Summary
Chris faces a tough week with job woes and family health drama, while Sam brings back insights and swag from the final NZ Podcasting Summit—including debate over the best day to publish podcasts.
We discover an overlooked artistic prank involving Telecom, talk about ultrasonic fire suppression tech, and hear about robots taking over warehouse shifts.
FIFA ticket prices spark outrage, James Cameron faces a lawsuit over facial likeness, and AI is blamed for taking jobs (and blowing budgets).
Links
FIFA Ticketing Problems
NZ Podcasting Summit
Ultrasonic Firefighting Tech
Indigenous Actor Sues James Cameron
Prank of the Year Podcast
Show Transcript
This transcript was generated by an AI and is probably not 100% accurate. It pays to listen to the podcast, but if you have questions about any of the information found here, please reach out to us.
Intro [00:00:00]:
Foreign. Sam Podcast. Pull up a bar stool and join us for a random conversation guaranteed to make you think, earn your money back.
Sam [00:00:21]:
Hello and welcome to episode 580 of the Chris and Sam podcast.
Chris [00:00:25]:
I’m Chris.
Sam [00:00:25]:
And I’m Sam. This is your weekly fixer, randoms, technology and life, brought to you by us in Hamilton.
Chris [00:00:30]:
And yes, exciting place that it is.
Sam [00:00:33]:
It is.
Chris [00:00:34]:
Last week, Hamilton, the. Why did I think Bermuda? I was gonna say the Bermuda of New Zealand, but I don’t know what that means.
Sam [00:00:45]:
That’s not a term. Last time I said that I was going to the New Zealand Podcasting Summit. I’ve been there, I’ve come back. Lewis gets up and he goes, welcome along to the fifth annual New Zealand Podcasting Summit. This is the last one.
Chris [00:00:57]:
Oh, really?
Sam [00:00:58]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:00:59]:
Oh, no.
Sam [00:00:59]:
He goes, all good things come to an end. And then that was pretty much it. And he goes, we might do something in the future. Won’t be next year, probably the year after. Random.
Chris [00:01:10]:
Oh, God damn it. Because I’ve been saying to people I’m gonna go to one of these days. I know.
Sam [00:01:15]:
So interesting talks, interesting things. Obviously they’ve got sponsorship from different people and we’ll start off with that. Road gave away a couple of things. There was a giant bag and inside that giant bag, like shopping bag thing, was a box for another bag, which is the black one that I bring the podcasting gear in. Thanks, Road. They also had this classic beanie and rode. Really whoever supplies them packages the stuff. All their T shirts and everything are in this very heavy duty plastic bag.
Sam [00:01:45]:
Open this up and this is a one size fits all beanie and it’s way too small for my giant melon head. But I want your opinion on it. Is it. Does it seem little for a beanie? Well, is it?
Chris [00:02:00]:
No. It’s stretchy, isn’t it? Hang on, I’m going to my head.
Sam [00:02:02]:
Yeah, it’s stretchy. Ish. But like I can jam it on my head. But yeah, yeah, it is a bit tight.
Chris [00:02:10]:
It’s a bit small. It is on a face yarmulke, like.
Sam [00:02:13]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Okay. So that was cool. There was a guy and I think his name was Richard. That is what it is for this podcast. He’s from Triton Digital. They are a big platform and statistics. Six things out of Australia work all over the place.
Sam [00:02:29]:
He was the keynote speaker. He gave a couple of things for New Zealand. New Zealand stats on podcasting pretty good. For top downloads in New Zealand, you have 30 something percent, I think in Auckland, 19 in Canterbury and then 3.9% in third Hamilton, and then the rest of the country is even smaller. But one interesting stat, and we will have to discuss this probably afterwards. The best time to upload and publish a podcast is Wednesday. And the second worst day is a Sunday.
Chris [00:03:04]:
And so we’ve been doing Sunday for the last 12 years.
Sam [00:03:07]:
And that could be a reason that nobody knows about us.
Chris [00:03:12]:
Okay.
Sam [00:03:13]:
So he reckons Wednesday morning and he talked about it and I’ll tell you what, it threw a couple of big podcasters.
Chris [00:03:19]:
Yeah.
