Latest / Nonsense with cj little and Jeff Parker / HEADLINES: Lawsuits for Likes, Haunted Python, & the Great Router Ban of ‘26

Transcript

HEADLINES: Lawsuits for Likes, Haunted Python, & the Great Router Ban of ‘26 · Nonsense with cj little and Jeff Parker

• 0:00
  I was thinking of you because while you have given me the gift
• 0:02
  of Arch Linux, yes, which I love because I, you know, it's free
• 0:06
  like beer, right? I get it.
• 0:07
  It's I can just use it. It's also free like speech to to
• 0:10
  quote RMS. Now I don't use the free like
• 0:12
  speech part 'cause I'm not actually changing the software,
• 0:14
  I'm just consuming it free like beer.
• 0:16
  But you could. Yeah, but you've neglected to
• 0:18
  also point out that it's really free, like a puppy.
• 0:20
  Is that right? Because it just keeps needing
• 0:22
  more and more work. I just it's just like it's it's
• 0:25
  really great. I've got our but like it's
• 0:28
  peeing on the floor and I gotta go mop it up and I gotta buy it
• 0:30
  food and like. Like in what way?
• 0:32
  Like like software updates? Yeah, you do that way no matter
• 0:35
  what system you're. On ring is upside, of course.
• 0:38
  Yes, of course. Every system you should have
• 0:40
  these same turtles as I'm. Complaining if you very happy.
• 0:44
  If you don't have these problems on any other system, your other
• 0:47
  systems are insecure. You should have this on every
• 0:49
  system. I understand.
• 0:51
  I'm just saying that the great RMS Richard Stallman said.
• 0:55
  Free like beer, Free like speech neglected the free like a puppy.
• 0:58
  Part He left the dimension free like a puppy.
• 0:59
  Neglected that part, which I think is important to realize
• 1:02
  quietly that really software, open source software especially,
• 1:06
  is very puppy ass. That's all.
• 1:08
  It's just more of a PSA for folks, That's all.
• 1:10
  I'm I'm trying to get at 2:00. The Apple Company presents a
• 1:21
  truly terrible podcast. Welcome to Nonsense Season 4,
• 1:24
  episode 20. I'm Jeff.
• 1:25
  Parker, I'm CJ Little. This is our take on the week's
• 1:27
  business, tech and entertainment headlines.
• 1:29
  This time, algorithm on trial. The verdict that turns social
• 1:32
  media features into legal liabilities.
• 1:34
  Oh. Not so sad now, are you,
• 1:36
  Winklevoss twins? The House of Cards How hackers
• 1:40
  turned AI tools into digital spies.
• 1:42
  All your bases are belong to us. FCC pulls the plug.
• 1:45
  New foreign made routers banned in the USA.
• 1:48
  That's a lot of words to just say all routers orders have been
• 1:51
  banned in the US there. Are no consumer routers now that
• 1:53
  are made in the US? Are there?
• 1:54
  No, there's no. Farm to Network program where
• 1:57
  somebody whittles them away in their backyard, then brings them
• 2:00
  to a local farmers market. There's no Etsy place you can go
• 2:03
  where you can get homemade routers.
• 2:05
  I'm sorry, are the routers in between the strawberries and the
• 2:07
  Peaches? Where do I go to find the
• 2:08
  homemade routers? No, that doesn't.
• 2:10
  It's not a thing, people. It's not a thing.
• 2:12
  Also a big story later this week is about aliens.
• 2:14
  It's always aliens. Amaze amaze, amaze, amaze.
• 2:17
  Together we saved 2 worlds. Are we just like the alien show
• 2:19
  now? Is that is that our new thing?
• 2:21
  It's the third. Time that we've talked about
• 2:22
  aliens in three weeks. So maybe we are.
• 2:25
  Yes, it's National Farm Workers Day.
• 2:26
  Sun scorched skin and calloused hands feed a nation that often
• 2:29
  forgets to say thank you. Today we honor the quiet
• 2:31
  resilience of farm workers, the backbone of our food system.
• 2:34
  Their labor is the bridge between soil and soul.
• 2:37
  Dignity, fair pay, and gratitude of the very least they've
• 2:40
  earned. I love the idea of farming, but
• 2:42
  I don't want to. Farm.
• 2:43
  No, it's a lot of work. It's a lot of work, yeah.
• 2:46
  I don't feel like I pay enough for what I buy.
• 2:48
  And a lot of machinery too, which I'm also a big fan of.
• 2:51
  Have you seen the carrot video? There's just a carrot video last
• 2:53
  week. Oh, yeah.
• 2:54
  Yeah. Of how they make baby carrots.
• 2:55
  Oh. Oh no.
• 2:56
  This was the greatest thing on the Internet.
• 2:58
  Was that on onlycarrots.com? Where'd you see that?
• 3:00
  Pretty much. It's so cool.
• 3:02
  Wait, it's how they make baby carrots?
• 3:04
  Yes, baby. Carrots are not actually small
• 3:06
  carrots grown on the ground. They're regular carrots.
• 3:07
  They just get reshaped and reformed and all that.
• 3:09
  But the actual? I see.
• 3:11
  I'm gonna put a. Link in the show notes.
• 3:12
  This is so good. Wait, they whittle down regular
• 3:15
  carrots and debate to put baby carrots?
• 3:17
  You have to see this. Video It's not like a baby, it's
• 3:19
  more like a it's just. A creation full size carrot
• 3:22
  humans who made this thing very easy to eat and it's all clean
• 3:26
  and the sides are all but. It's an adult carrot
• 3:28
  masquerading as a child. It's.
• 3:30
  It's an adult carrot masquerading as a child.
• 3:32
  That just seems weird to me, doesn't it?
• 3:34
  It's delicious. OK, I have no problem with.
• 3:35
  Oh, hey. Give me some of those veal
• 3:36
  carrots. I heard those are really good.
