The Seven Five - Part 2

NN - S2 EP01 - From Supercross Thrills To Privacy Fears: A Catch‑Up With Friends

O. Kenobi Season 2 Episode 1

Originally released February 2021

We reconnect after a hard stretch, trading small-town updates, music geekery, and an honest look at grief while scanning a calmer political landscape and a sharper privacy reality. From geofence warrants to electric bikes and cheaper solar, we trace what’s changing and what to do next.

• family loss, change, and returning optimism
• Super Bowl jokes and Supercross memories
• trailer for I Am Greta and youth climate action
• impeachment context and a shift in national tone
• location tracking, data brokers, and geofence warrants
• Facebook pragmatism, VR logins, and privacy hygiene
• guitars, practice, and creative sustainability
• electric dirt bikes, EV momentum, and solar costs
• fewer platforms, clearer connection with listeners

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SPEAKER_07:

Nerds and Nonsense was recorded to hard drive in front of a previously recorded studio audience. Well, hello there.

SPEAKER_02:

What are you doing in California?

SPEAKER_07:

Oh, hanging out, you know, trying to stay warm. How are you?

SPEAKER_02:

Well, I'm good. I'm aboard, but I was just wondering, were you watching the big game? Yeah, I'm going to.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Oh bad watch on the bed. Oh boy.

SPEAKER_07:

Been busy.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. Just been sitting around now for a while.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, me too, uh, fortunately. Although I ha I have no idea what time the game starts or anything about the game. I barely know who's playing just from the headlines.

SPEAKER_02:

Getting ready to start.

SPEAKER_07:

Is it?

SPEAKER_02:

Singing America of the Beautiful.

SPEAKER_07:

Yes. All the pregame festivities, huh?

SPEAKER_02:

Well, no, it's gonna start here pretty about yeah. Probably about six minutes.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh wow. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, they got somebody singing a song that don't sound like America's beautiful, but that's besides a thing, I guess.

SPEAKER_07:

Well, I I got my sports in yesterday for the weekend, actually. There was UFC matches on and uh Supercross. I've been watching Supercross lately quite a bit. I love that.

SPEAKER_02:

Now what's that?

SPEAKER_07:

Motocross racing?

SPEAKER_02:

Oh, motocross.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, yeah. It's not the outdoor series, it's uh Supercrosses, the indoor stadium series, where they have those big huge jumps and crazy tracks, whoops, and all that stuff. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Do they have the jumps?

SPEAKER_07:

Oh yeah, yeah, lots of jumps. You know, it's a track. They race, they race around the track. Oh my gosh, yeah. That's what I love. That's why Supercross. I mean, I love outdoor motocross, don't get me wrong. And upstate New York, of course, growing up, that's what Marty did. Oh yeah. Yeah. So many of us rode dirt bikes and stuff, you know, for so long. But upstate New York has a lot of tracks and riding areas and stuff. Just not any out here. Well, I mean, that I know of. I haven't haven't been out riding dirt bikes out here.

SPEAKER_02:

Right. Yeah, that's what Marty did.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Racing.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, I remember. Yes. Very vividly. Yeah. Mark's Mark's talking about getting an electric one. He lives, you know, out in the country in Oregon, and one of his family members bought an electric dirt bike.

unknown:

Wow.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah. And so it's like 3,500, I think, something like that. Close to 4,000. And he's thinking thinking about ordering.

SPEAKER_02:

I think Marty has about 14 bikes.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah.

unknown:

I know.

SPEAKER_07:

That's the way Mark is. Yeah, that's the way Mark is with guitars and how I am with computers, right?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah. Yeah.

SPEAKER_05:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, you had to build a build a garage to make room for them all when you bought that your house.

SPEAKER_07:

I know. Jeepers. Crazy. How's the weather out there today, by the way?

SPEAKER_02:

Pretty good. No snow so far, but I'm yeah. You know, uh and um I got my registration.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh good.

SPEAKER_02:

But now I gotta find somebody to put the sticker on for me because I just can't do it.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh, you could probably just stop in the you know, like I said, stop in the Smallies or um any gas uh, you know, car service center. They'll just scrape it off and and put it on there for you, I'm sure. Where do you get it inspected?

SPEAKER_02:

I couldn't reach out there to turn, you know, to sure.

SPEAKER_07:

Where do you get it inspected?

SPEAKER_02:

Uh Smalley.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah. Yeah, I would just stop in there, you know, next time you're in the area.