Sam [00:03:20]:
They were like, but we publish on this day and we release it the night before. And he goes, why are you releasing the night before? And they go, well, we release it Sunday night, so they’ve got it Monday morning. And he goes, well, just release it Monday morning. Like the Apple Ping. Like, don’t do that. And it broke them a little bit. So that was interesting. Now, I did meet a couple of people, as I do.
Chris [00:03:43]:
Yeah. I’m curious about this. Do you think we will change?
Sam [00:03:47]:
I think we might. Yes.
Chris [00:03:49]:
I think we should.
Sam [00:03:50]:
We’re gonna record the same day and then that gives a couple of extra days and the weekend to do anything extra or special if we need to.
Chris [00:03:57]:
Yeah. So if you.
Sam [00:04:00]:
So this is what we’re gonna.
Chris [00:04:01]:
Listening to. This have a real issue with us changing the day. I would be interested in your feedback.
Sam [00:04:08]:
No, I know. Like, Quentin listens to a Sunday morning in bed. Yeah, that’s. That’s his routine. He can still do that. It’s just. We’re going to release on the Wednesday.
Chris [00:04:17]:
Yep.
Sam [00:04:17]:
That’s all. So I think this episode’s going to come out Sunday. Yeah, we might do a little thing for Wednesday. And then after that, it’s every Wednesday. Yeah. Just so you know, your app will still download us. You’ll still get the notification, we’ll still promote it. It’s just.
Sam [00:04:34]:
We’re going to see what happens.
Chris [00:04:36]:
Yep. Sounds good to me.
Sam [00:04:37]:
So that’s what’s happening. Anyway, we did Mike Drop marathon. There was 25 of us going back to back nonstop interviewing each other. So you jump up and you interview the first person. So Kate from wintech, she interviewed me.
Chris [00:04:50]:
Oh, nice.
Sam [00:04:51]:
And then she jumped off. Unfortunately, I was number two, so I was the second person on. And it was. What do you take a bit too seriously?
Chris [00:05:00]:
Oh, it was the topic.
Sam [00:05:02]:
That’s the topic. And it was two minutes and then she moves out of the way. And then I interview the next person
Chris [00:05:07]:
and they interview the experts. Yeah. Yeah.
Sam [00:05:10]:
So I interviewed Hannah, who’s German and she takes being late way too seriously. I just went with giant pumpkins again. I did that last year, but I was really struggling and a lot of people were, because there wasn’t that many people that want to jump up on this. But anyway, there’s a guy and his name’s Craig. And in two minutes he tells us. And this is really interesting because I want to know if you know about this. So in 1993, he was waiting for the Simpsons to come on or something, but Holmes was on tv, current affairs show, and they were talking about a telecom postcard that got defaced but sent out to people anyway. That’s the gist of it.
Sam [00:05:48]:
And it stuck in his brain for 20 years, almost 30 years. And he tried to find out more about it. He made a podcast, of course, and it’s called Prank of the Year. So basically, Telecom had these art awards. Yeah, this guy down to needed made a little piece of artwork. They were like, that’s really cool. The people that usually won the artwork would go on the front page of the white pages or Yellow Pages 1 or whatever. And.
Sam [00:06:16]:
And he. This time they said, hey, we really like that. We want to do it as a postcard. And we’re going to send it out to some people. Sweet. He goes, cool, can you send the artwork back to me and. Or send me some postcards afterwards? And they’re like, yep, sweet, we’ll do that. So they send him a bunch of postcards.
Sam [00:06:31]:
He writes in them, sends them out as Christmas cards. One of his friends comes back and goes, hey, in your painting, in the background, on the landscape upside down, it says, telecom sucks and there’s a Clear Communications logo. And he’s like, what? So he told Telecom. Telecom’s like, let’s keep it on the down low. Don’t need to know about it. Somehow Holmes found out about it and talked about this.
Chris [00:06:55]:
I have heard that story. And I wonder if I watched that, because you would have been. That’s so familiar. But I wasn’t at telecom.
Sam [00:07:02]:
No, I didn’t think so.
Chris [00:07:03]:
No. I started telecom about 10 years after that. Okay, nine years after that.