• 3:38
  They should rename it to that Sales plummet you.
• 3:41
  Will like this video. I'll say I'm just put a link in
• 3:43
  the in the show notes. Sweetie, anything from the
• 3:44
  store? Yeah, some of that veal spinach
• 3:46
  would be great. The one that they kill early
• 3:49
  before it becomes mature. I like when it's really soft and
• 3:51
  tender. I don't mean.
• 3:52
  To interrupt this discussion on food, how's your week going?
• 3:55
  You were. Part of the discussion.
• 3:57
  My week was going fine but now I feel like I need to go sit in
• 3:59
  the middle of a farm and do a lot of soul searching.
• 4:01
  Some reading anyway the. Second week of our spring break,
• 4:05
  my children's spring break, which means that I am preparing
• 4:09
  for a week of camping up in the Sequoia.
• 4:11
  So I'm very excited about that. That's fun.
• 4:13
  I have. Cleaned all of the things I have
• 4:15
  done, some of the packing. What have you been?
• 4:16
  Doing when you were gone last week last.
• 4:19
  Week we didn't camp, we instead did a trip to the least happy
• 4:23
  place on earth, also known as Legoland, California.
• 4:25
  I love Legoland. And then we went and saw the
• 4:27
  Savannah bananas. Oh yeah.
• 4:28
  Which was also fun. Absolutely.
• 4:30
  But the I love the Savannah bananas.
• 4:31
  I love the concept they have the audio.
• 4:34
  They're set to 12. Oh yeah.
• 4:35
  It is so damn loud. I had earplugs in the whole time
• 4:38
  and it was still too loud for me and I'm like, am I just old or
• 4:41
  is it really loud? I think the answer really is
• 4:42
  both. Yeah.
• 4:43
  But man, was it like disregulatingly loud and we were
• 4:46
  in the outfield. I mean, it wasn't like we were
• 4:48
  close, but yeah, very cool to see.
• 4:50
  So he's spend time with the kids and and have some fun.
• 4:52
  We're going camping, which is going to be a blast.
• 4:55
  And then I over the weekend enjoyed a day of, of my, our
• 4:57
  first beach day of the year, which is just a day of, of
• 5:00
  nothingness. Just go to the beach, love it,
• 5:01
  sit in the sand, the kids play in the water.
• 5:03
  We saw some dolphins, as we do in California all the time and
• 5:06
  it was lovely. It was great.
• 5:08
  I and I'm sitting there thinking, man, I don't pay
• 5:10
  enough taxes for all of this. Like this is all.
• 5:12
  So great. Oh, it's spectacular.
• 5:14
  California just says the most lovely beach.
• 5:16
  I wish. Gas was a little more expensive.
• 5:18
  I'm only paying 750 for diesel today and I go fill up my truck
• 5:21
  to go camping. I really wish it was more like
• 5:23
  $12.00. I feel like that would be the
• 5:24
  right thing to pay for all of. This, well, it will be soon.
• 5:27
  Exactly, just I still have the return trip to come back.
• 5:30
  So. The last time I took it up and
• 5:32
  it was gas was over 7 bucks a gallon and I had to get diesel
• 5:35
  and the poor kid at the counter in Porterville, CA, I told him I
• 5:38
  needed $400.00 on pump 4. He looked at me like I had three
• 5:41
  heads. Of course, dude, it's a 44
• 5:43
  gallon tank. Like what do you want from me?
• 5:44
  It's going to be over 300 bucks. That's what happens.
• 5:47
  Yeah. I'm excited to to go have some
• 5:49
  fun with my kids. That's awesome.
• 5:50
  That's plan. How about you?
• 5:51
  MLB's opening weekend brought the arrival of the Automated
• 5:54
  Ball Strike Challenge system. Oh, exciting.
• 5:56
  It is exciting. UMP CB Buckner had 6 calls
• 5:59
  overturned in a single game. What?
• 6:01
  One pitch he called as a strike missed the zone by 2.7 inches
• 6:04
  UMPS be human. Turns out sure.
• 6:06
  In Kansas City Royal game, catcher Salvador Perez
• 6:08
  successfully challenged multiple calls from UMP Doug Eddings at
• 6:11
  the bottom of the strike zone, leading to visible frustration
• 6:14
  from the veteran umpire. Yeah, I'm gonna put a link in
• 6:16
  the show notes of this. It is great fun.
• 6:18
  K he schools the UMP as to where the bottom of the the strike
• 6:21
  zone. Is wait, hold on, For those of
• 6:22
  us that aren't glued to a opening day of MLB, how does
• 6:25
  this work? So anybody can call a challenge,
• 6:27
  no? The pitcher, the catcher and the
• 6:29
  batter can call it. You can be wrong twice.
• 6:31
  And then what happens after you're wrong twice You.
• 6:32
  Don't get any more challenges. You're done.
• 6:34
  As long as you're not wrong, you can go as long as you want the
• 6:36
  whole game. Well, no, until extra innings.
• 6:37
  And extra innings you get another challenge.
• 6:39
  Per one per inning. One per extra inning.
• 6:41
  Yeah, so you get, you get better odds than in the extra innings,
• 6:43
  much better. Yeah, one per inning, 2 wrong
• 6:45
  for the whole. Game 2 wrong for the whole game.
• 6:46
  If you don't get them wrong, you go a long time.
• 6:48
  And some of these things went on quite a bit.
• 6:49
  Interesting. Mitch Trezak was behind the
• 6:51
  plate for a historic moment in a Red Sox Pirates game where the
• 6:54
  ABS system overturned 5 consecutive calls.
• 6:56
  That's insane. Yeah.
• 6:57
  So did the like, was the UMPS did his glasses fall off?
• 7:01
  What happened? Why was he?
• 7:02
  I don't know. Have all these fans been right
• 7:03
  for so many? You get some.
• 7:04
  Glasses, Right, Right. How bad are you at your job?
