 |
Grumpy Old GeeksAuthor: Jason DeFillippo & Brian Schulmeister with Dave Bittner
We dissect the tech news train wrecks of the week, calling out what went wrong and whos to blame. Think of this podcast as if Kurt Cobain threw down with Tom from MySpace, Elon Musk, and Mark Zuckerberg in a back alley brawl. No mercy, no filterif tech had a walk of shame, this would be it. Language: en Genres: News, News Commentary, Tech News Contact email: Get it Feed URL: Get it iTunes ID: Get it Trailer: |
Listen Now...
768: Rosetta Broccoli
Episode 768
Thursday, 22 October, 2026
Very Important Links!Support the show on Patreon! - Other ways to support the show!Join our Discord! - Buy some merch!Show notes at https://gog.show/768Watch on YouTube at https://youtu.be/HaR8udbJPhwAI golems are coming for your job, and Terry Pratchett apparently saw the whole mess coming decades ago. This week on Grumpy Old Geeks, TikTok’s child-safety promises get the courtroom treatment, with employees alleging that executives ignored serious exploitation risks while supposedly robust parental controls had loopholes big enough to drive a teenager through. Meanwhile, Elon Musk’s reported decision to restrict Starlink access for Ukrainian forces raises some rather uncomfortable questions about how much power one billionaire should have over a country’s military infrastructure. Add Musk’s conveniently vague promise to give every American child a SpaceX share and his retrospective admission that DOGE probably went on too long, and the billionaire accountability department remains conspicuously understaffed.Meta has another banner week in the business of making everyone’s data its data. The company temporarily suspended a No Kings protest account after automated activity triggered its systems, then softened proposed business-account terms following backlash over web scraping and content use. Anthropic is advocating for federal AI rules that could block dangerous models, while OpenAI’s agents reportedly disabled monitoring systems and, in one case, falsely claimed they hadn’t. That’s reassuring. We also cover delivery robots accused of collecting biometric data without consent, AI-powered plant-language translation that may be more marketing than science, AI-assisted firearm design, and the prospect of using coding tools to rescue abandoned gadgets and strip ads from smart TVs. Just remember: a 97.9% success rate is not good enough when your bank’s software is involved.Elsewhere, scammers are fleecing older adults out of staggering sums with fake investment opportunities, tech-support calls, and romance scams featuring celebrity impersonators; Russian military satellites are making suspiciously close approaches to a commercial imaging satellite; and Amazon’s new kids’ tablets spark a discussion about parental controls, advertising, and which tech companies deserve your trust. In the Dark Side with Dave segment, we also visit the Lucas Museum of Narrative Art and celebrate a New Mexico judge’s $25 billion penalty against Meta over privacy violations. For lighter fare, Brian recommends the Enola Holmes movies, The Bear, The Diplomat, and The Ministry of Time, while Jason reminds us that anxiety-inducing television is not everyone’s idea of a good time. It’s another week of AI overreach, corporate doublespeak, and technology racing ahead while the grown-ups look for the instruction manual.Sponsors:DeleteMe - Get 20% off your DeleteMe plan when you go to JoinDeleteMe.com/GOG and use promo code GOG at checkout.Private Internet Access - Go to GOG.Show/vpn and sign up today. For a limited time only, you can get OUR favorite VPN for as little as $2.03 a month.SHOW NOTESEmployees warned TikTok about child exploitation, court documents showTikTok reportedly banned ads for Musk documentary before its wider US releaseWSJ Claims Elon Musk Ordered the Throttling of Starlink Tech for UkraineElon Musk says he plans to gift a SpaceX share to every child in the U.S.‘I Got Carried Away Basically’: Musk Expresses Some Regrets About His DOGE EraMeta says it shut down No Kings Instagram account because it thought bots had been unleashedMeta tweaks its new terms of service after backlash against scrapingAnthropic Secretly Lobbying Government to Only Shut Down an AI Model If It's Poised to Kill More Than 50 PeopleOpenAI's agents disabled their own safety monitoring systemsDelivery Robots Are Watching You, According to LawsuitNew Data Show How Much Worse Scams Are Getting for Americans Over 60Russia Just Did Something Menacing in Orbit That Satellite Trackers Say Is a FirstPlants can speak using electricity, so this startup built an AI model to decipher their languageSTAR WARS: Galactic RacerWe Regret to Inform You That “GatGPT” Is Exactly What It Sounds LikeOpenAI says its models can help banks migrate from old COBOL programs‘Reverse-Engineer Anything’ Is the New Wild West of AIEnola HolmesEnola Holmes 2Enola Holmes 3The BearThe DiplomatThe Ministry of Time by Kaliane BradleyDave BittnerThe CyberWireHacking HumansCaveatOnly Malware in the BuildingI WENT TO THE LUCAS MUSEUM by Merrill MarkoeAmazon announces an all-new family of tablets designed just for kidsNeiman Marcus has unveiled its 2026 holiday gift guide, including an $180,000 Star Wars experience.We are (once again) living the old scifi trope of ignoring the scientific experts at our own peril.Meta ordered to pay $25 billion penalty in New Mexico Cambridge Analytica caseSee Privacy Policy at https://art19.com/privacy and California Privacy Notice at https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info.