Sam [00:07:08]:
So prank of the year has 10 episodes all up. There’s about six episodes that are normal mailbag episode, and there’s some bonus ones and they try and work out or. Yeah. But almost nobody remembers this. But they did get hold of the actual artist. Eventually, right near the end, they got hold of him and he wrote a couple of emails and he gave them all these documents. He had some guys turn up at one Point that were from telecom security and got him in a car and said, where’s the painting? And he goes, I don’t know. You didn’t give it back to me.
Sam [00:07:44]:
And they’re like, what? And they go, well, we need to know where it is. He goes, I have no idea. So it’s all a bit weird. It’s a great little podcast, and it’s a great little random story. And now I want to do a random story, but I don’t.
Chris [00:07:56]:
It really. Yeah. No, that’s great. I love that. That’s really cool.
Sam [00:08:00]:
So pretty cool event. Usual. Yeah. Less people this year, but that’s.
Chris [00:08:05]:
Right. And do you know if that. Or you don’t know if that has any reason why they.
Sam [00:08:10]:
I don’t know. He didn’t really say. I think he’s just busy. And I think it was a lot of effort to put it on.
Chris [00:08:16]:
Yeah, it’s. It is always a lot of work to put these things on. I remember TedX stuff. It used to.
Sam [00:08:22]:
And then we’re doing it with Misty flicks.
Chris [00:08:23]:
And we’re doing it with Misty flicks.
Sam [00:08:24]:
I’m getting messages all over the place.
Chris [00:08:25]:
Yeah. Anyway. Well, you’re doing all the work.
Sam [00:08:29]:
I’m losing my mind slowly. What have you been up to this week?
Chris [00:08:33]:
Okay, so I’ve had a crap week. Okay, let’s start with that.
Sam [00:08:38]:
Yep.
Chris [00:08:39]:
Okay. So on Monday, my role was disestablished, so that’s not ideal.
Sam [00:08:45]:
So if you’re listening to this at any point in time in the future, 10 years from now, it doesn’t matter when. If you’ve got work for a speaker coach or instructional designer, come find Chris.
Chris [00:08:55]:
Yes.
Sam [00:08:55]:
He’s probably still looking for work. Doesn’t matter when you listen to this. That’s the majority. That’s the gist of the story.
Chris [00:09:01]:
Yeah. So. So that’s been interesting. And I’ll talk. I’ve got some positive things. I’ll talk about that in a sec. But then yesterday.
Sam [00:09:09]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:09:10]:
I got a message from my sister.
Sam [00:09:11]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:09:12]:
And she’d taken dad to his eye appointment at the hospital.
Sam [00:09:17]:
Okay.
Chris [00:09:17]:
And it’s like, oh, Dad’s not very happy. They took. Took him in and they looked at the scans that they had in February. Nobody looked at them till now and went, oh, you have an aneurysm just.
Sam [00:09:33]:
Just hanging on in the background somewhere,
Chris [00:09:35]:
I assume around his optic nerve because it’s affecting his eyesight. Because I knew it. Because he thought it was cataracts. But he goes, oh, some days it’s worse than others. I’M like, I don’t think cataracts work that way, like.
Sam [00:09:48]:
No, no, it’s like a gradual thing, I think.
Chris [00:09:49]:
Yeah, yeah. So I was worried that it might be something different and it turns out. But Audrey was upset. Well, Dad’s upset about it, obviously. Yeah, Audrey was upset. Like they’ve had these scans since February and they didn’t look at them till he took them. She took him in. So now he’s got to have surgery on his brain before they can do anything about his eyesight like this, They’ve got to do this.
Chris [00:10:14]:
So, um, I don’t know.
Sam [00:10:16]:
So did his appointment drive them just to look at the file before he turned up?
Chris [00:10:20]:
I guess they, they, they booked the appointment like a month ago.
Sam [00:10:24]:
But for obviously that day.
Chris [00:10:25]:
For that day. For yesterday.
Sam [00:10:27]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:10:27]:
Okay. Yeah. So anyway, so that’s, that’s, hopefully that
Sam [00:10:32]:
goes okay for him.