• 7:07
  Finally, on the 6th challenge, which he got right, yeah, the
• 7:09
  crowd gave him a Bronx cheer. In unrelated news, UMP Mitrizek
• 7:15
  has retired. Yeah.
• 7:16
  Some of these guys might might want to retire.
• 7:18
  I think it's really hard for a young person to call those
• 7:20
  things accurately with great vision.
• 7:22
  Imagine as you get older, sure, I mean, theoretically more
• 7:25
  experience should kick in, but I think vision really, really
• 7:28
  matters. It's completely remarkable how
• 7:29
  the ABS system does not slow down the game.
• 7:32
  The average challenge time is 12 to 14 seconds and over half of
• 7:35
  the challenges have been successful.
• 7:37
  That's impressive. I mean this might be the best
• 7:39
  use for these crappy Tesla humanoid robots.
• 7:42
  You just put them in the UMP position and all they do is
• 7:44
  regurgitate whatever the ABS system figured out in the minor.
• 7:46
  League, they had a time when they did that.
• 7:48
  By the way, I prefer those humans overseeing the computer.
• 7:51
  Sure, so that the UMPS are getting the calls 1st and then
• 7:53
  if the UMPS want to override, the UMPS can override.
• 7:56
  Yeah, I'm fine with that. Not the way it is now, which is
• 7:58
  the computer is correcting the UMP.
• 8:00
  I think that's a little strange. And in the minor leagues when
• 8:02
  they tried it that way, where they actually got a little
• 8:04
  earpiece, the computer would tell them it's a ball, it's a
• 8:06
  strike, whatever it tell them. And then the UMP would actually
• 8:08
  make the call of their choice. In every case they stayed with
• 8:10
  the computer. The calls not only were 100%
• 8:13
  accurate, there were no delays at all during the game.
• 8:15
  Yeah, not even a 12 second or 14 second delay.
• 8:17
  Wow, that's a better system. I'm not a fan that they're
• 8:19
  calling it ABS, such a popular acronym.
• 8:22
  Could we call it something different?
• 8:23
  Plastic plasticky or the brake system on cars, Antilock braking
• 8:27
  system? Yeah.
• 8:27
  I feel like we should just call it the BS system.
• 8:29
  I feel like that would be better, that would be more
• 8:31
  aligned with what it is. Just call it the correct system
• 8:33
  because oh, the call's enough. I got one more thing before I
• 8:36
  get off my week. There's been a thing that has
• 8:37
  been going around for the past. It's more than the past week,
• 8:40
  but I'm finally at the point where I want to talk about it,
• 8:42
  which is plug in solar. Have you seen anything called
• 8:44
  plug in solar? Are you familiar with this
• 8:46
  phrase? Plug in solar this is.
• 8:47
  These are. I'm guessing they're like solar
• 8:49
  cells that you plug. In there's solar panels and you
• 8:51
  don't have to have a permit or anything else, you just
• 8:53
  literally plug them into your wall and it starts supplying
• 8:56
  electricity to your house. Land of the free.
• 8:58
  I don't need to. I don't need a permit from my
• 9:00
  solar. Come on.
• 9:01
  It's not even legal in California yet, although there
• 9:03
  is a California SB 868 which will classify systems under 1200
• 9:08
  watts as appliances rather than power plants.
• 9:10
  So you don't need any interconnection agreements.
• 9:11
  You don't know it's going to get utility fees.
• 9:13
  You get good protections for renters who want to use this
• 9:15
  stuff, sure. Pretty cool it doesn't back feed
• 9:17
  the system in case there's an outage.
• 9:19
  The plugs prongs go dead the instant you pull them out of the
• 9:21
  wall, but it contributes to the amount of electricity that you
• 9:24
  that's cool out of the air off the sun there.
• 9:26
  Is a reason that we have the plug and receptacle system
• 9:29
  because the thing that provides power is not supposed to be
• 9:32
  exposed, which is the receptacle side yeah so when you start
• 9:34
  providing power on a plug, I do get a little nervous you.
• 9:37
  Unplug it and it drops dead. Yeah.
• 9:38
  It's really, I mean, that's. Nicely engineered, yeah.
• 9:40
  Anyway, I'm sure these work. Great, don't touch the prongs.
• 9:42
  Like a 9 Volt battery. Don't lick it to see if it's.
• 9:44
  On exactly. Anyway, pretty cool.
• 9:46
  That's gonna be a fun thing to watch.
• 9:47
  You can't wait to see if California's SB-868 passes and
• 9:51
  we can actually use these things in California.
• 9:53
  More solar. I'm I'm a fan, so I'll be using
• 9:55
  this next week is a lot of a lot of solar to keep our stuff
• 9:57
  charged. Yeah.
• 9:58
  Lovely. Let's get to our headlines,
• 10:00
  shall we? Let's do it.
• 10:01
  Yeah, yeah, for sure. Dopamine defeat.
• 10:02
  How a California jury pierced Section 230 immunity.
• 10:05
  The invincible armor of Big Tech just cracked.
• 10:08
  In a landmark decision this month, the Los Angeles jury
• 10:10
  found Meta and YouTube liable for the negligent design of
• 10:13
  their platform forms, awarding $3,000,000 to a young woman who
• 10:15
  claimed their features fueled A destructive childhood addiction.
• 10:18
  This wasn't about bad content, it was about the mechanics of
• 10:21
  the hook. The plaintiff targeted specific
• 10:23
  features, infinite scroll, autoplay, and push
• 10:25
  notifications, ruling the company's knowingly engineered
• 10:27
  dopamine loops that prioritize engagement over minor safety.
• 10:31
  With Meta assigned 70% of the blame, the verdict bypasses the
• 10:34
  traditional Section 230 protections by focusing on
• 10:36
  product liability rather than speech.
• 10:38
  As the first of over 1600 bellwether cases, this loss
• 10:42
  signals a massive legal shift. The algorithm is now a target.
