What happens when we take a break from guest interviews and just riff with each other? We find ourselves discussing the powerful impact our podcast episodes have had on us, not to mention the incredible guests we've been honored to chat with. Tonight, we're diving into everything from childhood memories to the fascinating world of AI art.
We take a trip down memory lane, reminiscing about our childhood hobbies like BMX and skateboarding, as well as the importance of allowing kids to explore and experiment. We'll even touch upon Neil deGrasse Tyson's advice that "kids are born scientists" and should be encouraged in their curiosity.
Finally, we'll explore the potential implications of AI art on the creative process and the dangers it poses in the realm of social media. We'll chat about how the algorithms can trap us into believing false information and discuss the importance of teaching ourselves and our children to think objectively. So join us for a lively and insightful conversation about the amazing guests we've had so far, our childhood adventures, and the fascinating, yet sometimes dangerous, world of AI.
The Loose Connection podcast is Hosted by Chris Leonard & Kyle Chirnside
email us at looseconnectionpod@gmail.com
Follow us on Instagram , Facebook,
What happens when we take a break from guest interviews and just riff with each other? We find ourselves discussing the powerful impact our podcast episodes have had on us, not to mention the incredible guests we've been honored to chat with. Tonight, we're diving into everything from childhood memories to the fascinating world of AI art.
We take a trip down memory lane, reminiscing about our childhood hobbies like BMX and skateboarding, as well as the importance of allowing kids to explore and experiment. We'll even touch upon Neil deGrasse Tyson's advice that "kids are born scientists" and should be encouraged in their curiosity.
Finally, we'll explore the potential implications of AI art on the creative process and the dangers it poses in the realm of social media. We'll chat about how the algorithms can trap us into believing false information and discuss the importance of teaching ourselves and our children to think objectively. So join us for a lively and insightful conversation about the amazing guests we've had so far, our childhood adventures, and the fascinating, yet sometimes dangerous, world of AI.
The Loose Connection podcast is Hosted by Chris Leonard & Kyle Chirnside
email us at looseconnectionpod@gmail.com
Follow us on Instagram , Facebook,
Hi, this is a loose connection. Thanks for the hundred people that listen to us. That were fucking blessed. Holy cow. We haven't done nothing in a long time, chris Hi.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's been a solid probably at least two months since we've been able to get together. So, yeah, we you know Kyle and I, this is we definitely wanted to keep us a regular thing. We're trying. You know life is wild. We do obviously have our full commitment to singleton noise. That's not gonna waver through all of this. So that will always come first And but you know, we still want to have some different conversations and if you've listened to any other episode, do you know this, what this is? So We don't have a guest tonight, we just want to riff and hang out and See what comes of that. So if it's not your cup of tea, hit, skip, hit, unsubscribe. I don't give a fuck. If it's your thing, cool, tell, tell, tell someone else. We at least, we at least know we have what John Downey, who apparently digs on this shit, so appreciate you, thank you.
Speaker 1:No, it and it's fun because We really didn't want to step on our our normal podcast with signal to noise. But Even offline we talk about so much, about how much Just listening to these things really affects us, man and We've we really kind of knocked it out of the park on the first five guests.
Speaker 2:I mean, i haven't heard any real comments, but We said we set the bar kind of high for ourselves. We're having a hard time actually getting back up to that bar.
Speaker 1:Definitely have some guests lined up. Um, i'd love to have some of those guys back that we've already put out there, and Man So man speaking of which.
Speaker 2:So, so well, you know, all right, yes, so man, yeah, joe valiente Frickin, that's probably the funniest one of the one that we've done so far, and So actually I want to give a shout out to Jeremy will. So, jeremy will. It was episode four. we talked about poverty and child adoption and sponsorship and, interestingly enough, we had just talked to him when he had just got back from Africa Where he was shooting some film about a documentary that he was about to release And we're literally as we record today. There was a song that him and his brothers with the band will it, which they haven't released any music in nine years.
Speaker 2:They just released a new track today, soundtrack or not soundtrack, release the theme song. Yeah, it's gonna be a theme song of this documentary called search light, and it's all about this storyline of, like you know, like 15 years ago I went to Africa, met this girl And some of the changes that happened there And and the impact has been happening and where they are now, and he went back and stuff. So just kind of funny to the full circle, like you know. You know what we just talked about, what's been worked on, so that we're working on the editing it. The premiere got pushed back because they're really pouring everything they can to that Document and making sure it's the best it could be. They also have to pay attention to certain things like protecting some privacy rights of people, as we're sharing some of these stories.
Speaker 1:I'm stuff.
Speaker 2:So they're working on some of that stuff They had.
Speaker 1:They had a they had a wild stuff, so didn't they have a guest drummer come in for that song too?
Speaker 2:Yeah. So here's yeah funny thing the mix of our audio world versus this world. So when Jeremy and his brothers went to go mix this track you know I'm I've been lifelong friends with Jeremy and he was like, hey, do you want to mix this track? like this whole documentary and and and song has been kind of pro bono type of thing, right. I was like, yeah, dude, whatever, whatever you need like just hey, fair warning, i haven't mixed a thing in like years, right, i've kind of have been away from the music scene, so I'll give it my best go.
Speaker 2:I got logic and stock plugins. We'll see how this goes. I made best effort possible And they said I got it to the point where it was, at the level of all their previous studio albums, but they felt like they just needed to like take it a notch further step in what that was and And. So they had good they're good friends and connections with Aaron Gillespie, which I plan on actually getting on this podcast by the way Hey drummer from under oath and he has a band called the almost.
