeah, and I can't disagree with any of that, but you should also mention The Economist. I think that's an outstanding publication that seems to get it together. I'll have to pick that up because I honestly just haven't read that. What I like about the Financial Times, they have the, I guess it's the, what do you call that section that there's no byline, but it's from the editor or from the paper or from the publisher? What do you call that part?

48:04 The op-ed pages? It's not op-ed. It's just like... The editorials? I don't know. Anyway, so it has the Financial Times logo. New beliefs? It doesn't matter. But here's their slogan. Without fear and without favor. I like that. Like, fuck yeah. And that's how they write. Without fear, without favor. I like it. You should read The Economist then because I think you'd enjoy it. I shall. Anyway, so this is from the Washington Post. It's a story about how hackers And this is just from today, how hackers have gained access to the power grids of several countries and have extorted money. And in fact, in several instances have actually turned off the power in the entire country.

48:50 And this came out at a security conference for utility companies and a CIA analyst told this story and it turns out that most people didn't know about this. And this is going to be big. I think this is a huge story. Yeah, I know and it's breaking now. I'm familiar with this story and It's it's I'd like to get a little deeper into it because I'd like to find out what exactly these power companies doing that leaves them so vulnerable You know I'm thinking we can certainly trace which countries and I have a feeling that the Netherlands might be one of them So I'm on it. I'm gonna see if there's anything to that because we might be able to get any deeper, but this is just I

49:30 Man, you know, this is just the, I think, the tip of the iceberg of security of systems. This is happening all over the place, of course, not just with utilities. Well, you know, there seems to be, when I see these kinds of stories out of the blue, and I know hackers do a lot of stuff, but every once in a while when I'm starting to see it's focused, focused attention on something that's a security issue, I'm always thinking there's some security company behind it saying, look, we got some software, we got some encryption stuff, nobody's using it, we can make a lot of money, let's shut down, you know, some poe dunk country in Africa, just shut them down from a distance and then, you know, extort them if we can, but whatever the case is, bring it to the attention of everybody so we can sell some more products. So your theory here, which I like and of course, you know, am all over, is not very unlike my theory about the drug companies releasing viruses into the air to sell cold medicine. Yes, the same sick thinking.

50:28 So, is it just sick thinking or is it a reality? Well, you can buy the book in the foyer as Adam and John explain all the secrets of the great conspiracy. a book of great conspiracies. I mean there's a lot of them. I think there's enough of material on the net that you could probably put together an interesting book. But you'd have to do it. The problem with these kinds of theories is you can't over, you know, you can't over hype them because you sound like a complete maniac if you know everything, every time you turn around there's somebody, you know, trying to do something sneaky. But the fact of the matter is business in general does a lot of sneaky stuff. I mean, just to be in business, you have to do some sneaky things once in a while. And I mean, the days... In fact, it was like the Jokers and Gizmodo that were turning off monitors at CBS. Or some years ago when IBM had its Warp

51:19 and Low-level thing seems to me. I have a word. There's a word. I'm trying to come up with that explains it petty childish Infantile it was actually it was effective. We got a lot of publicity. It was actually but it was a sneaky thing It was not a what I would call legitimate business practice and neither would be shutting down one of these power grids And I could see somebody doing it Yeah, I'd have to agree, but that's not that I don't think that's a very interesting book to write I'm sure we could write something more interesting

52:06 Well, I got my notepad out. We can come up with a title. Oh, because if we have the title then we don't have to write it. Is that the process? That seems to be the current process I'm working with. Ah, excellent. The triggering mechanism of thought. That's deep, man. That may be a bit too deep for me. I don't even get it. That's how deep it is. I think my wife is downloading porn again. The Skype connection's getting a little crunchy. So we got anything else for this week to regale our fan base with? I don't know, man. I think we kind of covered it. In fact, I think most people probably dropped off after I told them I got turned on by Esther Dyson, so...

53:02 think we're uh... maybe i think you know i would be perky i think what you may have perked up wow odd was good talking with you john always a pleasure and uh... with that we wrap it up and uh... will talk to you again next week presumably from the same locations but you never know in united kingdom i'm adam curry and in sunny northern california on a very warm day i'm john c durek and we'll talk to you next week on no agenda