• 10:46
  I mean, if we're going to to focus on awarding money to
• 10:49
  people who had destructive childhood addictions, yes.
• 10:51
  Holy crap. Like whoever owns that Barney IP
• 10:54
  better sell it as soon as they can.
• 10:57
  I don't know what's coming for them.
• 10:59
  This is this is super interesting to me.
• 11:03
  This was. It's also odd to me that this
• 11:05
  case was Meta and YouTube 2 completely separate companies.
• 11:09
  Why? Why?
• 11:09
  It just seemed odd to me. YouTube argued we are not social
• 11:12
  media and and the the jury said no, you've got infinite scroll,
• 11:16
  you've got these same things too.
• 11:17
  They were not targeting the content, yeah, which 2:30 would
• 11:20
  protect. They were targeting the actual
• 11:22
  design of the system and you understand the same design
• 11:24
  things. And well, and I, I would say
• 11:26
  that YouTube is, is certainly social media in one hand and not
• 11:30
  in the other. It's just different.
• 11:32
  I don't think infinite scroll makes it social media.
• 11:34
  I don't. I don't care about the name.
• 11:36
  No, but infinite scroll is what causes the dopamine hit.
• 11:39
  Yeah, that's what they were. Yeah, that's what they were
• 11:40
  arguing. I would say the push
• 11:41
  notifications, the the infinite scroll, those are the things
• 11:44
  that are more problematic. Yes.
• 11:45
  The the the label of social media.
• 11:47
  Who cares that doesn't yeah, it's just a label put on a
• 11:50
  thing. There is a decent amount of
• 11:51
  social content within YouTube, right?
• 11:53
  Not just the content itself, but comments and whatnot.
• 11:55
  So sure, but like, why are we splitting hairs over the name?
• 11:58
  The point is it created this sort of addictive loop.
• 12:00
  And I can I can totally buy that.
• 12:01
  That's a good product, right? A good product is one that keeps
• 12:03
  you coming well. Maybe not for minors, the.
• 12:04
  Question is how do you balance the safety of minors?
• 12:07
  And that is that is tricky. I take a view on this that is
• 12:09
  different and probably somewhat controversial amongst many
• 12:12
  folks. I think this is mainly on the
• 12:14
  parents. Meta tried very hard to put it
• 12:16
  on the. Yeah, I know.
• 12:17
  I understand. In the case.
• 12:18
  Maybe 15 years ago you could say that this wasn't as well known.
• 12:21
  But now, parents of young kids, now, how can you not know that
• 12:24
  these things are terrible for your kids?
• 12:26
  I agree. Do not let your kids on social
• 12:28
  media. That's a terrible, terrible
• 12:29
  thing. Yeah.
• 12:30
  However, there is a certain culpability that is that does I
• 12:33
  get these? Companies, I mean they have very
• 12:36
  slowly brought up some modicum of safety controls or for
• 12:41
  minors, I still think it is ridiculous that they don't put
• 12:44
  an automatic stamp on on your account when they can determine
• 12:49
  that you are underage. There is no doubt in my mind
• 12:52
  that with the profiling they can do, they know with a very high
• 12:54
  degree of confidence what your age is without you telling.
• 12:57
  Mark Zuckerberg testified himself, and he said it's very
• 13:00
  hard for us to know if these are kids under 13.
• 13:03
  It's very hard for Instagram to know if these kids are, you
• 13:05
  know, what age they are and all that.
• 13:07
  And then he also said he talked about the tweens as a valuable
• 13:10
  untapped audience. They are a valuable untapped
• 13:12
  audience. I totally appreciate that.
• 13:13
  I, I, I don't believe him, but you could say both of those
• 13:16
  things. I don't think there's a on the
• 13:17
  logic there. When I hear them say that, what
• 13:19
  I actually hear them say is we can't tell with certainty.
• 13:22
  And I believe that to be true. I believe you can't tell with
• 13:25
  100% certainty. Yeah, but such is life.
• 13:27
  I think you can tell in the 98th percentile.
• 13:30
  And by the way, the override should be pretty easy.
• 13:32
  They accidentally flagged my account as being underage.
• 13:34
  Then you go, well, OK, I'm going to upload a copy of my ID or
• 13:37
  some picture of the thing and away you go.
• 13:39
  And if I don't do that, then I just stay in wherever they've
• 13:41
  banished me. And that's, yeah, probably the
• 13:43
  best balance. I don't really want to give them
• 13:45
  my ID, but I think that is a reasonable trade off for keeping
• 13:49
  kids safe. And if I never get grouped into
• 13:51
  the 13 year old bucket because their algorithm is good enough I
• 13:53
  never to show my ID, that seems reasonable to me.
• 13:55
  Something like that, right? But we haven't done that.
• 13:57
  Instagram has deliberately engineered a system to impact
• 14:00
  body image and social comparison.
• 14:02
  I don't know about this. That was part of this
• 14:03
  discussion. The things that you were fed
• 14:06
  were to affect your view of your body and affect your view of
• 14:10
  your social standing. It was intentionally feeding you
• 14:13
  things that would would incite a reaction in you.
• 14:15
  They had internal company documents that showed they were
• 14:18
  trying to deliberately engineer body image and social comparison
• 14:22
  videos in the algorithm that was brought up in the.
• 14:24
  Case like I I wonder what that meant in practice.
• 14:27
  Is a great line in some internal communications that meta where
• 14:31
  one of the employees says, Oh my gosh, y'all IG is a drug, to
• 14:34
  which another responded, we're basically pushers.
• 14:37
  Yeah, that doesn't look so good when that goes in front of a
• 14:40
  jury. There are plenty of successful
• 14:41
  products that have said this that haven't been interpreted as
• 14:43
  drugs. But when you get it really right
• 14:45
  and you get it really good, this is what happens.