SPEAKER_02:

You're probably thinking, Oh God, not her again. No. Like I miss her all the time.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh, they're so great though. And I mean, have always been that way, you know. Smalley and uh Watkins Glenn Chapers. Man. Takes you back. What's in the place where Mr. Chicken used to be down there? Anything?

SPEAKER_02:

Nothing.

SPEAKER_07:

Nothing. Nothing. Yeah. Yeah. Right.

SPEAKER_05:

Oh.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh wow. Nice. Yeah. Love finding things like that.

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, quite a bit.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh, wow. Very nice. So is it seasonal then?

SPEAKER_02:

Right.

SPEAKER_07:

Wow.

SPEAKER_02:

Well, what what do you think?

SPEAKER_07:

You got any plans for tomorrow?

SPEAKER_02:

I don't have any beds to wash and all that happened.

SPEAKER_07:

Um, I cleaned it yesterday and I tore the bed all apart today and clothes to wash and isn't that horrible when you just I know, you just it's horrible feeling that way, right? I just gotta worry about something. I need to find something to do.

SPEAKER_02:

I gotta I just hope it got snow overnight so that I might have to shovel or something.

SPEAKER_07:

I know, I know. Yeah. We haven't seen any in a while. It's been, you know, into the forties and nice. So we've been really, really lucky, unseasonably warm the last week, and I think I haven't looked at the weather today, but I think it was supposed to stay that way for the next several days in the thirties and just kind of rainy sort of weather, you know?

SPEAKER_02:

Yeah, I think we're just supposed to get showers most of the week, you know. So it'd say, you know how bad, just showers.

SPEAKER_05:

Right.

SPEAKER_02:

Hopefully it's not anything that's gonna be real deep. Right. Right.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, yeah. Well, we got uh Ryan's down gaming in the family room, and Stacy is in the uh living room on her phone playing a game. Oh okay. Yeah.

SPEAKER_02:

Well tell them I said hi. Well, hey, I hate to cut you off here, but the game's starting.

SPEAKER_07:

All right, mom, love ya.

SPEAKER_02:

They just throwed the quarter in the air.

SPEAKER_07:

Okay. Love ya. Love you too on your enjoying. Yeah, enjoy your evening. Thank you very much. Yeah, bye-bye.

SPEAKER_01:

Bye-bye. But there's simply not enough time to wait.

SPEAKER_00:

They fall out from climate change. The impacts could be catastrophic. All of this with the global warming to hope it is the most pressing two of our time.

SPEAKER_03:

You have to go to school.

SPEAKER_01:

When it came to the climate crisis, I thought my parents were just like everyone else. We weren't doing enough. For many years, people refused to listen to me. Children were very mean. But I don't care about being popular. I care about climate justice. Is climate change an issue that children like to start to be concerned about? I would say stuff for, but I I have it. When I get interested in a subject, I become laser focused. It's a real movement that's growing!

SPEAKER_00:

Greta comes up on stage, she speaks, and her words are devastating.

SPEAKER_01:

My name is Greta Timber. And I want you to panic. We are in the midst of a mass extinction. I can't just sit there and watch her do all this for the environment and do nothing. We don't want to do that. We will not stop until we are done. You're reading not on climate. A nod. I'm a nud.

SPEAKER_07:

That was the trailer for I Am Greta, a Hulu original documentary. And the trailer is available on YouTube. I'll have a link in the description. The story of teenage climate activist Greta Toomberg is told through compelling, never-before-seen footage in this intimate documentary from Swedish director Nathan Grossman. Starting with her one-person school strike for climate action outside the Swedish parliament, Grossman follows Greta, a shy student with Asperger's, in her rise to prominence and her galvanizing global impact as she speaks sparks school strikes around the world. The film culminates with her extraordinary wind-powered voyage across the Atlantic Ocean to speak at the UN Climate Action Summit in New York City. Check out I Am Greta. Only available on Hulu. See how that works? You know how that works, right? I was just getting off the phone with my mom, who says hello, by the way. Yes. So Hi! Hi!

SPEAKER_04:

Is she nodding?

SPEAKER_07:

She's in New York watching the football game. She doesn't care about us at this point.

SPEAKER_04:

We'll have to tell her later.

SPEAKER_07:

Right. All right. What's going on, man? It's been a minute. It has been a minute, right? Like, we haven't talked to the world in a minute. It's been a few months. And we're back.

SPEAKER_04:

So I'm sure the world is like, where in the hell are they?

SPEAKER_07:

Oh my gosh. It's like a new awakening.

SPEAKER_04:

We abandoned the world.