Chris [00:10:33]:
Yeah, yeah, hopefully that’ll be cool. Um, so other than that, I’ve got a couple of ranty things that I can talk about, but we’ll, we’ll, we’ll go somewhere else. But first, I, I, I have had a really cool week.
Sam [00:10:45]:
You seem very positive for a person that does not have a job.
Chris [00:10:47]:
Yeah, well, I’ve met some really, really cool people. Right.
Sam [00:10:50]:
How are you meeting them?
Chris [00:10:52]:
I have been because I knew that this wasn’t looking good. So I have been doing a lot of outreach. I’ve been doing a lot of, you’ll see loads of TikToks and Instagrams and LinkedIn videos and YouTube videos from Chris going on up the presence type thing. So on in the last few days I have talked to. Let’s have a look. We got Danny in Sweden and I’m doing an interview with her for which will turn up on YouTube. I have talked to Hannah in Poland. I’m doing an interview with her as well and we are doing a combined two day workshop.
Chris [00:11:39]:
She’s a kinesiologist, something like that. I need to say it. Right. And so that’s really cool. And then this morning I was talking to Ramona in Hungary and we’re doing a LinkedIn Live debate. So that’ll be coming up. I’ll let everybody know when that’s happening, when we’ve got it.
Sam [00:11:59]:
Do you know what you’re debating?
Chris [00:12:00]:
Yeah, yeah. We’re going to do a series of things, I think. But the first debate was maybe it was top of mind. It’s like, how do you give, if you’re a leader, how do you give your team bad news?
Sam [00:12:12]:
Oh, I haven’t got to that yet in my team leader course.
Chris [00:12:14]:
Yeah. So we’re gonna be doing that as a topic and then just before you got here, I was talking to Nayri in Australia and I’ve been asked to do a speak at a summit in July. And that’s basically TEDx based. It’s an influence. It’s the topic of the thing is speakers and influence and stuff. So how you can increase your credibility through doing a TEDx talk is basically what I’m.
Sam [00:12:41]:
Sounds pretty interesting, but I think the key takeaway here is just the random global people that you’re talking to.
Chris [00:12:48]:
Yes.
Sam [00:12:48]:
Like, that’s really cool.
Chris [00:12:49]:
It is. It’s cool.
Sam [00:12:50]:
I mean, I don’t know if it’s going to make money for you.
Chris [00:12:52]:
Yeah. None of this is like cash in hand stuff. Stuff.
Sam [00:12:55]:
So, yeah, there’s a potential, though.
Chris [00:12:57]:
Follow on. There’s potential and it’s moving in the right way.
Sam [00:13:00]:
Talking about money. If you want to help, support Chris. Patreon.com tcasp.com There’s a link somewhere. Just look for the Chris and Sam podcast at Patreon. You can become a Patreon supporter. Some of you guys dropped off years ago. There’s a couple of diehards there. I don’t want to say names off the top of my head in case I get that wrong, but there are two people still supporting the podcast and we are very grateful.
Sam [00:13:22]:
Thank you very much. I think Chris can buy some beans with that money.
Chris [00:13:28]:
Yeah. So, yeah, no, that’s cool. Ranty things. Talk about ranty things. So I have a cane, as you know.
Sam [00:13:36]:
Yeah. From Chemist warehouse.
Chris [00:13:37]:
Okay. Actually, I’m going to get up and show you the cane and you can describe it.
Sam [00:13:41]:
Okay. Am I going to realize that this is poor quality? Oh, yes. Okay. So it’s a black extendable cane. It’s a Wagner body science model. And we’re gonna call them out on their crappy quality. But basically the metal rod has pushed through the rubber foot.
Chris [00:14:01]:
So for the want of a washer, all they needed to do is put an M6 washer at the bottom of the cap.
Sam [00:14:07]:
Yep. The rubber cap. Yep. I see what you mean.
Chris [00:14:09]:
And put that in. And this would have lasted for six months, a year.
Sam [00:14:14]:
A lot longer than whatever you’ve had.
Chris [00:14:15]:
How long have I had it? Like three weeks, four weeks, something like that?
Sam [00:14:18]:
Nah, longer.
Chris [00:14:19]:
Oh, six weeks maybe.
Sam [00:14:21]:
Something like that.
Chris [00:14:21]:
Yeah.