Speaker 2:You know him because you tormented him with under. And just phenomenal human. He's a producer, drummer, great great dude, right. So he had actually produced a record for will it before? So, he ended up yeah and so Yeah so that was the connection that Jeremy had had with him and actually Jeremy's toured with him as a speaker, because Aaron Gillespie has actually been sponsoring kids on his tour And with the almost doing the almost stuff and which is a great band, by the way.
Speaker 1:It's a small like. It's a small. Remember, when that first almost album came out, i was like holy cow, that's Aaron, and he wasn't even playing drums. Like one of the hardest drummers in metal period. Andy sings Dude, we okay. So going way back, we're talking like 2001, 2002 ish. We went to st Petersburg, florida, and played of his a?
Speaker 1:o living sacrifice, norma Jean, who was oh my god and then there was this local band that opened the show under oath and It was right before chasing safely came out. I was with the band called not waving betrowning from st Louis and Was with their old singer. But when I saw those dudes I was like holy shit, these guys are, it's gonna pop. But I didn't know them back then but we always did like a little weird hardcore shows. Those guys were always like the sweetest, coolest dudes ever, like It's awesome that Jeremy got those, that Aaron stepped in and played drums. I heard the track. That's why I picture Yes, picture my.
Speaker 2:He stepped in. Not only did he play drums, and Aaron ended up actually mixing the track And definitely added some like producer level elements that, like, i'm just not quite frankly capable of right now and took it to the level that needed to go. And then, small world, a good friend of mine, former employee, aaron Aaron Palyjian he mastered the track.
Speaker 2:Which is kind of cool, like yeah, it's small world. So yeah, that track released today, the documentary, will be out soon. I'm sure it'll be good for us, maybe even just revisit that once it's actually, is that the story of?
Speaker 1:is that the story of the girl With the general mutilation in the yes, Oh, yeah, Yes okay so if you guys haven't heard that episode, would you and we need to go watch it or listen to it and You'll understand what we're talking about. This girl basically it's her story grew up in a tribe that basically female general Mutilation happened when they were of child.
Speaker 2:FGM. Yep, that was it. But she was able to help, literally like her. Her dad was like I don't know, for lack of the terms, like Mara, the town or whatever. And the fact that she was able to convince her father basically to a not marry her away or not FGM her And was able to actually literally change the laws in that village over the conversations that Jeremy and his team did freaking a decade ago, and then she, he, gets to go back and like, see her in this full circle thing is a pretty, pretty insane.
Speaker 1:Gotta watch it. Gotta watch it when it comes out. We'll keep you updated, we'll. We'll throw links for stuff in our description and stuff too, for sure. So I Think it's cool because One of our first episode with Fred I Would just talk to somebody and I actually told, told the story about the guitar and his daughter playing so and really, and How the teenager thing like She wouldn't, like he'd walk down stairs and she quit playing the piano or quit writing the songs or whatever, and never really involved Dad. Well, my friend Ian's daughter does the same thing, but he he plays like in a metal band here and his daughter is one of the Disney singers, she's a Disney princess basically, and He hates show tunes and stuff but he likes super back his daughter.
Speaker 1:But when she used to practice and stuff he wouldn't, she wouldn't let him like watch or listen or nothing. But now she like does Disney show tunes. He really enjoyed that episode, you.
Speaker 2:You know it's funny, small World is at Fred Mescherino. His son Scout is actually doing an internship in our warehouse this summer. So I'm working with his son Scout all summer. Wild, it's a small world, yeah, oh man. So I think we're going to catch up on things. You know what? I have a different thing in mind. Let's do this. So in early, not numbered episodes, we're just kind of piloting this thing, you and I. We kind of did some like I don't know reflection or reflection or throwback to just some childhood things, and mostly focused around music, right. But one of the first things when you and I started talking about, like hey, what do we talk about? What would we dig into? You've always talked about BMX and riding bikes and skating as a kid. I want to go there. What's the first time? not really riding the bike, but like what was like? what was the first time, like getting into like BMX and like, was it like park? Was it like ramps? Like what did you get into?
Speaker 1:Oh, man got to remember I'm 50.
Speaker 2:So and I grew up in.
Speaker 1:Missouri in the middle of everything you know. So we are behind in culture. I would say you know a good five to eight years between the coasts. So seeing BMXing and skateboarding was done through magazines, you know You'd go to the grocery store and just look through magazines. And middle class area grew up in a middle class area in St Louis, missouri And basically there was only like one bike store that had nice shit, like they had the red lines and GTs and stuff like that, and they actually did like a little thing at one of the VP fairs. It's a 4th of July parade thing that they have downtown and set up huge fireworks and blah, blah, blah, but on the top they set up a ramp for BMX and a ramp for skate And they invited all these like pro dudes in And you see a ramp like half pipe or was it?
Speaker 1:like just a straight up, like street, street course and half pipe on the top of a parking garage downtown St Louis And like that's really when it popped off here And yeah, I still ride now Like I'm stupid. I don't do anything like wheels on the ground. I've went and skated a pool, Joel Lonkey He used to be a front of house guy for Billy Idol and a bunch of other stuff, But it was cool because skateboarding and BMXing always came with a culture, you know. I mean you see the kids, you can pick out a skater kid. You can pick out, you know, a biker kid or that kind of kid.
Speaker 1:So I felt like sometimes oh, here comes a joint, you can always come on, you can. You don't want to back, okay.
