Comments

Episode-2098- Listener Calls for 10-12-17 — 14 Comments

  1. I’m the guy that called in about the creepy phone. Funny thing is that Phillip DeFranco on YouTube covered this topic today thursday 10/12/2017 midway in his show. Apparently the problem lies with the Google Assistant program that came in the latest update. However I will differ with Phillip in his interpretation that this was an honest mistake that they fixed, I say phooey, they got caught.

  2. I have a Samsung tablet that I use solely for the weather radar app to monitor storms when I’m doing work outside. I’ve never logged into any account on this tablet, nor done searches. I thought it was amusing so see the random ads appear on the weather app as it had nothing targeted to work with.

    A few months ago I borrowed a multimeter from my father to do some testing on some new batteries. I noticed that the multimeter was made by Fluke instruments, and mentioned this to my wife as I recalled that Jack worked for a company called Fluke. I wondered aloud if they were the same company.

    For the next few days, the weather app ads were for Fluke Instruments multimeters…

    Part of me wanted to believe that it was just a big coincidence. But I somehow suspect it wasn’t.

  3. I have had that experience many times where I talked about something rare to someone and then related adds start to pop over the next few days.
    I guess that it can recognise bits of sentences for example ‘I would like to buy A …..’, then it sends adds about ‘A’.
    But it usually feeds of simpler things like your browsing interests or key words in your email. I think it can also parse word doc attachments in you My Documents folder.
    But then if you are not up to any mischief then who cares.

    • Ah, the logical fallacy of Petitio Principii. You’re asking me to believe the conclusion that I shouldn’t have anything to hide from those monitoring me, while also begging me to believe the unproven statement that those monitoring me have only good intentions.

      Similar to the statement that I shouldn’t have anything to hide from the government if I’m doing nothing wrong. My response is that I consider the government to consist entirely of violent thugs. And it’s in my best interest to ensure that violent thugs learn as little about me as I can possibly achieve.

  4. We’ve known for years that our phones can be used as listening devices. It was reported in the newsmedia years ago. They told us it works even when the phone is off and the only way to turn it off is to remove the battery.
    Of course, iPhone users can’t remove their batteries, can they? LOL

  5. The difference is that we knew the government was listening, not private corporations. That is a completely different animal. May I suggest watching the Glenn Beck Book List video on 1984 on YouTube. It’s a three parter. Quite interesting.

  6. The Dixie Chicks were fairly unheard of in Europe until the invasion of Iraq then became a household name and enjoyed considerable success here.

    Their anti war stance made them successful in countries and they then had good success outside of the US in a sort of John Lennon way.
    They are are talented band and it is difficult to keep down good talent anywhere, talent has a way of rising to the top.

    In 2003 there were public marches of hundreds of thousands of people across major cities in Europe in protest at the invasion and war on Irag which many believed the war was simply an oil grab.

    It is also worth being aware that outside America, Canada , the UK and Australia, many ordinary working people ( millions, I guess) view the American army industrial complex, (including its factories, foreign bases, sofisiticated weaponry and wealthy business tycoon owners who proffit from it ) as a more evil organization than the Natzis. Yet many of the same people would enjoy watching a tv program like a replay of MASH and identify positively with and enjoy the rough and tumble of life in a US army base.
    Maybe it’s the power and purpose of Hollywood.

    Many people can entertain opposing views simultaneously in their mind when it doesn’t effect them directly.

    Great Podcast today, really enjoyed it.

  7. Could be coincidence but I had a phone conversation with my sister. She asked me which martial arts she should consider putting her kids in. Now I’m not in any martial arts and I’m not in that scene. I don’t search for anything related to it at all. For the next several days, I started getting ads about places I could go to learn various forms of martial arts. Freaked me out. This was a phone call.

  8. 4H allows for most of the things people say they want in Boy and Girl Scouts. From shootings sports (BBs, archery, .22 rifle, trap, skeet, muzzleloading, and air pistol), to camping, cooking, photography, woodworking, animal husbandry, and robotics. My wife was a girl scout and is excited by the greater involvement our kids get from 4H.

    However, it is only as good and vibrant as the adults that volunteer. My wife and I both volunteer to be project leader/mentors at the county level mentoring kids from 8-18 from several different clubs.

    With this said, I have nothing against Scouting. We have a troop that camps on our place each year for “wilderness” camping and I teach them tree identification. In talking with the leaders, the boys aren’t allowed to use power tools. I understand not letting them use a chainsaw at 8-10 years old, but not allowed to use a portable drill??? Probably part of why we’ve seen an uptick in number of 4H members.

  9. Regarding scouts, my boys have been in Boy Scouts since 2011. My husband and I have both volunteered actively, and I have to say that I haven’t seen any of the BS (like boys not being allowed to use water guns at the pool) that I’m sure happens in certain parts of the country. The fact of the matter is, at the unit level, the activities are driven by the volunteers who work with the boys, and if there are a bunch of helicopter parents around, a particular unit might end up being pretty crazy in the end.

    Jack, I doubt the kinds of things you were talking aobut are a national stance because even in Cub Scouts, both my boys got to shoot guns and bows, and as a Boy Scout, my older son has learned how to hunt, trap, shoot, camp, and survive in the wilderness. Even at the council level, scout camp teaches boys and young men to shoot .22s, shot guns, bows, and air soft. And you better believe they’re allowed to do things like paint ball.

    The organization itself is a little annoying though. Fundraising benefits the national and regional groups a lot more than it does the units that actually raise the money. And in both Boy Scouts and Cub Scouts, we’ve had a guy come to our banquets as a “friend of scouting” who’s begging for money. It’s a little (or a lot) annoying because the people in that room already pay tons for their boys to participate, but that’s the way it goes, I guess.

    In the end, I’m happy with my boys’ participation in scouts. They’re actually getting a lot of things out of their respective programs that their dad and I can’t teach them, and I feel so grateful for that.

    Just another perspective…

    • @Sarah, what happens happens but what you are saying is you are ignoring the rules set by BOSA.

      By the way good!

      The organization is sunk, the Iron Law is always the death nail.