Sam [00:14:21]:
So do you need a new walking stick?
Chris [00:14:23]:
I have ordered from Aliexpress a. A new rubber.
Sam [00:14:27]:
Oh, okay. Okay. Patreon.
Chris [00:14:29]:
I was Gonna ask you if there was any and to go down Dave’s Emporium because it’s not far from where you are. It’s the only place I can think of that might have a rug, maybe. And then I was like, I need a washer. I need a washer. And I’ve been measuring. I don’t have any washers. I found out because this is a 1.9. Yeah.
Chris [00:14:48]:
19 mil cap.
Sam [00:14:50]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:14:50]:
US penny. I have a few US pens in the perfect size, so. Okay, that’ll be saving my. My.
Sam [00:14:57]:
So patreon.com like we said, for Chris to get a washer and a rubber in for him to walk.
Chris [00:15:06]:
No, it’s all good. And then the other thing was, I wouldn’t grab something out of the. The litter box the other day. And guess what was in there? What? Another bloody wasp nest just started.
Sam [00:15:20]:
Oh, my God. Is it still there?
Chris [00:15:22]:
No, no, I used the cane.
Sam [00:15:24]:
Oh, good.
Chris [00:15:24]:
I used the cane, pulled the thing out on the ground, came back inside, got the mortine, sprayed the hell out of the litter box, hobbled around, hobbling around. I didn’t get stung. That was my dicing with death. Those that don’t know what I’m talking about, check out the best bee sting story ever.
Sam [00:15:42]:
Yep, in the catalog. Look at it up on the website, actually. I wonder if this new technology that scientists have made and no one really needs could be used for wasps. So infrasound waves is a new approach to fire suppression. So they’ve done this demonstration in Contra Costa county, and they invite all these people along. You watch the video, and there’s an oven fire, and they’ve got this AI driven sensor, of course, with wall emitters, and it blasts infrasound waves towards. Towards the kitchen fire. And it eventually puts it out.
Sam [00:16:24]:
And it’s a very underwhelming video. I was expecting something better, but basically it’s like.
Chris [00:16:34]:
But the thing is, like, it invisibly stops the fire.
Sam [00:16:38]:
Well, they’re sort of saying, hey, this is great. We’re going to install it in our building. It’s sort of the same setup as sprinklers, but without the hassle of water. You know, it can put out this fire, and it put it out way slower than I think a sprinkler would in this video, but it wouldn’t damage
Chris [00:16:55]:
the carpet and everything else in the building. So that’s plus. But if it can put it out faster than it grows.
Sam [00:17:03]:
Yeah, exactly. But one of the problems with it, or the benefits of water is it cools Everything down. This doesn’t. There’s still heat. Yeah, you’ve still got tremendous heat. There’s no fire, but you don’t have the damage.
Chris [00:17:19]:
So I could just flare up again. Potentially.
Sam [00:17:22]:
Potentially. Future applications, a backpack based system for wildland firefighters. So if you’re running around with a speaker waving it around, because, I mean,
Chris [00:17:34]:
I would sort of almost believe that as a. I mean, that would be a survival device. Maybe you fall into a trench and you turn on the backpack so the wildfire goes over you and doesn’t burn you.
Sam [00:17:46]:
Maybe, maybe.
Chris [00:17:47]:
But that’s the only thing I could think of because I wouldn’t trust that to bloody fight fires in the.
Sam [00:17:52]:
There’s a lot of trust, I think, being put into this. Cause when you watch the video, it’s
Chris [00:17:58]:
like, well, you need a big bloody battery. And guess what? Those things are flammable.
Sam [00:18:02]:
Don’t worry about that. You run around with your battery pack. You run around. Why is it exploding? Don’t worry. You’ve got the sonic vibration going on or whatever it’s called. So anyway, I don’t think it’s that good. There’s an indigenous actor that’s wanting to sue James Cameron.
Chris [00:18:18]:
Oh, okay. Indigenous to what country?
Sam [00:18:22]:
She is native Peruvian. Indigenous actor. I’m going to butcher the crap out of this name.
Chris [00:18:30]:
Fair enough.