Speaker 2:I don't know what contraption is that you just smoked, but it just doesn't.
Speaker 1:Oh, you don't want it.
Speaker 2:I like your shirt. I got one, just like it.
Speaker 1:Hashtag lose connection here, So Carly just brought me a joint. If no one's watching, she's probably a joint. Yeah, that's Chris. You've never seen Chris before. Come here. We're recording. We'll cut this out.
Speaker 2:I mean we'll cut this out. I've been over.
Speaker 1:Hang on, she can't even hear you.
Speaker 2:It's so blurry because of Kyle's connection anyway which is where he can see me anyway. It's so blurry anyway because of Kyle's shitty connection that I can't trust me. I can't see anything, so it's okay.
Speaker 1:That's perfect. We're looking at it. What does it look like from your end? Oh, it's blurry, it's probably blurry.
Speaker 2:I see Kyle's bald head. I see, no, a little bit. It's okay, it's a connection, it's all good.
Speaker 1:This ain't no 4K HD.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it's right.
Speaker 1:This ain't no 4K HD show bitch, it's good. I sign off my right, All right. so I don't even know how to pick back up from that What just happened.
Speaker 2:Oh my God. So were you like you trying to do like all kinds of like tricks, like like on the bike and stuff, or were you just straight up just trying to like, just like, ride the ramp and stuff? I mean, like, how like, how hard-coded did you go So?
Speaker 1:bikes started out, bmx, like we used to make trails around my neighborhood. It's all like wooded areas and stuff like that. So we'd go bring shovels and rakes and like make trails and jumps and dips and the whole nine yard and you have to fix them all the time because like you make them too far apart or you make them too close together or they're too vile or whatever. Lot of bloody shins, lot of walking back to the house with bent rims and blown up tires and And like were these like your bikes?
Speaker 2:were they like? were they like legit BMX bikes or are these just like Walmart bikes that y'all wanted to be?
Speaker 1:BMX bikes, walmart bikes until we got to us Or Kmart, probably Kmart right there. Yeah, kmart, we had a Kmart right by the house. I got a Huffy and I completely destroyed that thing and that was the thing. We had one fucking bike store. It was touring cyclists and there's like everything was so expensive but you could put shit on the layaway, so I put.
Speaker 2:Layaway.
Speaker 1:I put a diamond back. Which one it was? but it was bright green with white tires and I was like, yeah, it didn't have none of the pegs or nothing, because we were not that rich. but yeah, bmx just started out doing trails and jumps. dude, we were the dudes that would make plywood brick ramps, like where you stack up the bricks. Yes, 100%. And same, same And we would make like a half pipe.
Speaker 2:And, dude, you thought, like, so, like we had a hill too, right, we had like this hill in our yard. I kind of live more on the sticks and we would do the same thing. You get like a small piece of plywood and maybe a cinder block. Dude, you thought you were 20 feet in the air when you came off this thing. Oh yeah, in reality you might have been a couple inches off that ramp And it was like hitting the hardest surface you've ever heard in your life.
Speaker 1:When the bike landed Yes, like the chain would rattle The handlebars would go forward.
Speaker 1:I don't know how many times I see my friend's handlebars like all the way over, you know, but there was always that one kid. So there was this kid, danny Stigers, down the street. His parents had a little bit of money on him or whatever. That fool got a red line with some Paragwin mags like chromed out like. He was like you want to try on my bike And I'm like, yeah, that thing was fucking sweet. There was always one dude who had a sweeter ride than you. You know what I mean And you're always trying to get the next ride. My parents wouldn't buy me a skateboard because they thought it was super dangerous, but I like the culture of that better because it's a little bit like punk rock. Like I got that thrasher skate rock cassette when I was super young And I like their style. Like the Alva dudes were all like long hair and they had dreadlocks and they fucking were like thugs.
Speaker 2:The Spitfire logo was always what got me right. I remember like I was never a skater kid at all. But I would remember seeing the magazines or the stickers of like Spitfire and thrasher and those or whatever, and what was? I remember looking at skater magazines and there was the logo that was always like this like fire and ice or like this red is like red and blue. I don't know what manufacturer that was.
Speaker 1:I have to think about it.
Speaker 2:I don't know. I remember looking at like decks, like looking at skater decks and like man, i fucking just love this Dude.
Speaker 1:I've never really I mean I've ridden a skateboard, but like It's turned into an art form now, like I think I have so many friends that I'll call or whatever they'll send me pictures and they just have the art on the wall now, like they go buy all the reissued decks.
Speaker 2:It's just like vinyl. It's just like vinyl, color varying vinyl. I mean, people don't buy that to listen to it. They buy it to put it on the wall, which I'm not against, not at all.
Speaker 1:It's just a thing. Trust me, when I was a kid, even if I broke a skateboard, i kept it Like it was that important to me. I mean you break kingpins and tails and everything. My parents wouldn't buy me a skateboard so I had to save all my money to get it and back in the day a complete was like 170 bucks and that was a lot in the 80s And Did you do like the Janko jeans and like the chain, like the big?
Speaker 1:baggy thing or like what was your vibe? I was a metal punk rock kid.
Speaker 2:That was probably a little past you, right? That was probably a little past your time. I was like The Janko and the chains and all that stuff That was past my time, that was more like corn, that was like 90s or whatever, yeah it was my time. It was my time.
Speaker 1:We were just like little punk rock kids dude Fucking tight jeans and shitty t-shirt and a hat, you know. Plus we were a little redneck, you know, because we were fucking Missouri.