SPEAKER_07:

Yes. Well, a lot of folks needed us. What a crazy time, man. A few months uh so much loss, so much, but so much change. Oh my gosh. Just so many things going on. It's crazy. And today, the big day, you watching the game? Super Bowl. No. Super Bowl number what? I don't even know. I don't and it's Chiefs Buccaneers, I think. Tampa Bay Buccaneers and Chiefs. That's all I know.

SPEAKER_04:

Where are the Buccaneers? That's all I know.

SPEAKER_07:

Tampa Bay.

SPEAKER_04:

Outside of their buccane head. That's where the Buccaneers are, buddy. On the side of your buccane head.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh, you kill me, man.

SPEAKER_04:

Oh shit, it didn't work.

SPEAKER_07:

It hit it. It's I don't know. I just got I I've got so many things to be doing, but I really wanted to get a short little episode out and catch up. Let the world know we're alive and well. We've made it through some some loss the last few months, dealt with a lot of BS in our personal lives, you know, family members due to COVID and others uh situations, from Bobby L to Eddie Van Halen to Mark's dad, my two of my mom's sisters, my aunts. It's just been crazy. But I see, you know, it's as of January 20th, it was like boom. Like somebody just flipped, you know, over the page to me. I just all of a sudden it seemed like so much hate. We the the hate was not not you know inundating the news. The hate and division seems to have petered out in the headlines, which is kind of nice. And things seem more uh you know optimistic than pessimistic and hateful.

SPEAKER_04:

So yeah, that is thinning out.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, it's been really cool. It's been really cool to see. I was noticing that I saw I did see an article today about Trump not being on, you know, other social media platforms after being booted off from Facebook and Twitter, and his impeachment trial starts tomorrow, in fact. But you know, at this point, I personally don't I'm not I'm not not even gonna throw out my two cents, you know. I mean the facts are obvious, everything was clearly obvious, and whatever happens from here on out is entirely political. It has no relation to right and wrong, morally, ethically, legally, or otherwise. So uh, you know, uh it doesn't really matter to me.

unknown:

What happened?

SPEAKER_04:

Well, her is gonna stick to his uh game plan and uh hire a bunch of thugs and they're gonna attack the place. Yeah, impeachment, my butt. Kill 'em, boys.

SPEAKER_07:

Yes. Man, it's just crazy. And then you're seeing, I was, you know, in the news reading and seeing how, you know, it's headlines. Police in Minneapolis used geofense warrant for, you know, the Floyd protests last year. And then uh that was on uh The Verge not too long ago. And then there's a great article uh on the verge that said, hey, go read this story in the New York Times about the investigation of location tracking data of the Capitol rioters. All those folks that like proudly snapped their pictures and posted on social media as they're breaking the law and you know causing destruction and chaos and death. Yeah, here I am. I was here. Yes. Check me out.

SPEAKER_06:

Oh gosh, man.

SPEAKER_07:

But anyways, that article was pretty interesting. Go read uh this was on the verge uh this morning, I think it was. Go read this New York Times investigation of the location tracking data of the Capitol rioters. And it goes on to say you're being tracked around the web, sure, but also in real life. The apps on your smartphone are constantly feeding data into the digital advertising market, where it's bought and sold by hedge funds, financial institutions, and marketers. A new report in the New York Times underscores the horrifying implications of the system, featuring location data mined from the rioters who sacked the US Capitol on January 6th, leaked by an anonymous source in the industry. This new data included a remarkable piece of information, a unique ID for each user that is tied to a smartphone, they write. This made it easy, even easier to find people, since the supposedly anonymous ID could be matched with other databases containing the same ID. And it goes on and on and on. So yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Yes, anyone on my Facebook page.

SPEAKER_07:

Is anyone surprised? Come on, folks, cheapers. Wow. Unbelievable. But hey, speaking of which, I went back to Facebook last year, you know, made a stink about leaving Facebook when we launched the show, left Twitter, everything. I'm still not on Twitter, but I did have to create a Facebook account last summer because of Oculus of the VR system requiring it for certain features. So I set up a private Facebook. And then, of course, when my mom was in the hospital, I needed to inform family and I leveraged Facebook to uh keep them abreast of her situation. That's been about the extent of my Facebook activity with that profile. And I like to keep it that way. You know, I like to it's just the family and uh and a few close friends. I mean, I'm not gonna reject folks, but yeah, it's not for that. I don't want to be on there. You know? But even if you're not on Facebook, you're being tracked by Facebook. So I mean that's kind of the point of all this that we've had all of these discussions and episodes of me ranting about you know consumer privacy and understanding the implications of your actions, period. You know?