Sam [00:18:32]:
I can’t even. I don’t even know where to start. Koreanca Kilcher. Okay, I’m sorry. But basically, he stole her facial features for an Avatar character. Oh. She alleges that he extracted her facial features and then directed his design team to base one of the characters on her appearance. This was done without credit or compensation and exploited her biometric identity and cultural heritage.
Sam [00:18:59]:
And you’re sort of like, okay, that’s cool. But she learned about it because James Cameron was talking about it. He seen her in an advert where she played Pocahontas and he goes, she looks great. So we captured her like this.
Chris [00:19:18]:
He should pay her out, dude. It’s just. Just pay her out. Like, come on. Yeah, I think that’s fair.
Sam [00:19:24]:
His quote, his note that he gave her at some point in 2010. Your beauty was my early inspiration for this character. Too bad you were shooting another movie next time, but I’ll just steal it. What I should. I said the loud bit. I said the quiet bit out loud. Sorry, lady. James Cameron.
Chris [00:19:43]:
Yeah, no, but like, I don’t know
Sam [00:19:44]:
where that’s going to go, but he should just go, hey, in good faith here.
Chris [00:19:48]:
Yeah, he should.
Sam [00:19:48]:
I mean, he’s got a Lot of money, I believe.
Chris [00:19:50]:
Yeah, I think he’s doing okay. And I. I think, you know, as long as she’s, you know, she’s talking about millions, then obviously not. But 20 grand, 50 grand, something like that probably wouldn’t hurt, actually.
Sam [00:20:04]:
Yeah, I don’t know if it actually said how much.
Chris [00:20:06]:
Well, if she’s suing, she’d sue for a bunch, but she won’t. She’d settle for a lot less, obviously.
Sam [00:20:11]:
But this could set a precedent for other people’s biometric data being used for this sort of thing. And then it raises the question, there’s
Chris [00:20:18]:
a whole bunch of people that have already set their biometric data and stuff, and what have they done? They’ve copyrighted it or something?
Sam [00:20:28]:
All right.
Chris [00:20:29]:
Keanu Reeves is one of them. Those that have like, got their likeness. Likeness. And I don’t know where they’ve registered it. They’ve registered something.
Sam [00:20:39]:
Do you think people are stealing our voice?
Chris [00:20:42]:
I was talking about this in an interview just the other day actually, and I was like, we’re so screwed, you and me, because our voice has been out there for 12 years or something.
Sam [00:20:52]:
Do you know what they’ve been doing for the last 12 years? Figuring out how to replicate your laugh? Just that.
Chris [00:20:58]:
Hey, have you heard about FIFA’s dramas in the US? So FIFA’s got their. The World Cup.
Sam [00:21:06]:
The only thing I remember is didn’t they give Trump a special trophy?
Chris [00:21:12]:
The inaugural FIFA Peace Prize?
Sam [00:21:15]:
That’s it, yeah. What else they been up to?
Chris [00:21:17]:
Okay, so prices for FIFA tickets are
Sam [00:21:22]:
ridiculously high for the finals or just any of them.
Chris [00:21:27]:
So I didn’t realize until I read this story, or it was a video or whatever it was, that some of the games are in Canada and some of them in Mexico.
Sam [00:21:36]:
Oh, okay.
Chris [00:21:36]:
And some of the majority are in the U.S. oh, okay. So I thought it was all in the US but they’re moving around in both. So a little bit like when we had something here and it was Australia and New Zealand, you know, that sort of thing. So that’s cool. So Mexico’s best tickets, like the high priced tickets, range between 3,000 to $10,000 per ticket.
Sam [00:21:57]:
Us.
Chris [00:21:57]:
Us.
Sam [00:21:58]:
Okay. Far out.
Chris [00:22:00]:
In a country where the average monthly wage is $1,000, you gotta start saving.
Sam [00:22:06]:
I hope your marketing’s working well.
Chris [00:22:08]:
So. And people are freaking out, like. Cause it’s not like it’s an elitist sport, right?
Sam [00:22:15]:
Not really.
Chris [00:22:16]:
Soccer is. Or football is what everybody plays from an early age, so they want it to be accessible. But FIFA doesn’t care FIFA doesn’t care, but I love this. The most embarrassing thing is the opening game between USA and Paraguay. So it’s the opening game of the whole tournament.