Speaker 2:I guess probably when I came up like we were riding the coattails of like all the shit that you went through, people caught onto and commercialized it, whereas like when you were going through it, it was like you guys were like actually making the scene as opposed to like the wave that I caught was the commercialized version of the scene that you You ever seen that?
Speaker 1:that TikTok, where they're like why don't we fuck with Gen Xers, like why isn't nobody give them people shit? and it's like because we'll fucking kill you. We grew up on metal fucking playgrounds. We got tetanus shots like we drank out of the hose like.
Speaker 2:I drank out of the hose guy, i know, but it's just like that was Gen X.
Speaker 1:Like I came Dude. There was a time my mom told me My adopted mom told me when I was growing up, that I was in the emergency room like once every month for something. We just used to just destroy stuff. Like we go to parking lots and do rail slides before people would like let you and everyone's like get out of here And they chase you off, like the cops would try to chase you and stuff And I don't know nobody. Everybody fucked with those skater kids. We had the burnout dudes that listened to all the rock and metal and stuff like that, and then we had the jocks and preps and then we were like the shitty skater dudes. There was only like 10 of us. It was crazy. I still am friends with 95% of the people that I used to skate with in high school. That's fucked up.
Speaker 2:That's awesome. That's awesome. Not many people can say that, though There's legitimately not one person from high school that I'm a friend with or associate with, but anyway. So I never got into like actual BMX. I always had like a mountain bike because I lived kind of in the sticks, so I would like ride around trails like I had this trail in the woods.
Speaker 1:We didn't have mountain bikes back in my day. We had tin speeds, bro, the little skinny wheels.
Speaker 2:Tour de France ihrelaikash browser. All Americans saying I went to ACER to land on the road and then I definitely had like this big hill in my yard and we'd make these ramps and again It was like maybe a four by four.
Speaker 1:Yeah, why would on top of us? how many times did it break you?
Speaker 2:know, and you thought you're getting, we get. Every time you thought you were getting mad area. I guess you're probably getting six inches off the ground off the ramp at best. I Told this story. I think maybe we were talking off air after our sickles and doys or something like that, but I was thinking about this when we. I knew I wanted to ask you what the BMX thing? right? So, like my driveway, as a kid I had this like a couple hundred foot long driveway and it was like like from where my house was, it was like this Incline down and then plateaued and went back up a hill. I mean, it was like a couple hundred feet long of this big hill and I had this grand idea one day of, like you know, i had been watching like Drag racing as a kid, you know, on TV.
Speaker 1:I'm like gonna go bad.
Speaker 2:You know what they really? They released these parachutes out their back of the car to slow them down when they're going down the one. I'm like I wonder if I could do that when I'm on my bike, right? I'm like, what would that look like if I'm going down this hill and I could, like I could, release this parachute My back and like, slow me down right? I'm like, alright, so, like. So I grabbed a backpack And I grabbed some like yarn.
Speaker 2:I grabbed like 20, 30 feet of yarn I'm maybe not even that long like, maybe, like I don't know 12, 15 feet of yarn and I Like I had maybe been to like home back and like in in like middle school, right, so like I could sew, right, so like I'm like sewing some yarn into like the back of the backpack and I get like Walmart Walmart bags and I and I and I and I sew like maybe three Walmart bags, just some yarn and the back of my backpack and I have this grand idea that I've like a stuff I'm gonna have my backpack and I can make a long zip cord my back back.
Speaker 2:So I'm like riding down the hills like fast I can fast. Again It's wrong down and I just ripped the zipper down. If I let this, you know, go out the back, it's gonna be just like then, just like the drag races go slow me down as I go down this hill. It didn't know you. You know what. I put so much effort into that though I was so proud of myself, i'm like damn it, it didn't work.
Speaker 1:It doesn't work. And you're going as fast as you. Oh shit, i should have started off that fast. You know, and um, i Like some of stuff that Neil Tyson de Grasse He says he said you can't you hold on.
Speaker 2:It's Neil. It's you keep texting us, neil Tyson de Grace. It's Neil de Grace.
Speaker 1:Okay, whatever, everyone knows who I'm talking about. He said kids are born scientists, so you can't be the hovering parent that always says no, because everything you do is a fucking science experiment. You know what I mean. Will this break? Yes. Will this do this? Yes, i make it. Will I clear it? Can I jump over that? Do you think I could swing to that? like oh, killing bugs, you know, just like stupid stuff. All those things that we did when we had skateboards and bikes were just like a scientific test of our, our bodies, like ability to recover after we fucking dump. Like It's so funny, but it helps. In my life now, because that's how I treat Kemper, i'm like I kind of got to let this chick, you know rec get kicked in the face with a soccer ball. Like You can't be. Like oh, are you?
Speaker 1:okay, babe, ain't no one asking if.
Speaker 1:I was okay. They're like it's dinner time. Why are you ten minutes late, dude? we used to ride, okay, so my mom didn't know this. She would only let me go around the block and it's probably like a Quarter of a mile. It's not a big block whatever, but it had a big ass hill. So we used to do it all the time. But then we could go a little bit further and a little bit further.
Speaker 1:So, right up the street from where I live, there was a fucking arcade. There was a Le Mans I don't even if you Google that shit Le Mans or Aladdin's Castle, so it those were. But it was this huge arcade And they got fucking Tron and they had the little Thing on top of it so people could gather around and watch. And We used to split up there, dude, and I'd like steal a dollar out of my mom's purse or whatever, just so I could play Tron. But I knew exactly when I had to leave and how many games I could play before she would want me to check back in. Dude, we used to do so much stuff like I saw my neighbor up there, you know what I mean like I'm walking out, getting on my bike and my Neighbors like, what are you doing up here? I'm like, oh shit, i'm busted. We used to.