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07:

I don't know.

SPEAKER_04:

I thought somebody was following me. I knew it. I knew it. I tried to make a few corners, man, to see. Now you've just pretty much verified it for me, bud. Yes, I knew it. Stalking me, and I'm not even there. And you're not even on there. Nope. Oh, they're determined to get me.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh, they got it.

SPEAKER_04:

I've had my kids work against me, they've had everybody work against me that's on that old face space looking thing.

SPEAKER_07:

It's the beauty of it, is that you know, any third party at one point, up until 2014, any third party, you know, on that platform, advertiser, you, me, anybody could set up an app basically to scrape data uh, you know, data from Facebook through their API. Same with Twitter and the others. And you could grab everybody's what they you know, their interests, their likes, their everything about them that's publicly available, and some that's not even, you know, it's through their own API. And of course, law enforcement was using that as well. And yeah, so anyway, yeah. Social media. I'm not a huge fan. In fact, we dropped our Patreon community for season two. I love the the Patreon platform there. But really, it served its purpose for us, allowed us to uh get off the ground, uh collect a few donations that paid our cost, which was incredible. But Patreon, I really like the concept. It's a place for creators. If you're an artist, you're podcast, a video, you make widgets and you want you know direct support, not you know, doing advertising, allows you to connect and interact with your your patrons. Uh so it was really cool to have that uh rate from the get-go and the handful of people that interacted with us there, but more pain and overhead than it's worth. And like I said, I'm not like I'm I'm on I'm on the internet enough with work and my work stuff. Yeah, so don't need it. But in other big news, how's that Martin? That brand new.

SPEAKER_04:

No, I was just riding along with you, buddy.

SPEAKER_07:

Uh brand new spanking Martin. D40.

SPEAKER_04:

Oh, I thought you said how's that, Martin? I thought you were asking a question. I didn't understand you. How's the Martin?

SPEAKER_07:

The Martin. Yeah, yeah.

unknown:

How's that?

SPEAKER_04:

Sounds good. Can I hear it?

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, let's hear it.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, I got I got a pickup on it now. You put some pickups on your wandy bar. And a few other accoutaments. No, that's electric. I had around my neck already.

SPEAKER_07:

Nice. Which one?

SPEAKER_04:

I wear them as necklaces sometimes.

SPEAKER_07:

Which of your vast collection are you wearing?

SPEAKER_04:

This is named Mr. Paul Reed Smith.

SPEAKER_07:

Paul Reed Smith.

SPEAKER_04:

Yes. Single-cut version, USA model.

SPEAKER_07:

Nice.

SPEAKER_04:

Nice and red. Oh, it's got a great neck. It's a good shreddy shredder.

SPEAKER_07:

Yes. Man. So you been playing much?

SPEAKER_04:

Been playing all. Much? Much? Been playing completely. Yes. Always. What else is it to do, man? Waiting on warm weather?

SPEAKER_07:

Right.

SPEAKER_04:

Waiting on healthier, healthier weather.

SPEAKER_07:

Yes. Riffin. Gotta get you that uh electric motorcycle, that dirt bike. I was telling my mom about it.

SPEAKER_04:

Man, I enjoy it. I know it's on the horizon because I've thought about it too much. Right. I know myself.

SPEAKER_07:

It's already in the wish list.

SPEAKER_04:

I've seen me do it.

SPEAKER_07:

What was the name of it again?

SPEAKER_04:

It's called a Surron.

SPEAKER_07:

Surron, that's right. That's the company. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

I forget what they'll do. They got several different models. Oh, they were it was pretty slick.

SPEAKER_07:

It's definitely.

SPEAKER_04:

They, man, they move.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

I was thinking it was doing about the one I was riding was my future nephew-in-law's. And he has it fixed up, you know, where it goes full speed on sport mode.

SPEAKER_07:

Right.

SPEAKER_04:

And I was thinking, man, we're going at least 60, 70 miles an hour, but upon further investigation, it's more like 45 to 55.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah. Yeah. It feels like you're flying. Oh, oh dude, 45 miles an hour on a dirt bike, you know, on trails, that's hauling ass. And that is yes. It's I like the size. I like how it's not too small, you know. Yes and not too small.

SPEAKER_04:

Still it's weighty. Well, I mean, it's like over a hundred pounds, but yeah, it's real limber. It's like a bicycle motorcycle or like a bicycle motocross.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, BMX style. Like, yeah. Yeah, it's pretty bad. I was just uh looking at an article about those Harley Davidson motorcycles again. And the serial one cycle, the e-bike brand by Harley Davidson. Serial one cycle. Four bikes start out ranging from 3,400 to 5,000. Bicycles. And and that electric, what what's their electric bike? Live wire. Live wire. That's like 30 grand, man. Geez. I know. It's crazy.