• 14:48
  I don't fault them. I think that is the definition
• 14:50
  of a good product. I think the the gates is
• 14:52
  Microsoft doing deals with the original equipment manufacturers
• 14:56
  to provide Windows at a discounted rate was a good deal,
• 14:59
  right? That was good for everybody.
• 15:00
  Everybody won there until you get of certain size and you go,
• 15:03
  well, now maybe it's a little bit of a monopoly, maybe now
• 15:06
  it's problematic. This might be more than just
• 15:09
  size, this may be actually things that have can affect the
• 15:12
  mental health of twins. For sure that's a problem.
• 15:14
  For sure this is not I'm I'm. Now it's like putting tar in
• 15:17
  cigarettes. Yes, we know it's addicting.
• 15:19
  Yes, we know it draws you back to the cigarettes.
• 15:21
  Sure. But it is causing harm.
• 15:23
  I, I was merely trying to, I was not trying to equate the two in
• 15:26
  terms of of damage. More of the rules change for you
• 15:29
  at some point right when you're the yeah you doing the deal with
• 15:33
  O ES to make sure your stuff is included that's a that's a good
• 15:37
  deal right that's a good deal for you and for the consumer
• 15:39
  they're getting a better price but at some point when you're 85
• 15:41
  or 95% market share that's no longer a good deal for for the
• 15:45
  masses that's just a good deal for you yeah, I would think here
• 15:48
  what I'm trying to say is showing people content that they
• 15:51
  want to see is good that's probably what you want it makes
• 15:54
  the product sticky and provide. Impelling content isn't harming.
• 15:57
  Them Well, that's the thing. How do you know if people
• 15:58
  respond to harmful content and all you're doing is putting
• 16:02
  looking at the signal of what they respond to, you're going to
• 16:04
  show them more of it. So I on a, on a very naive
• 16:06
  algorithm, sure, that makes sense.
• 16:08
  But at some point you've done so much of this, much like in the
• 16:11
  the monopoly case with Microsoft, you go, oh, you have
• 16:13
  a higher standard now you have to meet and whatever that is,
• 16:16
  right, filtering out content that is harmful, even if it's
• 16:18
  what people want to see, especially for kids.
• 16:20
  And I feel like that's really where it it appears that Meta
• 16:24
  kept their head in the sand for years, if not like a decade over
• 16:28
  this. I don't think their head was in
• 16:29
  the sand. I think they knew what they
• 16:31
  were. I'm not saying they didn't know
• 16:32
  what they're doing, I'm saying they they kept having said on on
• 16:34
  a solution. They didn't provide a solution
• 16:36
  for this. Right, 'cause it was beneficial
• 16:37
  to them to not. Provide a solution.
• 16:39
  Of course, now it it appears they have provided a solution.
• 16:42
  I've seen a lot of advertisement around their their current kid
• 16:45
  and teen product, but that's only been of the past year or
• 16:47
  two. And I think with this case
• 16:49
  exemplifies is that the damage has already been done.
• 16:52
  I have no idea what this future is going to look like.
• 16:53
  Are we really going to litigate this same case 2000 times in
• 16:56
  court? Yes, we are.
• 16:57
  I don't know, I I. Stand by.
• 16:59
  This is a bellwether ruling. This opens the door and the
• 17:02
  approach of this, because it's not coming after 2:30 content,
• 17:05
  was really novel. Yeah, of course you.
• 17:07
  Product liability, the fact that they were coming up, coming
• 17:10
  after the dopamine loop, yeah, was so different.
• 17:12
  But but just pure purely from an efficiency perspective, it does
• 17:15
  not seem sensical to bog down our legal system with 2000 of
• 17:19
  the same case, right? That's why we have class action
• 17:22
  lawsuits. I'm not saying that's the way
• 17:24
  that it should go, but it seems really non efficient and
• 17:26
  nonsensical to to litigate the same case a couple 1000 times.
• 17:30
  It's really up to those who bring the suit.
• 17:31
  Of course, but at some point when you're like.
• 17:33
  They get their day in court. I understand that, but it just
• 17:35
  seems not efficient, not good for our legal system.
• 17:38
  Don't do the crime if you can't do the time I'm.
• 17:40
  Not saying that I'm not saying there shouldn't be culpability
• 17:42
  and and liability. That's not my point at all.
• 17:44
  But they just have like here's case number 643 that has the
• 17:48
  same arguments. Oh, it's going.
• 17:49
  To be a lot of, it's just going to be a lot of these.
• 17:50
  What's the? Solution.
• 17:51
  What do you what do you do in that case?
• 17:52
  It just doesn't seem optimal. Those lawyers, you need
• 17:55
  something to do before they get replaced by the humanoid robots.
• 17:57
  The Trojan horse in your AI How a nearly ubiquitous Python file
• 18:01
  might be a secret hacker. The Light LLM supply chain
• 18:03
  attack is a digital house fire that starts in the basement.
• 18:06
  Most people don't use Light LLM directly, but the apps they rely
• 18:10
  on for banking, healthcare, or productivity often do.
• 18:13
  By poisoning the single piece of code, the team PCP hackers
• 18:16
  turned a trusted bridge into a silent data site.
• 18:19
  When developers updated their systems, the compromise library
• 18:22
  began stealing sensitive API keys and environment variables.
• 18:26
  This is how secure apps suddenly leak private data or lose
• 18:29
  control of their AI features. It proves that even if your
• 18:31
  password is strong, a single corrupted building block in the
• 18:34
  software supply chain can compromise your digital.
• 18:37
  Life, you haven't made this scary enough now.
• 18:39
  This is. Petrifying.
• 18:41
  Oh, sure, sure, sure. As a lifelong software
• 18:43
  developer, I read this story and I was like, oh man.
• 18:47
  My my first reaction was, I'm surprised it's taken this long
• 18:51
  for there to be something this bad that's happened.
• 18:53
  We've seen these before. This is not the first time sure
• 18:55
  effectively to to try to simplify it, there is a a
• 18:59
  package that is used by many pieces of software that helps
• 19:03
  integrate your interface to LLMS.
