Latest / The Daily Sarcast / August 12th, 2026: Sam Altman Isn't On Grindr, The Solar Eclipse And Director Directors

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August 12th, 2026: Sam Altman Isn't On Grindr, The Solar Eclipse And Director Directors · The Daily Sarcast

• 0:00
  Do you hate when people tell you not to look directly at the sun?
• 0:04
  Introducing eclipse classes for people who don't listen.
• 0:07
  They're certified and protective, and most importantly, they come with a speaker
• 0:12
  on the side that says, stop looking at the sun,
• 0:16
  because sometimes we need some technology to solve ancient human problems of
• 0:20
  seeing something dangerous and just thinking, I wonder what will happen if I do it anyways.
• 0:26
  Eclipse classes for people who don't listen. because your eyes deserve better
• 0:31
  than your decision-making skills.
• 0:33
  Available wherever you make questionable choices.
• 0:36
  I would stay in a loveless marriage just to make sure I could be with Lena every
• 0:40
  day. That's how much I love Lena.
• 0:43
  Mark Consuelos explaining that he would rather stay with his wife than lose custody of the dog.
• 0:49
  Insert theme song here. This is the Daily Starcast. I give you the news and maybe a laugh.
• 0:54
  I'm Lindsay Vernick and today is August 12, 2026.
• 0:58
  Oh my god, if you listened to yesterday's starcast, thank you and I'm sorry.
• 1:03
  It was a really, really chaotic day and I'm like still recovering.
• 1:08
  But yeah, obviously it's been a really chaotic week and it's only Wednesday.
• 1:14
  In real news, Putin's billion-dollar vacation home is having some issues right now.
• 1:21
  There was a Ukrainian drone strike, and it hit a Russian air defense system
• 1:26
  near Putin's infamous Black Sea Palace.
• 1:29
  The system is about 12 miles from the palace, and it burned for roughly three hours after the strike.
• 1:37
  This system is one of Russia's most advanced air defense systems.
• 1:42
  It's designed to detect and shoot down aircraft, cruise missiles, and other threats.
• 1:47
  So that's kind of awkward, right? I mean, the whole point of putting it near
• 1:51
  Putin's palace was to protect the area from exactly this kind of attack.
• 1:56
  It's not just some random vacation home. Putin's Black Sea Palace has been at
• 2:01
  the center of controversy for years after investigations said that enormous
• 2:06
  compound was built for him at a cost of roughly $1 billion or more.
• 2:11
  Apparently, this place is literally insane. There's a lot of gardens,
• 2:15
  there's a theater, there's an underground ice rink, and a private church.
• 2:20
  Like, when you're Vladimir Putin, beach house means something that literally
• 2:25
  requires its own military defense system.
• 2:27
  Ukraine has claimed responsibility for strikes against Russian military targets
• 2:31
  in this area, but the Kremlin have not confirmed that the palace itself was
• 2:36
  damaged. I mean, they would never.
• 2:39
  So we do know that they didn't blow up putin's house they blew up the thing
• 2:43
  protecting putin's house putin spent a billion dollars on a palace surrounded
• 2:49
  it with air defense systems and ukraine basically said that's cute.
• 2:54
  Okay sam altman did not message a comedian on grinder,
• 2:58
  this became this whole thing after a comedian and musician jake schroeder posted
• 3:04
  screenshots on instagram to show that he had matched with OpenAI CEO Sam Altman on the dating app.
• 3:11
  And apparently in this conversation, Schroeder asked if Altman was actually Sam Altman.
• 3:16
  And this supposed Sam Altman was like, yes, I'm lonely and horny.
• 3:22
  And then Schroeder turned him down.
• 3:25
  And then this like fake Sam Altman was like, did you use chat GBT to write that?
• 3:30
  Which kind of is a very believable Sam Altman response.
• 3:34
  Schroeder posted all the screenshots on July 31st, and the post took off and
• 3:39
  went viral and got about like 150,000 likes.
• 3:42
  But then, obviously, the story kept going.
• 3:45
  He then posted what appeared to be an email from OpenAI's legal team asking
• 3:49
  him to remove the screenshots and offered him money to do it too.
• 3:53
  And then he claimed that he had a Zoom call with OpenAI and that the company
• 3:57
  offered him $500 and a branded OpenAI crew neck in exchange for taking the post down.
• 4:04
  He even posted a fake update saying OpenAI had offered him a job, and people believed it.
• 4:10
  But the entire thing was a joke.
• 4:14
  OpenAI said that Sam Altman had never interacted with Schroeder,
• 4:17
  and the screenshots were fabricated.
• 4:20
  This comedian has apparently been making fake celebrity dating app screenshots
• 4:25
  as a part of his comedy for a while, and this was just another bit.
• 4:29
  The joke also played off an actual 2024 Grindr-related story involving Altman.
• 4:35
  Altman had been the subject of speculation after a fake Grindr profile using
• 4:39
  his name was circulating online, which made this new joke just believable enough to take off.
• 4:45
  So no, Sam Altman was not actually on Grindr telling a comedian that he was
• 4:49
  lonely and horny, but he probably is under a different name.
• 4:54
  And today, the moon is going to briefly ruin the sun's day.
• 4:58
  There's a total solar eclipse happening across parts of the northern hemisphere,
• 5:02
  with the path of totality crossing Greenland, Iceland, northern Spain, and parts of Russia.
• 5:07
  So for people on the path, the moon will completely cover the sun for about two minutes.
• 5:12
  This is the first total solar eclipse visible from mainland Europe since 1999,
• 5:17
  and a lot of people have been waiting for this one.
• 5:20
  Spain is expecting millions of people to show up to watch it with hundreds of
• 5:24
  official viewing sites and more than 35,000 police and emergency personnel deployed.
• 5:30
  That's a lot of manpower for the moon to put on a two-minute show.
• 5:34
  But there's also a tiny complication. Spain is in the middle of peak wildfire
• 5:38
  season and temperatures could go up to 104 degrees there today.
• 5:44
  So today, millions of people are
• 5:46
  going to be staring at the sky while also standing in a giant outdoor oven,
• 5:51
  parts of the u.s are going to be able to see a partial eclipse including parts
• 5:55
  of alaska maine and the northeast new york will see a partial eclipse but nowhere
• 6:00
  near totality so if you want the full experience you had to travel,
• 6:04
  because even the sun has decided new york is too much.
• 6:09
  And if you are watching today, make sure that you are wearing certified eclipse
• 6:13
  glasses because if you look directly at the sun, it can cause serious and permanent eye damage.
• 6:19
  But I'm also very confused by this because I stare directly at the sun all the
• 6:23
  time and my eyes are fine.
• 6:26
  So I don't really know what they're talking about either.
• 6:29
  In Lindsay life, I called the director of the show that I'm on a director director
• 6:36
  and he literally got so offended.
• 6:38
  Like, sorry, literally every single person in this industry refers to themselves
• 6:44
  as a director and a producer.
• 6:46
  So, yeah, if you're a real director, you're a director director.
• 6:51
  Things I'm thinking about.
• 6:53
  How everyone at the airport is either paying a lot of money to go somewhere
• 6:57
  or getting paid money to go somewhere.
• 7:00
  Cooking tip of the day. Sometimes you have to defrost things for a while before you can cook them.
• 7:06
  Feedback comments questions a nice jewish boy looking for a date email me at
• 7:10
  lindsay at the daily starcast.com thanks so much for listening again don't forget
• 7:14
  to sign up for the summer residency and i'll talk to you guys tomorrow.