SPEAKER_04:

That's crazy. These surruns, they get up to maybe four, they're around three to four.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_04:

Depending on what model you get.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah. Well, I'm telling you, electric is definitely made some serious inroads, you know, in the last two years, three years, five years. It's uh it's it's crazy that it's been such a viable means for us for so long, and it's taken this long to get to this level. Now the federal government, I guess, is committed to all federal vehicles being electric by I thought I saw 2025 or something in a story, which maybe 35. Yeah, I don't know. I was gonna say 2025? That's crazy.

SPEAKER_04:

I know that's like in in a minute.

SPEAKER_07:

I know.

SPEAKER_04:

I think it was 2035. I think.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah. Yeah, maybe it was. Maybe it was.

SPEAKER_04:

You know me, I graze headlines. I don't read articles unless they drag me in.

SPEAKER_07:

But you know, the other thing I saw was that solar is officially the cheapest electricity in history. Finally. You would have thought that from the get-go, but the infrastructure and everything took a while to get us there. I think that was on popular mechanics where I saw that. Pretty cool though.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, solar it's really generous. Also, free cancer.

SPEAKER_07:

Yes, free cancer.

SPEAKER_04:

No charge. And uh yeah, solar, very generous.

unknown:

Yeah.

SPEAKER_07:

Hey, I noticed our new president's not a big fan of like, you know, tweeting and uh things, which is uh good to see. He's got other boys got work to do.

SPEAKER_04:

He's got other things to be focused on. He's got shit going on. Oh my god. He's got to sell his house, he's probably got a garage sale going on. Oh, he's got all he's changing his addresses. That's shit, just getting your post office changed, you know.

SPEAKER_07:

Oh my gosh, he was moving. I don't think he's selling anything, but moving this weekend. And so yeah, definitely. I was making all that up. No, for real. He was he went back to you know help Jill uh decide what was coming down to the White House, what wasn't, that sort of thing. And I saw that he brought back uh the weekly addresses, uh president weekly addresses. Yes, but he's just gonna just be doing it in a podcast-like format, which is genius. Absolutely genius. I love it. Simplicity. Folks, quit making things so complicated.

SPEAKER_04:

Yeah, you seem to be touching all the right buttons in all the right places.

SPEAKER_07:

Yeah, I like it. It's you know, and reaching out and trying to cross, you know, uh, you know, build bipartisan support. At least trying. At least seeing that effort, that alone, much brighter day for me, you know. Thank you. So I don't know. But it's been uh it's been interesting. And I'm glad I caught you, man. I'm glad we could throw something together real quick, get this out on the street, and hopefully actually plan out an episode one of these days again.

SPEAKER_04:

Crazy formats. Wouldn't that be planning? Wouldn't that be crazy? It is crazy. Supposed to fly by the seat of your pants. Exactly. Make shit up. I do all the time. I just make it up as I go along. I can jump in any conversation I find myself in. And hang pretty good.

SPEAKER_07:

No, I couldn't. I can't do that. I I fail miserably.

SPEAKER_04:

Well, the secret is to get out before they realize that you don't know shit. Just like, man, he seems so wise, and yet he's gone now. I have so many questions for him. Like, that's exactly why I'm gone. That's exactly you don't need to know my business.

SPEAKER_07:

You kill me, man. All right. Well, I am gonna jump off from here and throw some stuff together. I'm so glad we got something. I had a chance to do this.

SPEAKER_03:

Telling you. Keep playing, man. Gotta keep playing. It's the only thing there is. Music, man. Keep playing. Right? I'm gonna come looking for you if you don't.

SPEAKER_07:

Man, that was awesome. That was awesome. Sounded great.

SPEAKER_04:

You're known for lying.

SPEAKER_07:

I am not known for lying.

SPEAKER_06:

Yeah, you are so full of shit. Copyright 2021, nerdsandnonsense.com. All rights reserved. Well, except that I don't really mind if you share this, so maybe feel free to do that.

SPEAKER_07:

You know, share and share alike, that sort of thing. Speaking of copyrights, though, special thanks to Joe Daniels, copyright owner, co-writer, and original drummer from LocalH for permission to use Bound for the Floor by LocalH as our show's theme song. Click the Support the Show link to make a small donation via PayPal to support our independent ad free show. And remember, be great and do great things, my friends.

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