Sam [00:22:33]:
Okay.
Chris [00:22:35]:
Is not selling. Right. Well, they’ve, they’ve sold probably half or more than half the thing, but they were expecting to sell it out. Okay, but do you know who’s. Who’s sold out or sold more tickets? I don’t think it’s sold out either. But sold more tickets.
Sam [00:22:51]:
Who.
Chris [00:22:52]:
New Zealand vs Iran has sold more tickets.
Sam [00:22:55]:
Good on them.
Chris [00:22:57]:
Than USA vs Paraguay, which is the opening game of the whole tournament. Which should be, you know, host country. Opening game should be the one that sold out first. N. So yeah, New Zealand versus Iran has sold more tickets than the opening match with the USA as of the time that I wrote this, which was a few days ago.
Sam [00:23:17]:
So that’s cool. Good on them.
Chris [00:23:19]:
Yeah, yeah. So that’s hilarious. But I think, I think FIFA’s shot themselves in a foot quite a bit with that. Oh, and America has because a lot of people don’t want to go to America at the moment. Surprise, surprise. They’d rather go to Canada or Mexico to watch a game.
Sam [00:23:40]:
That’s right.
Chris [00:23:41]:
Go to America if they don’t live in America. Yeah.
Sam [00:23:43]:
Anyway, I saw this today. I was watching it at work. Oh, it’s very loud. The Helix O2 is a humanoid robot.
Chris [00:23:50]:
Okay.
Sam [00:23:51]:
And they’re using it for sorting packages. But to do it, they’ve had an eight hour live stream going today where you can just watch this robot work. And it’s a bit creepy. I don’t know, it’s just.
Chris [00:24:05]:
It does look quite human and it’s very dexterous. It just.
Sam [00:24:10]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:24:10]:
So that something up turned it over. I think he looked at it. Yeah.
Sam [00:24:14]:
So that’s. This was live today. I think it’s finished now. But yeah, for eight hours. I like. Here’s a shift and one of the questions, I never really thought about it.
Chris [00:24:21]:
So is this like an Amazon type thing or you know what?
Sam [00:24:25]:
It looks like it, but I don’t
Chris [00:24:27]:
know, it could be any sort of. What do you call it? Dispatch center.
Sam [00:24:32]:
Yeah, I mean Amazon’s got their own ones. I don’t know what their model’s called.
Chris [00:24:35]:
Yeah, but someone was like, but everyone’s not humanoid. They’re pick, you know, things on wheels or something, aren’t they? Or do they have humanoid as well?
Sam [00:24:43]:
No, no, they’ve currently got the little bots that move all the box and stuff around. No, I think they want to get Amazon’s Got their own robot. They’re building, I think, like a humanoid one. Oh, yeah, I did, but someone said, and I never really thought about it. And it’s like one of those dumb moments when you go, oh, yeah, that makes sense. They were like, why are they humanoid?
Chris [00:24:58]:
Like, that’s what I keep thinking.
Sam [00:25:00]:
No, because the space is already set up for a human.
Chris [00:25:04]:
Right, right.
Sam [00:25:05]:
So when. Yeah. And I was like, oh, they don’t need to redesign anything. Like if they were building a brand new center. Yeah, you might go with whatever. Something different.
Chris [00:25:13]:
Yeah.
Sam [00:25:13]:
But when you’re replacing the humans that need to pee in a bottle and just whinge.
Chris [00:25:21]:
Actually, I will mention that because we got disestablished, as I said. I’m just going to harp on that.
Sam [00:25:26]:
Yeah, good. Fair enough.
Chris [00:25:28]:
One of the reasons that we did, I fully believe, is that AI has taken our job and not in the way you normally think. So normally you’d think, no, the company’s going to get AI to do my job. That’s not what’s happened. What’s happened is that the work we do for our clients, our clients have gone, ah, why do we get EPIC to do this? Let’s just get AI to do it instead. And so we are not getting that work that we normally get. And. And they’re going to have a rude awakening when they get their quality, I’ll tell you that.