Speaker 2:I used to have these times where I'm like you know what, like it wasn't like, hey, i'm done with this house type of thing, but I'm like I'm gonna go away for like hours And I'm gonna pack up. Did you have woods? Did you have all the joloram where you live? Oh yeah, i had what I had woods all around me, right?
Speaker 1:So like I was, like I'm gonna go around and I'm gonna go around and I'm gonna go around.
Speaker 2:I had woods all around me, right, so like I was like I'm gonna wait today, Like I'm I'm not coming back, right, and I'd pack all this shit in there. I get my Walkman, i'd get like all my other shit in his bag, i get on my bike and I go out there and like, and I had this fort right out in the middle of the woods, so like I had this big ring, that we would ride my bike in the woods and like in the middle, that with this big fort, like literally built like a lean-to and we'd have just shit out there and whatever, and.
Speaker 2:I'm out there. I'm out there for hours. I'm like, yeah, man, i'm just staying away from the house, i'm not coming home, you know. and then eventually it's like, yeah, i'm kind of hungry, i should probably go home. and then you come home and it's like you've only been out of the house like an hour, but you haven't actually been out like all all day. but you had the intention like you're gonna go, i'm not coming home for like eight hours I'm not coming that first time.
Speaker 1:So I have woods by my house too and that first time, that feeling of that first time going into the woods was so like Can I say masculine It's really just like yeah.
Speaker 1:Woods, but then you have a fort. We had a fort here too, and we built BMX tracks back there. So like we like knew where the shit was, we named the trails. It was like dorset trails, oh yeah, like yeah, yeah, it was kind of a thing and that's what I'm saying like that culture has kind of like Drugged me through life. I hate to say it. I still skate now, i still do all that shit now.
Speaker 2:Dude. Alright, so here's speaking of bikes and my neighborhood and whatever right. So like we had this thing, a couple of our neighbors We'd get together, we made a whole like again.
Speaker 2:I lived like in this neighborhood like a cul-de-sac thing kind of, kind of out, you know in the country a little bit right, we Literally made a whole game out of our neighborhood. We literally made a map that we would keep on this little like pouch on the front of our hand, of bars or whatever We had like where the stop signs were supposed to be right. We had that we would bring like monopoly money that we'd keep in like a fanny pack or whatever and like They never person would like take tolls at a stop sign and you had to do this whole thing, like we literally made like a whole game Out of our neighborhood and spend fucking hours out.
Speaker 2:I know we're sound like fucking like old creeps right now, right, but like this is the shit we did when we were fucking kids. I don't know like it was. And here's the funny thing This means nothing, but it made me think about as a clean the basement out the other night. So this neighbor That I had at the time We were in the same grade like again, this is like, this is like late grade school, early middle school at best, right, do? I had this massive crush on her massive crush and and I would, i would, we would write handwritten letters to each other.
Speaker 2:Right so she was. She was one of the ones of the group, of the posse of us who would like. I Definitely did make mixed cassette tapes for her. Yes, 100%. She's the only person that ever made me I'm a little psychic, little psychic, and So I. I got into this routine. This had to have been maybe just before middle school, or middle school anyway, doesn't matter. And And every morning I'd walk up to the, to the, my mailbox. I didn't have a bus stop because I went to private school, whatever, anyway.
Speaker 2:And like see her parents drove her to school and, like we would, we would hand off, we would hand off handwritten notes every morning, right, and it was like we literally it's like the typical thing of like you're you're running like two conversations, right, because like you're handing off a note but you're also receiving a note, so you're kind of like doing this like you know back and forth thing. This went on for like almost two school seasons.
Speaker 1:Wow.
Speaker 2:So you know just every morning I literally was at the bus stop like passing these notes. I Still have this shoebox of all of those notes that I received from her in like fucking middle school. Shit you not in the basement.
Speaker 1:I probably asked some mixed tapes. That's about it. It's got. I know one of the songs from the mixed tape. Did you want to hear Ozzy Osbourne The Ford? Because we had check it out. Dude, we had to record our songs off the fucking radio.
Speaker 2:Yes, the radio, the radio. And hope that they didn't like try to talk and hit the post And like talk over top of it and you couldn't plan the order. You couldn't plan the order of what's on the cassette tape Because you just had to just hope that Delilah, that night, was gonna play the song that you want to share with your neighbor. So check this out.
Speaker 1:This is a weird flex, right? This is a weird 1980 something flex. If you had a dual cassette recorder and you recorded a lot of radio shit. Oh yeah, oh, you made the best mix tapes. I, and it was kind of a flex, like people knew if you made a mix tape, because like they're like, oh, that's so-and-so, like the mix tape thing is funny enough.
Speaker 2:I Early as early on, i didn't have a dual cassette. I had two cassette players that could record so you could play off of one, hit record on the other. And so you're going. I looking back at this now I can't imagine how shitty the little microphone was on this single-deck record player Recording the speakers off of this other.
Speaker 1:Uh see the I got band practice that we're recorded like that. What are you talking about? So that that's how old we are?
Speaker 2:and Fuck, we should stop doing that. But no, no, it's just, it's just fun. All right, go, let's change fucking directions here. You know what I've been fascinated by lately? Oh, I've been fascinated by No, i've been, i'm videos I send you Super that old flat earth.