• 19:05
  So it's it's for developers. No consumer would ever use this
• 19:08
  package. They do.
• 19:09
  They're using it. They just don't know that.
• 19:10
  You would never use it directly. You would never go out.
• 19:12
  No, again, no consumer would go out and use this package
• 19:15
  directly. You would use software that uses
• 19:17
  something, right, that uses this, and that's the way that
• 19:20
  it's been implemented. So even from a developer
• 19:21
  perspective, many developers were not using this package
• 19:24
  directly. They were using some other thing
• 19:27
  that then had this behind it. And that's the trust chain that
• 19:30
  got broken. The way it was done was pretty
• 19:32
  amazing. I mean this, this package, by
• 19:34
  the way, normally gets about 95,000,000 downloads per month.
• 19:38
  Yeah, it is one of the more popular packages.
• 19:40
  It's used by everybody. Yeah.
• 19:42
  And and again, it's open source, like everything's open.
• 19:44
  This isn't a closed thing. This is something that we we
• 19:47
  should have been able to see what happened was mildly
• 19:50
  fascinating. It appears they got the the
• 19:52
  hackers got control of one of the developers machines, grabbed
• 19:55
  their keys and then slowly injected themselves into
• 19:59
  different parts of the chain. Sure they didn't actually change
• 20:01
  the source code from what I understand, they just injected a
• 20:04
  binary that had this bad payload in it into the build stream,
• 20:08
  which is really insane. And what it searched for and
• 20:11
  what it stole was exactly what you said all of your your keys,
• 20:14
  your API keys, your variables, crypto wallets.
• 20:17
  It would just. I mean, it was actually somewhat
• 20:18
  trivial when you look at the code.
• 20:19
  It was just going through your machine trying to pull all these
• 20:21
  well known files off a a developer's machine is really
• 20:24
  the intent, right? This is for the developer.
• 20:26
  And the part that's even more nuts to me is that you did not
• 20:29
  have to instantiate the code for this to happen.
• 20:31
  Just the update of the code was enough for it to run this
• 20:33
  payload. So you just running an update
• 20:35
  was enough to to trigger this. That is really not good.
• 20:39
  Not just from the the people who are at risk.
• 20:40
  The developers are at risk. Like now you have to go.
• 20:42
  You have to rotate all of those keys.
• 20:44
  Yeah, if you were exposed to this.
• 20:45
  Yeah, that's a lot of time, right?
• 20:47
  It's like a lot of effort that just got sucked out of the
• 20:49
  system. Fortunately, I suspect they're
• 20:50
  gonna be more of these. I don't know what the fix for
• 20:53
  this particular problem is gonna be, because even if you had a
• 20:56
  trusted signature, that would not have worked here.
• 20:59
  But you'd have to have shared trusted signature, maybe across
• 21:01
  multiple machines. But then you just need to
• 21:02
  compromise multiple machines like it's a cat and mouse game
• 21:04
  that's gonna. Continue.
• 21:05
  You're gonna have an AI agent that you send to go look at the
• 21:08
  code. Yeah, for you.
• 21:09
  That's the. Yeah, and you're gonna say check
• 21:11
  and make sure it doesn't do blah blah blah blah blah blah.
• 21:13
  And that list is gonna get enormously long as more of this
• 21:17
  cat and mouse game plays out. I'll tell somebody that's
• 21:19
  somebody just injects into your AI check, you know linter.
• 21:22
  Yeah, it's possible. Again, cat and mouse game, but
• 21:24
  how fast? Did they catch it?
• 21:25
  How long was this out out in the wild before somebody went wait a
• 21:28
  minute? If I understand correctly, the
• 21:31
  the way we caught it, we as a community caught it was because
• 21:34
  someone's machine, the software was taking too long.
• 21:37
  This is the thing that that was the Microsoft guy who discovered
• 21:40
  the SSH flaw in in Linux, and it was like his machine took
• 21:44
  literally a half second. He noticed, yeah, there's, it
• 21:47
  seemed to take an extra half second to do something that he'd
• 21:50
  done many, many times. And he went, Something's wrong
• 21:51
  here. Yeah, in that case, that dude
• 21:53
  was insanely meticulous. Yeah, and that's why we caught
• 21:57
  it. Like if if that human didn't
• 21:59
  exist and in that time at that place, that thing would probably
• 22:02
  still be deployed. Nah, somebody was.
• 22:03
  Somebody would have caught it. People notice those things.
• 22:05
  Sure, but that one was hard. Especially in the developer
• 22:08
  community, you care about a half second.
• 22:09
  This one was not nearly that tight, but people saw, I think
• 22:13
  what they saw CPU usage spike and they're like, well, why is
• 22:15
  that happening here? This shouldn't be happening.
• 22:17
  Yeah. And they dug it in like, what is
• 22:18
  this payload? And they're like, oh, this is
• 22:19
  bad. Yeah.
• 22:20
  And the payload was injected again.
• 22:21
  It wasn't in source code. It was injected as I think it
• 22:24
  was like 2 base 64 encoded strings and then executed some
• 22:28
  code. So it was like, you know, kind
• 22:29
  of hidden, not well, but sort of hidden, sure, in in the payload
• 22:33
  that was in there. But it just bananas.
• 22:34
  Like it shows how at risk we still are in this this lovely
• 22:39
  global community of software that we have.
• 22:40
  There's still real risk in there.
• 22:42
  Kind of a bummer there is risk, but.
• 22:43
  Both the Microsoft guy who discovered the extra half second
• 22:46
  and the whoever figured this out.
• 22:47
  Yeah, both of them. I'm impressed, yeah, at how
• 22:49
  quickly we came across oh, there's problems here.