Sam [00:26:01]:
Now, I saw something and I don’t know if this will happen with some of these clients going to that. And I agree with you, the quality is going to be terrible. But there was some comments online and I’ll just take it with a grain of salt. I’m not sure. They fired a whole bunch of people, which was fine. They replaced it with the AI chatbots, or what do they call them? Agents.
Chris [00:26:21]:
Agents.
Sam [00:26:22]:
AI agents. And four months in they’ve gone, oh, my gosh, we’ve blown all our credits and all our money and we spent more in four months than the humans. So something to keep in mind, because they do, when they do more and more work and start chatting to each other, your bills is going to go through the roof.
Chris [00:26:39]:
Yeah, yeah, because I was. I saw an article, I reposted it on something, I think, and the top line of credit, the monthly subscription was 120,000amonth for this AI because it’ll cover the credits. And it’s like, but that’s four people’s salary or whatever it was supposed to be. And it’s like, well, yeah, is that worth it? Whatever.
Sam [00:27:04]:
Well, however many big concerns about the Data centers for AI at the moment. Utah’s building the biggest one, I think, ever. The amount of resources it needs, the amount of heat apparently it’s going to put off is astronomical, so.
Chris [00:27:19]:
And the power, the power those things suck out.
Sam [00:27:22]:
Oh, well, they’re talking about it here in New Zealand. They want to build one in the south island and I think it’s going to use maybe more power than most of the South Islands or something. Stupid.
Chris [00:27:31]:
Yeah, it’d be equivalent to Christchurch or something like that, I’m guessing. But yeah, they’re ridiculous. This is ridiculous. Because they’re building them, presuming there’ll be the demand.
Sam [00:27:43]:
Yeah.
Chris [00:27:44]:
They don’t know there will be demand.
Sam [00:27:46]:
No. I just really don’t know how this is going to play out.
Chris [00:27:48]:
Yeah. Overall, if you remember, and I don’t know if you would know this or remember this, but there was a huge thing about fiber optic cables. Yeah.
Sam [00:27:58]:
Okay.
Chris [00:27:58]:
20 years ago, whatever it was. And they do all these fiber optic cables in the sea that linked.
Sam [00:28:05]:
Yeah, yeah.
Chris [00:28:05]:
All the continents together. And then all those companies went bust because there was no market. And then they had. But they were built. So it’s sitting there doing nothing. And then we could do call centers in India and that’s how that whole thing happened.
Sam [00:28:20]:
Oh, wow.
Chris [00:28:21]:
If they hadn’t built them at a ridiculously high price, which then they had to all go. They all went bankrupt. And so they were bought up for pennies on the dollar. And then. Well, the infrastructure’s there. We can just plug in and use it now. It created a new industry, but a lot of people went broke doing it. So I think that thing will happen again with.
Chris [00:28:43]:
And I don’t think that’s the first time that sort of cycle has happened. I think that cycle will happen again with AI. You’ll have all these companies, they’ll build all these centers. One or two of them will do okay out of it. A bunch of them go bankrupt. The centers will be there and then they’ll turn.
Sam [00:29:00]:
Move the Indians something.
Chris [00:29:03]:
No, Chris will be living in one because he can’t afford rent.
Sam [00:29:07]:
Maybe that brings us to the end of the podcast and what we’re going to do because we’ve just run out of time. We’re going to do a kickstart or drop kick for the Wednesday. So you can hear this Sunday special one Wednesday next normal podcast will be the following Wednesday. You with me? No, we’re going to do a little special one on Wednesday to remind people that we’re coming out on Wednesdays.
Chris [00:29:29]:
Oh, okay.
Sam [00:29:30]:
And it’s going to be a Kickstarter drop kick, because I got two here ready to go.
Chris [00:29:33]:
All right, so we’re not doing the little one next Sunday to say no, we’re coming on Wednesday?
Sam [00:29:37]:
Nope.
Chris [00:29:37]:
Okay. All right, all right.
Sam [00:29:39]:
Okay.
Chris [00:29:39]:
I’m with you.
Sam [00:29:39]:
No, they can just catch up on their podcast apps. You can find us wherever you want. TCAS.com and until then, I’m Sam.
Chris [00:29:47]:
I’m Chris.
Sam [00:29:48]:
See ya.
Chris [00:29:48]:
Bye.
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