Speaker 2:We're gonna go there. I believe you. No. So I'm actually fascinated with people's infatuation or arguments or whatever around AI. Right, it's so funny to see the polarizing conversations over AI, right, you hear the whole boomer conversation of like oh, they're going to take over the world and we have to be careful. This is fucking scary. And then you hear, you know Gen X and Millennial, like hey, we just have to figure out how to educate the next generation on how to use this properly, you know, and everything in between, to the point of like, obviously the government figuring out, like shit, how do we regulate this thing? that's already out of control? Or I don't know. Like, i'm super fascinated with just where that's going to go, how it's going to affect society.
Speaker 2:And the dialogue, the dichotomies that go around.
Speaker 1:You also have people like Elon Musk who are like telling people it needs to stop or it's not going to be good. Like you are right, it's super polarizing. It's hard to understand. Like the information that we have now and the abilities that we have on our phone and our laptop now are just like tiny compared to what they're saying AI can do. you know It. just, we're almost being fed whatever they're telling us, so it's hard to even believe anything.
Speaker 2:I'm definitely intrigued on the ethical side of what the government feels like it should or shouldn't do, right, i mean.
Speaker 1:Oh yeah, that's a whole fucking different thing.
Speaker 2:There's some level of me that yeah, no, but it's a respectable conversation, or it can be. I should say, of like, yeah, there are certain ethical levels to this, and like perfect word.
Speaker 1:That's exactly what I was saying.
Speaker 2:Without getting into political ethical without getting into like the actual, actual political sides of this thing, for lack of a better term. I consider myself somewhat of a libertarian, somewhere in the middle Right, like not, you know, not too much, not too little Right. And so I mean I'm intrigued, but I am intrigued of like fuck on one level, like yeah, like as a society, like we do have to consider and think about this, but at the same time I think it's fucking amazing some of the things that can do. And you know, obviously we've kind of focused on this a little bit from the arts side of things, or that's where I would have continued to look at this.
Speaker 1:And the Jeff Holly side of things.
Speaker 2:I don't know.
Speaker 1:Nothing makes sense, you know, and I think that's almost like you have to talk about the other side of things, the ethics and the philosophy of AI, to get to a base level, to start, i mean just think hold on real quick.
Speaker 2:By the time Kemper gets to high school, your daughter. For those who don't know, by the way, by the time she gets to high school, there's probably going to be an AI ethics class. Let's just. I mean, that's how fucking, that's how fast this is going to go, by the way, yeah.
Speaker 1:I mean, how many big corporations that grow this fast are all truly ethical, you know? And there's going to be a measurement of that with the size of what this component is going to add to society, right? So how do you? it has to almost like it can't be political, because Like here's what I see.
Speaker 2:Like I see you know, have you seen the clips of like Regis and Kelly when, like the internet?
Speaker 2:came out Yeah dude Right And like, like Kelly on there was, like there's this thing called the internet And I don't know. Apparently you look things up and you do things like and she looks like a complete fucking idiot, right, because what we know the internet to be today, right, i literally think those same things are going to happen with the way we're talking about AI, and that's the perspective that I'm trying to think of of this. Of like, are we just being literally the same people who in the early 90s, late 80s, who were like what's the internet, what is dial-up mode, what is email? Like this is a fad, this is bullshit. You know what I mean? Like that's where we are with AI. I feel like I don't know.
Speaker 1:So that's kind of running around in my head right now because I'm thinking about when did the web start regulating like weird shit? You know what I mean. Because that's.
Speaker 2:Oh no, when did Al Gore invent it? I'm just kidding.
Speaker 1:It was weird When did they start putting regulation on the actual internet? Because I remember going on BBS stuff like dial-up and like you could find some pretty raunchy stuff on there and you could be.
Speaker 2:Like, like, like rapemypoocom Yeah something like that, you know? Do you remember that shit? Do you remember that?
Speaker 1:Literally Rape my poo, but there must have been regulations before. I just think the ethical questions need to be asked and like it's so overwhelming right now. it's kind of like you see a person like Elon Musk or someone who's worked from Microsoft or Google say that you know they might be taking it too far, or like you know there needs to be regulation. put on it Like it does strike a bit of fear. you know They all grew up in the time of Terminator dude, t1s and T3s, bro. Like we don't need none of that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, can it be weaponized? It's tough, it can't be weaponized, which, oh, of course, it can Like, anything can be weaponized. And I mean, i'm trying to have as opened of a mind to it as possible, but then also trying to check myself at the same time of like is that too much? Is that too far? Right, and it's like you know, keep bringing it back to the art realm, right, Like, specifically, music, for instance. It's like you know, if does it matter, if we can get to a point where, straight up the next I don't know My Chemical Remix song is 100% AI written. Does that matter, right?
Speaker 1:You know.
Speaker 2:And so what would I be a little bit if they could write and like Floyd album that never happened or Led Zeppelin song that never, you know, i think that would be cool.
Speaker 2:You already are having. We already having like the, the, the, the, the, the sarcastic things right, where you have, like Frank Sinatra singing a ludicrous song, right, like shit, like that's already happening or it's already out there, right, and? but I'm talking about like, so the, the question that actually I propose what. I met up with Matt Carter from Emory and I was actually kind of talking about this a little bit.