• 22:52
  It does. Work so part of the guidance on
• 22:54
  this that I man I struggle endorsing but I think you sort
• 22:57
  of have to endorse is to pin all your versions and only upgrade
• 23:00
  your versions of your libraries on a 1 by 1 basis that's a lot
• 23:04
  of time to go into each one yeah I think the advantage of pinning
• 23:07
  and I think you're you're going to see I think you're likely
• 23:09
  going to see the software adopt this is just don't don't
• 23:12
  automatically to the latest I think you're gonna want some
• 23:15
  like but somebody. Has to somebody has what I mean.
• 23:18
  Out you're gonna have. This works.
• 23:19
  This doesn't. I think, I think that's the
• 23:21
  future because right now most package managers, the way they
• 23:23
  work is you can either pin to a version or use the latest.
• 23:26
  Yeah, that's basically it. Maybe you can put in a cap and
• 23:28
  say don't go past this minor version or whatever, but that's
• 23:30
  it. There's no concept of tears of
• 23:32
  acceptability. That might be the next thing we
• 23:34
  have to introduce is where you say, hey, you're going to be on
• 23:37
  the, it's not the, the release candidate list, but it's like,
• 23:40
  I'm gonna audition this set of package images and use them.
• 23:43
  And then once it's done, I'll, I, I as part of the community,
• 23:46
  1000 of us, yeah, will confirm that it's good.
• 23:48
  And then the masses can take it. Something like that.
• 23:50
  And as developers who might need to say, OK, I'm going to take on
• 23:52
  these five, These are just going to be the five that I'm going to
• 23:55
  confirm. And if enough developers do that
• 23:57
  on different packages, you could get there.
• 23:58
  As long as we've got a good Internet connection, everything
• 24:00
  will be fine. US blacklists all new foreign
• 24:04
  consumer routers. Aw.
• 24:06
  Come on man. The US government is pulling the
• 24:09
  plug on foreign made routers and is sweeping national security
• 24:12
  move. The FCC has banned the import of
• 24:14
  new consumer grade routers manufactured abroad, citing
• 24:17
  unacceptable risks. Officials warn that these
• 24:20
  devices provide back doors for state sponsored hackers.
• 24:23
  Foreign made hardware was directly implicated in the Volt
• 24:26
  Typhoon, in the Salt Typhoon cyberattacks which targeted
• 24:29
  American power, water and communications, according to the
• 24:32
  FCC, his official national security determination this
• 24:34
  month. Consumer grade hardware was
• 24:36
  directly implicated in the Volt Typhoon, Salt Typhoon and Flax
• 24:40
  Typhoon cyberattacks. Do we believe anything this FCC
• 24:43
  says? Well, OK.
• 24:44
  They don't have a great track record of credibility.
• 24:46
  The ban is a massive shock to the tech industry as nearly all
• 24:49
  consumer routers are currently designed or assembled overseas.
• 24:52
  While your current home router remains legal, future models
• 24:54
  must be American made or pass rigorous security vetting by the
• 24:58
  Pentagon. It's a bold high stakes play to
• 25:00
  re secure the digital supply chain and bring high tech
• 25:02
  manufacturing back to US soil. This is somewhat fascinating the
• 25:06
  the typhoons that you mentioned there.
• 25:08
  Why? Why are we only named these with
• 25:09
  typhoons is is beyond me, but it kind of makes sense because
• 25:11
  those were all bot Nets from consumer grade and Soho grade.
• 25:15
  Gear, but then you just switch your botnet over to a different
• 25:17
  type of gear. Are you going to ban all
• 25:19
  foreign, well electronics period?
• 25:21
  I mean, you're going to be anything that connects to the
• 25:23
  Internet can become a botnet if you have a sinister
• 25:25
  manufacturer. First let's talk about the ban
• 25:27
  that was put in place. They literally banned all
• 25:29
  foreign made consumer grade routers for consumers only for
• 25:32
  consumer grade gear, which is literally all of them.
• 25:35
  They're still allowed to be part of the bot.
• 25:37
  This is. Only new devices, devices that
• 25:39
  were previously approved, which basically means anything that
• 25:42
  got an FCC stamp, they're still allowed to be part of the
• 25:44
  botnet. Those are OK.
• 25:45
  But going forward, if you have a new device that you want to sell
• 25:48
  in the US, you have to get the FCC's clearance on, right.
• 25:50
  I looked at what the vetting is and it actually, to be honest,
• 25:53
  it doesn't seem like it's enough.
• 25:55
  It seems like it's a little bit. You got to show ownership.
• 25:57
  You got to show who owns the whole like custody chain of the
• 26:00
  ownership of the corporation, right?
• 26:01
  That's good. I actually think that's a good
• 26:03
  start and that's something we should probably have you do.
• 26:05
  So I like that, but I didn't see anything about code audits or
• 26:08
  any sort of of code Espro. There's nothing on those ends.
• 26:12
  And what I would have liked to have seen is a solution, an
• 26:15
  alternate solution put in place. This could have been a great
• 26:17
  time for us to just buy or, or or push manufacturers to sell
• 26:20
  multi Nic, basically dumb computers, simple interfaces and
• 26:24
  then use open source software, right?
• 26:25
  PF Sense is open source and is lovely.
• 26:27
  Let's just move to that. There are so many great open
• 26:29
  source solutions, this should not be a problem in 2026.
• 26:32
  You could buy a $50 multi Nic device from Best Buy and have
• 26:36
  the Geek Squad kids flash it in 15 minutes for 30 bucks and have
• 26:40
  a great solution that's open source and more secure than
• 26:43
  anything we're going to get out of this.
• 26:44
  Like that should be the path. The path should be that
• 26:46
  consumers just don't care so you're going to have to force it
• 26:48
  upon them. I don't see consumers caring
• 26:50
  about this. We'll.
• 26:51
  Do our part. We'll put the link in the show
• 26:52
  notes to the PF Sense router. This is a router you want.
• 26:56
  This is a router that is running open source software.