Speaker 2:I'm like all right, so we already have an industry of musicians and artists who are ghost writers right, where people you know, katie Perry's, in the, whatever pop worlds and whatever they don't write their songs or, for the most part, don't write their songs already. Right, how different is it if AI wrote this song versus some ghost writer who lives in Nashville? how different is that, if? do you actually care whether your ex-favorite artists actually wrote that song and actually relates to that song? because I'm willing to bet that nine out of the ten songs that you feel are the most emotional things you've ever experienced with an artist that you like, good chances are they didn't either write the music or they didn't write the lyrics. So what does it matter if a computer did that versus an actual human did that?
Speaker 1:same thing, you know, people used to say about DJs and electronic artists. I mean, i think that's the same same kind of growth pattern but, like you said, there has to be a sense of ethics to it. You know, like you can't just blatantly steal, there's already things in line. Now that you sure you know you can't use somebody's likeness or use their voice or whatever like, because isn't that what what's his face got in trouble with? he used it was Ed Sheeran or whatever who did you talking about the like the David Gweller?
Speaker 2:or whatever did that, did the Eminem song or something like that, but I think there might have been some permission there. I'm not sure, but that, the specifics of that one, if there was actual legal trouble there or not, i can't, i can't remember, but I mean that shit's gonna happen. Like, for instance, i literally, you know speak of tiktok, i literally heard like Frank Sinatra sing I don't know a ludicrous song or something. It doesn't matter what it was, you know it was. Or the Beatles, you know it was, you know Paul McCartney singing some other thing and at the end of the day, like you know, the average consumer will probably have no way of telling the difference. Is that ethical, is that we've had parodies our whole lives, right? how different is that from you know, you know, weird Al or anyone else just covering another thing?
Speaker 1:I don't, i don't know, i don't know either it's interesting and the chat aspect of it is crazy that it can write chat you be to write for you and the more info you put in and now people are like giving you keywords to like open up different things. You know and and at some point, chris, you got to think about what we see as a consumer and what people are working on behind the scenes. You know we don't have access to the blood-cooled computer and you know Transylvania or whatever that's running these crazy programs that people are worried about. You know, it's definitely amazing to see and it's cool that everyone's talking about it.
Speaker 2:I'm just personally trying to objectively be able to just sit back and just think about it, as opposed to be like fuck, no, this is bullshit. Or oh my god, this is the best thing, okay.
Speaker 1:I got a question somewhere is somewhere in the middle I got a question why does all the AI paintings or drawings, or whatever they call them, design work? why does it all look like something that you would find in a truck stop in Iowa? like it doesn't matter. It looks like a bad penthouse magazine. Like it there's but that's that's.
Speaker 2:That's only for now, though. That's. The thing is like.
Speaker 1:It's getting every day, dude, that shit is getting more and more photo roll, but you're like draw Mario on Mr Toad's Wild Ride at Disney World and it looks like a fucking velvet poster from 1987. like it's all it does but that's it's.
Speaker 2:That's only temporary. I'm telling you right now, a year from now we're gonna be fucking mind-blowing like a year from now, you're legitimately not gonna be tell like, is that, is that a real picture of Johnny Cash singing Folsom City Blues, or whatever, at that jail? or you know, is that Paul McCartney in there? what did Paul McCartney happen to go over the none of us knew because someone's box coming back.
Speaker 2:You know, box still alive right, all those, but you know what I'm. But again, i tried to look at the bright sides of these things, or the interesting, interesting size of these things. If anyone who has dabbled into AI art, specifically like mid-journey or any of these things, were like you're trying to create images like the, the biggest key in all of that still is you as the person putting in the descriptors. Totally so I, i. The thing that intrigues me is like okay, how well can you describe where you want to go? of course, the AI can always go somewhere, but there is a, there is an art to actually putting in the descriptors to get into the image that you even wanted in the first place, and that's the part that's the part that intrigues me, and I guess it's volume of users on that server that's gonna trigger the AI to go oh, someone entered this word.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna go look up every picture or thing associated in imaging with that word. So people continuously typing in tags and phrases and whatnot. That computer is fucking getting smarter. So you're right, it's not gonna always look like a bad 1987 penthouse magazine, like art, like something on a bad.
Speaker 2:It looks like Japanese art, like it's crazy that that's what you either do, like you now need to just go with that to mid-journey and say what is the? the? the bathroom stall number three at the Flying J in Iowa. Stop exit 13. What is the art on that wall? and see what?
Speaker 1:it's diamond studded hat that says USA wolf hauling into a moon. Dude, it looks like truck stop art. It's like wolf hauling into the moon, like anything that you would find on a on a truck stop t-shirt is what you get now. But you're right, entering more information and more keywords and people kind of like cracking the code is getting the information, even at a commercial level. That we see is is pretty believable, whether we hear it on tiktok or recorded, or the imaging that they're creating with it. It is getting better, that's for sure. I I worry about this. I worry about the conspiracy theory stuff behind it. Like we have such a high traffic of information now, like I find myself on tiktok a lot now and watching reels and it's you see short little things that blast by and I start believing them. Right, and you, you've witnesses, i start believing them. So then I'll go to YouTube and watch the cop Kyle's a flat earth or questions I gotta, i gotta question everything.
Speaker 1:Hey, i'm into it.
Speaker 2:The way that people are describing it is pretty believable and the funny thing is is I can watch because people, because people are fucking idiots and I'm not calling you an idiot, but people are fucking idiots, right and because people will like. These tiktok videos and reels are super fucking convincing because, like you're like, well, these people sound like they're scientists exactly talking about. Who am I to fucking question what this people exactly?
Speaker 1:and and that's dangerous right.
Speaker 1:So that's my conspiracy that's my conspiracy behind this whole AI social media especially the conspiracy social media, the weird platforms that people can get on now that we're only seeing commercial versions of, like that's the conspiracy that is changing the earth right now. It's making people fucking weird. Think about it. You watch this stuff enough in. Your algorithm shows you the same stuff over and over and over and over. You start finding a belief system in it and I think that's what loose connection was kind of about, was like we found this weird in and that's what the flat earth thing did to me.
Speaker 2:I was like holy shit, and it just makes me question well, and that's that it's, it's, it's, it's a symptom of and I'm not saying you're fall, fall to this, but it's a symptom smoking too much weed you can find. You can find Anything to back up. How do I say this? You can find enough sources to validate your thoughts and opinions without constructively or objectively looking at anything else. Right, And so like, that's obviously what has divided politics, That's what's dividing science all these things.
Speaker 2:It's like again, and then it feeds itself. Like you said, it's like okay, the second you watch one Flat Earth video. Just because let's just use this as an example, just for the sake of like. All right, because me personally, while I don't believe in Flat Earth, i am genuinely curious to understand what Flat Earthers think, so that I can also know how ridiculous it is, you like when I send the videos To a degree, but I've also sent you back, Like I said to you back.
Speaker 1:hey, here's what Neil deGrasse Tyson says about how fucked up, that is, but you're right, i love the core of that. But I'm willing to at least listen to it, to go okay, because this is the thing, about society is like, and this is one thing that I'm trying to teach You get stuck in the algorithm.
Speaker 2:I'm trying to teach my daughter specifically, because I can't control the world and I can't control my daughters, but I can at least attempt to educate them to think for themselves or think objectively, right. And so if I'm going to teach them that, i have to do the exact same thing. So I can't just go, oh, flat Earth, or whatever is fucking stupid, without at least actually just even understanding where they're coming from, enough to go, what's the other side say, or what are the other things You know, and then not go too far that way either. So, but then, like you said, this vicious cycle of the algorithm goes oh, you watched five minutes of a Flat Earth video. You must be a Flat Earth, or so I'm not even mad. The algorithm is going to spin you in this down spiral.
Speaker 1:All of a sudden, nasa's evil and there's people living underwater, bro, like. Come on, like the algorithm is consuming people And I'm glad you said it like that, because that was the point of the whole thing was is like the algorithm will show you things that you've never looked at from that side of things, and it keeps feeding you And then it's always there.
Speaker 2:But there's a good and bad side of the algorithm. That's what I get tripped up.
Speaker 1:You thumbs up one yoga girl doing yoga, and that thing comes up for months. Bro, i'll be sitting there flipping through and all of a sudden, whoops. You know what I mean?
Speaker 2:Come on, dude, i'm talking about the auger, i swear, babe, i'm not watching any videos. I swear, i'm not watching any videos.
Speaker 1:I'm gonna watch them forever. I thumbs up one fucking video.
Speaker 2:all right, Hey, but the Sometimes you gotta thumbs up a nice ass.
Speaker 1:I'm just saying, you know It's totally true, but that's what I'm saying, Like people get sucked into these algorithms and like I get on social media and it's becoming a nightmare. It really is. So my conspiracy theory about the whole thing is like what if information stopped, dude? What if the information the way that we know it right now stopped and we didn't have things like think about it, We just talked about the 80s forever, with my stupid stories and your BMX coming down the hill. Think about it. We didn't get.
Speaker 1:We got news from the TV or the newspaper for a long time And this is the new age man. This is where people get their news and their belief system and like, the amount of time that people spend on TikTok and Instagram and now Facebook, since they have reels, is like it has to be going up expeditionally And I think people are getting really sucked into there and it's making everything polarized right now. So this AI thing is just part of that polarization, because you don't know what's real and what's not, And there's gotta be, if there was a way to set up an ethical governing system, like you said, libertarian a lot of different libertarians.
Speaker 2:They're trying, i mean they're trying to figure out the ethics of this shit. They really are, i mean, but it's gonna be like anything else. It's like what do you deem as ethical versus what do you deem as ethical, and how do you find that fucking divide? I mean, that's gonna be, that's what I mean. That's where we are. We're at the crux of that And that's what intrigues me is, you know, trying to be as objective and, as you know, neutral as you. Well, while consuming it, and just I don't know, i'm trying not to make the same mistake of the comments of, like the internet's fucking stupid Who's gonna use email. You know what I mean. Like that's. Those are the thoughts that are in my mind of like what we're going through right now and trying as best as I can to look at it that way.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's gonna be a journey for sure. Well, i don't know, dude, i'm fucking stoned, holy cow. I leave for Korea in two days, so hopefully we can plan out a guest and-.
Speaker 2:Well, that's not gonna help on us. Actually, you guys will say that's not gonna help us. Trying to stay consistent, but it's I'm gonna bring my microphone and everything with me.
Speaker 1:Just in case things go down. I might even have band members jump on and tell stories or something or log in from somewhere cool in Seoul, korea, i don't know.
Speaker 2:Yeah, man, it's awesome. Well, we thank you for listening to this rambling. The irony is that we've actually done one of these ramblings before, but we never released it, And I'm gonna say fuck it, we're gonna release whatever it is that we just talked about, and it is what it is. So if you don't like it and you've made this far, then I guess you maybe liked it, because you probably wouldn't have made this far. If you didn't have made this far, fuck you, And oh well.
Speaker 1:We'll see you on the next one. Thanks guys, bye.