• 26:59
  Do the world a favor, get the PF Sense router next time you need
• 27:03
  a router. And it's, it's turnkey like
• 27:05
  again, you don't have to like have to do anything be monkeying
• 27:07
  around with, right? With SSH, you just install this
• 27:09
  thing out-of-the-box and away you go.
• 27:11
  OK, enough with the headlines. In fact, enough with the
• 27:13
  episode. We have to get out of here.
• 27:15
  Special thanks to our floor director, Jack Little.
• 27:17
  Thanks, Jack. Jack.
• 27:18
  We'll be back later this week with our big story.
• 27:20
  More morks, fewer mindies. Where are all the aliens?
• 27:23
  Until then, thank you for listening to all this nonsense.
• 27:25
  I'm Jeff Parker. I'm CJ Little.
• 27:27
  Nanoo, Nanoo. That's what I was going to say.
• 27:29
  I was going to say Nanoo, Nanoo. You said Nanoo.
• 27:31
  Nanoo, what do I say? Hey, shawl Spot.
• 27:46
  With Sony's Betamax SL 8600 video recorder, you can see any
• 27:50
  TV show you want, Jeff, anytime you want to see it.
• 27:53
  I love that the Betamax, which plugs into any TV set and is
• 27:57
  easy to operate, can videotape a show for up to three hours long
• 28:01
  using the L750 video cassettes. I know, you're excited, aren't
• 28:04
  you? Get out by setting the easy to
• 28:06
  use electronic timer. The Betamax works while you're
• 28:09
  doing something else, even while you're out of the house.
• 28:12
  It can also videotape something off of 1 channel while you're
• 28:14
  watching something on another. This is sorcery.
• 28:17
  It's. Like we live in the future.
• 28:19
  And remember, Sony has more experience in video recorders
• 28:22
  than anyone over 20 years of videotape experience.
• 28:27
  In fact, Sony sold more video recorders to broadcasters in
• 28:30
  industry than any other consumer manufacturer.
• 28:33
  They even make their own tape. They do so for years.
• 28:36
  You've watched TV shows at the times you've had to.
• 28:39
  Now you can watch them at the times you.
• 28:41
  Want. It's about time.
• 28:43
  It's a total game changer. The Sony Betamax SL80650 two
• 28:48
  $100 at an electronics retailer near you.
• 28:50
  Please tell me you. Adjusted that price for the
• 28:53
  current dollars. That is current price.
• 28:56
  I'm always going to give you these numbers and current price,
• 28:58
  $5200 to put ATV show onto videotape.
• 29:02
  Wow. Now I know you know the Betamax
• 29:05
  story. I kind of picked this one kind
• 29:07
  of sort of on purpose. Yes, Sir.
• 29:08
  And I suspect I know you're going to be in the in the
• 29:11
  ballpark, sure, But there's a couple of tidbits about this
• 29:13
  thing that are really interesting.
• 29:14
  I want you to guess the year first and then I want to tell
• 29:16
  something interesting tidbit that's.
• 29:17
  Hard. Let me see, I was probably I
• 29:19
  wasn't even driving and our friends, my friend Kurt's family
• 29:22
  got a beta machine. So my guess has to be maybe
• 29:27
  1978. Oh, you're very, very, very
• 29:31
  close. The let me give you some hints.
• 29:33
  The top single of the year was my Sharona from the neck.
• 29:38
  Does that help any K? No, but I've met Sirona.
• 29:40
  Also in the top, Oh, that's cool.
• 29:42
  Also in the top ten were two singles from Donna Summer, one
• 29:45
  from Rod Stewart, Gloria Gaynor and the Village People.
• 29:48
  Does that help any? No 1979.
• 29:50
  Oh wow, I was close. I was now.
• 29:51
  This was the first Betamax with a built in digital clock.
• 29:54
  Yeah, it had a wired pause control, which I find
• 29:57
  hysterical. The biggest problem with it
• 29:59
  though, from a product perspective, was that it handled
• 30:01
  the new what they called the X2 speed the the faster.
• 30:05
  Slower. I'm sorry, the slower.
• 30:06
  Record speed at less resolution right?
• 30:08
  The Betamax had better quality than the VHS, the competitor at
• 30:11
  the time, but only 60 HS could. Record longer, yeah.
• 30:14
  So they did this slower, so they dropped lines of resolution to
• 30:17
  get a longer tape, which basically negated any sort of
• 30:20
  technical improvement value that it had over the VHS.
• 30:23
  Picture quality advantage. But I didn't know this.
• 30:25
  This 8600 apparently could not play previous beta one tapes.
• 30:29
  Wasn't backward compatible. Wow.
• 30:31
  So it just sort of existed in its own little universe.
• 30:33
  Oh, that's terrible. So that.
• 30:34
  Kind of blew my mind. But this is the thing that
• 30:36
  really blew my mind. Despite losing the format war,
• 30:39
  Sony continued to make Betamax recorders until August of 2002.
• 30:44
  Oh, wow. I didn't know that.
• 30:45
  And they sold blank beta cassettes until March of 2016.
• 30:49
  Yeah. Which was really the end of its
• 30:51
  sort of commercial lifespan. Yeah.
• 30:52
  And this thing. I'll put a link in the show
• 30:53
  notes. I just.
• 30:54
  I loved when electronics looked like a piece of furniture.
• 30:57
  And this was still huge. It had, like, wood siding on it
• 31:00
  or whatever. Yeah.
• 31:00
  Sticker like, sort of like the, you know, the Atari flashback of
• 31:03
  the time. Kurt's families had wood siding
• 31:05
  on. This thing was massive, yeah.
• 31:06
  Yep, I remember that 11. $150.00 in 1979 dollars, which is about
• 31:12
  $5200 today. Just to think about that from a
• 31:15
  television perspective, like you had your TV and then you had
• 31:18
  this thing so that you could record television, like that was
• 31:20
  your entertainment destination. The Sony Betamax SL8061979, love
• 31:27
  it.